i'll drink to that

Actually, I won't drink to that; after last weekend's going-out-with-a-bang social activities, I'm attempting to adhere to the no-alcohol rule for the next few weeks. As a result, today was pretty lowkey. I slept somewhat fitfully until ten a.m. -- I had been sleeping wonderfully, until someone started scraping paint off the house behind my apartment promptly at eight a.m. when such noises are permitted in the city. Boo. Of course, he stopped just after I finally got out of bed, although he went back to it for most of the rest of the afternoon; I really hope that he decides to sleep in tomorrow, or else I will be quite annoyed.

The midday continued to be mildly frustrating; Terry had plans to go to lunch with some of her b-school friends, who were 90 minutes late to meet her (who does that?), which unwittingly inconvenienced me as well because I was holding off on showering until after they left because Terry was using their brute labor to bring her desk up two flights of stairs from our storage unit, and I didn't want to shower until I was done helping with that task and unpacking/repacking the storage room. However, I can't really complain (even though I just spent two run-on sentences complaining) -- they got the desk up here with minimal drama, which means the storage room has more usable space that I can promptly fill with the last couple of boxes from my room + Terry's bike. But by the time they left and I showered, made some vague effort to dry my hair, and left the house, I was an hour later than intended to Katrina and Geetika's joint birthday party in Dolores Park.

Dolores Park was the general ridiculousness that it always is, with people openly drinking and smoking pot, some illicit DJ putting on a random dance party, a dude wandering around selling pot-filled caramels, some guy spending an hour shaving intricate patterns into another guy's head (with a sarong as a hair cape), a bunch of frisbee players, Vidya being herself, and some people wearing animal masks. It was a cloudy day in the city, but it was still a nice way to spend a couple of hours, even if I did spend the early portion of my afternoon hating on one of the party guests whom I didn't know -- she was playing croquet badly and too aggressively for her skill level, and hit my foot hard with the ball twice and almost missed me twice more even though I kept trying to move away from her. I bitched about her unwittingly to her boyfriend, but I was annoyed enough that when he said she was his girlfriend, rather than apologizing profusely like I normally would (and like I did to the strangers who were assaulted by a rogue champagne cork from Katrina's first champagne-opening experience), I just told him "good luck with that". Ha.

Anyway, after the croquet set was put away and I felt like I was in a safe zone again (albeit a safe zone surrounded by strange people in animal masks), I had a good time. I hung out with Jess, Chandlord, Katrina, Adit, Raja, and a variety of other guests, including a girl who was John's aunt's friend's daughter and is visiting the city to decide whether she wants to move here. We ended up splitting from the group and discussing writing for awhile, since she's a freelance writer/writing teacher with an MFA and I'm a novelist (if one can call oneself a novelist if one hasn't sold a novel, bleh). sssanyway, the afternoon was lovely, but since I wasn't drinking because of the ulcer friend, I made my farewells, grabbed a sandwich to go from Morning Due Cafe (one of our old haunts from the days Adit and I lived together, which were less 'days of wine and roses' and more 'days of sandwiches and insults' - and wine, I suppose), and came back to the ultraevil Marina. Once here, I ate half my sandwich, and then Terry and I watched half of last week's Project Runway. She had to go out before the show was over, but I finished it like the trooper that I am, and now I'm contemplating going to bed early so that I can get some stuff done tomorrow. We all know how that story will turn out, so I won't leave you in suspense -- I probably won't get anything done, and will beat myself up about it afterward, which is why I have an ulcer. Charming, eh? Goodnight!

come - we have borscht

I had a v. low-energy day -- it started when I didn't want to crawl out of my cozy bed to drive through the fog to the south bay, and it didn't really improve from there. That's not to say that I didn't have fun; my training session with Alyssa was good, as usual, and you'll find out momentarily that I actually left the house tonight and did something entertaining (yay for me). But the salad I had at my beloved Joanie's Cafe made me feel slightly queasy, since my stomach is no longer hurting but isn't exactly perfect, and I was sleepy on the drive home, so I took a nap when I got here. I did eventually write a few pages of zee non-gargoyle young adult book, and I'm slowly figuring out what happens next, so hopefully I'll make some progress this weekend.

Terry got home from work and watched me eat some slightly stale bread with peanut butter (not that stale bread is better for my stomach, but it's what I had leftover from dinner on Monday), and then we walked over to Fort Mason to watch an improv show. We were going to check out the food trucks that are set up in Fort Mason on Friday nights, but since I didn't feel like eating, we just went straight to the theatre and grabbed seats. Lauren (aka Subz) and Nathan (aka Nathan) met us there, and we had a delightful time. It was a longer version of improv than I've seen before -- the show was two hours, and they improved an entire movie-length love story. There were parts that were truly hilarious, and there was one particularly attractive dude who looked a lot like Robert Pattinson and who also drove some of my favorite plot points, so score for that. The show basically managed to appeal to all my interests -- a love story set in the 1800s, with a guy who goes to India, and another guy who ends up kidnapping him and taking him to Moscow. Needless to say, I was utterly delighted. They're doing a Jane Austen themed improv show on my birthday, so you can guess where I'll be celebrating my thirtieth...

After the show, we grabbed cupcakes from a truck right before it closed down, and then Lauren and Nathan gave us a ride home. And now I should really consider going to bed, since I have grand plans to write tomorrow morning before attending to my exciting social calendar. Goodnight!

had a dream i was king -- i woke up, still king

I spent the entire day in the glorious south bay -- which wasn't entirely glorious, since I should have been writing in the evil city instead of bumming around my old haunts, but it ended on a high note, so I'll take it. I went down to train with Alyssa, of course; I was less sore than I expected from yesterday's brush with yoga, but Alyssa worked to ensure that I will be sore tomorrow. So, training with her in the morning should be fun. After we trained, I did another half hour of cardio while reading the first couple of chapters of "Game of Thrones", which I'm finally trying after hearing great things about the HBO adaptation of it earlier in the summer. So far, I really like it, and if it gets me to do more cardio whilst reading it, that would be a good thing.

After finishing cardio, I showered, changed into clean gym clothes, and hung out in the lobby for an hour reading a story for tonight's writing group and taking care of some other tings while drinking a smoothie (I'm such a yuppie). Then I had a stretching session with Brian (hence the decision to stick around the gym, which I don't usually do), who worked on my hamstrings and calves -- I'm pretty sure he bruised me, but I feel temporarily looser than I usually do, so hopefully that will help.

I finally left the gym and snuck over to my old place of work to kidnap Heather (aka dear respected madam) and take her to Starbucks for a blissful hour of gossiping. I hadn't seen her since before I went to Germany since her family was in town for two weeks right when I got back from my trip, so catching up with her before I go to Iowa next week was imperative. She was in reasonably good form, and I was quite happy to see her even though it was too short for my tastes. After I dropped her off, I grabbed a v. early dinner at Chipotle and worked on their patio for awhile; I had to relocate to another Starbucks to use their free wireless briefly, since I needed to upload a last-minute blog post for the group romance blog I'm part of, but at least I got some stuff done.

The reason I stuck around the south bay was because I had my writing group tonight. I'd taken the unusual (for me) step of sharing something that was still an early draft, with a lot of details still to be figured out -- they read the second chapter of my non-gargoyle top secret young adult project and gave me feedback. It was super helpful to see what they thought was working and what wasn't, and it's all good stuff to keep in mind as I keep pressing forward with the rough draft. Sadly, I'm still a long way from being done, but the idea has me v. excited, and it was good to get some validation that the writing group thought it was cool too. We also discussed a short story about Anglo-Indians, written by our host, which I quite enjoyed, and we all sat around and discussed writing and the industry and life until it was 9:30pm and I needed to get back to the evil city before collapsing.

Meeting with writing groups, whether it's this one or the romance writer community, always makes me feel very excited and eager to get cracking, so I'm a little resentful that I have to drive down to Palo Alto and train in the morning. But I'm keeping my weekend much freer than I did last weekend, so hopefully I'll make some serious progress. Now, though, I should sleep so that I can make it to the gym on time -- goodnight!

salaam namaste

I had a lovely day, even though I only wrote two pages -- but since those two pages were written with a fountain pen filled with Noodler's Widowmaker ink (Noodler's is the brand; Widowmaker is an awesome bloody red), it really felt like so much more. I got up in time for a conference call, which was the first one I've had in months and months. Since I agreed to plan the awards ceremony for next year's romance convention, I anticipate that I will have many more such calls in the next few months. The call was good, but it lasted an hour, and then I spent another hour and a half typing up my notes, putting together an email welcoming the committee to their new responsibilities, etc. Ah, the joys of work.

When I finished, I had just enough time to grab some water, a towel, and the yoga mat I bought yesterday before walking up the block to try yoga for the first time. Alyssa (aka the devil who tortures me) has told me multiple times that I should try yoga to improve my flexibility, and I finally gave in since there are many yoga studios in my neighborhood (since that's what Marina people do). This studio was quite nice; it's very small and intimate, and there were only eight people in the 12pm class, which was perfect. I had no idea what I was doing on a lot of it, and no fancy yoga mat could make up for how much I was sweating (although now I understand why people buy Lululemon yoga gear, if they think it will help), but I actually rather enjoyed it. Things I Hated and Now Love - 5328, Sara - 0. The intro deal was 3 sessions in the next ten days for $10, so I'll try to go a couple more times before heading back to Iowa next week, but since it's seriously one block away and not crowded at noon, I don't think going will be too much of a sacrifice.

After yoga, though, I basically collapsed on the couch and played with my ipad for an hour or two. I finally showered, sat down at my desk, took care of some more stuff, attempted to buckle down, and daydreamed about my book for awhile. I finally wrote my two pages, and the fact that the ink looked like my own blood was appropriate for how hard it's been to get the words out on this scene. Terry came home around seven and neither of us wanted to cook, so we went to Perry's, which is a restaurant a couple of blocks away that made me a mean grilled chicken BLT. When we got home, I typed up the pages that I'd written earlier, took care of some other stuff, checked in (briefly!) on my online game world, and should now consider sleep. I'm training with Alyssa tomorrow, which could either be great or terrible depending on how I feel post-yoga -- we shall see. Goodnight!

i just came to say hello

Today was much more productive than yesterday; I still didn't write a single word of the non-gargoyle YA book, but at least I didn't spend five hours playing online games. I made it down to the south bay in time to train Alyssa (well, mostly on time; getting out of the city was rough), who was in fine form. Then, I showered, grabbed a salad at Joanie's Cafe, and went to Borders to peruse the latest round of discounts. While I scored some great deals and walked away with eighteen books (a strange mishmash of YA, romance, and writing books), I'm not sure I'll go back -- it's just too depressing picking over the rotting carcass of my favorite bookstore.

