roll, bounce!

E & C took us skating!!!

Action figures

You don't know from flattered until you have had your likeness crafted out of toilet papers tubes.

I love hand-made gifts!  Thanks, E!

(p.s.--you can't really see it in this pic, but I am holding a clipboard and ruler in one hand--all fieldwork style-- and 2 (two!!) purses in the other hand.  This woman knows me well...)

why i love my friends

I was telling Leslie about the crazy end-of-semester that I am experiencing right now and to cheer me up she sent this:



Which is possibly my favorite segment of Sesame Street ever, right next to the one where the girl takes her llama to the dentist, and the amazing stop animation of Teeny Little Super Guy.


Ah, good times.

>>>>>>>> UPDATE: in a random act of synergy, MadPainter also just posted an awesome SS video. I always loved that art deco house...

first world problems

Hosted a clothing swap today. Swell ladies, fun clothes. Two kinds of soup, and cookies too.

Everyone left with a bundle, but look at all we have leftover! It's all headed to women who need these things more than we do. But it makes you think a bit about all of our excess, doesn't it?

blame it on the season

Today is one of those days where I am struck by the realization that every person who has known me for any significant amount of time is hundreds of miles and several plane rides away. Sometimes I look around and wonder what the heck we are doing here, stranded so far from those that know us best.

Perhaps it is triggered by the fact that my dear friend Katherine just sent me the new Death Vessel album for my birthday, and I've been playing it over & over until my brain is positively cloaked in bittersweet harmonies and swirling melodies. Or maybe it is the memory of dancing joyfully in circles in a barn in New Hampshire on a crisp late summer night until all that was left to do was leave our clothes on the dock and jump headfirst into the lake with nothing but moonlight to guide us.

We make new friends, new memories, with every place we move & I love the new people in our lives, don't get me wrong. I just wonder sometimes about the sacrifice, and the new memories we could be making with old friends, rather than clinging so strongly to the past experiences to keep them from slipping away.