It's been a week since the visiting relatives all went home, so theoretically, I should be all rested up and back in my old groove.
For some reason, that isn't happening.
I can't even remember what I've been doing all week. Somewhere in the middle of it, the mermaids came to visit. The mermaids consist of Josie's core of friends who always have to celebrate their birthdays together. All the mermaids don't have July birthdays, but most of them do. For years now, they've been gathering in late July to see a movie and have dinner. This year, they went to see Mama Mia!. Alex and I had seen it before (it was Alex's third time) but it was just as good as the first and all the girls enjoyed it. They all agreed it was great fun and that Pierce Brosnan is an excruciatingly bad singer. But I for one love that he wasn't dubbed over. After the movie, I took them to Lake Calhoun for some swimming. Then, after much driving around, we swapped Carolyn for Lulie and the party continued. I brought them all back here for dinner. Josie had requested crunchy chicken wings. The six of them polished off almost eight pounds of wings. After dinner, there were fudgecicles instead of cake. By the end of July, we're all pretty tired of cake. Besides, it's way too hot to bake.
And yet, I'm going to bake cookies later.
I am trying to get back to work and I've ground out a few things this week. I also just returned from putting the finishing touches on the wine cellar I've been decorating since January. It's finally done, and I'm happy with the way it turned out. I think I'll charge a hundred billion dollars.
Maybe not. I don't want to discourage future clients. A hundred million dollars?
Yesterday, I helped Katie move out of her apartment. Her new place won't be ready until the 21st, so for the next three weeks, she's back at home like the old days. Fortunately she doesn't own much yet, so it didn't take the two of us much time to pack up her stuff. She and Josie put her bed back together up in the room they used to share. Josie has gotten used to having all that room to herself, so she thinks it's cramped, despite it being the biggest bedroom in the house.
Tyler is coming home to visit in about ten days, so for a week, the whole family will be back in the house together. It's been five or six years since they all lived at home. It will be fun! The kids all get along much better now than they did when they were little.
When I was done moving Katie out, I had to shower and get out to Mom's. She was having a get-together with some of the ladies of her parish and asked me to come. It was really fun! It was a smallish group of ladies that I have known since I was little. One was a very good friend of Jay's Mom, one had had her youngest kids in school with my oldest, and one was the mom of one of my oldest friends. We ate cookies, drank wine and told funny stories about the old days.
It's been one year since the 35W bridge collapsed into the Mississippi. I only bring it up because I am sick to death of road construction. That stupid bridge fell right in the middle of an enormous highway redesign that starts about six blocks from my house. I can't go anywhere in any direction without crawling through narrow alleys of orange cones and rough roads. Our commuters were already confounded without the added benefit of a major artery deciding to do a swannie into the big muddy.
I can't believe it's August already.
