Five-and-Twenty: Summer Replacement

Why has this week felt so impossibly l o o o o o o ong? In this day and age when days pass like minutes and everything seems to blend together, this week has felt like it contains a month. Which is kind of cool in a way, to have time slowed back down like this, and agonizing in others.

The last time I remember feeling this way was during the early part of the pandemic, when the last two weeks of March 2022 passed at a crawl. But this one has been more due to events in my personal world than the world at large.

I've detailed some or most of what was going on at the beginning of the week. The minutes leading up to my appointment on Tuesday morning were already dragging. My head and heart were heavy with thoughts of work. Tuesday night Mel and I actually got into a bit of a fight because she asked me a personal question to which she didn't like the answer, although to be fair I didn't give her the whole story. Once I did, things were cleared up and we made up, having wasted the better part of an evening being mad at each other. (I always get mad at her when she's mad at me because what gives her the right, you know? But once she explained her position better I understood her hurt and was able to clear it up. Decent husbanding.)

Yesterday, Mel was in the city again, again for work but only in the morning and after that was her work BBQ on the island. She asked whether I could come to the city (even though I was not invited to the 'Q) and I declined, citing that I had already said I would be available for our usual Wednesday 5:30 workout (which ended up being 5:00) and we miss so many of those lately that I would hate to willingly miss another. Look at me, actively enjoying exercise. What is this guy.

Mel's train was late getting home after being stopped -- well, it had been a few weeks since that happened -- and when she got home we were both pretty beat so we ordered sushi. Which is good, but you know, it's an expensive habit. (It used to be a weekly occurrence but we've tapered it off lately, and now it's just something we do when we don't know what else to do... which admittedly, is nearly every week.) She was so drained that she called it a night at 8:30. I stayed up and wrote about the X-Men. In the morning I accompanied her to another appointment before work, then spent the day fretting, as I had been since the day before, about the lack of stock availability for the Kobo. At the end of the day I was able to sit down and get the ball rolling on working it out, which I guess is the kind of certainty and drive they want to see. After Mel was done we went to my mom's for dinner.

Today was more of a normal day, even a half-day because of summer hours thankfully. That said, the afternoon tends to evaporate when you work a little later than noon and then spend your "free time" running errands. Oh well, it is what it is and we've got the weekend (Saturday's got some things going on, Sunday might be relaxing.)

Other than that, you know, I'm just trying to figure some things out, to write and scheme and line up what comes next. I'm trying to take a break from forcing myself to write until I have an idea I think is really good, but you know how these things tend to hit, and I've already had a few that intrigue me.

I also have an ambition to get really far ahead on the X-Men blog so that I can cover a massive crossover (the 9-part X-Tinction Agenda) all within the month of September -- hugely ambitious, but if I can settle for a a few double-post weeks I would be happy. I mean, I'm not trying to race to the end of the Claremont Run -- I should want to savor it -- but what remains is a bit harried and not exactly what I was always most excited about doing, so... why not go for broke?

This is fun, I like this. Keep on rockin'

-Scotto