My life — and this blog — have always leaned into distractions. The self-soothing techniques I learned as a little kid in a dysfunctional household may not be the healthiest: escapism through reading; watching movies and TV; and playing video games. But I had no idea this early training would serve me so well in my 40s. Or that stress cooking and baking would factor so heavily into my adulthood. And it is strange to watch the rest of the world catching up with these coping mechanisms. Well, those, like me, who have the luxury to stay home, away from the pandemic’s front lines. People who once had other distractions that don’t apply to me. Like sports (watching and playing them), regularly spending lots of time with family (haven’t got any really), going to all day beer festivals, etc. Those folks are just now figuring out how to hang out at home and how to cook and bake and plan meals. This is all old hat to me. But I do miss live music shows, eating out at restaurants, traveling, and socializing around fire pits. And we’ve only gotten one month of this under our belts, as of today.
Lowlights from the weekend:
- While drinking boxed wine Friday night, I had the brilliant idea to chop off my split ends with kitchen shears.
- I had to take too many doses of Excedrin for a splitting headache verging on a migraine and my heart has still been racing, despite my decreased caffeine intake (yes, I know Excedrin contains caffeine, which is one reason I’ve been decreasing my coffee intake to half a cup in the morning).
- I did not go for any walks or do yoga.
- Vacuuming did not happen.
- I didn’t feel like talking to anyone, other than my kid.
- I failed to Harvest my Hamama microgreens at their peak, yesterday, and woke up to find them looking sadly wilted. I know the feeling.
Highlights from the weekend:
- When we moved into this place in August I noticed the signal from the wireless router in the living room didn’t quite stretch to the back bedrooms so well. A few months in I bought a Meshforce wifi extender system but it sat in the box until yesterday. It’s all set up now and the signal has been boosted.
- I watched Portrait of a Lady on Fire and it was as wonderful as everyone has been saying.
- While it was snowing in April outside I whipped up a hearty seitan stew and listened to a lovely episode of The Daily from the NY Times: Weird Al Yankovic’s Weirdly Enduring Appeal. Here’s Weird Al with his daughter cosplaying as him. Adorable.
- Saturday I watched Superman: Red Son with my son. It’s getting harder and harder to find new movies he’ll agree to watch with me so I was thankful for this one.
- I put in way too many hours playing Animal Crossing. But I finally got the hang of fishing and we’re done with that creepy bunny day rabbit. Hoping to see some shooting stars soon.
- I waited so long for this Killing Eve season premiere. And then they went and killed off one of my favorite characters! But it was all done so perfectly.
- Another fine episode of Westworld. I particularly enjoyed this week’s plot device with Caleb. And a subtle observation from Bernard: “She’s sending them off their loops.” Chilling.
File under a little of column A, a little of column B. I have piles of unread books but I opted to re-read Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files. All of them. There are like, 17 books and a bunch of short stories. I think I’m on book eight already. I have a love/hate relationship with this series. Overall, they are fun and I enjoy the world-building. But he’s crap at writing women. So many micro-aggressions in these books along with misogyny and subtle racism. I’d forgotten about or blocked out a lot of it. But it’s still like being reunited with old friends. Old, flawed friends. Like real life. That’s oddly comforting.
Yesterday I set up the wifi extender but I also assembled a vegan Easter basket for my 20 year-old son. And collaborated with my ex-husband’s wife to arrange a social distancing Easter egg hunt in our backyard for my boy. That was definitely the highlight of the weekend.
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