My husband has this habit of watching the same movies over and over again. He will get into a groove with a certain movie on HBO and watch it like sixteen times in a week. The Descendants and Jersey Boys are two that come to mind. Lately, it’s been Gone Girl and The Fault in Our Stars. This habit drives me crazy, but yet I will sometimes sit there and get sucked in too.

The other night we were watching The Fault in Our Stars for only the second or third time. I wondered aloud what the title meant. (I haven’t read the book.) There was a pause, then we said at the same time, “Sounds like Shakespeare.”

Sure enough:

“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars/ But in ourselves.”

— from Julius Caesar

So now we know. The movie is about two terminally ill teens who fall in love and also travel to Amsterdam to visit this asshole of an author. Then one of them dies. Even though I have sat through some of the movie four or sixteen times now, I still haven’t seen the whole thing, so that’s all I can tell you.

Although this is like a three-hanky movie for my husband, I find it generally annoying and cloying. While we were watching the other night, Hazel vowed to the imminently dying Gus, “You will be remembered! I will remember you!”

“For the two weeks that I outlive you!” I added.

“You have a cold, cold heart,” sniffled my husband, throwing the Kleenex box at me.

Speaking of illness, my cold finally went away, and Friday was the best day of last week. I took my sons and their friend to a place called Crow’s Woods. I know I said there was not much left to discover around here, but somehow I never knew this place existed until the other day when my son found it online. It’s 50 acres of woods that has four or five trails of varying length. The longest is around two miles, maybe? We really enjoyed it and I would love to go back in the fall.

There was also a big community garden outside the entrance to the woods.

After the woods, we went home and changed to go to the pool. It was a great day at the pool with friends 🙂

Saturday, I had to get ready to host my nephew’s 2nd birthday party on Sunday. My husband and I ended up really going nuts, even cleaning windows, like getting out the ladder and cleaning the outside. It felt great. I decluttered the front of the fridge, the top of the fridge, the top of the rolling cart. Sunday, I “decluttered” the top of the microwave (swept everything off of it into a container and hid it). My husband even finally hung up the curtains I bought off a Facebook yard sale months ago. I had unused hardware from some other curtain rod that I had spray painted silver, and my husband came home one day with a rod and finials that someone had given him (homeowners at his job sites are always giving him their extra stuff).

So everything looks good and feels streamlined in here right now. But I know I could go through again and purge even more stuff.

The party was a good time and all the kids thoroughly enjoyed themselves. I made sure we all ate the leftovers today. Doing my part to avoid food waste by finishing off the Friendly’s Ice Cream Roll right now. It was a stress-free, pizza-and-cake party.

All in all it was a great weekend, and I even got to sit out back and chill a little bit, each night.

But today I drew out a calendar of August and all the s— that has to get done, for real, no more stalling. It made me feel better. It can be done. And I got a few things done today.

By the way, I was so tempted to go out to eat or get fast food tonight, since we went to the pool late in the day. But I resisted and came home and cooked, and I would like my medal now.