shall i compare thee to a ...

My brother once told me I looked like "The Scream". My first college roommate once told me that my longness reminded her of "something by El Greco", like "Madonna of the Long Neck".
   Yesterday Bjorn told me I look like "that painting", the Botticelli Venus.
   Does this mean I'm aging well? Does it mean I was standing on an improbably large shell? It can't be that my hair is a different color, because it was wrapped up in a yellow towel turban at the time.

carefree

I sold my car! I am car-free!!
   This is the good life. Living without driving!
   I met Bjorn in a parking garage; my vehicle was assigned the space next to his. Now we are a carless family. A good story.

For celebration, I give you "Sampo", the song in the opening credits of Tonari No Totoro.

あるこう あるこう わたしはげんき
あるくの だいすき どんどんいこう

Here's my translation: 'Walk, walk. I am healthy. I love walking! "don-don" goes the sound.'

Let the Thanks Begin

~ Three Thanks ~

I'm grateful for my future-oriented, generous in-laws cutting me a plump check for my Roth IRA. It turns out that they every year fill the retirement funds of their children and their children's spouses. This is "putting your money where your mouth is" if there ever was such a thing.

I am grateful that, through Amazon, I have been connected with someone who wants to own Roscivs' complete set of the Hikaru No Go manga in Japanese. I've felt it was being wasted. I love Hikaru but can't read Japanese. I want it to go to someone who wants it.
   I suppose that this person could be collecting manga to line the floors of cages of sad birds whose wings he's clipped, but I am happy to have this opportunity to tell myself the story that these are going to a home that wants them.

I am grateful for the red blanket on my bed.

One door-bell Ding later

We now have two fire extinguishers with agents that extinguish fires of classes A, B, and C. Honestly I didn't know (three days ago, an hour before finalizing my extinguisher order) that there are different extinguishing agents for different fire classes. I didn't even properly know that there are fire classes. I mean, I knew that there's a sciencey art to fires; I knew there are specialists who determine how arsonists light fires and whatnot. I also knew that one should check one's extinguishers periodically to see if they are still good. What I didn't know was that I could naively have bought a limited-use extinguisher that would put out a fire kindled by a napkin but not put on a fire fed by gas. But don't worry, I didn't buy any such thing. I bought two non-dinky fire extinguishers.
   It seems odd that by law you have to have fire detectors in your house when you sell it, but not fire extinguishers.

New House: Utilities: Garbage

When I called the city to set up our utilities, I selected the smallest available garbage bin (and the largest organic-waste bin). The woman at the city seemed to think that we would be soon asking for a bigger garbage bin.
   We have a 20 gallon garbage bin. Garbage is collected every other week. This means our cap on waste is 5 gallons / person / week.

Bin day is Friday. I love watching the truck pull up to the house, extend the claw-hug to the bin, lift it, and empty the contents. I loved it as a kid too.

Moving is a high-waste activity, and our bin is filling up. Will utili-lady be right? Will we want a bigger bin? I guess: not.
   I intend to monitor how much garbage (i.e., municipal solid waste, MSW, that what goes to landfills) we produce on a regular basis. Can we produce less than 20 gallons a month? Less than 20 pounds? — I'll have to weigh myself with the garbage to know. I looked up how much MSW the average American produces. The measurements I found are of weight, against which bin volume does not provide a meaningful comparison.

Dx Day

Four years ago, a Tuesday, I got home from an early-morning (9am) doctor appointment. It was partly a pre-natal visit. Life was pregnant with possibility.
   After I came home and reported on my visit, Roscivs said I need to go to the doctor, too. He called his doctor. I heard him tell her I've been coughing up blood.

We got nine months of cancer treatment and a death. It looked a lot like this. Our first cancer picture, though, was Roscivs holding a pee-stick pregnancy test positively indicating elevated hCG — only it was his pee, not mine.
   Nine months of that, and no baby for us.

Today is a Sunday. I am excited to clean the two bathrooms in my new home. I am okay. I want to be alive.