Did I mention the bit about how the book company laid me off? Yeah, that sucks.
I mean, Sunday was good. I met up with Squigamunk and her bf (well, once I found their house),* because it was Labor Day weekend and I felt silly spending the ENTIRE weekend without going out and doing something with people.
We planned to go hike Morse Mountain, where I went with S3 and![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
straussmonster and other so many years ago, and not that many. (They live right near it, and that's one bit of the local scenery that I know: I thought I should introduce them.) It turns out, though, that when it's a weekend and it ISN'T October, you need to show up by 10 or so if you want a parking space (and hence, to get in at all). Popular place.
So instead we drove down the OTHER road to Popham Beach, where we walked out to the island-when-it's-high-tide, and Squigamunk tormented crustaceans and we found something none of us could identify in a tidepool: it had ten legs and looked a bit like a woodlouse, and some of them seemed to be carrying (their young? parasites? the crustacean equivalent of ramoras?) on their undersides. Squigamunk crammed half a dozen of them, plus a small crab, in a clam shell full of water at one point. And then I showed them Fort Popham, which they didn't know about either; and we didn't ACTUALLY climb a gate to get onto the roof, but we thought about it.
In between, we sat on dry grass full of ants, so as to catch a late lunch. I remarked on how parched it - and the trees, and everything - were getting. Which was a bit ironic, 'cause the next day, of course, it rained like the sky had swallowed a diuretic,** off and on all day. We needed it, lord knows, but I was glad I'd scheduled the expotishun for the PREVIOUS day.
At one point we lost power. The repair guy said something about a pole catching fire.
And then somehow it was Tuesday, and I was going to have to stand in front of a class and pretend to be a knowledgable adult.
First, though, I got up way earlier then turned out to be necessary, to meet the guy from the motorcycle shop who was going to buy the Mob. Which he did. For far less than it was worth, but possibly not less than its worth minus the cost of fixing whatever's wrong with the starter, AND the kickstarter, and whatever else may have gone wrong with it. I think it was the right decision, but it makes me sad. I will miss having a form of motorized transport that gets 80 mpg, and the glorious feeling of breaking the speed limit when you're going at 30 mph.
Anyway. Then, much later, there was class. By that point I'd figured out what the hay I was doing, so it went ok, though I could have done it all better. I recited the beginning of the Enuma Elish again. It seems somehow appropriate for the eve of a related culture's New Year.
...And then I read a REALLY depressing article on the state of the academy late at night, which got me despairing of both myself and the world. (Whatsovay calls Tiny Wittgenstein: that sort of thing.) This had me lying in bed unable to get to sleep for self-despair, so after a bit I decided I needed to tire myself out enough to stop thinking, and got up and finished the MS index for my Mom's project. By the time I was done with that, it was 1:30. I got up six hours later to put the garbage out. Today has been a two-mug-of-coffee kind of day, and my brain still isn't ready to function. Bobcat.
* Google directions and Brunswick apparently don't mix.
** In Terry Pratchett's famous phrase
I mean, Sunday was good. I met up with Squigamunk and her bf (well, once I found their house),* because it was Labor Day weekend and I felt silly spending the ENTIRE weekend without going out and doing something with people.
We planned to go hike Morse Mountain, where I went with S3 and
straussmonster and other so many years ago, and not that many. (They live right near it, and that's one bit of the local scenery that I know: I thought I should introduce them.) It turns out, though, that when it's a weekend and it ISN'T October, you need to show up by 10 or so if you want a parking space (and hence, to get in at all). Popular place.So instead we drove down the OTHER road to Popham Beach, where we walked out to the island-when-it's-high-tide, and Squigamunk tormented crustaceans and we found something none of us could identify in a tidepool: it had ten legs and looked a bit like a woodlouse, and some of them seemed to be carrying (their young? parasites? the crustacean equivalent of ramoras?) on their undersides. Squigamunk crammed half a dozen of them, plus a small crab, in a clam shell full of water at one point. And then I showed them Fort Popham, which they didn't know about either; and we didn't ACTUALLY climb a gate to get onto the roof, but we thought about it.
In between, we sat on dry grass full of ants, so as to catch a late lunch. I remarked on how parched it - and the trees, and everything - were getting. Which was a bit ironic, 'cause the next day, of course, it rained like the sky had swallowed a diuretic,** off and on all day. We needed it, lord knows, but I was glad I'd scheduled the expotishun for the PREVIOUS day.
At one point we lost power. The repair guy said something about a pole catching fire.
And then somehow it was Tuesday, and I was going to have to stand in front of a class and pretend to be a knowledgable adult.
First, though, I got up way earlier then turned out to be necessary, to meet the guy from the motorcycle shop who was going to buy the Mob. Which he did. For far less than it was worth, but possibly not less than its worth minus the cost of fixing whatever's wrong with the starter, AND the kickstarter, and whatever else may have gone wrong with it. I think it was the right decision, but it makes me sad. I will miss having a form of motorized transport that gets 80 mpg, and the glorious feeling of breaking the speed limit when you're going at 30 mph.
Anyway. Then, much later, there was class. By that point I'd figured out what the hay I was doing, so it went ok, though I could have done it all better. I recited the beginning of the Enuma Elish again. It seems somehow appropriate for the eve of a related culture's New Year.
...And then I read a REALLY depressing article on the state of the academy late at night, which got me despairing of both myself and the world. (What
sovay calls Tiny Wittgenstein: that sort of thing.) This had me lying in bed unable to get to sleep for self-despair, so after a bit I decided I needed to tire myself out enough to stop thinking, and got up and finished the MS index for my Mom's project. By the time I was done with that, it was 1:30. I got up six hours later to put the garbage out. Today has been a two-mug-of-coffee kind of day, and my brain still isn't ready to function. Bobcat.* Google directions and Brunswick apparently don't mix.
** In Terry Pratchett's famous phrase
