Back From the Dead

Wow, guys. Pray you don’t get this thing, whatever it is. It’s VIOLENT. I’ve been sick for a whole month now, and every time I think it’s letting up, I relapse.

As such, I’ve not been much with the getting work done, though I’ve read a few books:

• The Hunger Games
• The Princess Diaries
• Vampire Academy
• Seaborn
• Saving Zoe
• The Amulet of Samarkand
• Two Parties, One Tux, and a Very Short Film about The Grapes of Wrath (which is awesome and I haven’t heard ANYTHING about it, ever, which is a damn shame, because it’s funny and boy-focused and not enough YA is and go get it right right now!)

and watched a heap of movies:

• Raising Victor Vargas
• Field of Dreams (again)
• Six episodes of the first season of Mad Men
• Hancock
• Kung Fu Panda
• The entire John Adams miniseries with Paul Giamatti and Laura Linney
• Fifty First Dates
• The first five minutes of Walk the Line (then I was quite sure they were about to kill both the dog and the brother and turned it off)

We also gave Rio a bath. She’s almost forgiven us, but that’s probably only because I’ve been sneaking her leftover turkey.  She’s so fluffy now. Fluffy and HUGE. Thirty pounds, we’re sure. And five months old. And more beautiful than ever. It’s ridiculous how gorgeous she is. Most dogs go through an awkward adolescent phase. She’s has not. Every time we take her out, people stop us on the street to tell us what a pretty dog she is.

Now, if only she would learn “stay,” she’d be perfect.

Yesterday, Sailor Boy and I raked the yard. Ah, the glories of home-ownership! Now, I’m from Florida, and this is the first year I’ve had a yard and have also lived in a place where the leaves fall. In Florida, if a palm frond falls, we just drag it out to the curb. But we had a ridiculous blanket of leaves in our heavily-treed new backyard. This is what it looked like:

And after we raked it all up, the pile was the size of Nikita, our car. Here’s Rio and me in front of the pile:

Things I learned: How To Use a Tarp to Drag Leaves To Your Curb. No, seriously, is this how northerners spend all their autumns? John Adams totally did not do this, did he?

You like my blue fuzzy fleece? I think it makes me look kind of like Grover, but it’s windproof, so I adore it beyond all rationality. Because you see, the other glory of home ownership is paying for your own utilities. I have become a lover of all things fleece.

Ugh, four more months of cold weather. Can I just hibernate now?

Though, despite the winter weather, I am happy. Thanksgiving was a whirlwind, what with all of the traveling across state lines to visit family and meet brand new infant nephews and all. I had my own private moment of thankfulness this morning, as I lay in bed (wearing fleece, though not my Grover jacket)  and listened to the rain patter on the windows of my house — my own home! — with my wonderful husband asleep beside me, and my adorable puppy (who can finally be trusted in bed with us!)  asleep on my legs. I am a lucky, lucky woman.