After Borders, I drove back to the evil city, stopped at the grocery store to stock up on real food rather than the stuff I served at my dinner party last night, came home, and called my parents. I also spent some time researching yoga studios in my effort to check another thing off my list of activities that will turn me into a vile Marina yuppie, so I may go to one of them tomorrow depending on much I hate my soul and want to destroy it. And I'm not going to lie, I played a bit online, but it was nothing like yesterday. Terry showed up sometime, and we watched an episode of "Bones" and last week's "Project Runway" before I decided I'd had enough tv and came upstairs. I spent the last couple of hours preparing for a call that I have tomorrow -- I don't have 'calls' anymore like I did at work, but since I'm planning next year's awards ceremony at the romance writers convention, I'm going to have some calls this year to discuss it. The first one is tomorrow, and I think I'm prepped for it, but we'll see how it goes.

And now, I should go to bed; even if I do have a call and the possibility of yoga tomorrow, I need to get myself back in gear and create some serious wordcount for my novel. Goodnight!

kiss me til you're drunk and i'll show you

I am horribly ashamed of myself today - I started off with all these great intentions, and then I got sucked into the online ripoff equivalent of "Civilization" on Google+ and wasted several hours. I've been craving a good game of Civilization (I should be ashamed to admit this, but if you've read any entries over the past eight or nine years, you know that I'm a dork), but the latest Civ apparently doesn't work well on a mac, so I've never bought it. I got way more into this online thing than I had any reason to, though, particularly since it's not nearly as strategic and involved as Civilization (which may be a good thing).

Suffice it to say that while I did stop long enough to go downstairs, clean the kitchen, and eat the leftover half of my burrito last night, I didn't really pull myself out of my stupor until 3:30. At that point, it was imperative for me to shower, go to the grocery store, and start preparing for the dinner party I threw tonight. As it turns out, I made way too much food, as always, although I blame this miscalculation on the fact that Adit didn't show up and neither Tom nor Julie ate much because they'd both stayed home sick today. But, Priyanka, Tom, and Julie came over, and Terry ate with us, so it was still quite fun despite the disasters. I made my old, easy standbys - caprese salad with those awesome roasted tomatoes, truffle butter pasta, and strawberry shortcake - and the evening overall was a success.

And now, I must do whatever it takes to keep from wasting hours on online games; I'd managed not to play a single game on Facebook, and now suddenly I'm exactly what I snubbed before (which is pretty much the story of my life). I have to go to Palo Alto to train with Alyssa tomorrow, but I have grand plans to come back early and write like made tomorrow -- we'll see how much I get done. Goodnight!

and aim for my heart if you feel like

Today was a lovely cap to a hectic weekend -- I'm glad that the weekend progressed as it did, but I do wish that I'd gotten a chance to write today in my brief downtime between events. I slept fitfully last night, as expected since I had been drinking and was sleeping on a daybed in Adit and Priyanka's living room -- I don't sleep well if I've been drinking and I can't sleep in strangers' beds, so once the first exhaustion wore off, I woke up a little after eight and just laid there dozing until Chris and Connie woke up. We sat around and chatted for awhile, but Adit and Priyanka never materialized, so we finally left. I needed food, so I walked down the block to the Castro Samovar in search of some food and caffeine. Unfortunately, I thought my chai was much worse than all the version of chai that I've had there, like the milk had been scalded. Also, the service was generally quite bad, led by the greeter who had the poor judgment necessary to wear a red thong under v. thin white linen pants (with a belly-baring button down tank top).

So I eventually fled the Castro, came home, caught up online, and slept for a copule of hours. Then Pincus called, which was an excellent motivator to get out of bed, through the shower, and out on the street to meet him. We actually met at Adit's, even though he wasn't there, because the parking situation is better than it would be here. We walked around the Castro and through Dolores Park for an hour or so, and since Adit still wasn't back from his afternoon event, we then drove to my place, toured about, and spent some quality time talking about life. Adit and Priyanka showed up sometime around 7pm, and we spent the usual ridiculous amount of time that it requires us to make dinner plans. We'd finally settled on Tacolicious, but a block down the street, Adit mentioned "60 Minutes", I expressed disappointment at not being included even though I had walked away from our roommate relationship in the past, and then suddenly we had turned around and were on our way back to the Mission amongst much laughter.

I must say that Papalote's is an excellent burrito shop, and their homemade salsa is the best thing I've tasted in an age. So we hung out there, ate, and went back to Adit and Priyanka's apartment to watch "60 Minutes". Yes, we're old. I came home before watching "Entourage", though, and with the realization that I've barely slept the last two nights and haven't done any writing, I'm going to go to bed now and hit it hard tomorrow so that I can have fun in the evening. Goodnight!

to the window, to the wall

I am high on life (read: drunk on wine), tired, and about to sleep on Adit and Priyanka's daybed. I could have slept in their guest room, but Chris and Connie are already asleep there, so I will have to make do.

Sssanyway, I only slept a few hours last night before waking up and going to Berkeley for the monthly romance writers meeting. the meeting was great, all about professionalism in one's writing career (which I'm guessing does not count ignoring an ulcer to get drunk and then blog, but I digress). My friend Becky came to the meeting, we stayed for a great lunch afterward, and I v. stupidly voluntereed to be the VP of programs next year, because I'm a sucker for punishment.

After the meeting, I drove home, which took 75mins due to ridiculous traffic on the bay bridge, and then came to Adit's to help him cook since Priyanka was still sleeping. We made risotto and a pesto pasta, and Priyanka woke up in time to fry some pakoras. Tom, Julie, their former roommate, Chris, Connie, and another one of adit's friends showed up over the next couple of hours, and we had an extended dinner party (wrapping up with a giant Mrs. Fields cookie that Chris had inscribed with "bite me koolwal", ha). Eventually, we relocated to Dolores Park, where we saw a free outdoor screening of Jaws. And then we lost Chris and Connie to blissful slumber while the rest of us went to a bar and had far more alcohol than was advisable. We lost Tom and Julie at the bar, but Adit, Priyanka and I then went to a diner and tried to stave off hangovers with fried breakfast food (I anticipate no success). And now I'm staying the night rather than trying to find a taxi home, so hopefully I sleep okay despite my sins. Goodnight!

storms are brewing in your eyes

I need to get up in less than six hours, which is criminal, so I shall be as brief as possible. I made it down to Palo Alto just in time for my ten a.m. training session with Alyssa, which was a miracle given how much I didn't want to get out of bed. Alyssa found new and creative ways to torture me, but I left feeling victorious. After I showered, I went to Joanie's and had my usual cobb salad (they know what I want as soon as I walk in), then spent an hour trying to run my errand for the day -- finding bolts for my patio table. I tried to be good and frequent a local non-chain hardware store, but was punished for my do-gooder nature because they only had three bolts in the size I needed, and I needed 24. However, I did get them to make spare keys for our apartment, which we'd been meaning to do for awhile, so it wasn't a total wash. And then I proceeded to Home Depot, where the bolts I needed came in packages of 3 or 4 for $1.15 (nuts included), instead of the $0.55/bolt (not including nuts) at the local place. And we wonder why small businesses struggle...granted, I would have bought from the small place because they actually tried to help me find what I needed, but it ended up being cheaper to go to Home Depot, buy and rip open a couple of bags of bolts to make sure they were the right size, and then procure the rest.

Armed with $8 of bolts, I came back to the city of sin and put together our patio table -- so now (or perhaps after I clean the cobwebs off of it) we can sit on the roof deck and enjoy the fine California weather. Then I spent some quality time chatting with friends online, which I almost never ever do, so that was good. I also made some more notes about zee gargoyle book; I brainstormed at lunch and I've been thinking about it quietly in the background all the time, so I think I'm close to understanding what happens next. That's the danger of going into the book without a clear plot -- sometimes I have to stop and let things percolate, which always feels like laziness even though there really isn't another option at that point.

Eventually, though, I had to get ready and go out. My friend Jenni (whose fiance passed away this spring) just moved to the city with Lauren (not Subz - my old boss from a million years ago who was really more like a friend than a boss), and they invited me, Durand, and two of Lauren's b-school friends to an inaugural dinner party at their new place. They would only be a 10-15min walk from me, but as it's straight uphill, I drove instead and spent as much time looking for parking as I would have walking, but I arrived non-sweaty, so that was worth it. I had a totally fabulous time; it was great to see Lauren, Jenni and Durand, as usual, and Durand and I hit it off with the b-school friends quite well (to the point that I told two people I had just met a few hours earlier that I once baked a cake, decorated it to look like Poland, and then 'partitioned' it at a Germans vs. Austrians theme party, which is usually not something I divulge right off the bat as it makes me look crazy). I didn't get home until 1am, sort of forgetting until I was in my car that I'm supposed to be in Berkeley at 8:15am to meet some people before the monthly romance writers meeting. Ugh. So I should really, really go to bed -- goodnight!

not so fireproof

Today was extremely lackluster; I just need to accept that I probably have one day a week in which I am completely useless so that I give up on it earlier and do other things. I just barely made it down to Palo Alto in time to train with Alyssa, which went well despite my utter lack of desire to be there. Then I ran some errands, had lunch at Chipotle, and came back to the evil city with the intention of going grocery shopping. But, there was unexpectedly annoying traffic on the final approach to the bridge, and by the time I got into the city proper, I was in no mood to go to the store and then fight my way back across town to my apartment.

So, I came home with the intention of writing -- and instead read some profiles of 9/11 victims' families ten years later (happy birthday to me!) in the New York Times, then took a nap. I tried again to write when I woke up, failed again, finally threw in the towel, made dinner (including some undercooked hamburger, which hopefully will not make my stomach worse -- my dream is that the bacteria kills whatever is in my stomach without killing me in the process), and started rereading Susan Cooper's OVER SEA, UNDER STONE, which is the first book in her THE DARK IS RISING series. It's one of the classic works of children's fantasy, and since I'm trying to figure out how to pace the beginning of my non-gargoyle series so that I reveal just enough information to clarify without revealing so much that it either takes away suspense or makes the story drag, this was good research.

