when you first come in the game, they try to play you

I have nothing of note to report today - I had a multihour meeting about the mural festival this morning, and I do not like having my mornings impeded upon, so that messed up my flow. I mean, the meeting was good (although there is a lot to do), but still, I wish these things could happen in the afternoon instead.

sssanyway. When I got home, I made a tuna salad sandwich, did a tiny bit of house stuff, and took a nap to recover from the indignity of having to leave the house before I wanted to. I did do some writing in the late afternoon, and again until it got too dark to be on my balcony (with a break for leftover pasta somewhere in there). And then, when I was done writing, I played Zelda for a few hours (longer than I intended, since I started at nine p.m. and thought I would just play for an hour...but it was more like 3.5). Zelda isn't the most useful thing I could do with my time, but it clears my head better than a lot of other time wasters, so no regrets tonight.

After I finally stopped playing, I switched some laundry out, took out my contacts, and spent twenty minutes drafting something for the mural festival that I wanted to send out tonight. And now, I'm definitely going to bed (because my Nintendo Switch is charging in the other room, not because I suddenly have all sorts of willpower). Goodnight!

i don't wanna rain on your crazy parade, buddy

Today is essentially my last day in the city of sin, and while my body will be happy to get back to avoiding gluten and getting eight hours of sleep, my heart is happy that I made the trip here.

I woke up this morning in Tracy, and Jen, Joann, Jane, and I finished our sleepover with breakfast, which was basically last night's leftover dinner. We had enough tater tot casserole left for all of us, and we put a fried egg on top of each serving, which made it a total winner. I'm tempted to experiment with making a breakfast tater tot casserole (with sausage and maybe some peppers instead of the carrots/onions), but we'll see what I discover. We also had leftover apricot salad, which is also a nice breakfast treat. So, all in all, my attempt to bring Midwestern culinary delights to California was a success.

Eventually, I left Tracy (while the rest of them stayed and continued hanging out) to drive to Alameda to see Claudia. Claude's mom was visiting, so we had a nice chat - I hadn't seen her since Claudia's wedding, but it was great to see that she's doing well. She brought tamales with her, which were delish. And I took some leftover jello to Claudia and her son Téo - Téo wasn't really interested in lunch since he'd already eaten, but he had a small scoop of jello and then demanded three more scoops of jello with a crazy gleam in his eyes.

So, we had to take him to the park to burn off a bunch of sugar. Claudia and I talked while watching him play in a sand pit, and it was actually pretty delightful - the weather was nice, Claudia and I were overdue for a chat, and Téo (who turns three soon) is perhaps the cutest child in the history of children (no offense to my other friends' children). It was a really nice afternoon, so hopefully we'll get a chance to do it again sometime soon.

Then, I parted ways with them and drove to Berkeley to see John and Jess. I did not see their kid, so I have no report about Ian since they dropped him at his grandparents' place. But I'm happy to report that John and Jess are doing well. We went to Saul's Deli, which is where we always go for breakfast, and I was surprised to see that it's open for dinner and also serves surprisingly fancy (and inappropriately named) cocktails. So we had latkes, and I had a sandwich with roast beef / harissa / horseradish / swiss that was excellent, and John and I each had a cocktail and split another while Jess enjoyed her fancy healthier beverage choice.

And then, I parted ways with them, drove back to the city of sin, and met up with Chandlord. We were supposed to grab a drink, but instead we stayed in - and I somehow, some way, tricked her into watching SAHARA (and paying to rent it). This is basically the opposite of doing something nice for someone who hosted you. I, of course, still love it, but Chandlord seemed rather displeased with a variety of plot holes that I thought she made much too big a deal of. C'est la vie, I guess.

