you know that i love you boy, hot like mexico, rejoice

I'm totally wiped out - it's only 10:38 in California, but it's 11:38 in ye olde mountains, and I'm really feeling it. Of course, I'm in mountains now as well - but this time I'm up in the Sierras, not chilling at the base of the Rockies, so it's *totally different*. And by that I mean it feels the same.

But today was as smooth as it could be - I woke up, showered, drove my car to a sketchy off-airport parking lot, took the shuttle to the airport, checked in, and managed to have time for a full breakfast at Cantina Grill ([censored]'s favorite!). I met up with Barbara S at the gate, since we were flying to the retreat together...but thanks to some magic on my part, I was flying first class, so we only hung out until we boarded.

But we got plenty of time after, including an hour+ in an uber. When we got here, Barbara and Anne were already here, as was Deb, so we drew for rooms and called the missing people (Tina, Grace, and Christie) to let them pick. This meant that I ended up in a king room, but one that gets more noise than usual, so I'll hopefully suck it up.

But now I'm desperate for sleep - we had a lot of gluten free pizza and some ridiculous conversation and red wine, as we're wont to do, and sleep will hopefully cure some of that ails me. Goodnight!

in the end it doesn't even matter

I had dinner with Katie tonight and it was AWFUL. j/k, it was lovely, but she was snarky about how I say everything is lovely, so screw her.

Today was good, all in all - I had a million meetings, left at 2:45 so I could drive to Denver, then took another couple of meetings from Black Eye. Then I met Katie for happy hour and dinner at Senor Bear - the margaritas were great, my carnitas were delish (although they were made with veal, which was bizarre), and the company was so-so (although the waiter was great).

But in all seriousness, it is great to be close enough to Katie to have dinner on a whim and still sleep in my own bed. After dinner, I went to her house and said hi to the girls (Julia didn't growl at me until after she'd been excited to see me, and Anne did my hair for me, which went about as well as it sounds). Then I drove home, packed, answered email, etc...and now I desperately need sleep.

And finally, happy birthday to my sister! Goodnight!

i need a break and i want to be a paperback writer

Today was a long day in the corporate salt mines - all good, for the most part, although lunch was a sad sandwich (yes, I'm already complaining about the free food, even though they randomly showed up with chili in the middle of the afternoon). I slogged hard from nine to six, and could have kept going...

...but everyone else had already left my area, so I threw in the towel and engaged in some retail therapy. I really needed a break tonight from everything related to work and moving, so I went full #treatyoself - I got a new pair of uggs for Tahoe, and some more moisturizers at Sephora (I'm thus far avoiding looking like the cryptkeeper, but it's a constant battle), and it all made me feel moderately more relaxed. Then I talked to [censored], who helped me strategize about [censored], so that was good.

And then I went full-on into my old SF life and found a French brasserie, where I had steak and fries and a glass of red wine while writing for the first time in two months. The place couldn't hold a candle to my beloved, dearly-departed Des Amis (#neverforget), but it felt so fucking good to sit there and observe people and scribble notes in my journal. It was exactly the mental break I needed to unwind tonight so that I can get some good work done tomorrow and then abandon it all for Tahoe and a much-deserved writing trip.

But now I need to sleep - goodnight!

i sprinkle holy water upon the vampire

I'm fairly exhausted, but at least today went much better than yesterday. I woke up sometime after seven, showered, dealt with the fact that I don't know where anything is, made it out the door at 8:15...and was still on time to my 8:30 meeting. This, my friends, is incredible. Granted, if I were still self-employed I wouldn't have to go to anything at 8:30, but compared to my previous stint in the corporate salt mines, the lack of commute is fairly magical.

Anyway, I spent the day mostly holed up in a series of conference rooms with the two managers who I will be managing - they're in Boulder to visit me this week, and we spent today doing all the usual updates, deep dives, planning, etc. Granted, we couldn't plan much since I'm two weeks in and don't know anything, but it was fun to pretend!

By the end of the day I was exhausted from thinking/talking too much, but I had to keep pressing on - we had a team dinner, which was only five people since the team is still growing here. We went to a place called Next Door, which was super yummy. Getting there was a hassle, since parking was terrible - I tried to park in a garage, but the car two cars ahead of me broke the entrance gate, and there were cars behind me at this point, so no one could back up. The attendant very blithely said they'd called someone and it would be five or ten minutes before they showed up...but that wasn't good enough for me, so I got out and examined the situation and convinced him to remove a stupid traffic cone from a lane so that we could back out and turn around there. He did that, which saved me and a few other cars (with difficulty - it wasn't an easy turn), but since no one at the top was stopping cars from coming in, I predict it became a total cluster. But I got out, which was #winning.