Sadly, it kind of sucks that I now view so much of my reading life as research -- I basically took the activity that I enjoy more than any other and made it a duty, which is rather unfortunate. Sometimes it's awesome (i.e. I can spend two hours watching "Highlander" and say I was working!), but on nights when I'm not in a particularly good mood, my old standby of reading a good book doesn't always soothe me. Still, I'm not going to complain about getting to read whatever I want, and I need to spend more time doing it given the extreme piles of unread books sitting around waiting for me. But now, I'm going to go to bed; I'm training again tomorrow, so I should really get some sleep. Goodnight!

when you have to purchase mad d batteries

I'm falling asleep over my laptop, so this shall be exceedingly brief. I slept in longer than I should have this morning, but that's the consequence of going to bed at 1:30am. So I didn't have time to make it to the gym this morning, but I did drive down to Palo Alto and get my blood drawn for the tests my doctor wanted to run to figure out what's going on with my stomach. Then, I scurried over to my old place of employment to have lunch with the dude who replaced me. It's been more than two months since I was last on campus, but it still felt like home -- enough so that I was v. annoyed when the receptionist wouldn't let me through the secure doors to use the bathroom, even though it's her job to keep riff raff like me out. The dude seemed nice, and his excitement about the job at the beginning of his tenure seemed proportionate to the apathy I felt at the end of mine, so I suppose it's good that the big boss has him instead of me, right?

After I left campus, I went to Starbucks and played around with my consulting website for awhile. Then, I decided to go to the other campus of my youth so that I could write at the Stanford library. I took a break when I first got there and talked to Katie (happy birthday, Katie!), and then I managed to crank out six pages this afternoon -- not the twelve that I was hoping for, but I'll take it. Then, I grabbed dinner at the CoHo, drove back to the evil city, and spent the last couple of hours procrastinating, talking to Terry, and rereading the first segment of my manuscript before starting to fall asleep. I'm almost 20% of the way through the first draft, which is great progress, and things are quickly heading towards the first major turning point of the book, so I hope my sanity will survive it.

And now I'm off to bed -- I have to go down to the glorious south bay (which is feeling less glorious) again tomorrow to train with Alyssa, and then I need to write before the story kills me. Goodnight!

beating like a drum and it's coming your way

No writing today, and I just stayed up way too late messing around with my website -- shame on me. But, the day wasn't a total wash. I made it down to the south bay in time to train with Alyssa, so that was lovely. Then, I visited my doctor about my stomach issues; she wasn't able to diagnose me completely, and so I'm going to get some bloodwork done tomorrow, but she went ahead and gave me more acid blockers since I'd responded well to that before. The sad news is that I'm supposed to stop all alcohol, caffeine, mint, chocolate, etc. for the next few weeks, which is going to make me v. grumpy indeed. But, if this is fixed just by taking an acid blocker for a few weeks while my stomach heals, I'll do it without complaining (too much).

After the doctor, I grabbed a quick lunch and drove down even further into the glorious south bay - past the point of glory, actually, since I was down somewhere around Los Gatos. My dentist is down there, and even though he's now over fifty miles from my new house, I'm staying loyal. So, I got my teeth cleaned, and a clean bill of health with no cavities for something like the fifteenth year in a row. Then, I made my way back up to the evil city, where I procrastinated a bit until Terry got home. Neither of us felt like cooking, so we went over to Unwind, which is a bar/food place a block away from us (we're so adventurous). We caught up over sandwiches, then came home and ended up watching Disney's "Beauty and the Beast", which was kind of hilarious. Then she went to bed and I worked on my consulting website until suddenly realizing that I needed to sleep if I had any hope of making it down to the glorious south bay in time to get to the lab tomorrow.

So that's life for today - I will endeavor to be more interesting tomorrow. Goodnight!

i got the moves like jagger

I was v. productive today - I don't expect the rest of the week to fall in line like today did, but I'll take what I've got. I didn't get out of bed until almost ten a.m., but I still managed to write 3029 words (12 pages), do two loads of laundry, work out, watch "The Highlander" (the movie, not the series, starring Sean Connery in a supporting role in which he plays an Egyptian/Spaniard who sounds like Sean Connery) as research for my book, respond to a whole bunch of email that I'd been shamefully neglecting, and read a chapter of "The Secret History of the World," which is all about conspiracies and thus v. good for my young adult non-gargoyle romance. I also watched the last episode of Craig's trip to Paris from last week, which was an excellent culmination of a fantastic series of shows. And I even showered somewhere in there, so I'll count that all as a smashing success. If I could write 3000 words every day...

...but I can't, and I shouldn't be going there because then I will be horribly disappointed with myself when I don't do it again tomorrow and will end up ironing my hands or something as punishment. Tomorrow will not be nearly as productive since I'm going to be running around the entire time -- I've got training with Alyssa, followed by a doctor's appointment to find out what's going on with my ulcer friend, followed by a dentist's appointment that I've already rescheduled three times, followed by the potential for dinner in the glorious south bay. If you didn't discern any appreciable writing time in there, you would be correct. So, I'm going to go to bed now and try to get up early to write before going to the gym. I know, if you had a nickel for every time you heard me claim that I was going to get up early, you could buy a whole *chain* of hotels in Bratislava. But really, I might actually do it this time. Goodnight!

i blame myself for being too much like somebody else

I wrote six pages today; I'm not in love with it, but it will do for now. I'm in this weird dead-feeling patch of the manuscript where I need to set up whatever the main quest is for the rest of the book, but since I don't know what the quest is, they're sort of wandering around talking and failing to get to the point. That means I know I'll edit a lot of this out, but if they don't wander in the wilderness, I'll never figure out where they're going, and the story will die on the vine. Isn't that dramatic?

So I got out of bed sometime after ten, showered, ate some appropriately invalid-y food, made a lot of tea, and tried to fix our internet router. While I was fixing the router, I also installed the expanded hard drive for the Tivo, so we have an additional terabyte of storage -- yay for more saved episodes of Craig Ferguson in my future. I managed to write in the afternoon despite almost getting sucked into watching tv with Terry's sister, who was hanging out here this afternoon -- my fortitude at walking away from a television was amazing. I threw in the towel on the writing when it was time to call my parents, and after talking to them, I slunk back to the tv and watched an awesome Craig episode in which he visited Versailles. Then, I walked down to the heart of the Marina to pick up a salad (verdict: would have been great if the dressing hadn't been chock full of dill, which I still can't eat without having bad flashbacks to Ukraine), came back, watched some "Mad Men" and "Bones" with Terry, and then pretended to write for the rest of the evening. I say "pretended" because I would look at the manuscript for a bit and then conveniently remember something that I needed to do, so I didn't add many words.

But, I shall add words tomorrow; I'm not going to Palo Alto, so I have the whole day ahead of me to write as much as I please. I expect that means I will write nothing and be severely disappointed in myself, but I will attempt to avoid my usual fate. Goodnight!

by the time you hear this i will have already spiralled up

I didn't write a single word today, which means tomorrow is going to need to be crazy productive - hopefully I dream of some plots tonight so that I can make progress. But despite the lack of writing, I had a lovely day; I woke up around ten, showered, ate my ulcer-friendly bagel for breakfast, and started staring at the manuscript. I hadn't looked at it very long before it was time to get ready for Natasha and Chris's baby shower; it feels liks just yesterday that I was at their wedding shower in the same place (Natasha's parents' house in Belmont), and now they're about to pop out a kid. Craziness. Anyway, the baby shower was super fun. I saw a lot of people from work that I hadn't seen in awhile (since Natasha's birthday party in April, to be exact), and I love Natasha's family, so that was fun. They hired some people to cater the equivalent of a taco truck, with a grill and a whole condiments spread set up in the driveway, and I'm happy to report that the ulcer let me eat two small quesadillas (one with chicken, and one with the riskier carnitas - but they were small and I spaced them out, so they snuck under the ulcer's radar). Natasha is a super cute pregnant lady, as expected, and they're going to be v. entertaining parents, so hopefully everything goes well.

After the baby shower, Terry and I came back up to the city, and I sat down at the desk and procrastinated for a bit before thinking about writing. But then I made arrangements with Jessica for her to come over for dinner, with pizza and Anthony and Dormain in tow, so I spent an hour cleaning the apartment instead. I hadn't seen Anthony and Dormain in ages; they've gotten married since I saw them last, but otherwise they seem to be the same as always (entertaining and ridiculously cute). They circled for parking forever, but eventually made it up to the house, where we spent a couple of hours enjoying pizza, wine, homemade cookies (with peanut flour - who knew?), and tea. After they left, Terry and I watched an episode of Bones, which would have been better if I hadn't immediately guessed the killer, and now I"m going to go to bed early in hopes of writing a million words tomorrow. Goodnight!

there's a countdown waiting for me to erupt

Even though I was loath to get out of bed this morning, I made it down to the glorious south bay in time to train with Alyssa. We didn't get much training done; today was one of our periodic reassessment days in which we measure everything, set goals, etc. Since I haven't been in town much for the past few months, the main goal was just to maintain everything, but now that I'm looking at some extended time in California (with the exception of the twelve days I'm spending in Iowa at the end of the month), we've set some aggressive goals. Of course, all the stuff we discussed related to diet is directly dependent on whether I'm allowed to eat anything after I meet with my doctor on Tuesday -- I'm really hoping that it's an easily treatable ulcer that doesn't require long-term changes to what I eat, but we shall see.

The ulcer friend was pretty quiet today, but I barely fed it, so that seemed to starve it into submission. I'm basically living off of bread until I go to the doctor, which seems to be working. So I wrapped up at the gym, ran an errand to Target, grabbed a bread product at Starbucks for lunch, came back to the city of sin, and attempted to write this afternoon. I only got in four pages, which wasn't as much as I intended, but I'm kind of stuck because I've hit a wall (literally; the heroine's back is against a wall in a dead-end alley) and need to figure out where the next few chapters are going. I even took a break to clean my bathroom in hopes that that would inspire me (since it would be great to stop cleaning the bathroom because I needed to write -- it's a great excuse), but no dice. Eventually, I took a longer break and watched last night's episode of "Project Runway". And, Terry came home and we watched an episode of Craig, so it was all good. And then I came upstairs and wrote two pages of notes on where the story is going, so hopefully I can start writing again tomorrow.

