Party in p major

 peonies.

 pears.

 pink lemonade.

 pair of scavengers.

 pair of scavengers.

 pleased papa.

 Pokemon.

 piñata.

party boy.

Shirts and books

Yay for sale t-shirts made in the USA with organic cotton!  While I don't even aspire to this kind of physical flexibility, it's a good mantra to be reminded of when I catch a reflection of myself: be flexible.  With myself, with others, with life.

Because life happens, whether I like it or not (and this is in no way a complaint)...like my pile of books to read doubling in the last 24 hours.  (Not to mention my stagnating list of books to read in 2012, remember that?)

Peace.

When there is no 12A

Don't tell my kids, but deep down inside, I kind of believe, at this point, that the earth...or at least the United States, is going to hell in a hand basket.

A small, yet telling, example.  Yesterday, Cap was reassigned to a seat in a row that did not exist on the plane he was boarding.

Down with bureaucracy!

Gifts

Cap showered us with gifts last night.  He had an unexpectedly hefty pay day for a talk he gave at a Japanese university.  The crowning glories were Panny and Papa Panda from Panda Go Panda.

Things are about to get hectic here.  We have a birthday to celebrate this weekend and then Barbra comes for a visit next week.  I'm pretty compulsive about posting so I don't think I will disappear, but things may feel scant here for awhile.

Some ideas about how to spend the Summer are beginning to form...and some kind of mindful technology/screen practice is an idea tossing about in the wash.  Time will tell.

Peace and love.
 

And to all a good night

I felt icky most of the day but made it to the end which packed quite the bang for its buck.

 the Bloggess came!

 look who was sitting two rows behind me.

 Rosie!

 we had so much fun.

 the kids and I ended up able to get to EWR with time to spare.

 Cap's back!

we filled Moomin's gas tank the night before Cap left.

18 days later, just under 3/4 of the tank remained.

I am off to bed.  Peace and love.

I'm just a burner, they can't trace me

OMG!!!  Your internet awesome of the day, my fellow Wire lovers.  Check it.

Grateful

I realized this morning that 2 1/2 weeks with no kid respite is just a bit too long, for me.  Next time I will plan to embed chunks of time to/for myself.

Last night was a nadir.  I was chowing on pomegranate chocolate chip coconut ice cream (that Sag had picked out to make a milkshake with) while watching Gene Simmons Family Jewels at 11pm.  I'd been in a bad mood all day.  I've been putting the new pickles from the farmer's market to the comfort eating test (finished a quart and free pint bought Saturday tonight) and last night I finally turned to ice cream.

Then, I stayed up till nearly 3am.

Today has been quite fine, despite all that.

After yet another whatever's-in-the-fridge-or-pantry meal, I called the faraway health food store and they are kindly holding two bags of Gem's favorite spice cake mix for us till later this week.  This meant our errands today stayed quite local.

• the post office for some international stamps

• the hardware store to get what turned out to be a super expensive special size battery for our new car flashlight

• the ATM to withdraw cash from the savings account to cover us till pay day (le sigh)

• the bookstore where I sneakily picked up some birthday books for Gem, got some details about tomorrow night's Bloggess event, and plucked some Father's Day/get well/sympathy cards

• the library where this was waiting for me

• my fave cafe where we picked up local eggs, honey and the Irish breakfast tea I fell in love with last Fall

• the supermarket where we bought the bare minimum for today and tomorrow's needs

(I love living in this town...at every stop of our errands we were recognized and treated warmly.)

Once home, we lunched, I made some tea and then we played Carcassonne.  Sag was under the weather again, but the game seemed to cheer him up.  With the recent expansion set we got, the games are now close to two hours long!

Finally, the game ended and it was on to homework and reading for the kids while I made dinner.

After dinner, the kids were showered, the tea basket was decluttered, and the kitchen was cleaned.  Now the kids are watching a birthday gift which arrived in the mail today (thank you, Auntie Barbra :-) and we are all sipping herbal tea with honey.

