Busy weekend, Saturday I went to guitar lessons and then in the afternoon evening, I went to two concerts – the first one was from 6:30-8ish at the UU church with the house band as a benefit for the music fund. That was fun, Jeremy and Edda came with me and Jeremy made some delicious pulled pork sandwiches for the event. We danced and had a nice time. Then I dropped them off at home and I went to downtown G-burg to hear my guitar teacher in his band which was also a lot of fun. The UU band hit 85 decibels and I didn’t wear earplugs, the Sonic Spell (my teacher’s band) hit 100 decibels and for sure, I wore my fancy earplugs. I think I was the only one wearing ear protection which is CRAZY because at 100 dB, it actually hurts my ears. I’ve been to a number of guitar performances now and I won’t go without earplugs because 100 dB is apparently the correct volume for rockin’ out. Also, impossible to hold a conversation with any friends.
Sunday, I went to lift and Ward is trying to get me to compete in a competition in late August. We’ll see. Hahah.
For decades, I think since 2007 or so, my best thrifting find was a pair of Dansko clogs (retail at that time – $100 or so) ever so lightly worn, for $4. As time has passed and the secondary, used market has matured, it’s been really hard to find such amazing deals anymore. Now I still shop used – for example, I still buy used shoes (ebay, rei used market), but usually I’ll pay $30-50 for a pair that used to be $120 dollars new. Still a good deal, but not a zinger anymore.
But yesterday, I think I outdid myself. I found this chair at a used furniture store – I’ve been wanting a simple bow back wooden chair with no arms and those cross supports so I can tuck my feet into them when I work. It was a singleton – no priced marked. I asked how much it was and the lady shrugs and says $5. And I said – SOLD. I bought this chair for $5.
Underneath – it’s made in Denmark by Tram Stole.
Made on October 2, 1981.
And here’s the chair for sale for 590 euros – or about $650! I’m very excited about this. I don’t think I’ll be able to beat this find for the rest of my life. Lol.
I’m loving our new heat pump dryer. I would recommend it to anyone in the market for a new dryer. But! This weekend – we discovered that it was leaking. Yikes! Christine, our downstairs tenant, was doing an extra large load (which normally I don’t do) and I was happily puttering around the house on my self-imposed “vacation” when Jeremy yelled from the kitchen – there’s a water leak! And we ran around and found out it was from the dryer. So, that’s weird – a leak from the dryer, hahaha. A heat pump dryer has no vent, instead, it draws out the water from the clothes and condenses it and then puts the water down the drain. And then because I was on “vacation” and the house was not flooding – I was like, I’m dealing with it tomorrow and not thinking about it right now. Lalalalala. I spent a long time thinking that it was the large load and trying to figure out why that was, but it turns out that the installers had put the drain hose on the wrong hole and the entire time we’ve been running this dryer, it’s been just putting a puddle of water on the floor and I didn’t notice until a large load was placed in it and emitted more water – enough to drip through the ceiling. So I sighed and moved the pipe to the correct drain hole and now I think I’m good. I’m glad Christine did the large load, otherwise, I might not have figured this out for years and completed rotted out my house from the inside, but now, I just have some water stains which match all the other stains in the house.
Christine really outdid herself for Sunday night dinner which was Easter sunday. Ham, scalloped potatoes, green beans. All deliciousness. Felix, who comes from a vegetarian house – but happily has been eating meat here – commented that this might have been the most massive meat thing he has ever seen. It was a nice, lively conversation – I had fun.
I’ve been wrestling with being in a terrible mood for a few weeks now, nothing is really bad – except for all the things I cannot change – I know everyone loves breaks, spring breaks, winter breaks because trips! no school! just lazing around!- but they always throw me for a loop and I get discombobulated. I much prefer the steady-ness of everyday. I love what I do everyday on a regular day. Edda’s schedule changed everyday last week and it was a headache keeping track of everyone’s schedule (the camp and our caregivers’ schedule was different each day and often changing each day during the day which sometimes would result in me changing my day’s plans at the last minute mainly for pickup and dropoff – and I felt like – why am I the only one keeping track of this?!). Usually, I can handle these changes with aplomb, but I just could not this particular week.
It did not help that I knew Jeremy would be gone this week – this is classic Doris moodiness to which I give no excuse. But he had to go and I tried to send him off without standing in the door whimpering as he left because, what the hell? I can run the house on my own. (Mostly). hahaha. Anyways, this is an important trip, full of funders who are funding his work…so yes! Go Jeremy!
He brought his “travel bike” on his business trip with him and here is Southwest loading up his bike.
He’s spent the winter building this bike – the designated travel bike. I have no idea how it differs from any other bike that he has except that perhaps you can bang it around more in the belly of a plane and not be as hyper worried about damaging everything, but he seems to be happy with it. And it’s making its travel debut in Illinois.
I think I’m turning into a crazy plant lady. Everywhere I go, someone gives me a new plant. I have to get rid of some of them.
It’s been a tough couple of weeks for me mood-wise. Things are totally ok, but sometimes I fall into blue moods that are hard to get out of and with Jeremy travelling all last week, it’s been a slog. So I took a long weekend “off”. Meaning, no life admin (time sheet approvals, slogging through emails), no house admin (laundry, water leaks, decluttering), no working (either for pay or volunteer), only fun things and napping. So I made music. I spent a day baking a princess cake (22 steps from the NYTimes baby!), and I made more music.
