the rain it raineth every day

i'm a big shakespeare fan. have been since i was a little slip of a thing. so that's where i'm taking today's title from. one night when i was a kid i sat up all night and read all of shakespeare's histories, listening to the saint-saens requiem, over and over.

well, not actually all of the histories; i didn't read king john or henry VIII, because they're not part of the same narrative as the others, but to really follow them (as i explained to my father, who "suggested" i should go to bed) you have to read them all at once, and it helps if you have a few maps and charts handy.

it has nothing to do with anything, really, except that it just never seems to be not raining here anymore. it's starting to get on my nerves.

last night i went out and rode the huntington course. i remembered it as being much steeper, but i was slow anyway; about 503 seconds slower than last time. the important thing to remember is to stay rubber side down n the return trip. the pavement can be kind of bumpy and you want to stay all the way out on the bars. so. no brakes.

it was the first outing in the new uniform, so that was kind of fun, but as i think i mentioned already, it was raining. ordinarily i'd just change clothes in the parking lot, but it was cold and rumblestrip doesn't live too far away, so i went over there and changed indoors which was a nice change of pace and i also got to hang out with rumblestrip for a while, so that was nice.

especially since rumblestrip's out of town for a few days. the Flyingfishers are gone to the world cup. i'll miss 'em.

i always say that if you're going to be gone, it's good to be missed, and rumblestrip and Flyingfisher should be happy to know that they were missed tonigt at the party.

it was kind of bittersweet for me, because people, especially newer people, treat me like the "famous flask"; you know, the flask who used to have the really big cache adventures. the flask who used to be the first finder, or solve the big puzzles, or stay out for a week at a time, or find a dozen in a day.

but now i'm the flask that barely finds anything, who stays home most days and sleeps. i am not even caught up in my logging; i'm still working on st. patrick's day, when i was out with DJ and CAL. before things turned really bad.

so people treat me like i'm still a big hitter, but i feel like a fraud.

it's nice to get out and see people, though, even though i have some brain damage and some memory loss and there are a lot of places and people that ought to be familiar and that i ought to remember, so i spend a lot of time kind of standing around smiling politely, trying to remember who people are.

there are a few folks i can remember on my own, people who really understand and do everything they can to help me cover for the memory lapses. and some people just understand and don't mind having to reintroduce themselves.

i made a quick bread this afternoon; it was supposed to be banana bread and heaven knows there were enough bananas in it, but i don't think it came off all that well. still, a couple of people at the party (people i know to have trustworthy taste) liked it just fine and took all they could get.

you know what they say: there's no tasting accountants.

so. tomorrow i have to make some bread (orange apricot, i think) and go to my dad's birthday party. i think crashco will come with me for company, which means we'll stop at a geocache or two. now i have to take a truckload of meds and supplements and go to bed. oddly enough, i'm sleepy, even though i woke up this morning, had some luckies, went back to bed and slept until two. then i lay inert for another hour.

but when i woke up, the depression had lifted. sometimes you get what you need.

i hope you get what you need. i hope you sleep soundly and wake refreshed. i hope you travel safely. i hope your team wins.

je vous souhaite de bonnheur et de bonne chance.