how do you live so happily while i am sad and broken down?

1. I had a couple meetings today but actually managed to get a bunch of stuff on my to-do list done in between them.

2. The delicious chamoy Kettle Chips we were buying from the independent neighborhood market have been sold out, but today Carla looked on the Kettle Chips website and it said that Whole Foods sells them, so we walked up there this evening and they did indeed have them! With the weather getting warmer, we've been having sandwiches a lot for lunches and dinners and these chips go perfectly with every type of sandwich we've had.

3. I was surprised to see Chloe get up on my desk yesterday. She hardly ever does now that Carla's desk with its high cupboard that allowed them to get up on the bookshelves is not in here. But she just wandered over and checked things out and then left lol.

1. Had another work from home day. Loads of things on my work to-do list and all of them were just stuff to do at the computer, which I can do more comfortably from home and save myself a commute, so that's just what I did. Tomorrow will be mostly WFH as well, since I still have a ton more similar tasks on my to-do list and no meetings scheduled.

2. The heat spell is over and the temps are back down in the 60s (50s at night). We had all the windows open over the weekend but I closed the ones in my bedroom this morning and by the evening we closed them all, as it was not only quite chilly but really windy as well.

3. On Saturday when it was really warm, I looked out the window by my bed and found Tuxie napping in the weeds. This area is just a narrow space (like two feet) between the house and the neighbors' fence, and there's a large bush that kind of blocks it from the front, so the gardeners never get in and trim the weeds, so they're really overgrown and make a nice bed for napping. I checked on him several times after that and he was there for ages, just changing his position every once in a while to get more sun or more shade.

Currently Reading
The Ladies Road Guide to Utter Ruin
13%. Sequel to The Benevolent Society of Ill-Mannered Ladies. I'm listening to this as an audiobook (as I did with the first) and so far enjoying it.

The Clockwork Ghost
No progress.

The Undiscovered Deaths of Grace McGill
65%.

Architectural Follies in America
37%.

Recently Finished
Hidden Figures
Finally finished this! There is also a young readers version that's about half as long and I wonder if that might be the better way to go, because this was just really plodding and felt like a slog to get through.

How to Seal Your Own Fate
This was fun. I hope there will be more books in the series.

Hammers on Bone
This is not just Lovecraft-inspired but straight-up Lovecraft fanfic, and as someone who has never actually read any Lovecraft and only knows a few character names and concepts from general osmosis, I felt like I was missing a lot. If that had been more clear in the summary I wouldn't have picked it up in the first place. In addition to that, I just did not like really anything about it. The main character for some reason talks like a stereotype of a noir detective, but in a really grating way. The best thing it had going for it was that it was really short. I have another novella by this author on my to-read list, but honestly this does not make me want to read more from them.

Paranoid Gardens
I picked up this graphic novel because it's by Gerard Way but it was pretty disappointing. So much is going on. Way too much. There's superheroes and aliens and a weird cult based on a cartoon character.

Motherlover
I actually read this a while back on the author's patreon, but it's finally out for real. Super cute f/f graphic novel about a couple of neighbors falling for each other.

Hey, Mary!
Did not realize Andrew Wheeler had a new graphic novel out but this just popped up on Hoopla when I was looking for something quick to read last night. A very religious Catholic teen struggles with accepting that he's gay. I feel like this would be great for kids in a similar situation to read.

Do Da Dancin'!: Venice Competition vol. 13

I set my alarm this morning so we could get down to the park before opening and beat the heat. High today was mid 90s, supposed to peak around one, but it was already 70 when we got there at 7:30. D:

( Read more... )

1. Had a work from home day today. Tomorrow I've got to go down to San Diego so that's a lot of driving and it was nice to not go anywhere today.

2. When we ordered from the Egyptian place the other day we both got wraps that came with a side of fries, and there were so many fries. The wraps were huge, too, so in the future we could definitely just get one to share, but even then one of these fries would have been too much to share. And we had two of them. So we tossed around ideas for what to do with the leftover fries and Carla had the idea of making a Spanish style tortilla with them, basically an omlet with potatoes in it. It turned out really well! She's already made it twice for herself and then today we had a larger one to share for lunch. And there are still fries left! Anyway, definitely a good way to use up leftover fries which we'll be making use of in the future, I'm sure.

3. When we got back from Japan, I got this bamboo bath stool for Carla to use to soak her feet in the tub like she'd been doing in Japan. It's got a nice shelf underneath and I fully expected all the cats to check it out but so far no one has, except brave Ollie! And even then it took him a couple weeks to get around to trying it. He seems to like it, though.

We normally wouldn't want to go to Disneyland the next morning after just having been out at a late-night event there the previous night, but it was the last day Carla's friends were in town and we wanted to get together with them, so we "forced" ourselves to go lol.

( Read more... )

Star Wars Nite! Last year there was no event held on May 4th because it fell on a Saturday and Disney does not want to close the park early on the busiest day of the week. But this year it's a Sunday and apparently they don't mind closing early then.

They don't do anything particularly different for the event when it falls on the fourth, but they do have special May the 4th merch that drops on that day, so this way we were able to check that out as well as do the other event stuff all in one trip.

( Star Wars Nite! )

1. Woke up to rain this morning, totally unexpected. It never rained hard, but it did keep up a consistent light rain for the entire morning. But we had no plans to go out today, except maybe walk up to the farmers market, but there wasn't really anything we needed there (in fact, we have a ton of stuff at home we should eat before getting anything new) so we just skipped it. And the afternoon was nice and dry, so we could go take a walk, and do stuff out in the garage. Hopefully no rain tomorrow for Star Wars Nite. The forecast says no, but then the forecast said no rain today, too (including while it was raining), so we'll see!

2. I made gochujang spam fried rice for lunch and it turned out great. I used more sauce this time so it was even better than the last time. (The first time I made it, I wasn't sure how spicy the sauce was going to be, so I went light on it.)

3. We have a fairly large cabinet under our bathroom sink and as we all know, the larger the cabinet, the more junk it fills up with. It had gotten to the point where every cupboard and drawer was stuffed full, but you could never find anything you actually needed. Last week we cleaned out the drawers, and today we did the cupboards, and now we can actually find the stuff we need easily and there is room if we need to put more stuff in. Most of the stuff we cleared out, we just threw away. So many long expired products. But there were some unopened, unexpired things we are just never going to use, as well as a few other gadgets and stuff, so we put that out in the little library for anyone who wants it.

4. The mattress on Carla's bed is over ten years old and really starting to show its age, so we finally went ahead and ordered a new one and it arrived today. It's nice and firm, so hopefully that will help her sleep better.

5. The other day Carla sprayed catnip spray on a bunch of things, including the warming beds, and apparently that's what it took to finally get Jasper to sit in one long enough to realize they warm up. Now he's been spotted in a couple different warming beds multiple times.

1. In addition to the new menu items that dropped on Wednesday, there is also a ton of new stuff coming for the Disneyland 70th anniversary celebration starting May 16th and they relesead a foodie guide for that today. So many new things to try!

2. Speaking of new food to try, last night when we were going to Disneyland, there was still a fair amount of traffic so the mapping thingy was sending us on surface streets for part of the way and we passed by an Egyptian restaurant and unlike the many other times we see an interesting sounding restaurant while driving and then forget about it when looking for something to order, we actually remembered this time and ordered from them for dinner. Everything was very tasty, so I'd definitely be interested in getting from there again.

3. Chloe poking her head out of the blankie nest.