This little squirrel decided to share a lunch-break with me as I sat at the counter in Stacks earlier this week, drinking my decaf Americano and nibbling a cookie. He or she or they munched on a peanut left for their friends in a nearby park. Not mad about this sort of company. Peaceable companions are the best. 

This time around I felt it before I confirmed or knew about it. There was an uneasiness in the air, a slight shift of the spring trajectory we had been on, and when it finally came across someone’s FaceBook feed it was almost a relief to see it. Mercury is in retrograde. A relief, and then a worry, and then something in-between.

Sitting down for a daily meditation, I watched as the wind brushed through the thuja hedge, touching on the Japanese umbrella pine before scuttling out of sight. A spell of rain began soon thereafter, and the chill in the air signaled we had not yet crossed the frost-free date in upstate New York (last time I checked that happened the first week of May). 

Now that I know Mercury is in retrograde, I can relax a bit, and lean into the mayhem and mishaps to come. It’s a more peaceable way of dealing with life in general, a reminder that when we roll with the punches it’s sometimes easier than going against the flow. 

The bane of lawn purists around the world, this little dandelion is too often seen as a pesky weed, but if they were less hardy, less common, and less unrefined they’d be cherished as garden plants. It’s all a matter of perspective, and a shift in the way we view the world is always a healthy exercise. 

The flowers themselves are radial works of sunshine and wonder, their seed-heads the stuff of childhood whimsy and wishes. The jagged leaves are handsome in my eyes, but I like a leaf that looks like it could bite. When you learn to appreciate something like the dandelion, life is so much sunnier at every step. 

Officially announced as the Commencement Speaker for this year’s SUNY at Albany’s graduation ceremony, DB Woodside has a formidable entertainment portfolio that goes back to the 90’s. As an actor and director, he has appeared in ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’, ‘Single Ladies’, ‘ Parenthood’, ‘Lucifer’, ’24’ and ‘The Night Agent’. SUNY’s commencement speech will bring him back to his alma mater (he earned his BA from SUNY and a Master’s degree from the Yale School of Drama) and this earns him a Dazzler of the Day crowning. 

Having been a loyal customer of Sephora for well over a decade, I frequently made use of their semi-annual sales for their loyalty customers, the latest of which took place from April 14-24. I’d been eyeing the new Tom Ford ‘Soleil de Feu’ which was auspiciously released a few weeks ago, and on the first day of the sale I went to make use of it, only to find out the item was suddenly ‘Out of Stock’. I clicked on the ‘Notify me when available’ option in the hope that it might be online again before the sale ended. 

Yesterday the sale ended at midnight, and this morning I got notification that the item I wanted was suddenly back in stock. This was the same thing that happened a while ago on a previous Sephora sale, which came and went without me being able to order the item I wanted. I reached out to the Sephora help chat and was told they cannot honor the sale on out of stock items. Strange how the timing worked out for this again. It’s left a sour taste in my mouth for continuing to patronize the company. I can find discounts on cologne more regularly, and more consistently, at fancier department stores, with more decent treatment for loyal customers, so perhaps that will be where I go next…

For now, Sephora, I’m disappointed with the poor customer service, and this is the second time your loyalty sale has proven unusable.

UPDATE: After several e-mails and this blog post, someone from Customer Service go tin touch and told me they would discount me 20% for this purchase. When I plugged the code in it rang up for 10% but rather than push it I took it, and modified this post. 

One of the lessons I learned early on in the 20-years-and-counting run of this website was that not every blog post can or should be profoundly moving or earth-shattering. A good blogger is lucky if they manage that feat once a month – though I did aim for at least one epic post per week, a dream that I still don’t usually manage to achieve, but it’s inspiring to have a goal. In between the big events were the filler posts – the ones that sustained anyone’s need for a daily fix of the nonsense they may have come to expect from my inane ass. These were the posts that largely became the driving force of a blog – the day-to-day doldrums that dropped a few fun hints of drama or tragedy or hilarity that life threw at all of us. Taken together they form the voice you are hearing now – the one that often represents the unguarded and unedited version of myself, of the voice that runs throughout my brain during every waking moment of the day.

