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You can never have too many guitars

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“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.

Better late than never

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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.

The crowd of runners (only one wave, I think)

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!

Look what we did!

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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.

I have priorities, really I do

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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.

Busy weekend ahead

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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.

How NOT to waste a Sunday afternoon

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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.

Cleaning up

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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?

Wet dogs

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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.

I forgot about this part of spring

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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.

5 miles? Not so bad.

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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.

A list

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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.

Brunch is for babies

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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?

Most Awesome Day

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Today was a really good day.  Most awesome, I might say.  Mightn’t I?  I dare say I might.  🙂  For reals.  Seriously, I spent the day BUYING USED BOOKS (Hello, my name is Zannah.  I don’t believe we’ve met.  I read.) and hanging out with my very best girl friend, and THEN I got to spend my evening with my very best boy friend.

I got up before the sun (maybe not as awesome as the rest of the day) and was on the road by 8am (with stops for gas and Starbucks, so really on the road by 8:15) to meet Jess in Maryland for the B.I.G. book sale.  B.I.G. (Books for International Goodwill) has a book sale every six weeks, and this is the first one we’ve managed to get to since Jess told me about it sometime last fall.  It’s held in this big warehouse – you know, I don’t even know if they use the whole building.  The sale part was only in one corner.  A big corner, but not even a quarter of the warehouse.  The books were well-organized, and the place was pretty crowded.  We quit after about two hours, mostly because the place wasn’t heated and our hands were frozen.  I will definitely go back.

We left my car in the lot at the warehouse and drove to Chesapeake Beach for lunch.  I had an ulterior motive for choosing Chesapeake Beach, though.  Dad was stationed there – wait.  He worked at the Pentagon then, right?  Why did we live all the way out there?  Anyway, we lived on the base, right on the cliff above the bay, just south of Chesapeake Beach, and I wanted to see if we could get on the base and see the house.  Didn’t happen.  We found the base, parked outside, walked up to the security guard at the gate, and got turned away.  She wasn’t even nice about it.  Not rude exactly, but no hint of sympathy.  We drove north through Chesapeake Beach again (took about 3 minutes – that place is tiny) looking for lunch.  Found it in North Beach.  I have no idea what the name of the place is (Something Seafood Pub), but lunch was really good.  Lunch was over, but we weren’t done hanging out, so we found another cafe and had some coffee.  We still weren’t done hanging out (when are we?), but it was after 3 and we needed to head in opposite directions to go home.

John was studying for his new class when I got home, but once he finished, we both camped out at the dining room table with our laptops.  He started working on the database he’s building for our books, and I backed up this website’s database and all the files so I could upgrade my version of WordPress.  It took a while (the backing up part), but I’m running the latest version of WordPress now, and I plan to spend some time messing around with the look of the site tomorrow.  Oh, I got the parent/child page thing to work, so if you go to my Books and Movies page now, the links on it should work.  And I’ll get better about updating those pages.

Don’t forget about the Name Our Bookstore contest!

Cold in Kentucky

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Well, the weather outside is chilly (not very frightful), but inside is nice and toasty, made more so by the Yuletide Fire DVD Mom got.

I had a very weird few moments at the Canadian Brass concert (where they played only a couple of Christmas songs) Saturday night.  They played Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, which I know from their Greatest Hits album.  I listened to that album on repeat while reading The Mirror of Her Dreams and A Man Rides Through, by Stephen R. Donaldson, years and years ago, and ever since then, whenever I hear that album, I’m returned to that story.  That’s never happened to me with a live performance before, but it did Saturday night.  For the length of the song, scenes from the books were shuffling through my memory.  Strange.  But cool.

Then Jess and I stayed up to watch Love Actually and drink champagne.  🙂  Until 2am.

I wimped out on my run this morning.  I took Howdy with me, but I left my ear muffs and gloves behind.  We only made it three blocks before I decided I was too cold.  That was dumb, ’cause it’s going to be even colder tomorrow.  I won’t forget my ear muffs and gloves again, but I don’t know how much that’ll help.

Kimchi!

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I don’t feel like I did enough today, and I think it’s because I didn’t run.  I got out and ran some errands (bought a new thermostat, got the oil changed in my car, had copies made of the house keys for the new pet sitter (who we’re meeting tomorrow)), so I was at least, you know, active, but I feel like a slob.

