Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

It's pouring outside here in Southern California and in many other parts of the state (plus feet of snow in the mountains!)- we need it a million times over, but I must say I don't like it. I appreciate it, but I don't like it. I can't walk my dog, traffic is abysmal, and I walk around staring at my ceiling, since I just know it's going to start leaking (it's who I am).

It's Election Night and I'm avoiding the news. I know it's not going to be great and I rather get it all in one chunk tomorrow rather than lots of disappointing tidbits tonight. There are some local and state issues that I feel more optimistic about, at least.

My husband is away for nearly two weeks out of the country for work, so I'm holding down the fort with a loud, chatty eight-year-old. Thoughts and prayers, please.

Coincidentally, the day my husband left to fly halfway across the world, is also out anniversary (we went out over the weekend, so it's all good). Marriage is really, really hard- not the part about being monogamous, the part about two different people with two very different personalities living in one space and making a life together. It's just tough, some years are very, very tough. Luckily, this year has been the easiest of them all- out of all fourteen of them! 

Last month Sawyer and I took a weekend trip to Sequoia National Park and it was such a great weekend away. We drove to Visalia Friday afternoon, stayed the night there, hiked all of Saturday in the forest, and drove back in time for his swim lessons on Sunday (it's about four hours without traffic). The drive from the park entrance to the biggest tree (by volume), General Sherman, was incredibly windy but kind of a fun drive.

I just finished Thomas Hardy's Woodlanders for a research project I'm doing with my students and while it isn't best, there was a certain college-nostalgia I had while reading it. I took a class on Hardy at UCLA and just the idea of knowing I was going to write a paper on the book while I read it took me wayyyyy back.

I'm listening to Matthew Perry's memoir and...damn. It's really good, but really heavy.

I'm looking forward to lots of family time this month! We actually hung out with some of my husband's family, who we haven't see in years, a few weeks ago and then my mom comes in little over a week, and then when she leaves my sister and her husband are coming. Maybe I'll squeeze in a visit with my grandpa, too, and a cousin and I are trying to calendar some time to get lunch. Tis the season!