"So, where are you in Harry Potter and the Mountain of Magical Cash?"

"It's his birthday."

"Wasn't Ginny's birthday present awesome? She was totally going to give it up to him."

"...I haven't gotten that far, woman."

"Oh. Sorry."

"Damnit. Every book. EVERY BOOK, you've got to spoil it."

"I didn't really spoil --"

"Eh, eh, EH! There will be no more mention of it."

"But--"

"EH! I am putting my foot down. The foot is down. You cannot talk about the book until I am finished, do I make myself clear, wo-man?"

"...totally going to give it up."

"I hate you so very much."

Weekend plans:

1. Buy Harry Potter.
2. Sleep.
3. Read Harry Potter.
3. Sleep.
4. Maybe eat somewhere in there.
5. Pull in a little OT.
6. Finish Harry Potter if I haven't gotten around to it already.

You?

The new job has officially staked its claim in my psyche. This was determined when I came out of a dead sleep at 5 a.m. realizing I hadn't done a thing for a thing and immediately threw on some jeans and made a run to the office to do the thing for the thing.

And hey, new discovery. East-bound traffic on Paseo is surprisingly heavy at 5:20 a.m.

It took the better part of a year of employment at the Journal before I was struck with that sort of panic. I don't know if it's a difference in duties, or a difference in maturity levels or what, but there I was at 5 a.m., cruising into the office in dirty jeans and a hoodie, startling the night crew. "You could have just called. We could have done the thing for the thing for you," they assured me. And yeah, I could have and they could have, but it seemed important to own the panic. Also, I couldn't remember which thing didn't have the thing done to it, and like hell was I going to be on the phone with a coworker I don't know saying, "No, not that thing. Try the other thing." That would have just cemented my reputation as a flake with those people.

New jobs. Ah, aren't they a gas?

The last month has been kind of a run up of pointed questions in the direction of "it's been over a year, when are you going to have that damn book finished?" from a couple of different sources, some whom are kind of hoping I finished or will finish in the near future, so they might actually get a little cash out of my chaos, and some whom (bless them) just want something to read.

I can only answer the same way my father answered the road trip standard of "are we there yet?"

We will get there when we get there.

Just, FYI.

Someone in the house has gout.

I am not at liberty to name the person rocking a bitching case of the disease of kings, but I can tell you it's not me. It's also not Peanut, nor Buttercup. And it's definitely not the cat.

So. Gout.

In the run up to the diagnosis, I had noticed the New York Times had been going on an everyone-eats-together rampage in the Style/Food section, and I was happy to agree. I said to the gout patient (before we knew there was a gout patient in the house) that, aside from nights where I breeze in from work at bedtime, we would be a family that made one meal for dinner, period. The gout patient had no problem with that. We're not a house of picky eaters, even with my protein-crazed eating habits.

Except then Gout showed up with a full suitcase and now I'm having to go back on everything I said.

For one, Gout does not get along with my personal health plan. Strike that. Gout LURVES my personal health plan. More meat, Gout says. Moooooore meat! And salt! And dried legumes such as peanuts! Oh, and foie gras! Oh, Gout loves foie gras.

Not that we have access to that particular gout bomb, but hey.

I spent the weekend consulting Dr. Google and running back and forth to the grocery store for more fresh fruit (Gout and the fresh fruit? Not so much) while the gout patient hydrated and experimented with his new Super Strength NSAID of loopiness. And I've started dealing with the fact that for the time being, we're a two-dinner family.

Gah. Stupid gout.