Back in the olden days of the internet, “currently” and “around here” posts were popular with us personal bloggers. Many of us published one (or both) of these posts once every month or two. Sometimes these posts were used as filler when we didn’t have anything else to blog about at the moment, or when a more meaty blog post wasn’t ready yet.

A lot of us also used “currently” and “around here” posts to document the details of our daily life at that point in time—many of us were moms with babies and toddlers and used our blogs as a creative outlet and a documenting/memorykeeping tool. These posts were also a way to connect with each other and share things we were excited about or inspired by before social media and influencing took over and diluted the experience.

I loved reading other bloggers’ “currently” and “around here” posts, and I loved sharing my own. Now that I’m back to personal blogging à la the olden days of the internet, I figured it’s time to reintroduce the “currently” genre/series here. Here are some things currently happening in my life.

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COUNTING down the days (210) till season two of Severance. 

DELIGHTING in a Lindt LINDOR dark chocolate truffle before bed every night. 

DREAMING of living in a home that has laundry and a dishwasher and an HVAC system. Or even just one of those things. Imagine how much money and time and how many (metaphorical) spoons I’d save if I didn’t have to (1) wake up before sunrise every Sunday to make sure I get to the laundromat early enough to snag a washer and dryer and (2) fork over $10.25 per a load of laundry. Or if I didn’t have to wash every fucking dish and utensil by hand. Or if my home had heat and/or air in every room instead of only one (heat (which have only in the living room) or none (AC). A DREAM.

ENJOYING the few weeks of regular weather and temperatures Portland will get after a scorching-hot summer and before it turns wet and cloudy and cold for months and months on end. (For those who are unfamiliar: the 11 seasons of Oregon.)

EXPERIMENTING with drying bouquets. The internet told me to tie the stems tightly with twine (check) and hang the bouquet upside-down (check) in a dark space (check). The dark space, the internet says, is essential to keeping color. This bouquet is one I made at a flower arranging class over the summer. I tied it tightly with twine and hung it upside-down in our very dark and very tiny coat closet that’s home to many things, none of which are coats. This photo was taken several weeks later. I love how vibrant the colors still are.

FINISHING up my first-ever block of conjugate training. Given how incredibly boring I generally find powerlifting to be, I’m surprised by how much I’m enjoying. I think the variability and the novelty that it adds are keeping me interested.

LISTENING (again) to the podcast I Said No Gifts, which might just be my all-time favorite podcast, from the beginning. Bridger is so fucking funny.

LOOKING for a local shop to buy an old-school (and functional!) Walkman from. It’s the only thing my ninth-grader asked for for his birthday—I can’t not come through. (I’m also looking for at least one local repair shop that would be able to fix the thing if it broke.)

LOVING the end-of-summer bouquet I bought myself this week. (The flowers in this bouquet were grown and arranged by the same flower farmer and florist who grew and arranged the flowers in the gorgeous bouquet I brought to the Howells a few weeks ago. (Yes, I plan to dry this bouquet, too.)

MISSING running and hiking. Still/always. I recently found all my old race bibs while digging through boxes looking for something else, and I’ve been working on finishing up a hiking-related memorykeeping project, so that feeling has been especially acute lately.

MOURNING the hours of daylight fall has stolen (stolen!!!) from us (me, personally!!!). 

PREPARING to add weightlifting back into my training beginning Monday. I’m so goddamn excited. (This means I’ll have six barbell sessions a week—four powerlifting sessions and two weightlifting sessions. Mondays and Thursdays will have both a powerlifting and a weightlifting session. Tuesdays and Fridays will be just powerlifting.)

REALIZING that bouldering is much more challenging and difficult than I thought it was going to be. Am I even cut out for it? TBD.

STRESSING about—what else?—the election. 

TAKING photos for a new project I’ve dreamt up that was inspired by two different projects by two fellow local Redditors.

TRYING to get back into a regular memorykeeping routine with a weekly-ish Project Life album. 

WAITING (very impatiently!) for the two rolls of film I dropped off last week to be developed. Both rolls were from disposable cameras—one from nearly 20 years ago when my oldest was a toddler (the waterproof one) and another shot by my youngest a few summers ago. Will any of the photos on the oldest roll turn out? Who knows! I can’t wait to find out.

WANTING to visit Hopscotch Portland. 

WONDERING who will headline Warped Tour 2025. My vote always and forever is for blink-182. 

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Of the bloggers I used to follow and admire and find inspiration from, Elise is the only one who’s kept her blog up, though she no longer blogs (she fully quit the internet last year). To get a better idea of these types of posts, you can browse through her old “currently” and “around here” posts here (click or tap “older posts” at the bottom of the page to keep browsing).