And so, a pretty productive day draws to an end.  Not without its share of moans/groans and shrieks/eeks from each of us, but relatively mellow.

Here is a song we've been digging lately.  Peace and love.

You start with what you have

This is what I thought we'd be doing this morning.  Running lots of errands.  Including some to prepare for Gem's birthday weekend.  Which, with all the hubbub of late, has snuck up on me a bit.

But, one of us is under the weather figuratively (Sag) and one of us is under the weather literally (me) and I am letting go of the expectations and rolling with what is, instead.

I am trying to embrace their peaceful ways and be in the present.  I am still recovering from a really icky bringing-in-the-garbage-and-recycling-cans experience where I encountered what smelled like a broken open bag of vomit and somehow ended up with hands that smelled like poop.  One of those times it really sucks to be a super smeller.

Just found this fun tie-in to the kids' study of Mesopotamia.  Oh, and we watched Free Willy: Escape From Pirate's Cove yesterday to tie into Sag's study of dolphins and orcas yesterday.  It was solidly good fare.

Rock out in peace.

Kickin' it to the curb

I can't quite get my head around it.  That in partially cleaning out two small areas of the apartment, eight bags of garbage were produced.

I feel bad that: a) the equivalent of eight bags of trash has been occupying my side of the bed and the floor of the linen closet for months and months and months; and b) that there is much more to come.

I feel bad that during that time mice were partying undercover of the clutter.

I feel bad that much of what I've tossed could have, at one time, been donated somewhere, and is now just garbage.

But, I do also feel good.  That I'm wrangling this bull now and staying pretty calm about the whole thing.

Peace.

When push comes to shove

If I could have, I would have had a drink (or three) or done some drugs.  Instead, I had one of these...

1/11 remains, three boys and a desperate grain-free sugar-free mama will do that.

I want to forget what I saw when I cleared out (just the) the floor of the linen closet.  I almost wanted to shove everything right back in there and put it "out of sight".  I nearly started gagging as I cleaned it all up.

Think Port Authority Bus Terminal for mice.

But, when it comes down to it, I am stronger than I think when it comes to things physical.  I had a harder time being brutal about letting go of all the junk that's been down there.  So (senti)mental am I.

Three garbage bags plus five frikkin' humidifiers, ...

and some peppermint infused cotton balls later...

a new normal has been established.

I'll get to the shelves in there later today or tomorrow.  I'm doing a load of rescue-and-recover laundry of things that we actually still want to keep that had been...tarnished.  Lunch and dinner will be whatever is in the fridge and pantry.  It will be a low key the rest of the day...till the kids and I fire brigade all the garbage out to the curb tonight!

Peace and love.

P.S.  Lana posted this to Facebook recently and I have not been able to get it out of mind.  Love.

Cool as a cuke in a pool

This made my day.  Sag started swim class this morning and had a blast.  

I placed peppermint infused cotton balls all over the kitchen after finding a single dropping on the counter I cleaned up yesterday.  Grr...little rodent 1 - spluttering me 0.  (No droppings anywhere else, though.)

I made grass-fed beef sliders for lunch and Sandy's Asian-y chicken drumsticks for dinner.

I had a hard time falling asleep last night, I had caffeine for the first time in over a week and it was timed just a tad too late in the day, methinks.  Between sleep deprivation and my leg muscles being sore today, I decided to chill and read rather than tackle another decluttering job.

Peace.

P is for pep and peppermint and pulling-off-the-blinders

These dry, breezy, cool sunny/cloudy days that scream "spring" and "fall" in the mid-Atlantic region always, always, reset my system to GO.  Today I wondered...where in the world is it like this year-round?

So, what did I do with all my pep?  This manatee on a mission put a dent into her decluttering/cleaning.  I decided to go low tech in my rodent repelling and picked up some peppermint essential oil and cotton balls instead of the sonic gadget.

