frictionless

pen drawer overhaul - towards the end

Tired of talking about my ankle (improved but still painful) or my weight (staying the course) or even Vermont in the Autumn (lovely) so this is a short update to say that being at home is great and I’ve really seriously decided to do less travel-for-work this school year. This involves saying “No, thank you.” a lot. Eventually this may lead to a decrease in overall speaking requests or, who knows, maybe an increase in the amount people are willing to pay me to come speak to them. For now, I have no get-on-a-plane talks scheduled. I have two panel discussions scheduled for October (NELA and in re: books) and I believe that’s it for 2012.

This is just fine since there is a lot to do around here. The house got filled with moths and fuzz in my absence which just highlights how little I’ve been around since May really. And, as I say over and over, I like it here.

So the Pen Drawer Overhaul was a late night project where I cleaned out my pen drawer and got rid of all the slacker pens that take up space but don’t do anything. There’s just a small amount of extra psychic energy I get back from not thinking “Gee I should really do something about that…” And my Albatross List has dwindled from big things like “sell house” and “retrieve things from friend’s basement” to “make dentist appointment” and “dust.” Not bad for autumn-slipping-in-to-winter.

out and a boot

Took the stupid boot off and have been limping around and doing my exercises without it for the past few days. I am one slow person. Went out to my favorite stores (Savers! Ocean State Job Lots! Price Rite!) to get some supplies for the weekend and realized that there is no such thing as a favorite store when you’ve got a gimpy foot. Plus I’m bad at parking near the entrance to places since I’ve got the “Park further away and get some exercise!” bug so firmly ingrained in me.

On that front, things are good. Since I started this “Lose that grieving weight” program in April I’ve lost 14-ish pounds eating about 1200 calories a day and getting a good amount of exercise. The MyFitnessPal routine (are you on there? friend me.) is that if you do, say, 400 calories worth of exercise you can add those to what you’re allowed to eat for the day. This is a lot more fun when you can work hard, play hard and eat hard. Less fun when you’re in an aircast slicing up yet another apple. I’m going off the plan for the weekend because we’re going to get the grill going and I might want cake and/or ice cream…

Aaaaand, I never did get this little blogopost finished before the weekend. I had a lot of people come over and hang out and it was a good time, the weather couldn’t be beat and I ate an extra day’s worth of food calorie-wise which is actually totally okay with the plan that I’m on as a “Hey it’s your birthday” sort of extravagance. Here are some photos.

I’ve got some friends coming in and out this weekend and then I head back to Vermont on Tuesday. Drop-in time starts up again next Tuesday and I’m looking forward to my home routine a little. I spent most of yesterday in and out of the backyard hammock reading a Big Summer Book after getting myself a library card at the Westport library. Starting the slow process of tidying up and closing things down. Not starting new projects. Wrapping up old ones.

As a few people have noted on the Facebook Happy Birthday Machine, the Virgo Month of Leisure is again in full swing and possibly for the first time ever, I’ve hit the mark.