Fond of rumpots, crackpots, and how are you, Mr. Wilson?

I have no idea what to say.

There are certain protocols that go along with returning to blogging after an extended absence: the "yeah, it's been a while since I last posted" shrug, the catch-up details on what's been going on, the indication that regular posting will/may recommence. (Apologies for any of the above are optional. Unless you're me, in which case bring on the wailing performative regret!) I've done a thousand reboot posts like that, and I am sick unto death of writing them because I always do them wrong, with all my mea culpas for things that don't need mea culpa-ing and all my promises with no stiff cardboard backing. All I know is that I've been wanting to get myself moving again on journaling for months, but have had no gumption to do so. hypnagogie just started up again with daily morning entries after a very long absence, however, so I'm going to borrow a cup of gumption from her and see how this goes.

The lack of initiative has largely been because Life decided to shake stuff up like a souvenir snow globe: first, I moved to Brunswick, Maine to be with hypnagogie on shorter notice than expected, to an apartment with a purple front door and its own washer-dryer. The good news is that the apartment is amazing, Brunswick is amazing, my life up there is amazing, no regrets. The bad news is that Maria Kondo-ing and packing up my accumulated worldly possessions had to happen VERY VERY QUICKLY, as did getting Nik off to Job Corps in Vermont, so March and April were downright gonzo-pants. Well, that and the other bad news that I'm still working in Lexington and the powers that be have denied us the possibility of working from home, so I get to commute 2 1/2 to 3 hours each way, five days a week, complete with Boston-area I-95 traffic both coming and going. That level of nonexistent work/life balance doesn't leave much brain-space for ruminations on, like, coffee cups or season 2 of Fleabag. (OMG watch Fleabag seriously because I can't even with the thing it's SO GOOD.)

So yes, I want to write, and no, I have no idea what to write about. I'm trying to remember that back in the day, lack of content was hardly a hindrance—behold, World, my lunch choices! Are you not entertained?! How on earth did I do this several times a day? It probably has something to do with being in my 30s, and/or having nothing better to do. Whatever. My apartment has a purple front door, my job has good free coffee, Fleabag is available for streaming, the sky is up there, the earth is down there, ob-la-di, ob-la-da. Meet back here tomorrow? Same time, same place?

I really need to find some way of getting my nostalgia gland unmired from the 1990's. I followed a link to a link to a link to a year-old slideshow ranking all 27 then-extant seasons (?!) of The Real World, and now I'm sitting here twitching like a live-birthed fawn because I so desperately want a copy of seasons 1 through 6 right flipping now before I explode in a cloud of MTV-colored viscera. (That'd be New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, London, Miami and Boston, in that order. And yes, from memory.) I mean, sure, I know The Real World led to Survivor and Survivor led to Big Brother and Big Brother will lead to the Apocalypse, but we didn't know that back then. I'm not even sure how the show managed to lodge itself in my consciousness to that degree, but lo, it did. And now, want. Covet. Gah.

For the record, the ranking gave six of the top nine slots to those six episodes, with San Francisco in the #1 spot. WHICH IS THE CORRECT ANSWER.

One of the great joys of interacting with loved ones? Instilling them with soul-crushing addictions that will haunt them for the remainders of their anguished lives. To wit:

* While on Kid Patrol for the weekend, Girl-child started humming a tune that sounded remarkably like Sousa's "Liberty Bell March," a.k.a. the "Monty Python's Flying Circus Theme Song." Naturally I joined in, which got me an odd stare, especially when I got to the foot-squish raspberry bit at the end. Turned out that she was in fact making it up as she went, and just happened to ITM a reasonable facsimile to the march (where "ITM" = "Infinite Typing Monkeys"). So being a geek father, I sat the kidlings down with the opening credits, followed by Parrot Sketch, then Ministry of Silly Walks, then Restaurant Sketch.... I know, I know, bad parental influence, but really, this part of their education should have started in infancy, which leaves me doing cleanup now.

* On Saturday, with kids still in tow, I showed up at the Game and Craft Day hosted by fiddle_dragon, zeyr and wired_lizard. The kids, having roughly the attention span of a Chihuahua on a double mocha java, soon found themselves bored, at which point fiddle_dragon came to the rescue with an offer to teach them how to sew a pillow. Girl-child finished hers in no time, then demanded a Ben Franklin's run for more fabric and batting, managing to kill off a second pillow by bedtime, which she immediately slept with. It's all downhill from here.

* Speaking of Game and Craft Day, I finally managed to bully talk figmentj into sitting in on a game of Dominion. Conventional wisdom said that she'd play a game, maybe not be too bored with it, but most importantly put my cajoling to rest once and for all. Instead, halfway through her game (we had enough cards for two simultaneous rounds), she wheeled around to glare at me with malice and implied stabby threats. An accusatory finger pointed in my direction. "By the way? I hate you."

It took me a moment to understand what she meant. "Ohhh, you're totally hooked, aren't you?"

"HATE. Haaaaaate." At which point she reshuffled and carried on. Ah, love, believe me, I know. Been there.

* On Saturday night, I showed the kidlings a few episodes of The Muppet Show. On Sunday afternoon, we ate dinner while Girl-Child punched up every Swedish Chef clip she could find on YouTube, one after the other. I've created a monster.