Yesterday was an absolute blast. I usually don't like being outdoors, and I usually don't enjoy being social with groups of coworkers (even very nice entertaining ones like the ones here), but despite these strikes against it the offsite was a wonderful time. In a way it reminds me of the baby shower; I keep really enjoying things that I expect to be awful. What's up with this?

But the offsite. We hung out in Shoreline park, sitting on blankets and listening to music. I talked with Susan (a newish QA person) about books and Sailor Moon and comics in general, and eventually Eric and Moria sat down and joined us, while the other developers played Frisbee and yelled to each other in Hindi. Eventually the four of us went out on the lake in a paddleboat; I sat in the back of the boat, wrapped up against the wind in one of Moria's blankets and made cheerful conversation about the lake and the birds and the various kids out windsurfing and in sailboats. The kids kept waving to us and asking us how we were, which was sweet, and I liked waving back. It was very calm.

Right around when we started getting pretty tired and hungry we saw the food arrive, so we went back to shore (having used up our rental hour almost exactly) and fed. After lunch was the sunset meeting, a chance to discuss the project we'd just finished and how it went and what needed to be fixed for next time. I was expecting this to be a frustrating meeting filled with gloom and despair, as that's how the last two were, but instead this was pretty optimistic and cool. The amount of stuff we're now doing right is so satisfying that identifying the problems wasn't very painful. Now we know we can actually fix things, given time. Plus all the problems seem so small in comparison to the kinds of things we were running into back in January... it's so good to have made progress.

The sunset lasted a few hours, and then we played a few games of Mafia (those rules are close but not identical to the ones we used), which despite my worry ended up being a lot of fun. We played three games, and in retrospect I'm surprised by how involved I was in all of them; I even moderated the third. I guess it's times like these that make it difficult for people to believe I'm fairly shy.

So. That was the offsite. When I got home I realised I'd gotten a sunburn, which I think is a rare thing for me. It's certainly very painful, and I spent most of yesterday evening during gaming (we played Outpost, having not the right people for Ahrounquest or Civ) and a lot of today wandering into the bathroom to put noxzema on it, which both helps the pain and theoretically keeps it from drying out so I don't peel. All this sunburn lore I'm learning is quite entertaining, but I do wish it weren't so immediately relevant.

Keely will be here soon! In fact, Marith is probably picking her up at the airport even as I type. She's visiting her parents in Irvine for a while, so she's flying up to hang out with us this weekend. Usually she's in Baltimore, so we don't see her very often, although eventually she'll finish being a grad student and move out here to live. I should go home and spend some time letting my brain dribble pleasantly out of my ears before she arrives. A bunch of us (Jim and I, Keely, Marith, Chrisber, Trip) are doing out to dinner somewhere nice, and then back to my place to play Mythos. I'm really looking forward to dinner, although a little less than I was because I'd hoped to go to St. Michael's Alley and it turns out they're closed tonight.

Last time Keely was here I was deeply inspired to write, although not much really came of it. It'd be nice if I got that inspiration again; I can't figure out what's stopping me. Fear? I don't buy the 'If you don't write it's because you don't care enough.' I care. I'm just not ready yet to actually do it, and I want to figure out why so I can fix it.