But now I need to sleep; I'm increasing my wordcount goals aggressively for next week, and I need to start immediately. Maybe it's crazy, but I want to see if I could write this book in a couple of months if I really set my mind to it, and the only way to do that is to double my current daily wordcount averages. Doable, yes; likely, not so much. We shall see, though -- goodnight!

i don't switch up i just laugh

I'm counting today as a positive disaster -- there were some rather negative aspects that are currently clouding my memories, but all in all, things went well. I'll get the negative out of the way right now: I didn't write anything (although I did do some brainstorming), and my ulcer friend is back and trying to eat through my stomach wall so that it can kill me (the fact that I'm anthropomorphizing my ulcer friend isn't worrisome at all, right?). The ulcer friend is much more negative than the writing, obvi; I thought that perhaps, perhaps it wasn't as bad as it had been when I was in Germany, but I pushed my luck tonight and ate meatloaf, and I spent the entire drive back to the city shifting around in pain and worrying that every cough (from the unrelated still-healing cold) was going to end in vomiting all over my dress. Yay.

Enough drama about my ulcer friend, though. As I said, the rest of the day was good. I trained with Alyssa, which was both good and bad; since I'm still recovering from a whole host of ailments, I think I'm running a slight, lowgrade fever, and the workout overheated me. Fifteen minutes in a cold shower solved that, though, and I took my time dolling myself up before going to Joanie's for lunch, since I thought I might be able to tolerate a salad (I was, which is why I got cocky and ate meatloaf later). I did some brainstorming there for zee gargoyles, so it was all v. nice and leisurely. Eventually, though, I took care of the errand that I was dreading and went to the AT&T store to beg for them to restore my unlimited data plan. As it turns out, it was the best customer service experience I've had in awhile; I didn't have to wait in line, they didn't argue with me about it at all, they switched it back immediately, and the rep even texted me an hour later to say that he'd checked the status in the system and it was all worked out. So yay for them -- if all their service was like that, they'd have a much different reputation these days.

After that errand, I sat in a parking lot and called United to fix the other debacle from yesterday. That woman was also v. nice, and fifteen minutes later, she was able to issue the ticket I was trying to purchase yesterday, so I was quite pleased. And then, I took care of some more stuff before heading over and picking up Irish Matt, who was in town for a few days and suggested that we get together. Longtime readers of this blog know that Irish Matt does not bring out the best of my temperance when it comes to drinking, but I managed to confined myself to two glasses of sauvignon blanc over four hours, which is pretty good for me when I'm hanging out with him. I took him to Cafe Borrone, and we spent some quality time sitting in the sun (well, the shade near the sun) on the patio, which was utterly lovely. Then, we walked across the street to the Oak City Grill, where I had my ill-fated matchup with a v. delicious beef/veal/pork meatloaf. I dropped him off at his hotel just before my stomach started hurting in earnest, which was perfect timing since I would have been v. poor company after that.

But, my stomach is feeling better than it was in the car; it's by no means perfect yet, but I'm sure sleep will help. Tomorrow it's back to my bread and water diet in an attempt to control the problem until my doctor's appointment on Tuesday -- I live such a wild and crazy life. Goodnight!

grave digger

It was another productive day; I fell approximately one hundred words short of my daily goal, but I'm going to let it slide in the interest of getting some sleep, and will plan to make it up tomorrow. I made it out the door a little before ten and spent a couple of hours at La Boulange, where I ate some v. bland bread-type breakfast in the interest of nursing my ulcer whilst writing some of zee gargoyle romance novel. I came home because I wanted to sit in the comfort of my own home while finishing up my writing goal, but when I got here, I discovered that the Nexus S phone was free for today only. After researching my options online, I realized that I needed to go into a Best Buy store to buy it if I wanted to keep my unlimited data plan, since I couldn't keep it by ordering online. I also discovered that the only store in my general vicinity with phones in stock was in Marin. So, I drove over the Golden Gate Bridge, spent an hour in the Best Buy in Marin, and walked out with a sleek new phone. Of course, the rep fucked it up and somehow gave me only 2Gb of data with an 'upgrade' to 1000 texts/month, which is why my bill was the same price as it had been before (which is the only number he gave me to verify that I was still paying the same amount/supposedly getting the same service). So, I'll have to call AT&T tomorrow, but at least the phone is sweet.

I swung by the grocery store on the way home to buy more bland bread products, then spent the late afternoon on the phone with United buying a ticket home in August (and that rep seems to have fucked up as well, given that after twenty minutes on the phone, the reservation in my account says it's "on hold - purchase by 11:59pm EDT on August 4" - so I get to call United sometime before/after I call AT&T tomorrow). I did a bit more writing as well, but I threw in the towel when Terry came home, and I sincerely hope I dream up a plot for the next chapter tonight, since I have no idea what happens next. When Terry got home, we drank some wine (prob a bad idea, but my ulcer isn't officially diagnosed), watched another episode of Craig in Paris (love!), and watched an episode of Bones.

All in all, it was shaping up to be a quiet night, and I was about to knock out the last hundred words of my daily goal when Adit called, asking if I was going to Julie's birthday party. I wasn't super psyched about leaving the house, as evidenced by the fact I'd been in my pajamas since four p.m., but while Terry went to bed (lucky girl), I rallied, threw on some clothes, and grabbed a cab (see: earlier wine consumption) to Julie/Tom/Rat's place. There were ~14 people there, but it was quite lowkey, particularly for them. Chandlord showed up as well, and a v. good time was had by all, with a lot of talk of a lot of topics that I shall not repeat here. Adit, Chandlord and I left sometime after midnight and got pizza (mistake: I was quite hungry, given my half-starved day, but my ulcer friend didn't like pizza), and then I took a cab back to the foggy Marina.

And now, I should sleep; I'm training with Alyssa tomorrow, I have several annoying calls/errands to make, and then I'm writing somewhere in the glorious south bay so that I can be productive before my dinner plans down there. Goodnight!

i had my spit glands removed during the war

Today was a v. productive day culminating in an awesome Craig episode and a mild resurgence of zee ulcer, so overall I'm counting it as a victory. I drove down to the glorious south bay to train with Alyssa, and I was on time despite taking time to eat breakfast this morning, which was rather miraculous. It was v. good to see her; the advantage/disadvantage of being on time is that she can force me to do more exercises, and while it felt good to work out (shocking, I know), my still-recovering cold/ulcer-ravaged body was quite winded/overheated by the end of it. Still, it was good to be back. We're going to reassess and set a new baseline on Friday and come up with plans for the next month, and I'm excited to have some sort of routine. Also, according to the scale at Equinox, my ulcer helped me to lose six pounds whilst in Germany, so I'm going to start calling it my ulcer friend until my doctor tells me otherwise next week.

After working out, I took a cooling shower, dried my hair, and went to Joanie's Cafe (the love of my life) to have a cobb salad and brainstorm what happens next in my gargoyle romance novel (sans gargoyles). Then, I went to downtown Palo Alto and checked out the liquidation sale at Borders, which made me quite depressed. Borders was my absolutely favorite store as a child, and I basically hoarded whatever money I could get so that I could buy books there whenever my parents took me to the one in Des Moines. So, I'm quite sad that they couldn't get their act together. The liquidation sale isn't in super final closeout mode yet, and so the books I got were only 20-30% off, but I still walked away with an odd mix of history (mostly middle ages/secret societies), romance, and young adult, all of which will feed into my eccentricities. I also ran into Alana, an old coworker (in the 'we worked together for seven years' meaning, not the 'elderly' meaning) who is currently on maternity leave, so we caught up briefly in the dying light of the store (which is cutting back on A/C and lighting and no longer offers bathrooms, which I suppose is another way to cut costs). I'll have to go back next week and see what's been priced lower, but at this point I just hope it dies quickly rather than lingering on in pain.

My stomach felt pretty queasy after lunch, and so I bailed on the v. tentative plan I had to have dinner with Jessica and instead came back to the evil city, where I nursed my vaguely pain-filled stomach while writing in bed. I later relocated to Starbucks to eat a plain bagel for an early dinner, since I didn't think my spaghetti sauce from last night was going to make my stomach happy, and I kept writing until a little after seven. All in all, I wrote ten pages today, which was enough to make me feel quite smug. That meant that I could veg in front of the tv tonight without feeling guilty. And veg I did...

...and I saw the best thing ever, which was last night's episode of Craig Ferguson in Paris. He's in Paris all week, and if last night's episode is any indication, this whole week is going to be a winner. He really is an amazingly funny, inventive dude; rather than having a stage or a location or whatever, he did several interviews outdoors on card tables set up in random spots, and also did interviews on an open-top bus and in a restaurant (replete with a waiter setting and clearing plates around them as they spoke). It was the most awesome thing I've seen in forever, so you know what I'll be watching the rest of the week. Then, I watched a rerun of "NCIS: Los Angeles" that I hadn't seen, did some stuff online, and am now going to go to bed. I don't have to go anywhere tomorrow, but I want to see if I can hit ten pages again -- a girl can dream. Goodnight!

i'm on the edge with you

I treated today like my first day back at work - I even put on manager pants and a sweater, despite the fact that I had no plans to leave the house. Of course, I didn't get out of bed until almost eleven, but I blame my lingering cough for that. When I did get out of bed, I showered, made myself both lunch and dinner (hamburger + corn for lunch, and spaghetti sauce for dinner since I needed to use up the rest of the hamburger before it went bad), ate, and then sat at my desk and stared at my manuscript. I eventually wrote six pages, which is my daily goal right now, so I was pleased about that. But, I don't know exactly what happens next, and so progress ground to a halt so that I could give my subconscious a chance to come up with a story.

When I stopped writing, I called my parents to make up for not talking to them yesterday due to the timing of book club. Then I tried to write some more, but didn't get very far, and so I threw in the towel. I was making my spaghetti when Terry got home, and so we hung out while making and eating our dinners. Then we watched an episode of "Bones", and then I spent a bit of time considering the secondary character who popped up at the end of the chapter I just finished so that I can write the next chapter tomorrow.

But now, I should sleep; I'm training with Alyssa tomorrow, which should be fun and painful, so I should get some rest. Goodnight!

i want a new drug

I awoke at six a.m., which may be a sign that the jet lag is still having a subtle effect on my sleeping patterns -- I wasn't able to go back to sleep, which is rare for me, so I laid in bed for three hours going down some rabbit holes on Wikipedia. I eventually got up, did the dishes, took a shower, made some breakfast, ate said breakfast, and was still in my chair at my desk by eleven with the intention of writing.

And despite that intention, I still tried to avoid it. I checked Google +; I checked Twitter; I checked Facebook; I chatted with Ritu Rani; I checked the social media triumvirate again; I copied my to do list from my notebook to my whiteboard; and I typed up the scenes that I'd written in longhand while I was traveling. Eventually, though, I pulled myself out of the procrastination morass and forced myself to write, and I turned out 1500 words (six pages), which ain't so shabby. Figuring out what to reveal and how to reveal it in the opening chapters of my non-gargoyle romance is going to be tricky, but at least I love a challenge, right?

