…and Ysabel wanted under the covers. Took me a while to get to sleep considering the new room arrangement (funny thing, hotels don’t bother me)…but it works great.

The koi were too cold to eat this morning. They were down at the bottom not moving, but warmed up and wanted lunch.

We still haven’t heard from Lynn, who is trying to recover from a double dose of the flu (a regular flu shot atop swine flu)…what luck!

And Jane organized my spice cabinet. Well, we may have some interesting recipes for a while, but it looks great.

Besides, cinnamon and clove go great on beef. You just have to think Mediterranean/Middle East. I’m actually rather fond of it.

And we are being so good: my kitchen is re-messed due to the cabinet re-arrangement, but not badly; and we are otherwise keeping the place immaculate. This is honestly the first time we haven’t lived as if we were on the move in…well, since 1970-something, when I moved inside Oklahoma City and never quite got unpacked: one big box I just threw out, since I hadn’t needed anything for a year and I figured anything in there couldn’t be that necessary. But that’s no way to organize things.

Then Jane moved down with her household. Then we moved to the house next door. Then we moved to Spokane, and used as many as four storerooms at once trying to manage our stuff and our records.

Then we got the house—but we just hit the ground running, trying to make deadlines, and we never have gotten unpacked, which by now dates all the way back to the 80’s…

So now I can say my room is unpacked. Jane’s room is unpacked. And the kitchen is unpacked. The bathroom is sort of unpacked.

We have the office, the living room…and…shudder…the basement/craft area/library/and baggage, not to mention the garage yet to go. But we’re gaining on it. We have sincere hopes that by totally having a place for everything and everything in its place, we will stop shifting chaotic stacks of things about from place to place and actually have some relaxation time, where, if we want something, we’ll know exactly where it is.

That means files in order. Shudder.