And now, I need to sleep so that I can pack up tomorrow - I'm moving to an airport hotel tomorrow night and doing some exploration of the south bay before that, so I want to get out of the city in good time. Goodnight!

and now i pull up in my green honda

I had a lovely and relatively productive day today, although I probably should have gone to bed two hours ago. I spent some time this morning taking care of email and getting ready, and then I had a meeting regarding my volunteer project. One of the women there told me that she'd told her husband, after seeing how I was organizing something, that I'm like my grandma on steroids, which she assured me was a compliment. I'm pretty sure she meant my organizational skills (mine are related to spreadsheets; Gram's were related to feeding dozens or hundreds of people), but she may have also meant that I'm a couple of inches taller than Gram. However, my height advantage is not due to any sort of illegal drugs, and is more due to Gram shrinking before her death.

sssanyway, I was flattered, so I'll take it. After the meeting, I came home, ate some leftover fish chowder, did some more work, and ran a few errands. I also made dinner, which took waaaaaay longer than intended - I was trying a new recipe, and while the food tasted amazing in the end, it took more like forty minutes to cook instead of twenty (and this was at the final cooking stage, not including the twenty minutes of prep before that). I'm looking forward to the leftovers and I would probably make it again, but I need to tweak it to figure out if there's any way to speed up the process.

While the dish was simmering, I wrote for 40-some minutes, which I'll take. And I ended the night with some Zelda - I may be overdosed, which is what I need to get out of playing for awhile, so hopefully tomorrow I won't feel the urge. But it was fun to play tonight, so #noregrets.

And now, I need to sleep - goodnight!

i'm just mad about saffron

I apparently forgot to blog yesterday, but the only thing that you missed was that I made a fish chowder which was not [censored]'s favorite...but I'd been craving it and I was v. happy to eat it, so hopefully [censored] will live. It was very bad repayment for the fact that [censored] put up my remaining office and bedroom blinds, but we're still speaking, so I think it's okay.

Today was pretty productive, all in all - I actually got dressed in real clothes and put on makeup when I woke up just to get myself into the work frame of mind, since all I wear anymore is variations on a pajama theme. The clothing seemed to help, or at least I was in the right mood - after I put my desk back together (since I'd had to tear apart my office to give [censored] access to the windows), I wrote approximately ten pages before / after lunch. This was more than I've written in a day in a v. v. long time, and [censored] is about to discover how weird I get when wandering around the house after a lot of writing in a day, which is something only Terry and Adit have deep experience with. I'm happy with how the story is going, although I suspect I'm currently wandering in a cul-de-sac that won't stay in the final draft, but we'll see.

At some point, I took a break for lunch (and made a v. tasty grilled ham and cheese sandwich). And I did some house stuff after I was done writing - mostly cleaning my pendants in my kitchen and testing some new bulbs, and also saying farewell to [censored]. At some point, I took trash to my dad's dumpster, and I ate some leftover chowder. I also did some stuff for the volunteer activity I'm getting involved in, since we have a meeting tomorrow. And I played some more Zelda, without perhaps making much progress, but it's hard to tell with that game. And now, I must sleep - goodnight!

welcome back to the age of jive

I'm tired, but it's my own fault - I've let myself get into this Zelda game over the past couple of days, which has meant staying up later than I should have. Luckily for me, my battery died a little before midnight tonight, so I'm going to go to bed and hope that I make up for lost sleep tonight.

Despite that, I haven't been entirely lazy - I spent yesterday and a bit of time this morning finishing the paint job in the bathroom, so at least I'm done with that. And today, I also made eggs for brunch and then potatoes au gratin for dinner - I took the potatoes to my parents' house to go with a ham and some baked beans that my mom made, and it was all pretty delicious.

Beyond that, I have very little to report, and a lot that I want to get done tomorrow - so I think it's time for bed. Goodnight!

but i ain't never crossed a man that didn't deserve it

Today wasn't quite as productive as I'd hoped - writing is a weird and sometimes stupid process, and I am far enough out of practice with the weirdness of it that I can't always tell when I'm procrastinating vs. when a break is necessary because something is percolating. However, I did mess around with fountain pens for a good chunk of the morning, which *feels* like it's writing related. I haven't used fountain pens in a couple of months at least, and over a certain span of time they eventually dry out and need to be cleaned before they can be reinked. So, I cleaned out some pens, reinked a couple, and am delighted to be back in the pen game (yes, I am a nerd).

