you can beat the heat if you beat the charges too

I'm blogging from my basement, which has never happened before - but I'm testing out sleeping down here in case I ever want to put a guest here, and so far so good. More to the point, I have three delightful houseguests this weekend, and by putting myself down here, everyone gets their own space (although one space is an air mattress in my office).

So today was a blur of getting ready - I had to work for far longer than I wanted to, and then I scrambled to finish cleaning, doing laundry, showering, etc. But I left just in time to pick up Jen, Jane, and Joann from the airport - we're having a friendship renewal weekend extravaganza, and we're v unusually doing it in Iowa.

We kicked things off in style by having dinner at Johnny's (where I always used to go on airport runs). Then we grabbed some groceries in Indianola and headed home. Unfortunately the weather looks like it's going to oscillate between garbage and actual danger most of the weekend, so we'll see what we do. But so far so good - we got home, settled in, and then had a v leisurely bottle of champagne while chatting with [censored] (who v graciously shared his name with the friendship renewal crew).

Now, though, I desperately need to sleep so we can pursue all sorts of fun tomorrow - goodnight!

down bad

I was v productive today - still not enough, but better than usual. I worked at this new day job all day - and by the way, I made official and permanent this week, which is exciting. I took a "break" around five to vacuum downstairs, and then I did a bit more work until I had to leave for a meeting of my secret society. 

I walked in the door the moment we were supposed to start, which is how it usually happens. I wanted to skip tonight because I have so much to do, but I'm glad I didn't - over snacks afterwards, someone told a story so hilarious that it was worth the price of my annual dues.

Thus entertained and energized, I came home, said hi to [censored], did a wee bit more work, and cleaned my kitchen. This included wiping down the pendants, stove, fridge, etc in addition to the usual countertop cleaning. It really doesn't take that long, and yet I always find it all to be daunting - maybe I'll remember this next time, or maybe I'll procrastinate on such tasks for another couple of months. 

But now I need to sleep - I have a million things to do tomorrow and not nearly enough time. Goodnight!

if my eyes were closed, i could follow where you go

Despite going to bed super late last night, I didn't struggle today - probably because I slept until 9:30 to make up for it. There are serious advantages for night owls to work in a time zone that is two hours ahead of most other people, and I took full advantage today.

Still, I did do a lot of slogging - but I took a long break around dinner to take a walk, do some laundry, bake a potato, etc. I had to do more work tonight, but it should make tomorrow easier, so it was a tradeoff I'm willing to make. But now it's time for bed - goodnight!

somebody told me to believe in better times

Mondays are going to be very Mondayish for the foreseeable future - it seems to be the most meeting-heavy day for my new gig, and I was in meetings from 10:30 - 3:30 without a break. And I'm in a meeting now (from 11pm - 1am, theoretically) in preparation for an event next week.

But it wasn't all terrible - the meetings are pretty interesting, and the people are great, which is a real upside compared to some previous experiences I won't name. And I took a nap this evening and did some tings around the house. Unfortunately, though, I have no other interesting tidbits to share - and as soon as this meeting is over, I'm going to bed. Goodnight!

would you believe me now if i told you i got caught up in a wave?

I have nothing to report - I did house stuff basically all day. I did write for just a little bit this morning, but otherwise cleaning was more important than anything else. After a day of effort, my bedroom, office, and dining room are fully clean, the guest room has fresh sheets, my living room is dusted, and my garage is somewhat tidied up. [Censored] also went above and beyond with various tasks, and so this feels like a v. worthwhile spring cleaning sprint even if I didn't have guests coming later this week.

So, while today felt v. productive, it's v. uninteresting from a blog standpoint - and that means it's time for bed. Goodnight!

if the line ends out on the road there's a story meant to be told

There's lots to do, as we like to say around here, but I think I'm going to go to bed. I wasn't as in it to win it as I wanted to be this morning, but I did get around and drop of some returns at the post office before grabbing some groceries. I spent the day doing a variety of household tasks - I'm in the midst of a major cleanup before my friendship renewal crew arrives next weekend. Some of the tasks involved [censored], as they often do. I took all the books and stuff off my office bookshelves so that [censored] could anchor them to the wall - they have never threatened to tip, but I intend to have someone sleep on an air mattress in my office, and I would feel quite horrible if they were crushed by all my books. [Censored] also put up the towel bars / robe hook that we'd been meaning to put in the main floor bathroom for a year, so this was quite an improvement.

Beyond that, I also did quite a bit of reorganizing in my bedroom and office, finally finished unpacking from my trip, etc. At some point, it was time for supper, so [censored] and I picked up Casey's pizza and took it out to our parents' house, where we had a lovely time hanging out for awhile. And then I spent the rest of the night putting all my books back on my bookshelves, tidying up my desk, etc.

And now, it's time for bed - tomorrow is all the vacuuming, dusting, and making of beds, so wish me luck. Goodnight!

i need to forget, so take me to florida

I had a lovely day, all in all. I woke up feeling a little sick to my stomach, but I rebounded and got on with my work day. I'm still figuring out the rhythms of this work-from-home situation - you would think that I would be a pro at it after the pandemic, but the rhythms of this job are pretty different (i.e. many fewer meetings), and I'm also still getting up to speed.

But I slogged most of the day, with a pleasant surprise call from Ritu in the middle of it. So we chatted until I was too hungry to keep talking, and then I ate some leftover chicken taco meat and slogged the rest of the day. I also had an impromptu meeting with Adit (some people call him the cat, but clearly no one at work does) - it's v. nice to have a built-in friend at work from the get-go when I'm trying to figure things out.

Eventually, the work day came to an end, and I repeated yesterday's post-work excursion in reverse - I drove [censored] to [censored], where I dropped him off to pick up his truck. Before we left the town where it was serviced, we grabbed dinner at Toot-Toot - we'd driven by it yesterday and I didn't intend to eat there, but I looked it up after and it shockingly had 4.5 stars on Google. It's a buffet-style place and the buffet tonight was $18.99, but they had prime rib, ham, burnt ends, fried catfish, several kinds of fried shrimp, steak, and a whole bunch of other stuff. It was all pretty tasty considering the spread, and it was worth glutening myself at the time.

However, now I have a bit of a headache, which means I can't keep doing anything work or house related, which means I need to go to bed. Goodnight!