Monday

  • So much rain. I came home from work, did a few minor tasks, then moved to the sofa early for two episodes of Handmaids’ Tale.
  • I hired a Task Rabbiter to come Thursday and assemble my bookshelves. Which means that soon, this nonsense will be sorted out:

Tuesday

OOTD:

Angie kimono, size 1x, old. Similar here; Amazon/Daily Ritual black tee, size 4x; Black Gloria Vanderbilt Amanda tapered jeans, size 22W short; Aldo leather espadrilles, old. Comparable here.

  • I came across this charming video. It was almost like doing a meditation to spend 14 minutes watching it. My mother used to make that butter/sugar spread for me when I was little.
  • I was invited to join my Bike to the Beach colleague to another event this Friday – in Queens, aka Out of the Office All Day, so that’s a treat!
  • Drove to a nearby beach, thinking I’d sit on the beach and read for an hour until sunset…but the little bugs were so bad I had to sit in my car with the windows up, boo. Wasn’t much of a sunset, really, but at least I got myself out of the house for a bit.

Wednesday

  • Went for my physical this morning and tried to speak with the doctor about some of the issues I’ve been having. This is a whole event unto itself. I have another appointment in four weeks to go over bloodwork results. This may need to be its own rant post. On a brighter note, I was feeling much better this week.
  • Tried the beach slash sunset thing again…still buggy…and even less of a show than the night before.

thursday

  • Darling Chris from Task Rabbit came to assemble my bookcases. A fail on so many levels. He was fine, kept trying different things, but no matter what, as soon as one of the bookcases was assembled and we went to move it to its spot, it went down like dominos. It was crazy. After an hour we made the decision to quit for the day, and I would decide how I wanted to proceed (use extra hardware, perhaps…or find different bookcases altogether) and then I would reach out to him again. Obviously, I paid him for his time so now I was out $$ and STILL had no bookcases. PLUS, once one was assembled oh so carefully on the spot and we braced it up against the wall with the pieces of the other bookcase before it could fall apart, I could see that two were not going to fit, after all! When I first moved in and decided I wanted these two bookcases against the back wall of the alcove, there were boxes all along the side wall, so I had to measure wall-to-wall above the boxes. Turns out there’s a weird 2.5″ lip (like a weird molding) along the bottom of the wall, it comes up close to 10″… and those 2.5″ are preventing both bookcases from fitting in the space side by side and looking like a built-in library wall. So disappointed. Since then I’ve decided I do not want to spend the money to buy two new (and I mean “new to me,” like off CraigsList, not NEW) bookcases…and I go back and forth between thinking we’ll just use a bunch of metal L brackets to brace this thing together and I’ll put in the middle of the alcove wall and call it a day…OR not even bother with that extra expense and just push the boxes into the alcove and work out of them one at a time. That was a really long, boring, dumb story. But this is where we’re at:

Actually, I think if I shove enough stuff in that space to the left of it, it’ll hold together and I can go ahead and unpack boxes onto it. And when all the stuff is sold or rehomed, I can just take the whole thing apart (by blowing on it) and throwing it out. Which is a shame. But they’re quite large…and thinking ahead to my eventual next place which will most likely be considerably smaller than this, it’s just not practical to think they’re going with me. So. That’s what I’ll do.

friday

  • This was a super nice day. We left for the event in Queens at 8:30am and didn’t get back til it was time to go home. In between, the event was like a mini block party/carnival, with food trucks and games, and they very nicely set us up with a table and little canopy overhead and they told everyone there to give us donations. I had a sausage hero for breakfast and spumoni italian ice for lunch, and mini pizzas as a parting gift. There was excellent people watching, like grown-ups, in nice clothes. Our teachers are all so young and dress to be active with the kids. So this was a nice change.

  • I went to dinner that night with friends – it’s been so long since I kept skipping things to just go home and rest. It was nice to be out.

saturday

  • Now that everything is leafed out, I get the prettiest shadows on the bathroom wall in the late morning. I’m usually at work and miss it. Ha, the picture looks sort of ridiculous. It’s prettier in person.

  • Disappointed that this Gwynnie Bee top was so short. I liked the little ruffle placket down the front. And before you go “it’s not too short…”

Yes. It is.

  • My girlfriend and I were saying Friday night at dinner how We Just Need to Start Moving…and I said, “I’ll walk 5 days this week if you’ll walk 5 days this week,” and it was on. So Saturday afternoon I headed to a nearby preserve for an easy 20-minute walk…and all of a sudden there were cactuses! Cacti! Just in a little opening in the woods. I thought this was the weirdest thing.

I think the path goes all the way to a beach, but this is far as I went.

  • I’ve been making more time for reading. This is what I read this week:

Arranged, by Catherine McKenzie. An interesting premise, a good story, a fast read. Two Thumbs Up.

Then this one, Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine. The first couple chapters I was just not feeling it, it felt stiff. But I’m so glad I continued on as it turned into a charming, sweet, funny, touching story. I cried and laughed out loud. Two Thumbs Up.

sunday

  • Trying to do something with messy box mountain today…here’s the before…

I got sidetracked when I opened a box of old photographs (as I always do):

I’m a filing weirdo.

Funny story, this was maybe like…1996? I just bought that exact dress. Again. 

My cousin and me with my usual “Muscle Man” pose. I think I’ve shared others like this with you. I have No Idea where I got that from. I would have been 8 here.

14. Sans hips. Sans a LOT.

Okay. Enough with the pictures. Back to work!

  • After. A little better.

  • Met She Who Shall Remain Nameless for a little stroll through town, looked in some galleries and shops, then went for a light dinner.

Betty: The Thief of Ideas

This looks interesting.

And now it is Sunday evening, almost time for bed. This week is a little hectic at work, it’s the last school week of the year so there are things going on. But I feel okay right now, so…that’s good.

OH. So sometimes I just want to write something. Maybe another blog post talked about something, or I saw something on the news…or something just happened…and I start writing about it in my head thinking maybe I’ll do a blog post…but I don’t have pictures for it, and it would be weird to match some of these topics with an outfit I’m wearing (like my dr rant). But…I don’t know. Like just this past week there was the dr. appointment, the issue about Nike UK’s plus size mannequins, and an article about “stainless clothes.” All these things sparked something in me and I just wanted to go blah blah blah but I don’t really know if anyone’s interested in spending their time reading my opinions about random things. And I have a LOT of opinions about random things! So. Thoughts? I don’t want people to stop coming by cuz you think it’s just gonna be another opinion post. I wouldn’t do it a LOT. Please. I just barely get my three a week done! But sometimes.

Okay, shutting up and going to bed. At 8:30pm.