Jim got home shortly after I finished yesterday's entry and told me amusing tales of gaming. I was laying around on the couch devouring The Phoenix Guards rapidly, but forced myself to put the book aside to talk to him. I'd promised him dinner and a movie, so we tossed around plans. I was feeling pretty tired despite all the sleep I'd had, and still frustrated about Might and Magic VII, so I kept closing my eyes and un-enthusing. To pass time while I rested Jim started playing with some glittery blue nail polish I'd bought. Next thing I knew he'd dug up some old nail polish my stepmom had given me about ten years ago and was busily testing colours on his pilot case. He's been quietly coveting one of the purple cases from PalmColors for a few weeks, so this wasn't altogether surprising. I perked up to watch him play, and next thing I knew I was messing with nail polish, and by the end of it Jim had painted my nails a very intense glittery blue, and the back half of his pilot was a magenta that didn't work as well over the dark-grey case as we'd hoped. It was really nice, though, to just lie back and let him fuss over my hands and enjoy feeling cared about.

Once my nails were dry I took a quick shower, and then we went to Clarke's for dinner. I had the beef corn dogs, just like I hoped, and also some wonderful crunchy onion rings. We ate really slowly, but even so still had a lot of time between dinner and the 2135 movie. Jim has been wanting to take me to Cost Plus for a while, and it was nearby, so we stopped in and I ended up getting completely sucked in. It's a sort of yuppie import store, with wicker and candles and garden ornaments and -- most interestingly -- wine and food. I spent a long time staring at the fruit wines and ended up picking up three different ones; a bottle of Chaucer's plum wine, a bottle of cherry, and a bottle of something black curranty. Jim got a bottle of a kosher-for-passover muscat to bring to Harold's next year, which should be neat.

Reading that you'd think we drank a lot, wouldn't you? Except we don't; we have a ton of alcohol and we hardly ever drink it. I love the interesting tastes and the complexities, but I hate the fuzzy feeling and the loss of control that implies, so it's just not worth it to me to drink much or often.

After the wines at Cost Plus we headed for the import food. I was pretty restrained, but still ended up with a bunch of stuff; rose-petal and quince jelly, wildflower honey, weird processed cheese, a jar of autumn chutney, a small packet of dutch mints, and two sampler packs of Yamamotoyama teas. I carefully avoided buying huge amounts of chocolate, and passed up a lot of interesting looking sauces and oils because I haven't been cooking enough to really justify that.

We took it all home and then went to the movie -- we'd decided on Shakespeare in Love, since it's more likely to vanish soon, and also conveniently nearby in the cheap theatre in Cupertino. It was just as good as everyone had told me it was, so good it really almost hurt. I walked out thinking I could never, ever see it again, that it'd just crack me open wide if I tried, and now I'm thinking of all the scenes that hurt and how much I want to see it again, because even though it was painful it was also breathtaking, and the second time through I can appreciate the craft of it much more because I won't be so focused on knowing how it ends.

I drove home still mostly in shock, talking to Jim about it in bits and pieces and really happy but overwhelmed. Once we were inside the house Jim opened the cherry wine, and that was incredibly nice. It reminds me of the deep layered cherry I get from a good merlot, but without the complexity, like someone had separated out all the flavours I find in merlot and made a bottle of just this one thread. We shared two glasses while I lay on the couch finally finishing The Phoenix Guards and Jim painted the front of his pilot case with the blue glitter. I slowly got settled from the movie -- the wine helped and so did the really excellent book -- and crawled into bed happy.

Today has mostly just been sleeping so far, then getting up and being nervous about group tonight. It seems like no matter what I do fate conspires against me so that there are huge gaps of time between sessions every time I finally get comfortable. No matter how tonight goes I'll only have one or two more sessions before I miss at least one again to go to Chicago for a week. Sometimes I really want to just give up, but every time I feel that way I remind myself of how good it can be and grit my teeth and do it.

I've been sort of wandering bookless today; I really want more Brust, but I don't own a copy of Five Hundred Years After, and I'm not sure I want to rush out and buy one if I can borrow it from someone. Instead I glanced through a bunch of my library books, and have finally picked up The Time of the Ghost, a really good Diana Wynne Jones book that I first read several years ago. I liked it just as much this time around, and was completely taken in by all the plot twists and turns. One thing that amused me on rereading is that this time I was painfully aware of just how screwed up the family in the book is, whereas the first time around I don't think I really noticed. I do keep running into things like this, internal shifts that change what I see in all sorts of external things, and it's making me humble in a really useful way. How can anyone ever feel like they understand the entirety of something when viewpoints can alter so easily?

Okay, that's a nice thing to think about, and it fits in nicely to a Usenet discussion I've been reading about people who do and don't reread books. I am, as you may have noticed, a devout rereader -- but a rereader who has to shower now and then go to group. Jim is going to Tien's birthday party tonight, which should be fun for him. I'm a little sad I'm not able to go, but Jim's promised me a full report which should make up for it some.