Morning, munchkins. …

Morning, munchkins. It's been quiet so far; got up, had some breakfast, wrote down what I ate. Yes, it's back to the dieting/exercise, because lo, it is almost fall, and somehow that's always a season of good intentions for me. I think I lucked out this time around, though, because I've traded some old bookshelves to Lakshmi for personal training lessons. Yesterday, she taught me some basic yoga, plus we did a bit of weights. More next week. :-) I've been hovering around 142 or so, ever since Sri Lanka; time to get back down to 135, and hopefully lower. 130 by the holidays would be great! We'll see how it goes. She set me very minimal goals this week -- at least three 20-minute sessions of cardio. This is an assessing week, I think. She said next week would be harder.

After the yoga, Lakshmi hung out for a bit while I finished cooking food (Kev made the potato curry, because I was running late, and it was yummy) for the Kriti meeting. We had many leftovers, but they were all meat, no good for the vegetarians coming to the meeting. So I made coconut sambol and eggs with chili, and served it with the leftover chicken curry and goat curry and Kev's potato curry and mango chutney and coriander chutney and mushroom biryani and naan and pita and Thai shrimp noodles, and it was all good. We went through two bottles of wine, and had a rather unfocused but still productive meeting. I think. :-) Fresh mango and blueberries and chocolate for dessert, mmmm....

This morning, I went up to the deck and drank my tea while deadheading the flowers and unwinding sari fabric from the climbing roses. We had draped fabric over the gazebo for the party (Kevin's idea) -- very pretty, but since we did it in a hurry, we didn't do it in a very organized way. The fabric hung down too far and snagged on rose thorns, and it wasn't secured well and kept flapping about. I had visions of saris taking off in the fierce winds we get up there, flying across the city in the midst of a storm. There's an image for a poem! It's also too thin for really shading from the sun; our new plan is to double the fabric over, so it doesn't actually come down the sides, but does effectively cover the top (also leaving plenty of room for roses to climb). I'll sew the pieces together, hem the ends and add little ties, so that we can attach it easily (and remove it easily too). Maybe this weekend...

One snag was too fierce for mere unwinding, so I came down to get scissors and a book to read with the rest of my tea. I'm reading Barbara Kingsolver's book of essays, Small Wonder right now. At times, it's a bit of preaching to the choir for me, since she's trying to be persuasive about environmentalism. I'm already persuaded! But her writing is lovely regardless.

Today, a handyman comes by to fix some last small things that weren't quite right when we moved in (one shower didn't have its ceiling tiles installed; one faucet doesn't work). And then I will hie myself off to a cafe for writing for the afternoon. This evening, I'll be reading up at Women & Children's First; if you're in town, I hope you'll stop by!