There’s a ton of heavy stuff going down in our country right now. I don’t want to make light of any of it. But I’m writing my life, and in my life right now my house has no gutters on a weekend of continuous heavy rain.
Rain pours off the roof onto the front step. Better come through the back.
Rain pours off the roof and through the shade sail to splash on the table and the back deck. Better come in through the front porch.
Tuesday through Friday last week showcased the best of Washington weather: Temperatures in the 70s, light breezes, sunshine, glittering mountains. Then Saturday morning, BAM! Literally — we were out for our daily family walk when thunder and lightning started up, followed by rain that hasn’t let up yet.Continue Reading >>
I find working from home challenging at times when Benji comes in needing intervention: he’s hungry, the computer isn’t working, he’s bored. The “I’m hungry” whine in particular seemed to come constantly, and it felt like I was always having to get up and make a snack or lunch for someone.
When all this first started, so long ago, I happily quit making sack lunches. I never liked packing lunch even for myself, and definitely not for Benji, who pretty much daily complained about whatever I put in there — even if he asked for the food himself.Continue Reading >>
My family doesn’t make any bones about our nerdiness. So this year, we’re embracing the fact that Ian and Benji both achieved prime number ages (37 and 7, respectively) and yesterday I hit a square number (36) age.
To celebrate my entry into 36 years, Benji and mom created a scavenger hunt with 10 clues to give me the first 10 issues of the classic graphic novel series Lone Wolf and Cubthat my family found at my request:
Amazingly, my mom found the first 10 issues of Lone Wolf and Cub. My sister sent a picture of a lone wolf and a cub.
I stumbled across Lone Wolf and Cub on Hoopla and fell in love with the pace and the art and, of course, got sucked into the story: Would Ogami Itto avenge his family’s honor against the powerful Yagyu? What would happen to his (strangely never-aging) young son? Would any of them survive their final confrontation??Continue Reading >>
Just a little wrist pun humor to start off this post, in which I’m posting a delightful photo timeline of my wrist recovery. The color changing my injuries went through was just so darn interesting.
Day 1: Injury inflicted.
Day 3: After painting; with Tegaderm bandage
Day 4: Bandage-free!
Day 5: Colorful knuckles
Day 6: Slowly fading colors and less swelling
Day 8: Bruise draining down my forearm. Gross.
Day 10: After a 100-mile bike ride. Held up well.
From here on out I think it’s just taking ibuprofen occasionally and not doing anything stupid.
I don’t think I mentioned it, but my left leg seems to have gotten some kind injury during the crash, too. Every ride I’ve done since then, my leg has output a little less power, has felt a little weaker and more sore, and has occasionally been accompanied by foot tingling or soreness. I’ve asked a few friends if they think I should be worried, and universally they’ve said it was almost certainly some internal swelling, pull, or other injury caused by the crash, and that time would take care of it. So I’m trying not to let the fact it’s my surgery leg freak me out and instead just wait patiently. Time will tell.Continue Reading >>
After our orange paint excitement on Saturday, one of us discovered paint in our hair. Apparently someone brushed his head against the wall that had wet orange paint on it, giving adding unintentional orange highlights.
Being a capable, independent 7 1/2-year-old, someone solved the problem himself: he started to cut his own hair. While I like the initiative, we moved quickly to head off (pun intended) the problem by obtaining a real hair cutting kit.
Last night Ian administered Benji’s first at-home haircut. At first Benji wanted to set the buzzer to one meter, rather than a few millimeters. Then we measured my hair and determined my long hair is 55 cm, or barely over half a meter, and he decided he actually wanted it to be an inch.Continue Reading >>
I mentioned a few days ago that we moved a desk into the closet in Benji’s bedroom to give him a little office space of his own. After using it for a bit, we came up with the idea of allowing Benji to paint the space to personalize it a bit more.
Because of my wrist injury, I didn’t go for a big Saturday bike ride like usual. I seized this opportunity to execute the painting plan.
First, Benji and I went to the paint store to pick out his paint. We meticulously wore face masks and (mostly) stayed far from store employees. Benji homed in on the color he wanted almost immediately: Rumba Orange. I had already decided to let him pick any color he wanted, so even though it wasn’t what I would choose, we went with it. Continue Reading >>
On Wednesday I went out for my usual longer hill ride, happily appreciating that the morning rain had cleared early enough for roads to dry so I could ride my S-Works.
Long story short: Waiting at a small intersection to go south across a busy, high-speed road, I miscalculated the speed of traffic and rode my bike into a car.
It wasn’t exactly T-boning the car, although at higher speeds that’s what would have happened. Instead I had been stopped and just started rolling at a speed I thought would let the vehicle pass, but somehow the vehicle didn’t pass — it was right there when I got into the road. I slammed on my brakes and swerved, but the side of the vehicle (a black Toyota SUV) loomed really large ahead of me. I thought my front tire brushed the side of the car and the next thing I knew I was on the ground behind the vehicle. Continue Reading >>