Played poker.
Felix made an amazing swedish meatball dinner for all of us at Sunday night dinner (hence the princess cake to go along with it).
And then my long weekend off continued by going to Longwood gardens again – this time with Jeremy’s parents to celebrate Jeremy’s dad’s birthday and Katherine’s achievement of becoming a master gardener.
It was a beautiful, perfect day.
We ate at the fancy restaurant again which was delightful.
Katherine’s favorite course is dessert, so we ordered FIVE. omg. Do you see that little mushroom-shaped dessert? So good.
Happy to spend a day with everyone, such a nice time.
Today is Monday – the first day of Edda’s last spring break. Now that the weather has turned to spring, I really feel the last-ness of Edda’s public schooling. We are winding down to graduation and the end of her being a kid. We’ve been so lucky – MCPS came through for us and saw us through Edda’s childhood – esp her high school team which has been in place since Edda was 14 – what a great team, through covid, through many, many challenges – they showed up for Edda everyday. I know that there are teachers and admins who are moving on after this school year – to other positions within the county, so it feels extra like the end of an era.
Elka and I went to the dog park yesterday to be outside.
Friday Vibes was Decades Dance party night PLUS Chipotle. We could not miss it.
I ran into a mom who recognized me from when the kids were three years old. It’s pretty cool to have those connections happen.
Jeremy’s such a good father – he spent a lot of the night dancing with Edda to YMCA, I Will Survive and other great dance classics.
Saturday – Megan and I volunteered at Main Street for one of their art events. Megan had made like 40 of these pens and let me pick out a package.
So, I find myself often – weirdly – at art events where I have a few hours to paint something. This went terribly at the yoga retreat, I totally didn’t know what to paint. But this time – I prepped by watching some youtube videos about how to paint flowers in acrylic.
So, it turned out…OK. Not terrible. These paintings are going in a gallery with sale prices. I priced mine for $45. I should buy it back myself, lol.
Felix, excitedly, got invited to his cousin’s Rachel’s birthday party bash and he spent the afternoon making cinnamon buns. They were delicious!
This morning, I skipped church (because the choir was not performing) and went with Edda to practice my snatch. So I think I have the form down not too terribly, now the only instruction is to get…stronger. FYI, I can snatch 15 kg which is the weight of a toddler or a bag of potatoes.
Jeremy was out of town for two dinners (Kansas City)- and Ginny is also out of town on personal business – so it was just me, Edda and Felix for dinner early in the week. Jeremy did a wonderful and kind thing and made Edda’s lunches for when he’d be gone and left me very simple dinners to make. He’s been making these pre-marinated chicken thighs from Whole Foods and told me I needed two packages to feed three people. I was like….ok? Thinking that there were only four in the package, but there were FIVE. So…five chicken thighs for three people? I mean, I knew I’d eat only one, Edda would eat one and then Felix would eat…more than three? Did we really need that much meat? Anyways, I texted this photo to Jeremy while he was in the air (unable to get my text) saying…really? This is not enough for three people? Turns out, Megan came over for dinner and we still only needed the one package. But like a dutiful sous chef, I did make the 2nd package – so ten chicken thighs for the original three people. Which meant that we had the exact same dinner the next night – cold with also one chicken thigh leftover still sitting in the fridge right now.
We are on some crazy protein kick in the house right now, Felix is determined to gain muscle – you can see the creatine and the protein powder next to the chicken tray. Jeremy is into it too. I don’t focus so much on getting a gram per pound of body weight, but I try to cut out carbs in the house which makes the share of calories of my diet coming from protein higher. Anyways, I don’t believe in protein, I believe in fiber. More veggies people! Balanced with protein.
Kansas City was good to Jeremy – though he ate no BBQ nor did he really see anything outside. He stayed in the hotel the conference was in.
I know everyone is watching White Lotus, but I’m not. Mainly because I’m too cheap to subscribe. Instead of thinking I’m missing out (which I am), I’m, instead, deciding to fight the algorithm. HAHAHa.
Because I’m into vocal music and I’m completely tapped out on Glee club-type a capella, I’ve been listening a lot to the Rachmaninoff’s Vigil I went to see a few weeks ago. I’m also delighted to find myself listening to: Caroline Shaw’s ‘Partita for 8 Voices’ | Music on Main. So interesting, I did not know about this person before yesterday.
And to go the other direction, the movie I’m watching is Captain America: Winter Soldier which, I hear, is one of the best MCU movies out there, which…I think is a low bar. But I’m still, slowly, working on a movie watching challenge and this week’s theme is a movie with a season (Spring, Summer, Winter or Fall) in the title.
On Friday we went to Friday Night Vibes with Edda. The weather was lovely as was the company. I really enjoyed my pasta dinner – Jeremy was not impressed. haha, I think because I’m restricting carbs in the house, I look forward to any pasta dish outside of the house no matter how mediocre it may be.
My guitar teacher showing off his Gulf of Mexico shirt. We are learning a new song my Mumford & sons.
Introducing Felix to Domino’s pizza. We got it delivered, I don’t think I’ve had dominos since college. Or at least, my fondest memories are of Domino’s in college.