Dinner, while delicious and healthy (kimchi, rice, lettuce wraps), was painful.  I have a cut on my thumb, just under the nail, and the rice vinegar and soy sauce in the kimchi hurt a lot as it ran over my hands.  Which happened with every bite.  John eventually gave up on the lettuce wraps and just ate rice and kimchi with a fork.  Next time I’ll make sure we have chopsticks.  This is the second time I’ve made kimchi (using Mark’s recipe – good recipe, Mark!), and it turned out pretty well.  John has already eaten most of the non-spicy batch I made for him.

Tomorrow Jess is coming over, and we’re going to see the Canadian Brass Christmas concert at George Mason.  John surprised me with tickets for this concert last year at the Kennedy Center.  He’s pretty good with surprises.  And the concert was great, so I’m very excited.  And Jess is coming over!

Not enough time

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I still have over three full weeks before I rejoin the working world, but I feel like I don’t have enough time.  (I know, stop whining (for any number of reasons).)  I’m just amazed at how quickly all this time filled up.  I’ll be visiting Mom and Dad all of next week, and then we’ll go to PA for Christmas sometime the week after that.  In between, I plan to spend a day or so with Jess in MD.  We’ll be back from PA for our anniversary (I think), and then New Year’s will be on top of us.  And I start the Monday after New Year’s.  So I have somewhere between 10 and 12 whole days with nothing planned in them.  Maybe 9 to 11.  And now that I’ve counted them out like that, it sounds like more free time than before.  It’s just when I look at it week by week that it looks super busy.  I certainly don’t want to NOT do any of the things I have planned.  And I’ll probably feel better about it when we know how many and which days John will have off from work.

Party on, Wayne.

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I’m tired of painting.  The second coat is on, so tomorrow I’ll do the trim.  Or at least part of it.  I think I’ll need John’s help with a couple of things.

I should feel more tired than I do.  It was after 1:30 when we got home last night from the holiday party.  I’m sure it’ll catch up with me tonight.  The party was fun, though.  Lots of food, open bar, a live band and music when the band needed a break.  We went to find Joe so we could say goodbye on our way out, but Joe was on the dance floor, so saying goodbye turned into an hour of dancing.  I like to dance.  🙂

So you know how John is usually the tallest person in the room?  He’s got a coworker who’s 6’6″.  We spent a lot of time talking to him last night, and I just couldn’t get over how he dwarfs John.  It was totally weird.

And now I’m off to shovel the sidewalk and the driveway.  Here’s a cute picture of Roxy (I didn’t want her to feel left out).

No news IS good news!

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Mindy came home from the hospital today.  I talked to her this afternoon, and she’s doing okay.  Mom is taking care of her.  🙂

John and I went to Annapolis today to hang out with Jess and Chuck.  We had a little bit of a hard time getting started this morning, though.  Last night we went to Joe and Megan’s house for a few hours after work.  We weren’t able to leave work early at all, so we rushed home to let the dogs out and try to run them around for a few minutes before abandoning them again.  (We made sure we put everything edible or valuable as far out of their reach as possible, since it’s days like this when they get destructive.)  We made it to Joe’s house around 7:30 or so.  It was a little bit crazy there, but good crazy.  After the boys went to bed, we sat around in their living room with a fire and talked until about midnight.  I pulled John away with the reminder that we were getting up early the next day to go to Annapolis.  He and Joe have plans to have lunch soon (and hopefully Megan (and the boys) and I get to come along…).  Anyway, we got home and got to bed around 1am.  Got up at seven.  No, the alarm went off the first time at seven.  For a second I thought the clock was wrong – I was WAY too tired for seven am and it was so dark outside!  But we snoozed for about half an hour and then got up.  Snoozing helped.  And I was wide awake and ready to go by the time we hit the road.  Starbucks helped.  Their croissants are really good.  🙂

Jess told me where we should meet them when we got the Academy this morning, and she warned me that even with directions, it might be hard, since there ARE NO STREET SIGNS.  I figured that the only street signs that would be missing would be right at the very end, and I didn’t think it would be a big deal.  I was half-right.  We had street signs until the last two turns, and yes, the two that were missing were right at the end, right at the Academy.  But the Academy is a BIG place.  So we turned too soon, found ourselves across some body of water (not the Severn itself, but something attached to it), turned around at St. John’s College.  Got back on the road we were on, went a little further, didn’t turn on what would have been the right road (because it had no sign) and ended up across the Severn.  I was pretty sure that wasn’t right, so we turned around again.  This time I took that turn onto the right road, but went right by the hall we were supposed to park behind.  I got pointed in the right direction by the gate guard.  And Jess and Chuck showed up just as we were parking our car.  So our getting lost helped with the timing, but still.  Street signs are important!

