Weeknotes: January 19–23, 2026
Monday, January 19
I dream intensely, though when I wake, I can't remember any details. While the dark recedes, I stand with my coffee at the window, watching a snow squall whip down the street. Today is Martin Luther King Jr. Day — no work or school, though I end up devoting time to both.
In the afternoon, I drive into town to buy ink cartridges for my printer. Arctic winds shoulder my little car as I try to stay in my lane amid the blowing snow. Minutes later, sunlight pierces my dirty windshield — it's a day of extremes.
Weeknotes: December 29, 2025–January 2, 2026
Monday, December 29 – Friday, January 2
Silver days and cozy nights. The illness that tugged at my throat just before Christmas reached its crescendo on Sunday, then persisted to a lesser degree through the new year. It ran parallel to a week of dazzling snowstorms, reminding me of childhood winters, sledding hills, and runny noses. I always seemed to have a cold during the holiday break. I even spent a night in my boyhood bedroom, house-sitting for my parents, re-examining my hometown, and hiking snowy segments of the Penosha Trail. I bushwacked my way to the reedy edge of Deidrich Lake, frozen over like I remembered it, though not enough for skating. The next morning I stood on the high ridge above Mt. Suicide, a classic thinking spot from my earnest teenage years.
New Year's Eve, stepping from the ambient glow of Andy's bar into the December hush to find the Frog Island pathway draped in a mat of virgin snow. That's how you start a new year — you make your mark on a blank page. My footprints mirrored the river then crossed over it at my favorite bridge. At home I hugged my pets and said good riddance to a year of tumult and chaos.
Weeknotes: January 6–10, 2025
Monday January 6
Outside the giant home decor superstore shreds of yellow caution tape flap like pennants, suggesting unknown drama. Scant cars punctuate the desolate parking lot. Grim is the word that comes to mind. In Chris Frantz's Talking Heads memoir (which I've stuck with, and am now enjoying) he recalls how Johnny Ramone used that word over and over to describe their shared 1977 tour of Europe ("Oh shit, man, this is gonna be grim").
I don't go to this store very often. It's one of those wastelands of excess that makes me feel edgy and cynical. It's like a blander Pier 1 without any curation, a shelter for the world’s decorative vases and wicker plant stands to live out their days in a heady fug of candle store aroma. I'm in the market for new bathroom rugs that will pair well with the tricky seafoam walls and faux driftwood floor covering I inherited when I rented the house. Last winter I spontaneously bought a complete set of grass green rugs and matching towels which I pretended to like for a couple days before recognizing I'd turned my bathroom into a 1980s Holiday Inn. January is when I'm most inclined to tackle these problems. Aren't we all working on our interiors this time of year?