Break

My word document is giving me the rainbow wheel of death, so I'll take a moment to write on here.

Things are calming down at home. Still a lot of conversations to be had, much work to be done. But the sweetness is bigger than all that, and I'm very grateful. We just found an AMAZING after school program for Oliver -- The Art of STEM. It's project-based, where the kids design a project and then spend their time skill-building to complete the project. This is so perfect for Oliver's brain, and it's the same cost as the after school program at his school that is pretty much just playing for four hours. They also get to play at the STEM one, but a project is where it's at for him. He LOVES that shit. Plus, Jodie's job is ending for the year soon, and she can volunteer there, which will make her very very happy. All around, it's totally dreamy. Expensive, but dreamy.

I have to turn in a revised (still very rough) draft of my thesis this afternoon. I've made some decent strides, but I'm terribly afraid of Susan. I fear the amount of time I've spent on this - not a whole lot - is pretty evident in my work. Today has been productive, but I spent much of the rest of the week literature hoarding, which is one of my worst research habits. I just cast about for papers I should read, download them to my ReadCube, and don't actually read or write much of anything because it's all overwhelming. Oy. Good progress today. Lots of incorporation of phylogeographies of other PNW organisms, geographic structuring patterns that are similar to my pseudoscorpions... And the papers are getting easier to read and incorporate into my work and writing style.

I'm feeling the loneliness and isolation of after Michigan. That's pretty rough. Would you all please just come over for family dinner this Sunday? Just come over. We'll feed you.

Alright then. I better get back to it. Loving you all...