We got an information-filled (and trivia-filled) tour of the Academy from Chuck.  It’s a very impressive-looking place.  I kinda wish we’d been able to see it filled with middies, but that’s my own fault for waiting until the holiday break to get out there.  We weren’t able to see the chapel (there was a wedding going on), but we wandered through parts of Dahlgren Hall and Bancroft Hall (which is HUGE!), and much of the grounds.  Some of the grounds.  Saw the mast from the USS Maine.  There’s all kinds of cool stuff just laying around.  John took some pictures, but I haven’t looked at them yet, so I don’t know what he got.  After our tour, we headed into downtown Annapolis for a little bit of wandering and some lunch.  I love that kind of historic downtown shopping district.  Fun to just window shop and people-watch.

After lunch, Jess and Chuck took us to the bookstore with the dragon in the children’s section.  I really like that kind of bookstore.  It’s basically in an old house, sort of shotgun style, with a step up to each room as you go further towards the back.  Not very big, but cozy and crammed full of books.  That’s basically what I want, although I think I want it on a slightly larger scale.

Oh!  On our way to lunch, we were walking by this hotel and Chuck muttered something about wanting us to go in and see their heating system.  We all looked at him like he was crazy.  We should know by now that he is, but he certainly steers us in the direction of some really interesting stuff.  This hotel apparently used to be heated by hypocaust (an underground heating system used by the Romans), but no one at the hotel knew it until they were doing some renovations.  So there’s a room off the lobby with a glass floor so visitors can look under their feet and see part of the ducts used to move the heated air around.  It was really cool.  But walking on the glass floor unnerved me and Jess a bit.

Anyway, we had a wonderful time with Jess and Chuck (as usual – thanks, guys!) and can’t wait to see them again.

We were home before 3:30 this afternoon, and we’ve done very little since.  Actually, that’s not true.  We put up the tree and decorated it, and we’ve talked to almost every member of John’s family and helped them all with gift ideas.  🙂  So now I’m waiting for the pizza we ordered to arrive, and then we’ll watch a movie (maybe Dan in Real Life, maybe Brokeback Mountain – I know, I know.  Very different movies.).  Tomorrow, we have to finish our Christmas shopping.  At least we know what we’re looking for.  Mostly.

Worrying won’t do me any good.

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Nothing happened today.  I have to post something without the crutch of actually having an event to write about.

How about this?  I am super excited about our day in Annapolis this weekend.  Hmm.  That doesn’t sound like me.  I mean, yes, I’m excited, but I don’t usually say I’m “super excited” about anything.  🙂  “I’m very much looking forward to it” sounds stilted.  But the sentiment is the same.  I get to hang out with Jess and Chuck for a few hours, go on a tour of the Naval Academy, see Annapolis all decked out for Christmas, and have yummy fish and chips.  Oh, and I get to see this mysterious bookstore with a dragon in it.  What could be better?

I’m hoping to have all holiday shopping (what little we’re doing) done by then.  John and I will probably try to go to the mall Thursday after work.  We only have a couple of things left to get.  I ordered as many things as possible online so I could avoid going to the mall.  I don’t mind the crowds, but parking is a pain.  And it drives John crazy.  🙂  He hates circling for a parking spot.

Well.  Mom just called.  Mindy is in the ER for an emergency appendectomy.  I started to get upset, but this is not a life-threatening surgical procedure.  She’s been there for a few hours already this evening (for tests), so at least she was in the right place when the doctors determined this was necessary.  Mom says the doctors promised Mark they’d be able to tell him something in less than an hour.  I’m not sure what that means, exactly.  Does it mean they’ll be done that quickly?  Or that they’ll know about how long it will take by then?  Or that they’ll know how long she’ll have to be in the hospital recovering?  I have no idea.  But when Mark calls Mom, Mom will call me.  So I will try not to worry.

In other news, if you haven’t seen Keeping the Faith (and you like romantic comedies), you should see it.  It’s actually funny, which is something you can’t say about many romantic comedies.  Ed Norton, Ben Stiller, Jenna Elfman.  Good movie.  That’s one I always watch if it’s on TV (I just caught the end), and I never feel sullied (to steal Chuck’s term) afterward.  It’s just a good movie.

Yeah, I can’t keep babbling about random things right now.  Mindy in the hospital, Mindy in surgery trumps everything else I can think of.  So I’m going to post this and fret offline.

[On a side note, the spell-checker suggest Elvina as a replacement for Elfman.  How is that more of a word than Elfman?]