which karen is it
I'm glad I updated yesterday. You can read all about my Fourth of July Weekend there. And I'm fine with it, with having much less to write about today. I don't have the bandwidth to recount the events of my entire three-day weekend today.
I sure do have an easy time keeping myself busy even when so many things, particularly movie theaters, remain closed. I'm beginning to feel amazed I ever managed to fit in two to three movies in the theater per week. I mean, I'm sure I'll pretty easily go right back to that once it's safe to go to movies again, although I have no expectation of that being the case any time soon—or at the time they actually re-open theaters, for that matter.
This just in! Literally while I was writing the above paragraph, I received a knock at my condo door. I assumed it must be the floral arrangement Barbara already texted me was coming, even though she said it would not arrive until the 9th, and it just got here early. There was no one at the door when I opened it, but there was indeed a surprisingly large, beautiful floral arrangement, with several flowers in it I presumed to be tiger lilies, with orange petals with lots of little black dots near the flower's center. I was still operating under the rather strong assumption that they had come from Barbara while I took pictures of it, until I finally opened the card and saw what it said:
Matthew - sharing in your sadness as you remember your mom. With deepest sympathy, warmly, Karen.
. . . Wait. Karen? Mom's old school friend? We had exchanged several messages but she never asked for my address. Only Kris did! Maybe Karen asked my brother or even Karen . . . or hell, she might even have had the wherewithal to check my "Contact Info" page on Facebook, where my street address can indeed be found. I immediately had to message Karen with photos and thanks, though, and mention the thing about Barbara, to ask if her arrangement also featuring Tiger Lilies was deliberate or just an amazing coincidence. I was really kind of stunned by that, when I saw the card.
—Wait, hold on. Damn it, I am an idiot! I had to message Mom's friend Karen again to let her know I likely made a mistake. The flowers came from a shop in Ballard, which means they almost certainly came from my friend Karen . . . the one I have FaceTime lunches with every other week. DUH. Still, I know no fewer than four Karens (and that's not including old high school classmate Karin on my Facebook friends list, who would make it five), so it would have made sense for her to specify which one she was!
I texted Karen (in Magnolia, here in Seattle) and finally got confirmation from her she was the one who sent it. The tiger lilies are still an incredible coincidence (unless they are standard in sympathy floral arrangements? I have no idea), regardless of whom they're from. I just know I have more tiger lilies on the way from Barbara.
Beyond that, there's not much more to tell today. Shobhit worked yesterday from 11:00 a.m. to 7:30 p.m., and when he got home he suggested we have chai. I happily made some. Big mistake! I have got to stop drinking that stuff after 7 p.m. I was wide awake and didn't even try to go to sleep until well past 11:30, and it was easily another hour before I truly fell asleep. I already know this pattern, and I need to put a stop to it! No more chai after 7:00! Hell, even having it at 6:00 would be better.
Anyway. I also made salad for dinner, out of two boxed greens from MacPherson's Produce, a bag of shredded iceberg lettuce, "salad topper" we got from Costco, some dried goji berries, slightly sautéed onions and mushrooms, fried sliced veggie sausage, and a sprinkling of gorgonzola cheese. I must say I did a bang-up job because it was a truly delicious salad. It still was when I had the last of it as leftovers for lunch today.
We watched, I think, three episodes of the Netflix Original Series Space Force, which is so much better—and funnier—than I ever expected. It was a fine way to spend the evening, and overall yesterday was a pretty chill day that I was generally able to enjoy.
[posted 12:39 pm]