I bought this new-to-me cleaning product last weekend when the mysterious dust made its debut into my consciousness.  It's been on my list of things I'd like to do, for ages, to make some cleaning solution with vinegar.  I've been very happy with it so far.

The "after" shot of under the kitchen sink.  There is no way I would subject you to a "before" shot of this former disaster area.  It's kind of crazy how things can get as bad as they do.  But, I am a very concretely "out of sight, out of mind" person.  

In a positive way, this has allowed me to maintain very emotionally close friendships with friends who I have little to no contact with (visual or otherwise) for not only months, but years.  The key is that I never stop caring, and I am quite comfortable with the "not thinking about" (it just is, there is no baggage).

The pockets of clutter in our household represent the negative way in which "out of sight..." manifests.  There is something bordering on (seemingly) pathological going on because these pockets don't always exist behind closed doors.  Sometimes, they are in plain sight, yet my brain stops "seeing" the clutter.

By the way, there were some droppings under the sink.  Those cotton balls you can see are infused with peppermint oil.  Peppermint oil is considered a mouse deterrent.

I cleaned out the area next to my side of the bed.  I'd cleared it out about seven or eight months ago, but it quickly filled back up with "things to donate/find other homes for".  So, for about six months or so, this area was cluttered with, as it turns out, three garbage bags worth of stuff that literally just sat there, seen yet unseen.  

That framed poster was given to me about a year ago, a thoughtful hand-me-down from someone who was decluttering herself.  (She'd noticed I had a postcard of the same print.)  For a year it has been propped up against one wall or another.  I've reached out to my brother-in-law, who is handy, to see if he can help me put it up.

After cleaning up from dinner, I kept going and decluttered the counter top and washed down the stove.  (The stove top needs more work...and product.)  I was nonplussed to turn from the counter top and see this heinous pile of mess tucked in the corner right next to it.  Another no man's land that is in plain sight, yet gets seriously overlooked.

One step at a time.

That's the linen closet.  Usually, the laundry basket is in there overflowing with dirty laundry.  That is just classic...and sad.  I'm thinking I'm going to tackle this spot tomorrow.

Believe it or not, the day was not all about cleaning.  We also played Carcassonne, went to the library and did laundry.  The kids introduced a friend to their Minecraft server and gave him a tour, all virtual-like.  The kids wrote cards and watched a movie they borrowed from the library.  They did homework.

I have a new book from the library and am dying to get to it.  But, there is also laundry that needs folding.

Peace and love.

Glory be

As the atmospheric pressure lifts, so do I.  It is palpable.  Windows have been thrown open and I practiced Qigong just a little bit more than yesterday morning (no great shakes yet, but one step at a time).

I was not surprised...yet was dismayed to see the nocturnal critter(s) was back in action again last night.  There has been some speculation about whether it might be termites which had not occurred to me.  Are termites more active at night/when there is less people activity going on?

Yesterday we had some mid-day drama courtesy of the almost 12-year old.  I think he is feeling the absence of his father in ways he cannot articulate.  He would say he is more attached to me, which is probably true, but he is much more like Cap and I think he is feeling the imbalance of being outnumbered in terms of household personalities.

We made it through and were rewarded with our planned trip to the comic book shop.  I splurged a bit and we picked up The Princess and The Dragon extension for Carcassonne (Jim, who was manning the register loves Carcassonne and was wonderfully attentive to Sag as they discussed some of the finer points of the game), the new Chip Kidd penned Batman graphic novel (he wrote one of the funniest novels I've read in the past few years The Cheese Monkeys) and, finally, a decent Pokemon card pack for me!

We chilled out before heading out in the evening for a quickish shop to Whole Paycheck which saved me the trip today.

After dinner it was showers, Skyping with Cap and the recently requisite episode of America's Funniest Home Videos before heading to bed to read.  And the excitement of a tooth finally coming out for Sag!

