rideau

Okay, so all this week I've been twiddling my thumbs, biting my toenails, falling asleep in mid morning, and wiling away the afternoons perusing the internets, because A) I have no work to do, and B) my supervisors are all on vacation, or have no work to do themselves, so are unable to direct me towards more work. This is the first time in years that I've been perpetually shy of work, and frankly it's a bit disconcerting. So, an update.

I made dinner for my brother and sister and their SO's last night - menu as follows:

Roast chicken, heavy on the garlic
Braised kale with toasted sesame seeds
Coconut milk rice pilaf

I'm so used to cooking solely for myself (and only having to worry about satisfying my own fairly low culinary standards) that I wasn't sure I'd be able to coordinate a proper meal - most of my meals are single dish. But it went off well, I'm pleased to report. Good to know I still have it in me. (I used to be a much better cook, but entropy and laziness took over.)

I've spent the past three months on Zoloft, in an attempt to quell the ever present anxieties I've been living with for years. I've met with mixed results. Oh yes, I chilled out a bit, and some of my concerns dropped by the wayside, but the cost was that all other emotions dissipated as well. And I stopped dreaming, which sucked royally. I've begun weaning myself off the medication. Loss of emotion is too high a cost for relief, and that is something I totally didn't get the several other times I've been on antidepressents. So I've begun dreaming again, which is nice. Last night I dreamt of Neil Young in South Africa driving a biodiesel tank. Not sure what to make of that one.

I spent a weekend at Kripalu yoga centre a while back, and it was fucking amazing! Great vegetarian food, great people, huge Shining-esque building, great environment. I totally want to live there when I grow up. Except, the yoga classes were sort of flat, which is weird, but everyone else I know who's been there has said pretty much the same thing. I'm definitely itchin' to go back, though. At first, I thought I'd train there as a yoga instructor, but now I'm having second thoughts - if I'm not too keen on their yoga style, maybe I should train somewhere else? I'm not totally decided yet.

I told my sister I had nothing to read, so she lent me Crow Lake by Mary Lawson and A Northern Light by Jennifer Donnelly. I'm reading Crow Lake - it's pretty good, although it reads like a lot of other contemporary fiction from Canadian women (Margaret Lawrence, Margaret Atwood). Very brooding, introspective. Just my cup of tea.