Inane Chatter

It rained all night last night.  A welcome change, and really soothing to fall asleep to (several times, since I woke up a few times last night).  We woke up at 7 this morning to find it still pouring, so running was out of the question.  We found ourselves breakfasted and in the basement before 9am, and we spent a good hour making some donation and trash decisions.  We’re not done getting rid of the crap in the basement, not by a long shot, but we made a sizable dent.  (That looks weird.  Sizable.  Sizeable?  Still weird.)  Around 10:30, I went to Costco for Roxy’s medicine and then to Target (yeah, I know – again), and I was supposed to be home before noon so we could leave at noon to meet Erik and Margaret for lunch and a movie.  Well, you know how Target is.  I got sucked in, and it was almost noon when I got in the car to come home and get John.  So we were late.  I hate being late, but this time I can’t blame anyone by myself (sorry again, guys!).  It didn’t help that I got off the toll road going the wrong way on 7 and had to turn around and THEN wade through the normal traffic in the area.  Lunch (at Maggiano’s) was good, but it was more about catching up with E&M, who we hadn’t seen since mid-May, and that was much-needed and much fun.  After the movie (Knight and Day – the first half was funny and pretty entertaining.  The second half was okay, but less fun.), I bought a new wallet (a nice red, big, adult-type wallet to replace my falling-apart, overstuffed, tiny little wallet that gets lost in my purse and was meant to only hold the bare necessities but got drafted into full-time use because I don’t know why), and we came home, checked on the dogs (they’re fine), and did geeky website things together (I updated my Pages section.  See?).  Tomorrow might not be so productive, but you never know.

As I waited at the stoplight at Bellevue and Memorial on my way home from work today, I heard someone call my name.  I looked over and, oddly enough, it was the guy from last night (the one who wouldn’t stop talking) in the car in the next lane over.  I know Newport’s a small town, but what are the odds?  Which is pretty much what we talked about for the 30 seconds before the light changed, through our open windows.

When I got back to the inn, I changed clothes and came downstairs to head out for dinner.  I’d planned to wander a little and then eat a light dinner and come back early so I could get a normal night’s sleep.  (Last night was not normal, and not long enough.)  I ducked into the parlor to grab a cookie (they set out tea and they have the BEST cookies), and I met two women who had just checked in.  We chatted a little, then a little more, and before I knew it, it had been an hour.  I decided not to keep them any longer, since I knew they wanted to head out for dinner, and they invited me along, so we continued chatting for the next three hours.  They’re staying in one of the other houses here, so I’ll probably see them again.  Hope I do.  I liked them. 

(We had dinner at Puerini’s, and I had garlic sauteed with garlic, shallots, garlic, butter, garlic, herbs, and garlic in a white wine sauce.  With clams.  And garlic.  That’s how it feels (and tastes) now, anyway.  But it was good.)

It’s ten to three.  We pulled away from the gate on time, did some taxi-ing (how do you spell that?  Taxying?  Taxing?  Taxiing?), and then came to a standstill on the tarmac with a message from the pilot.  “Something something something from Atlanta, 30 minutes before we can take off, approximate time of take-off 16 after the hour, blah blah ten-minute warning to turn electronics back off.”  So…why did we pull away from the gate?  Why board at all?  Maybe so those of us who are sleepy can nap uninterrupted, as both of my seatmates are doing right now.  (One is snoring.  Lightly, but still.)  I’m on the window this time, exit row again, next to two seemingly ordinary people.  We’ll see how it goes.  And Mom, I don’t ALWAYS have stories to tell about my flight.  On my way home from Atlanta two days ago, my seatmate was a woman visting her daughter in Leesburg.  She was a bit of a talker, but perfectly nice.  It wasn’t her fault that I wasn’t in the mood to chat.  (Maybe if she’d been a hot ex-Marine I’d have changed my mind about that.  )

I finished my Dresden Files book while waiting to board.  I have another one with me, but I’m going to try a new mystery writer first.  New to me.  Has anyone heard of Lawrence Block?  I read about his books somewhere (almost everything I buy comes from a recommendation now), but I can’t remember where.  So far so good.  The book is called “The Burglar in the Library”, the main character owns a used bookstore, and he’s heading to an English-style bed and breakfast to look for a possibly non-existent rare book.  Just my cup of tea.

Yesterday, John and I went to Erik’s place to help him celebrate getting his Masters degree in International Commerce and Policy.  (Erik, did I get it right?)

