at this rate i'll be cleaning my kitchen soon

It's the evening before my first day of vacation!  I don't remember how to blog!  I am out of chocolate!

Well, now that I think of it I do have some chocolate chips and some hazelnut hot chocolate powder.  I could consume these things.  But I'm trying to not have a lot of caffeine today.  I've been drinking lemon tea.  It's basically really strong lemonade + hot water + ginger lemon sugar.  A byproduct of my latest failed attempt to candy ginger and lemon zest, whoops.  I mean I guess I had some success, but mostly a mess of sugar - which is, thankfully, still a potent sweetener when dissolved in hot water.

Guys, I have a lot of hot water!  I have one of those office water cooler things in my apartment.  The kind that is hooked up to the pipes, so I don't even need to order water.  It filters stuff itself -- AND it was recently tuned up so I can trust that it is working as well as it ever could.  Cheer.

It's almost vacation time and I have made no real plan.  I have been preoccupied with preparing for and teaching classes.  Also I'm busy reading books.  I have a record of the books that I have read over the past few years - top record for a year is 36.  Ain't nothing but a peanut!  I gotta beat that, people.  Have to beat my own personal best.  I want to read at least 37 books before the year is out.  Content I won't restrict because I derive so much pleasure out of so many different books - they all count to me.  But I need to put some good things in my brain.  Books make me feel calm and they make me a wee bit more informed and they keep me from wasting too much time on this fine computer and its lovely connection to the world wide web.