Woke up this morning before my alarm went off, which I seem to be doing with regularity these days. The nice thing is that I didn't have anything on my personal agenda until about noon, so I got to remain in bed, reading the latest Temeraire novel. Eventually Nathan woke up, and we discussed the fact that both of us had a hungerish sort of thing going on in our bellies, and that it had been rather a long time since we'd indulged in some Original Pancake House goodness. (We are very glad we don't have to give it up when we move back to the PNW.)
It says something about the temperature that it did not even occur to me to suggest that we walk; OPH is only a mile from our house, but baby you'd better believe we drove that mile. Normally when we go we try to go early (before nine) because it's a very popular place, and the wait time can be outrageous. This isn't so bad on a pleasant day, when you can sit outside on the fountain and watch the Crazy People of Birmingham creep out the tourists, but today was the sort of day that has you squeezed into the minuscule yet air-conditioned foyer, getting unintentionally snuggly with a bunch of strangers. Anyway getting there before nine tends to reduce your wait time, but apparently getting there after eleven has similar results, so that was fortunate. We only had to wait about ten or fifteen minutes before we were herded back to a little window alcove (from which I could conveniently carry out the people-watching I'd missed out on earlier). I never bother to look at the menu in OPH- I long ago gave up pretending that I'm going to order anything other than french toast- and Nathan already had his Final Contenders in mind (he opted for blueberry pancakes) so we managed to get our order in as soon as our waitress showed up.
Brunch was absolutely splendid (minus the part where the waitress kept trying to refill Nathan's "coffee"- which was actually hot cocoa) and after we waddled back out onto the street we decided to pop into Golden Temple to see if they carry dandelion coffee. Nathan made noises of trepidation, but I promised to protect him from my hippie brethren. As it turned out the did not have what we were looking for, but I did notice their lovely variety of non-peanut nut butters, so I'll have to go back once I've finished the almond butter jar I'm currently making my way through.
From there we headed home again, to pick up laundry and for me to change into my painting clothes, for today was the day I'd promised to go over to Jeff and Elizabeth's and paint a tree on their nursery wall. I spent about five or six hours on it, and I'd say it's looking pretty good- although I'm going to go back and look at it with fresh eyes tomorrow to see what needs touching. Plus it doesn't have any leaves yet... need to go by Michael's and buy stuff to make a stamp, 'cos damned if I'm going to paint all of them by hand.
So I have this weird feeling of not really having done much today, even tho' I guess I did. Five hours of drawing/painting is definitely doing much! But it didn't really feel like work... it's been a long time since I've gone into the kind of painting trance where you lose track of time; Elizabeth had to scold me for not drinking any water! She's a good sister-in-law. She says I could do that sort of thing for a living, and I guess I could. But it just seems weird to charge money for something that, to me, is so easy. Meh.
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