Just regular folks.

We had a nice weekend – started out on Friday afternoon with our first Friday Vibes since summer started. It was really nice to see everyone and everyone was excited to see us back, but it was a little sad because a Main Street member passed away suddenly the day before and everyone was reeling from that. Edda was happy to be back at Main Street – enjoying the pasta dinner.

I spent some time putting nails on some friends. I think I did a pretty good job overall.

Saturday morning, I got up early and ran. For the past few years, I’ve been exercising in the early afternoon which allowed me to not just get up and exercise, I like the slow getting up, but then the day would progress and I’d kind of always mini-procrastinate the workout.

Jeremy is doing some off-leash training with Elka which goes great until it doesn’t go great. Jeremy’s working on fetching a ball and coming when called. For many days, Elka was the model of perfection, following every command, ignoring loping deer and bringing balls back. And then the disaster day where she totally ignored the ball and wandered into the woods not paying any attention to anyone.

Sunday was Jeremy’s birthday (57) and I baked him these molasses cookies – his favorite.

He wanted to go on a 100 mile bike ride for his birthday – so he did. I had Edda for the day and we attempted to go to church so I could sing in the choir, but about 15 minutes into the pre-service rehearsal, Edda had a seizure and we headed home for some rest and recuperation. Which I needed because I had my flu/covid shot on saturday and needed sunday to basically sleep. zzzz.

Jeremy’s talk got uploaded to youtube, so if you’d like, you can listen to it. Last Sunday night at family dinner, Seth mentioned that he did not enjoy public speaking (he has to do some of it in the role of a HS ultimate coach) and on the way home, Jeremy mentioned that he doesn’t mind public speaking at all anymore. A far cry from 30 years ago when he was agonizing over his dissertation defense and was really (he’ll tell you) a poor public speaker. Now he’s practiced so much, it’s not a big deal anymore. I feel the same way about talking to people in small groups or one-on-one. I used to feel very self conscious in social settings and was relatively quiet, but I can really shine now in many social situations and move the conversation along and everyone can have a good time. I think it’s important to note that if you think you aren’t good at something, you can always become better at it and feel good doing it. Whatever it is you want to do – sing, run, write, be a better friend, come up with new ideas, write a novel, take better photos – it’s really just attention and practice. I wonder if I can be good at fundraising – this I think is an important skill that I’m not good at. But I have good role models for this.

The weather has been so beautiful, Jeremy has been able to go on some lovely bike rides outside.

His bicycles are stored in the dining room and he can see them as he’s eating dinner and last night, he gazed past me and looked at his bicycles and said very sweetly, I love my bicycles. Ahhh, true love. He retaped the handlebars to match the wheels and the water bottles.

I am learning to drive the new car (I didn’t drive it with the bike on top). There are things to learn, but I can already tell I’m going to love driving this car.

We finally got an electrician to come in and install the actual charger to the wall (we already had the drop) so we are ready to go. I have not yet downloaded the app, so I can’t see things like the location, battery charge level, nor can I turn on the AC before I get into the car. Soon.

Jeremy and I are both trying to be phone free at night when we are going upstairs for bed. I removed my most coveted apps from the phone – the NYTimes and reddit. I’m trying to not reach for it when I’m bored. Which is a lot of the time. Jeremy is spending the time trying to train Elka more. Here he is making Elka ignore a fried chicken piece on the ground. Good doggie Elka.

Our wedding anniversary was on Friday the 29th and I did not spend the evening with my husband, rather, I went to Wolftrap with my friends. (I did OK this with him first, haha) and we had planned to celebrate on our own on Saturday night with one of our favorite meals and ice cream. But it turns out (and I had forgotten this) that Emelina’s (Ginny’s daughter) birthday was the same day as our anniversary, so we pivoted and celebrated the two occasions together on Saturday night. Nothing is more fun than burgers and ice cream for a crowd. The line for ice cream was very long, but we used the time to go through the 10,000 flavor options and combinations possible. omg, the kids were entirely overwhelmed with choice. I never go very deep into the options – no I have no idea what flavor unicorn farts are!

This was mango ice cream with watermelon ice and rainbow sprinkles for Emelina.

Seni got a mango shake with gummy bear toppings (a terrible combination if you ask me, the gummies all get hard in the cold and are no longer gummy) and Joab got chocolate ice cream with horchata ice and oreo sprinkles.

We stuck some candles into the ice cream and sang happy birthday. May all your birthday wishes come true Emelina. Happy anniversary Jeremy, I’m so happy we are together.

It’s been gorgeous weather for the past week or so and we are loving it. Jeremy’s been frequenting the newly opened coffee shop within walking distance of the house. He’s now a regular with Elka.

So they were happy to give Elka a swirl of whipped cream as a treat.

