palace of winds

Why, you may have been asking yourself lately, why does Rachel not update more often? Why has she been so quiet?

Well, I haven’t been particularly interesting lately. Shocking but true. I don’t have a lot going on just now. I ride my bike a lot; the lake smells like lake now that it’s warmed up, deep and green and a bit fishy. I am thwarted by road construction at every turn; one such closure means the other side of town, the place with the bank and the post office, usually just a few blocks away, now requires a 2.5 mile detour. A sweet old man in the grocery store asked me how I like to prepare rutabaga.

And then there is the work I’ve been doing for the other site, the one that’s not quite there yet (but inching closer). And that work is important because once I’ve done that I’ll be ready to redo this site, to finish dragging everything (kicking and screaming, all the entries renaming themselves and shucking passwords and getting stupid in the process) over to WordPress. Oh what a trial it’s been.

Jo and I raised $239.00 for the AIDS Walk — thank you to everyone who donated! We hadn’t expected such an awesome response in just under a week. I haven’t started thank-yous yet, so if you have a specific request now’s your chance. (Yes, Bryce, I’ll write you a haiku.)

Saturday was all about me dragging myself unwilling into planned activities, and then enjoying them every bit as much as I thought I would when I’d planned them. I had a bike ride down to Whole Foods that very, very nearly didn’t happen; for some reason when the time came to actually go down and get the bike it was the last thing in the world I wanted to do. I went anyway, and as soon as I got my lazy butt on the seat I enjoyed myself very much. It was a little cool out but by the time I got to the store I was ready to shed my coat and my hoodie, and shopped comfortably in just my tank top — which you know is a small miracle, based on how often I bitch about being freezing. I went quite willingly to lunch with Carrie, so that bit was out of theme for the day, but it was wonderful to see her — we’re still way too infrequent with that, though I’m hoping we’ll be better this summer.

I’d asked my dad if we could on Saturday afternoon get a start on a project that will here remain veiled in mystery for the rest of summer. I again really didn’t want to leave the house but again did anyway, and was rewarded with a productive store-stop with my dad and a nice evening at my parents’, plus a find at Pier One that’s been eight months or so in coming: a papasan cushion. I got one of the more upright swively papasan chairs on freecycle, but it was just the base bit. I’ve been meaning to sew a cushion for it for ages and ages but just haven’t gotten around to translating dimensions to fabric needs and getting to the fabric store. Which is fantastic because I got this beautiful beige curdoroy cushion for $30, and there’s no way I could’ve bought all that fabric and stuffing and made anything near as nice for the same price.

And now it’s lunchtime, and I’m dreadfully bored with this entry myself, so. If you stayed awake through it, I commend you.

Thank you thank you to everyone who’s donated for the AIDS Walk so far! I don’t want to make any promises, but I want to do something nice to thank y’all. Any suggestions? I’ll definitely try to do at least an exclusive little write-up about the walk. Jo’s promised everyone stick figures, though, and I think that trumps me. Hmm, maybe I could also offer Jo stick figure originals…

Jo and I are walking this Sunday — please consider a tax-deductible donation!

I cut all my hair off.

Well. Not all.