Today's learning at home will include:

• vacuuming the kids' room

• vacuuming the living room

• vacuuming the big bedroom

• cleaning the bathroom

• doing homework

•  playing Carcassonne

• going to the library

• hosting a potluck common meal

Off to breakfast...peace and love.

Puzzle

It was nice to have the windows open for a couple of hours but the humidity is insidious.  I have cranked the air conditioners up again and am typing while sweating.

The three of us have mostly been doing our own things this morning.  I practiced Qigong last night and this morning for about two minutes.  It's something, at least.  I also washed the kitchen floor.  But I've also been snippy.

: :    : :    : :

Anyway, here is a puzzle.  Gem and I have both noticed recently that there is mysterious...dustiness? appearing around the seam where the linoleum from the kitchen/vestibule "meets" the fancy stone lip of the bathroom door.  (I say "meets" because as you can see the linoleum is curling up.  And I say "fancy" because our apartment is most definitely shabby...not shabby chic, in most ways, so this stone lip is way out of place.)

At first, I just thought it was dust build up.  (And since I'm being honest, yes, I left it alone while my mind flitted onto the next thing.)  But something about it just struck me as weird.  So one day, I spritzed it with cleaner and wiped it up.

The next morning, there was more dustiness.  More than pictured below.  So I wiped it clean again.  The next day more dustiness.  So I wiped it clean again.  This morning, again, more dustiness (pictured below), though noticeably less.

Very curious.  I don't think it's a mouse because there are no droppings.  And there is no food in this area, at all.  (And where there is food, in the adjacent kitchen area, there are no droppings or anything out-of-the-ordinary to be seen.)  Yet, whatever it is, it's happening only in the dead of night.  I've wondered if it is dust that falls as the house "shifts" in the night.  It's an old house and there are three full grown adults and a big dog who live upstairs.

Any thoughts?

: :    : :    : :

Just Skyped with Cap and as were kissing our good byes I remembered that I dreamt about him last night.  And that when Gem woke me up this morning I felt like I was being ripped away from my dream and it was so unpleasant.

Another reason to explain my grumpiness.

And another reason to be grateful.  We've passed the halfway mark, here's hoping for some coasting the rest of the way.

: :    : :    : :

Oh my.  Time to fix another meal.

Peace and love.

Our suns

We miss you, Cap!

Great scott

We watched this video of Maya this morning and Gem recognized the background music.  I just found it online for free (it's now public domain) and have added it to my Spring into Summer playlist.

Relieved...I saw Vinny today for a much needed tune up.

Bewildered...I had four pieces of Udi's toast today.

Thrilled...I ran into Kelly and the girls in the market this afternoon.

Confounded...I thought again about retreating.  I want some introvert time but my addled ADDish mind inflamed/bloated body are significant blocks.

Off to chug more coconut juice and relax my aching shoulders/neck/upper back.



Peace and love.

From this pocket of the universe

Last night I took an Aleve to manage a headache so I could fall asleep.  (Which I did at 2am bathed in the cool air duet provided by ceiling fan and air conditioner.)

This morning I woke with no aches or pains as the I had the previous morning.  I was joyful but then realized it might have been due to the Aleve still in my system.

In the hours since waking my wrists have been tickled with nerve-y signals.

My body is telling me to move on from this new baseline of no Qigong and no herbs.

: :    : :    : :

Clearing off the big table this morning of my piles.  Sigh.  Always with the piles.

This afternoon I have a mind to wash the kitchen floor.  The humidity is bringing out all its sticky qualities.

Some quiet, cool cleaning before our four-day week.

: :    : :    : :

Ditties bringing me into Summer...

 

: :    : :    : :

A welcome profile on a great basketball player.

: :    : :    : :

Peace and love.

That summer feeling

This morning has been a drag.  Not complaining, simply describing.

Woke with many aches: back, stomach, head, general all-over-the-body.  (Most of it has worn off.)

Doing laundry with the kids.  (Normally a Cap task.)  Lugging, stuffing, icky basement.

