A few notes from the weekend! Well, not notes, more like paragraphs. I’m still playing around with the format of these weekend posts.

TL;DR This was my first full long weekend back at home after three away! Yay! I wanted to catch up on things and relax. My three day weekend (it was my Friday off) followed a pattern – errands/chores/office work in the mornings, and chiller afternoons (on Friday we saw Oppenheimer (meh) and I painted on Saturday and Sunday). It was a good weekend, and the only thing missing was a long nap – I still feel like I need more sleep.

Thursday

Before work, I had toast with homemade jam Katja sent me from Germany. She has a huge garden and sent me goodies from it last year and I’m ecstatic she did again this year! It’s the best jam I’ve ever had! (She also sent me so many other birthday goodies – top left photo above)

I ran before work. I had taken two days of light recovery and was excited to run and felt great for a bit… then was completely zapped of energy. I took a gel and it kicked in a few miles later but I obviously still needed REST. I was so busy in July and my body has not caught up yet.

On my lunch break I picked up a birthday package (top right photo & left photo in middle row) from a rock painting friend, Danny. He and his family absolutely spoiled me too!

After work I picked produce to take to Lorena when I saw her for my mani/pedi that day. I chatted her in the morning to see if she wanted any cucumbers or green beans and was excited when she said yes because WE HAVE SO MANY. When I went out to the garden though, I didn’t see many cucumbers at first and was worried I was going to have to tell her nevermind, but then I leaned over and saw tons of them hidden. Sneaky sneaky.

I love how my abstract mani turned out, and catching up with Lorena!

Oh! And I had a surprise for me at home – my snister had sent me a lovely poetry book she had told me about earlier in the week – All Along You Were Blooming. I’m so excited to have it and flip open to a random page when I am feeling panicky.

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Friday

Friday was my Friday off! Woo hoo! Since I was so tired the day before, I didn’t work out when I got up, but did some brief Fake Meats work and organized the office (I needed to put away my birthday presents and figure out what to do with all the things that were in my old desk).

Then I:

• Started a new audiobook (Apples Never Fall, recommended by Stephany – I’m really enjoying it!)
• Dropped my car off for an oil change
• Walked while the oil change was being done
• Got groceries
• Prepped produce
• Picked up sticks in the yard (this took an hour and I picked up three carts full of sticks from a storm that happened when we were gone in late July)
• Took a bath
• Filmed a Meet the Maker
• Met Steven at the theater to see Oppenheimer

So, Oppenheimer. I knew it was a talkie, and three hours long, and was prepared for moments where I would feel bored or restless (it’s me – I don’t do well with serious talkies, but really wanted to see this in the theater), but, gah, I just could not wait for the film to be over.

We saw it in the theater because we thought there would be some things that would be better on the big screen but you could totally wait to rent this at home then watch with subtitles so you can understand it. We were both disappointed. The acting was superb though! (And I know we are totally in the minority in our opinion on it!)

Something funny happened before the movie – when Steven walked in to the theater, he was right behind the people who bought our townhome. What a coincidence (we don’t know them and didn’t talk to them).

When we got home we made dinner and considered renting Fat Man and Little Boy (also about the Manhattan Project), but decided to save that for Saturday and finished The Truman Show instead.

I started using one of the drawing books I got for my birthday and loved how the cute little kawaii rocks turned out!

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Saturday

I ran Saturday morning and felt much more energetic, yay! I checked my PO box, got gas and a car wash, then went home and thought I’d jump right in the bath, but found myself outside hanging out with Tywin the cat, then picking a bunch of produce. I’m glad Tywin brought me out there – I had forgotten I was going to pick more basil to make pesto again. it was my third batch of pesto from this garden, and I think the best, because I had a fresh tomato to put in it too!

I finally took my bath, then did a bunch of tidying up (the office is still a disaster!) and changed all the cat litters (ugh, one of my least favorite chores).

Steven was mowing and we had lunch together when he came in, then I think we both did a few more chores? At some point in the afternoon we sat down and rented Fat Man and Little Boy and I painted. We finished the movie and made dinner, then watched part of Ray, and I painted some more. I really enjoyed painting from the new 365 Days of Kawaii book!

When I went to bed I decided to stop reading The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August and start Bad Summer People. August is good, but too smart for me, and not what I need right now. My mind was either drifting while I was reading it or it was putting me immediately to sleep and making me feel bad I wasn’t making much progress. Bad Summer People is perfect – a juicy book about bad people behaving badly (well, that’s what I presumed from the first 4%).

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Sunday

I rode my bike Sunday morning. I usually stop riding after RAGBRAI, but I’m determined to keep riding this year while the weather allows, because I enjoy it so much!

I spent the rest of the morning at my desk – writing a blog post, doing Fake Meats work, ordering magnets (it went from $471.87 to $58.85 after the coupon!), writing cards, and organizing my sticker book  (yay!). I actually had a lot more on my to do list, but feel good about what I got done.

We had a late lunch and finished Ray and watched some of the Formula One show while I painted. I went to bed to read and take a nap and napped for about 20 minutes then got up. It was too late in the day and a nap would have messed up my sleep. Ugh.

We ended up going on a run (gosh, our first together in a few weeks?), then picked more produce from the garden, made dinner, and “watched” (I worked on this post) some bad old Keanu Reeves movie.

Overall, a nice mix of productive and chill! The only thing missing was a longer nap, but I feel like lately I either have to choose nap or paint, and I was happy to be painting!