Sorry, did I catch you at a bad time?

Gracie in an inelegant moment: "No one's making you watch, you know."

After my deadlines on June 24, June 27, and June 29, I was deadlined out. I also managed to do something funky to my left knee while out running June 27; it's a little swollen, but not really sore, and I can put weight on it just fine (thank God for King Soopers-brand ibuprofen and ice packs). Amongst these events, I decided it was time to just sit down and rest. Hence the utter dearth of posts.

Well, I could post, but it would be a lot of complaining, and there are plenty of other sources for that on the internet. I'm at the point where I know I need to do something else/new/different/better, but nothing much appeals to me. Any new hobby or interest or activity sounds like a lotta-damn-work, as my dad might have said. But how useful is just sitting around and reading, on what few evenings and weekends I do so, when I'm not blogging or going for a walk with Guy or doing laundry and other assorted forms of housework? I checked out the book The Not So Big Life by Sarah Susanka, the architect and author of the Not So Big House series of books, which were all well written. Her latest tome on reprioritizing and living a better life, one that matters? Occasional good ideas interspersed amongst hokum. I was disappointed, to say the least, as her other books have been brilliant. You're better off getting a good book on Buddhist or yogic philosophy, maybe Jack Kornfield's After the Laundry, the Laundry, or perhaps the rather light but helpfully philosophical Stretching Lessons by Sue Bender. To me, a self-help/philosophy book is useless if its principles cannot be applied in a useful way to a working-class or low-income person. If the questions being asked rely on you having a nice chunk of cash that's easily liquidated or lots of volunteer opportunities to turn down or resign from in order to attain enlightenment, then it's less philosophy and more navel-gazing for white people. And while I'm pretty white, I don't need more navel gazing.

The fact that I don't need more navel-gazing is pretty clear from the above rant, I would say--it's entirely possible and probable that I think and muse and ponder too much. Perhaps, I have wondered to myself, an interesting opportunity for this summer is to not achieve anything and in fact be anti-achievement. Clean the house once a month if that, order more takeout, don't write anything particularly intelligent or useful (and if you read anything I've written on this blog, you can safely say "mission accomplished"), and spend more time at the pool and doodling around. Could I, in fact, spend a great deal of time being inefficient and unproductive? That would be a good challenge for me, as I'm not sure I could be either for more than a day or so. (On a side note, I once told Guy that I wanted to attend a silent retreat sometime, and he laughed so hard at the thought of me attempting to be quiet for more than a couple of hours that he nearly fell out of his chair.)

So, as ever, I'll do my best to keep up with this blog and share architecty stuff with y'all when I think it might be of interest (and not compromise my clients' confidence and anonymity), but I will also attempt not to bore or annoy y'all either.

In other good news, Mom is coming out in late July for a week. Let the games...BEGIN!