The Fastest October Ever

I know, it’s been forever! Things have been nutty lately, and I knew I was overdue for a post, but I almost choked when I saw my last post was September 25th. September! Here’s what’s been keeping us going at breakneck speed.

In the last week of September, we had tickets to see Vance Joy in concert at Artpark in Lewiston, NY. We already had the tickets when we found out we’d be hosting an exchange student, so we brought her along and went to Niagara Falls in the morning, and then, for good measure, stopped at Six Flags Darien Lake on the drive home. There we learned that Cute W and I are officially getting too old for roller coasters, and there’s a whole long and involved story about my glasses that needs its own post. I’ll circle back to it.

That week I felt a bit like we had to recover from our weekend, but I also brought Ruth to a vet appointment, went to another documentary group meeting, and met with someone about a new volunteer thing — tutoring with Literacy Volunteers Capital Region. That Friday I’d impulsively bought tickets to Taylor Swift’s album launch movie, thinking it would be a fun Americana event for our exchange student (plus I am a Swiftie). When she didn’t recruit friends, another friend of mine managed to pull together the rest of the group so that the tickets didn’t go to waste. The next day we went to the high school to watch S cheer at her first football game. It was a gorgeous day and we took a lot of photos and videos to document this event (she is third from left in this photo).

That evening, we drove to Northampton, MA, to take J out to dinner in celebration of her 21st (!!) birthday.

The rest of that week was relatively uneventful, except that I had a hair appointment in which my stylist was talking me through The Change, and by The Change, I don’t mean menopause, I mean one of its fantastic symptoms, which is that my hair is becoming curly. In a weird and unpredictable manner. Seriously, y’all, what am I supposed to do with this?

Cute W headed out of town to visit his family for several days, and S and I attended a potluck the next weekend with her two future host families. She’ll move to her next family right after Christmas. It was very reassuring for her to meet everyone and see where she’d be living next.

The following weekend, S had a trip to New York City with the Rotary while Cute W and I had the weekend to ourselves. We had a belated birthday celebration for me and we attended yet another No Kings protest. This time I really amped up the interactivity (in keeping with my advice on how to have fun) by making selfie frames that people could use to pose with and bringing along stickers to give away.

We also brought along our bikes, which is a really lovely way to see just how many people there are while also being close enough to stop and chit-chat. The only bummer was that at the end of the protest I rolled over a big nail. Of course Cute W is super-handy and fixed it all up for me. But all this becomes quite a project, between creating new signs ahead of the event and then, after the event, editing and sharing a bunch of pictures on social media (you can see them on Facebook or BlueSky).

On Monday the 20th I took my car to be inspected and we learned that it would not pass inspection without the kind of massive investment that an 11-year-old car frankly does not deserve. Which suddenly made the end of October feel entirely overwhelming, because now we’d need to find a new car quickly, we still hadn’t gotten around to choosing, much less carving, a pumpkin for Halloween, and we were leaving on Thursday to spend the weekend in Chicago. There may have been some whining at that night’s documentary group. During that week I test drove cars at five different dealerships. Upon re-reading, I feel like this short sentence deserves more emphasis. Knowing that driving without getting lost is one of my least favorite things, anyway, and now I have to make conversation with strangers while trying to evaluate machinery and feeling massively unprepared because researching cars is not my strong suit, I’m just going to take a moment to say that I did a very good job of rising to the occasion in short order. Not, like, an excellent job, but a very good job.

Our trip to Chicago was super-fun. M drove over from Madison to meet us and spend the weekend, and we did tons of touristy stuff with S: the aquarium, the Art Institute of Chicago, an architecture boat tour, Willis Tower, hot dogs, deep dish pizza, and sushi. We were fortunate to have fantastic weather, and in tourist land you could almost forget that there are showdowns with ICE happening constantly. Except that our Uber driver told us that 11 other drivers had been taken from the airport when he was there yesterday, and when a guy complimented me on my anti-fascist button and I gave him one, he presented me with a whistle and instructions on how to put out the alarm if I saw ICE. Later I took a picture at a store that had free signs and whistle kits for the taking.

Oh, and at the Art Institute of Chicago, we were absolutely blown away by Raqib Shaw’s Paradise Lost, a visually stunning piece of art dedicated to Kashmir that is on display there through January. If you check that link, you’ll see that it is just massively huge (scroll down a bit and it shows the whole piece), but here’s one tiny detail below.

And after all of my mural admiration throughout Mexico, I would be remiss if I didn’t celebrate this lovely artwork in Andersonville, where we spent an afternoon shopping a bit farther away from Tourist Central.

In a shock to no one, our flight was delayed and we arrived home very late on Sunday night. Which brings me to last week. S and I finally picked out a pumpkin. I baked a cake in preparation for S’s birthday on Wednesday. Cute W and I visited multiple car dealerships. I had my first meeting with my tutoring student, for which I geekily overprepared. J called to let us know that some dental surgery we knew was looming had been scheduled for Friday, Halloween morning.

S’s birthday was a smashing success: we knew that our main gift would be a hit, but I was especially proud that she really loved a sweater I’d picked, too (gotta keep these exchange students warm!). Plus her parents had sent a package she wasn’t expecting, so she was psyched. And Cute W and S carved the pumpkin into a jack-o-lantern.

We bought a Kia Seltos on Thursday. That night, S and I went to see Wicked at Proctors (see my review here). Between buying the car and going to the theater, I picked up an air mattress from a friend and cooked two soups to bring to Smith College for J, who would be on a liquid diet for a week. As I was making the soups, S reminded me that she needed help with adding patches to her Rotary jacket in preparation for an event I’d be missing because the New Revised Plan was that I was doing dental surgery support instead.

Is that a random pile of clean clothes piled on a kitchen chair that I hadn’t gotten around to folding? Yes, and can you blame me?

J’s procedure went as well as could be expected, and after an oh-so-restful night on her dorm floor for Halloween night [sarcasm, obviously], I returned home on Saturday in time for take-out Thai and hosting a sleepover with two other exchange students who had come into Schenectady for the Rotary event. They were absolutely lovely, and Cute W and I invited them to come with us to see a rodeo this weekend.

Now things are finally slowing down, at least a bit, and I have a chance to get back into my routine. And hopefully figure out how to work all the dials on the car.