Hey, ten-minute warning.  I’ll finish that later.

Much later:

I’m in my hotel room after a trip to a nail salon (yay for pretty toes) and a trip to Kroger for breakfast and lunch supplies for the week.  Food and relaxing are at the top of my list for right now, so, um, bye.

We really need to make an effort to see our friends more often.  Yes, we’re busy, life is busy, and right now isn’t ever the best time, but these guys have been our friends for more than a decade, and I feel like we’re missing out on things.  Try harder!  I can do that.  For now, though, I’m going to track John down.  We got home tonight and heard loud music from somewhere down the street, so John went to find out if there’s a band playing or if it’s just someone’s radio turned up as loud as possible.  I’m sure he’s hoping it’s a band.

(This is me putting off thinking about tomorrow.  Except not really.  Just burying it.)

Yesterday afternoon, I went to DC to meet several local members of the Dooce Community.  Spokeit, a regular commenter here (say hi, everybody) organized it (thank you!), and six of us showed up at Busboys and Poets to hang out (one with baby and brother-in-law in tow).  We talked about everything from ticks to strapless dresses (and puffed sleeves!), and I had a really good time.  I didn’t stay long (about two hours) because I didn’t want to spend most of my last day at home away from John, but I would like to do it again.  Maybe host it next time?  I realized, after I left of course, that even though I brought my camera, I didn’t take a single picture.  I HAVE to get better about that.

Oh, and Spokeit, guess what song was playing on the radio as I left DC?  That’s ri-ight, the ubiquitous (big word points) “Hey, Soul Sister”.  The universe is telling me (and everyone within range of a radio, Sirius or otherwise) to go to the Train concert this summer.

Last thing about yesterday: as I left the restaurant and headed across the street, a guy I’ve never seen before flagged me down and tried to pick me up.  !  He was carrying a couple of cloth Safeway bags full of groceries, and he started chatting me up as we walked down the block.  !!  Was I from around there (no, I told him practically West Virginia), could he have my phone number (“Well, I’m married…” “You’re married?!?”  “… and I was just on my way to pick him up.”), can he call me anyway and we’d just be friends and do I live with my husband (“Of course I live with him.”  “Then I guess I shouldn’t call.”), and then he chatted about the party he was planning for the Lakers game tonight, and then he crossed the street to his apartment building.  And I heaved a sigh of relief because I really don’t know how to handle that kind of situation.  That sounds ridiculous, I know (it’s just talking), but people don’t approach me on the street and start talking unless they need directions or something.  And people certainly don’t hit on me.  Or whatever that was.

And now, let’s add to the list of, shall we say, interesting people I meet on airplanes.  On my flight to Atlanta today, I had an aisle seat in an exit row that only had one other seat (on the window).  A quick glance at my seatmate showed a guy a little older than me, tall, slender, with majorly muscled arms.  (He was wearing a black tank top.)  He was on the phone and was doing that thing some guys do with their voices when they’re talking to women, sort of softening it.  (Did I mention he was good-looking?  He was.  Very.)   Of course I was eavesdropping (it only looked like I was reading), and it sounded like he was talking to his mother.  The flight attendant came by to make sure we were comfortable with the responsibilities that go along with sitting in an exit row, and as she left, he turned to me and said (with a very cute grin), “If it comes to that, I will eat that door.”  It was funny, we laughed, and it turns out he used to be a Marine.  Recon.  Badass.  That helps to explain the tattoos on his arms.  He didn’t seem like your typical macho Marine, though.  He came across more like the perfect sensitive Marine, the ones that only exist in the movies.  He said he was a writer and had recently been published.  What kind of book?  Philosophy.  Oh, and he’s a physical trainer?  I can see that.  And an actor?  Busy guy.  Anything I might have seen?  HBO and The History Channel?  Wow.  And he works for veterans’ groups.  And plans to start a gym in New York that will double as a rehab/counseling center where ex-soldiers conditioned to violence can work on moving past all that.  And apparently, he’s for real.  I wasn’t sure for a while.  He’s this guy.  Also, this guy.  And he’s trying to decide whether he wants to work on a Discovery Channel project next (“One Shot, One Kill” – he was a sniper) or something with Spike TV or one of three other TV projects.  And all of that came AFTER he talked about the training and the killing people and the violent episodes and close calls and how he worries about the guys in his unit who may not have been as strong as he is and can’t break away from the mercenary work they’re doing now that they’re out of the military.  WAY more information (and way more intensely delivered) than I was expecting to take in from a guy I’ve never met before on an hour and a half-long flight to Atlanta.  But he was nice, and he’s got a lot of projects going on, but the ones he seems to take the most seriously are the ones helping his friends and helping veterans.  He was sincere and had been through a lot, and I got off the plane wanting to help him (after I talked to John to hash out how strange the whole experience was).  Oh.  Oh!  How could I leave this part out?  So he’s worked with HBO (he played himself in “Generation Kill”, which started as a book by a reporter who was embedded with his unit in Iraq), and he’s met Ridley Scott and he’s done work in England and HE’S FRIENDS WITH EMMA THOMPSON!  He was her personal trainer for a bit.  How cool is that?  I’m two degrees away (or is that one?) from Emma Thompson!