This inner-narrative finds expression in a public way that’s clearly not for everyone, but it has been a boon to my mental state in allowing me to vent and release whatever is on my mind. Sometimes simply getting a thought down on electronic paper is enough to acknowledge it and let it pass without much trouble. Too often the main problems in life are caused by bottling them up and keeping them to ourselves. There is greater strength in letting them out and expressing oneself, even if it leaves you out here alone, vulnerable and bare for all the world to see. 

So here’s to the filler posts, and to everyone who gets through an average Tuesday. There is glory in all of it. 

Such a dreary start to the week gets reshuffled with these charming columbine pics, and a recap of what ended up being a caffeine-fueled rollercoaster of delights and bedevilment. We shall wait no further time getting back into it…

Rode hard and put away wet – the way I always feel in the glorious spring. 

A peachy fizzy thing to lift the spirits. 

Pink or green: which witch would you be?

Lilliputian beauties defying their stature.

Women’s empowerment according to my niece. I believe the children are our future – teach them well and let them lead the way. 

My visual contribution to the week of 4/20.

The surreality of social media.

A dear friend celebrates her birthday – you remember JoAnn!

This caffeine-and-sugar-fueled Saturday night experience was documented in real time on the blog, and it was a shit show. 

Carving out a simple safe space no matter where you are.

Last night was complicated.

Dazzlers of the Day sparkled through the likes of Miley Cyrus, Bruce Springsteen, Noam Ash, Patti Murin, Ali Franco and Will Taylor. 

For those of you unlucky enough to be texted or involved in last night’s caffeine/sugar high and ensuing antics, you know how definitively why I do not do well with caffeine. It was a mad scene, sparked by an inhalation of boba tea at at 8:30 at night, after I just proclaimed to abhor the stuff. Apparently I love it and it’s my new crack. Next time I’ll go the matcha route because anything with a black tea base is proving to be too much for my delicate constitution to handle. Grab a bowl of popcorn and see last night’s live blog post for how it all went down. Maybe the next installment of live blogging will be me taking an edible and seeing what transpires. Won’t you be sorry then?

Somehow, I still managed to get up at a reasonable hour to pick up cider doughnuts for my parents. On such a rainy Sunday morning I felt no guilt retuning to the house to do much of nothing. I may get brave and throw out some sweet pea seeds just to get them into the soil before it turns too warm. I’ll wait to plant the cucumbers on the first of May, doffing clothing completely and partaking in the old custom of a young man planting them naked at midnight for best results. (A bit of a reversal of history, as this new custom will feature an old man doing it all, but I digress…)

A spell of music then, for a rainy Sunday. Languid, tranquil, easygoing music to slow the trudge toward Monday. Music tailor-made for a rainy afternoon, that tugs at the heart just a little, and in just the best possible way, sounding off a reassuring melancholy that the human spirit was made to endure and embrace. It will see us into the night, as the rain tapers off, and spring continues weaving her seductive spell. 

People have been trying to get me to try bubble tea for years – and I thought I might have on an excursion with Kira in Cambridge years ago – God how we miss Kira – but it apparently made little to no impression on me other than I wasn’t a huge fan. Oh Lord my head is spinning! Wait now… 

Ok – here’s the sitch: I do NOT do well on caffeine. It hypes me up too much, I feel like my heart is exploding and I’m jittery and talk-a-mile-a-minute even if we should be moving into the metric system, and apparently there is tea in bubble tea which, DUH, maybe I should have thought about but didn’t. So I am going to live-blog this mofo night in our house while the rain and wind rages! Join me! ALL NIGHT LONG, like Lionel… not that Lionel, the Richie one. Check back for more updates! 

8:25 PM – I slurped up the final beads of a Coconut Bubble Tea, with traditional BOBA, because this is only my second time at the Bubble Tea house and I went with what felt like I should be saying when the woman taking my order started peppering me with questions. Andy and I ran an errand after I got it, but I left the tea in the cup holder because I’m not allowed to have liquids in his car anymore (though I only ever remember crumbing a chocolate chip cookie in his car in the early days of our relationship). At about 8:26 PM it suddenly dawned on me that – WAIT – is there caffeine in bubble tea?!?

8:27 PM – I panic-texted a few friends who had mentioned the bubble tea to me in previous incarnations of our time here on earth.

8:29 PM – Time to heat up the carnitas!

