Happy New Year!

My sister and brother-in-law had to cancel their plans to visit us today, but then that gave me time to visit my friend Z, who is moving tomorrow – she’s six blocks from me now and will be about twice as far in the other direction.

Then, this evening, D. and J. watched Torn Curtain with me, which they hadn’t seen before (Hitchcock thriller starring Paul Newman and Julie Andrews in East Germany). It was quite a Julie Andrews day for me, as she was hosting a PBS New Year’s special with the Vienna Symphony in the afternoon, then we watched Princess Diaries 2 during dinner (with D. paying more attention than I would have expected – he concluded he wouldn’t want to be royal if it involved having to graciously receive citizens’ gifts of farm goods).

Between us, J. and I have gotten 50 likes on our New Year’s Eve self-portrait. ❤

We bought hats!

J. and I were in Fred Meyer to exchange the duplicate gift Santa had put in D’s stocking, and we went over to men’s accessories get J. some more socks, and lo, there were men’s hats there, and it’s really cold outside. I lost my winter hat two years ago, and I commented that the hats in the Fred Meyer women’s department had been too small for me, so J. suggested I try on some of these. I rather liked a dark blue felt fedora, but a different style of black hat seemed even better (the Internet tells me it’s a porkpie), and then J. found a faux leather black fedora that looked great on him, so we bought each other hats! And now we have hats!

D. does not approve of J’s hat, being far too much under the influence of some “fedora meme,” but it really does look good.

Lucy for mayor!

A friend of mine, more like a friendly acquaintance, is very active in efforts to get better school funding, and politics in general, and today she hosted a party for a woman who’s probably the leading progressive candidate for the next mayor of our small city. I was invited!

Our future mayor (I’m optimistic) was very friendly and has great priorities and a strong awareness of the issues, and she also appears to have really strong interpersonal skills. I was very comfortable chatting with her – if she weren’t running for mayor, I’d think of her as a great potential friend. (She could be anyway, of course, but I think she’s going to be very busy!)