Not Dead Yet!

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Day’s Verse:
Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
Ecclesiastes 4:12
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KnobsWe made it back to Washington intact; our train, contrary to the fears of some of our fellow-passengers, hit no cows and did not derail. We took a train coach to Albany; then overnight to Chicago in a roomette that included our own toilet, sink, and crazy fold-down beds; then three days from Chicago to Seattle in another smaller sleeper roomette, passing up along the Canadian border through Wisconsin, Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho (we slept through all of Idaho), and finally Washington. I read three books (Secret Life of Bees, The Dante Club, and Got Shorty) and we watched a half-dozen episodes of Firefly, which Ian gave me for my birthday. We snacked on the official Amtrak snack, a mix of strawberry-flavored sugary pretzel sticks, sliced almonds, and dried papayas, ate our meals gratis in the dining car, and met interesting new people. We watched lots of flat, grassy land go by and amused ourselves by commenting on the towns we passed through. We became car graveyard conniseurs, critiquing the less-organized Western car graveyards as compared to the wooded, grid-like compilations of rusted-out hulks in Ohio and Indiana. We ate dinner while watching the sunset on the Mississippi river, then the next night ate dinner while passing through heavily clouded Rocky mountain vistas. We disembarked to stretch our legs at various stops – St. Paul, Whitefish, various others – and marveled at the change in climate as we crossed the country. We felt unconfortable about the sleeping car attendant’s jobs; we like doing things for ourselves, and she kept offering to do things for us, like a servant. At the end we tipped her all our remaining cash. Continue Reading >>

Moving On

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Day’s Verse:
Better one handful with tranquillity than two handfuls with toil and chasing after the wind.
Ecclesiastes 4:6
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We moved today. As I sit on the floor, typing with the keyboard on my knees and the monitor directly on hardwood for the first time ever, Ian is running the vacuum over our vacuous bedroom. Blocks of dust mark the location of our furniture: a large rectangle for the bed, smaller rectangles for our rolly plastic dressers. We have spent the last year providing fertile breeding grounds for dustbunnies, but now they are all meeting a sad, vacuum-cleaner induced demise. Continue Reading >>

Cool Out. Just COOL OUT.

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Day’s Verse:
A time to throw stones and a time to gather stones;
A time to embrace and a time to shun embracing.
A time to search and a time to give up as lost;
A time to keep and a time to throw away.

Ecclesiastes 3:8-6
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35 - 37 William StreetThis is more for my records than anybody else’s interest. So please do read, but expect it to be full of names and boring details that won’t probably interest you a lot.

All of a sudden everything’s happening. Thursday I went to Providence with Darren and Brian, and saw my old friend Tiffany. We had a good day, I think, although the guys seemed a little weirded out by our idea of fun (walk down a street and look in eclectic shops? Sit, drink coffee, and talk together? What?!). That day my parents also flew in, but arrived too late for us to drive an hour to Natick, spend time with them, and drive an hour back. Continue Reading >>

More Huge Centipedes

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Day’s Verse:
A time to kill and a time to heal;
A time to tear down and a time to build up.
A time to weep and a time to laugh;
A time to mourn and a time to dance.

Ecclesiastes 3:3-4
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Last night I hung out with friends until 1 am. I hoped to sleep in as a result, but instead woke up at 6:30 as usual, totally exhausted. I consider the tiredness worth it, however, because I finally got to see This Is Spinal Tap, and it was hilarious. We played Rummy Royal for hours before that, ate chicken tikki masala that Darren made, and then enjoyed brownies topped with two types of ice cream, whipped cream, and chocolate sauce. Continue Reading >>

All Babies are Cute

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Day’s Verse:
There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven —
A time to give birth and a time to die;
A time to plant and a time to uproot what is planted.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-2
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Dropping our load of stuff off at the apartment, Ian and I saw a rare and extraordinary occurrance: two UPS trucks mating. Yep: a big UPS truck and a slightly smaller one were awfully cozy in the Avalon Orchards parking lot there. So that is how new little UPS truck babies come about. Continue Reading >>

In Loneliness, Character Revealed

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Day’s Verse:
Thus I considered all my activites which my hands had done and the labor I had exerted, and behold all was vanity and striving after wind and there was no profit under the sun.
Ecclesiastes 2:11
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ImprintedThe last three days have involved high levels of strong emotions, which means one of two things for my blog:

  1. I can go all LiveJournal emo on you; or
  2. I can go factual and dry on you.

Since an incredible amount of events have taken place in my life since returning from the Cape, I will attempt to combine erring on the factual-but-not-too-boring side with avoiding unnecessary speculation. Continue Reading >>

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Day’s Verse:
In much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain.
Ecclesiastes 1:18
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ImprintedToday Ian and I left the apartment fairly early with a carful of dirty laundry, boxes of books, and miscellaneous belongings. We piled them in the apartment, used our washer and dryer for the first time (nice, but the dryer is quite slow), and speculated about where to put furniture.

At 2:00 we left, driving through increasingly heavy rain to Wellesley, where we heard Vangie sing her senior recital. My gosh, she was amazing — her voice was strong, beautiful, and absolutely soared in the auditorium. She sang for almost an hour, standing there looking lovely in her red strapless dress, and it felt like moments. For the last song she finally loosened up and looked happy. We talked to her for a few minutes afterwards, but we felt odd among the hip, beautiful, artistic Wellesley girls (all of whom know Vangie much better than I do). So we dashed back through the rain and drove to Marlborough again to retrieve more laundry. That extended into more speculation about furniture placement, paint colors, and other details that will bore you. Continue Reading >>