friday may 15

today i spent 10 minutes reading a twitter thread about how the adjective "quite" has opposite meanings in north america and england, a fact i'd never known before.

wednesday may 13

today i asked my girlfriend what her three favourite chip flavours are and was stunned and thrilled to confirm that our top-three lists are exactly the same (miss vickie's balsamic vinegar & sweet onion, ruffles all dressed, lays ketchup).

monday may 11

today i read an article that weighed whether jim dale or stephen fry is the better harry potter audiobook narrator. having never read the books before, i decided to take advantage of some extra free time during the pandemic to finally do so. however, with no easy access to the books, i opted for the audiobooks instead.

inexplicably, i waited until i was almost done the third book in the series to do my homework on the two different narrators. in doing so today, i was dismayed to learn that jim dale, the one i chose, is viewed as more whimsical, while fry's narration is considered to have more gravitas. i love gravitas! but after becoming so accustomed to dale's style after three books that i can immediately identify which character he's voicing, i just don't think i can justify switching mid-stream.

friday may 8

today i went to send a friend a link in google chat, pasting it and hitting enter all in one motion so that i didn't realize until it was too late that i'd sent the wrong link. this resulted in a split-second of horror as i realized i hadn't actually copied the link i'd meant to send and had essentially just played clipboard roulette with whatever text i'd previously copied. it was a real relief when i saw the link i'd mistakenly sent instead was just a harmless story about masai ujiri's draft history.

wednesday may 6

today i unplugged the power cord for my girlfriend's laptop temporarily, plugging it back in after about an hour when i finished using the outlet. hours later, when she went to turn her computer on and found it dead, we realized i'd mistakenly plugged in our stand mixer instead -- its power cord was right next to the one for her laptop and looked nearly identical.

while i felt a little bad about the mixup, the worst part came about 10 minutes later, when i heard her log onto a zoom call and describe my mistake in detail to her co-workers to explain why she was late to the meeting. everyone had a real good laugh at my expense, joking about how at least the stand mixer was good to go.

sunday may 3

today i was woken up extremely early by a combination of the neighbours upstairs playing a piano and my girlfriend angrily vowing to do something about it. our upstairs neighbours are always up and making noise incredibly early, but this piano and the accompanying floor stomps (pedals?) were new.

within about two minutes, we were dressed and had gone outside to knock on their door and register our concerns. while i'd suggested maybe giving it a few more minutes so we could think of exactly what we were going to say and so i could wake up a bit more, my girlfriend shut down that idea, retorting that it was actually good that i still looked half-asleep, since it was proof they'd woken me up with the noise. the neighbours were very apologetic, so maybe she was right.

friday may 1

today i was walking along a sidewalk in my neighbourhood when a child - maybe four or five years old - began running toward me. as someone who appreciates and abides by social-distancing rules, i was prepared to take action if necessary to ensure that he didn't get too close. still, i was relieved when his parents just started absolutely screaming "STOP!" at him, even if the urgency in their voices made me feel like i was some sort of widely-recognizable pedo.

thursday april 30

today i had five different people come to my house to drop things off or pick them up. it sort of felt like living in one of those sitcom apartments where people are just constantly dropping in whenever they feel like to hang out, except that no one could actually come inside.

monday april 27

today i had to extend my usual work shift by 10 minutes to finish up everything i needed to, since hearing alice deejay's "better off alone" on a spotify playlist with 30 minutes left in my day had prompted me to watch electric circus youtubes for the next half-hour.

sunday april 26

today i watched furious 7 as part of my ongoing efforts to become a 'fast guy'. upon finishing the movie, i wished i'd somehow not known about paul walker's death, since i feel as if - without that knowledge - the kayfabe-breaking ending would have come off as some of the most surreal moments ever put on film.

thursday april 23

today i caught a minute or two of the very end of an episode of family feud, which featured a fast-money question that asked 100 people to name something a woman owns that has a strap. when steve harvey announced that the contestant's answer - a bra - earned a score of 51, my girlfriend earnestly said, "wow, that was probably the number one answer."

monday april 20

today i asked my girlfriend to teach me how to use a hairpin.

friday april 17

today i received an email from an acquaintance that was sent to me and one other person (a stranger). the level of familiarity in the email - which expressed excitement for an upcoming tv show that i had no reason to be excited about - clearly indicated it wasn't meant to be sent to me, which i thought the other two people on the thread would realize in short order. instead, they sent two additional reply-all messages to discuss the upcoming show. each time i received another one of these messages, i weighed whether i should say something to alert them that they were sending them to the wrong person, or if i should keep assuming they'd figure it out. i still haven't said anything, and now i feel like they're waiting for me to contribute to the thread with my thoughts on the show's trailer.

tuesday april 14

today i played crash team racing nitro-fueled with my girlfriend, who got so upset after doing poorly in two or three races in a row that she heatedly demanded i "email them" (presumably the game designers?) for an explanation.

monday april 13

today i was relieved to receive an email from iracing.com which said, "we were unable to process your subscription renewal." although i never actually subscribed to the site, a luke adams from kentucky did and mistakenly(?) used my email address during his registration. the monthly auto-renew confirmation emails i'd previously received were from an automated/unmonitored iracing.com email address, and it wasn't as if my credit card was being charged, so i'd decided the simplest course of action was to ignore those messages. but it'll be nice not to get them at all anymore.

sunday april 12

today i watched training day (2001) for the first time. watching it was not unlike recently seeing the first fast and the furious for the first time -- in each case, i felt as if i'd gotten to know the movie so well over the years from jokes, tweets, memes, and off-hand comments that i didn't expect to watch it for the first time and be like, "wait, this is what happens in this movie?"

thursday april 9

today i was called out by my girlfriend for wearing a "fully stained outfit" (separate food stains on my shirt and pants) when we were about to join a zoom session.

tuesday april 7

today i was thinking about going to bed when i began to hear a persistent - and unsettling - scraping noise that seemed to be coming from the unfinished utility closet off of our bathroom. fearing the worst, i scanned my office for some sort of weapon before i went to investigate, ultimately settling for a cardboard box that i hoped could be thrown over anything that might have found its way into the closet.

after going into the bathroom, closing the door behind me, and steeling myself for a confrontation, i swung open the closet and watched in horror as some sort of mouse-rat creature beneath the floor drain clawed at the grate in an apparent attempt to get up through it. it kept at it for several seconds even as i got nearer and tentatively attempted to bang my box against the floor to scare it away.

after the creature finally headed back underground, i quickly went and grabbed an old bowl that fit more comfortably atop the grate. while i was comforted that the thing's potential point of entry seemed to be cut off and that the sound didn't start up again, it was another two hours before i could actually fall asleep.

monday april 6

today i celebrated my birthday at home. while it certainly wasn't the first time i'd ever done that, it was the first time since reaching adulthood that i'd been able to do it without feeling a little bad about not having made grander plans.

sunday april 5

today i watched my girlfriend tear up with joy when our goodfood delivery arrived on time after not showing up at all last week.