Les Bonnes Choses

I've got my mac mini hooked up to our TV and A/V receiver, letting me watch ill-gotten television programming, and, more importantly, get big sound out of my mp3 collection. Currently shuffling through my Top-Rated playlist (I am anal enough to go to the trouble of ranking my music), iTunes recently played a song off of The Cure's Disintegration album, and I was suddenly quite aware of being alone. Now, The Cure is not the most upbeat band in the world, but this album instills me with a particular sort of melancholy because I filled my parents' otherwise empty house with its tracks in the summer of 1991 when I took OAC Biology in summer school while the rest of the family went to the cottage (my choice).

Ten days ago, the rest of the family went back to London to spend the rest of August in more familiar territory while I got things in order. Not just the house, mind you. For those of you not keeping track, I've had quite a list of things to do in order to get on track here. For my family's sake, some of these things, such as this weekend's fMRI scan session downtown at CAMRI, involving both Amy and I, are probably best done during this time. In the future, I'll be doing scanning without Amy, leaving the possibility that she can keep Rebecca company if she's free.

Most nights have concluded with Rebecca calling me via Skype from her dad's laptop. As we both have webcams, it's been nice to be able to see and talk to each other. And I occasionally get a quick hello and silly grin from Jude, when he's not having a meltdown or fighting with his cousins. But at the end of the day, all I really want to be able to do is pick my little guys up and give them big hugs.

Fortunately, iTunes has now shuffled along to some insipid 90's dance music that reminds me of running the gauntlet of London dance bars in the summer of '95 -- not an especially glorious time, but fond memories nonetheless. So I'll finish up on this upbeat note, and perhaps practice the running man in the living room with the curtains drawn.