My hair is too long for its length right now ("What does that even mean?" RDC asked) and needs its first trim. I have to make an appointment with Janelle, who I guess is my new Frank. I haven't had a Frank for ten years, since he was not One with the long hair project.
Anyway. Yesterday I walked out to get a sandwich, hair in a ponytail, nose in a book. It was 65. Today it's going to be 70. It's not going to be easy to Embrace the Down when it's over 60. Or when I'm working in the garden. Or on my bike. Fifteen fewer inches of hair has to be cooler than a braid to the small of my back. I can get it off my neck, which is vital; the wispies (that I asked for, I know) fall in my face and it might be time to invest in barrettes.
Yes! Walked out to get a sandwich! There are now, in addition to the grocery store, two whole restaurants in walking distance. They are even of a lunchy, sandwichy nature. Goddess knows when it was over 95 downtown, I was a big fan of staying inside over lunch, subsisting on whatever I had remembered to bring from home or could glean from the building's convenience store or sandwich shop. Out here, though, there are no trees to walk under in the heat, no buildings of the sort to cast a shadow (also, therefore, not such a heat sink), and no plaza right outside my door with trees to read my book under.
When I got back with my sandwich, Tex was just coming out with his lunch. We ate on our patio in the sun. I looked around and made the same observation yesterday, 11 March, as I made 8 January when it was in the high 60s and Lou and I went rollerblading and returned to a staff cookout (for, not of): there are no umbrellas on our patio tables. There will be no, or much less than there ought to be, outdoor eating unless umbrellas take up residence here.
Bitter, party of 150. Well, 120. Maybe a fifth of us prefer the new site.
And there will certainly be no hanging out outside if I Embrace the Down for the summer.
I bought the damn thing so I should read it. Three months of negative reviews have soured me on its prospects, though, and I can't believe that if Tartt didn't notice she had a twelve-year-old girl detective named Harriet her editor also neither did nor said so, and I understood about Harriet tipping someone the Black Spot not because I've read Stevenson (although maybe I should have after The Secret History) but because I've read Ransom. Also on page 82, "The flustered orchestra, which was composed mostly of penguins, struck up the tempo."
I borrowed The Iliad from the Field branch on Saturday (this branch is located conveniently across the street from Bonnie Brae ice cream, where a double-dip of Triple Chocolate probably didn't help the weight issue). Maybe I should just stick with that.
Tex said I should teach him whatever I learned from my trainer (which I always type "trainder" as I do "raindy"). Tuesday he said he wanted to try my new bike (he's six inches taller than I--I can't wait to see that) and I told him he ought to go to the gym, rather than tootle around on my bike. He promised, so yesterday we went during the day. (I would love to go during the day more often and need to latch onto to regular driver-gymmers.)
He'd said he didn't know how to use any of the weight machines and I advised him of the two free trainer sessions the gym neglected to tell me about until after I'd bought my ten pay sessions. So anyway I thought this was going to be tutelage, although what I could tell him beyond "don't lock your joints, keep your gut sucked in, and align your joints with the pivot points of the machines," I had no idea.
It turned out he would rather use the aerobic machines, and thank the Climbing Tree for that, because--aside from his conservative nature and my lycra--this meant I could crank Alanis and Eddie Vedder and put in some real leg work.
Seated weighted calf raises, 3x15 @50
One-legged leg presses, 3x15 @ 90. Ninety!
Hack squats, 3x12 @120
Donkey presses, 3x15 @60 or so
Leg curls, 3x15 @45
Ball squats and lunges to exhaustion.