At some point in the afternoon, I did a v. light workout, and I also spent some quality time on my balcony with my notebook and one of my freshly-inked pens. Fall is starting to set in, and while it wasn't cold outside, I still felt happy to have a blanket while I wrote. An idea is percolating that is either going to be amazing or terrible, and I'm still feeling my way through it - we'll see what I come up with.

Eventually, I had to put on real clothes so that I could go into town for a meeting of my secret society - it was the first meeting of the year, which meant dinner, which meant I had an extra incentive to show up. My mom saved me a seat next to a woman who is just as obsessed (if not moreso) with the royal family as I am, so we discussed the queen's funeral while things got underway. The supper was pretty tasty (mashed potatoes, roast beef, green beans, fruit, etc), and the social part was good - I've known most of the women forever, so it was fun to see everybody. And my mom and I both won some of the raffle decorations at the end, so #yayme.

Then I came home, messed around online, and wrote for another hour-ish. And now I should go to bed so that I can do a million (or at least ten) things tomorrow - goodnight!

rule britannia

I succeeded in getting up at 4:30am to watch Queen Elizabeth's funeral. Of course, this means I didn't succeed in doing much of anything else today. The first part of the funeral at Westminster Abbey, including the processions before and after, lasted a couple of hours, and then I took a nap before the second part of the ceremony at Windsor. It was all pretty moving, from the precision and pageantry that went into the whole day (and the ten days leading up to it), to the human grief behind the formalities.

I've lost some interest in the royals the last few years - partially because I haven't been writing romances, and so haven't been doing any research into British history, and partially because it's increasingly clear that the family is determined to continue repeating generational traumas and self-inflicted wounds that have been going on since George I showed up from Hanover in the early 1700s after (allegedly) murdering his wife's lover, (actually) imprisoning his wife for the rest of her life, and becoming estranged from his son, who would be George II. Whether they're Hanovers, Saxe-Coburg-Gothas, or Windsors, they've had a nearly unbroken chain of animosity, infidelity, and bad family decisions going back over three hundred years.

I suppose that drama makes for good tv / clickbait, and also I clearly know too much about it. But it will be interesting to see where the monarchy goes from here. Queen Elizabeth managed to stay above the fray of all of that, and her father was a hero during WWII, so it's been 80+ years since the monarch him/herself was a scandal. She managed to overcome all the messes with her children and grandchildren - but I don't know if Charles will be so lucky. And unfortunately for Charles, he's inheriting when he's 70+ years old and everyone has had seventy years to form an opinion about him; this is very different from Elizabeth inheriting at 25, and then being so silent in so many ways that the nation could project its idea of the monarchy upon her.

So...I'm less interested in the monarchy now, but I still watched the funeral, and I'm still glad I did. It's the end of an era, and it was interesting to see it live rather than catching the soundbites later.

After that, I took a couple of naps, ate some leftover chili, did some house tasks, etc. I also talked to Alyssa, who was in good form. And I got takeout pizza for dinner, since I don't have many groceries, which is a situation I shall rectify tomorrow.

And now, I need to catch up on the sleep I missed last night - goodnight!

i ain't even trippin, i'm not slippin, i just come on back for more

I had a v. nice day, all in all. I got almost nine hours of sleep, which was v. restorative. Then, I made some coffee and wrote for an hour - the ideas that I'm coming up with feel pretty good right now, and I'm guessing they've been percolating beneath the surface even though it feels like I haven't been doing anything writing-related recently.

Eventually, I ate an early lunch and got dressed. Then, I caught up with Terry - we hadn't talked since her wedding, so we chatted for awhile and talked about life and career and all that stuff. I also talked to [censored] for one of our usual quick (aka thirty minute) convos. Then, I ran a couple of errands, including picking up paint chips for the next phase of decorating schemes at my Iowa house + getting a few groceries.