That’s short-lived, I promise.  I don’t like gardening, but I’ll do what I have to do to keep the neighbors from attacking.  We missed mowing the lawn last weekend because of the trip to Pittsburgh, so throughout this past week, the grass got taller and taller and weedier-looking and weedier-looking.  It looked awful, so bad we could have been hiding cars on cinder blocks in the front yard, and we lost the dogs every time we opened the back door.  I knew we had a busy weekend ahead, so since I got home from work early yesterday (yay!), I decided that the least I could do was get a head start on the yardwork.  I spent over three hours out there, weeding my flower bed in the back and mowing the front lawn.  It made a big difference this morning, as John was able to clean, mow, and weed-whack the backyard while I mulched the flower bed, all in about an hour and a half.  (I carried every one of those giant mulch bags all the way to the bed by myself, and I can’t remember the last time I was so completely covered in dirt.  Actual dirty dirt.)

We were right on schedule to get out of the house with plenty of time to get to DC (I’m meeting some people – details will follow after our meetup), but then John checked his work email.  Apparently, something didn’t go quite right after an update and everyone’s panicking (probably unnecessarily), so John’s trying to calm them all down.  I’m waiting to find out if he’ll be stuck working or if he can still go with me.  End result?  We’re running late.  But, since this is a group party-thing I’m going to, it’s not that big a deal if I’m not right on time.  And since I’m leaving tomorrow for a week, I plan to only spend an hour or two at the thing anyway.  I’ll probably want to stay longer (I already want to stay longer), but I don’t want to leave tomorrow feeling like I hardly saw John this weekend.

Oh, we’re going.  More later.

Okay, okay.  I accept that what happened to me yesterday morning was a panic attack, and I’ll call the doctor in the morning.

TV, anyone?

I love the theme song for Treme (on HBO).  John and I haven’t decided if we want to keep watching it, but we had to watch the first two episodes.  Required viewing in this family.  Why?  Check out the concierge in the second episode.  She’s related to ME!  How cool is that?  The concierge in question (who Steve Zahn waved at!) is my soon-to-be-famous sister-in-law.  So, you know, kind of related to me.  Close enough.

Candy, I thought you were great.  Even though we were watching for you, we were caught by surprise when you did appear, and then there was much squealing and pausing and rewinding and rewatching.  (I’ll take credit for most, if not all, of the squealing.)  We couldn’t possibly delete the episode from our DVR, of course.  We’ll have to show it to everyone who comes over.  And we started with Jess on Saturday night.  So for the next…I don’t know how long, everyone who enters the house will have to watch Candy’s scene in Treme.    You think I’m kidding?  Just wait.

Go visit Curiosity. She’s listing her priorities for life (and making fun of Victoria’s Secret models).  Who can resist?

You know what bugs me?  (In a little way, not a big way.)  Finding a blog I like, and then realizing they don’t update every day.  And it’s not just that they don’t update every day (’cause that’s okay.  People are allowed to lead busy lives and do other things and NOT update the blog every single day.  Yes, you have my permission.), but then they don’t update every few days, and then it’s been a week, and then two months.  It’s so disappointing!  I bookmarked you because I liked you!  I liked to read you!  And then you abandoned me.  How could you?  *sob*  (Mom, I’m not talking about you, since I talk to you every day, and you tell me the things you would blog about.  I feel up to date on you.  But if I didn’t actually know you, and I found your blog some other way, then yes, I’d be talking about you.  (Was that too harsh?  I didn’t mean to be harsh.))  I have five or six blogs bookmarked that fall in this category, and since I already don’t have the time read all the blogs I bookmark (but I really want to), I may have to clear those few out.

“Zannah, why haven’t you gotten me a Les Paul?”

