I'm trying really hard not to use post titles like "I Think I Can, I Think I Can" or "Crawling to the Finish Line", because I know I'll go back to past Novembers and find the exact same post titles. Does anyone feel like they're finishing strong? I've felt pretty good from a blogging perspective this month this year, but I am running on fumes at this point.
I am also still reeling from Engie revealing that her library makes people go to a desk and show their card to an actual person to retrieve their holds. What? Why? At my library it's a few rows of shelves in the middle of the main room, and you just find your label - the first four letters of your last name and the last four letters of your library card - and take your books. The machine won't let you check out books that are on hold for someone else so that's not a concern - wait, Engie, do you have to go to a real person to check OUT your books too? Doesn't that just unnecessarily make more work for the library staff? Okay, obviously it's fine, I just really like to dart in and out of the library without anyone seeing or commenting on my pile of holds that can barely fit in my arm-span. What's it like for the rest of you? Am I making too big a thing out of this? It's quite possible I am.
When Angus was in a growth spurt, more than once he gallumphed up the stairs and bounced off both walls to the point that he knocked pictures off. I found this simultaneously infuriating and amusing. Today I chucked a giant package of Costco toilet paper onto the stairs and knocked off the Eve of those pictures where the letters are made out of objects found in the world - like this except mine was from a craft show and I'm a little crestfallen that you can get them on Amazon now - and the frame cracked. Matt has already repaired it once and thinks he can repair it again. Embarrassing, though - I don't even have a growth spurt to blame it on. Well, not one I want to admit to.
What is Dubai chocolate and why is it suddenly everywhere?
I know habits are very hard to break. I have several habits I have tried to break and have either not successfully broken or have found really really really difficult to break. There are two that were much easier than I expected them to be. The first one was leaving only one space after a period instead of two. I was finally convinced that since I was no longer typing with a manual typewriter there was no reason for the second space. I though it was going to take forever to learn the change. It wasn't hard at all. The other one was not scrolling on my phone in bed when I wake up anymore. I have a weird relationship with sleep and I really never wake up feeling rested, and a few months or a couple of years back I started looking at my phone thinking it might be a nice way to wake up gradually ("oof", Eve winced when I told her this, "rookie mistake.") It was not. It was just an earlier start to doom-scrolling, and my hands would go numb, and I would be even more frustrated with myself by the time I got up. So I decided to stop and just... did. I still scroll more than I would like, but at least I've pushed it later in the day?
Two down, four hundred and ninety thousand to go.
Someone named Julie2343 who sounds like she should be a bot but is not suggested I read The Correspondent on my post about sending postcards - just finished it! I love a good epistolary novel. I love the word epistolary. I don't love the word epistle, though. Not sure if it's the way it sounds or my religious trauma. I'm tired.
