Friday, January 2: Upstairs, Downstairs

Today we continued moving things out of the kitchen and family room and into the basement. We are at peak inconvenience right now, running up and down the stairs to complete even the smallest task. Ready for lunch? Great--it's in the upstairs fridge. Go down to the basement for a plate. Back upstairs. Oops--I need a serving spoon. Back upstairs. Back downstairs to heat up the food and eat it. Forgot water--back upstairs to fill a glass. Forgot a glass. Back downstairs and then back upstairs and then back downstairs to eat. Back upstairs for the dishwasher. By the end of tomorrow, we'll be fully moved, but today was comical (and annoying). 

Lucia spent most of the day hanging out at a friend's house, and Greta spent most of the day doing a puzzle. She has rediscovered a love of puzzling since we gave her a cute puzzle for Christmas and Mom and Dad gave us a puzzle table-top with drawers as a family gift. It is the best. I spent most of the day organizing the kitchen, reading, and working on archival projects (November and December Chatbooks mini-books; my 2025 family photo Snapfish book; starting the many steps needed to print my blog posts from 2025 as a hardcover book). 

In the evening, I watched a few episodes of Stranger Things with Greta. Lucia just finished the entire series and loved it. Greta was nearly through season 1, and I joined her for episodes 7 and 8. I know this is the trendy show of the moment--it's everywhere, people love it, and I'm curious about it. But I have to say that, so far, this is not the show for me. I know it's not fair to say that since I haven't watched it from the beginning and have only watched a couple of episodes, but I can't imagine spending any more time with this series. I generally am not at all interested in sci-fi / fantasy / paranormal in TV shows, UNLESS the character development is so extravagently wonderful that I can invest fully (see: Lost). Lucia said she cried at the series conclusion, and I just can't imagine caring enough about these characters to cry over them. (And I'm a crier! I cry at TV shows and movies and books and poems all the time.) Anyhoo. I may end up watching more if we're all huddled in the basement and the kids want to watch it, but we will see.