“Clearly, I don’t love you enough.”

We watch a lot of TV.  Not as many movies, but we’ve seen a few lately.  We watched Broadcast News last weekend.  Both of us confused it with Network (another one we haven’t seen), and we didn’t figure out that we were thinking of an entirely different movie until Broadcast News was over.  Where was the rant?  Oh, right.  Wrong movie.  We watched Some Kind of Wonderful tonight, but I was a little disappointed by it.  I’m not sure what I was expecting.

List for this weekend:

• Run
• Clean
• Groceries
• Swing by the office to drop this week’s evaluations off and make some copies (Yes, I peeked, and yes, they were nice to me again.    Thankfully.)
• Make sure Jess is okay after Chuck gets on the plane (he’ll be gone for three months)
• CATCH UP WITH MY BLOG FRIENDS
• Library (to get a new book to listen to during my commute)
• Bank

Roxy (who’s doing well, thanks for asking) just gave me a look that said she wished we’d just go to bed already.  Don’t we know we’re keeping her up?

*Edited to add the last two items on my list.  I remembered them this morning.

One week ago today, John and I got up ridiculously early (for a Sunday morning) (no, 5:20 is always ridiculously early) in order to get to DC (via metro) so he could run in the Cherry Blossom Ten Mile Run.  His training had completely derailed, since we had three feet of snow clogging all the paths and streets, and then when it finally melted, he got sick, he was working late, he had schoolwork – everything came together to make it hard for him to be ready.  He ran the Army Ten-Miler about three and a half years ago, but he hadn’t hit that distance since then.  And since he didn’t feel prepared, he was half-convinced the sweeper bus was going to pick up and take him out the race.  He had to keep up a 14-minute mile pace to avoid being picked up.  He knew (and I definitely knew) he’d do better than that, but that didn’t stop him from being nervous.

We go to the metro at Dunn Loring and got on the train.  Everyone who got on that train, at every stop, was a runner.  (They’re the only ones crazy enough to be going to DC that early.)  By the time we got into the district, the train was packed, and we all got off at the Smithsonian stop.  I wish I’d had my camera out because I looked back over my shoulder as we rode the escalator up and saw that the platform next to the train was one solid mass of people.  It looked really cool, but since I was part of that mass, I couldn’t get into my bag.  (I was playing sherpa, so I had the backpack to hold all sweatshirts, towels, water, etc.)

We followed the crowd from the metro to the grounds around the Washington Monument.  The race started in waves, so they didn’t expect all 15,000 people to be at the starting line at once.  The first wave was scheduled to go at 7:40, with the last wave at 8:00.  John was in the red wave, which I think was the second one.  All John had to do was pin on his number and go.  Of course, we’d just commuted in for more than an hour, so John (and every other runner) needed to find a port-a-potty.  Fortunately, there were tons of them.  Unfortunately, probably 7500 other runners had the same urge.  We joined one of the REALLY long lines and started to worry.  It didn’t look like it’d be possible for him to make it to the front of the line before the last wave started.  (It didn’t matter which wave he joined, so missing his wave wasn’t part of the worry.)

We waited in line for a while, and then he sent me off to find any alternatives.  I ran across 14th Street (near the starting line) and found another row of port-a-potties with NO LINES.  I raced back to John, waved him out of his line, and sent him running in that direction.  Feeling much better, he found me again as the next to last wave was starting, and we got him in the crowd.  And it was a crowd.  SO many people.  They were sent off, but they were packed in so tightly that they all walked for another few minutes.  So I walked along with them, outside the railing.

John in that crowd. The race has started, but nobody's running yet.

There they go.

I found a great spot along the rail right by the finish line (I was already there when  I look that last picture), so, along with some other very enthusiastic spectators, I shouted myself hoarse cheering on the finishers.  Long before John came in, Erik and Margaret joined me at the finish line, bringing much-needed caffeine.  We cheered John across the line, and then headed for our meetup point.  Here’s Erik, convinced he can spot John in the sea of people:

And here’s John, triumphant and sweaty.  He finished almost four minutes faster than his last 10-miler time.

From there, we hopped the metro out to Ballston to have a yummy brunch with Erik and Margaret at Whitlow’s, and then we went home, where both of us collapsed of exhaustion, even though only one of us deserved the rest.    Go John!