Friday night I went to Wolftrap with some folks from the guitar studio. We went to see the Tedeshchi Trucks Band at a sold out show. We’d spent the last month or so learning to play parts of their most famous song, though much more simply and straightforwardly. The weather was beautiful, the guitar playing wonderful. Derek Trucks is a virtuoso guitar player, a delight to watch him play. I brought snacks which was important to me. Even though I really enjoyed the event because I got to hang out with my guitar peeps and I did enjoy the music, I still don’t quite understand concerts. I guess it’s being surrounded by other people who also really enjoy the music, but I think I’d never really go to a concert initiated by myself. It was just a tad too crowded for my taste, I felt like the oversold the lawn seats, so we had to get there super early and even though we did, it was hard to find a spot. Also, I loved that they had two headliners – with our band playing first and they started exactly at 7:30 and ended exactly at 9 pm and we did not stay to hear the second band and I was back home by 9:30! Amazing! Loved that.

Me and Serita!

Also, I’m doing some fall planting for the yard, out of all the bare root trees I planted in the spring, only the white oaks survived. So I went and bought the next size up trees to plant this fall. The first set came this weekend – witchhazel. I planted two. And then I also got an american holly to make the minimum for free shipping. I don’t have a wire cage for the american holly, so I’m hoping its prickly leaves will be enough to deter the deer. Gooo witch hazel.

I got to play my teacher’s Les Paul Gibson fancy guitar on Friday. He had strung lighter strings on it and wanted me to try them. It was fun playing a fancy guitar.

On Saturday I went to my first Olympic weightlifting meet with my club. A small, local meet – a good beginner meet. Ward, my coach, talked me into this. It’s very interesting, I bought a singlet, I weighed in. I was the oldest, but only by like 6 years. These are my fellow competitors. There are some very strong ladies here. I went to the meet a few hours early – you have to weigh in about an hour before the meet starts. Many people are trying to lose weight to make a certain weight class, I do not care which weight class I’m in, so I happily just at whatever I want whenever I want to because I’m too old to be doing that sh*t.

Because I’m the weakest one, I got to go first which I was happy to do. Done and over with. It’s a lot to get used to honestly, like at practice, I had to get used to people watching me do things and then immediately telling me what to change. I’m not used to people watching me do anything – everything is awkward. Jeremy and Edda came to watch me, but then headed out after I finished. I stayed to watch the finish of the women’s and the men’s flight too.

I have a gym and coaches and a nice team. And here we are.

And here’s my clean and jerk. I did make my snatch (which is a more complicated lift), but I’m less happy with it, so here you go.

And just like that…summer is over. I went to the first choir practice of the season last night and it was kind of like the first day of school – seeing old friends that you haven’t seen all summer. And then doing something challenging and fun together.

But then I got home after 9 pm and couldn’t sleep well. Too exciting! And now I’m tired for today. But oh well.

I’m trying to figure out many things. Like how to fix Edda’s wheelchair.

I’ve been repotting my houseplants.

Jeremy is in Sacramento doing great work – apparently he has both groupies (asking for autographs) and bipartisan support. I’m not sure which surprises him more. So proud of him and you can read about it here and here. (He needs a better headshot).

Ahhh, yesterday I had the entire house to myself and it was fabulous. It feels like that has never happened since January when Felix moved in. And then we went to Missoula with a bunch of people and the funeral, I bunked with either my parents (my mom snores and kind of yells in her sleep) and/or Chris. No alone time for Doris! (cry emoji). And then yesterday, Jeremy left for Sacramento and Edda was at day camp and I was home by myself. I want to do all these social things, but I do love my alone time where I’m responsible for only myself. I do enjoy making people happy, so it means that when I’m with people, I try to make it a good time which is both fun for me and very tiring for me. I do understand why a lot of people enjoy living alone. People are annoying. I read somewhere that being slightly annoyed is the price you pay for community. And yes, I know I’m annoying too.

Jeremy did bike in Missoula – his big ride on our last full day was cancelled because of the weather which was unfortunate. But he did see the neighboring mountains. I still can’t believe how great that vacation was and a big part of it was that while I did plan a bunch, everyone was super flexible and agreeable to my plans.

While I was gone in California, Edda was at her first week of day camp. A new coffee place opened in our neighborhood. Elka got to go inside. The night before we left for CA, Chris stayed at the house to make the morning ride to the airport easier. He came at dinner time to eat with us and then asked if he could do anything helpful. Jeremy asked him to take Elka on a walk and Elka proceeded to take him right to the ice cream store to ask for a cold pup pop. Elka did this by refusing to go in any direction except towards the ice cream shop. Now, Chris had no idea why he was standing in front of the ice cream store with Elka looking at him so expectantly. Apparently now Elka asks Jeremy to go to the ice cream store not only each day, but on every walk. HAHAHAHA.

We are navigating new transportation options for Edda which means using Metro Access which is both wonderful and annoying. Jeremy did a lot of this when I was in California. But here is the sprinter van picking Edda up.