Then I went to dinner, which, as I said, was tasty - I had one of the best greek salads ever. The conversation was fun and I was enjoying myself, but rather than going shopping after, I came home and wrestled with my new mattress. It's an organic latex mattress (supposedly less carcinogenic since it isn't treated with the same flame-retardant chemicals as regular mattresses), and it shipped in three three-inch layers of latex, which had to be wrangled into a wool mattress cover. This was, as you can imagine, not an easy task...but I succeeded. And I tested the comfort by immediately taking a nap (so far so good!). But then I dragged myself downstairs and spent the last couple of hours working (no doubt at great cost to my phone plan, since I still don't have internet here and had to use my hotspot). And now it's time for bed - goodnight!

disco science

Today was one of those days when pretty much nothing went according to plan. It was always going to be a bad day when I said goodbye to Katie...not that I actually said goodbye, but last night was the last night I plan to spend at her place for the foreseeable future, so when I left this morning, I carted the last of my stuff out with me. We had one last coffee at Black Eye, and I'm going to miss that tradition...although it's probably for the best that I won't be back for awhile, since Katie loudly asked me how my rash was, so I'm probably dead to them.

After that, it all went moderately downhill. I made it to Boulder without any real issues, but when I got breakfast, I accidentally dumped my eggs and bacon back into the communal egg tray (then scooped it all back up without anyone seeing, but the eggs were contaminated), then oversalted them, so breakfast wasn't the joyous refueling that I'd hoped for. Then I had a meeting, and then I left to oversee my furniture delivery, which I was super excited about...

...until it turned out that the sleeper sofa wouldn't fit up the stairs. I'd had a sneaking suspicion after moving in that the staircase was going to be a problem, since there's a pole at the base and a beam on the ceiling right above it, and yes, that proved to be too insurmountable for the couch. Of course, I don't have a couch for the living room yet, so I had them put it in the living room instead (which was also an exercise in navigating a tight space - the rooms themselves are all great sizes, but the staircase/hall on both floors is going to be a moving problem). So it's not the end of the world, but it wasn't necessarily the couch I would have gotten for a living room, so I was a little unhappy about that.

[editor's note: I'm slightly less unhappy since I took a nap on it as a couch tonight, and am now sitting on the pull-out and it feels very comfy, so it'll be okay. but I was not happy earlier!]

sssanyway. Then I went back to the office, where I had a late lunch that was kinda disgusting, followed by a lot of meetings that I wasn't really in the right headspace to enjoy. I finished off by having dinner with a couple of my direct reports who are in town this week, and it was great (I had a v. tasty gluten free burger with green chile, which was awesome), and my team is great...but I probably should have skipped, since I'm reaching my introvert wall and I have a lot of extrovert tasks to get through before I get a break.

On the way home, I stopped at Whole Foods (note: 'the way home' is less than ten minutes and Whole Foods is on the way, which is amazing) to get some tea and coffee (the bare necessities), then came home and took a nap (vital), then spent the last three hours organizing and unpacking and generally trying to sort the things I have here so that it's not all quite such a disaster. And I made a list of all the things I need to do asap, and it was a v. v. v. long list, so I should probably go to bed and hope I can tackle some of it tomorrow - goodnight!

isn't that the way they say it goes...well let's forget all that

I had a great day in Colorado - even if it was cold and misty and a prelude to much worse to come. This will be the first real winter of my adult life, and I'm not sure I'm ready for it. My spirit is, but my body...totally unclear.

Anyway. I woke up to the dulcet tones of children's shrieks, and then had breakfast with Katie, James, and the girls (I should have put James first, since he made it). I also chatted with Katie for much longer than I should have, but not nearly long enough given that I was gone for a week and will be gone again starting tomorrow. My current plan is to sleep in my own place starting tomorrow night - I'm getting a sofa and a mattress delivered, which means it's theoretically possible.

Of course, it won't be nearly as comfortable as here - but I'm so beyond excited to have my own place again. I went up there for awhile this afternoon (after dropping $500 at Target - things add up quickly when you need all new cleaning supplies, towels, a laundry drying rack, paper goods, etc., etc., etc.) - I spent some quality time doing a couple of loads of laundry and organizing all the stuff that I'd hauled in from my car. I think it's going to be a great place once I get settled - and even before I get settled, it's bright enough and peaceful enough that I wasn't missing my lamps or my music.

So, that was all exciting. I also took a break to talk to my parents, who seemed to be in good form. Then I sped back to Katie's, where I was late for supper, but that just meant that I missed out on most of the wine (good thing, since I had to trim my bangs tonight). She made an awesome risotto from one of the Barefoot Contessa cookbooks, which I thought was super delish, and we generally hung out and talked until it was time for the girls to go to bed.

And now that I've taken care of a few things online for the first time in ages, it's time to sleep - goodnight!

say it ain't so, i will not go, turn the lights off, carry me home

Apologies for not blogging last night - by the time I was ready to blog, it was actually this morning, and I needed to eke out whatever sleep I was capable of before boarding a plane.

You can guess, therefore, that yesterday was eventful. I got up earlier than I wanted to so that I could finish packing, check out of my airbnb, and return my rental car to the San Jose airport. I was supposed to fly out of there last night, which would have meant dropping off the car in the afternoon - but since my plans changed, it made sense to drop it off before work. But my diligence was rewarded with tostadas for breakfast in the work cafeteria, so I felt pretty smug about that.

