Oh, that's awesome, amyparker!

We are going to a friends' gathering on Monday at one friend's "new" house... that they bought just before pandemic. Can't wait to see my peeps!

Yay! Yes parker and fella are our first gesture at socializing in a while. There will assuredly be fireworks, not while parker's here, though. DNW.

I went to an actual party tonight! And it was wonderful. It was supposed to be on a rooftop but the weather didn’t cooperate. But even for outdoors it was explicitly vaccinated only per the host/birthday girl, so the move to inside wasn’t such a big deal.

Mozzie, otoh. He is not prepared to be on his own. Even with half a trazodone, every time we checked in he was climbing the walls. (Almost literally - once I looked in and saw him leap from an arm chair up to the desk.) And def some howling. Once we got home he chilled out pretty quickly though.

Well the rest of my day was better—hung out in my friend’s backyard for a bit with her and the dogs, then went and had dinner and went to the women’s basketball game. Where I also ran into other friends, yay! And got an invite to hang out with friends who just moved, at their new house, and bring the dog, tomorrow! So yay. We are supposed to have good weather too.

Though I forgot to close the windows in my bedroom and it is now 58 in here. Yikes! Time to grab that extra blanket…

Do people have plans for the holiday weekend?

A friend of mine invited me over for Karen food. (The group from SE Asia—no managers will be requested.) And at some point we’ll be watching Raising Arizona as part of the summer Coen-Sturges film fest.

They invited you over for potato salad with raisins, Calli?

We have a graduation party today for Casper's best friend. Casper and her friend are trying to friend-match us with the parents; they say we are both quiet nerdy couples who need more friends.

I also want to take Iris The Dog to the big park with a creek where people take their dogs. She loves water but hasn't been swimming yet. The only problems will be getting her to leave, and getting her clean.

Casper and her friend are trying to friend-match us with the parents; they say we are both quiet nerdy couples who need more friends.

Aw, that's nice.

I have not that many plans, which is fine because it is so cold and rainy, but I will go to hang out with family on Monday (inside most likely). I'm glad my one friend group got together last weekend when it was nice out!

Chilly and rainy here today. There will be WoW and probably takeout later. Maybe a movie (at home). That's about it for today, besides some random chores, I'm guessing.

Technically, Matilda's school year ends on Weds, June 2nd. But for all practical purposes yesterday was the last day as she took her Algebra 2 test and turned in her creative writing assignment for English class (a 20 page science fiction story involving memory erasure and an older brother/younger sister sibling dynamic. Read into that what you will).

Thus ends the great experiment of online school encompassing the last quarter of her final Middle School year, and her entire Freshman year of High School.

To her credit, Matilda has stayed on top of her work, pulled down good grades, made friends at her new school, turned on her Zoom camera (unlike most of her classmates) and formed good relationships with all of her teachers. She has something affectionate to say about each of them.

All this while being almost completely isolated from her oldest, closest friends, at a HS where she didn't know anybody, with no arts programming this year, and no team sports (after having soccer or softball from 1st grade through 8th) while fighting her way up out of a pretty severe depression that lasted almost 9 months.

Kudos to her resilience.

On top of all that, she's got almost a completely different body than she had in Middle School. She's grown four inches, and is only half a finger's breadth shorter than JZ. She's got all the hormonal gifts of puberty with breasts, and a butt and acne. Her braces are off. She's got a complicated skincare regimen and serious winged eyeliner skills.

One more anxious hurdle to get over with her wisdom teeth on June 11th, and then...the summer is lined up. She's bringing her bestie, Mia, up to Reno with Jacqueline as they stay with JZ's mom for a week. Starting July 1 she begins work as a camp counselor, and that runs all the way to the beginning of her school year in mid-August, where [knock wood] she will be on campus for the first time.

The job will get her out of the house every day, doing something physical, looking after kids, hanging with other counselors, pays very well (SF minimum wage is $17/hr), but it's only 4 hours a day so she'll still have plenty of time to socialize (and money to spend).

All of her friends will be vaxxed, and she can hang out with Mia (who she knows from camp), and Iris (the one previous school friend that she's seen this year). New school friends MI and Ruby, who share her love of anime and manga. New friends from her jewelry class who live in the neighborhood, Willow and Ryon.

After 14 months she'll be able to see her friends, under her own power, without parental scheduling. I'm not sure what qualifies as Normal anymore, but that definitely qualifies as Good.

What a fucking year+.