I AM KING PRAWN!!!

Well, I spent a quiet night at home mentally composing a post for tonight, a list of Things I Do Well vs Things I Am Terrible At. But this is preempted by my unbridled affection for the Muppets:

(yanked from my darling girl Kelley)



Sam the Eagle! Animal! Bunsen Honeydew! You have to hang all the way til 3:58 to see my girl Miss Piggy, but totally worth it. And truly, is there a character, both real or fiction, in all history, with whom I relate more directly than the Swedish Chef? No. There is simply no way.

P.S. When we were in Seattle I made great pains to see the Jim Henson exhibit at Experience Music Project. I rerouted an entire day's plans, and went by myself while everyone else went to a pub. Casey said, "I think you have a different relationship with the Muppets than the rest of us." So be it.

my case for normalcy

Normal women my age develop the scientific circumstance known as "baby fever."

I, obviously, have kitten fever instead.




I would like to politely request that each one of those little kiddos comes and sleeps on my pillow tonight. Siiiiigh.

excuses

If blogging is mental exercise (that's a stretch...) and 30 minutes on the treadmill at the Y is physical exercise, I think I can only suck it up for one or the other tonight. So I'm going to get in the shower. Maybe this is a new trend in me actually having the discipline to accomplish the things I set out to. Craft fabrication last night, workout tonight, what could lie in wait for tomorrow night? Those Black Bean Cakes that we keep postponing, perhaps.

Also, I had a great idea for a blog post earlier today, and it was likely related to food, and damn if I can remember it now. I need to start writing it down.

tonight I...

a. made dinner and had the kitchen mostly clean in under an hour (Taco Salad from the 30 Minute Cookbook, god bless it)

b. had my first two At Bats of my entire life. Somewhere my father weeps with pride, despite my lifetime 0.00 batting average.

c. had a fierce argument with an impassioned gay man regarding my anti-animal movie stance.

d. didn't even peek at the inbox to inspect the coming hellstorm that is the day after Billing Run. I know what's coming. I'm ready.

Feast or famine

Once again, I'm undertaking the self-torture that is NaBloPoMo. That's right. I neglect the bloggings for almost three months and then decide to blog daily for the next thirty. The last time I did this, I complained the whole time about how November is such a busy month and who has time to find interesting things to write about every day? The answer: not me. But here we go, anyway.

And just to prove my point, that's all I've got for tonight. My future husband is unapologetically snoring away next to me, after a long day of football drinking. He didn't even finish the big dinner I pulled together (baked linguine, honey-roasted carrots, asparagus with parmesan butter and garlic bread) or the episode of Gourmet's Adventures with Ruth (Reichl). I blame Jon Burr and his nefarious influences for sending Austin home in such a state.

I'm uploading Halloween pics and videos as we speak. Expect to see some extended video of Ali the Dancing PeeWee shaking what her momma gave her. And John "Tape Monster" Baldwin, in a costume that was probably more conceptually successful than in actuality. I don't envy him the cleanup.

Hot damn, y'all. It's November!

looking back

So I *almost* did it. I missed a single day blogging in April, but I nearly made up for it with two posts in one day a few weeks later. It was good practice, even if it didn't exactly mean I shared something scintillating every day. I will do my very best to NOT take a month off now. But I'll be glad that I can delete that 10 pm daily alarm that says, "BLOG!"

I will say, it was entirely unlikely that you were going to hear from me today. It's 7:30 pm and I'm still in my nightgown, nursing a colossal hangover. Emma Talent Night was, of course, a total blowout, and I drank too many berry vodka drinks much too quickly. It was super, super, super fun, of course, and I've been told that I didn't *act* that drunk, so that's a relief. I appointment myself one of the official photographers for the evening, and got some pretty great shots that got progressively blurry as the night went on. I'm sure just technical problems with my camera, right? But the fun wore off when I woke up on our bathroom floor at 4:15 am. These are probably details I could have spared my parents. But it's possible that my mom was doing a little drunk texting of her own, as I received this at about 10:30 pm:

G p frkn good no tlk yet posl yr m

Thanks, Mom. She was at a Glen Phillips show. Obviously.

