My niece, Crystal, is on an airplane winging her way to San Francisco!

I'm so so happy I can do something nice for her. She's a nurse, 42yo single mom of two (the eldest --an adult --is looking after the younger who is finishing middle school).

She carried the heaviest part of the cancer care for my sister, and really hasn't been unburdened by responsibility for decades. I don't know if she's ever had a fun vacation. (She texted me from the plane asking if she should tip the Flight Attendant after receiving a G&T.)

She's a total sweetheart and has a wry sense of humor. Really enjoy her company.

I intend to spoil her as much as I can while she's here with breakfast at Zazie and drinks at Alembic and poking around Japantown and the Mission and North Beach.

Oh, that should be a nice visit. What a lovely thing for you to do!

Was it "The Song of the Siren"? ( [link] ) I've read the book forever ago, but have never seen the movie, and I have to admit how much it amuses me that you have watched an Israeli movie which I haven't.

(Bonus trivia: the man who portrayed the guy the heroine doesn't end up with, Yair Lapid, became a politician and was even the prime minister of Israel for a very short while)

I think it was! And huh -- you never know where actors are going to end up!

If I can't get that Hec, I'm glad someone like her will.

That's sounds like a great time, Hec. Awesome that you are making it happen.

Relaxed weekend here, a nd it's about to include a nap. Score.

David, I'm glad you and Crystal have each other.

Song of the Siren - read it years ago, I don't think I watched it. But it does remind me of a different story from the Shabbat dinner I went to. We talked about the Gulf War and how we expirenced it as kids (I was 6 at the time) and why we remember it as not a big deal even with all of the sirens and gas masks. There was an American friend of mine and another from Israel who is a bit older than I am. When we started talking about chemical weapons versus rockets and we got to the topic of atropine I immediately said "oh, funny!" and meant that and my American friend of course looked at me as if I was insane. While I was laughing my other friend explained that while it was an incredibly confusing and stressful time in Israel ("chemical weapon? Go up, the gas sinks down. Oh wait, sorry, these are ordinary rockets. Go into a bomb shelter. Wait. We actually don't know if it's a chemical weapon or an ordinary rocket") it was also an amazing time of comedy and sketchshows and one of the most famous ones was someone who listens to the home front command orders while getting extremely panicked and whenever they said clearly do not inject atropine unless you were exposed to chemical weapon he of course injected more and more atropine.

I mean, I know it's not that funny. But it was very, very funny at the time. IDF spokesman at the time is famous to this day for stating "drink water" as an advice to what people should do if they're stressed. It's funny, looking back. But maybe you had to be here.

Anyhows, back to the usual program. If you'd like to help - and you really, really, really don't have to, OK? - one of the groups I'm volunteering with is crowd funding. They're providing food to survivors and evacuees facing poverty, Bedouin communities in the Negev, Palestinians displaced due to settler violence, asylum seekers and migrant workers. I love their scope of humanity. [link]

bookmarked your post so I can help, sometimes.

I am thinking of so many of you. I hope it has been a safe and uneventful weekend for those that need it.

Yesterday I went to a fiber festival an hour away. I spent more money than I was planning, but it’s fine.

Today the plan was to clean then log on and do some work since I hope to vein a new job in a different department in 3-4 weeks (signs point that I will get an offer on Monday). BUT, I sat longer than I planned to, so only some of the cleaning is getting done. I posted over on FB in accountability to hopefully jump start a late afternoon surge.

I guess theoretically I could still easily get an hour of work done and in an hour might be able to cross off a couple of onerous things that people are on me about.

Hmmmm -

I honestly didn't expect the Bengals-49ers game to shake out the way that it has. It makes all the difference in the world when the players are healthy, man.

Yesterday I did nothing. Today has been more successful. Went to a stretching class at my new gym and liked it a lot. Bought some new colored markers to play with, and some fabric dye. Came home and dyed the fabric and also bleached my hair. Am now making my hair pink again, though not sure I quite nailed the color I want, and letting the garments dry. The dress (which I bought last night) came out pretty good, but the tshirt is not so great (dyed both green, the shirt is kinda olive, the dress was white with green leaves on it and now is light green with green leaves, which works). Supposed to go to a friends for a movie in a bit—they were doing a whole pot luck that I meant to go to but since I just put the dye in my hair will have to hope I can make it for the movie.

Yesterday I got a number of things done: farmers' market, grocery pickup, buying Halloween candy, finishing a first birthday book for a friend and former boss' grandchild, going out to dinner (in lieu of the possibly canceled outdoor ghost stories event being held in a community garden). Today however, keeping myself and my cats fed and buying an outdoor push broom was all I managed.