Then I came home, ate some popcorn, and talked to my parents for quite awhile. I was supposed to go home next weekend, but the day job is cramping my style, so I'm pushing it off for a week (but will then be in Iowa for two weeks, which I'm hoping I can use to paint my office and possibly my bedroom if I get super ambitious). So, we caught up for awhile, and while I was talking to my dad I put some sweet potatoes in the oven to roast. After we hung up, I roasted some salmon - it's pretty much the easiest thing I make, and it's delicious every time. I also made some special butter with maple syrup / chipotles / orange zest (easy - just mix it all in the stand mixer for a couple of minutes, along with salt and pepper) - it really tastes great with sweet potatoes. So, supper was easy and also delicious, and my kitchen was cleaned up in a snap.

Eventually, I did a bit of day job work because I had to, and then spent the rest of the evening organizing myself. And now I should go to bed so I can get up at an early hour and still feel reasonably rested - wish me luck with that. Goodnight!

now we are free

I had a better day today than I did yesterday, probably because I spent the last five hours watching the Olympics. I felt a little melancholy while watching some of it tonight - Lindsey Jacobellis finally won gold after losing it back in the 2006 Torino Olympics when she was so far ahead on a snowboard race that she showboated and lost her balance, which was an amazing redemption story after so many years of work. But I watched most of those Olympics, and several others, with Tammy, who unfortunately passed away in 2020. So, as I was watching all sorts of ridiculous skating commentary tonight, I was certainly thinking of her.

But the Olympics were quite enjoyable tonight - I watched a bunch of snowboarding and the men's free skate, and it was a delight. And I got some work done today, took a nap at some point, and did some laundry, so I feel like I had a good combo of productivity (work) and actual joy (the Olympics).

And now, it's after midnight and I should really sleep - I want to stay up and watch the Olympics all night, but that's probably not the best idea. Goodnight!

death spiral

I had a pretty great day, although I was quite tired at the beginning - for some reason I didn't sleep all that well last night, and it had me dragging. But I got some good work done, and I had a final poke bowl for lunch before my next sojourn in ye olde Iowa.

Eventually, I was done, so I did a bit of housework and prepping to load my car, and then I welcomed Katie for a late afternoon happy hour. We lounged and had aperol spritzes and cheese and jam, and it was pretty great.

And then, the evening stayed great but took a different turn - I'd invited her whole family over to watch the opening ceremonies of the Olympics, and so while Katie came early so we could catch up a bit, James and the girls showed up in time for dinner. We ordered pizza and I gave them "baby champagne" (aka sparkling apple grape juice, which hypes them up like nothing else), and then we watched the opening. Overall, it was pretty gorgeous and well done considering the covid restrictions, although it's weird to see a basically empty stadium. And of course it's a prime opportunity for propaganda, which is always interesting to watch.

James and Julia left early, but Katie and Anne stayed until the end. It was v. different than old Olympics parties from days of yore, and I didn't bake any cakes at all, but at least it felt festive and entertaining. And Katie, as always, is great.

Eventually they left, and I did some more house prep while watching some taped skating stuff until I suddenly was too tired to continue. And now I need to go to bed - goodnight!

the god of maine proclaims the last evacuation of the dream

I wasn't feeling all that great today - and in the year 2022, it's impossible to tell if it's malaise caused by news of covid, or malaise caused by covid itself. I tested negative yesterday, so I'm hopeful that it's just general 2022 malaise. But I still took it as an excuse to do absolutely nothing today - I haven't been sleeping enough, and I haven't been relaxing enough, so I decided that's basically all I would do.

So, I drank coffee, messed around online, and did a little laundry because I couldn't totally relax even when telling myself to relax. At some point, I took a nap; I also took a shower, and those things combined were pretty great. And I talked to my parents - my mom seems to be recovering from whatever she had after Christmas, and my dad's foot is still on the mend, so hopefully they continue to do well.

Right as I got off the phone with my mom, my takeout Mexican food arrived - I could have / should have eaten leftovers, but I was craving enchiladas and rice and beans and queso, so that's exactly what I got. I decided I didn't have the energy or attention span to watch a two-hour movie...so instead, I watched four hours of The Witcher. Ha. The first half of the second season is quite enjoyable, even if I do have to have captions on so that I can understand when Henry Cavill is grunting vs. when he's actually saying something.

