Which means, I spent an hour running errands and the rest of the day cooking.

I wanted to bake a pie. A chocolate pecan pie. Specifically, this one. This pie is the easiest pie in the world to make. Assuming that you have pre-shelled pecans. Which I didn’t. I had a giant bag of fresh pecans my aunt and uncle had given us from Charlotte. How hard could it be to shell a cup and a half of pecans? That’s nothing! Or, so I thought.

About five hours later (I am only exaggerating slightly), I emerged victorious with my shelled nuts and turned my attention to the pie crust.

(Insert pie-crust-making-and-errand-running here. I really need a food processor. I hate cutting the butter into the flour by hand. Really really really really hate it. I’m bad at it too. Which is part of the reason I hate it.)

For dinner, I made roasted butternut squash soup, pan-fried salmon with spicy honey mustard sauce, and Israeli couscous. I told Jesse this was the most involved meal he’d eat for the next four months. The dinner was really just an excuse to use some toys I got for Christmas, specifically my immersion blender and my new Bialetti pan (love!).

Then Jessica came over to hang out and play music, and she bravely taste-tested the pie with us. The pie crust had kind of fallen over in one spot, so it wasn’t the most attractive pie ever, but…

…

Ohmygoodness.

Let’s just say, if shelling those pecans wasn’t so gosh-darn difficult, I might make this pie on a weekly basis. And then I would weigh 200 pounds. But I wouldn’t care. That’s how good this pie is.

Today being my last day of break and all, I think I’ll celebrate by eating the rest of the pie.

My current distractions:

“Ask yourself, what can cat videos do for your business?” From Sara, who must have picked up on the fact that I’m a fan of cat videos. However did she get that idea?

Weird Al spoofs Bob Dylan (and even has Alan Ginsberg knock off!). From Jason, who understands a writer’s need for community…and YouTube.

And last but not least, Marcel the Shell. With shoes. Thanks, Sandy!

1. Stuffing our faces with pizza. (Yum. Also, my first full meal since being sick. Thanks, Jessica!)

2. Talking about the music video Joey is directing for Jessica.

3. Pondering the possibility that Jessica’s house is haunted. (Mystery music every night at 10:00 p.m.! It’s not the neighbors!)

4. Dreaming big dreams.

5. Thinking about stories and art and music.

6. Howling–howling–at a kitten video.

Jessica had hooked up her computer to the TV and I can’t remember why we ran across the video, but as soon as it started, Jessica, Jesse, and I immediately started to shriek.

It went something like this:

“IT’S SO CUTE! AHH! CUTE!”

“OH MY GOSH–OH MY GAWWWW–SO CUTE!”

“MAKE IT STOP! TOO CUTE!”

Joey watched us with an expression somewhere in the middle of amusement, curiosity, and mild horror. Tears streamed down my cheeks. We slapped our thighs and pounded our fists on the floor. We continued shrieking.

We made so much noise the first time we watched it that we didn’t realize it had sound.

“It has sound?!”

So, of course, we watched it again. This time, we kept the shrieking to a minimum, so we could hear the kitten. I cried some more.

Friday night, Jesse had to work late (with Joey–they work together), so Jessica came over for dinner. We made a tasty veggie soup and from-scratch buttermilk biscuits. We talked for hours and hours, until we were practically falling asleep. Then she went home and I went to bed and Jesse came home after 4:00 a.m.

The weekend was lovely–I got caught up on laundry, cleaned house, and cooked a lot. Tostadas, which were delightfully messy. Beans and more biscuits. Pumpkin pie with homemade pie crust. Some kind of cheesy-creamy cabbage thing.

I’ll end this with the kitten video. I must say, though, that–as with most things–it’s better with friends:

I love being around these people, folks we’ve known practically since we moved here. Little S. and H. played on the blankets spread on the grass, and I thought about how I met these girls only days after they were born. Now, one is four and the other is three and a half. Impossible. I imagined what it would be like to see them start high school, and then college. I wondered how well I would remember these days, when they both dog-piled onto Brandon and then shrieked with joy as he stood up, lifting them into the air.

I thought how old we’d be when the girls got to college.

And, then, we talked about taxes and colonoscopies, and I realized we are already old.

