librareotyping

glasses

So for whatever reason I decided I wanted to learn how to make those serious business hair buns the same week it turns out that I need glasses for reading. I’ve always been of mixed feelings about my perfect vision. Like, yes it’s good to be able to see when you wake up and all the rest but for someone in my line of work it’s good to have glasses! And I’ve got too much dignity (most of the time) to wear ones I don’t need. As this picture shows not having a need for glasses doesn’t mean I don’t HAVE glasses, I just rarely get to do anything with them.

On the first of December I woke up like I always do and did some reading (this book about the Metric system, really good) and I felt more than usual “Gee it’s taking my eyes some time to warm up this morning” and then I remembered my Pile of Random Glasses and sure enough, looking through one of the many pairs made all the words on the page that much clearer. People who knew my dad knew that this was sort of an ongoing joke with him. Eye troubles and multiple pairs of glasses and eyedrops and shirts that had to have pockets so that he could carry all of his glasses around. Jim is getting to be a bit like this. Now it’s my turn! I have at least a few pairs of these glasses that work for reading, so I have them placed next to anywhere in my house that I read. This is a total of about four places. If I am smart I bring a pair with me.

So then there’s the bun thing. I’ve been half-assing hair buns for a while and decided I wanted a nice way of putting my hair up that didn’t scream “I half-assed this!” So I asked my librarian friends about how to do a bun right and the answer surprised me: you use socks. Or you can anyhow. So I tried it and it’s fun and stupid and most of all it looks AWESOME WITH MY GLASSES. So that is it. The end. I made a YouTube playlist of useful bun videos. It’s been a long sometimes rocky year but I hope to be ending it on a high note.

moving on, up

covered steps up to apt

If everything goes well, I’ll be moving in to this place a little over a month from now. I realize this isn’t much of a photo. It’s a mother-in-law apartment on the back of a nice house about eight miles up the road where I live. Just a teeny bit closer to work and the pool and my friends. Just a little bit further from Bethel and Boston and my family. Mostly good. It’s the most I’ve ever paid for rent and, relatedly, it will be the first time I’ve ever paid rent to live somewhere by myself. The apartment is small and has nice wood floors and insulated windows that look out on to tall trees. It has a guestroom, visitors welcome as always. My future landlady is one of my computer students. We got her her first laptop two weeks ago and just this week I set up DSL in her house. She sent her first email from her house on Tuesday. She is 83 years old.

Ola is getting back in the next week or two so we’ll overlap a little. Her youngest son is getting married at the end of July so there will be a certain amount of hustle and bustle and chaos there. I’ve spent the past few weeks trying to pack up most of my things that are in the common spaces and I have my room and a little more stuff to put in boxes. Anyone who wants to come haul a box to the new place is welcome to come by on August 2nd. I am pretty sure there will be pizza. And likely beer.

I’ve got the time to compose this because I’m waiting in an airport watching my flight to Chicago get further and further delayed. It’s already passed the time that it arrives in ORD after my connecting flight will have departed, so I’m scheming ways to either meet with friends in Chicago, get a flight to someplace else interesting [or more nearby, the LA area is filthy with airports] or prepare to show up in the middle of the night in LA. I suppose I could always drive home and bail on the entire proposition, but I’ve got a nice talk about rural technology to deliver and some librarians to hang out with that i haven’t seen in quite some time. I sort of expect summer travel to go this way. I have comfy shoes and a good book. I’ll get there eventually.