Then I sat in meetings all day (two weeks in and my life has returned to meetings), took care of some tings, and caught the 3:48pm shuttle to the city. It took almost two hours to get there, which proves, once again, why I don't live there anymore. But I went to Vidya's and promptly forgot my pain, thanks to red wine and thai food (although I had to walk four blocks downhill and then four blocks very much uphill for the thai food, so that gave me a different kind of pain (or mostly whininess)).

Chandlord was having a party last night, which was why I rescheduled my flight - it seemed like the kind of thing I needed to be there for. The early arrivals at the party were inauspicious (a bunch of people I either didn't know or didn't particularly care to see), but things picked up dramatically after we went outside and lit things on fire. And by that I mean she had a firepit, and so someone started a fire, and then others' attempts to keep it going mostly resulted in lots of smoke, which got into everything all of us were wearing.

But I made some v. entertaining new connections (in particular, a couple who climb stupidly high mountains; a guy named Adam; and Sarang's boyfriend). I also spent some quality time with key players (Santy Claude; Adit and Priyanka). And we had a v. delightful time in Chandlord's back yard until eleven, when we adjourned to Yamasho for 2+ hours of private-room karaoke, which wrecked my voice and my body (even though I was surprisingly sober for such a series of events).

Anyway, we rocked out (yes, I sang Nickelback, #noregrets), then I went back to Chandlord's house and slept fitfully for a few hours. But I had to get up relatively early since I had a 10:45am flight back to Denver. Chandlord very graciously took me to the airport, and I got through security with enough time to have a proper breakfast, which was probably all that saved me.

When I got to Denver, I drove to Boulder first to check out my apartment and retrieve that packages that were delivered there today. I unloaded some more stuff from my car, contemplated what I need to get, and was pleasantly surprised to find that my landlord had left a welcome gift (probably his standard starter kit for people who buy homes through him - toilet paper, paper towels, a bottle of wine, a wine opening kit, and a hummingbird feeder) - which was super thoughtful, especially since I didn't just spend a million dollars with him.

Then I stopped at REI to buy a jacket since it's suddenly cold here and I will also be freezing in Tahoe next week. Then I drove back to Katie's, since I'm staying here tonight - I picked up food for myself along the way so that I don't seem like quite such a deadbeat, and then spent the evening watching 'Aladdin' and drinking champagne. Yes, we're living the dream.

But now I'm desperate to sleep - goodnight!

love and darkness and my sidearm

I was going to complain about the fact that I just had a 9:30-10pm meeting on my ninth day back in the office...but my first paycheck just deposited, which shut me up right quick, as they say. #getitgirl

Work continues to be good - I'm finding that I'm actually pretty curious/interested/engaged in the learning process around the new job and what I'll be responsible for, which is a rather wonderful development since I had a sneaking fear in the dark of night that I would have trouble reengaging under the yoke of corporate whoredom.

However, going back this time is different because I actually have very few preconceived notions of the product/work space I'm entering - it's all about communities and social support, which I have a lot of personal fascination with (writing an honors thesis about German resistance movements in WWII has surprisingly more to do with this job than you might have guessed, at least from an interest standpoint). Last time, I had more technical knowledge about books and publishing, and so I had very strong, very early opinions that shredded any semblance of a honeymoon period. This time, it's just fun to learn something new...and the fact that my new team seems pretty engaged. They made me a hardcover photo book about themselves as a welcome gift, which is so over the top that you have to love it.

So anyway. I spent the whole day in meetings, but I took a break around 3:30 to have coffee with an old friend (Jason, who I knew forever ago), and than I saw Vidya (aka Chandlord) at 4pm. Then I got in my car and spent over an hour driving the 17mi to Belmont, which was a great reminder why I moved away. I had dinner with the Shedletskys at Vivace - it was a delish Italian restaurant, and we had a delightful time catching up. But I had to leave earlier than I wanted to so that I could make it back for my late meeting - and now I must sleep so I can get up early and pack up and vacate my airbnb. Goodnight!

the black lung

I'm too tired to blog - I had a great day, but I'm starting to cough up a lung, and I don't want to take a sudafed to help with the congestion because it makes me sleep v. fitfully, and I haven't gotten enough sleep the last few nights to survive another restless slumber. So I'm going to cut this short and go to bed - goodnight!

there's a piece of maria in every song that i sing

This cold is really knocking me out, which is super annoying - if I had been in this job for more than seven days, I would stay home tomorrow. Instead, I'm going to go to bed as soon as I finish this (it's 9:45pm here) and hope that I can sleep despite the sudafed that I've been taking to try to combat my congestion (somewhat futile, but I have to do something).