Edda also had a cluster of seizures on Saturday and Sunday – all of which Jeremy managed without telling me. He kind of shrugged and said, it would have only worried you. And it was true, so I didn’t know about it until Eliana texted the group chat that Edda was having another seizure.

As we were wrapping up our vacation in Missoula, my cousin Arlinda called me and told me that her father Joseph (my dad’s oldest brother) passed away and that the service would be in LA the following week. My parents are in Portland for the summer so we started trying to figure out logistics of moving everyone to LA and moving around LA to visit people. Chris, who is spending the summer here in DC, flew with me to LA. My parents flew to LA from Portland and we all met up. I rented a car – over the span of 4 days, I drove over 400 miles, quite possibly a record for me. LA driving is not straightforward – the entire trip was exhausting, but actually great in a way. When someone dies at 90 years old after being sick for a long time, the funeral has a palpable sense of relief and we were, in some sense, happy to spend time together.

The first night, we had dinner in a San Gabriel Sheraton – here’s aunt Jane:

Uncle Robert:

most of us at dinner:

Cousins Chris and Andrea:

The next morning we drove to Malibu where we visited Carrie’s house which out of about 300 houses, hers is one of 40 left standing from the fires earlier this year.

We went to the third street promenade for lunch and then to my uncle’s Buddhist service. My cousins, his daughters are in the photo. Did anyone know Joseph was Buddhist? ummm, not really. But the ceremony was beautiful, gorgeous.

We burned lots of money and houses and cars for Joseph in the afterlife. Vince and Dani drove up from Irvine to attend the service and dinner and drove back after dinner.

The next day, I dropped my parents off at the airport and went to Westwood to pick up Chris – his parents were going to fly home to Texas and Chris and I were planning to spend a few days with Vince and Dani in Irvine.

At Irvine, I saw Vince’s lab (beautiful)

We had pho dinner with Dani’s parents and went to a dessert place so Asian…only mango desserts.

Saturday morning, I got to visit Keyla in Palos Verdes and the kids are doing so well.

And then back to Irvine to spend the afternoon at the mall with the kids and watched Superman and then had dinner with Dani’s family and then went to a sound yoga class with Dani’s mom. Then to bed and Sunday Chris and I flew home back to DC. Overall, a great trip. Got to spend time with lots of people and get to know everyone better. Loved being able to spend time with Vince and Dani and Dani’s family. Now back at home, Jeremy is leaving for California today on business. Nothing stops.

We flew back on Friday night to National from Missoula via Chicago. I don’t think I’ve ever flown into an airport on Friday night. It is a party happenin’ – people picking up friends, taking their time, music blaring – lots of Hiiiii giiiirrrlll! Interesting. Anyways, we got home very late.

Saturday we tried to pull the house together in some way, jetlagged and then starting on Sunday, we had festivities starting to say goodbye to Felix.

We went to weightlifting on Sunday morning where I practiced my lifts for my meet in two weeks. What the hell? I’m just hoping for clean lifts at any weight now. I’m not going to be able to practice very much between now and then, so it’s going to be what it is. Everyone at the gym is so excited for me, and in turn, I’m excited for myself. If a little nervous. I found a brand new singlet on ebay for 21 dollars – retail $150 baby! I’m ready. Felix came, though slightly injured and didn’t lift. I really hopes he finds a coach in Sweden, he’s a natural. Thomas (the guy in the green) is leaving for college in Florida as well. Thomas’s mom baked cookies for all of us. Yummy! This is the nicest gym ever, really.

Sunday night, we went to Sunday night dinner which was HILARIOUS. Sometimes they are and sometimes not, but I’m glad this one was. Chris was there too and it’s his last Sunday night dinner too. So here’s a good-bye photo too!

Monday morning, I dropped Edda off at her adult day program. I spent about an hour talking to them, doing some paperwork and telling them about Edda and she had a great first day! There were a number of friends from school and life that we were able to reconnect with. That was a lot of fun. It’s in a beautiful location surrounded by woods.

Then it was time to say goodbye to Felix. As I told him and his parents, I’m so proud of him. Though it was a slow start, he completely knocked it out of the park for his stay in the US. He made about $8K, way more than I thought he would and made friends and became very, very tan. He got health insurance and he got his driver’s license. All great things.

Jeremy is swamped at work, so I dropped him off at National and we shared donuts and blueberry muffins from Dunkin’ before he headed to security and I made sure he got through and we waved ferociously at each other from far away when things were cleared.

To celebrate Edda’s first day and Felix’s return home, I invited Megan over for dinner and to do a real celebration, we all went out for ice cream. Elka came too – she wouldn’t miss it. And we christened the new car with her dusty paw prints. We were going to go to Carmen’s, but it was closed to give the workers a day of rest, so we headed to ben and Jerry’s.

Hooray for ice cream!