Brought down all the recycling with the kids.  (Normally a Cap task.)  Lugging, stuffing, icky trash/recycling area in the side yard.

Sag and I are quite grumpy.  Maybe it's our sensitivity to the weather.  Last night was an AC night (I still woke up a few times feeling warm).  This humid heat wave will hover till Wednesday, it seems.

Feeling a lot of gratitude for the work Cap does around here.  He is doing well in Japan, by the way, finding inspiration and meaning in the things he is seeing, hearing and doing.

Peace and love.

 

Moving right along

Time is so illuminating.  That's one of the reasons why being able to just be without worry and constantly trying to figure it all out is the way to live.  In balance, with flow, at optimal health.

• turns out we can operate the GPS in our car without Entune.  glad my annoyance didn't mutate into stress on that one.

• the bookshop website has been updated and now explains things pretty well.  being Aquarian, I am often ahead of the curve...I am learning being zen is a key partner quality to embody.

• my life was changed when our goddaughter was born fourteen years ago.  but time and technology (Google+ is proving itself useless in this one important way) have granted me new opportunities to learn from and about her.  love.

• Cap's time away is going by fast, so far.  but the space that is opened up by having one less person here is significant.  this three-day weekend is going to see some deep cleaning.

• speaking of cleaning.  it is no secret I do not like to clean.  but I like a clean space.  how I carry these two opposites peacefully is a mystery.  and deep down inside it's not peaceful.  the tar-like mess of stress bubbles up during PMS more often than not.  how do other people live with this?  how do they deal with it?

It's going to be a quiet-ish day.  After lunch I'm dropping the kids off and going food shopping.  Will fight the urge to buy tons of cleaning "product".  It's going up to 85º today and the humidity will be up about there, too.  Sag's been studying dolphins and orcas.  He read about Free Willy in the course of his research and wants to watch it.  Maybe we'll do that today, too.

Peace and love and orcas.

 

Friday's fibers

Sag made two portals today.  Here's me with one of them.  Our kids are creative/creating early and often, as the saying goes.  But, as with any art, I don't dig it all.  This, I love.

: :    : :    : :

Today, I drove.  Which I really don't like to do when the route/destination is not familiar.  But, the destination changed last minute to one I was somewhat familiar with which boosted my morale.  And, honestly, I love our new car so much, that I was driving Moomin boosted my mood.

It was nice to socialize a bit, hang out with a sweet dog and be out of the house.

: :    : :    : :

I've been asked: does your new car have GPS?  The Prius is high tech.  Or...more tech anyway.  And, yes, our model comes with a nifty "screen" package which includes a GPS.  I've been having trouble setting it up and this afternoon finally discovered the reason: our cell carrier is not a match for the necessary interface.

Annoyance.

Especially because our "Entune" account has been considered "activated" since the day I first went to the website to hook the system up, a month ago.  The day it didn't actually connect because as it turns out we don't have the proper cell carrier.  I wouldn't call that "activated".

I said, "well, that's not fair",  she said, "well, our system isn't set up to remedy that, but I can document your call"...I figured I wasn't going to get very far on the Friday afternoon of the three day weekend that kicks the Summer off.  

If we do decide to switch cell carriers so we can use the freakin' Entune (it's free for the first three years), they'll be hearing from me again to make our free period retroactive from when we actually are able to start using the service.

: :    : :    : :

Read See You At Harry's.  It was okay.  No great shakes.  It had some good moments.  For me, it suffered a little bit in that the protagonist was twelve and yet it felt and read like the narrator was much older.  The storytelling wasn't as transparent as I thought it was meant to be.

: :    : :    : :

Inspired by some chicken Donna made for common meal, I baked some pastured chicken legs for dinner tonight.  I seasoned them with garlic powder, ginger powder, salt and pepper.  Then marinated them in orange juice and olive oil.  Yummers.  Sag and I were all over the crunchy skin.

