Wide-Ranging Update

I started this entry this past Sunday, but never got around to finishing it:

David just texted from Chicago, where he's enduring a layover on his way home from New York City. He's in the airport, eating a not very good but very expensive pizza for dinner.

Last Sunday, when we got up before dawn to get him to the airport for his early flight, it had snowed and it was cold enough that it stuck around until 11:00 a.m. or so.

It rained on and off all day. Not much, but some. I really want a long, long rainy day. Lots and lots of rain. That's what I want for Christmas.

I had fried chicken for lunch, around 11:00, and now I'm not remotely hungry for dinner.

I've been eating badly and well. Day before yesterday I made beans and rice. Yesterday I had a kale salad--followed by a whole thin crust cheese pizza. Today I had fried chicken. It was the first meal I've eaten out since Dave left. He, of course, has been eating all his meals out, including a ridiculously expensive take-out office-wide lunch from some steakhouse near his office. Dave is a vegetarian, yes, so a steak house meal for him is usually something like a salad or mac and cheese. This time he had onion rings and a salad and a baked potato covered in fontina and truffles. (I just looked at the menu online to see that those onion rings were $14 and the baked potato was $16. Hahaha! Depending on the type of salad he had, that was a $45 steakhouse lunch--that didn't include steak.)

It's Tuesday now, Tuesday afternoon: 

We just finished lunch (a kind of bland pizza made with fresh mozzarella and broccoli). We're taking Gray Kitty to a new vet's office (to see our old vet since she moved) this afternoon. We were supposed to take him Saturday morning, but he knew something was up and so he hid under the bed and wouldn't come out.

Christmas is coming. Every year for the last several years, I've participated in a card exchange for a blogger (who doesn't really blog anymore) who I've never really met. This year, I only sent out 20 cards, but in the past, I've done 40+. I like sending cards to strangers and receiving them in return. (Once a year is about my limit for that sort of thing though.) As far as the rest of our Christmas preparations go however, the only Christmas shopping we've done so far is for two little three-year-old girls whose name we plucked from a giving tree at the co-op. We went to the local hippie dippie toy store and bought them some toys.

Over the weekend, we went to the studio and I worked a bit on my new, tall sculpture. I want to get some more work done on her, but I'll also have all day Saturday since we're firing a kiln on Friday/Saturday.

We had a bit of a flashback moment on Saturday morning when we stopped for a Starbucks and ran into someone from the old studio. She's one of those acceptably abhorrent type of people (by that, I mean that it's fine to run into her every 5 or so years, as long as the encounter doesn't go on too long). We stopped to chat for a few minutes and found out that the studio sale didn't go so well and that her daughter (once an anorexic) is now an alcoholic. So that was nice.

In the afternoon, we went out to lunch with Grace and Chris. It was Chris's birthday and we treated for lunch at our favorite Japanese place. It was nice to meet up and chat. Our favorite waitress has been absent for some reason, but she has been replaced by a new young woman from either Australia or New Zealand. (I made Dave laugh by describing her as "squidgy" because she is short and vaguely plump).

What else has been going on? I've been painting. Watercolors. I want to get back to sewing but I haven't been so inspired. Dave came home with a bag of gifts for me from Muji in NYC (they have a huge store near the NYC public library), including a pair of green linen slippers that I want to make a bag for (to use to pack them in when we go traveling). So that should be my next project.

The weather has not been inspiring. There hasn't been any more snow, but it's been gray and dreary, which is nice in theory only. I've been holed up, watching far too much Netflix.