Radio silence

End of June. I want to say everything is better. It is, and it isn't. My oldest is out for the summer and I enrolled both boys in swim lessons every morning for the next two weeks, at least.

The groove I had gotten into has been wrecked. I was working out two mornings a week and volunteering one morning a week at the local Y. Now I'm schlepping the boys and getting less toned by the moment. (Is that even possible?)

I'm still browbeating my oldest into doing Japanese workbooks almost every day. I still have an exchange student coming once a week to work with both of them. I'm still putting way too many books on reserve at the library, like some kind of bibliophile junky. I know I won't read them, but like a piece of bread given to a starving orphan for nighttime reassurance, I keep a pile of books nearby.

I'm out of dinner ideas. I've cooked all of the dishes I missed while living in Japan. I'm still waiting for a house so I can buy a grill.

And the house, if it's a buyer's market, I sure haven't noticed. I looked at a craftsman that was used as a boarding house in our desired neighborhood. It needed lots of work and was still 479K. It sold that night. I spend my free time trolling the MLS listings and ignoring my cluttered and crappy rental condo.

And I'm reading books on happiness. I'm working on that too.