In Which We Forgot the Russian Lounge Singer

12 June 2004

Last night it started raining pitchforks and hammer handles, which was totally fine with me (I stood in the open garage doorway, bouncing and smelling the rain) but was not so conducive to grilling for the Mark. So we made a last-minute decision to go to Nina's Russian Steakhouse and an equally last-minute decision to call David (of the DDB variety) and see if he and Lydy wanted to go. Lydy was gone for the evening, but David had not arranged supper for himself, so he turned up at Nina's and hung out for the evening with us, and it was good, food and company both.

Although there is one thing -- Timprov had mentioned this, but it was in the context of how Nina's had been, and the food he reported was interesting enough to drown it out in my brain -- there is a man, and sometimes also a woman, singing lounge songs at Nina's. Loudly, and with thick Russian accents. Songs like "I Just Called To Say I Love You." Apparently in a Russian accent this features more h's than I had ever anticipated. Every once in awhile I would listen to the lounge act and burst into giggles.

I got a dress and some shoes via UPS yesterday. The shoes fit. The dress...sort of fit. Fit as well as it was going to; that is, it was obviously the proper size but was cut kind of weird for me. It was on sale, but not that good a sale; and it was black, and I can find decent black dresses just fine, even on sale. So back it goes, and if I'm going to continue the accidental Goth trend in my wardrobe, I'll have to do it from some other supplier.

(I also think that the moral of the story is that I can't buy dresses from J. Jill. I've tried on their dresses before. I like dresses. But they've just been consistently cut for someone who is not me. I will have to stick to their separates. Alas.)

I haven't started packing yet, but I've made a start on the book pile, maybe. I've got a stack of books I've already read. I'm not sure how many of them are coming with and how many new-to-me books are coming with. I'm still thinking about it. The only one that's out of series order is The Kestrel: I haven't reread Westmark recently, but I might reread The Kestrel. I love The Kestrel.

Here's the thing about the Reagan funeral coverage: every time I pick up the morning paper and read phrases like "was surrounded by her weeping children, who tried to console her," I'm not thinking of the Reagans at all. When I see the coffin all over the front of the newspaper, I can't make myself think of a dead president or evaluate his politics on a point by point basis. I just see death and a grieving family and the trappings of farewell, and that's pretty hard to take this week. It feels almost intrusive on my own grief, and I want, quite unreasonably, to push it away and say, "Go do that later, this is mine." We don't get to claim grief that way. We don't get to dibs it. It takes nothing away from Mark's grandma if someone mourns Ray Charles while we mourn her. Her laughter is no less fondly recalled if someone else is remembered to have laughed, too. Still, I can barely follow a link or pick up the paper without a reminder, and I wish that had been different.

I don't think we'll have e-mail or internet access while we're gone. If there's something urgent, Timprov can reach us on the cell, or if you know the cell number yourself, you can use it. We leave this evening around suppertime. I'll be back Monday midmorning, but I don't think I'll be writing here until Tuesday at the soonest. I'll be on e-mail Monday, though.

Today I'll be trying to finish up some work and otherwise reading, maybe watching a comfort movie, trying to keep from remembering that I'm really not in a very good mood and not doing all that well just now. Distraction, distraction, distraction.

Back to Novel Gazing.

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