Some Random Friday Thoughts

1. Last night was our last symphony excursion for the season. We saw Mahler's Symphony for a Thousand Voices. I kind of feel like this one missed me for the most part. I was tired. (Hm, wonder why.) And felt like I was under some kind of spell of sleepiness through the first half or so. This also caused me to lose my place in the playbill, so I couldn't tell where we were in the program. It was a very lush performance. I estimated maybe 500 or more voices in the chorus, including a children's choir of about 60. There was no intermission--so it was really an all encompassing experience, a rather magnificent wash of music.

Afterwards we came back to town and went out for drinks at a posh little spot downtown. I had an Andalusian Sidecar and a Venetian Martini. I don't really know what either of those things are. The first one was a very complicated flavor. Not something to like so much as to interpret it as you drink it. :)

2. The birds and squirrels around our apartment are amazing. There were not very many birds at all at the old place. (It's amazing the climate and habitat changes we've experienced with this move of only about two miles!) Our cat, who was feral for the first three days of his life (a fact that D insists Felix claims proudly), but who has been an indoor cat for the rest of his life, just quivers with excitement as the birds swoop and the squirrels scamper and chatter in the trees outside our window.

3. In about two hours from now I'm meeting with the pastor of the church where I've worked for the past year (and attended for the past two) about the possibility of increasing my hours and taking on more leadership responsibilities for planning worship.

4. Our new apartment building does not have any bins for recycling. I called our City's Ecology Center and found out that they will deliver bins and pick up our recycling for free! They're supposed to bring bins by today. I feel as though I've helped make the world a better place with this little action.

5. My laptop was carried carefully over to the new place in my car. It was not moved, you see, but carried here. Nonetheless, when I plugged it in the other day, the 'i' key had decided not to work corrrectly anymore. I think that's just rude. Now I have to go back countless times and whack the living daylights out of the 'i' key in order to get it to register anything.

6. I lost about 30 lbs in 2004-2005. And I've been maintaining the new weight for about a year now. Even though I continue to wear several sizes smaller than I did two years ago, there is not a single day that goes by when I don't look at my body and convince myself I've gained it all back. I hate this. I wish I could be utterly free of it. It's my own little special relationship with the Accuser.

7. This Sunday is Pentecost. I'm going to be the worship leader. We're all supposed to wear something red. I don't think I own anything red. I certainly don't own a red dress. I cannot imagine myself in a red dress. Purple is as bold as I've ever gotten (at least in the past twenty years). I'm so much more of an earthtone kind of person. I just don't think I can existentially bear wearing red.

8. I had my first UPS package delivered to my new home yesterday afternoon. Wihoo! It was the book Anamnesis as Dangerous Memory by Bruce Morrill.

9. We're hosting our first-ever yard sale tomorrow morning outside the old apartment. Any advice for us?

I think I'll end my random thoughts there, since 9 is more random than 10.