Luckily, I have tomorrow off, so I can either get things done or I can finish bingeing The Witcher (it's anyone's guess!). For now, I'm going to go to bed - goodnight!

this isn't what i signed up for

I had a pretty good day, although I definitely didn't get enough sleep going into it - after staying up way too late reading, I slept fitfully and was awake well before I got my usual 7-7.5hrs. But I pulled myself from bed, made an iced coffee, and showered - since I didn't shower yesterday, I considered this a triumph. Then I had a morning call with Veronica, which was, as always, a delight.

After talking to V, I made more iced coffee, made myself hash browns and fried eggs for lunch, and then did some stuff around the house - laundry, kitchen cleaning, stretching, talking to [censored], etc. I also forced myself to leave the house to get groceries. This was not a big errand, since I am going back to ye olde Iowa for a few days at the end of the week, but I needed a couple of things to get me through so that I don't just eat takeout all week (not that there is anything wrong with that!).

When I got home, I talked to my mom for awhile - she seemed to be doing well, and she called me back to report that a calico cat that had been missing for several days had just turned up, so that was a highlight. Then I made supper (the tuscan sausage and chard pasta that I had made a few weeks ago - so simple, so good), cleaned the kitchen, folded my laundry, etc.

And then I finished the book I was reading last night - it was A GENTLEMAN IN MOSCOW, which I'd started a month ago and then not felt like reading while I was in Iowa. Also I hadn't felt like reading it because I didn't want it to end. But it was incredible, and also right up my alley for obvious reasons:

• I'm obsessed with zee russians
• I'm obsessed with aristocrats and class issues
• I'm obsessed with fancy hotels
• I'm obsessed with fancy meals and fine wines
• I'm currently obsessed with how extroverts make an entire world and life out of a v. constrained environment, which basically describes my pandemic experience

If you don't know why those bullet points are relevant to this book, the basic gist is that, in 1922, as the Bolsheviks are tearing up the old Russia to make way for the new one, a thirty-something aristocrat is sentenced by a tribunal to life under house arrest in the Metropol Hotel in Moscow. He likely should have been shot, but he'd written a poem that inspired the revolution - so they let him live, but he could never leave the hotel again. He was quite the character, and the hotel itself felt like a character, and the period through which the book is set is, of course, fascinating.

sssanyway, I quite enjoyed it and have now spent two hours going down a vast and deep wikipedia rabbit hole instead of sleeping, so it's time for bed.

And finally - happy mother's day to all the mothers out there (especially to mine!), and hugs to those of you whose mothers aren't here to celebrate. I hope you all had a delightful day!

these eyes will not be blinded by the lights

I had a long day - usually Fridays are a little quieter, but I had seven straight hours of meetings, which made eating and thinking and using the bathroom a little harder than usual. One of my meetings was five hours long, but it was gracious enough to allow for a fifteen minute break, which I used to take a walk down the block in an attempt to maintain sanity.

But the meetings all ended up okay in the end (or at least I survived them) so that's all fine. Then I ran some errands, including a trip to Nordstrom to pick something up + a trip to Whole Foods to get enough groceries to get me through the next week. Then I came home, ate some leftover pasta, and watched a couple of episodes of Stanley Tucci's SEARCHING FOR ITALY, which I'm still enjoying. And now I believe I should go to bed - goodnight!

live from new york

You can probably guess what I did today: I worked. Surprise! 🎉🎉

So I had a million meetings, including a VP presentation, because that's what I do now. But I ended up at five to have a coaching call with Alyssa, which was delightful (with some deeper discussion at the beginning; the killings in Georgia yesterday on top of hundreds of random attacks against Asian Americans in cities around the US over the past several months is terrible, and it's a lot to process and deal with, especially when these issues are sadly nothing new).

