Mixed

Some weeks fly by like a bullet train. Some drag on while simultaneously not leaving me any room to breathe, kinda like what I imagine quicksand might be like, in a slow version. And some weeks, insanely, are some fucked up superimposition of the two. Those are decidedly least fun of all.

How is it possible that this

was already a full week ago?

That was the day after the evening of Monkey working very hard to keep the secrets of the card she'd already made for JD and of the challah I had stashed in the garage for making french toast in the morning. She pulled that off, and hooray for her. But that was only the beginning-- there was still the matter of the cake we were planning to bake between her early dismissal (most conveniently coinciding Jewish holiday EVAH) and her gymnastics practice.

Cake that involved melting chocolate, separating eggs, beating them separately, and then folding.

Which technique not only makes for pretty pictures, but also works to impress the hell out of a seven year old.

And then... THEN she had to keep the secret of the cake between when JD picked her up after practice and when they got home. Which she did. Can I have some props for my girl?

It turned out incredibly yummy, by the by. We used Splenda baking mix instead of straight sugar, and for the glaze sugar-free (Splenda-sweetened) fake maple syrup, only because I couldn't talk myself into actually voluntarily using corn syrup.

The week before the actual day of the birthday was doing the sand thing. It wasn't just the prep, though that was headache enough, what with Birthday, Extended Edition looming seemingly without end-- family thing, featuring cake, day of; friends over for BBQ next day; hike the day after; and yet-to-happen coming-up-this-Saturday official party (during a camping trip, natch) together with the other Gemini in our close group of friends.

Anyway, the week since has also featured the train, for my favorite superimposed effect. Each day seems long, full of this, that, and a whole bunch of other things, half of which I don't even manage to get to. But the week seems to have sped by, leaving me now staring at yet another weekend.

We did go for a day hike last Saturday, though. Including this guy.

And we found this guy

right in the middle of the trail.

We didn't make it all the way to the top, but we did achieve about a 600ft change in elevation, and made it to where we could see this.

And on the way back down the mountain I tricked Monkey into talking about fractions. Yes, I am a nerd, but in my defense she started it with her talk about how many months have passed since her birthday and how old that makes her, exactly.

I haven't hiked in forever, but I kept up. Which, given my current weight (ridiculously high) and my current shape (round, duh!) is impressive, even if JD was carrying a whole lotta baby there. Oh, and my shoes don't exactly fit like a dream anymore. Though, ironically, I did much more damage to my feet the next day, going for a nice long walk in my flip flops. Trust me-- you don't want to know what they looked like after or what we had to do that evening or the next to improve the situation.

This concludes excuse to post pretty pictures the world's most boring post. I intended to talk about how and why I've been so unsettled the last couple of weeks, but I am thinking it will have to wait-- my pillow is telling me it's feeling lonely and neglected.


Oh, wait-- one last thing. My sister and I saw the man of Bon's dreams in concert last weekend. ZOMFG! That's all.