Random bullets of stream of consciousness

...with occasional whines, and a bonus dream interpretation:

• I am soooo busy. And tired. And stressed. And....is anyone still out there? Or did you click away when you read the irksome word "stressed"? (That's my second-least-favorite word that I use anyway. My least favorite is "playdate," and I only use it because the alternative is "invite x over to play" which has a gazillion more syllables even if it does seem more civilized to me. The sacrifices I make for efficiency!) I have been this way for weeks. I have also been offline almost entirely for weeks. I have barely had time to check my email, and all those pleasant hours I used to spend reading up on the lives and doings of you, my beloved invisible friends? Just a hazy dream of the past. Read on for details of why.

• Remember how I was weeding all those books, so I could get ready to pack up my library? (Too stressed to link. It was back in June if you want to look it up. Might even still be on my Recent Posts list over to the right, there, since I have been a sucky negligent blogger all summer and the suckiness it doth just continue!) Right. Well, now I have to unpack all the books I packed! And also somehow nag the Powers That Be into giving me a working computer. Oh, and a phone.

• My dad and stepmom came to visit! While they were here we all went to a real live county fair. With 4H kids and horse trials and racing pigs (at which my stepmother won a T-shirt that said "MY PIG WON!") and a RODEO, honest to God. "It's just like 'Brokeback Mountain,' we all murmured to each other, as the real live rodeo clown cracked real live unironic homophobic jokes. I kept forgetting we were only a ferry ride away from Seattle and thinking we were still on the Twinkie trip and were somewhere in eastern Oregon. I was gonna write a whole post about it but by the time we got home all I wanted to do was sleep.

• My glamorous cousin-and-partner duo came to visit! And they wrote a couple of books! Well, not while they were here, while they were here they mainly went gallivanting about, and also sat around our house entertaining us. But what I meant was, they have each had a new book published lately, and the books are quite good, and you should read them. And buy them. And tell all your friends to do the same. Especially if you like dashing swaggering wickedness and girl swordfighters (that would be my cousin's book) and hip edgy 21st-century fairies in New York City (my cousin-in-law's). For them, I will link.
  

• Mermaid Girl turned six last Monday! She had a family party on the day itself with the aforementioned cousins and the aforementioned grandparents and a truly stunning pink ice cream cake. Then she had a fairy party with friends this weekend. Then we all collapsed from sugar-and-present overload and rolled ourselves under the porch to sleep it off.

• Also, MG can now really and truly swim with her head underwater. Considering that she spent four years in Group A of her swim lessons because she refused to even bob under water, it's hard to overstate the magnitude of this development. A few days after the breakthrough, she woke up and said, "Let's go to the outdoor pool today. I've decided that I'm going to go down the [big] green slide." And she did. First with us, then by herself with us catching her at the bottom, then entirely by herself. Afterwards we sang her a shehecheyanu (prayer for new & exciting things) over by the pool ladder.

• First grade starts tomorrow. New teacher: not just to MG, but new to the whole school. She sent us a letter introducing herself and listing the many required school supplies that students should bring on the first day, which include not only the expected pencils and folders and glue sticks but a plain white oversized T-shirt which should be WASHED before sending it in. I repeat: letter came today. School starts tomorrow. RW just got back from Office Max and reports that it was kind of a party over there. "Like the post office on April 15," I think she said.

• We will not be washing the required T-shirt.

• But we did break down and buy her a pair of Crocs. Finally. She is a fashionable girl, you know.

• Last night I dreamed that one of my favorite bloggers (not telling who cause I don't want to spook her) had died in some unspecified way, and that I went to the post office and there were a whole pile of packages for her, which had been mailed to all different addresses but somehow all ended up at my local P.O. (which btw is not her local PO in either the dream or real life.) And I told the post office where they should really send them, but then later thought that maybe I should've just signed for them and then mailed them to her family myself, so they can see how many people cared for her.

• I interpreted this dream to mean that I should start blogging again, orientation week or no orientation week.
  
• So here I am.