By we, of course, I mean mostly John.  After mowing the lawn (John), some light weeding (me), dog poop scooping (me), and then tying up a sagging bush (blame the three feet of snow that sat on top of it for a month) with neon yellow string (mostly John), John decided that today was the day to somehow attach these extra pieces of latticework (or trellis?  not sure what you’d call it) to the corner of the deck.  In the morning, we’ll have a little shade.  I haven’t figured out what to do about late afternoon.  I took pictures!  I forgot to take a before picture, but here’s one when we were two-thirds of the way done.

Actually, here’s a before picture, no trellis yet, with John hard at work doing…something.  On a ladder.

And here’s the finished product.  From the yard…

…and from the deck.

Since I had my camera out, I figured I’d take some pictures of the yard when it’s at its best.  And the dogs.  So here’s most of the backyard, with my flower bed in need of mulching.  Maybe next weekend.

Here’s the rose bush that’s trying to take over the deck.

Technically, that’s two rose bushes.  Here are few pictures of the dogs taking advantage of the shade.

It’s breezy and the wind chimes are…chiming, I guess, and we could hear them clearly if the windows were open, but did you see how high the pollen count was today?  My car is covered, and even though I was outside most of the day, there’s no way I’m letting clouds of pollen get into the house.

Most of the day got away from us, but all the chores are done (minus the grocery shopping) and John asked for two hours to himself so he can concentrate on his project for school before we settle in with dinner and maybe a movie.   He’ll have to spend much of tomorrow on his project, too, but at least he’ll have done something today, and he won’t have to worry about the lawn and stuff.  And tomorrow morning, we can catch up on the four hours of Lost we have saved on the DVR.  Hopefully, the rest of my weekend will include nothing more taxing than a morning run tomorrow, catching up on TV, lots of Internet time (I have to get my fix in on the weekends, now that I know what my weeks at work look like), a trip to Wegman’s (hardly a chore), and some play time outside with the dogs.  Maybe at the dog park.

For now, I need a shower.  And comfy clothes.  And I’m in for the night.  Oh, one more thing for tomorrow – set up a couple of lunch dates with a couple of friends.

And they don’t include working after I get home on a Friday evening for several hours.  But I promised myself I wasn’t going to talk about that.  Instead, I’ll mention that Roxy got so excited about the pieces of lamb fat she was going to get that she repeatedly walked herself into the narrow dead end between the arm of the couch and the wall.  Head first.  She doesn’t like to back up, so she’d stand there, tongue out, tail wagging, with her nose just barely over the arm, until I nudged her backwards with my hand on her chest.  Like three times.

John is in the office pretending he’s Brian May, and I’m pretending I have time to check some of my favorite sites before my eyes close.  We don’t have any plans this weekend (other than the usual light house cleaning, lawn mowing, grocery shopping, and something (I know there was something else I wanted to do, but did I write it down?  Say it with me.  No!)), so I hope to run and relax.  And relaxing had better include catching up with my favorite online people.  Also my new favorites, thanks to a recent thread at the Dooce Community and, of course, Spoke’s Blog Love series (first day here).

Before I go to bed, this is for Mom, Sandwich Stealer (not that one), Jess, and other people I could name but will not.  Today.  Just you wait.

I think the point of mentioning my priorities in the title was so I could say I still have mine, and I think they’re in the right order, but I need to work a lot harder at figuring out how to make them happen every day.  Or most days.  I feel a bit overwhelmed, and not by anything bad, but by not being able to make time for all those little things I like to do.  But I will.  I will figure it out.

Eventful, at least.

Okay, you got me, there’s only one event, but I have things to do!

I spent most of today finding out what I’ll need to be able to do everything this weekend.  I got shoe recommendations from my friends online and found stores that carry those brands, I talked to the vet about how to switch Roxy’s medication correctly so we (hopefully) avoid seizures, I picked up the new prescription from the vet, and I figured out how we’re going to get to DC and where I’ll watch the race with Erik and Margaret (who I’ll be emailing soon) and where we’ll meet up with John again for Sunday’s Cherry Blossom 10-miler.  So tomorrow, I’ll buy shoes, John will do homework, we’ll pick up Roxy’s new medication, and we’ll run down to DC to pick up John’s race packet.  Quick trip.  And we’ll drive, of course, not run.  That’s for Sunday.  And then, we’ll get up absurdly early Sunday morning (so I’m sleeping in tomorrow, but I will run at some point during the day), drive to the nearest metro stop, metro in to the race, have a late breakfast with our friends, and come back and finish our Sunday at home.  Hopefully being lazy.  And at some point, we’ll mow the lawn.  And maybe mulch a flower bed or two.  Or not.  That doesn’t sound very lazy.