I finally needed a break, though, so I walked to Starbucks, grabbed a latte, came home, and tried to call my parents. They weren't home, so I did some researching of women's names, then started reading up on famous weapons. I did talk to my parents for a few minutes eventually, but it was only to tell them that I couldn't talk because I was on my way to book club (sorry parents!). Book club was quite fun again; Lauren (aka Subz) wasn't able to make it because she was in Tahoe for the weekend, but Vidya, Terry, Katrina and I met at Katrina's to discuss this month's book -- BOSSYPANTS by Tina Fey. I think we all agreed that it was too light to really have grievances with; we all seemed to enjoy it, and yet we also wished there was more of a narrative thread or perhaps more substance or something. But, as the point of the book club is to drink, we succeeded, and a good time was had by all.

Post book club, I got a call/text from Katie, who said that a coworker of her sister's was in town and was looking for someone to get a drink with. I thought I was doing him a favor (although it turns out that Katie's sister is also in town and could have hung out with him, but foisted him on me instead -- well played), so despite my lingering cough and the fact that I got up at six a.m., I agreed to meet up. So, I dropped Katrina off at the bar, took Terry home (where we quickly grabbed food), and then took a cab back to the bar to hang out with Katrina and two of her friends. The friends ended up being total rockstars; I want to start a romance book club with one of them, and the other makes elaborate themed-food Oscars parties that sound v. reminiscent of my Olympics extravaganzas. Needless to say, we all got along swimmingly, and it's probably a good thing that one of them had to leave before the guy showed up, or we would have totally overwhelmed him. But, he was nice and the conversation was fun for an hour, which was all I could take before it was time to return to the Marina and my lovely bed.

And now, I shall sleep; my whole plan tomorrow is to write and catch up on bills, all of which is v. necessary. Goodnight!

moon river

I'm still sick, and so shirked the only task I had for the day (driving down to the southernmost part of the glorious south bay for a picnic in honor of the friend who passed away three months ago). That may make me a terrible person, but given how much I was coughing this morning, it was probably for the best. Instead, I got up, ate some breakfast, watched some tv with Terry (the last two thirds of "Mamma Mia", which I find vastly entertaining), and eventually wandered upstairs to shower and do some work. I didn't get any writing done today, but I did start trying to pin down a name for my female lead character - she's got a couple of different working names going, but I feel like I should know her name before I start writing her in earnest. Or maybe that's just the procrastination talking - I shall write tomorrow whether I know her name or not.

Even though I wasn't feeling well, I was craving Mexican food (which I hadn't had in ages, given my trips to Germany and New York), and so I conned Terry into dinner. We stopped by the mall first so that she could use some points that were expiring tomorrow, and I refrained from buying anything (mostly because current 'fashion' with the flowy dropped waists makes me look frumpy and oversized, not because I was being particularly good about expenses). After the mall, we had Mexican food, stopped at the grocery store, and came home. Then, Lisa and Doug (and their daughter Ellie) showed up for a surprise visit; they're in town from LA for the weekend and wanted to see the place, which we duly showed them. Then, Doug took Ellie back to the hotel, while Terry, Lisa and I sat around and discussed life for an hour or two.

And now, I shall go to bed; if I'm going to get to a solid draft by October 1, there's no time to waste. Goodnight!

deceitful country

I should be at Adit and Priyanka's housewarming party, and I've no doubt that I will hear incessant complaints about my absence, but I just couldn't rally my cold-struck self for the monumental task of getting there, being friendly, and coming back. Adit called me this morning while I was still in bed to harass me about whether I was coming or not, and I assured him that I would, but as the day progressed, the chances diminished considerably.

Yes, I've reached the extremely whiny phase of my illness. I did make a doctor's appointment, but as it's not until the 9th of August, I have a feeling that we will be discussing my ulcer rather than my cold (unless the cold is still around in a week and a half, in which case it will certainly need to be discussed). I also made some efforts toward finishing the task of unpacking my room; there are still two boxes that I haven't unpacked during the last three moves, so I'm not sure what to do with them, and I need to hang photos, put away the last bits of office supplies, and sort all the mail that's come in over the past month. But, the room is close to livable, which means I should be able to start writing next week (or hopefully this weekend) without feeling like I'm living in a sty.

My efforts exhausted me, though, and I took a nap from 6:30 to 7:30 in an attempt to rally for the party. 7:30 turned to 8:30, and I dragged myself into the shower hacking and coughing -- which Terry apparently heard, since she returned from LA while I was trying to wake up. I'd already decided I couldn't go, but when I stumbled downstairs in search of strong, sweet mint tea, she confirmed it with one horrified look at my ill self. So, I sat on the couch and drank my sweet mint tea while watching last night's premiere of "Project Runway" with her -- not my original plan for the night, but much more suited for my stamina.

And now, I shall go to bed, and hopefully I'll get past the whiny stage tomorrow, even though I'm still deep enough into the illness that it will probably be at least a few more days before I'm feeling better. Sigh. Goodnight!

my heart's a stereo

The jetlag + the cough are hitting me hard, so even though it's not quite ten o'clock, I'm going to call it a night. I forced myself to be moderately productive today, despite my general wishes; I got out of bed around ten a.m., after sleeping for eleven hours, showered, dried my hair, and went to Samovar to indulge in one last meal of happiness since I needed to go grocery shopping and was too hungry to wait until after lunch. Samovar was lovely, as usual, and I did a bit of brainstorming for the gargoyle book, so I'm glad I went. After Samovar, I went to Container Store and picked up some glass canisters for my teas, then went to Whole Foods and stocked up on a bunch of stuff I was out of.

After the grocery store, I realized that I had perhaps overexerted myself, and so I took a bit of a nap - not long enough to completely screw my attempts to get back onto normal time, but long enough to keep me sane. And then I spent the rest of the afternoon/evening trying to straighten out my cluttered bedroom, with a break to make some white chili for supper, so all in all it was a good day.

But, I'm now falling asleep on my laptop, and I should post this before I turn incoherent. Goodnight!

back when ain't nobody listened to my mix tape

Today was v. long - it started out in our apartment in Berlin and continued through two trains from Berlin to Frankfurt, several hours of hanging out in the Frankfurt airport, and a 10ish-hour flight from Frankfurt to San Francisco. Chandlord and I were about to take the BART to San Francisco when she called her sister and found out that her sister could pick us up instead, so her sister v. kindly dropped me off at my apartment, where Chandlord and I parted ways.

And honestly, the end of the trip could not have come a moment too soon; I coughed and sneezed and generally felt like death the entire thirty-six-hour day, and while I love Chandlord and traveling, the fact that I was sick the entire trip pretty much made me over everything, even things I usually enjoy. Which, I know, is kind of a bad attitude to have, but hopefully my attitude will improve with some sleep and a doctor visit in the next few days.

I shall go to bed now to spare you any more mutterings; the trip really was fun, when I could ignore the feeling that I was slowly coming apart at the seems, and I'll post pictures when I get a chance. Goodnight!

once upon a time in brandenburg

I'm once again blogging earlier in the night than usual, but tomorrow we will all return to regularly scheduled programming - aren't you excited? Today was our last full day in Germany, and we spent it in a v. depressing way by visiting Sachsenhausen, the concentration camp intended mainly for political prisoners on the northern outskirts of Berlin. I visited it ten years ago, when I came to Berlin on my college research trip and spent several depressing days visiting nazi era stuff before meeting up with the boys for a v. different experience at the Love Parade. This time, though, we did a guided tour, and the tour guide was quite good; she's been a guide here for over five years, and while I didn't really learn anything other than a few anecdotes that I hadn't heard before, it was still a worthwhile way to spend a few hours.

And now, I'm hanging out while Chandlord goes to a modern art museum, which i had no interest in seeing; lucky for her, she befriended a girl on our Sachsenhausen tour who wanted to go, so hopefully she has fun. Then we will meet for dinner, which can't possibly rival last night's experience - we had a v. extended two hour tea at a Tajik tea room that felt v. East German to me. It was on the second floor of a building that the reunification rebuilding mania seems to have missed and the service was slow, but it was awesome. The Tajik themed room was a gift from the USSR at some point in the seventies, and after the exhibition that it was used at, it was turned into a tea room. I had two servings of their bedouin tea, which is Assam mint tea with a shot of bright green peppermint liquor (which I'm happy to report I was able to drink, despite my bad encounter with peppermint schnapps so many years ago), and Chandlord and I befriended a Japanese kid and his family who ended up sharing our table, since the place was packed. Then we went to a gayborhood and had dinner - our first attempt was thwarted by the fact that they only served meat (which reflected the clientele, ha), but we ended up at a decent Thai place, which was enjoyable, before heading back to the apartment and to bed (for Chandlord, at least - I stayed up and finished reading a book called DIVERGENT by Veronica Roth, which is sort of like Hunger Games but not as good, although I did enjoy it and will read the next one when it comes out).

And now, I shall enjoy a glass of wine and think about gargoyles while I wait for Chandlord. We shall be back in the US tomorrow!

achtung baby

Once again I'm blogging in the afternoon when I know that I have Internet access; you'll just have to assume that the rest of my day goes well, and I'll pick up the blog again tomorrow. Chandlord and I have parted ways for the day - she wanted tot do a bike tour, which I had no interest in, while I wanted to see yet another baroque palace that wouldn't trip her trigger. So, she went off to the bike place, and I laid around in bed, repacked, and then took myself off to Schloss Charlottenberg (with a stop at a cafe first).

Schloss Charlottenberg is the largest remaining Hohenzollern palace in Berlin, and housed several kings and queens, of which the most recognizable was probably Frederick the Great in the 1700s. However, the palace was badly damaged during the war, like so much of Berlin, and while the interior contents and been removed for safekeeping prior to the 1943 bombing that took out most of the building, some of those contents were later looted by the soviets (whom I thoroughly despise), and have never been returned. But, they've done a pretty good job of recreating the palace, even if it's kind of sad to know that the painting, wall covers, floors, etc. area almost all reproductions.