You will most likely NOT hear from me tomorrow, as we'll be out of town for the first time in over a year! We're Hotlanta bound in the a.m., cruising by the Holy Mecca (I mean IKEA) and then checking into our very posh hotel that we got for a song because they just opened yesterday! Woot! Then on to Emily and Neil's wedding of amazingness, and I'm just super excited. We'll be home Saturday afternoon, hopefully in time to catch the last of the Market Celebration at the Farmer's Mkt. That seems like good karma, right? Plus, Snowballs! Then Scott Miller at Mercy Lounge Saturday night, YAY. I'm looking forward to the brief road trip with my Boo, it's not an experience we share very often and I think we're both ready for a minibreak.

Happy Quite Nearly May!

the lies I tell to my diary

Sorry friends, you're looking at another half-ass post tonight. I'm in the throes of a battle of wills with my iPod and my poor decrepit iMac (aka The Jukebox). Why won't they talk to each other? Why won't they be friends? GAH.

I need my own personal Reggie for nights like these. Austin doesn't seem too concerned about my technical problems. I have important mix cds to make!

Friday Video

Because I don't know what tonight holds (other than meeting baby girl Stella Jeanette Cecil!) and because this made me bounce up and down in my chair with glee, I'm going the lazy route and posting a video today.



Thanks to Yewknee for the video alert. Happy Friday!

partial self-portrait

Delaney: Honey, what should I blog about tonight?

Austin: Susan Boyle.

Delaney: Babe. I don't even know enough about her to make it interesting, and I'm not going to be the billionth person to blog about her.

Austin: You should look up who performed AFTER Susan Boyle and write about that.

Delaney: This is not helpful.

Austin: I think that would be hilarious.

post 120, how bout that?

Some sweetness from the laziest weekend

pre-date postings

Rather than risk skipping another day of the blogs, I'm going to throw this one up here before we leave for dinner (location yet to be determined). I'm wearing a fun new green sundress and feeling rather cute, even if I kind of think this dress makes an exaggerated bulge out of my tummy. Austin swears no. My hair looks good, anyway.

I spent the majority of the morning and afternoon on Myspace, of all places, exporting all my old blog posts to my desktop (using that Print Preview: Save as PDF trick). I had forgotten that I spent most of 2005 only posting dumb internet surveys instead of actual written blogs, which is pretty obnoxious. I indulge occasionally in the list-format surveys on here or on Facebook, but back then it was 15 postings in a row. It is no wonder that my dedicated readership at the time consisted of two: Austin and Agnes, who were both completely obligated to read. Sorry to both of you, four years later. Would it be annoying to make a blogspot page for these old blogs, so that non-Myspace users could peruse them? I haven't decided yet.

Before I forget, Kenzie is doing ok today. She ate an entire can of wet food last night and again this morning, so her appetite is back, which is a huge relief. We even attempted the trick of hiding her antibiotic pill in her food this morning, expecting a total fail, and it worked! Shocking. So far so good. She's still camped out behind the bed, except for two random (mysteriously motivated) wanderings down the hallway into the bathroom (maybe the tile feels cool to her?). This involved a lot of complaining. Nothing new there. I wish I could keep her under closer observation, but I know she feels safer behind the bed, and I'm glad for the separation that keeps her pretty much unbothered by the rest of the menagerie.

As Mom pointed out, I was due for a third crisis this week (1. slashed tire 2. Kenzie vet drama), so I tried to cut the tip of my left middle finger off last night. It turned out to just be a rather painful, fingernail-invading slice, but nothing life-threatening. I was chopping an onion lazily, with a dull knife, so that's what I get. I need to get my chef's knife sharpened, but don't want to be without it for a day. If you're keeping score, that does mean we had Skillet Chicken Pot Pie last night, so delicious. And watched the Bourne Supremacy, which wasn't nearly as good as the first. I usually love Joan Allen (especially in Pleasantville, swoon) but didn't buy her for a minute in this film. And the Russian assassin's apparently psychic ability to find Bourne in any crowded metropolis was not exactly thrilling. He's just a dude who wears black all the time, how much could he possible stand out? Unimpressive. We'll still watch the third one tomorrow, Austin has it stashed on the DVR.

