The man writes about some significant events that stand out to him from the first thirty years of his life as if they are diary entries. He starts with his birth in 1967: he was two weeks late and his parents had to call a snowplow to be able to drive their car to the hospital. He mentions a pillow he plucked to pieces when he was three, a girl named Kathy who babysat him but who he thought was going to marry. Birthday presents received, school bullies fought, Valentine's Day crushes admitted, tears at the dentist. He wishes his dad a very happy birthday when he does the math and realizes that he was conceived around his father's date of birth. The man then writes a letter to a Dr. Adler, saying that the test that she had given him did, in fact, make him feel sad, blue, and bored. He wonders what it is like to be happy, noting that the red pills she had prescribed him were giving him an allergic reaction. He apologizes to a Jessica Cooper for standing her up for a date, asking her if she thought they would have been happy together. He pens another entry to a "Man in the White Pants and White Shirt Who Looked at Me Through a Face-Sized Window Every Half Hour," knowing that although that man was trying to make sure he was not trying to kill himself, he found his reappearing presence reassuring. He thanks a weather satellite for showing up every night among the night stars, something to look forward to. A Sara appears in his life, moving into the man's apartment and taking great care of him. He smashes their television set and throws the radio out into the rain one evening, fearful that he was being watched, with voices in his head. He thanks Sara for putting up with and holding onto him, especially when he couldn't do so for himself. He thanks a Dr. Gregory for writing a new prescription for him to stop the voices in his head. And he ends with a note to Sara, saying that he held off on signing divorce papers as long as he could but that he ultimately did, noting that it didn't have to take a judge to see that he was mentally unstable. He proposes splitting memories even with her, the good, the bad, and the ugly.