I must say that the boys and DH do express appreciation and praise for my cooking skills on a regular basis. They know how to keep fed.

My to do list for today:

☐ Clean off desk
☐ Clean off dining room table
☐ Clean off coffee table
☐ Wash dishes
☐ Actually put the dishes away
☐ Vacuum
☐ Make bed
☐ Throw stuff away
☑ Get burrito

I was a somewhat finicky eater as a child (hey, at least grilled cheese sandwiches and fish sticks are easy to cook, right?), but I do remember being grateful to Mom for cooking despite being a career woman and not making me eat things I didn't like. Eating at friends' houses tended to put mealtimes in perspective, and I'm not even counting the one time a friend's grandparents served raccoon to see what reaction they'd get.

Throw stuff away

If you really expand the definition of "stuff," it makes the preceding items on your list redundant. IJS.

Well, damn, Tom, now I want a burrito.

Other onerosity items report:

File cabinet purged, giant stack set aside to go to the shredding bin at work later today. Also, pancakes made, old dry dishes put away, new wet dishes washed and put on now-empty drying rack.

Still to do: Three more birthday cards and/or letters, heckle Matilda into actually EATING the pancakes I made, clear away the ancient Christmas tree trimmings still sitting on the back porch, try to rehab Jerry the lemon tree, who seems to be dying from overwatering with no proper drainage.

I also have to get over my rage at the maintenance guy -- he's been in the backyard trimming the giant loquat trees and rampaging ivy, and while so doing he completely beheaded the two little azalea bushes we rescued from last year's Easter display at church and had been slowly nursing back to health in a nice shady corner. THEY WEREN'T DEAD, THEY WERE DORMANT, AND THEY'RE MATILDA'S MIDDLE NAME, AND YOU BEHEADED THEM. They're just a pair of tragic little stumps now; it makes me want to break his face.

But he's truly not a bad guy; he just knows fuck-all about plants, and it's hardly worth it to try to fix the yard because he's likely at any given time to just bumble on through and swop everything dead.

Second sleep was much more restful than first sleep. CJ sent me a beautiful sunrise picture. Even if he doesn't appreciate a lot of what I do, I love that he gets the little things like a sunrise.

I have a hungry 7 year old I'm watching. Two fruit snack packs, one cut of fruit, two Eggo waffles, and another cup of fruit. Lazy breakfast but he is still hungry. I'm trying to distract him with Legos.

Charlie Pierce on a long day in Watertown: [link]

Such a good writer.

Went to yoga, where I got to do my favorite-named pose: reclining pigeon. My afternoon plans seem to be falling apart, which is just as well, as I need to go to the bookstore and grocery store, and probably make some meringues.

Now I want Spaghetti-os. Or a burrito. I have neither. (American Spaghetti-Os aren't vegan, but the Spaghetti Hoops that they sell in the UK are, and I can get those in the international section at Wegman's. They're not quite the same, but get pretty close if you mix in a handful of mozzarella Daiya.)

I'm getting set to shut down my computer and go do my Tom waits tour.

I Pricelined a stay at the Doubletree Hilton in downtown LA (Little Tokyo, actually) and it's fab. They have a great rooftop garden where I took my coffee this morning to review my material.

Kim walked me around downtown last night after dinner and showed me more cool spots, including The Biltmore Hotel which is ultra deluxe and old school and the last place Elizabeth Short (The Black Dahlia) was seen alive. They start their Black Dahlia tour from the lobby there.

Then we went to The Last Bookstore which was a massive old Crocker Bank converted into a bookstore. It's great! Huge, great selection of new stuff on the main floor, LPs, and then you go up to the mezzanine and they have a labyrinth of 1 doll books. I found David Niven's memoir The Moon's A Balloon (my mom's favorite) up there for a dollah.

I'm off to tour.