However, despite the cold, today was good - I actually had a couple of hours this morning to get some work done, which mostly involves reading a lot of stuff and trying to absorb as much info as possible. Then I had some meetings, with a break for a v. bizarre lunch (I had rice and beans, but I threw cold chicken cubes and hot sauce on top from the salad bar rather than eating the chicken mole that went with the rice/beans, since for some reason they put vanilla wafers in the mole and made it not gluten free). And then I had some more meetings. Yes, my life is meetings again.

But I left at 5:45 and met up with Joann (of spinster honeymoon fame) for dinner at Shana Thai. This is one of our go-tos anyway, but it had the added benefit of a) the right amount of spice/comfort food for my cold and b) it's across the street from where I'm staying. So, we had a wonderful time catching up - I think she's excited about the prospect that I will soon be in the market for fancy vacations again (the golden handcuffs get quite comfortable after awhile, especially in Hawaii).

Then I came back to my airbnb and spent some quality time taking care of personal life stuff (choosing health insurance, ordering internet service for my new house, etc.)...and now it's time to sleep. Goodnight!

she moves in mysterious ways

I'm wiped out - I had a long (good, but long) day at the office, and I feel a little like I've been tossed into a pool while wearing a straitjacket, since there's so much to learn and so little time before I start drowning. That's a problem for another day, though - hopefully one where I don't feel quite so sick, since my cold is ramping up and I definitely don't feel in it to win it.

However, I did manage to leave the office and go to the evil city (for the only time on this trip, send I left SF for a reason and that means I don't want to commute every day that I'm here). I had a dinner date with Lauren (aka Subz) at gardenias, and I was a little early, so I ran a couple of errands and browsed through Alexis Bittar (yay jewelry, my fave) before meeting up with Lauren. It was lovely to catch up before her baby comes, and it was over all too soon, but that was probably a good thing since I was desperate for sleep and needed to drive to mountain view before I could check into my Airbnb and crawl into bed.

But now I must sleep - goodnight!

i like my guns all big like texas

So, last night I apparently actually wrote a blog post and got within seconds of being able to post it, but I was so tired that I fell asleep sitting up with the lights on, and when I came to, I closed the laptop and went to bed. Oops. Read the post below to find out what I was up to last night!

And as you might have guessed, I spent this morning paying the wages of my sins. I really shouldn't have gone out last night since I have what is turning into a killer head cold, but my desire to be a grown-up with Katie couldn't be denied, so I had a lot of bourbon and a lot of fine conversation, and absolutely #noregrets. Well, maybe one regret, since my ears didn't really pop very well on my flight today and I was not thrilled about that. But I woke this morning wishing that I could get ten more hours of non-congested sleep. Of course, it wasn't meant to be, so I showered, packed (slowly), and then Katie and I went out to grab breakfast burritos (she'd fed the kids pancakes hours earlier, since their night wasn't as abbreviated as ours was - their stomachs were empty and ready for breakfast instead of full of bourbon and ready for a nap). The breakfast burrito saved my life, so I was able to gather my things and head out....

...and the 'out' was to the airport, where I parked my car, survived a longer-than-usual security experience with my shorter-than-usual temper, grabbed some tea, and made it to my gate in time to talk to my parents for a few minutes before boarding. I'm in Mountain View this week for trainings/meetings, which is a trip that came up v. last minute (I booked it on Thursday). So, SF friends, please don't hate me, but I'm not going to expend any heroic efforts to go to the city since I'm not feeling all that well and traffic here is a nightmare.

But I did make some fun plans - I spent tonight with Heather (aka dear respected madam), since I wasn't sure when I'd see her next, and she lives fifteen minutes from the San Jose airport, which was super convenient. We spent the evening talking, gossipping, and generally catching up while Salim prepared tastiness for us - and then we all ate steak and corn while watching 'Deadpool', which I'd somehow never seen before even though everyone told me I would enjoy it. And, it turns out, I did enjoy it.

But now I'm exhausted from all my adventures, and I need sleep desperately if I'm going to get through trainings tomorrow - goodnight!

this town was meant for passing through but it ain't nothing new

[editor's note: I wrote this last night while falling asleep and made it soooo close to the end, but somehow went to bed before finishing it. enjoy!]

After three boulevardiers and an old fashioned (all of which are almost entirely alcohol, if you don't count the cherry in the old fashioned), I can report with a reasonable degree of certainty that Katie is almost as bad for my liver as Adit is. Granted, the number of cocktails consumed tonight is far lower than the epic family nights of yore...but since I have a sudden, miserable cold and Katie has not-so-sudden, still-occasionally-monstrous toddlers, four cocktails with her (at altitude, no less!) should count as ten cocktails with Adit.

sssanyway. Today started off with the brutal, inescapable knowledge that I caught the cold Katie had earlier this week - all my smug dosing with emergen-c came to naught, and I awoke feeling like total death. Luckily for me, the fam went off to take some photos, so I spent the quiet time unpacking and repacking my clothes in preparation for tomorrow's trip. When they got back, we went out for pho - I can't eat midwestern chicken noodle soup anymore because gluten, but Vietnamese rice noodle soup with chicken was just as good if not better.