I didn't spend a ton of time there; only part of the palace was open today, and I made it through that wing in about an hour. Then, I took the ubahn to Zoo Station, where I got off and wandered up Kurfurstendamm, which was the place to see and be seen before reunification suddenly turned the area from the heart of west Berlin to the outskirts of the main city itself. There are still tons of shops and restaurants there, so I wandered a bit before ending up in a v. cute tea shop near Savigny Platz that may or may not cater to a clientele at least twenty years older than me. And I've been working ever since - believe it or not, but I've squeezed quite a bit of writing time into this trip, even if most of it has been brainstorming rather than actual page production. But I'm a lot farther along on the plot for my gargoyle book than I was before I left the states, and I think I'll be able to write quickly when I get back.

And now, I need to settle up here and make my way to the city center, where I'm meeting up with Chandlord at some Tajik tearoom. Tomorrow we are ending our Berlin time on a depressing note by touring Sachsenhausen, and then Wednesday we leave for the US!

ich bin ein berliner

In lieu of a full blog post, I'm just going to list some stuff and let you tell yourself your own story...

- floh markt
- chicken schwarma and mint tea
- pocket watch necklace
- strepcils
- Prenzlauer Berg (aka Noe Valley)
- Berlin's answer to Four Barrel Coffee
- tons of platzes
- boat tour to nowhere
- Vapiano
- inefficient restaurant concepts
- red wine + ulcer + cold = jhoketime

And now, this blog will end prematurely; we aren't home for the night, but I'm
posting while we are out and about and have Internet access at hand. We have two more days in Berlin, with grand plans for both days, so hopefully I don't come down with cholera or something in addition to my other ailments. Goodnight!

germania

The rest of my day, after my midday post, was v. lowkey - perhaps too lowkey, thanks to some poor planning and a lack of desire on my part to go out in search of strangers to befriend. I met up with Vidya at the appointed time, and we had the worst lunch we've had on this trip, which was unfortunate given how much good food there is here. Then we went to Kreuzberg and had a drink (tea for me, wine for Chandlord) at a cool cafe right on the riverbank. It wasn't raining today, which was a miracle, so we quite enjoyed ourselves.

After that, we wandered around the area and saw an art installation of painted panels from the Berlin Wall (called the East Side Gallery - it's a permanent fixture on the river), then had some delicious ice cream. It was after this that our plans fell apart, since we tried to take a boat tour that never arrived at the dock it was supposed to leave from. At that point we were both tired and I, at least, was cranky from my sore throat, so we came back to the apartment, where I wrote and Chandlord read. This wasn't enough activity for her, so she left in search of the people we met at the bar last night, while I stayed behind to nurse my cold and my hatred of people.

Hopefully tomorrow will get things back in gear, provided Chandlord doesn't die tonight - we're going to do some flea market stuff, etc., so I'm praying it doesn't rain. And now I'm going to log onto data roaming just long enough to publish this post, which will probably cost me a million dollars - the things I do for the blog. Goodnight!

kreuzberg sonata

Apologies for not blogging yesterday; we don't have Internet in our apartment in Berlin, and we got back too late last night for me to seek out a hotspot. I may not be able to remember anything about yesterday since I didn't blog about it last night as usual, but hopefully you'll get the highlights.

Our apartment in Berlin is great; it has a sleeping space separated from a cute little living room by a curtain, and the kitchen more than meets our needs since we aren't cooking. Sadly, the tv doesn't work, and so while I can quite easily amuse myself by writing, Chandlord doesn't care to spend much time there. This is probably good for me, but it's hard to remember that when I'm dealing with both the remnant effects of my now-medicated possible-ulcer and the cold that started forming yesterday. It's like I've got a tropical storm season going on with my health: hurricane ulcer, followed by tropical depression cold (that I hope won't turn into anything worse), followed by who knows what else.

Anyway, enough whining. Chandlord and I left the apartment yesterday with grand plans to see some museums, which we accomplished despite the steady rain and wind. We went first to the Pergamonmuseum, which hosts a lot of antiquities that the Germans took from Greece and Mesopotamia; as far as I know, they weren't any worse than the British about this, and in any event they lost some of their stuff to the Soviets (who haven't deigned to give it back), but it's still a little crazy that so many things, like the Pergamon altar and the great Ishtar gate, both of which take up gigantic rooms all their own, ended up in Berlin rather than in their original sites. But, it was super convenient for me, since I won't be making it to Babylon anytime soon, and I got some more ideas for my gargoyle series (which I will have to start cutting back at some point), so that was great.

After that museum, we made a quick stop at the Neues Museum, mostly to see the famous bust of Nefertiti, which was as beautiful as any picture you've seen of it. Happily, we'd gotten a metro card that included entry to some museums, so we were able to skip the hour long rain-drenched line for tickets at both museums, which was key. Smug about our success, we wandered around and had a late lunch/early dinner (whatever a meal at 4pm is) at a fancy Italian restaurant - we split a mozzarella burrata, I had an awesome saffron pasta with bacon while Chandlord had a great ravioli, and then we followed up our meal with tea for me and coffee for Chandlord. It was one of the best meals I've had here, so it was quite successful even if I felt too drenched and grungy to be in such a lovely establishment.

After "lunch", we walked down Unter den Linden and saw the Brandenburg Gate, still obscured by rain. Then we went back to our apartment, where I took an hour to write while Chandlord discovered that the tv didn't work. Mostly, though, the reason to go back to the apartment was because my shoes were soaked; it is no wonder that I have a cold developing, since it's rained almost every day since the wedding. Vidya finally dragged me away from my notebook and out into the city; our destination was a bar in Kreuzberg, which is an up and coming area of former east Berlin that is quickly being overrun by artists, hipsters, and their ilk. The bar was utterly ridiculous in a good way; the decorations were artistically appealing/appalling, the drinks were pretty cheap and generous, and it gradually became quite packed over the course of the evening. We ended up striking up conversation with some girl whose mother lives in Stillwater, Oklahoma (and so we bonded, since I spent several days stranded there after my brother's graduation), although the girl has lived in Europe for the past eight years making some sort of living as a bartender/artist, so she's clearly too cool for me. When we parted ways, Chandlord and I had doner kebab, which turned out to be mildly ill-advised, and then stumbled home.

We didn't get back to our apartment until almost two, and I warned Vidya that I was unlikely to want to get up early to see the jewish museum that I have already seen. So, she left this morning without me, and I've had a relaxing time lying in bed, showering, and making my way to east Berlin, where I will meet her in a bit (after I get some writing done). Perhaps I'll blog tonight, or perhaps I won't, but either way, more fun awaits!

swamperdoo

Chandlord and I arrived in Berlin, found our utterly lovely apartment, and promptly went out for dinner to a Chinese restaurant chosen solely because it's called Good Friends. And that, my friends, sums up my day - I'm blogging from a street corner where I can get Internet access, so read thevpost below for more about today. Goodnight!

heil heidelberg

I am blogging v. early in case I don't have Internet access tonight. Chandlord and I are sitting on a bench in the Frankfurt airport train station, waiting for the train that will take us to Lepzig, where we will switch to a train that will take us to Berlin, where we will attempt to find the apartment we are renting. But despite the fact that we got up earlier than I ever like to (6am), we've had a lovely day so far. Even though last night's hotel was quite strange, their breakfast was acceptable, and so we fueled up before hitting the road to Frankfurt.

En route, it became clear that we had tons of time, and so we stopped off for an hour in Heidelberg, an ancient city with the oldest university in Germany. Our destination was not the university, though; instead, we wanted to check out Schloss Heidelberg, the ruined castle overlooking the city from vast heights above a hill. There isn't much left of the castle; it's all in ruins, with crumbling walls slowly descending into the grass filled moat (although I suppose that descent has been stopped by the town's desire to preserve the remnants and charge people money to see them). But even though the interiors are long destroyed, the exterior still has some wonderful masonry, sculpture, etc., and it was quite easy to imagine how imposing the castle would have been hundreds of years ago in all its glory. I took tons of pictures for my gargoyle research, so I am glad that we were able to stop; Heidelberg is a city that I will have to come back to, since an hour was not enough to do it justice.

And then we brought the car back to the airport, bid it a fond farewell, grabbed some Thai food from an airport restaurant, and sat down to wait for our train. And now I shall bid you a fond farewell as well - I will blog again sometime in Berlin!

she's got nothing on but the radio

Chandlord and I are in the ancient and beautiful city of Augsburg, enjoying a stay at a v. strange hotel before heading to Berlin via Frankfurt tomorrow. We arrived around ten a.m. and spent the day exploring; unfortunately it rained all day, which was all the excuse I needed to buy an umbrella and two sweatshirts, but the city was still lovely despite that.

Augsburg was founded by the Romans and remained an important city in Bavaria for two millennia. Our first stop was the cathedral, which had a romanesque crypt underneath the gothic main building. The stained glass was incredible, and the artwork was also lovely. From there, we wandered to the Rathaus and saw the Golden Hall - I was disappointed that this had nothing to do with the golden hall of Rohan in Lord of the Rings, but it was still quite impresive. The Rathaus was the town hall, built in the 1600s, and the Golden Hall was about as gilded as you would expect given that name. Augsburg was home to the Germans' version of the Medicis and was the foundation of German finance, and the money that flowed through this town over the centuries was obvious in the quality of the art and buildings.

After the Rathaus, I wanted to take a break and enjoy the prilosec that an apothecary gave me for my stomach, so I had a cappuccino while Chandlord climbed the tower next to the Rathaus to get a view of the city. When she returned, we finally had Bavarian pretzels before wandering down the street. We saw the Damenhof, which is now a restaurant but used to be the lovely courtyard of the women of one of the richest families in the city - it had a gorgeous pool/fountain and a lot of tiles and pillars, and Chandlord somehow came to the conclusion that it was like Miami or Vegas. Then, we proceeded to a gallery of baroque art; the ticket seller there proclaimed that we were art students and let us in for free, which was v. kind of her. I must say that I loved the gallery, since it gave me all sorts of ideas for the gargoyle series and was also not filled with rain, unlike the outdoors.

Post museum, we grabbed pizza at a cafe that used to be a cinema. Chandlord wanted to walk around some more, but I was eager to write down my ideas, slightly sick to my stomach, and tired of the rain, so I had tea in a super cute cafe while she explored. When we reunited, we retrieved the car, checked into our hotel, took a nap, and then walked back into the old town to have dinner at an Italian place that Chandlord found on her walk. The food was delicious - I had lasagna and she had gnocchi, and while I should have taken it easier and so ended up with a stomachache, it was still a lovely meal.

