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Originally uploaded by junku.
Junku has the best photostream ever. Kittens. Fat babies. Awesome japanese things. Leaping cats.
Seriously. It is as though he looked into my brain and made a photostream tailored JUST FOR ASHBLOEM. I could look all damn day.
And sometimes I do.
Backyard at Christmas
Originally uploaded by ashbloem.
Christmas has been pretty crazy, per usual. It has been fun, and the house seems a sort of stagecoach stop for all friends coming and going betwixt family and evening drinking. Micah was once again hard to handle (only AFTER the drinks), but that aside, everyone was happy and light and funny and witty and all that business.
I like it very very much that we are an open house for everyone who wishes to come through. I wish we had more beds, but what can you do? One night Sandy, Jeremy, David, and I managed to fit in our queen bed. And it was cozy.
In addition, we have the boyfriend of Miss V with us for the holidays. He’ll be here another week. We have Jeremy for another night…. and then that’s all. I look forward to the calm but I know I’ll miss it all.
Originally uploaded by ashbloem.
I’m been sort of blah and busy the past few days. I’ll be back soon enough. In the meantime, I’ll probably be on Flickr more.
I’m not sure I’ll ever really like Christmas. I’m really giving it my best this year, but all the busy sucks. Also, we went back to gift-giving this year and I don’t like that either – the shopping, not so much the gifts. But I can deal, since everyone else does. But still. Stupid stores.
And I guess from here on out I can’t really talk about a lot of things I used to. First time I ever felt I really can’t write what I want to, and that has dampened quite a bit of my enthusiasm for it. Hopefully I’ll get it back at some stage, but probably not before I switch to a locked format.
And really, I guess that’s what part of my dampened spirit is about right now. I’ve pretty much had something I really love taken away from me. Guess I’m lucky there are a lot of things I love, but writing is certainly tops.
I’m so ready for this month to be over. October, November, and December 2008 are officially equal in suckage to the entirety of 2007. I’m really sad that the year of my wedding, when I’ve otherwise been SO HAPPY, had to be besmirched like this. Not really sure I’ll ever get over that entirely.
Jesus, I can’t wait to leave this city.
Home… home.
Originally uploaded by ashbloem.
Now I just need a good Amsterdam print. And Luzern. Maybe a London one, though I was only there a couple months, really. And Florence too, as long as I’m at it. Then I have all my lived-in-cities covered.
Hm. Let me know if you see any good ones.
I am so happy in the new house, and I think it is unlikely we will move until we are ready for the big one. So now I can just dream about our future in the Pacific Northwest or Chicago, and how great it will be when we move to one or the other.
Originally uploaded by ashbloem.
For the first round, we made scottish shortbread and swedish saffron breads.
“‘There you are!” cried the Toad, straddling and expanding himself. ‘There ‘s real life for you, embodied in that little cart. The open road, the dusty highway, the heath, the common, the hedgerows, the rolling downs! Camps, villages, towns, cities! Here to-day, up and off to somewhere else to-morrow! Travel, change, interest, excitement! The whole world before you, and a horizon that’s always changing!”
Maybe fiesty Toad was more influential than I would have guessed, blowhard & conceited Falstaffian characteristics aside!
These days, though, I lean more towards Ratty, pretty happy messing about in my boat. But I still love that the whole world is before me, and a horizon that’s always changing.
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Oh Lillet! Someday like Mole and Rat we will take to the river and be happy messing about. We’ll be Mole and Rat to each other, and Davey & I to each other, and you and Trey to each other, and Annie to Dab, and to each and all our friends and children in turn. And maybe, just maybe, I’ll be taken by motorcars or something, and I’ll throw a little Toad into the Mix.
THAT’S how I imagine the future when I am most happy.
That’s right. Like a pastoral children’s book.
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Cheese!
/smiles
Blood is said to run thicker than water,
but that's until spirits thin it.
Genes bond me to my mother's other daughter -
but friends? Apparently we never have been it.
Illness still lingers in the Ashbloem-Davey household. It’s getting a little irritating now. I had to ditch the half-marathon due to not being able to breathe – and I’m glad I did, though also disappointed. One of the reasons I signed up for it at all was because it is in the winter… and wouldn’t you know it was 70 degrees or so on sunday? I would have melted. I hate running outside when it is more than… oh, 50 degrees or so. But no matter. My body has decided to make up for all the years I have been so healthy by holding on to this cold/cough for the past six weeks. Well SCREW YOU BODY!
Oh wait. That’s probably the wrong attitude. I guess I should be extra nice to it, really. EMERGEN-C ON THE WAY.
The weather turned, and it is nice and cold and icy outside today. And with the exception of having to scrape the ice off the windshield, I just love it. Today I get the afternoon off work and I can’t wait to get home and curl into the sofa with David and cats and tea and some big fuzzy socks.
Last night I wore my earmuffs even!
I desperately love Wind in the Willows and was so happy to read this this morning: http://www.salon.com/opinion/kamiya/2008/12/16/wind_in_the_willows/index.html
I may have to use my afternoon off to re-read it. It has been a couple years. Oh Rat! Oh Mole! And Toad! Tee hee!
OK, off to my office holiday lunch.
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