Then we came home and I took a v. extended nap while Katie introduced her sweet daughters to the sexual misogyny of motorcycle gangs (you had to be there). I also napped while she cleaned and supervised her daughters and generally kept everyone alive - thank you.

Anyway, I'm falling asleep as I write this and am typing nonsense, so I'll stop on a high note - 

i'll wait for you where saturday's a memory and sunday comes to gather me

I survived my first week in the trenches of the working world. It's still going to require some adjustment (mostly on the wardrobe, since I'm not used to wearing real clothes instead of yoga pants every day...and also on the morning situation, although getting up and going for coffee with Katie every morning before going into work was a great way to adjust). But so far, so good.

So I slogged all day, although I had my aforementioned coffee with Katie at Black Eye to get me going, and I also went out for coffee after lunch with someone from the office. And, I finally got the key to my apartment...unfortunately, I won't be there next week because I have to take a last-minute trip to California, but I was able to unload my car tonight after work, so that's great. It's rather nice not to look like a vagrant anymore, even if I got all sweaty and annoyed unloading my stuff and hauling it up the stairs. Then I stopped at Chipotle for dinner, then came back to Katie and James's, and now I'm considering going to bed early because I think I might be succumbing abruptly to the cold Katie had all last week. Goodnight!

welcome to the rock's glorious biceps

No blog tonight because I stayed up too late watching most of "San Andreas" with Katie and James...NO REGRETS. Goodnight!

hey now you're a rockstar

Too tired to blog - I'm deep into the grind again, although I started the morning with a coffee run with Katie and ended it with some tv watching with Katie (we finished A-Team, which was just as terrible as I expected), so it was pretty good from that perspective. Also, there are some fun people in the Boulder office, including my friend Natasha, whom I had lunch with (and with a girl whom I knew like a decade ago...old timers are crawling out of the woodwork).

But I spent the entire day either talking to people, trying to resolve technical issues caused by my stupid onboarding process, or sitting in meetings where I know little to nothing about what's happening. And then I had dinner with my new manager and three of the other managers based in Boulder...so I wasn't off until nine, which made for precious little decompression. It was all great, though...I'm going to be exhausted for awhile as I get used to the golden handcuffs again, but in the end it will be worth it.

And now I must sleep - goodnight!

possibility days are impossible

Today was back to the grind...but I can already tell that my life will be more sustainable, at least from a commute/balance/happiness standpoint, than it was in SF. Of course, it's premature to make that judgment since my car is still full of clothing and I occasionally pull onto a side street and rummage through it like a fucking vagrant, but in my reality, my current situation is awesome.

I woke up this morning, showered, spent some time with Katie and the girls, and then seduced Katie into going to Black Eye with me to grab coffee before I left for the office. I wasn't feeling any pressing need to get there since I knew I wouldn't be able to resolve my computer situation before 10am...and it ended up being more like 1pm by the time we were finally done (after I'd wasted several hours of a coworker's time to help me through the process since I needed their laptop to fix my issue, but hopefully they'll forgive me). But I had some v. tasty carnitas for lunch (this is why I went back), and once the laptop issues were resolved, I was in business. And I'm pretty eager to get up to speed, which I think is a good sign....

...so eager, in fact, that I stayed until almost 6:30pm, and when I walked out into the parking lot, it became clear that *no one* stays that late, which is a good sign for that work/life balance thing I'm trying to prioritize. I grabbed dinner at Modern Market - it's a chain that I discovered in Colorado Springs, but there's one between the office and my new apartment in Boulder, so I predict many future trips there. Then I drove back to Katie's, with a stop at Ulta to buy more face products to salvage the remnants of my ravaged skin (Colorado's low humidity is not my friend). Katie went to bed v. soon after I arrived since she's feeling like death, but I opened the bottle of red wine I'd given her earlier (swamp taketh and swamp taketh away) and indulged while writing emails.

And now it's time for bed - goodnight!

hey shorty, it's your birthday

It's my birthday! and also a national day of mourning. and also I went back to my former place of employment today (based in the Boulder office) - and by that I mean I took a job and am going through new hire orientation in a couple of weeks for the third time.

There's way more to that story, of course, but I'm tired after a day at the office, and I need to sleep. But I had a great first day and a great birthday - I got all dressed up and Katie took my picture like it was the first day of school, and then we grabbed coffee before I headed to Boulder. When I got to the office, I discovered that my friend Natasha (whom I told all this news to on Friday) had left a bottle of champagne and some birthday balloons on my desk, which made an odd complement to my new hire decorations. I met a bunch of people, had lunch with some teammates, ran into some old friends, etc., etc....

Then I peaced out and came back to Katie's. Katie was a super friend and bought a big gluten free cake and made homemade ice cream, and James grilled up a delicious steak, and the girls jumped and screeched and sang to me, and it was all totally delightful. This was the first time in forever that I neither cooked my own birthday feast nor organized the festivities, and I have to say, it was rather awesome. Of course, past festivities involved more wine and less screeching, but on the whole, this one was a winner.

