and though my kingdom awaits and they've forgiven my mistakes

I'm utterly wiped out, but since there are people who claimed to be nervous about what I might share on zee blog tonight, I clearly had an entertaining day. It started with a training session with Alyssa -- or rather, it started at four a.m. when I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep, and then fell asleep only to have nightmares of a) Prince William's wedding and b) a serial killer coming after a girl who managed to survive him the first time. Needless to say, those dreams weren't particularly helpful, particularly since I live in a cabin that can somehow feel scary and secluded even though it's on a relatively major street. After I woke up for the final time, though, I got ready and dragged myself into the gym. It was good to see Alyssa, and I'm eager to get back into things more steadily than I have been over the past few weeks, since my insane writing schedule encouraged me to eat like crap and skip the gym.

After training, I went to BevMo to buy wine and Courvoisier, and then to the grocery store to get the required ingredients for tonight's feast. Then, I came home and cleaned madly, some of which I did while talking to my mother. My house is usually pretty clean, but it was quite cluttered from several weeks of focusing on my writing while neglecting everything else, and I decided to put in the time to make it immaculate. I mostly succeeded, and I'm glad that the house is up to my standards again. But, I should have stopped cleaning and started cooking half an hour earlier than I did -- the food took longer to prep than I remembered, and so even though I started cooking by 4:30, the food wasn't ready until 7:30 (and my friends were supposed to come over at 6:30). Oops.

But, we had a fantastic time regardless. The group was my oldest work friends, the ones who get together for a friendship renewal dinner every six weeks -- you may recognize the names, if I tell you that Tolu, Joann, Sarah, Lizzie, and Jane came over. We did this one at my house partially because Lizzie is back in town for spring break (she moved to Seattle last fall for grad school), and doing it at my house was far cozier than going to a restaurant, even if my 'service' was extremely slow. But, I had snacky snacks and plenty of wine to tide us over, and it was nice to have plenty of time to catch up. And, the boeuf bourguignon turned out v. well -- sadly for them, it will be even better tomorrow, but it was certainly edible tonight.

My friends left sometime after nine, and I forced myself to load the dishwasher and wash up the few remaining items before sitting down so that I wouldn't have a mess to confront in the morning. But now, even though it's only eleven, I'm going to go to bed -- I had several glasses of wine tonight, which always makes me sleepy, and I'm too tired to do anything productive now anyway. Goodnight!