blissmorgan

It is my regular day off today, and my bedhead has decided that I am a brunette lion. I am embracing this.
 

, 

 

 

I posted as much on Tumblr and am now buried under a dude-alanche of internet thirst. This isn't even that good a picture of me. What.

 

Definitely got a picture that I thought was gonna be a dick-pic but turned out to be a selfie. And now we are talking in French. And I am a lion.

 

Le what.

 

ANYWAY.

Last night I went over a new friend’s house for game night with him, his wife, and two other folks I had not yet met. I was Very Nervous, because STRANGERS! but I was also Excite because Gaming And New Friend(s)! We played Oregon Trail: The Card Game, which I have played a few times before and none of them had ever played. We watched a How To Play The Game video before we got started, and they giggled about how much the guy says essentially  “Y’all gonna die,” and then noticed that the official instructions basically said the same - that if at least one of you get through 50 Trail cards to the Willamette Valley card, you win the game, but more probably the game ends when everybody dies.

 

Two people died of snakebite. One person died of I think Typhoid. And two of us made it to the end! WE WON! We were flabberghasted and delighted.

 

It was also really nice to go out to do a thing, and have everything totally fine and taken care of at home. No phone calls in the middle of things, and in fact no actual trouble that needed handling; SALM is a good Bonus Parent, and got all the Spawn to bed without issue. And he is Awesome Partner; he encouraged me to go have fun with people, and there was no resentfulness or any sort of sense of debt incurred when I got home. He’s glad that I’m maybe building a little bit of meatspace community, and he’s looking forward to when he can do that himself. I’m looking forward to that, too.

 

I must note before I forget the layers of scents on me, because they are so GOOD together:

 

Roadhouse from BPAL: Truck stop sleaze. Weedy dandelion and hops with a whiff of tobacco and hemp and a swirl of booziness.

 

Windward Passage from BPAL: Breezes blowing off of the waters of the Caribbean: marine accord, seaweed, and bladderwrack.

 

Susanna Dean from SailorZeo on Etsy: Her happy ending is receiving a cup of hot chocolate sprinkled with nutmeg. Her scent has notes of chocolate and nutmeg, as well as rose for the ka'tet, musk, and moss

 

I do not work today. This is the first week in a long time that I have not been asked to take on any bonus hours; the woman I was largely covering for on her maternity leave is back, and so they aren’t asking me to come be there and do the thing. This is inauspicious, given the large probable vehicle bill that I need to save up for. I’m nervous and a bit unhappy about this timing. On the other hand, the vehicle still runs; I can save a little and get the brakes done, and then save like WOAH and get the exhaust taken care of before annual inspection in May. Assuming I don’t get the loan I applied for, that is. Jury’s still out on that one.

 

But not being at work today and tomorrow is weird, and sort of.... disconnected feeling. I am going to spend some time being useful around the household - try to clean up the living room one day, and the kitchen the other. Today I started in on laundry, and am glad this was a load I was at home while it was running because it was off balance. I ran into the room and tried to rebalance it. I did it ass-backward and made it worse, and in the process of trying to steady the laundry robot (we have a stacked single-unit, dryer above washer) it rocked so hard that the nearly-full family size laundry detergent container came crashing down from where we keep it atop the machine. I just barely managed to put my hand up and....not catch it, really, but slide-slam it down onto the lid of the washing machine. It would have hit me right in the head otherwise, which is a scary though. What if concussion? What if knocked out and then the already rocking laundry robot fell on top of me?

 

It does not do to dwell on the awful things that did not happen unless I am brewing them up to write into a story.

 

I have laundry to sort and fold, and also bunches of yarn to sort through. I need to bulk-destash, and start figuring out what to do, project-wise, with what remains. Otherwise it is merely clutter.

 

But so much of my headspace today is concerned with the fact that I do not have a kitty and this is Not Right. I need a kitty. Does anybody know anybody whose kitty made some new kitties that need home? I have a home in need of a kitty.

 

So I dressed up. Purple dress, orange wrap, dark red shoes, and a matching set of cubic zirconia jewelry just for a little extra bit of glitterflash in case my purple eyeliner and glittery lavender eyeshadow were not enough. I looked good, y'all. DAMN good.

 

The party was slated for 3pm-11, and man... there was definitely a point late afternoon where SALM and I just kind of sat on the couch and TL;DR'd out. We knew almost nobody there; he actually just came for my sake and for the prospect of good food, because he only kinda sorta met our hostess once in passing. It's been so long since I attended a proper grownup party instead of a kid's part that I had forgotten how long they are, how unstructured.

I constructed some break time for SALM by sending him home (it was not far) to check on the kids, and of course it was at that point that we were all invited out of the house into the chilly, chilly yard for champagne and hors d'oeuvres. It was there that I discovered I very much like a slice of asian pear with a small ball of blue cheese, topped with crushed pecan and drizzled with honey. It was also there that I got tired of holding down a lonely tall table with my elbows, made a beeline for a likely looking pair of gentlemen, announced that boredom was new fun and bluntly claimed them as my two new best friends. And that is how I met L and his husband R, who had flown in from literally the other end of the country, and who had known the hostess longer than pretty much everyone at the party who was not related to her by direct blood. Well chosen, me!

R is quite tall, and took a lovely selfie of us in the afternoon sunlight as it was setting across the lake. I am going to have to ask the hostess to reach out to them for me so I can get a copy of the photo, because I suspect I might actually look rather good in it.

We three proceeded into the tent before being invited or instructed to do so and found it to be warm, which was a fucking delight. Our flesh had time to thaw, and then everyone else came in as well and we found our seats. Much to my delight, we were seated at the same table, along with a young couple from Brooklyn with their toddler who is the cutest little sunuvagun I've seen in ages, and a couple from up in Boston. Once SALM returned from the parenting mission, it was time for shenanigans - the hostess had a series of "stand up if you ever [very specific thing meant to single out certain people]" that were followed by her children handing bead necklaces a la New Orleans to the last folks standing. I came away with no beads, but a good time was most certainly had.

Food was had, and conversation was had, and wine and champagne, and laughs as folks stood up to make speeches and give the hostess some small gifts. We were all handed lyrics sheets and sang a song to/about her set to the tune of This Land Is Your Land, and while my voice is still rough from the illness I have had all week that did not keep me from participating, and with gusto.

After food and conversation SALM made another jaunt home to check on the Spawn, and the rest of us arranged our chairs on the dance floor to enjoy the performance of the musical guest, Susan Werner. I fancy that I am falling madly into fandom over her - her music is a fucking delight. Too, she used the word "specious", which made L put his hand on my shoulder and mutter about how much he adores folks who enjoy words, at which point I revealed my Masters of English nerdity. I need to remember to give a podcast called The Allusionist a listen, on his recommendation.

Unfortunately, I only actually got to hear three of Werner's songs, because just as she was beginning the fourth SALM skidded to a halt on his knees beside me to tell me that he'd gotten home to discover Youngest Spawn migraining; apparently the boy had been attempting to call me and, fool that I was, I'd left my phone on the dinner table when we moved for the concert.

We vanished like ninjas. We hit CVS for medicine on the way home. The lad is now, having been medicated and thrown up and finally tucked in, sound asleep on the couch, where he will sleep off the badness. I changed out of my party clothes, and am trying to balance the feel of having done the right and good parenting thing with the disappointment of having had to abruptly cut short a really delightful evening that I'd been looking forward to for quite some time.

I will mourn just a little for what could have been, and enjoy the memory of what was - and the music of Susan Werner.