But now I'm desperate for sleep - goodnight!

wake me up when september ends

Today felt like the calm before the storm. I woke up this morning and enjoyed some breakfast burritos that James had picked up - they were super tasty, especially since they made mine with corn tortillas. Then I got a mani/pedi so that I could feel human again. After that, I picked up some coffee, came back to Katie's, and spent the rest of the afternoon/evening hanging out, with a break to call my parents and another break to walk with Katie to the nearby wine store to get something for dinner. I also spent some time dealing with my exploding wardrobe and trying to contain the mess so that Katie doesn't kick me out for trashing her guest room.

And now, after watching some tv and drinking an Emergen-C, it's time for bed - goodnight!

that's how we do it down in puerto rico

Today was kind of an odd day - I think the wildfires might be affecting all of us, since everyone was quite cranky today (including the girls - Julia growled at me when she saw me this morning, and I had flashbacks to my dogsitting experience, but luckily she warmed up and also isn't likely to have rabies). So I felt vaguely off all day - and after eating breakfast and hanging out and having a morning dance party here, I was feeling like I might need some alone time and Katie/James might need some family time...

...so I went to the mall, of course. I saw them there briefly, since they'd headed there before me, but I stayed much longer - they went grocery shopping, but I tried on lots of clothes (and even bought a few), and then I had a leisurely lunch at the Nordstrom Cafe. By the time I got back to Katie's, it was almost six, and so we ate supper fairly shortly thereafter. Katie and I had discussed going out for drinks tonight and leaving James to put the girls to bed, but none of us were feeling it - it's hard to be super psyched about partying when going outside smells like smoke and makes your throat burns. So we stayed here and hung out and talked (yes, we can still find things to discuss), and now I want to aim for eight hours of sleep before the children begin our day again. Goodnight!

something just like this

I'm slowly acclimating to the altitude again, but it's all made more challenging by the smoke from the wildfires - Denver is covered in haze, its fabled mountains hidden under a shroud of particulates and poison. Okay, I'm being dramatic (maybe). Still, Denver continues to delight. I spent the morning at Katie's, doing laundry and 'answering emails' (which means my laptop was open in front of me and Katie and I talked the whole time, and so the emails I've been meaning to write for weeks are still unwritten). Then we went to Avanti for lunch - I skipped my usual arepa and had a burger instead, which was delightful.

After that, Katie went into her office and I went downtown to look at furniture. I browsed half a dozen stores, took tons of pictures, tentatively made decisions in my mind, and ordered the sleeper sofa that I'd had my eye on for awhile. Then I found an art supply store (v. pertinent to my needs) and bought a couple of notebooks and a pen since it feels like it should be the first day of school and I need to stock up.

Then I came back to Katie's. She wasn't home yet, but James and the girls were, so I hung out with James while he cooked supper (and I also read a book to the girls that was about a mermaid, but was such a blatant ripoff of Goldilocks and the Three Bears (but with octopi) that I was weirdly offended). Then we ate supper, I whipped up some mojitos (drink of champions, and by 'champions' I mean 'champion drinkers'), and we hung out the rest of the night. After the girls went to bed, Katie, James and I retreated to the basement and watched 'Red', which continues to be an awesome move and I'll fight anyone who says otherwise.

And now I must sleep - goodnight!

backstroke everyday in chicago

I had a v. productive day in Denver - still no writing, but I'm getting closer to some decisions. I woke up this morning and showered in time to vacate the house when Katie left for work - but we went together to Black Eye (a coffeeshop), where we worked/talked while having coffee (a tasty pourover for me, which was way too hipster but also way too good) and breakfast (her pork tacos looked awesome but the tortillas were flour; I had bacon and eggs, which sufficed).

Then, I left her to go to Boulder - I had an appointment to look at an apartment, and I really liked it a lot. So much so that we have a gentlemen's agreement for me to rent it - he didn't have a copy of the lease on him, and also there's still a bit of work to be done (new counters, then installing the appliances), but the space was exactly what I wanted - quiet side street but still close to stuff to do; outdoor decks but no yard maintenance; large kitchen and nice living room/dining area so I can cook (and eventually entertain if I make any friends here); and extra space so I can have an office. He's also a real estate agent and very graciously told me that if he sells me a house, he won't charge me for breaking my lease to move out of the apartment - that's not in the cards immediately, but I admire his hustle.

So, that was all fun, and I felt really good about finding a place. It may seem hasty to rent the first place that I saw...but this isn't my first trip to the apartment rental rodeo, and I'm pretty good at assessing a city's available inventory through deep, hours-long stalking of rental sites and property values.

Then, of course, I needed to go window shopping for furniture - I need to buy a bed and a couch as the first orders of business, so I spent some quality time exploring Boulder's mall scene (verdict: every store I need, and by that I mean there was a Sephora). Then I drove back to Denver and met up with Katie - we worked at another coffee shop, then checked out a jewelry shop that she loves before coming home.

