leaping backwards

This week I have been faced with my past, mostly my childhood and adolescence. Strange that I celebrated my birthday this week and spent the Sunday before it with my best friend from age six to twelve and my best friend from age twelve to nineteen. Two very lovely women, incredibly successful women who in turn connected with each other as well.

While my life took turns that theirs didn't, we are all happy with our choices. Be it kids, partnerships, IPOs, basset hounds, multiple degrees that render us useless, suburbs versus the city, we all grew up as the children of first generation immigrants to this land far far away.
I spent the last 23 years running away from my childhood friends. It is not to say it was bad internets, it just was something that I just didn't want to be part of for a while. I built my own support system that I cherish and will never let go, there was just something magical about sitting around on Sunday discussing how we'll never be like our parents in some ways. We will never be able to hold a candle to the parties they had and that makes a all a bit sad and relieved.

I never thought that I would be the girl who needed fifteen chafing dishes for my 100 guests, but I know that push comes to shove, I could call the girls and they would do me proud.

I am making connections with them again, mostly through my mom and dad coming back and my dear brother, who was quite anti-social during his Bershon period, but has blossomed into Mr. Suave.

Hey, starting tomorrow, I'll be blogging daily, in support of NaBloPoMo. I even bought a new crackberry to make it easier while lollygagging and throwing vast sums money at the French for things like cheese baguettes and really bitter coffee.

bonjour mlle nm, comment-allez vous?

word of the day

Indolent.

Getting old sucks.

However, the alternative sucks worse.

nm

Just in time for my trip in eleven days

Dollar hits all time low against the Euro.

Recession, there is no freaking recession. Weak dollar good! Allows more of the US to be bought!

Argh.

We have been really good about hedging funds for the last few trips. I may be paying for my now 7 dollar cafe creme using euros I bought at 1.41 this summer. Really.

It was fun while it lasted (sniff).

nm who now has to up her ATM limit just to take 200 euros out

a new year

Tomorrow marks the beginning of my next year. Its prime, though I am beginning to feel less prime by the day.

I have had lots of on my mind, none of it very inspiring and some of it not very pleasant. It may be middle aged doldrums, it may be more than that. I'm hoping it soon will pass.

I'm trying to figure out what to do next.

nm

no brainers/non starters

You know those things that make it easy to say yay or nay to something -- people you date, places you go, people you hang with. Intravenous drug use, excessive gambling, three simultaneous relationships and bad family vibes would be non starters/no brainers in the relationship arena in case you are wondering.

Consider this internets -- no brainers when you were to go looking for a house and the garden you will spend the next 20 years cultivating.

any sign of bamboo in the garden -- run screaming, you will never rid yourself of it
clay soil --I weep when I garden in Berkeley
neighbors with outdoor speakers and/or a conversation fire pit

Luckily, I am really only dealing with the first issue. We are lucky enough to have a neighbor who never uses his back yard and his "firepit" and when he moves, we'll be pickaxing it out.

I hate bamboo.

I'm not avoiding you all, just really have nothing to say these days. V. busy with work, gardening and planning the number of one star restaurants one can eat in five days in Provence.

So far, we're up to two, I believe three is the limit.

nm sorting the bamboo from the bamboozled

An oaky finish, Bomarzo, Italy, January 2008.

I cannot say more than it has been a week.

I'm glad it is over.

I'm now sick, probably due to those around me and end of the week
stressors. Everything will be okay, thank goodness.

TH is in the 510 until tomorrow, leaving me with a 23 month old basset hound who does not feel that icy rain is an impediment to his social life.

If you live in Washington State, for gosh sakes, go to your caucus tomorrow. I will admit to never have gone to one, but the 98 emails from my left wing friends have convinced me that I can pull myself away from something to devote a few hours to this. My district caucuses in the school where I went to the 1st grade. All those days of pledging allegiance in my classroom must have paid off huh?

Many guides have done a great job of explaining the system and how it works. Megan did a great job of recapping it all.

Who am I supporting? I'm still unsure, the dark basset, is my first choice, but not many others.

nm rocking out the vote

Um, for those of you who don't follow my every move on twitter or flickr, I had a great time in
Kauai. Even the extra seven hours it took us to get there weren't so bad. Alaska kept us fed (burger king), watered (mai tais anyone?), entertained (how many times can you see Mr. & Mrs. Smith?) and updated as to if the rental car places would be open when we got to Lihue.

Other than that, it rained on Saturday, which is not uncommon, it just made it impossible to do a low water crossing we wanted to do. We revisited Hanalei, tried to find Makai Orchards (swept away in the bad dam breech), had some damn fine pineapple and then some really mediocre japanese food.

Sunday we bagged anything touristy and went right to the beach. Great day for it. Don't expect to see us all tan or anything. It was a good day for a book read, getting your feet wet and being amazed at how relaxed you can be for four hours.

Back to the grind again. The lull of the Internet, data standards, Haut-Provence or Rhone Alpes, tea or coffee, kibble or pasta, all are decisions that make us crazy.

I'm looking forward to some more structure before I have to vacation again.

nm creating brownie points as we speak

The unbelievable but maybe true.

Rethinking the seasons and time with Waverly Fitzgerald.

Wondering if I really need new shoes.

nm off to kauai for the next 48 or so hours