I never travel without a pad of paper and a pen. On the third or fourth day of any trip, I'll need them. My mind freed by the change in schedule and environment, ideas and plans well up out of me, too fast to commit to memory, and must be set down in ink before my return home makes them scatter and dissipate like the night's dreams in the cold ( Read more... )

I seem to have stopped using LiveJournal. I didn't plan to. The major things on my mind lately haven't seemed appropriate for long-form discussion in a semi-public forum. I've always considered nitty gritty relationship details too private to post, except maybe under tightly locked-down friends-only settings - and really I'd rather just dish in ( Read more... )

Sometimes I get glum, and it helps to list some things that are good. So here they are:

• My old house is on the market. It might take a while to sell, but there's nothing else I have to do to get it ready - just wait for the right buyer to notice it.
  
• Even though I feel over my head at work, I get mostly positive feedback from my new team. I ( Read more... )

I have been a huge slacker in the Elliott website department, but these snow days gave me a chance to catch up. There was a lot of material to work with!


Photos from 2007-2008 at Nurturing Knowledge; Elliott's first year of preschool:

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School started two hours late yesterday and today because of freezing temperatures and ice. I realize other students and even teachers may have ice around their houses, but there is no ice around the school and there is no ice around my house, so I'm really frustrated by the snow delays. I grew up going to school in subzero temperatures and piles ( Read more... )

Christmas: Oh, about 10% done. Remember the good old days of glorious spreadsheets and 75% done by Labor Day? Ha! But I'm pretty zen about it. I'm not giving to as many people as I used to, I'm not trying to impress anybody, and pretty much everybody I know is trying to cut down on material possessions these days. Win ( Read more... )

In my haste to add a third of a cup of dry white wine to my pot of chili verde tonight, I got a little rubber stopper stuck inside the wine bottle. Oops! I finished off the bottle during dinner (don't worry, it was half empty already when I started - hence the little rubber stopper). And then we faced a dilemma - give up the wine stopper for ( Read more... )

2000 crushed me, 2004 crushed me. It was way past time... and I'm so glad I was in a packed house at the Montlake Ale House, crushed in a whole different way by the press of the crowd when they called it at 8PM. I'm so glad I had Elliott with me. I hope he remembers this ( Read more... )

I saw a HOPE poster in a window on Fremont Ave. this morning that I loved. I can't find it online, but this one isn't bad. From http://www.designforobama.org/ -


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I bought a few bottles of wine for my housewarming, and my investment was repaid severalfold: my wine rack is now full! Is this normal? Do I just need to throw more parties to keep myself in booze ( Read more... )