A random summer post

I love the summer. I have already explained that. But I shall tell it to you all over again. And then again.

I love the summer. I love that my toes are always warm and that I don't shiver uncontrollably upon exiting the shower. I love that my skin doesn't crack open. I love the smell of the air outside. I love that my yard is green and my trees are growing and I have flowers in front of the house. I love having a yard and a house in the summer. You can take them in the winter. You can shovel the snow and spread ice melt along the driveway and sidewalks. That is fine. But in the summer, they are mine.

Don't look, but the summer is more than half over. AAAH! NOOOO!

I was going to be out and active all summer long, torturing my body back into its 22-year old form. How has that been going, you ask? I feel guilt. I get about 20 minutes of biking in each day. Commuting. That does nothing for my Michelle Obama arms. How, I ask you, am I going to get Michelle Obama arms on a bicycle? I will just have to wait until the fall, when I begin commuting by foot again. Oh wait --

Another thing I love about summer is having more time to read novels. Unfortunately, this summer so far, I have not done enough reading of novels.

Nor have I written anything on my own novel.

Speaking of novels, if one wanted to write a novel, where would one store one's draft? Particularly if one's husband is always in front of the home computer? And one didn't want to put the draft on one's work computer because, um, one does not want one's boss reading it? And one has considered Google docs, but decided upon reading this article that one would not like Wal-Mart reading one's novel either before its advanced release date, in case one decides to sue Wal-Mart.

If one is going to sue Wal-Mart, one must have an impeccable Google footprint. And Facebook footprint. Since I keep forgetting to see what all my Facebook friends are doing, I am pretty clean there. But the Google docs thing would totally ruin my case. Who can take seriously a law suit by someone who writes that kind of drivel? Of course, those Wal-Mart lawyers would be all over this blog as well, but that doesn't bother me. Knowing my secret yogurt recipe would not actually affect my case. No, no. The purpose of this blog is to prevent me from ever running for President. Oh, and for the record, Google also reads my email, but I also keep that very boring. For example, when siblings email about birthday presents for my Dad, I suggest socks. Nothing is more boring than emails about socks. I hope Wal-Mart enjoys reading them.

Let's talk about summer and what it means at work. Summer means I get to spend all my time working on projects and finishing up those projects I didn't have time to finish during the school year. But alas, I have not finished as many projects as hoped for. Boo. They keep expanding. Like the Blob. I try to contain them in my fist like a ball of playdoh, but they leak out between my fingers and grow and grow until they eat me in a terrible display of 1958 movie special effects. (Did you ever watch that movie? I don't think I ever sat through it, it was so bad. But that doesn't mean it doesn't make an apt comparison for summer research projects.) But I love my job in the summer. It would be much more painful to take on the Blob during the academic year.

What else? Recall that we live in an orchard here? People keep asking when we expect certain fruits to be ripe. Then Tim and I scratch our heads and look at each other and ask, "Now when did that happen last year?"

For future reference: The first raspberries were ripe over the 4th of July weekend. A week later, the first sour cherries are ready to be picked. Apricots are still a few weeks away.

I will try to update as necessary. Of course, sometime next spring someone will ask me when I expect the cherries to be ripe, and I will scratch my head and look at Tim, and he will say, "Didn't you put that in your blog?" and then I will look back through the archives and find this post and read it a little ways until I realize it is all about Wal-Mart, and then look somewhere else. So, buried this deep in pure text, this information is actually lost to the world. Lost.

Like summer in just a few more weeks. Boo hoo. I love summer. Ah. Warm toes.