So, umm, "hi"

Having a regular job, I find, is really cutting into my personal time.

But millions of people do this, right? Hold jobs and have families and do stuff, and still have time for housecleaning and shopping, maybe a little tv, some blogging even. I'm sure I'll get the hang of it someday. Or I'll find a way to improve the computer situation such that I don't have to wait (read: give up) my turn.

The thing I hate most about work: papercuts. I have lots, everywhere!

Helena is her usual awesome self, though a tad on the dramatic side lately, both in the exaggeratedly emotional sense and in an inventive sense too (for example, her greeting her reflection in the mirror as if it were a stranger). But I have no anecdotes.

Has anybody seen The Fountain? We watched it Sunday night, after a very sad weekend (a memorial service for my deceased cousin; we drove far and back). The tree of life, the fountain of youth, becoming one with the cosmos, eternal life in death. I haven't made sense of the movie fully rationally, but I found it strangely beautiful, poetic; it left me at peace.

I stayed up late finishing a project for Helena for daycare: a family tree. Next time she's on her own.

This weekend also marked Helena's first stay in a motel, which she has incorporated into her play-acting scenarios.

I've long finished reading Murakami's After Dark, which I thoroughly enjoyed while I was in it but seems to have left me already, and McCarthy's The Road, which I was surprised to discover I did not like much at all. I fully intended to write more about each, but I'm starting to wonder if that'll happen.

The thing I like best about work: the commute. In the mornings, it's a family affair. I ride a couple more stops on my own, reacquaint myself with the novel I fell asleep to the night before. The way home is all mine. It's not long, but just long enough to read a chapter.

I started Alexandre Dumas's Georges, but it's a little more demanding than I can give it at the moment. I'm about halfway through Peter Carey's Theft right now. What are you reading?