Back from Duluth

 And busy as ever, of course. I've been absorbed in a project of which more at a later date (nothing life-changing, just absorbing) and the baseball tournaments continue unabated. Mostly without me, too, I am sorry to say. I am planning to attend a game today (but only one) and with the one I went on Friday that makes the most games of any one tournament I've attended this season. This makes me sad, less for the loss of all those games I could have been watching than for the way, when I show up, none of the other parents know me. Sigh. C'est la vie. Even if I attended every game and every practice, these parents live all over creation. Or the greater Denver metro area, anyway. It is not a situation conducive to grownup bond-forming.

These photos make it look so sunny and pleasant.

 But! Enough complaining. It was a hectic week, I spent much of it in airplanes/airports, and the second night I got home Silas's old long-suffering gerbil died (quietly in his sleep, I am relieved to report). Silas was distraught and felt that his grief required a day off of school (denied.) He also began researching replacement pets and was disappointed to find that the more playful an animal is, the less likely I am to approve it. (Ferrets? In your dreams, buddy.)

In fact, it was 33 degrees and snowing most of the time.

 The garden is growing in greenish bounds and could be using my constant attention (this is really what I want to be doing, rather than driving to baseball games/ soccer games/ birthday parties/ the store). I finished Undaunted Courage, felt bad for Lewis, and signed Helen up for swim team (since baseball is clearly NOT ENOUGH.) At least that's with friends and other neighbors, the same ones I am delighted to see and gossip with at soccer games. Yesterday, in fact, as I drove Helen from the soccer game to the American Girl Doll store to buy a present for the party she was going to later, and reflected pleasantly on the chats I'd had on the sidelines (these chats tend to rather overshadow the game, which is surely as it should be, unlike the tense silence at baseball games), I thought, Raising Arizona-style, of the distant gray-haired future, in which perhaps these women would be my actual friends with whom I would actually do things, like drive into the city and attend concerts and shows or drive into the mountains and drink beer in the sunset.

My annual Duluth run.

It could happen, I suppose. Or there will be others. I have to assume that there will be somebody, that once the hectic smash of the current nontimes have passed (and they will pass, that is certain, with the swiftness of a freight train), that we will actually pick ourselves up in the ensuing silence and go about having a life of our own again.

Random assortment No. 2

1. The Friday favorites list is apparently beyond my blogging skills now.

2. The kids' school registration was last night. We stood in one line for 20 minutes, and then another line for 25 minutes, all so we could turn in our forms and checks and OF COURSE I ran out checks, just like I did LAST YEAR, and after standing in line for 45 minutes and having my blood sugar level drop to just about zero the thought of not being able to pay for whatever the last thing was on time like a responsible parent made me totally panicky. UGH. Although it was nothing a beer afterward couldn't fix.

3. We met the teachers--they're both lovely. I was struggling not to be biased but I was really glad that Helen got the kindergarten teacher who isn't brand new (although I'm sure the new teacher is LOVELY and will be a WONDERFUL teacher).

4. I was surprised at how completely ignorant I was of the fourth-grade teachers. You'd think that after two years I'd have some sense of the school beyond the immediate Silas universe, but nay.

5. Neither child has friends in his/her class. Again, OF COURSE. Although I'm not convinced that Silas really cares about friends, to tell the truth. He seems to have buddies everywhere (and he has buddies in this class) and best friends nowhere and bases his favorite friend of the month on the entertainment options at their house, more or less. I SO DO NOT GET THIS.

6. It's Friday, yet there is no dumpster at the house. Hmm. So apparently no demo today.

In review: summer

1. Si started the second of his summer activities today (camp). HurRAY. In some ways my life as a mom has been a single trajectory toward this point. For two (2) days this week I have the house to myself once again.

2. It's not overnight camp, though. Perhaps overnight camp is the real goal of my Life as Mom (well, college/ job/ leaving the house as a functional adult is my goal. Fingers crossed, here.).

3. Last week Hubs and I went to the only restaurant in Denver I was really excited to try (my palate is tres jaded): Domo. OMFG, you guys. It delivered. All Denverites among my readers, please go.

4. I also had a job interview last week. My excellent interview skillz were again in evidence, although I wouldn't say that overall the interview was a bomb, and this time I actually think the interviewer's lack of interviewing skills was part of the problem. I got the sense he kind of based his decision on whom to hire less on qualifications and more on his gut. Nevertheless, I have been existentially wondering Do I Really Want a Job more than usual (I've also been calculating how much more we could do if I had a regular income of decent proportions. Like: we could redo the kitchen! We could afford new windows! we could hire someone to do the stonework in the back yard, instead of moping about how we don't have the time to do it ourselves!)

5. We had houseguests (my MIL and my nephew) on Saturday night and old friends over for dinner on Sunday. God, it was nice. In fact, overall it was a people-filled weekend--which is how our life used to be. And how it will be in the future.

6. Despite this, I spent an inordinate number of wee hours of the night fretting about Silas and Helen's old friends from our old town, and how due to my negligence and neglect, we are not keeping those ties. I need to NOT DO THIS. Fret, I mean.

7. So! On to a new week!