Fits and starts

I've started about three posts today, but completed none of them. Perhaps if I do a bit of a extraneous thought dump, a mental emptying of the recycle bin, so to speak, it will clear the way for a return to quality writing.

• The work on the office roof is ongoing...into our third week. The combined scents of hot tar and gasoline drifting through the office have more than one of us nauseous, and after about three hours' exposure triggers a massive migraine for me. No word on when they will be done.

• Said migraine was so intense last night I gave up and went to bed to sleep it off - shortly before 6:30 p.m. Naturally, I woke up refreshed and ready to go seven hours later. Messed around for half an hour or so, then went back to bed and spent the next two hours dreaming of wandering in a Walgreens with moving shelves and kleenex boxes that turned into toilet paper. It was a relief to finally get up.

• There is nothing better on a hot summer day than knowing there is cookies and cream custard waiting in the freezer at home.

• The Italian beef and barley soup made and frozen last month provided easy, tasty lunches. I still have a couple of containers, but it is time to make another batch. Funny, I don't recall it tasting this good when I made it as instructed, on the stovetop, rather than in the slowcooker like last time.

• It is probably time to start eating down the freezer and pantry items in anticipation of moving. Maybe I'll go nuts and make anchovy bread from scratch this weekend, provided I can start the dough early enough in the morning to get it finished and baked before the hottest part of the day. That would make one can and pound or so of flour that wouldn't have to be packed up.

• What, doesn't everyone make anchovy bread?

• Why is it that while I've been selling books for over three years, I still have twelve boxes full (and need at least three or four more)? At least the thirty-odd in the Kindle don't weigh much. Come to think of it, those additional boxes don't include the cookbooks. Ay.

• Summer hours are here. While in the past I've worked my four long days from 6:30 to 4, this year, wanting to take advantage of the cooler morning hours (better sleeping), I'm working 7 to 4:30. Amazing how difficult that half hour shift has been. Then again, I woke up at 1:30 a.m. today ready for work, so it may be I'm just a wee bit off kilter.

• My landlords are going on a ten day missions trip in August. To Bogata, Columbia. I'm torn between praying for them and locking them in a concrete bunker to keep them from going. There is believing God will protect you, and there is taking unnecessary risks. This clearly falls into the second category.