Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. Karen and I spend a few hours catching up on the phone to start the week.

2. I sit the middle school practice players down and ask them what they enjoy most about volleyball — and what frustrates them. They want more serving practice, and they like how supportive everyone is (and being able to feel like experts in their gym classes!). But overall, they’re having fun and feel they’re getting better, which was a relief for me to hear.

3. As I hoped, the exercise of dropping a (kid-friendly, very soft) volleyball on your head is an excellent introduction to ball proximity for the 5-to-7-year-old crowd for the first day of coaching. No one ducked out of the way they often do, afraid that the ball will hurt when we gently toss it in their vicinity.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. Neal’s and my schools played each other in volleyball today. We were hoping for my middle school and his varsity team to win, but had to settle for just one of those things. (Incidentally, my middle school team is now 4-0, but they face a team that intimidates them on Tuesday, so we’ll see if our undefeated record holds next week.)

2. Jordan, Hannah, and I went out Wednesday night to a restaurant bar to watch the Pitt-SMU match on tv. The game went to a fifth set, and the restaurant let us stay past closing to watch the end.

3. Rudi and I got our COVID boosters early this year, just in case it becomes more difficult and/or expensive to get them. As it happens, I was turned away at Walgreens for not having a prescription, despite the fact that D.C. had passed emergency legislation saying one was not needed. (It wasn’t the pharmacy’s fault. They were following corporate policy. I emailed the company and reported them to my councilperson with the hope that her staff would follow up.) Luckily, CVS understands the law and had availability later the same afternoon — and gave me a coupon in addition to enhanced immunity.

As today was the first day of fall, it’s time to share ten of the books I’m hoping to read this autumn as part of That Artsy Reader Girl’s Top Ten Tuesday:

1. Sherry Thomas’ The Librarians
2. Falling Like Leaves by Misty Wilson
3. Hannah Nicole Maehrer’s Accomplice to the Villain
4. The Scandalous Confessions of Lydia Bennett, Witch by Melina Taub
5. The People’s Project, curated by Saeed Jones and Maggie Smith
6. The Nightmare before Kissmas by Sara Raasch
7. Haikyu!, Vol. 1 by Haruichi Furudate
8. Jolloff Rice and Other Revolutions by Omolola Ijeoma Ogunyemi
9. Sonali Dev’s There’s Something about Mira
10. The World’s Greatest Detective and Her Just Okay Assistant by Liza Tully

I’m averaging about three finished titles out of the ten for this year’s earlier lists, so I’ll be interested to see if I do better this fall or not.

How about you? What do you hope to read this autumn?

A day late, but three beautiful things from last week:

1. One of my practice squad got promoted up to the game group and did reasonably well in her first match (and with vociferous support from her teammates)!

2. Six of us from my team got together out in Virginia, so Harmony and Sergio, neither of whom are playing right now, could join us for supper. Four of us stayed out ’til after 11.

3. Sunday was the Adams Morgan Day neighborhood festival, and I got to wander through a few shops and stalls, eat my annual Jyoti samosa (which is as big as your head), listen to some music, and run into Chris and Julie. I miss the street being closed, but it was still a fun way to spend a weekend afternoon.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world?

I slacked on sharing my summer reads, but it’s time to get back on track. Back in June, I finished four books — three on paper and one in audio:

A Letter to the Luminous Deep by Sylvie Cathrell

This is a double epistolary work of speculative fiction, which I started in audiobook format last year before remembering I hate listening to letter and email headers. (more…)

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. With a gorgeous Friday night ahead, I bike across town with my beach chair and snacks to a new-to-me park, where they’re showing My Neighbor Totoro, which I’ve never seen. Luckily, it’s dubbed, because the crowds are such that I would never have been able to read the subtitles!

2. My middle school team decisively wins their first match of the season. (I celebrate by buying myself a slice of pizza and a bag of Jordan almonds.)

3. Rudi and I both had eye exams this week, and I have new contacts (in the right prescription) for the first time in too long.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?