And now, I must say auf wiedersehen; we leave for Frankfurt v. early tomorrow so that we can return the car in time to catch our train to Berlin. Goodnight!

in the burning heart

So my stomach is still killing me (I hope not literally, because I never have sat down and written the final blog post to be posted in the event of my demise, and this would be an anticlimactic one to end on), but that didn't stop me and Chandlord from getting out and enjoying Bavaria. We left Munich and drove to Schloss Neuschwanstein, the castle that Walt Disney based the Disney castle on. This ended up being an all day excursion, since we hadn't booked ahead and so couldn't get tickets immediately - the next three hours worth of tours were sold out, but at least we were able to get in. While we waited, we drove back to a v. picturesque village and had lunch on an outdoor patio; Vidya had a delicious lunch that made her full, while I had a delicious lunch that made me hurt. Then we went back to the entrance area, had a cup of tea, and caught a bus up to the top of the hill to see the castle.

King Ludwig II built the castle in the 1800s, inspired by Wagnerian operas, and was the only person who ever lived in it. He spent less than 200 days there before he was declared mad, taken away, and found dead under mysterious circumstances shortly thereafter. I will describe it more when I upload some photos, but suffice it to say that the castle was both quite impressive and a tremendous example of why most monarchies have failed in the last century, since it was a huge waste of money. But, that village is getting plenty back from the millions of tourists who come there every year, although I doubt Ludwig built it with the intention of promoting tourism.

We got back to Munich around seven and met up with our hitchhiker from the wedding, who brought along a couple more people. We started at a biergarten, but a powerful storm suddenly overtook us, so we relocated to a Cuban restaurant and spent several hours talking. It was a lovely way to end our time in Munich; we leave for Augsburg tomorrow, which should be lovely. And now I should get some sleep and let my stomach attempt to heal itself - goodnight!

the church built by the devil

Chandlord and I had a lovely day in Munich, interrupted only by the rain and my stomach. We escaped my hated hostel by nine am and walked into the center of town, which (as with most old european towns) is roughly s circle bounded by what used to be the city walls. There were no walls to stop us today, and we ended up in Marienplatz, home of a world famous glockenspiel clock display that is not particularly enteraining.

However, what was entertaining (v. entertaining) was the free tour that we took of Munich, led by one of the more entertaining tour guides I've had in recent memory. I can't really replicate how entertaining he was, although he did call Vidya up to demonstrate something and mangled her name repeatedly in ways that were funny only to us. He also seemed quite knowledgeable, and since I learned my lesson at a v. young age about the dangers of attempting to correct tour guides (age 10, Laura Ingalls Wilder museum), I let the couple of minor errors that I noticed slide without comment. I know, I'm so magnanimous.

Munich is a pretty fascinating city. It was home to a series of Bavarian kings back when Germany was a bunch of loosely organized city states, and the guide said that there are signs of human habitation in the area stretching back for ten thousand years. What fascinates me most, though, is how a city of such culture and learning, etc., could have been the cradle of Nazism and Hitler's rise to power. This is not a judgment on Munich - rather, it's a sobering reminder of how quickly a cultured, reasonably smart populace can fall into chaos and end up losing everything. It's also amazing to me how they rebuilt the city after the war like modernity had passed it by; they used concrete instead of masonry in a lot of places, with painted-on columns rather than grand stone facades, but the intent to rebuild everything as though the world wars had never happened was clear.

Anyway, after the tour ended, we had some extremely delicious pizza at a nearby Italian place, then looked at expensive dirndls and bought a sim card for my phone so we can call the US. However, my stomach was in intense pain after lunch, so rather than touring, we picked up the car and checked into the new hotel. We sat around for an hour, and then I encouraged chandlord to abandon me so that she could go out for drinks with our hitchhiker and I could rest up and hopefully stop having stomach problems soon. And so now I'm going to go to bed - we are doing a day trip someplace tomorrow, but don't yet know where. Goodnight!

spandau ballet

Chandlord and I are still alive, no thanks to alcohol and German youth hostels. We had an utterly fabulous time at the wedding, and may be some of the best wedding crashers ever - after three days at the castle, we were fast friends with scores of guests, picked up a hitchhiker to bring to Munich with us, and had clearly partied hard enough to fuel five weddings.

I can't do justice to the experience, since I'm typing on my iPad while sitting on an uncomfortable bench in a German youth hostel - we booked it from the car this afternoon while driving to Munich, but upon arrival it became clear that it was going to live up to my horrid hostel experiences rather than Vidya's decent ones. I promptly rebelled, so we are switching to a hotel tomorrow, but needless to say we spent no time here tonight. Instead, we went to a biergarten with our hitchhiker, where we watched most of the womens world cup final amongst a crowd that was split pretty well between Americans and Japanese. I'm having some stomach issues that are threatening to derail me, but as they manifest themselves most when I eat, perhaps I will just treat them by not eating tomorrow. Yay.

Sssanyway, Germany is awesome, the wedding was amazing, and I will post pics and more stories when I have time. For tonight, though, you'll just have to be satisfied with knowing that I'm alive and, therefore, that this blog and all its drively glory will continue in the future. Goodnight!

Goodbye!

We are taking off - goodbye!

rolling in the deep

My day started off well and descended into a veritable swamp of annoyance. I drove down to the glorious south bay to train with Alyssa, who had a gift for me - or rather, Equinox had a gift for me, since I've apparently spent enough on personal training and massage to merit a v. nice new gym bag. It's the most expensive gym bag I've ever bought, given how much I've spent there, but c'est la vie. Our training session was good, and I was sad when we parted ways; I really haven't been home enough to make any progress toward my goals since April, which is both amusing and frustrating - I'm looking forward to settling down again at some point, even though I'm not sure when that point will be.

After showering and drying my hair, I made my first attempt to pick up my dry cleaning, only to discover that they were closed for an hour - annoying. But, I got over it because I had lunch plans with my friend Becky, who is also a writer, and whom I met during my historical fiction class a couple of years ago. She works for one of the local newspapers and just finished writing her first novel, so we had a lot to discuss. And, we discussed it at the new incarnation of Joanie's Cafe - they just opened today in their new location, and I'm happy for them. They're clearly still working the kinks out, since the service was slow even though it's all the same people (I think they kept forgetting that there was a corner they needed to check around, since they seemed to forget about our existence at several points in the meal), and my cobb salad for some reason had olives instead of bacon, but otherwise, the space was nice and I think it will be a good move for them. And, it was great to see Becky and catch up on our writing lives, which was a nice interlude in the stress of trying to get ready for my trip.

I left lunch and made my second attempt to pick up my dry cleaning - only to be told that even though it was supposed to be ready yesterday, it had somehow not arrived on the truck last night. Boo, hiss. They told me that it might be on today's truck, arriving sometime after five p.m. This was bad news, since there was a dress in that dry cleaning that I intended to wear at the wedding, and I didn't have time to drive down again tomorrow to try to pick it up. So, I messed around Palo Alto waiting for the dry cleaner; I went to the mall, got some travel sized moisturizer from Sephora, got two pairs of flat walking-around shoes, and stocked up on unmentionables at the Nordstrom annual sale (which I got to access early, since they value me so much and all). The stocking up on unmentionables was a good thing, since the sale will be over when I get back, but still. Then I ate at Chipotle so that I wouldn't have to try to scrounge up something to eat upon getting home, and then I went back to the dry cleaners.

And the dry cleaner then told me that the dry cleaning delivery truck had been in an accident, and wouldn't show up until at least ten a.m. tomorrow. So, I gave up and will wear a different dress at the wedding, since I don't have time to deal with it. That of course meant that I drove back to the city at the height of rush hour, increasing my aggravation, but I managed to calm down while talking to Terry (and to my brother, who called to discuss [censored]). Terry and I watched some episodes of "Bones" while I took care of vital things on my laptop like buying train tickets, answering multitudes of emails, paying bills, etc. And now, I should really, really sleep - Chandlord and I leave for the airport around 4:15 tomorrow afternoon, and then our adventure begins! Goodnight!

we could have had it all

I had a moderately productive day - it would help if I knew where to do things in the city so that I didn't feel compelled to go to the glorious south bay to run my errands, but as I didn't have time to figure out where to do everything I needed to do in the city, I drove down anyway. Even though I didn't get out of bed until ten, I still managed to drop off dry cleaning, eat at Chipotle, get my oil changes, get gas, get an international drivers permit from AAA, get an iPad (finally my dream has come true, which means that it's much more likely that I'll blog from Germany if I can find Internet access), get a more comfortable pair of walking around shoes, and stock up on leggings at the Nordstrom sale. Yay to all of that, right?

I must say that I'm in love with the iPad - I do think that I'll get a lot of use out of it with my writing, and it's going to be super handy with my freelance editing business. I've been salivating over it for a year, and occasionally tried to buy it in the store, but they were always out. Today, though, the Palo Alto store had the exact model I wanted, so I snapped it up. I may love pens and ink and cute japanese stationery, but I'm also a technophile, and I'm kind of surprised that I managed to hold out this long.

I got home around five, just managing to beat traffic, and cleaned the kitchen like a good girl before letting myself play with the iPad. When Terry got home, I was in my pajamas, but I uncharacteristically managed to rally and go out for an 8:30pm dinner with Vidya, Julie and Rat. If you know me at all, you know I usually don't rally once the pajamas are on, so I was quite proud of myself. It was totally lovely to see them, even if Julie, Rat and I subjected Vidya to too much reminiscing about our days in Loro. We finally parted ways around 10:30, and now I really need to sleep - my to do list tomorrow is ridiculous and I need all the sleep I can get. Goodnight!

hunger games, etc.

I should have accomplished way more than I did today, but it all worked out - I may not be entirely ready to get on the plane to Germany Wednesday afternoon, but at least I had fun procrastinating. I didn't get up particularly early (as expected, since I didn't go to bed until after two a.m. last night), and when I did get up, I took my time showering, eating breakfast, etc. I also needed to make a list of groceries to procure at Whole Foods, and it's unsurprising that I put off the trip to the grocery store since I expected it to be a zoo. It wasn't quite as terrible as I thought it would be, but it was still annoyingly crowded, etc., etc., etc. (this post is starting off even more slowly than usual, apologies).

When I got home from the store, I mixed up a marinade for some chicken, then went to my room and talked to my mother for well over an hour. I had to take a break then to put some tomatoes in the oven, but I spent another chunk of time talking to my father, thus meeting my weekly phone quota. After the phone calls, I got sucked into watching a bit more of the Harry Potter marathon going on (I'd watched some 'Prisoner of Azkaban' earlier, and then got pulled into 'Goblet of Fire') before suddenly realizing that our guests were going to arrive momentarily and that I should really get cracking with the food.

