Tipped and returning

Talked on the phone with a friend on solstice, it was a nice reconnection. Actual solstice happened at 4am on the 21st here so we were already past the hinge when we woke up that day. Let's get through the dark weeks and move towards hope. 

Plague Christmas was better than I expected. We feasted and played games and enjoyed our toys. I continue to appreciate not having to travel at holiday time.  

Rain and sleet today means inside feels like the right place to be. I'm grateful that we're getting any sort of precipitation. December has been very mild and we're in drought conditions here. 

Oldest daughter is packing up and getting ready to say good bye to her housemates. We'll be driving her to Evanston to move into her dorm room next week. 

She's had one more housemate-related brush with Covid. We're all waiting to hear the results from the housemate's test tomorrow. K will get tested this weekend and we'll hope we have the timing right and Of Course hope that it's not needed. Such a lot of moving parts, this human society, it reminds me of the early computer game Life. I try to be conservative and stay home but all our interactions carry a bit of risk and I'm starting to cross my fingers more often.   

Just finished The Sealed Letter by Donoghue. I had thought it was about a love affair but it is instead a historical novel based on a London divorce case in the 1860s. A bunch of non-heroic characters, very good. I was concerned that my sympathy for one of our narrators was going to be terribly abused by the ending. Luckily not. My favorite character is said to have lived to be fat and happy into their 90s. Huzzah!    

Time to get working on my book club book: Against the Grain nf. I've read 2 chapters but am finding it much drier than my enthusiastic friend's retelling. I wish we could just get beers and have him bring up his fave ideas.  

22

Still counting down

45
I am not much for new year's but I do like seeing the progress of this countdown.

It could happen to any of us
Discovering that a picture of you as a child has been used as a meme for years. The meme-ing itself is not nearly as funny to me as this man's a) picture as a child before othodontia work and b) deadpan reaction to the discovery. I laughed until I sobbed. I hope you find something to make you laugh that hard. It was a release. 

Season's pop greetings
My favorite way to enjoy Mariah's timeless holiday paean is this surprisingly adorable video from the wild wild chatroulette days: Yay beardy!

Dark!
I am wrassling with my reptile brain. (A new imaginary form of gator wrasslin'!) It says that it is dark at 5pm and so I should sit on the couch and eat all the things. But as much as I like couch+snacks I don't find much satisfaction in that. I am trying to get outside in the middle of the day (I missed today - whoops) and also do the exercising thing when I can bear to. My physical body needs to get out of this house and move the large muscles and if that doesn't happen I start feeling like Everything is Stupid. I am making an effort to remember that the light is longer by the end of January. I can find a path through the next dark weeks.

Dork!
I recommend Jackie Kashian's stand up. But in addition she is a podcast powerhouse who has been producing the Dork Forest episodes for a long time. She interviews others (usually comics, sometimes family members, occasionally actual experts) about their enthusiasms, the things they get excited about. Here's the homepage The Dork Forest with the latest eps on top. I haven't even heard most of these, need to cue them up for my reluctant exercise sessions. Jackie is notably ignorant about pop music (of any era) and many other topics which makes her the ideal blank canvas for others to inform about their  fave areas of expertise.