Whatever happened to all this season's losers of the year?
I turned a milestone birthday, and it was extremely lowkey, which I suppose is good. I honestly kinda thought my family would make a little more of it (given past examples) and I'm not sure if I'm disappointed or not that they didn't. They did try, kinda. After a certain age I think you're pretty much in charge of your own birthday pleasures and celebrations and you shouldn't expect other people to make a big deal. So, I shall just plan a bunch of things for myself privately, and go about them quietly in June.
I did find a place nearby that does indoor skydiving, so I think I'll give that a shot, having already done the regular skydiving thing back in my twenties. I don't have anyone to go with me, which is a bit of a downer, since that would have been something Louise would have been on board for-- everyone needs to have a Let's Do Stupid Shit On A Whim Friend.
At any rate, I got a brief massage, played with the niece and nephew, had a softshell crab sandwich, and went swimming on my birthday, which was all nice. The next day, I picked sixteen pounds of the first strawberries and took an afternoon nap, and the day after that, I went to the Brandywine River Museum to see the last week of the George Weymouth exhibit, which was amazing. I've seen some of his landscapes before and always liked them, but I never knew how many portraits he'd done as well.
I love the Brandywine museum because I love so much of the Wyeths' work, and the more you read about them, the more weirdly intertwined and incestuous they come off. All the artistic families and neighbors seemed to marry into each other, plus there's the added drama factors of the whole Wyeth brand and the Helga modelling storyline. There's probably a couple really good thinly disguised novels to be gotten out of it.
The drive to the Brandywine is a little over two hours, and everything was so explosively green on the way there. It feels like summer has really gotten a foothold in, and spring has basically exited without fanfare. If you stand still for more than a minute, some sort of vine will grow over your foot. All the rivers are swollen with the past two weeks of rain, and driving home, I had to go through Ellicot City with my phone blaring flash flood warnings at me every ten minutes. It was the worst rain I've ever driven through; I could barely see anything. Thankfully, there was one of those rare moments where everyone on the road decided not to be a jackass, and we all basically slowed to forty miles an hour and didn't fuck around.
The Brandywine is close to Kennett Square, which is apparently the mushroom capital of the world. Louise would have gotten a major kick out of that. I just like the food.
No major chicken updates, though it's only a month from now that I get the baby ducks. I meant to upload the Mealworm Madness fight between the baby chickens, but found that of the videos I took, half are in portrait and half are in landscape, so merging them all is not the easy task I assumed it would be. I'll have to sit down and fix them some upcoming night when I have nothing better to do.
Baby shower keeps baby showering. I think if you basically put the work in the hands of your friends, you're not allowed to interfere as much after that, but what do I know. Throw your own damn shower if it matters to you that much, and screw the etiquette rules. Like, seriously, if you want to have quality control over everything, do it yourself. My greatest fear now is that she'll ask me to be godmother, which I do not want in the least. I also still haven't figured out how to either tell my mother I can't go to the wedding, or tell my friend I can't go to the shower.
My current plan is to fake my own death. I probably should not have recorded that here.
I know none of this is very interesting, but I've fallen out of the habit of journaling and I'm trying to get back into it, and to get better at it. It's hard to journal with the purpose of both entertaining other people (and yourself), and accurately accounting for things that happened. The latter usually ends up suffering in favor of the former.
Oh, and my neighbor left a passive-aggressive note on my door last week, telling me my clogged rainspout was washing away all her mulch. There was a frowny face on it. Lady, you've lived here longer than I have; therefore you know I have no power over when the gutters get cleaned. If you think your sad note can guilt me into buying you some mulch, you're in a for a disappointing time. I have stomped over and ignored more blatant social cues than that.
I did find a place nearby that does indoor skydiving, so I think I'll give that a shot, having already done the regular skydiving thing back in my twenties. I don't have anyone to go with me, which is a bit of a downer, since that would have been something Louise would have been on board for-- everyone needs to have a Let's Do Stupid Shit On A Whim Friend.
At any rate, I got a brief massage, played with the niece and nephew, had a softshell crab sandwich, and went swimming on my birthday, which was all nice. The next day, I picked sixteen pounds of the first strawberries and took an afternoon nap, and the day after that, I went to the Brandywine River Museum to see the last week of the George Weymouth exhibit, which was amazing. I've seen some of his landscapes before and always liked them, but I never knew how many portraits he'd done as well.
I love the Brandywine museum because I love so much of the Wyeths' work, and the more you read about them, the more weirdly intertwined and incestuous they come off. All the artistic families and neighbors seemed to marry into each other, plus there's the added drama factors of the whole Wyeth brand and the Helga modelling storyline. There's probably a couple really good thinly disguised novels to be gotten out of it.
The drive to the Brandywine is a little over two hours, and everything was so explosively green on the way there. It feels like summer has really gotten a foothold in, and spring has basically exited without fanfare. If you stand still for more than a minute, some sort of vine will grow over your foot. All the rivers are swollen with the past two weeks of rain, and driving home, I had to go through Ellicot City with my phone blaring flash flood warnings at me every ten minutes. It was the worst rain I've ever driven through; I could barely see anything. Thankfully, there was one of those rare moments where everyone on the road decided not to be a jackass, and we all basically slowed to forty miles an hour and didn't fuck around.
The Brandywine is close to Kennett Square, which is apparently the mushroom capital of the world. Louise would have gotten a major kick out of that. I just like the food.
No major chicken updates, though it's only a month from now that I get the baby ducks. I meant to upload the Mealworm Madness fight between the baby chickens, but found that of the videos I took, half are in portrait and half are in landscape, so merging them all is not the easy task I assumed it would be. I'll have to sit down and fix them some upcoming night when I have nothing better to do.
Baby shower keeps baby showering. I think if you basically put the work in the hands of your friends, you're not allowed to interfere as much after that, but what do I know. Throw your own damn shower if it matters to you that much, and screw the etiquette rules. Like, seriously, if you want to have quality control over everything, do it yourself. My greatest fear now is that she'll ask me to be godmother, which I do not want in the least. I also still haven't figured out how to either tell my mother I can't go to the wedding, or tell my friend I can't go to the shower.
My current plan is to fake my own death. I probably should not have recorded that here.
I know none of this is very interesting, but I've fallen out of the habit of journaling and I'm trying to get back into it, and to get better at it. It's hard to journal with the purpose of both entertaining other people (and yourself), and accurately accounting for things that happened. The latter usually ends up suffering in favor of the former.
Oh, and my neighbor left a passive-aggressive note on my door last week, telling me my clogged rainspout was washing away all her mulch. There was a frowny face on it. Lady, you've lived here longer than I have; therefore you know I have no power over when the gutters get cleaned. If you think your sad note can guilt me into buying you some mulch, you're in a for a disappointing time. I have stomped over and ignored more blatant social cues than that.