Pardon me while I announce what is obvious by now.  John is running in the Cherry Blossom 10-miler Sunday morning, so anyone who reads this and is in the area is welcome to join me, help cheer on John, and then have something to eat.  I wish you were all nearby.

John walked in the door just a couple of minutes ago, almost too tired to hug me hello, so I’ve started the rice and I have to go stir up my stir-fry.  He needs to eat well and get plenty of sleep for the next couple of days.  That should happen every day, for both of us, but you all know how hard it is to make that happen.  We’re better about the eating well.  Not so good about the sleep.

Hmm.  Well, that really depends on what you consider a waste of a Sunday.  And I think that entirely depends on what sort of weekend you’ve had or what kind of week is coming up.  For me, this Sunday, wasting the day would have meant doing nothing.  If you know me, you know that I consider doing nothing on a Sunday (or any day) to be one of the best ways to spend a day.  Normally.  But I have a very busy, somewhat stressful week coming up, with a long commute at either end of the work day and very little time to get stuff done.  Today, not wasting my Sunday meant being productive.  So I went to the grocery store (Wegman’s, of course) to stock up for the week ahead, went to Staples to buy a laptop bag for work, got my car cleaned out, paid the bills, filled out the census form, and did what little picking up was required to put the house back into the shape it was yesterday morning.  That part was easy; Jess and Chuck aren’t that messy.  And now I’m done with all of that and I can spend the rest of the day doing whatever I want.  I think.  And what is that?  I think it’s reading.

But first, I’ve seen a few movies recently.  John and I watched District 9 last weekend.  It was not at all what I expected, but that could have been because I didn’t see any previews or read anything about it before I saw it.  It was interesting, certainly, and gory enough for three movies, but I can’t say I want to see it again.  We watched Dean Spanley and then Stardust with Jess and Chuck last night.  I think I really liked Dean Spanley (it was not at all what I expected – took me completely by surprise when I started to see where it was going), and I think I’ll like it more when I can see it again.  Jess performed her magic to get our DVD player to play her Region 2 DVD, and we’re very impressed.  Stardust is one I already knew I loved.

I’m a little chilly, so I off to take a nice warm bath, read my book, and…I feel like there should be a third thing to keep the rhythm of the sentence going, but I can’t think of anything.    My goal for the evening is to not stress out about tomorrow.  I’m as prepared as I can be.

…so you get this very short post.  Jess and Chuck are here, after a day at an arts and crafts fair followed by wine and cheese at a vineyard, and now we’re going to settle in with wine, snacks, and a movie.  (Hi, everyone! – Jess)  So this is all you get.  ‘Cause I’m busy.

So now the bathrooms are clean, the guest room beds are made, and upstairs is vacuumed.  I still need to clean the windows and dust.  At work (need I say it was another long day?), I basically cleaned out my entire desk.  I threw out what I could, but everything worth keeping is important enough to actually have with me in the training classroom.  So it all came home with me today.

I’m meeting Jess and Chuck around noon tomorrow in Chantilly, but there’s stuff I need to do first.  Sounds like I need a list.

1. Lord & Taylor is having a shoe sale.  I could go on Sunday, though.
2. Buy a laptop bag (for work) at Staples.  I’ve found the one I want.  That can wait until Sunday, too.
3. Get my car washed, inside and out.  I think the place I go is closed on Sunday, so I have to do it tomorrow.  I’ll be carpooling next week, so my car should be in good shape.
4. Dust.
5. Clean the windows.
6. Go to the grocery store.  I don’t even know what I need to get yet, but I won’t be able to feed Jess and Chuck if I don’t go.

At least I’m not traveling yet.  If this were the last weekend before all the travel, I’d be way more anxious and making many more lists.

My computer, thanks to John, is now running perfectly with its new hard drive and shiny new Fedora operating system.  And I get to use my pretty pink laptop with the nice keyboard.  (It’s really a pleasure to type on this keyboard.)

I think the condition of the house has been holding me back.  A half-clean house, so close to being mostly clean, makes me feel like I’m more in control of how and when I exercise, what I eat, and how I feel about myself.  You know?  If the house is clean, then I’m successful, and I have more energy and more enthusiasm for exercise.  But we still have too much clutter.  How do we get rid of all this crap?

