12:32 a.m. Well, it's happening. Just as I predicted at the end of August when the last of the summer energy frenzy was upon me ... I am eating creamy white food and taking longer and longer naps. It crept up on me slowly this year, but it's got me in its soft padded grip, nonetheless.

I am becoming a slug. A human slug. I'm moving slower and slower. I'm preoccupied with oatmeal. I think climbing into bed with my big pillows and big books is just the thing. Soon, if I know what's good for me, I'm going to haul out the grow lights and somehow attach them to the wall and turn them on and bask and wallow in their recuperative glow.

But not yet. Let's say I like to suffer. Let's say that I don't like to overmedicate. So sure, sure ... I had a container of sushi rice for dinner. Just the rice. So, is that a crime? Sometimes I just like to see how low I can go and still seem human. Today was a lowish-water mark, it's true, but I believe I can even do less and eat more before I finally get on my own flabby nerves.

Yesterday I made a fine carrot soup. I would like to share it with you. It takes minimal effort and it's orange. Let's say you have a bag of those nasty big old carrots in the bottom of your fridge and you're sick of looking at them. You don't remember what you bought them for, long ago, but now they're beginning to sprout.

So, you wash 'em off and you chop 'em up. You put them in a nice pot and put some water in. Put on the lid and let them get all steamed and partially cooked. You must keep the flame (or red electrical coil) low and stir them every once in a while. Now would be a good time to read the newspaper or MacAddict or InStyle. Your choice. Just remember, you can't fit it in or in it and you can't afford it.

Now, the carrots are soft-ish, so you take out a big heavy pan, or -- if you don't want to wash another pot -- you empty out the carrots into a bowl and you use the pot you've been using. You add some butter to the pot. You add as much butter as you think you can get away with. Margarine is just plain nasty, so we're only going to use butter here.

You turn the heat on again, this time a little higher. The butter is melting. Keep the butter dish (or cube of butter) out beside the pot. You'll use a little more. So. The butter is melting and you're looking pretty busy indeed. You put some scoops of the carrots (lifting them out of the water) into the butter. Now, this part is called "cooking." It assumes you're going to stand there and stir; add more carrots and let them get nice and coated in the melting butter; keep going until all the carrots are in the pot again and stir, stir, stir. Add salt and pepper along the way. Taste them. This is a symphony.

Cooking is the second-best thing you can do on an early dark evening.

Now at this point you've got a nice pot of buttered, cooked, salted carrots. You've really done your part in the great scheme of the day and you could go and take a nap now. But no -- wait! We're going to make soup. We need only one further step.

If you have one of those stupid Braun wands with the blades on the bottom that actually work pretty well, but for the life of me, I can't figure out why -- well, you go and dig it out and wipe it off and plug it in. Otherwise, you'll need a blender or a potato masher or a hand mixer. Already this is beginning to sound like too much work. But we soldier on.

Now you pour some milk on your carrots, mix it up with the blender appliance of your choice, and voila! Depending on the quality of your milk, you have a fine creamy carrot soup. Last night I used evaporated milk, because I bought a case of it for Y2K and you know what? I'm sort of losing interest in the whole crisis aspect of the thing, already.

Already I'm over it. And I suddenly have this unnatural desire for the milk, straight out of the can. So I've broken into my stash and I'm going to just let the crisis wash over me. If I continue at this pace, by New Year's I'll be so tired and drowsy I'll just sleep until spring, or the lights come back on, whichever comes first.

So, that was the excitement for yesterday. I cooked. The soup is also very good cold, by the way, right out of the plastic container, standing up or sitting down, if you're too lazy to bother heating it up. The great part is you can put it in your mouth and it just melts on your tongue -- and you don't even have to chew.

Could life get any slower than this? We'll wait and see. Waiting is an activity, too, you know.