: :    : :    : :

Gem is not having any of his usual pre-birthday angst.  It is so wonderful and eerie at the same time.  I'm happy for him, but it's such a departure.  He still says he doesn't want to grow up/things to change...and I don't know for sure what's going through his mind because I'm in no rush to point out that he has, in fact, changed quite a bit in his pre-birthday mood...maybe he's resigned...or accepting in a new way...or just is in a different way.

12 in 16 days.

: :    : :    : :

I was floored to find out The Bloggess is coming to our very own local indie bookshop on her book tour!  I picked up "tickets" for Shannon and myself today.  Shannon is a fan, too.  At first I wasn't going to go because it's the night Cap is returning from Japan.  But, now that I'm out from under the dark cloud of a few days ago, I'm feeling like this is a really fun and genuine opportunity.

Funny aside.  I was confused about why the website didn't mention whether the event was free or not.  I didn't see a ticket price, but also didn't see the word "free".  I asked via Facebook whether the event was ticketed and one of the staff responded to say it was and I could drop by the store or go through the store website.

I'd had no luck figuring it out on the website so I dropped by the shop.  And there I learned that the "price" was buying a book through the store!  I don't know if things have changed or what, but I've never had that be a requirement for going to a reading.  What am I saying...  Things have changed.  The last book reading/signing I went to was probably Lousie Erdrich in Harvard Square in 1998 or so.  Before Amazon, before the war on independent booksellers.

Anyway, I'd already bought my copy, from the shop, weeks ago, which they knew.  I love having a neighborhood bookstore where they know my name.

The Bloggess!

: :    : :    : :

Rain soaked roses

Oh my peeps.  Thank you for coming back.  The sense of connection keeps me going.

I did fall asleep last night sometime after 2.

And today has been much better.  Mostly because the massive sugar/corn syrup hit has been absorbed to the point where the acute damage has been done and my body is moving on.  But partly because the air cooled down...it was still wet and dreary, but there was some sort of atmospheric shift.

The kids and I hit the library and the comic book store.  We played another game of Carcassonne (we've played every day this week).  They did some homework Cap assigned before he left.  We went to Donna's for common meal.

I started up our Subaru, Giles, just to warm the engine up a bit.  I was shocked at how loud he was!  While I was out back I stopped to snap the roses :-)  I liked how they looked like a path up to the heavens...or at least to the pine tree.

Hope something lifted you, today.

Peace and love.

P.S.  I was quite tickled to find a place online that will ship you four strips of the special velcro one uses to attach an EZ Pass to one's windshield.  We only needed two strips so we could hang the EZ Pass in Moomin, but where was I going to find that?  For $3.67, TollTape.com will hook you up.  Very fast service and shipping.  I recommend.

P.P.S.  Yes, we finally named our new car.  Moomin.

P.P.P.S.  A case of necessity breeds invention?  Maybe.  Or it's just kismet.  My library treats are YA morsels: A Greyhound of a Girl and See You at Harry's.  Should be getting Stolen in a few days.

It's all i can do

My happiness at getting into bed before midnight has faded because...

• I was sleepy enough to go to bed earlier but didn't...which nagged my mind

• I didn't have much space...and didn't have it in me to do a firm pushover to make room

• tossed and turned

• finger combed many hairs out

• general mugginess of still air

• tendrils of hot flashes (it's been awhile since I've had sleep woes, even longer since hot flashes)

• mind would not quiet

• realized my sleepiness was fading

• jumped in my skin when my mind yelled at me: you are living amongst garbage!*

• took that as a sign to get out of bed, if even for a bit

Peacelovepeacelovepeacelovepeacelove

* I was having semi-free floating thoughts about decluttering, clean lines in living space, moving into new space, dumping loads of stuff into wonderfully large disposal bins...when, bam, I yelled at myself.

Timing

• Today has been what it is having downed a pint of ice cream in one sitting yesterday.

• Our lease was dropped off today.  For the full term ending next July 31.

• Donna brought me a decaf latte to my doorstep a little while ago.

• Missed Daniel's Spring Concert tonight.

