Horrible heartburn.

The other month a friend was in town for a big tradeshow, and so I met her and her stylist coworkers downtown to hang out and go to dinner and whatnot.

When I first got to my friend's hotel, she was still curling her hair, so she invited me up, and all the women were drinking screwdrivers pregaming before dinner, and she had one in a take-out coffee cup with a plastic sippy-top.

So, she finished her hair, then we went out and hung out outside and passed the coffee cup back and forth and chatted and caught up, until her coworkers headed down and we could all go out to dinner.

At dinner, then, I had a few bites of stuff (I had already eaten), including some really delicious fried eggplant.

Then, that night at like 3:30am, I sat bolt up in bed with horrendous heartburn, and I couldn't really fall asleep until 6:30am.

I had completely forgotten that orange juice and especially orange juice combined with fatty food gives me horrible heartburn.

I had discovered that as a kid with orange juice and bacon, but I never drink orange juice, so I had completely forgotten about it till the screwdrivers and fried eggplant fucked me over.

I just want to read and read and read.

Since I'm closing off my dissertation, I can kind of begin reading around on my next academic project.

All I want to do now is read and read and read, since it's like whole new vistas opening up to me, since all the books I'm reading are on new topics and new eras and are "big picture" books teaching me many new things.

I love it.

But, it's killing my work ethic to get some article projects done.  I'm trying not to let that guilt ruin my pleasure, though.

My latest vice:

An Italian bakery tucked away on a side street near my house, that's been open since 1950.

Their foccaccia is divine, and sometimes they have day-old coffee cakes for half-off.

The first time I was in there, too, I got a zeppole, since it was close to St. Joseph's Day... The bakery has odd hours, but someone put up on Facebook that they had been there, so it put the thought in my head to head up there one afternoon on a day when I was working from home, so I went up there and got a zeppole to go with my afternoon coffee.

I need to limit myself, otherwise I'll be in there a lot getting stuff and then carb- and sugar-loading and packing on the pounds.

But I'm not embarrassed about "Rumours."

So, I've been treating myself to a used CD of something I really want, every time I finish off a writing project.

For the longest time, I'd been wanting to get Fleetwood Mac's "Rumours," only no project was coming to fruition.

Then, out of the blue I get mailed a hardcover copy of this collected essay volume that I'd banged out a piece for and had mostly forgotten about, even though like a month earlier I had emailed in my address to get my free complementary copy!

Saddly, the piece isn't my best, though I think it was a good idea to get it included and get my messaging out there, for whoever picks up the volume.  That said, I'm not advertising it on social media, since I'm kind of embarrassed about it.

But, I'm not embarrassed about "Rumours," which getting that volume let me buy, so I'm kind of happy that I wrote that dang essay.

Reflection of my one library coworker.

So, the other day I ran into my one library coworker who's very political, and who said that the recent presidential election "poisoned" her memories of growing up in rural Missouri.

I mentioned that some people I know recently heard Hillary talk, and that Hillary had said that she gets this reaction a lot, where women see her and start crying.

"I can see that," she was like, and she started talking about watching the livefeed from Wellesley on some cable news network when the election returns were going south, and the looks on the young women's faces...

Then, all of a sudden she broke off and was like, "Heck, I'm crying now, I have to go," and at that she scooted away.

Theatergoer next to me the other week.

So, the other week, this theater goer next to me was this (younger older) (white) woman with a very pleasant smile, and since it was a sold out show and I was cracking open a pack of gummy bears, I offered some to her.

"Oh thank you!", she was like.  "You read my mind!".

She then went on to say that she was newly retired from different food management jobs, and that "it's great."

Her daily routine, she added, is to paint in the morning, and then do whatever she wants the rest of the day, and she has been going to a lot of movies lately, especially "madcap" ones.

"If they're madcap," she was like, "I'm there."

She also said that she has a friend who has chronic pain and that that friend got assigned medical marijuana that comes in the form of gummy bears.

"I have a hard enough time stopping eating them now!", she was like.  "Can you imagine if they had pot in them?".

Someone I met the other week:

A guy named "Tusk."

He's originally from West Virginia, his parents were in the Hell's Angels and had a one-night stand, and they named him after the Fleetwood Mac album.

"Hell's Angels are into Fleetwood Mac?", I was like.

"Oh yeah," he was like, "Led Zeppelin too."

"That makes sense," I was like, "But Fleetwood Mac?  I have a hard time imagining Hell's Angels f*cking to 'Go Your Own Way.'"