Something to get off my chest

Dateline: above the sold garage in Portsmouth RI, 5 June 2005

Yesterday lost to painting faces all day at my kids' annual spring fair. Pretty shakey hands after doing that non-stop for about five hours. A few full masks, including two on my two youngest, but mostly cheek art. Eldest daughter does balloon animals. We collectively cash in a lot of tickets at the fair. I donate a signed paperback and map which does a decent trade at the raffle table. After the fair we have dinner with friends at their house, probably the last time we'll get together before we move on. He's a close colleague I would like to someday soon bring into the business.

Friday night I get a quick email from Warren at Esquire challenging me to a short piece. The notion sticks in my head all day long Saturday while painting. Near the end of my fair duty, the notion blows up into a full argument, so I call Warren and tell him my spin. We agree I should give it a go today, if for no other reason than to get it off my chest.

So I get up today and write from 9am to 6pm, breaking just in time to take the kids to Star Wars III as payback for the slow day. My three oldest dress up for the show. My youngest boy insists on going as Obi Wan Kenobi, and he waves his light sabre during the movie whenever Obi fights, repeating his lines throughout the long movie. Fortunately, we sit way up front and the theater's fairly empty, so no one picks up his motion in the darkness.

It was a strangely fast weekend after a blistering week. Participants at last week's game wanted a private forum in which to keep the conversation going, so we built one for them. I sense all sorts of follow-up brewing on this one, given the "chatter" I'm monitoring among the network of people involved, but I'm not sure how much I'll get involved.

I didn't get anything really done on my endnotes compilation for BFA this week. Then again, it's not like I was ever asked to produce hard copies the first time around, so I'm not sure why I go to the effort of cataloguing everything like that. Still, I'm just old fashioned enough to want to do it.

Depending on how Warren views what I produced today, that piece might take up some time, but there's so little to give. I have a bunch of family/move errands to do tomorrow, then I'm back to another Esquire piece later in the day. Then I'm looking at a couple of quick jaunts for speeches in coming days. Then the first POD arrives in the driveway, kicking the packing sequence whether I want it or not. June is disappearing before my eyes and I still have to squeeze in the big edit of the unbound manuscript. July is vast moving wasteland, with minimal travel outside of the move. August beckons with its possibilities.

Man, I've got some calls to make tomorrow. I'll try to read the NYT Sunday paper before I conk out, but I have to get back to workouts too. Tipping the scales pretty heavy after all the fine dining at the game. Fun to eat a lobster again though.

The allergies are killing me right now. Really bad batch of late trees blooming because the spring here so delayed by cold weather.

And yet, exercise I will.