Eventually, the party wrapped up, and we stood and picked up our blankets and chairs and empty Coke bottles, and as we waved our goodbyes, I felt very, very happy.

North Carolina, you aren’t half bad.

School: Will definitely happen, very soon. (Tomorrow, in fact.) The syllabi are done but need another checking. I don’t have keys to my office yet, so all my literature anthologies and files are currently living in the guest bathroom, where they will probably stay through the end of this week. I have been in an epic battle with Blackboard (an online course management system) all week, and I’m not sure who’s winning.

Irene: May happen. Am hoping will not happen.

School + Irene: Will we miss class Friday? Monday? Will the campus flood? How do I want to modify the schedule in the event that the university closes? (And when on earth am I going to move all this stuff into my office?)

Baby: I was going to throw a baby shower for a friend this Saturday, but if Irene crashes we’ll have to cancel. And baby has been dropping hints that he might be interested in coming early. Please don’t show up during the storm, little guy…

Redecorating: We are smack in the middle of rearranging two of the bedrooms in our house. Before this weekend, Jesse and I had separate offices. My office also served as the guest room, and his also housed a ton of music gear. We recently decided to move our offices back together (we missed each other!), and the second room will become a guest room/music room. And we decided to paint both rooms. And while we were at it, we steam cleaned the carpets. Now things are mostly put back together, but our dining room table has become a catch-all for everything that doesn’t seem to have a place. It kind of feels like moving.

Most everything about July, I miss. But, I was also very very alone for most of it. I could go days without seeing a single person who knew who I was.

On the whole, this alone time was a good thing, as it gave me time and space to think and write, and it was something I’d never really done before. But I cannot say I miss that part of July.

If you’ve been reading this blog for any amount of time, I’m sure you know how happy I am to be back with Jesse, so I’ll spare you more of the gushing. It’s also nice to be back in a town where I know people, and where people know me. A few other things I am enjoying:

Cooking for two-plus: I’d always heard my single friends complaining about how hard it was to cook for one, but I never really understood until July. Cooking for one sucks. Recipes are always written for crowds, and even if you halve the recipe, you’re still eating leftovers far more than you’d like, and not everything reheats well. It was much harder for me to motivate myself to cook for just myself, and it wasn’t nearly as fun. I’m sure with enough time I’d get the enjoyment back and get used to it, find a kind of beauty in cooking for one, but I didn’t manage it in a month. Now that I’m home, and especially with our new trimmed-down budget (not a lot of room for eating out), I’m cooking up a storm and loving it.

Birthday parties: Since I’ve been back, I’ve been to two birthday parties, and there’s something strange and lovely about celebrating with people you’ve known for years, people you met when you first moved here and didn’t know anyone. These are people you met when you were twenty-two, and somehow they still like you enough to invite you to parties.

Board games: To be more specific, Settlers of Catan, which I was just introduced to. (Beginner’s luck–I won my first game. This may have contributed to my liking the game.) Have you played that game? Also, telephone pictionary, sitting around a table with several friends and laughing so hard I couldn’t breathe, eating far too many snack foods, wondering what we’ll all be doing in a year, two years, ten.

However, I later found out that neither of them have been to the Haight.

So…I am wondering what her friend thinks of Becki’s crazy sister-in-law whose suggestion for spending a Saturday morning catching up with an old friend was to explore the Haight.

If you’re not familiar with the Haight, well imagine everything crazy and weird you’ve ever heard about San Francisco, thrown in a heavy dose of hippie culture, and permeate that with a lingering smell of incense and marijuana…and that’s the Haight.

Here are some pictures from when Jesse and I went:

I think the Haight is fun. Where else are you going to find a store selling taxidermied squirrels dressed in tiny suits and posed with doll furniture?

I just hope Becki’s friend has a sense of humor.

I was a bit of a weepy mess before he left, though. We don’t spend a lot of time apart, and when we do it’s almost always I who leaves. In fact, this was the first time I’ve ever spent more than one night alone in our house. I wasn’t sure how I’d react to so many days alone, just me and the cats.