Then I talked to my parents while reheating some of last night's pasta, which was still delicious tonight since I figured out how to reheat it in the oven without drying it out. And then I did some laundry, painted my toenails, and gave myself a fresh gel manicure while watching a couple of episodes of SEARCHING FOR ITALY. It's Stanley Tucci's travel/food show on CNN about a variety of Italian cities and their cuisines, and I'm so desperate for new food and new travel experiences that watching this was pretty close to torture. But I enjoyed the episodes on Naples and Rome while exercising some self-care, so it was a good evening.

Of course, I couldn't totally resist work, especially since working from 9:30-5 isn't quite enough for my current situation, so I just did an hour of desultory slidemaking. And now I'm going to close my laptop, do some journaling or reading, and go to bed. Goodnight!

tryna stream my way to a better life

I'm trying to kick the coming week off better than this last week - not that this last week was bad, but the week before I was on vacation and going to bed at one and waking up at nine like my body would prefer, and so it was brutal to get back into day job timing. So, it's 10:10pm and I'm hoping to be in bed in twenty minutes (although I may read for a bit in bed, but that's dangerous....).

Today was good, though. I got up around 7:30 and actually left my house quite early - my usual order of Philz is weirdly delayed (and by 'weirdly' I mean 'entirely to be expected because everyone is ordering tons of shit online), and so I was out of coffee. So I stopped by the pharmacy to pick up a prescription, put gas in my car for the first time in many weeks, and picked up a latte and a bag of beans from Huckleberry. When I got home, I made myself an omelette and reheated some fries (from a takeout order) and green beans (from a different leftover supper), and it made for a pretty tasty breakfast.

Then I ventured out again to pick up a writing book at Bookbar - and it felt like I was a Victorian orphan looking through the window at a wonderland of forbidden treats, because I couldn't go in to browse (browsing is by appointment only) and so I just stared in the window drooling and dreaming of reading books and drinking a glass of wine (Bookbar is a bookstore / wine bar / coffee bar) until the staff found the book I had ordered. Someday, my bookstore friends, we will be reunited...

Then I came home, talked to Veronica, contemplated the story, ate some leftover Thai food, and did a bunch of outdoor work (mostly watering things that needed to be watered). I also talked to my parents, who seemed to be doing well. Then I made supper (spaghetti carbonara and some brussels sprouts, yum), talked to [censored], wrapped up some stuff from the conference I attended this weekend, made some plotting notes for my book, etc.

And now, after a productive weekend and a lot of thoughts about what I should be doing next with my writing, it's time for bed - goodnight!

when we up in the club, all eyes on us

Last night was a trainwreck - I should have gone to bed hours before I did, but instead I curled up on my chaise and doomscrolled and read every bit of the internet. The result was that I didn't go to bed until almost three, which is completely absurd. And so even though I slept until a little after nine, it really wasn't quite enough.

However, I successfully rescued the day - when I got up, I made coffee, did some laundry, and ran to the grocery store to stock up on produce. This was key towards ensuring that I don't need to leave the house next week if I don't feel like it (I mean, I want to take some walks...but I'm not sure I want to be forced to interact with humans). When I got home, I put my groceries away, quickly cleaned myself up, and then came downstairs just in time to welcome Katie to my lovely backyard oasis.

Since the weather is getting colder and covid is spiking enough to keep us from seeing each other inside, our evening activities are pretty curtailed. But it was sixty today, which was still perfect for sitting in my backyard. We started off sitting on the ground in a patch of sun, but we eventually relocated to the couches as the sunshine moved, and it was a pretty perfect couple of hours. I also inducted Katie into the poke club (the place I order poke from is actually called PokéClub) - we ordered poke bowls for lunch, and they were just as delicious as always.

Katie eventually left, and then I tried a new recipe for pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting (see my other blog). I subbed gluten free flour for regular flour without changing anything else, and they turned out perfectly - really tasty cupcakes, totally delicious frosting, and easy to make. They came out of the oven right before I had a friendship renewal call with Joann and Jen, so I ate my first one while I said hi to Joann, and then frosted the rest of them later in the call.

