A panic attack is an episode of severe anxiety and dread. The symptoms include palpitations, shortness of breath, and chest pain. There may be dizziness, sweating, numbness or tingling, and shaking. This is an extremely frightening experience, with the person being afraid that he or she is going to die.

From Wikipedia:

Experiencing a panic attack is said to be one of the most intensely frightening, upsetting and uncomfortable experiences of a person’s life. Sufferers of panic attacks report a fear or sense of dying, “going crazy”, or experiencing a heart attack or “flashing vision”, feeling faint or nauseous, or losing control of themselves.

In emergencies, tenants may make necessary repairs and deduct reasonable repair costs from the rent. For example, when a landlord has been notified that a door lock is broken and willfully neglects to repair it, the tenant may hire a locksmith and deduct the cost from the rent. Tenants should keep receipts for such repairs.

—From the New York Tenant’s Rights Guide.

Call super. No answer. Call building manager. No answer. Call landlord. No answer. Call landlord’s emergency number. No answer. Leave voicemail. Call locksmith. Finally, an answer.

Locksmith comes. $55 just to show up.

Locksmith drills out my lock. $285.

Locksmith replaces my lock. $400.

Locksmith does… something else? Something locksmithy? $95.

Ah, plus tax. $69.

$904 later, I still don’t have any groceries. Hmph.

Did you know the average sell-through rate for a magazine is about 30%? The sell-through rate is the rate which a given issue of a magazine will sell from a store. That means 70% of all printed magazines are just stopping by the newsstand on their way to the garbage dump or recycling center. All that time, work, and energy, just to make trash.

At 23rd St. and 6th Ave.

That is all.

That is all.

What’s my excuse? Don’t have one. So, I’ll try to start putting things here again. I’ve been Twittering a lot lately, so most of my little one-off things to say have gone there. I’m considering integrating my Tweets into this space, so maybe you’ll start seeing more here.

(Don’t know what Twitter is? Watch Twitter in Plain English, realize it’s awesome, then join and follow me. Or don’t. Choose your own adventure.)

I’ve got some things tucked away in my head to write up, so I’ll be back soon, I promise.

But this isn’t a post about resolutions for 2008. It’s a retrospective on my 2007 resolution.

I’ve always done fairly well academically, but during college I hadn’t ever had a perfect straight-A semester. Since I was going to graduate a semester early, 2007 perfectly contained the last two semesters of my college career, so I made my resolution on December 31st, 2006, that in 2007 I’d get a 4.0 one of those semesters.

Summer of 2007 rolled around, and I came close. Two A’s, two A–’s. 3.85 GPA. Close, but no cigar.

I was down to the wire with only one semester left. But I stuck the landing. Booyah.

2007 Resolution: Completed.

(2008 doesn’t have a traditional resolution, per se. It’s more of a curious project. More on that later.)