• When I opened the door for Donna, I saw Well Fed had arrived.

• With warmer temps, bugs have been bumbling into the apartment to be squashed.

• This song tugged at my listening heart at the end of Sunday night's Mad Men episode.

Everything is timing.  Timing is not everything.  Not good, not bad.  It just is.

One more (a good one)

The urge to get offline (and move onto the next less virtual thing) brought to mind a jumble of words that I realized were, in essence, "do not go gentle into that good night"...so here it is, the poem, in full.

Peace.

GF funny

Dang, after I click "post" I am getting the frick offline.

Check out this tumblr.  'Tis gluten-free funny.

Love and light.

No crystal ball

I realized tonight there is something specific taking up valuable real estate in my mind that I haven't mentioned.  We may move this summer, after all.

The house has become more albatross than anything else for our landlord, this year.  His wife is sick and he does not have the time or energy to devote to dealing with the house (which was a stretch for him even before he got married a few years ago).

He was here the other day helping our downstairs neighbor with something (she is moving out July 1 after living here for 12 years!) and let it drop that he's considering putting the house on the market "as is" and seeing if he gets any interest.

We were seriously thinking about moving on up this Summer when our lease was up.  We would love just a bit more breathing room now that the kids are nearly as tall as we are.  They were 4 1/2 and 6 when we moved here.  As Gem would say, "le sigh".

But then, we bought the car.  And we got nervous about the double whammy on the budget: new car payment and bump in rent.  So we thought we'd stay put...and now the Universe seems to be suggesting we develop a plan B.

So, I have been looking at rental listings.  My late night scrolls through Trulia are engrossing.  Clicking through photographs, mapping out locations, chuckling at words like "cozy" and...chewing my lip when I see, again and again, how much nicer the apartments are once you leapfrog over our rent budget ceiling.

Le sigh.

I do not know what will happen.  I wish I had a crystal ball.  Not knowing is hard, but what's harder is not succumbing to useless worry about what might happen and how negatively that might impact the kids.

What I do know is that I really love this apartment.  It's too small, but it's our too small.  It's kind of dinghy and dilapidated, but it also has a lot of character.  This is the space the kids have lived the longest in their lives.  And for Cap and me, our time here falls just shy of the apartment we lived in the longest up till now (Sargent Street in Cambridge).

In a way, I can't imagine living anywhere else.  Which is dangerous for the heart.  And may explain some of the late night/off-Paleo shenanigans.

Peace and love...and feng shui.

crystal ball by jantsu18

Bouncing bits

Where to start...my mind is all over the place.

PMS/sugar --> sleep disturbance --> pint of Ben & Jerry's in one sitting more sugar = unfortunate cycle.

Haven't we been here before?



This ain't over.

Meanwhile...

• drumsticks were hella on sale at Whole Foods.  I have some marinating overnight in wheat-free tamari, coconut sugar, garlic powder, ginger powder, sake and maple syrup.  will bake and broil tomorrow.

• the Bloggess is coming to our local indie bookshop!  I am thrilled even though it is likely I won't be able to go.  (Cap is coming home that same night.)  I've started reading her memoir and am enjoying it.

• have I mentioned the show House of Lies?  it's on Showtime and I'm catching episodes here and there on demand.  I go back and forth between feeling giddy about it to thinking it's pretty uneven and no great shakes.

• I have all three episodes of the second season of Sherlock in our dvr.  looking forward to watching those.

• Peep Show is hilarious.  I've told Cap we should watch this together.  we shall see if I can wait as long as this might take!

• my cup spilleth over with gratitude: our new kitchen gadgets (which make things go smoother), our health (two incidents today served as intensely sad reminders that mental health should never be taken for granted), and our extended family vacay coming up in August (Williamsburg again!)

• and Skype.  Skype is very good when partner/dad is halfway around the world with wifi.

• two artists I love have new music coming out: Regina Spektor and Sigur Rós.

Peace and love.