Bits and bobs and summer rain

I drove to work this morning with the driver's side car window rolled all the way down. Somehow, even the exhaust from my stop and go rush hour traffic tango smelled better. Wet smog smells better than dry smog? Who knew? I didn't get very wet since the rain was more "spit" than shower, but that smell puts a smile on my face every time. (The rain part, not the smog part.)

Less than 3 weeks until I take leave of sultry San Diego and hightail it up to P-town. Can't wait. Of course it's only temporary, as I have to come back home after a week and a half. But still... my cousins and I are scheming every which way how to maximize the fun in this trip. I bought my camera last year in time for that Portland vacation - I can only wonder at what difference a year will have wrought in my photographs this time around.

I'm going car shopping today. Ugh. The new car part, that's okay. But the whole haggling with car salesmen. On top of that, the car-buying process for someone with sketchy credit is even worse than the usual rigamorole. I'll have butterflies (not the good kind) in my stomach all afternoon.

I've finally decided to stop procrastinating on my website upgrade while all the cool media jobs pass me by. I finally settled on a domain name and registered it this week. Then I went into my old site and in one fell swoop, deleted every single page. I've slowly started to build it back up again - put in a few links and the bare bones of my photography gallery. It'll probably take about a month or so, but seeing it develop is so exciting.

One final note - I joined a book group. Last night was the first meeting I was able to attend and I was nervous. I kept trying to picture myself back in Schaffer's class and how much I enjoyed discussing the texts we read, but that was 10 years ago and it's not like academia has been a huge aspect of my life in the past several years. But as the discussion started, I found myself being drawn in and soon I was posing questions and trying to understand the significance of the underlying themes with the best of them. It was so refreshing, being able to sit in a coffeeshop with a group of 20/30- something like-minded people. The conversation was intelligent and the wit was sharp. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and as I drove home, I was aware of a sense of posession. This was an activity that was mine and not something I wanted to share with my partner. There are so many things we do together, but this one... this one I want to claim for my own. Is that wrong? Anyway, if anyone has any book suggestions for the next read (Thom, I'm looking at you), please let me know, as we're supposed to vote on the next one by Friday. (To give you an example of the kinds of stuff we read, the last book was Love and Other Demons by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. And if you're interested in joining, I can send details.)

Enjoy the rain!!