Good Things

Good Thing #1: Final proofs of our book have been completed and reviewed and now the manuscript is off to the publisher! So it is officially done and the next time I see it, it'll be an actual book. I have co-authored three books now for this particular series but this is the first one for which I'm the first author. I'm pretty psyched.

Good Thing #2: Telling my grad student who led the charge on a particular analysis that her analysis is what our intellectual mentor in this area of work liked best about my talk last week. My grad student was so pleased and excited to get that kind of recognition. (It was well deserved - she's totally awesome.) Later, I got four requests from different researchers for a copy of our presentation and the best part about that was taking the time to stop and thank my team of grad students (and one new professor who has been continuing with the project via skype). Their work has been really outstanding, and it feels great to reflect on that, and to make sure they know it and know how much I appreciate them. I am so lucky to have these amazing, amazing students.

Good Thing #3: Summer foods. Anything with the herbs I've got growing in my garden - lots of basil. Lots of cilantro. Today it's roasted peppers with garlic, red wine vinegar, olive oil, flat parsley, fresh ball mozzarella, and capers. Soooo good.

Good Thing #4: The heat wave has broken. Pleasant low 80s temps instead of weirdly hot mid-nineties temps.

Kids: Nora seems to have recovered from whatever strange affliction was plaguing her. She's resumed her equilibrium just in time for Milo to start having a rough time. I wonder if he is getting sick; he's been very teary today over very small things (like losing a rubber band).

It's 8:45 p.m., an hour after their bedtime, and I can still hear Nora marching around upstairs in her room and singing songs to herself.

Last night we had a storm. I woke up from the storm. Then I heard our door open. Nora crept into our room. She started to settle down at my feet, like a dog, and I said, "Why don't you come up here with us?" So she slept between us. This reminds me of how far we've come. A few years ago a storm like that would have meant two crying babies, us up and out of our room, comforting them in their room. Exhausting. Now, I don't even have to get out of bed - they come to us. So nice! And to top it off, Milo slept through the whole thing. Even better.