Unfortunately, 2020 is the gift that keeps on giving, and none of us had any particularly good news to share (although Joann got promoted, which is great, but I already knew that). But it was good to catch up, as per usual, and hopefully Joann and I (and Jen, if she feels so inclined, despite being married) get to spinster honeymoon again together somewhere in the world someday. They were all supposed to come to Colorado in May, but that airbnb got canceled long ago and it feels impossible to imagine how the year might have gone if coronavirus hadn't happened. But someday we shall see each other again! And until then, we can just snack in each other's faces on videoconferences.

sssanyway. After we hung up, Katie showed up again - this time with her children so that they would have somewhere to trick or treat. She had actually brought me candy earlier to give them tonight since I hadn't planned on trick or treaters, so this took literally zero effort on my part (other than opening the door). The girls were dressed as ninjas, which was a good way to incorporate masks, and it was fun to see them for a few minutes. I also gave them cupcakes, which I think went over well.

Then I messed around on my other blog for a couple of hours, documenting the eggplant parmigiana that I made the other night + putting up the cupcakes. Then I ate chili, doomscrolled a bit, and basically got nothing else accomplished. And now I'm determined to be in bed before midnight, so it's time to sign off - goodnight!

to seeking, to finding

I am drunk on words, and it feels like it used to feel all the time, when I slipped through my teens among the pages of novels. My childhood sometimes feels like a story that happened to someone else; the real story was what I read in books. I can name old characters with more clarity than I can name old neighbors (except for the ones named Clell, because that name is too much like a story to forget). But as I grew up, the real world took precedence; the story world was something I dared not enter for too long, other than to write my own, because if left to my own devices I will let books devour me.

But I've been reading a lot the past week or so, slipping back into stories, perhaps finally so bored with quarantine that I've been forcibly brought back to something I used to love to lose myself in. I don't let myself read that often mostly because I can't stop once I start; the most I've read over the last few years was on plane rides, and those rides usually meant no sleep and a gritty-eyed viewing of whatever country I'd landed in, strung out on story and exhaustion and whatever wine they served on the plane.

Tonight, in my house for the seventieth day in a row, I finished THE STARLESS SEA. I loved it; a lot of people would not, but I like allegory and metaphor and overly-wrought symbolism, and the language was luscious regardless of how you feel about the plot. It's something I would consider reading again, just to see how she pieced it together; it's not something I would recommend without knowing the tastes of the person I was recommending it to. I read for hours tonight, as soon as I'd finished eating some leftover lasagna, first by sitting on my patio until the sun set, and then curled up in my chair with the spice of a moscow mule and a bit of breeze coming in through the patio door. And I should probably go to bed, since I have to work tomorrow...and I am no longer a teenager, and even though that past is indistinct, I know that I can't stay up until dawn like I did then and hope to function tomorrow.

Today was day seventy. Ten weeks ago tonight, I had a final decadent dinner out, with Katie, at El Five, watching the glimmering lights of downtown Denver while eating paella and drinking wine and speculating about what would happen next. The answer has not been kind; but the answer is not finished. We may only be at the beginning of this story - or we're at the end of it, and a new story is about to start.

But these are all ruminations for my journal, which is a much scarier, wilder place than the blog....and these ruminations are also for tomorrow, when I've had some sleep. Goodnight!

erin go bragh

I'm in Dublin after a thoroughly uneventful trip - it was all slightly miserable since I forgot to put on compression socks and am apparently an old person now, but it could have been worse. We were almost an hour early landing in Dublin, so I made it to my hotel by 10:30am, which was too soon for a room.

I should have gone out and done tourist stuff, but I used to live here and had no need to do anything specific...so I sat at the hotel restaurant and had breakfast, then read in the restaurant, then read in the lobby, then read in bed in my room, then read over dinner. I started this amazing series (which starts with SHADOW AND BONE by Leigh Bardugo) on the plane last night, and it was so amazing that I devoured three books in approximately twelve hours. Yes, this is insane, even for me. And maybe I should go back and reread the stuff I basically inhaled. But it felt so great to indulge my inner bookworm after months of starving her - and it made me want to crawl into the vast pile of books I haven't read and lose myself there forever.

