wow. the holidaze

it was a busy little break, yes it was. starting the saturday before Thanksgiving, i began the great move to the country. the boys and i had beds set up, a washer and dryer in place and a couch and a piano and even some food in the house, all thanks to the pick-ups&muscle brigade. there were many laughs, only a few scrapes, and overall everyone is pretty happy.

the kittens have joined us in the country and gabriel is joining his "cousins" over a different mountain altogether for a bit. all in all, i think the relocation is for the best.

Over the holiday itself, the boys and i cooked all sorts of weird but wonderful things, beginning with cookies and ending with a double-layer orange cake with cream cheese frosting and tangerine wedges for decoration. While not moving or playing or cooking, i managed to read quite a bit. I finished up Lamb and returned it to Jffn. Man, it is on the Highly Recommended list. Then i delved into some Terry Pratchett that had been lying around: The Amazing Maurice and His Highly Educated Rodents (which Tiger read the day after i finished with it), The Colour of Magic, and The Light Fantastic. I'm just now starting Sourcery, finishing up the Rincewind set. I'm in love with the Luggage.

thanks for your support

kn0w1 sent along a string of pictures entitled "why you shouldn't get drunk." i think i might tape them to the inside of the wine cabinet as a supportive reminder to my resolutions. :)

it was a good weekend, filled with food, reading, a bit of cleaning (hey, can't go crazy here) and all-in-all a good and restive time with the boys. i interrupted the mildly-depressing-but-well-written The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter for the cosmically hysterical and well-written Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal [many thanks to jffn for lending this to me]. Honestly, anyone can enjoy it, but the deeper your Judeo-Christian educations runs, the more you will appreciate the depth to which this humor is crafted. In fact, it might well be the cornerstone of my curriculum of the whole last millineum as far as the boys are concerned (yes, it's that good). I read over half of it in the past two days and can't wait to finish it up tonight.

a change in the weather

Funny enough, I seem to have been doing fairly well on the resolutions (which I was just reminded of this morning). While far from perfect, my progress is a far cry form the usual “hey, neat idea; shame it didn’t work” results I’ve been getting over the past few years. The smoking is still occasional, but truly rare. Who has time to drink anymore? And even a single hard cider over cheesy fries is enough to make me all nappish.

The house I was looking at has a boundary issue, which is a real show-stopper for me, but the good news is that I know what I qualify for (even though it’s a pittance) and have begun the process of finding where I’m going. The boys and I haven’t hiked yet, though we have taken some walks in a more urban(e?) setting. Yesterday during the school holiday I ended up renewing my library card and rediscovering the online catalog we have in the valley. We each took home a movie (mine is Snow Falling on Cedars, which I haven’t watched yet) and Dragon and I each found a book we just couldn’t live without (mine? The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter -- hard to believe I’ve never read it, but there you have it).

Overall, it’s really about having goals and become a legitimate person at long last. The simplifying isn’t happening yet at the visible level, but I can feel it percolating around in the ether, and I see things differently. I am actively looking forward to the donation stack that is forming in my mind, even though it will mean a ton of work, mostly involving carrying stuff down the stairs. The only good part of moving All Those Books will be using the cat to scan them in to Library Thing when I unpack them. Wherever that might be.

The time has come for the boys to have separate rooms, and that’s the biggest factor in finding a place to live: three bedrooms, not just two, and preferably a house so that we can keep the pets. It’s not easy, and anything we can afford will likely mean a serious increase in the petrol bill to accommodate a commute. But it will be my life, and that’s what matters.

I feel more alive that I ever have in my whole life.

resolutions

this is the new year to me, so i thought i'd post some resolutions:

• drink less
• quit smoking
• eat dinner together at home more often
• hike together
• move house
• simplify, including possessions, expenses, expectations

i know, as a list goes, this lacks originality in the extreme. but it's mine, and i mean it.

back

i'm back in communication again, and let me tell you, i had An Excellent Time.

just for starters. . .
I drove a tractor, and fed horses and went bowling and got just a little bit better with the .22 and figured out that the Springfield 1911 is too heavy for me to carry but found a Colt model at the gun show and really like it (my wallet doesn't, but it's not like i'll be buying anything anytime soon) and learned to play some weird-but-cool fighting game on the Xbox and some driving game (that he said was just like passengering with me) and watched something called Bean which made me laugh until my sides ached. i made minestrone soup on one night and he made manacotti on another (and MAN can he cook!!) and we talked and laughed and loved and lived and gracious sakes the time simply flew by.