If you asked me what happened in September 2024 and I answered without looking at my calendar, I’d say nothing much. My mom was hospitalized for pretty much the whole month (with any luck she’ll go home tomorrow) with idiopathic colitis that seems to have gotten better but was never explained.

But if I look at my calendar, I see that it was actually a full month with a lot of fun stuff going on. So here we go!

Fun

Our local Bricks & Minifigs had their grand opening. W. and I took M. and his best friend. My brother joined us, too. The line was long and it was sunny, but eventually we got in and I got what I had come for: Kermit and Miss Piggy minifigures. W. won the raffle grand prize, which is a Back to the Future Time Machine set signed by the Broadway cast of Back to the Future. I’m torn because this is a set I really want to build but I know building it will ruin any collector value it has, so. I don’t know. I guess maybe I’ll buy the set separately sometime? I also got a couple of the D&D Minifig surprise bags.

W. and I went to see [Clue Live On Stage](https://clueliveonstage.com/, which was incredibly fun. It’s got all your favorite stuff from the movie, and lots of other jokes that you can only do in live theater.

A family we’ve known for a while since their kid and M. have been in school together hosted a Chilean Independence Day party, which was very fun to go to. And I remembered that I don’t need to try Pisco Sour again because it is way too strong for me.

W.’s mom wanted to take M. to Paperhand Puppet’s annual show, so we all went along with M.’s best friend and his dad. The artistry of these giant puppets is incredible and I loved seeing how clever they were doing things like having bubbles come out of fishes’ mouths. The scale of those puppets is not to M.’s liking so I don’t think we’ll go next year, but I do hope to see them at a fairy festival or something sometime because they’re very cool to look at.

My friend K. and I have been playing epistolary RPGs, which are great because he lives in another state. We just have a shared Google Doc to play in. First we played The Only Amenity in This Endless Dungeon is a Daemonic Postal Service and then we started Tether.

Work

We had Back to School Night, where caregivers come and learn a bit about how their kids’ days go and what to expect over the course of the school year. My role was to hang out in the library and chat with the grown-ups who wanted to learn more about the library. It was really great to meet everyone and talk with them about their kids’ use of the library. One parent expressed interest in volunteering in the library, so I’m in the process of getting that set up.

Another parent who has been volunteering in the library for years really started working in earnest once I finally figured out what would be most helpful for her to do, and that has melted away tons of stress I had about not being able to get everything done in 20 hours a week. Is it still enough work for a full-time position? Of course it is, but at least now I can focus my attention on the things only I can do, like instructional support, collaboration, and collection development.

Speaking of instructional support, I put together both print and digital resources for the 1st & 2nd year (equivalent of 1st & 2nd grade) classes about North American animals. This is a fun way for me to learn about what’s already in our collection. I also pulled together statistics about things kids were interested in for a 4th year rounding lesson, which it sounds like the kids really enjoyed.

Stress

There’s been one big source of stress, which is that in August I took my and W.’s watches to get their batteries replaced, as a little anniversary gift left over from our anniversary in July (15 years modern gift is watches but we both already had great watches, hence watch batteries) and the glass on W.’s limited edition Mr. Jones Sun and Moon Miyamoto watch got broken. The store employee told me they’d send it to a jeweler and have it ready in a few days. I didn’t hear from them and after a month, I finally went back and asked about it. The store employee took my name down and said he’d look into it and call me. Two more weeks went by and I had no word, so Monday I went down there and was ready to just ask them to give me the watch and I’d take it to a jeweler. But they tracked it down, I laid eyes on it, they corrected my phone number because the original person had written it down wrong, and then they called me later to confirm it was at the jeweler. So here’s hoping that gets resolved soon.

Media

I read 6 books, a bit of a slow down from earlier in the year but what can you do? When you go from unemployed to employed, your reading is going to slow down a bit.

W. and I have been watching the new season of Only Murders in the Building. We watched the latest season of Hilda as a family and finished up a Gravity Falls family watch, too.

My brother and I saw Beetlejuice Beetlejuice in the theater. Beetlejuice is such a critically formative piece of media for me. There was no way its sequel could hold a candle to it in terms of having a place in my heart. But I think they did a great job. It’s super fun and I think has exactly the vibes that a 35-years-later sequel to Beetlejuice should. Also I love our Baby Goth Queen Jenna Ortega.

I played a little bit of Dragon Age: Origins but once my mom was super extra sick, I didn’t want something that intense, so I’ve been playing Disney Dreamlight Valley, which pleases me greatly.
Whew. That’s enough that I think maybe it’s time for me to start doing weeknotes instead of monthnotes.

How was your September?