home!

Briefly:

I am back! I had a lovely time in San Francisco - the class was wonderful and I will post pictures very, very soon.

Our little D. Sergei had emergency surgery yesterday (stone in his bladder, yeeeeouch) and so I am preoccupied with all things "home."

Back here very soon.

Off to San Francisco! -- see you next week --

I am getting ready for San Francisco -- packing will commence shortly. Anyone want a postcard? If you e-mail me your address by tomorrow night, then you can anxiously await the good times at your mailbox the coming week.

Reading for the airplane:

• FINALLY (Lauren!): the memoir that is queen of all mems: Mary Karr's The Liar's Club (1995). Opening quote:
  

We have our secrets and our needs to confess. We may remember how, in childhood, adults were able at first to look right through us, and into us, and what an accomplishment it was when we, in fear and trembling, could tell our first lie, and make, for ourselves, the discovery that we are irredeemably alone in certain respects, and know that within the territory of ourselves, there can only be our own footprints. --R. D. Laing, The Divided Self [I got chillz]

• And Xialou Guo's Twenty Fragments of a Ravenous Youth (2008). So excited about this one, too.
  

I'm flying sans iPod, but with my camera + new (to me) Holga [see here]. Glee, my people, glee.

I went through quite a number of my magazines yesterday and today -- I rip them apart when it feels okay to do so and take out what I like and then glue it in a notebook. As nerdy as it sounds (but do remember I'm a librarian), I love it!

Another thing of note: I finally bought this candle. Only almost three years later (I love blogging because I can look back on my recorded/written self and say things like holy shit). Anyway. Steve says it smells like I threw a bottle of cologne in the fireplace. He might be right. But it was $26. And when you don't have a fireplace? It will so do. Now if I could find someone who manufactures changing leaves...

Jane & Cole are both snoring. Oh, yes. They are the funniest little pair of snoozers. And with that, I will end. No, I have one more thing to add. Madonna's Sarah Palin moments. Can I just tell you that usually, celebrities and politics make me cringe (see this + this). But Madonna gets a pass. She is so whack. I love her.

daily never almost

• I haven't been reading and that is just plain awful! I've started the Alice Waters' biography, something Chez Panisse what-have-you, but this is the first evening I remembered to actually bring it home for serious reading (rather than a break room distraction, ya know what I'm sayin'?).
• And then there is the television - that darn, distracting television and political season and the debates, and I think I'll have time to read and poof, no!; I am dedicating every last moment to the campaign. I think that's okay; I've waited eight years for this kind of election.
  
• And then there is the fifth and final season of The Wire on DVD and we bought it and holy crap, I am savoring all of it. How is this the end? Nnnooo no no no no no.
• Time to get started on dinner & debate-watching. More soon.