I guess it's dinnertime. We'll see if we end up eating Mexican food on a patio (which is definitely what the Boo wants) or driving to Joelton for catfish (definitely what I want). This will be a matter of filibustering until our co-diners (Jon and Ali) take a stand. Possible compromises: Sky Blue Bistro or Eastland Cafe, both places I like to eat that also offer porch seating. Bon Saturday!

coming down off my expectations

Tonight I declined to watch 30 Rock with Austin and instead settled in bed with the laptop and visions of blog topics dancing in my head. And instead of composing the manifesto I've been manifesting all day, I caught up on my Reader. Google Reader is the biggest timesucking timesaver ever. Sure, it's better than methodically checking every single one of my bookmarks every day, like I used to. Now I know when my favorite sites are updated, and they're all listed in one handy place. But that handiness and availability makes me a little too subscribe-happy. I recently unsubscribed from Weddingbee, from the Twilight lexicon (what?) and from the East Nashville listserv. Among those three sites I would estimate 150 new posts daily. And sure, it's easy enough to scroll through them quickly and scan for pertinent topics. I won't say I didn't occasionally just click "Mark all as read," and not even lose sleep over it. But I don't even miss any of them now, after a few weeks of going without.

Maybe I don't need to know all the details from the White House blog. Cakewrecks is occasionally too prolific to keep up with. Bites has been very post-heavy the last few months, but it's all very topical to my interests and lifestyle. This month's blog challenge has added another 20 or so to my daily check-in, but they're sure entertaining and make me love my coworkers even more. Wedding blogs are really starting to stack up, though. There has to be a cutoff point, I can't keep inundating myself with so many brilliant ideas every day. Our wedding is only going to happen once, and will only be a maximum of 5 hours (plus related activities, but still...). There is no way I'm going to cram every scrap-paper cupcake flag and multicolored macaron into our Big Day. I'm not even going to try.

What's my point? Keeping up with my Reader is rather time-consuming, and probably prevents me from doing more in depth writing of my own. But I love my daily dose of LOLcats and Zooborns and Married to the Sea (who only recently added a RSS feed, thanks Drew and Natalie!). And somehow I managed to make a blog post about reading too many blogs, that's so meta!

Two things I can talk about tomorrow: Emily's surprise shower/chocolate tasting tonight (so much fun) and Mackenzie is sick (filled with worries). And how weird is it that tomorrow is already Friday?

Happy Nashville Sounds Opening Day

This must be the sportiest two weeks of my life:

Wednesday April 1: World Cup qualifier soccer game
Thursday April 2: Bowling with Emma peeps
Tuesday April 7: Predators hockey
Thursday April 9: Nashville Sounds baseball opening day
Saturday April 11: Nashville Rollergirls vs. New Orleans Big Easy

Plus we've played spades almost every night before bed. Not to mention this all comes after surviving the maelstrom of activity that is the NCAA men's college basketball tournament when you share a home with Austin Gray.

Sporty McSporterson. That's me. I hardly recognize myself.

I'm going to the hockey game. Please enjoy this survey in my absence.

1. Who was your FIRST prom date? First and only: Scotty Hooper, after many months of scheming.

2. Do you still talk to your FIRST love? I guess that depends on who we're talking about. I'm going to say probably not.

4. What was your FIRST job? Writing peoples' names on Christmas stockings with Elmer's Glue and glitter at Hickory Hollow Mall, December 1993.

5. What was your FIRST car? 1988 Nissan Maxima Station Wagon: Imogene, the Cruisin' Machine

6. Who was the FIRST person to text you today? I haven't gotten any texts today.

7. Who is the FIRST person you thought of this morning? Probably Austin? I don't remember thinking about anything when I woke up. Just dismay.

8. Who was your FIRST grade teacher? Mrs. Johnson. She is the teacher who informed my parents that I seemed bored because I was eating my crayons, and recommended I be placed in second grade. And I was.

9. Where did you go on your FIRST ride on an airplane? Nashville, TN. Our parents had already moved out here the month before, my sisters and I stayed with our grandmother while Mom and Dad got us settled. Then we flew out to see our new home.

