there was originally going to be a central topic, i promise

You know you're on the right track when you're evaluating potential baby names based on how easy it would be to teach the kid to say it like a Pokemon when they're two.

We have our priorities in order here.

It feels like my to-do list has exploded in the last few weeks between baby stuff, student journal edits beginning, and various other tasks, but my energy level has yet to catch up. Everyone says you're supposed to get your energy back in the second trimester? Lies.

In all the chaos, a few good things have been growing. It has been months since I last touched the transcription of my hand-written first draft, but I picked it up again this weekend. As guilty as I feel for abandoning these characters for so long, it's encouraging to find that I'm still as invested and interested in them and their story as I remember being. I might be 60 by the time I consider it to be anywhere close to readable, but hey, if I'm not writing for my own enjoyment first, then what's the rush?

Fall has indisputably arrived here, a double-edged sword for me. I love the cooler weather and the colors that come when the leaves change, but the lingering darkness in the morning is also a reminder of winter to come. You really can't beat the sunsets though.

I've been looking into online editing sites as a potential form of employment that I can fill once I'm home-bound. It's a side project that I really ought to be spending more time on, though this current application is really tripping me up. There is a long list of poor job application questions that have been and continue to be asked, but I swear this one takes the cake. To be fair, based on the rest of the questions, I feel like this company is going for "fun and playful," but knowing that doesn't make it any easier for me to answer this: What is your unfair advantage? Now, I had a horrendously difficult time writing those short little self-promoting essays that all college applications seem to require. Why would this be any easier? I struggle enough with modest self-promotion, but this feels like they're encouraging you to be completely pretentious. The kicker is, you know there's a line here between "appropriately pretensions" and "well, you're just full of yourself," and I have no idea where it is. Am I allowed to edit your application process? Because I would just remove this question outright. What's the weirdest/worst thing you've ever been asked on a job application or in an interview?

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to go see a movie for the first time in forever before attempting to wedge our current couch through the narrow birth canal of our hallway into the second bedroom in order to fit new furniture into the living room tomorrow. If you come over in the next few weeks and see a large, tarp-covered, sofa-shaped object in the kitchen where our table usually is, just pretend with us that we succeeded.