However, at some point I was seriously dehydrated and also hungry, so I came downstairs, ate dinner, and finished the last book (which made me the weird single lady wiping away tears, but luckily I have no shame). I then did a couple of hours of day job stuff while sitting in the lobby bar. And now I need to try to force myself to sleep so that I can wake up and go to the office tomorrow - goodnight!

building steam with a grain of salt

Today was the real last day of vacation - last Tuesday was just a test run, since Wednesday and Thursday were minimally productive and I was hanging out with John and Jess Friday and Saturday. However, they left early this morning, so I had one final day to get some stuff done and settle back into some semblance of order before the chaos starts again.

I was far more productive than I usually am on Sundays - I got out of bed before 8:30 of my own volition, and spent the morning making lists of things I require in possible houses + researching printers + doing some bullet journaling. I had a noon meeting with my landlord, who is also a real estate agent - I'm considering buying a house, so I wanted to see if he would be a good fit for what I'm looking for. This is a tiny baby step toward the ultimate goal, but we had a good conversation. I still need to do some more thinking about what I want - the biggest question is whether I want a single family home in line with my subconscious Iowa desires, or if I want a duplex/townhouse with more modern features and minimal maintenance in line with my conscious time availability / maintenance abilities. I really don't want to share walls with anyone, but I also can't get a house on 80 acres in the area that I want to be in, so it's not like my inner Iowan will be satisfied anywhere here. And the places where I could get 80 acres would result in a long commute, and my inner Californian would be sad.

sssanyway, I probably won't solve that problem until I start looking at some properties and really understanding what the market looks like for each type of dwelling in my price range. After our meeting, I came home, did a bit of nothing, and then ran some errands, including grabbing a late lunch and buying a new printer. The printer became necessary a few months ago when I discovered that they no longer make drivers for my old printer that match any of my current operating systems, but I'd put it off until now. But I got a great black-and-white laser printer with wifi printing capability for $89.99 on sale at Staples, which happens to be one of the top-recommended printers on a bunch of consumer websites, so I'm pretty thrilled. Yes, I'm super dorky for being super thrilled about a printer, but you should know this by now.

Then I came home, called my parents, and then spent the evening setting up my printer and using it to print some inserts for my journal. And now I'm going to read a bit and go to bed, thus hopefully getting my week off on the right foot. Goodnight!

serial thrilla

Did I tell you that I bought an Audi? Yes? Well, I now have an even newer Audi. Surprise!

The thing I didn't say on the blog over the last month was that there were some irregularities (at least, in my mind) with the Audi that I bought a month ago vs. what the dealership had contractually agreed to. So, while I loved the car, I eventually lost my patience with them and sent a strongly worded email at five a.m. on Friday to the general manager of the Audi dealership, threatening to file a false advertising / false mileage / contractual failure complaint with the state + leaving negative reviews everywhere I could. The end result of this was that they swapped my original Audi for an even newer Audi - same trim, same features, same money, but none of the issues with the original.

Of course, that took time that I didn't really have to spare today - but I was in and out in about an hour, after signing all the paperwork and giving back my original and testing out the new one. They're functionally identical, and the dealership was profusely apologetic about my previous experience - so I forgive them and would recommend them in the future. And that's a good thing, since I adore my car and can see myself buying Audis in the future (provided that I continue to live a life of corporate whoredom, of course, in which case I will make myself feel better about the golden handcuffs by eventually upgrading to a sporty two-door coupe when my midlife crisis fully hits).

sssanyway. The rest of my day was uneventful - I got up in time for a 7:30am conference call (I do not recommend this), and then slogged until five, when I went to the dealership. I should have worked tonight, but instead I went to Pizzeria Locale and had two glasses of wine and some pizza and did some journaling in anticipation of my birthday (I like journaling on my birthday and reflecting upon my year, #sorrynotsorry). And now I should still be working, but I'm going to go to bed and hope that sleep will make me more productive in the morning - goodnight!