10. Who was your FIRST best friend & do you still talk? This question prompted me to search for Talora Gross on Facebook, because I haven't thought of her in years, and haven't spoken to her in much, much longer.

11. Where was your FIRST sleepover? I'm going to guess Aunt Dorothea's.

12. Who was the FIRST person you talked to today? The Boo. Assuming that Mischa doesn't count.

13. Whose wedding were you in the FIRST time? Cousin Elisa's.

14. What was the FIRST thing you did this morning? Groaned.

15. What was the FIRST concert you ever went to? Pearl Jam on the Vs. tour, Murphy Center, March 1994.

16. What was the FIRST vinyl record you ever bought? I don't remember ever BUYING a vinyl record, until I got that fancy Radiohead one for Austin. But I think the first one that was bought for me was Michael Jackson's Thriller. Unless you count the little Mattel ones that were storybooks. We had Ewok Adventure and Alice in Wonderland.

17. What was the FIRST cassette you ever bought? Possibly Debbie Gibson's Out of the Blue

18. What was the FIRST CD you ever bought? Garth Brooks, the one that was Black and White. That might be the name of the album, can't remember.

19. What was the FIRST mp3 you ever downloaded? Probably something from the Hitmaker!

20. Who was the FIRST famous person you ever met? Vince Gill, at a Belmont Basketball game.

21. FIRST tattoo? Still zero.

22. FIRST piercing? Ears, when I turned thirteen.

23. FIRST foreign country you went to? Jamaica, mon.

24. FIRST movie you remember seeing? Mary Poppins, on the Disney Sunday Movie.

25. When was your FIRST detention? In seventh grade, on a field trip, some classmates and I crossed the street to eat at Dairy Queen. We all got in school suspension.

26. What was the FIRST state you lived in? California.

27. Who was your FIRST roommate? A girl named Mandy? Jessica? Something like that. She was from Kentucky and went home every weekend.

28. Where did you purchase your FIRST home? Inglewood!

29. Where was your FIRST child born? Nowhere. Never.

30. Who was your FIRST kiss? Again, Scotty Hooper. I hope he doesn't ever google himself.

31. What was the name of your FIRST elementary school? Ashland City Elementary School (ACES!).

minor rant

I've threatened to address this topic for years. But the magazine industry, in addition to being nearly obsolete, is an enormous racket. Subscription cards are a horrifying waste of paper and trash, for one thing. Even (maybe even especially) magazines that spend a great deal of their pages on eco-wellness and conservation can be tipped upside down to an avalanche of the familiar white rectangular cards. How many subscriptions do those things sell? I would guess less than one for every fifty magazines that are purchased. So what is the logic to putting FIFTEEN of the damn cards per magazine? Wasteful, annoying. If you'd like to hear a gross detail, ask me what I do with them. It's kind of like freecycling, but involves cat litter.

Additionally, the magazine renewal process is the opposite of transparent. The only way to know when your subscription is actually expiring is to figure out the encoded date on your mailing label (and if you already opened your magazine, most of which are encased in plastic now, you already threw away that label). Otherwise, the only gauge you have for the timing of your expiration is the CONSTANT letters you get encouraging you to Act Now! Lock Down This Special Introductory Price! You're Qualified for Professional Industry Pricing! I just received a subscription to a well-living magazine last month as a gift from my Aunt, and TODAY I received a "Renew Now and Save" letter in the mail. The amount of paper this industry wastes in pointless advertising (not to mention the actual printing of the publication, which rarely gets kept or reused) is astonishing.

And even if I was an absolute sucker, and I went ahead and mailed this company a check to renew at the special low price of $10 annual, it is never made clear as to whether that payment would add an additional year to my current (prepaid) subscription, or if I'm just paid up for the upcoming 12 months. I'm going to get those damned renewal notices no matter if I'm paid up for the next decade or not. How would anyone who didn't keep pristine payment records AND maintain a constant conversation with magazine customer service ever know? I'm pretty certain that, over the last fourteen years of subscribing to Martha Stewart Weddings, I have paid for at least eighteen years worth of service. Sure, at $16/year (as long as I can remember), it's not like this is breaking me. I am extremely loyal to this magazine, I have saved every single issue, and I read every single page. $16 is completely reasonable for that amount of value, and I will always pay them as soon as I get an invoice rather than risk missing an issue (and, admittedly, when I *did* miss an issue last fall after we moved, MSW replaced it immediately, no questions asked).