8:30 PM – My spirit animal is the first to respond (I just saw her in Boston!) and she was all “HAHAHA” and then “My friends were next to me when I got this and I got a chorus of ‘I love your uncle.'”

8:32 PM – More reports coming in that bubble tea is tea and may have caffeine in it. I’m befuddled. It looks perfectly cream-colored with nary a tint of tea. 

8:57 PM – Andy banishes me to the attic for the rest of the night. Like I can’t FUCK SHIT UP from this lofty vantage point! HA!!! I’m going Michael Flatley on these wooden floors! Lord of the Irish Jig! Where my clogs at?!

9:13 PM – Mia chimes in to my caffeine SOS: “God help you. God help us all. Take cover and sleep it off.”

9:24 PM – Oh fuck, I forgot the carnitas in the microwave! No wonder it was beeping every five minutes. I have become adept at ignoring the BEEPS. 

9:28 PM – Let me add some links to this page. I love links! Click on all the links I am going to create for you! 

9:31 PM – Oh fuck, I forgot the carnitas again! What is the post of the dumb BEEPS if no one is going to listen to them? 

9:32 PM – Too many messages are coming in from everywhere and I’ve bitten off more boba beads than I can chew. I need the carnitas. Let me dine in peace! It is not good to eat so late. 

9:35 PM – Click on this link now. Remember the old Atari 400 Computer when we would write little lines of code. Line 10 would be ‘Make a colorful line’ and then Line 20 would be ‘Go to Line 10’ and then a loop of colorful lines would appear when it ran! This is like that. Go to Line 10. 

9:39 PM – Please allow me to remember and enjoy a carnitas bowl that has been in the microwave for God knows nobody’s business. 

9:41 PM – Adding a carnitas link!

9:41 PM – Does anyone click the links? I do hope so – links are life! They connect the present with the past. We just watched ‘Grey Gardens’ again today. It’s very difficult to keep the line between the present and the past. Very difficult. 

9:50 PM – Carnitas break! For real this time! Back in a bit! Maybe not! Shouldn’t be live blogging. This is why. 

10:00 PM – All glory and honor to the almighty ‘American Life’ album, celebrating its 20th anniversary! Just like us!

10:02 PM – Caffeine may be fading, but it’s still bringing out the exclamation points! 

10:13 PM – When you don’t know how to end it: Miss Vanjie… Miss Vanjie… Miss Vanjie… 

10:14 PM – Taking a shower! 

10:54 PM – Guess who’s back? Tell a friend! 

10:55 PM – Before I start the entire series of ‘Mad Men’ again, a few thoughts that came to me while showering. Most of my best blog post ideas, if any have been decent, come to me when I’m in the shower. That’s when I’ll come up with the perfect turn of phrase or cadence of words for something, and of course there is nowhere to write it other than on the shower door which the steam soon erases anyway so we need to devise some sort of writing mechanism that is water-proof – maybe mascara – for just such an instance. There, now, it’s gone from my head. This should have been brilliant. But now only the faded echoes of brilliance, which is just dullness, remain. Caffeine gives me the jitters and run-on sentences. 

11:07 PM – ‘Mad Men’ has been chosen as the (Godwilling/fingers-crossed/Sweet Baby Jesus) wind-down for this journey because it has always held a sort of Zen-like atmosphere. Maybe it’s the intricate period detail, or the slow and methodical character development, or the delicate unfurling of all that cigarette smoke – whatever the case, it’s a calming show for me, and at this particular moment of all the particular moments, I want for a calming influence. (I’ve also had a big-ass glass of water so once the caffeine gets diluted I’ll be able to fall asleep and probably wet the bed.)

11:21 PM – Here to make this post extra linkalicious for you. FOR ALL OF YOU!!! ALL FUCKING FOUR OF YOU!!!!

11:28 PM – Is this thing on? 

11:30 PM – To quote ‘Parade’, “This is not over yet!” I will speak for you Leo!!!

11:31 PM – Nope.

12:56 AM – Attempting sleep now. Pray that this long national nightmare is over. 

1:01 AM – Let me just check Instagram for a sec as I’ve already done the Wordle of the day. 

1:02 AM – Do I need a colorful fan wreath? It’s a wreath made out of colorful fans. 

1:03 AM – Maybe I will sleep better in the bedroom.