It’s been raining off and on all day (mostly on), so during a break this afternoon, I let the dogs out to play.  They were amusing themselves, sniffing around, eating dirt, and I went back to my book.  A little later I realized I was hearing rain hit the windows pretty hard and I remembered the dogs were still outside.  I rushed over to the sliding glass doors and found two soggy dogs huddled up against the door, trying to get under the overhang.  Adorable.  They’re in now, mostly dry, and being a little clingy.

I’ve already shelved my new books (I had to move about a shelf’s worth of books all over the house, one shelf at a time), and now I’m relaxing.  I think John just gave up on his projects for the day, so we’re going to cuddle up and watch TV.  And skip dinner.  We had a big lunch with Jess and Chuck after the book sale.

The rain is messing with my running plans.  It was raining hard this morning when the alarm went off, so we slept in the extra hour and I went straight to work.  When I got home from work (less than an hour ago), it was raining enough to keep me in.  It’s supposed to rain into the evening, slack off for a little (when it’s too dark and too late to run), and then pick up big time over night and all day tomorrow.  So even if I wanted to get up super extra early (we’re already getting up extra early to meet Jess and Chuck at a book sale in Maryland) to run tomorrow morning before we leave, I couldn’t ’cause it’s supposed to be pouring cats and dogs.  I like rain and everything, but I was on a roll!

</whining>

It’s Friday, it’s the weekend, I get to buy books tomorrow (Hi, I’m Zannah.  I read.), and I get to hang out with people I like.  And I can sleep in on Sunday.

[Pause while I peruse my bookmarks.]

I really and truly just gasped.  Out loud, by myself.  I think I found the house I’m supposed to live in.  At the very least, I need lots of money and an interior decorator who can read my mind and find these pictures years from now when I can afford to redo our entire house.

Go here and read this.  (You don’t have to.  Next time I’ll ask politely.  But it’s a nicely written post about being alone during a power outage.)

I’m done for now.  I have very important things to do, like going through my books and writing down titles I’m missing and authors I love so I can look for their books.  I think we’ve already discussed my need for lists.  I can browse through a book sale forever, but if I don’t bring a list, I might browse right past something I’ve been looking for because I didn’t recognize the author.

SPRING!  I know it’s not spring yet, but it’s starting to look like it.  It’s sunny, it got up to 50 degrees, we ran a race, the dogs spent the day outside, and I almost opened some windows.  More progress on that tomorrow, hopefully, since the high is supposed to be 55 (!).  It’s been a very cold winter, and I am SO ready for it to be over.

For the last two and a half weeks, ever since John coaxed/supported/shamed me into registering with him for the 5-mile race, I’ve been dreading today.  I wasn’t at ALL prepared to run 5 miles (high winds, snow and ice on the sidewalks, and being forced to run in the neighborhood streets are my main excuses), so my plan was to run as much as I could, counting on adrenaline to help a little, keep a steady pace, and then if I need to walk, try to walk only for one minute and then jog for at least three minutes before walking again.  So I had a plan.  I also took a peek at last year’s race results and I knew that at least a handful of people took between 70 and 85 minutes to complete the race, so I was fairly confident I wouldn’t be last.  But you never know.  Maybe those people decided never to run 5 miles again so they didn’t bother registering this year.  I told John (who wasn’t feeling all that great about it, either) to look for me around 60-67 minutes.  Closer to 67.

It was a beautiful morning (and it’s been a beautiful day), but pretty breezy, so it was still plenty cold (wind chill in the upper 20s, I think).  We joined the crowd at the starting line and John asked me where I wanted to fit in: front, middle, or back?  Definitely not the front (I’ll get trampled, plus I’ll just be in the way of all those super-serious, super-fast runners), and I was pretty sure I didn’t want to be in the back (why start there?  I’ll get there eventually on my own), but in the middle, there’d be all the psychological pressure of watching all those runners pass me along the way.  I said something to that effect to John as we threaded our way to the back of the first third of the crowd, and he said, “Well, you know what it’s like.”  I’m pretty sure he didn’t mean that I should be used to watching runners pass me.  Pretty sure. 

The course took us through neighborhoods in Ashburn John and I don’t typically see, and there were a few people out cheering us on.  There was a big hill near the end of the first mile, and just after it, a woman shouted from her front porch, “It’s all downhill from here!”  She was mostly right.  There were a couple of times the course doubled back on itself, so I could see that I wasn’t actually last, or even that close to last (definitely in the last third, last fourth, maybe even last fifth – I’ll post numbers when the results are up).  One of the times we doubled back, though, I saw a guy juggling.  While running.  He had 5 (maybe 4, but I think five) red balls in the air at once while he jogged up the hill.  Pretty cool, very weird.