But this leads me to my last topic: I have worked for a magazine, and elsewhere in the journalism industry. I know that the only thing that keeps these publications' doors open is advertising revenue. The operating expenses for any magazine are paid ENTIRELY BY THEIR ADVERTISERS. If you are purchasing a glossy filled with cosmetic, automobile and entertainment ads, you just gave that publisher an extra $3-4 that they didn't earn. They should be paying YOU to read their magazine and support their advertisers! The fact that these publications still attempt to add to their profit margin by assigning (occasionally outlandish) dollar values to the service of placing their magazine on a newsstand or in your mailbox is astonishing.

We have subscribed to a major weekly entertainment rag for most of the years that Austin and I have been dating. One year we got it for free because my subscription to Premiere magazine was transferred to an EW subscription when Premiere met an untimely demise (RIP). After that, we got an obnoxiously high renewal notice and canceled. Then a few months later got a ridiculously low "new subscriber" offer, and signed back up again. This has gone on for years now. Last year, my 2-year subscription was running out, and I got a nondescript card in the mail that told me, in unreadably fine print, that the card I'd used to pay for the original contract was going to be charged $46 unless I contacted them in writing to cancel in the next 14 days. I did so and received confirmation of cancellation. The SAME WEEK, Austin got a "subscribe now and save!" card inviting him to take advantage of the special low price of $19 for two years. A $27 difference in prices for the same plan?! Outrageous.

I love magazines. Especially cooking magazines. I cut most of the garbage mags out of my life (I used to religiously subscribe to Glamour, Cosmopolitan, In Style, Mademoiselle, US, Elle and Allure). I stopped taking Food & Wine when I realized I was only cutting one or two recipes out of every issue. Now I get Entertainment Weekly, MSW, Bon Appetit, Everyday Food (which I'm not planning on renewing) and Real Simple. The only ones that I always read cover to cover are MSW and Bon Appetit. Would I be more likely to read the other magazines if they were free? Probably not. Do I look at all of those magazines' websites regularly? I do. Is it clear that the days of the slick glossy publication are numbered? I think so, although it will make me sad when I'm no longer adding to my neatly ordered shelf of Weddings magazines once a quarter.

Just like in the music business, the magazine industry's total refusal to overhaul their subscription system from the outdated service that made them piles of money several decades ago is, most likely, its death march. Magazines that haven't put all of their content online, in an easily searchable format, will continue disappearing without a trace. I just wonder how many more years I'll find those damned cards under the bed or receive "urgent" notices in the mail before they've all just vanished.

insight in the moment

Tonight, instead of working on the thoughtful, actual-topic blog I've been pondering all day today, about female friendships, maturity, personality and relationships, I played spades with my fiance for three hours.

Did I make the right decision? From here, the answer is obviously yes.

On a food note, we made one of our favorite dishes from the Cook's Illustrated 30 Minute Recipe book: Italian Sausages with Onions, Peppers and Potatoes. Because this isn't nearly enough of a health-food dish, we traditionally serve this in a bowl with cheddar cheese grits (Alton Brown's recipe). Tonight, inspired by the shrimp and grits at Rumours, I made a balsamic reduction to pour over everything. It was syrupy and sweet (and made it hard to breathe in my kitchen while reducing). Delicious! Served with a little salad with that favorite wasabi-bleu cheese dressing. And chocolate chip cookies for dessert.

So that's fair warning, coworkers: chocolate chip cookies and cucumber sandwiches (aka leftover baby shower food) coming your way in the morning. Happy Monday!

a silent house

Today was, as expected, another experiment in chaos. Phones were finally restored at the office around nine, and emails didn't end up getting TOO backed up. But even as I'm typing this, I'm remembering two different things I didn't finish today that I completely lost out of my brain. Damn. Sometimes I thrive on crisis detail, and let adrenaline and busybody-ness kick up my productivity. But sometimes it's all just too much, and I literally forget important things that I was in the middle of working on. Luckily, my MacMail saves drafts even when I close the program. And I've got two unfinished emails that are going to go out tonight.

