Oh, my dear little librarian. You pile up enough tomorrows, and you'll find you are left with nothing but a lot of empty yesterdays. I don't know about you, but I'd like to make today worth remembering.
- from The Music Man (thanks, Katie!)

Or ...

The cheese dances in the park after the seance.
(Thanks, Rachel. We'll come back to this one in a few months.)

Today's been a dramatic day. Wedding things are happening, and I did not participate as much as I would have liked thanks to an icky blood-sugar crash that knocked me out of commission for a while. I don't know why, but even after things level out, I'm always incredibly tired. I just didn't bounce back afterwards. Lots of sleep tonight for me; there are dragons to slay tomorrow.

I'm in Atlanta, helping coordinate Jim and Tracey's (AKA 4x4 and Spitty's)
wedding. Here's what I've been up to:

I'm in Atlanta, recovering from helping coordinate Jim and Tracey's (AKA 4x4 and
Spitty's) wedding. Then a flight to Detroit for the Super Secret Mission. Here's what I've been up to:

I'm in Detroit, teaching a class to librarians. Can we say 'learning experience'? Here's what I've been up to:

I'm in Colorado, doing random Drupal work. Here's what I've been up to:

I'm in Colorado, doing random Drupal work. Here's what I've been up to:

I'm in Colorado, doing random Drupal work. Here's what I've been up to:

It ends with a shiny new Detroit terminal, and the most expensive rental car you've ever arranged for. You pass the giant tire, a covered-up Ferris wheel that seems strangely metaphorical for this collapsing city, into one of the strangest urban areas your home country has to offer.

You are keenly aware that you are absolutely alone, and you know you have fewer than twelve hours to call this whole ridiculous set of shenanigans off.  You are not a teacher; you are the daughter of one, and you ran screaming from that profession as far as your geeky, chubby legs could carry you.

You finish the first day and those wings, they vanish like they've never been and you land, carefully, gingerly, in your sandals on your injured left foot. You call two of your oldest and most absent friends, who are in a genteel suburb a little to your west, and agree that dinner should be later rather than sooner.

You would never have told them ahead of time that the prospect of taking kids to the zoo terrified you, and you were glad later that you did not because paradoxically, it was easy, and the clouds were even kind enough to finish their business early enough to allow you time to play outside.

A few hours later you recognize the familiarity of the geeky-auntie role. You have painted Zoë's fingernails bright blue, and in a move that will shock and amuse many of your local friends, photographic evidence of a toddler sitting in your lap (by choice!) has been gathered.

Denver comes with a blast of dry air and a welcome-back nosebleed. You call vaguely-new netfriends and get an offer of electrons and wi-fi from his place of business. You pick up a rental car that cost a fourth of your Detroit rental and head through industrial Denver for a temporary place to roost.

The 'neon' series chronicles furlough #1 not as it was, but how it felt. Start with 'neon : peachtree street' and read forward. Those of you with a literal bent might want to couple those entries with the twitterlog for the trip, which starts with this entry from Friday.

I made my final decision regarding drupalcon Paris this morning. In the time since I've known about the location of the event I've gone back and forth on the question until it felt like madness and whiplash. Do I spend the money? Is it worth it? How will I explain to my friends? Am I right to burn vacation days on this madness?

Until this morning, I had plausible deniability and weasel words.  "I think I'm going," I would say. "Not sure, though."