Just after the 3-mile mark, I realized I was doing better than expected, averaging about an 11-minute mile, and I started daydreaming about finishing in under an hour.  I wondered if John would even be looking at the finish line that early.  (Of course he would.  There isn’t much else to look at.)  Any walking I did was for less than a minute and not all that often (4 or 5 times total), and I was still on track at the 4th mile, so I ran the entire 5th mile and managed to pick up the pace at the very end, enough to feel like I was going to throw up as I crossed the finish line.  That’s the way to do it.    It passed, quickly, and John was there, and my time on the clock was just under 55 minutes.  I don’t remember exactly what, but my official time should be lower since it didn’t start until I crossed the starting line.  My watch said 54:24.  You know that means?  That I can do that without training for it?  It means I can do better.  And it was fun and I liked it and I won’t be afraid to do it again.  Another side effect: my fear of 10Ks disappeared.  I can DO this.

I just checked.  Results have been posted.  My official time (matches my watch exactly, for once) is 54:24.  Out of 280 women, I finished 241st.  John finished 197th out of 316 men with an 8:45 pace.  My pace was 10:53.

I can do better than that.

Anyway, we got home, had breakfast, cleaned up (ourselves, not anything silly like the house), and then John had to stay close to his computer since he’s on call to work today.  I talked to Jess (we’re making lots of plans), and then we filed our taxes.  John wants to buy an external hard drive today (and I need a new Scalzi book) AND I really want sushi for dinner, so we’re heading out soon to do all (at least some) of that.  The big decision for the evening is whether we eat out or bring sushi home (and snuggle in for TV or a movie).  Tough call.

Things I Like (in no particular order):

• Reading fiction, anywhere, anytime
• my dogs
• all dogs
• PUPPIES!
• And kittens
• And cats that actually like people
• chocolate
• milk chocolate
• white chocolate
• Paul Reiser
• Mad About You
• Saturday mornings
• sunny days (“sweeping the…”)
• summer days
• trees
• books (and their smell)
• big band music
• lists
• flowers
• BIG bathtubs
• showers with real water pressure
• manicured lawns
• manicured nails (my own, anyway – don’t much care for anyone else’s nails)
• clean sheets
• John’s clean, just-out-the-shower smell (much better than his just-came-back-from-a-long-run-sweaty smell)
• John (duh)
• everyone else I like (but won’t list here for fear I’ll leave someone I like off the list and that person (let’s call this person “H” for “hypothetical”)  will notice and be mad at me for leaving her (or him) off (even though it was an accident and I really do like H) and she will stop visiting my site, assuming  she was visiting and reading anyway, but if she wasn’t, she wouldn’t know I left her off and she wouldn’t get mad and stop reading, so I guess H was reading, which means, again, that I shouldn’t list anyone because I might leave someone off and she’ll get mad and stop reading)
• decorating with books
• my pretty new dining room table
• Ellen DeGeneres
• working from home
• that relaxed feeling as you drift off to sleep

Speaking of that last one, it’s getting close to my bedtime.  More accurately, it’s getting close to that time when I should be in bed reading.

We met Baby Alex today at brunch with Greg, Amanda, Erik, and Margaret.  He’s SO cute.  See?

And he was on his best behavior.  He only fussed a little, and only right before we left the restaurant.  Margaret and I are in love.  With the baby.    (It was good to see Greg and Amanda, too.)

After we left our friends to head home, we stopped at Hole in the Wall Books, our favorite local used bookstore in Falls Church.  It was supposed to be a quick stop (John’s looking for something in particular), but of course that didn’t happen.  We chatted with the owner for a while about the snow, then we browsed (I found about 12 books right off the bat), and then we chatted some more while the owner rang us up.  And since we were chatting, we took our time, and I found three more books.  I love used bookstores.

We got back to the house much later than we originally expected (and yet, not at all annoyed  by that because, come on, books and babies (and friends, right, can’t forget about them)), but the sun was still shining, so John disappeared into the basement to play his guitar and I took the dogs on a short walk (really cold).  Walking the dogs is only noteworthy because of what I overheard.  There were three girls playing on top of a mountain of snow in someone’s yard, and one of them said:

“I’m a 12-year-old girl, but my mom keeps telling me I have to be proper.  I mean, I’m twelve.“

For a second, I thought she had to quoting from a movie or something.  What mom would say that?