But that's ok. I'm tucked in on the couch with my red blanket across my lap and my puppy across my feet. Tonight we snuck out for sushi and I have big news: Samurai has sake now! A whole menu of nine different kinds. Mercy! In related news, I'm probably going to be asleep before ten. Right now I'm catching up on my Reader (so much additional activity with all the coworkers blogging!) and maybe I'll start on my astonishingly backlogged stack of magazines. I got the new MSW LAST FRIDAY and have only made it through the first few pages. Who am I becoming?! It's like I'm a stranger. To myself.

Honestly, everything else I've thought of to talk about can wait until later. Gotta save other topics for the next 26 days! Plus I just got so distracted by this video that I am just going to give up making any sense tonight. Instead I'll make a grocery list and be ready for a productive weekend that can at least partially be spent hiding out. Is April always this busy?

Any typos or grammatical errors tonight are sponsored by unfiltered sake.

sweatin' to the oldies

After a chaotic day, I have one major pronoucement: I LOVE DANCE DANCE REVOLUTION. Or DDR, as the game regularly refers to itself. If I had this in my house, I would not be (quite so) out of shape. I'm currently researching my options for owning DDR for my very own. Maybe we can register for it?

Let's see, what else? Oh, right, we had crazy storms in Nashville today. I love storms except for when my dogs are outside by themselves. Then it mostly makes me sad. Austin got home before I did, where he found some very, very muddy animals. They're all high strung even now.

The storms knocked out the power at work today for a little while, and once it returned, we were sans phones and email for the rest of the day. This is quite crippling to productivity. The good news is, instead of laying around on the floor and playing I Spy in the downtime, I threw myself into some problem solving conversations with several of my genius coworkers, and am excited about some of the solutions that were uncovered. It's 11 pm now, and we still aren't getting emails or voicemails, so I'm a little terrified to come in tomorrow to the deluge. I am also feeling the pain of some of my systems coworkers, who will likely be awake all night trying to restore our internal office communications by the time our customers on the east coast are in their offices tomorrow morning.

Oh, and I went bowling, also with my coworkers (maybe they're my only friends) (just kidding). It was super fun. The bowling alley was the site of the DDR throwdown with Emily and coworker/non-sister Casey. All in all, it was a busy but good day.

Tomorrow I am working from home in the afternoon while Sears comes to repair our (very nice! dammit!) refrigerator for the THIRD TIME. It is looking likely that we are going to have to cash our warranty in and get a new one before the year is out. Very frustrating. Monday we took a 60 degree reading out of the fridge. Unacceptable. Also in the afternoon, the Personal Farmer gentleman from Gardens of Babylon is coming to give us a consultation on what and where to plant for our vegetable garden this summer. I'm super excited about this project and will hopefully have more details tomorrow.

Buenos noches!

I wouldn't call it an epic fail...

...so much as just an inevitability. I did not avoid that shopping binge I mentioned on Thursday. I went straight to TJ Maxx after work on Friday and basically got a new wardrobe. It added up to seven new tops, a dress, gym shorts, workout pants, a sweater, a woobie, a corduroy blazer, a Wonderbra and a picture frame for less than $200. And I didn't stop there. Hauled it to the Mills today and found a new pair of jeans, four pairs of earrings, and three pairs of shoes. The upside: I got all of this for approximately one-third of what I would have spent if I'd been paying full price for anything. Or to put it another way: it's a good time to shop right now. At the Maxx I was gleefully throwing $3 shorts and $6 shirts into my cart, giggling to myself and snickering, "Why not?! It's THREE DOLLARS." I tried on eight pairs of jeans at the Gap and luckily the only pair I liked were also on clearance. $19.99, thanks. I was handed an "additional 20% off" coupon when I walked into Off Broadway, so I made off with two pairs of flats for half-off, and a sharp pair of Puma running shoes for $40. Fair enough, right?

