Up and paying bills. Looking to drag Da Punk out into the (odd and aggravating) cold and damp to return a textbook and buy Aims a backpack.

Shoulder seems to be just slightly out of place. Every time I try to raise it above my head, I get a twinge. This is probably karmic retribution for some cruel McCain jokes I made during the election campaign.

Listening to Torchwood: Children of Earth soundtrack by Ben Foster. Very Hans Zimmer-ish in some ways. Very cool.

Must to buy some coffee while preparing to pay rent.

Almsot half way done with cleaning 2/3 of the house.

Almost 1/3 done with writing the paper.

Also, almost asleep. So tired.

sj - Indeed, exhausted. A festival weekend followed by a holiday in Spain coming up, though! I'm glad to hear Aunt C's feeling better.

Shir - I agree. Barthes is irritating. But then, I like Derrida (something that makes my professors despair of me).

Talking of the holiday in Spain, The Girl's unlikely to be able to come with me as planned, as her father has very nasty pancreatitis and is in hospital, so she's going to fly out to Houston to see him. -ma both for him, and for me that I'll cope with holidaying alone (two friends are coming, but they don't know my support needsand I'm going to have to try to be very independent) would be very much appreciated.

Oops - meant to post that in Natter....

Travel~ma for both of you, Seska, and health~ma for your future father-in-law.

~mas to you, The Girl and The Girl's Father, Seska.

I didn't read a lot of Derrida yet, so I can't comment. And while Barthes is... well, kindda like The Annoying One, I did make a progress using Camera Lucida.

Of all those French guys, I prefer Latour and Baudrillard, myself. It's really easy - and fun - responding to their theories in papers.

sj, that's wonderful news about Aunt C. Continued speedy recovery~ma to her.

I need to figure out what to buy a 5 year old girl between now and then.

My suggestion: Anything by this author.

sj - Just noticed, 300 posts back, that you asked where home is. London, with The Girl, which is where I have returned. I was living in Leeds for a year to do my MA at Leeds Uni. I was only living in one room in Leeds, but it was a big room and it was all mine. This little flat (despite its glorious little balcony and also the niceness of being able to live with my partner again) is too full for all my books...

I get the feeling it's going to be a long day.

• hit the wrong button on alarm. didn't snooze it, turned it off.

• put polo shirt on backwards (thankfully I immediately noticed it was wrong when I had a face full of collar)

Don't these things come in 3's? @@ I's going to be a long day.

Oofdah. Survived the first morning commute with Emmett and Matilda. Getting an almost 13 y.o. and an almost 3 y.o. out the door by 7am is tricky business. Fortunately, JZ had us all fed, caffeinated and dressed and out the door on time.

Emmett's first class of the morning is Science at 8am, and if he's even five seconds late he gets detention. The teacher makes them roll a die and their detention is the roll times ten. So it can be as little as ten minutes and as long as an hour.

Of course, Emmett is the only kid commuting across the Bay Bridge from SF and sometimes the traffic is just not going to be accommodating.