The dinner guests were the inaugural meeting of a book club that I just formed; I purposefully kept it extremely small, so don't be offended if you aren't part of book club. And it was a complete success - Terry, Lauren (aka Subz), Vidya (aka Chandlord), Katrina and I all read the first book of the 'Hunger Games' trilogy to discuss tonight. As it turns out, all of us but Chandlord had read the final two books as well, but we managed to confine our conversation mostly to the first book, and it was all good. We targeted our discussion toward an 'airing of grievances' around problems we had with the book, which seemed like a good way to go since for the most part we all enjoyed it, and a gush-fest about how great it was would have gotten boring quick.

Then again, splitting three bottles of wine meant that boredom was impossible, and the group was a v. good mix. We also ate some chicken (marinated earlier in this post, if you were paying attention), my favorite caprese salad w/tomatoes (roasted earlier) and mozzarella, Terry's penne pasta with cheese and tomatoes, and some various accoutrements, and everyone seemed to have a grand old time. But, as it's a work morning tomorrow (for everyone but me - I have high hopes of writing, but I don't have to wake up at six a.m. to do it), people left around 10:30 with grand plans for the next meeting post-Germany. And now, I shall go to bed too - three nights from now, I'll be on a plane somewhere near the Atlantic, and I should get some sleep so that I can complete my massive to-do list before then. Goodnight!

when you see my face, i hope it gives you hell

I should have gone to bed ages ago, but sometime around midnight I started to realize just how much I need to get done before I leave for Germany on Wednesday, so I slogged for a couple of hours instead. Today was generally much lazier than it should have been. I didn't get out of bed until after ten, and then I sat around for awhile and ate breakfast with Terry. I did eventually drag myself up to my room and work on unpacking, and today's focus was my closet - so the good news is that I now have my clothing, shoes, bags, makeup, and other girly accoutrements organized so that I can easily see what I need to take with me when I leave for Germany. I also finished unpacking from my New York trip just in time to pack again.

I took a lovely break from my productivity, though, since Priyanka came over for tea and a tour of the new place. She marveled appropriately at my miraculous teamaker, and then we hung out for a couple of hours before I drove her home so that she could avoid the horrors of the bus. Then, I spent the afternoon and early evening alternating between unpacking and procrastinating before throwing in the towel entirely around 7:30 and making myself dinner (a hamburger and some potatoes, yay midwest). Terry and I then proceeded to watch a couple of episodes of "Bones" and a bit of one of the Harry Potter movies before she went to bed and I came back upstairs with the intention of going to bed as soon as I cleared a path to it...

...and instead I finished organizing my linen closet and created a detailed trip itinerary for zee Germany excursion, and reviewed my list of what else I need to do before then. Sigh. I'm v. excited about Germany, but I'm suddenly not excited by the next four days and what I need to accomplish before I go. But, I'm sure it will all get done, and I will be happier for it. And now, it's time for bed -- goodnight!

he always in the air but he never fly coach

I had a perfectly lovely day - it's rare when I manage to squeeze so many of my favorite things into such a short span of time, but I managed to hit the swampler trifecta today by enjoying a masala chai from Samovar, getting a facial, and buying office supplies from a Japanese stationery store within the span of three hours. And that's not even all the fun stuff that I did today - aren't you excited to read the rest of this post?!?!

The morning started by rolling out of bed, checking twitter, and realizing that I could catch the last space shuttle launch live on tv before leaving for the south bay. So, I watched the shuttle take off while eating the most amazingly delicious peach I've had in ages. Surprisingly, the shuttle launch made me feel like bursting into tears; it really is a glorious achievement for mankind, and I'm quite annoyed that we don't seem to have a solid commitment to space exploration (even though, according to some stats I saw which may have been of dubious origin and I don't feel like verifying tonight, the lifetime cost of the shuttle program was less than the combined total cost of the 2008 bank/insurance/auto bailouts). Granted, my mother should be happy since less space exploration = decreased chance that I will sign up for a one-way ticket to Mars on a whim (although I would only do it if I could blog), but still.

After the launch, I sped down to the glorious south bay and trained with Alyssa, which was lovely in a v. sweaty sort of way. Unfortunately, I wasn't really paying attention post-launch when I was cramming things into my gym bag, and I ended up with two tshirts and no bra. Oops. Perhaps no one that I ran into noticed, but even though I felt more comfortable physically sans underwires, I was psychologically quite uncomfortable all day. But, I got ready, grabbed a quick lunch at Chipotle, drove back to the city of sin, and had a quick masala chai at Samovar while writing some gargoyle stuff for an hour or so. Then, I went to my stylist to get a quick bang trim in preparation for my Germany trip before walking over to the spa (where I still keep meaning to cancel my membership and never quite manage to bring myself to it) and getting a facial. The woman was v. brutally aggressive with extractions, but my travel-ravaged skin looks great (which is why I keep going back).

Post spa, I sped (or rather crawled, since I was trying to get out of the financial district/Union Square at the worst possible time) home and met up with Terry to discuss dinner plans. We agreed on a relatively late dinner, which gave me time to procrastinate and shower before leaving the apartment. We drove to my old neighborhood and had dinner at Mission Beach Cafe, which was utterly delicious - we split a mango/avocado/feta/mixed-green salad, and then I had this filet mignon that may have been one of the best steaks I've ever had. It was served with green beans, heirloom cauliflower, etc., and some v. decorative sauces, and overall was amazing. We ended the meal by splitting a piece of strawberry rhubarb pie a la mode, and I had a fantastic latte that reenergized me for the rest of the night. All in all, it was a great meal, and while I mourned the fact that I've officially become a pretentious foodie, I still loved it.

Our evening took a strange detour after that - rather than going home, we went over to Adit and Priyanka's and visited them for a couple of hours. They're surprisingly well settled into their new place, with tons of photos and paintings (mostly Marina's paintings, mostly Adit's photos) on the walls and a bunch of lovely midcentury modern furniture that Priyanka has scoped out. We drank a fairly delicious wine out of v. nice glasses while discussing the royal wedding, romance novels, midcentury modern design, etc., and it was all quite lovely. But by midnight, Terry and I were both tired (Terry moreso than me, since she went with decaf rather than full-strength coffee at Mission Beach Cafe), so we came back to the lovely, foggy Marina. And now, I should really sleep; I have grand plans to organize my bedroom tomorrow, and I intend to stick to them. Goodnight!

i might take you home with me if i could tonight

Today was one of those days that makes me wonder how I lived when I had to be at the office for 9-12 hours/day - how did I get anything done for my real life? I know that I must have, since I didn't starve to death, or have oozing sores from living in filth, or end up in jail, or anything similarly dire. And yet errands took up a lot of my day - enough to cut into the writing time, but not enough that I wasn't able to squeeze in a few pages this afternoon.

I made it down to the glorious south bay in time to train with Alyssa. I hadn't seen her in a couple of weeks, so it was good to catch up, and while my trip to NYC was by no means a healthy voyage, I didn't seem to experience any backslide in terms of my fitness levels. I'm working out with her again tomorrow and next week before going to Germany, and then I'll have to hit the gym in earnest once I get back from Germany if I'm going to justify driving down to see her multiple times per week.

After the gym, I went to Joanie's Cafe - it's probably the last time I'll eat at that incarnation of Joanie's, since they're moving down the block next week. So, I said a fond farewell over a cobb salad while writing some ideas about the gargoyle series, and I'm eager to see what they do with their new space. After Joanie's, I went to the bank, dropped off my dry cleaning, took the combined mass of me and Terry's moving boxes to the recycling center, and drove to the Comcast office in Foster City to return my cable equipment from the old place before they charged me millions of dollars. Then, I drove back to Palo Alto and went to Stanford library, where I wrote approximately six pages over the span of a couple of hours.

I wasn't writing Ellie's story, though; I started a new Scrivener project and began writing the first gargoyle book. This book is speaking to me in a way that Ellie and Nick currently aren't -- it seems that everywhere I go, I'm daydreaming of the gargoyle series (which still has nothing to do with gargoyles, fyi), and ideas are just slamming through me and forcing me to stop periodically and write things down so that I don't lose all those great ideas. It's a very odd experience, living with a whole world and set of characters inside your head, and I can't really explain what it feels like, other than to say that I have to write this book or go crazy trying.

But, I took a break from being crazy to have a long dinner with Heather (aka dear respected madam) at The Counter. We discussed work gossip, books, life, children (why is everyone talking about babies these days? isn't turning thirty punishment enough?), etc., and I'm glad that I got to see her between New York and Germany. After dinner, I drove back to the evil city, watched a bit of South Park with Terry, and am now going to go to bed relatively early. It's a shame that I'm getting readjusted to Pacific time when I'm about to go back east (and even farther east than I was before), but c'est la vie. Goodnight!

zee germans

I slacked off today; it felt good to slack off in my own house, even if my bedroom isn't unpacked to the point that it totally feels like home. I woke up sometime around eleven and discovered that I was on the verge of getting a sunburn; I'd left the blinds open last night so that the open windows could promote a nice crossbreeze, and when the sun tried to wake me up this morning, I opted to put my eyemask on rather than close the blinds. In my sleeping haze, I forgot that the rest of my skin would still be exposed, and the mask plunged me back into enough darkness that I slept for another three hours as the rising sun traversed my body. Oops. Luckily, I didn't actually burn, and this is an interesting (albeit unsafe) way to get a deeper tan this summer, I suppose.

After I dragged myself into the shower, I realized that I was starving, and I had no food in the house. So, I walked down to La Boulange and had a sandwich while working on my young adult series; I spent the lunch hour plus another hour afterward analyzing the book that I read yesterday, continuing to brainstorm ideas, and dipping just a toe back into Ellie and Nick's story (which I intend to squeeze in a few pages of tomorrow). Sometime around two p.m., Terry arrived; she was in LA for the week and just returned today, so we were reunited after almost two weeks apart. We spent some quality time this afternoon catching up before I retreated to my room to take care of various tings, and then we went to the grocery store to stock up on food. She went to yoga while I did some desultory unpacking (which mostly involved shifting things around), and when she came home, she made me dinner (isn't that lovely?) before watching two episodes of "Covert Affairs".

And now, sadly, I realized that I need to go to bed immediately - I have to drive down to the glorious south bay to train with Alyssa and then take care of all sorts of annoying errands, so I should get some sleep. Goodnight!