And I didn't go to any movies, so that's like $25 I saved (per movie) by not getting ticket, popcorn, sour patch kids, etc, right? I will accept all assurances of justification from anyone who is offering them.

I've also just been unforgivably lazy. I literally didn't leave the house yesterday, or even take off my pajamas. I slept until ten, putzed around on the computer for most of the afternoon, and watched the Kiera Knightly version of Pride and Prejudice while eating pasta with butter and parm, aka my Single Girl meal of choice. The movie was really great, by the way. It's funny how you get over how ridiculous Kiera's face is after you watch her for like thirty minutes. After that movie was over I flipped over to catch the second half of Beautiful Girls, and then the last three-fourths of That Thing You Do. That put me to bed after 1 am, what a party girl!

Today at least I got dressed, met some of my favorite girls for brunch (at Margot, which was amazing, of course), then managed to get all our groceries for the week for $70 (including detergent, when did detergent get so expensive?!). I suppose that victory led to my error in judgment that was the fateful trip to Shopryland. Having had trouble leaving Kroger for less than $200 lately, maybe I ended up just about breaking even.

But really, the overarching significance to this weekend comes in the form of missing my boyfriend like a lovesick middle schooler. I'd like to think, as a woman with a free and independent will, I could handle a long weekend of just taking care of myself. Turns out, I'm completely addicted to the luxury of always having Austin within earshot (or IMshot). I talk out loud to myself a LOT when I'm alone. I feel like I'm forgetting important things. I start to believe that all of our pets are moping around and blaming me for doing some unspeakable thing that has sent Austin away forever. I assign ridiculous significance to the most benign things, like folding (his) socks or making (our) bed. The way I'm mooning about and wishing I could hear his voice, you'd think I was still in the first blush of new love, instead of creeping up on a five year anniversary (we met five years ago, to the day, tomorrow. Crazy, yeah?).

I suppose the good side is that I'm blogging for the second time in a week. It's reassuring to know that if you give me something to complain about, my college concentration-in-creative-writing tendency towards hyperbole and melodrama reappears with a vengeance. It just goes to prove my frequent assertion that most of the time I'm so happy that there is nothing to write about. And that is okay by me.

At least the house is relatively clean, and I've finished all the laundry, and have meals planned and pantry stocked for the upcoming week. I still can't shake the feeling that I've been rather pointless when given two whole days of no obligations. After those first couple of months of seeing almost constant visual progress on house projects, this last month of laziness seems especially wrong. There are so many small and dumb things I could accomplish if I just sat down to do them, like reorganizing my vanity table or my closet. These things bug me every day but I keep refusing to waste precious sloth time on them. Austin is no help here; he is tolerant of my laziness to the point of being encouraging (Delaney: "I didn't even brush my teeth today." Austin: "Good for you, babe.").

The other thing hanging over my head is the continued shambles in which my work inbox remains, and I'm heading in tomorrow for most likely the busiest day of the month. I stayed late on Friday clearing out pressing Billing issues that had come in that day, but many more have come up this weekend and I still remain permanently behind on my bigger project of tracking cancellations. I intended to put a few hours in tonight but so far, I've just been blogging. I tell myself, there's not point in getting burned out by working from home all the time, but the truth is, I'm horribly inefficient when I'm in the office. I have the dual timesucks of working with a gigantic group of good friends, and an inbox that needs (literally) constant maintenance.

But I'm probably not going to be too hard on myself. I'm going to go enjoy a bowl of Golden Grahams for dinner, in my peaceful six-sleeping-pet living room. I'm going to resist the temptation to play another round of that damn Blox game while trying not to call Austin every ten minutes to tell him I miss him. I'm going to hit the sack early tonight because I can expect the dogs to rouse me sometime between 6:30 and 7 in the morning. I'm going to force myself to get up and get to work early and then kick absolute ass at my job that I love until it's time to go pick up my Boo and go home for penne with vodka sauce.

Clearly, I have nothing to complain about.

Fairy Alphabet

I remember this so clearly that I wonder what it must have meant to me when I was four.