Oh, yeah, alarm clocks

Having a school-year schedule seems like a nice idea, but I have identified a flaw in the plan.

So this morning the alarm went off at 6—kind of early because Mik has an early class, but not nearly as early as it will be going off next week when morning swim practice starts. I stumbled out of bed, attempted unsuccessfully to be helpful with various tasks, and then plopped down at my computer and mindlessly read Facebook and Twitter for an hour.

The flaw, I’m saying, is that my sleepy brain isn’t really going to be equipped to handle anything that I might conceivably put on a morning schedule. Unless it is and I just need to adjust to having an alarm go off again?

Loose ends

The resolutions hiatus became a blogging hiatus, so I’ll just tie up all the loose ends I left hanging this summer:

• The eldest child did indeed leave for college before we knew it. (The worst.)
• I stopped messing around with other infused water combos and just drank a never-ending stream of lemint all summer.
• I made it to the mountains exactly once, which is pathetic, but early September is also a lovely time up there, so all hope for technically-still-summer fun is not yet lost.

…and I guess that’s it. I’m feeling the usual overwhelming desire to get myself on some sort of schedule as soon as school starts, but that’s tomorrow (a Friday) for some reason, so I think I’ll hold off on any such plans until Monday. I’m still pondering whether I want to do September resolutions at all, but I’m leaning toward making some easy, concrete ones. As nice as it was to have a break, it’s also nice to set some intentions, and it usually results in at least one thing being done that otherwise was never going to be done, so that’s a plus.

What passes for midsummer fun

I know the masses are surely crying out for reviews of amazing infused water concoctions, but to be honest I’m in a bit of a rut. I decided that the satisfaction of walking across the dewy grass in the morning to hack away at bits of my mint monstrosities outweighs any desire to go shopping for more creative ingredients—and, anyway, mint is really good. Here’s what I can tell you:

• Mint + apple slices: Tastes like apple juice to me, though admittedly I haven’t had actual apple juice in several decades. 8/10
• Mint + peeled orange slices: Just OK; oranges don’t seem to work that well in general. 6/10
• Mint + pitted cherries: Interesting! 7/10

(I think mint + peach could be a real winner; I’ll let you know next time I own a peach.)

I haven’t managed to get any non-domestic fun on the schedule yet: Several of my clients are either busy sending me work or busy jerking me around. Trying to set boundaries while remaining the helpful, available, willing, cooperative freelancer they know and love…

Updates on life and lemint

I think I maligned the lemon-and-mint-infused water before. It’s really refreshing, I’m starting to “get” the flavor, and I keep making more and more of it. Revised rating: 8/10

I also tried a couple of concoctions with orange slices, but I didn’t think they were good at all:

• Orange slices and a cinnamon stick: Cinnamon water is very weird, and it seemed like the flavor from the orange was all peel. 3/10
• Orange and lemon slices: Same deal with the orange peel, though less weird overall. 5/10

When I’m not infusing water—oh, who am I kidding. I’m perpetually infusing water now.

Along with all this water infusing, I have been crazy-busy all June with work and travel and major life events, starting with my eldest graduating from high school. (Say what??)

My people

On Thursday he heads off on a road trip with some friends, and the next thing we know he’ll be off at college. He won’t be that far away, and I know he’s going to love it, so we’re probably as emotionally prepared as we can be. I think my job right now is to not interfere too much as he has these last-splash events with his high school friends and deals with all the leaving-the-nest tasks.

After graduation, we attended a three-day college orientation with separate programs for the parents and students. It was pretty fun, but I’m not sure it was strictly necessary for the parents. Probably just the university’s sneaky way of forcing us to practice the big drop-off ahead of time.

After that we did two weekends in a row of swim meets, with me working frantically in the days in between to meet some deadlines.

Now I’m realizing that there’s one month of summer gone already, and if I want to make the most of what’s left, I’m going to need to do some serious fun-planning for July and August. Fun is GOING ON THE CALENDAR.

A minty diversion

I don’t know why this might be, with everything going on in the world and in my life, but today I’ve decided to drop in on the blog to talk about…

…infused water!

This is a sprig of spearmint, a sprig of peppermint, and two lemon slices. In water. It is so dang pretty and refreshing and basically solves all of my problems. Or, to be more precise, my two small problems of 1) having too much mint in my yard and 2) drinking too much tea and not enough water.

(Honestly, it doesn’t actually solve Problem #1 because, who am I kidding, that’s about one-millionth of my mint. And I don’t know if Problem #2 is a real problem, but if you knew how much tea I drink, you would probably advise me that it couldn’t hurt to cut back.)

Review: As much as the world keeps insisting that lemon and mint go together, I still don’t buy it. You taste the lemon and mint separately, not as some cohesive blend, which is too bad, because we could have called it “lemint.” Still, ridiculously cooling and refreshing. 6/10

Resolutions hiatus

If I’ve learned anything about making resolutions, it’s that they work out better when I put a lot of thought and care into them. Otherwise I’ll change my mind or lose interest before the month is over. Just a fact.

So today is June 1, my May resolutions were only sort of halfway kept, I’m swamped with work, and I’ve given zero thought to what I want to do next. I was going to think some up June resolutions anyway, but I could tell that it was going to be pointless. Then I decided I should just reprise my favorite ones from the previous 18 months, but that was no fun and also pointless (since the best of those habits are still going strong anyway). 

Plus, looking at the calendar for June, we have house guests, a big graduation party, Dex’s college orientation, an out-of-town swim meet, an out-of-state swim meet, and the usual infiniwork. July is almost as busy, and August’s planned activities include driving from Montana to California and back and taking our firstborn to college.

So new plan for the summer: Take a break from resolutions! Time to think (and blog) about other stuff. I think it’s the right decision, because it sounds really fun. :)

GREAT report card for May

Can NOT believe it’s June today. This nonsense is all a day late, but May overall was nuts, and I had real-life things to attend to, like successfully meeting a book deadline (woo-hoo!). And this:

(Don’t you hate it when multiple people are taking pictures and in every photo everyone is looking at a different stupid camera? Scourge of modern society.) 

Anyway, here’s the wrap-up:

• Goal: Memorize Psalm 46. I was still telling myself that this was short and that I had plenty of time right up until last week. Read it a lot but memorized nothing. F
• Rule: Start every day with a plan. This was so incredibly helpful that I started making weekly meal and vitamin-taking and exercise plans as well. More about that later maybe. A
• Exercise: 30-second flexed arm hang. On the plus side, I am a bit stronger now. Otherwise, total joke. C (with a generous credit for “effort” due to the callouses on my hands) 
• Affirmation: “Fix your gaze directly before you.” This was a good one. A
• Task: Digital decluttering. I barely scratched the surface of the photos on the computer. It feels pretty good, though, to have cleaned out my work files and password program, including deleting a bunch of old user accounts on various websites. C 

GPA: 2.4