Dang, I’ve got a lot of plates spinning right now. I’m not complaining– I’ve chosen the trajectory I set myself upon, but holy cow some days… Yesterday (well, it still feels like today to me, but technically it was yesterday) was crazy. Got up and cooked a hot breakfast (more out of guilt than desire) for the monkeys, then got Abby and myself ready to head out to the University bookstore. My mom is helping me with my textbooks (because really $91 for a used book?? for one class??) but there was a snafu with PayPal, and the cash isn’t in my account. My schedule was tight, because we also both had appointments for haircuts. Did I mention we never got over 20 degrees here today? So Abby and I are in the car on the way to the U-district, and Bean’s teacher calls– he’s got a field trip and the flurry of the morning I forgot to sign the permission slip. U-turn, and head back to his school.
Then my stylist texted me and had to reschedule, which was kind of good, because now I had time to actually hit the bookstore before Abby had to be at preschool. We park in the icy lot and run into the big brick building, only to find they don’t open the textbook section until 11:00 a.m. It was 9:45. Crap. Okay, grocery store it is then. Back into the icy parking lot and up the hill to my favorite market- (until Trader Joe’s opens in two months!!) and got Abby a cup of potato-leek soup while I wandered around the cheese section (scored a Port Townsend Seastack!)
We made it back to the bookstore just as they were opening, but were already behind half a dozen other students. They had two of the three books I needed, and we headed back out into the frigid crazy cold. Dropped Abby off at preschool and came home, with two solid hours before the next shift of driving and dropping kids off various places kicked in. What did I do with myself? Homework? No… I made a lame effort to find a movie I need to watch for one class, but ended up talking to friends, opening the Seastack, tossing in a load of laundry, and busting into some Good Mail that showed up in my mailbox.
Some days you just have to roll with it. Today was one of those days. And sometimes, just staring out the window in a quiet, empty house at the snowy yard is, in fact, a very important thing to do.
Dandelion Mama 
All this talk of cheese is making me wish I knew more – I should put your number in my cell and call you to have you walk me through the cheese section of the fancy Harmons that’s not far.
Not that it probably helps for this semester, but have you considered Amazon student? It’s free, and you get free two-day shipping. And no icy parking lots. Though it’s only free for a year, so you might want to wait until you have to buy textbooks again.
And yet, somehow that list of things you did sounds like a whole lot more than window gazing to me…..
I was working in a group home for developmentally disabled adults during my senior year of college. One of the residents was in the process of moving out, on his own, with less supervision than he was used to. We were supposed to talk to him, find out what he was worried about, and give basic advice. My job was simple money management.
I had a textbook called “Financial Management of Depository Institutions”. Huge, expensive, and on cheap paper besides.
“Dude, can you believe this? My book here cost me $88 bucks.”
“Does it have any pictures?”
(I thumb through it.) “No, it doesn’t look like it.”
“I’d take it back.”
Guy with the mental ability of an eight-year-old totally outsmarted me on that one. We spent the rest of breakfast talking about all the things I *should* have bought with my money, like tickets to the dollar theater, and macaroni and cheese, and if you don’t pay the water and sewer bill, the toilet backs up and then *nobody* wants to go to the dollar movies with you….