But I didn't stay here all evening like I usually do - I ate some quesadillas with Katie and the girls, but then I drove to Littleton (a southern suburb) to go to a book reading/signing at Tattered Cover. My friend Sherry (whom I visited in Austin) was in town to talk about her latest book and do a signing, so I went to be supportive. Her talk was great, and I got a book signed by her before joining her and her literary agent and the agent's employees for dinner at a nearby Chinese/Japanese restaurant. So, that was super fun (and tasty)....but after getting back to Katie's at 10:30 and then talking to Katie and James until after eleven, and then stupidly browsing furniture sites until midnight, it's definitely time for bed - goodnight!

colorado passes by like writing on a wall

I'm in Denver, safely ensconced in Katie's guest room, which has begun to feel like my room since I've been showing up here so regularly this summer. Sometime soon, I'll have my own place and she'll no longer be subjected to my presence...but let's not kid ourselves, I'll probably still come to her place for dinner and then end up spending the night anyway.

I woke up in North Platte this morning and was extremely loath to get in the car again, so I dawdled - I ate breakfast quickly, since the hotel breakfast wasn't particularly yummy (although their coffee was excellent), but then I sipped my coffee and wrote some emails, and so I didn't actually get out of North Platte until 10am. This was over an hour later than I'd intended, but it didn't really matter since I had no pressing plans.

The rest of Nebraska passed by in total boredom, although I had a bit of excitement wondering if I would run out of gas, since I had decided to press on and get gas at the westernmost Casey's that I know of rather than stopping when I should have. Casey's is a convenience store chain that is particularly beloved in Iowa (where it started), and has slowly been spreading its virtuous tentacles across the midwest. They also make the best convenience store pizza ever, for those of you who can still eat gluten. The westernmost Casey's that I've seen is in Ogallala, Nebraska - and I just checked the Casey's map, which indicates that Ogallala is tied with a small town in Kansas for westernmost Casey's.

This is of interest to none of you, so I'll move on. Spoiler: I didn't run out of gas.

Most of today's drive was through Colorado, which was also supremely uninteresting since I've made that trip several times. When I got close to Denver, I veered off and went to Boulder instead - I'm checking it out as a potential place to live (which is looking highly likely at this point), and I wanted to scope things out. After only a couple of hours there, I was in love - I had a nicoise salad while sitting in a restaurant overlooking a pedestrian shopping area, and the weather was perfect and everything was delightful (even the bluegrass buskers playing banjos and washboards on the sidewalk, which I normally don't love but was somehow into today). The only downer was the moment when, halfway into my salad, I had a sudden, intense fear that the pile of indeterminate shredded white matter was actually crab - but the waiter eventually told me that it was 'confetti eggs', which I've never heard of, but at least I didn't spend tonight throwing up everything I've ever eaten).

So, Boulder gets a big thumbs up - it actually reminds me a lot of Palo Alto/Berkeley, but with fewer Teslas and more potential for snow. I drove around a bit more after eating, then came to Denver, where I sat at Avanti and journaled until it was time to meet up with Katie. I got to her house before she did, and the nanny stupidly let me watch them until Katie got back, which meant that I let them draw all over themselves in an effort to buy their love.

Then we ate supper (delish pulled pork and sweet potatoes), and I made mojitos for me and Katie to enjoy in the basement while James got suckered into putting the girls to bed. And now I need to go to bed as well - goodnight!

riding in the radio while we destroy the world

I'm in Nebraska, and it's just as annoying to be here as it always is. However, I should count my blessings - I made it to North Platte without incident (other than the insect genocide committed by my windshield), and tomorrow I'll be in Denver and ready to start a new chapter (and by that I mean drink rosé with Katie).

Today was the end of this edition of #smalltownlife. I woke up in Iowa and spent a couple of hours taking care of tings - I wanted to leave my room in a decent state, so I straightened up, took out the trash, organized, and tossed whatever I didn't want to deal with into [censored]'s pile (that's mostly a joke). I also had breakfast with my parents - I don't know if my body is prepared for the bacon shortage it's about to undergo, but #noregrets.

Then I lazed about for awhile, since the idea of getting in my car was strangely unappealing - but sometime after 1pm, I finally left my ancestral abode and waved goodbye to my parents as I drove away. My car is packed to the gills with stuff, which is strangely a good thing since it means nothing is moving around (and so nothing is making noise). I had a lot of miles to cover today, and I probably should have left earlier. But I made it to North Platte in record time - I stopped a lot less than I usually do, but I lost a combined total of 40mins to 20mins of bathroom/caffeine/gas breaks + 20mins of delays due to construction on IA-34 + I-80. Still, making it here in 7.5hrs was pretty decent...