Thursday night, as Jesse was packing, I realized I was out of coffee. Jesse suggested that we get up a little early the next day to spend our last little bit of time together at Port City Java. So we did. Got up at 5:00 a.m. and packed the rental car full of his music gear and then met up at the PCJ for coffee and twenty minutes of my pouting over his imminent departure. I cried as we drove away, he toward sunny Florida, and I toward school in the gray, damp North Carolina winter weather.

That afternoon, I stayed at work late to meet with some students and finish some things. When I got home, I put on a CD and turned it up and cleaned house. I mean, cleaned house. Because of our weekend excursion last week, I hadn’t done my normal weekend cleaning, and the house was pretty gross. So, I got out the mop and broom and cleaning rags and got to work. I think I used at least seven different cleaning products! I even broke out the Murphy’s Oil soap for the wood in our front entryway.

The house smelled strongly of cleaner and laundry detergent, but I didn’t mind. I know I’m supposed to dislike the smell of chemicals, and on one level I do, but this is what my childhood smelled like. Every childhood memory I have smells like freshly washed sheets or bleach water or Pine Sol. My mom was one of those women who kept a very, very clean house.

My friend Jessica came by that evening, after the place was thoroughly disinfected and sparkly, and we talked and talked and laughed and then we started yawning and, convinced it was extremely late, got ready to say goodbye.

Jessica said, “Watch, it’ll be 10:45.”

We laughed.

It was 10:45. We laughed some more. Ah, adulthood. Getting so tired at 10:45 you can’t keep your eyelids open a second longer. I suppose that’s what you get when you’re up at 5:00 in the morning.

Saturday morning, I had to get up early—but not 5:00-early—to take my car in for an alignment and to have two tires replaced. I graded essays in the waiting room for nearly four hours. A woman sat next to me and argued on the phone with someone I assumed she was in a romantic relationship with, someone who may or may not have been running around on her. She really gave it to him, and I could hear his disembodied voice straining against the phone’s tiny speaker, trying to defend himself. Finally, she ended the conversation and said, “Have a blessed day,” in a tone of voice that added, “You son of a…” I wanted to chuckle, but didn’t.

The rest of the day was spent on work for classes, and then Sandy and Rachael came over. We ate nachos (not just chips and cheese, but the works–beans, and beef, and everything else), and I turned the heat up to 70 degrees, and I put on an old Reggaeton CD I got right after we moved from Florida. I needed a little warmth, a little something tropical. I am sick of winter.

Sunday I spent on more work and then long conversations with Simona and then—finally, at last—a little writing. It was a quiet weekend, a weekend spent at home, a weekend spent catching up, getting ahead. It was just what I needed.

But no matter how rested I felt, no matter how nice it was to have a clean house and to be caught up on school work, I couldn’t wait for Monday evening to arrive. Valentine’s Day, and the best present of all: Jesse, home, with me.

Here's a picture of us on our honeymoon in Key West. We were babies. And very thin. And very much in love. Well, at least some things stay the same...

Girl friends and brunch: lovely way to start the weekend.

Saturday: brunch with two lovely friends. Coffee (French press, of course); perfectly cooked omelets with spinach, cheese, mushrooms, and tomatoes (I didn’t make them, am terrible at omelets); fruit salad; strawberries with whipped cream; Ezekiel bread toasted with goat cheese, tomatoes, salt, and pepper. I stuffed myself. It was perfect. Lots of chatting and catching up. The rest of the day was spent on updating the blog, tweaking some things in the design, researching, and beginning a new essay. Well, starting an old essay over. Same thing.

I want to use it as my school bag.

Sunday: Before I tell you the story, I need to give you the background: Friday night was date night and after we had diner food for dinner, Jesse and I walked around some shops and looked at things we couldn’t buy. We’re on a sort of spending freeze to save some money. I saw a bag on sale for waaaay cheap, and I loved it, but I didn’t get it. Sad. Okay, so Sunday after church, we went to lunch with friends. Before everyone arrived, Jesse left to give another girl and I some time for “girl talk.” He came back, out of breath, sat down, and explained he’d gone to check on a video game store nearby. Later, when we got back to our car, I saw the bag sitting in the passenger seat. He hadn’t gone to the video game store, after all. I have a good husband, yes I do.