...so I checked into the same hotel I stayed in back in June (remember that?), and then went across the parking lot to have a 9:15pm dinner at Ruby Tuesday. Oddly, the bartender there remembered me - I've only been there once before, but when he handed me the drink menu, he said 'you're a red wine girl - I remember you'. I'm somewhat saddened that my haggard, road-trip-weary face is the only thing he knows, since after seven hours in a car I look like someone who could give road head in exchange for meth [editor's note: I have no personal experience with any of this]. But he's right - I'm a red wine girl. So I had the same chicken I ordered last time, and a glass and a half of pinot noir, and we discussed Colorado - he's moving there next week, so perhaps I'll run into him in a bar in Colorado somewhere (in fact, he said as I was leaving, 'hope to see you again, but I hope it's not here'...which is a sentiment I agree with wholeheartedly, since I never really want to come to North Platte again).

And now I need to sleep - Denver and all sorts of adventures await. Goodnight!

when elvis went to hollywood

My car is all loaded up and I'm ready to head back across Nebraska, which does not get any more interesting with repetition. Iowa was covered in haze and smoke from the wildfires in Canada and Montana, which added a layer of grim foreboding (or just something vaguely orange) to the sky. And so after a day of packing and planning, and an evening of eating (barbecued chicken and fried potatoes) and watching fine CBS programming, it's time for bed - goodnight!

the news is dead

Nothing fun to report - I spent the day eating breakfast, drinking coffee, looking at apartments in Colorado (via the internet - I'm still in Iowa), packing up my stuff (how did I end up with so much stuff here?!), eating supper (barbecued chicken ftw), and losing at Ticket to Ride.

And now I need to go to bed so I can do it all again tomorrow - I need to get my car loaded up with all the millions of items I somehow fit into it on the way here from California nine months ago, and at the moment I have no idea how it all fit the first time. So, hopefully some sleep will prepare me to play tetris with my car and all my belongings - goodnight!

love's been a little bit hard on me

Today was a highly variable day. That, in immediate retrospect, sounds a little bizarre, but let's just roll with it.

I spent most of the day in a very unvaried way, actually...I spent basically the entire day in the kitchen, talking to family members. I woke up and had coffee and breakfast with my parents, and while breakfast was happening, [censored] showed up. [Censored] was followed shortly thereafter by Aunt B, who was down to visit Gram, her bees, and us (I have no idea what order of preference she had, but in my reality she was happy to see us). So we sat around and talked until it was time for her to go back to Des Moines - I'll see her again in Denver, but it was great to see her now.

After she left, I spent some quality time hanging out in the kitchen, and eventually [censored] and I watched a lot of [censored] until it was time for supper. Mom made a super tasty dinner - a new york strip roast with the same crust as prime rib (yum), sweet corn, and potato salad - which we all enjoyed tremendously. Then we squeezed in two games of Ticket to Ride - Dad won the first and Mom won the second, and I realized that I've probably spent 200-300 hours of my life staring at an upside-down map of the US since both Rail Baron and Ticket to Ride are based on US maps and I always sit on the north side of the map. Great use of time, eh?

Then it was almost time for bed, but [censored] somehow [censored] a fucking [CENSORED] with my mesh [censored] in the [censored], which really livened things up. So now I need to somehow try and sleep without wondering whether [censored] is waiting for me outside my [censored], which may be difficult since I've gone soft from city living.

But I'll be returning to city living soon enough - I think I'm leaving for Denver on Tuesday, which means I should sleep so I can pack tomorrow. Goodnight!

terra incognito

I meant to go to bed ages ago (of course, as usual, etc.). Today was pretty decent, all in all - I spent some quality time journaling over my coffee this morning, which is a much better way to get my day started than reading twitter for an hour. I also ate some lunch and dealt with some random tasks, and then I helped my mom with some volunteer stuff (related to the round barn, which required several trips and some silliness, but it was all done without either of us breaking our necks on a ladder, so that was lucky).

After that, I was kind of wiped out, so I lazed about in the kitchen for longer than planned, and then came downstairs and took an even-more-unplanned nap. Then I showered and did some work around my room - I'm driving back to Denver next week and I'm planning to take a lot of stuff with me, and I need to start organizing now so that I can load my car more effectively.

But I couldn't work forever - I had supper plans with Hannah (a friend from high school who is also my distant cousin). We were going to meet in town, since Ludlow's (a restaurant) had been closed for a few months and just reopened under new ownership this week - but when we got there, it was totally packed and people were waiting outside. This never happens, but it's good to see they're opening well. So, we drove to Seymour instead - this was a total backtrack for Hannah, but this is the price you have to pay in an area where the next closest restaurant is fifteen miles away (no joke: for several months, the nearest place my parents could go out to eat was fifteen miles away).

Luckily, fifteen miles around here is reliably 15-20min depending on whether you're taking pavement or gravel, so getting there was easy. So we ate dinner and talked for quite awhile - it was probably better that we went to Seymour since we wouldn't have been able to linger at our table at Ludlow's. It was great to see her, as usual, and also great to say hi to the taxidermied deer heads on the walls.

And now, I am desperate for sleep - goodnight!