ten good things

1. NEW HORN CASE NEW HORN CASE NEW HORN CASE. I have been meaning to get one for Literally Years -- basically since I got this horn, in fact -- because my horn... doesn't actually fit... in the case that was supplied with it... such that I had to remove a slide every time I put it away, and this massively raised the barrier to doing practice at home. More recently, the zips have been gradually giving up. SO. On Saturday A accompanied me on an exciting adventure to Paxman, whose step-free entrance is hilariously locked up at weekends so Everybody Learned Something, and I now own a case that (a) my horn fits in, (b) has working zips, (c) fits on my lap much better for wheelchairing, and (c) is BLUE. Detachable-bell, space for a mute, I totally failed to spot it on the website, props to Paxman for pointing it out to me (it was actually slightly cheaper than the thing I'd gone in expecting to buy).
   
2. Because Borough Market is right there if you've visited Paxman, we had excellent fresh pasta for lunch (I had the pumpkin and ricotta tortelloni; they were brilliant). Further inspiration for the Surprise Charity-Shop Pasta Machine, etc. I just looked up how to make tortelloni.
   
3. On Sunday I finally got around to adjusting Lightweight Wheelchair: I'd extremely belatedly spotted that the pushrims were on the wider of their two settings, and if I moved them on to the narrower the chair would probably need slightly less finessing to get through the front door. However, changing the setting involved removing the tyres and inners and both layers of rim tape, so I didn't get around to it until Sunday afternoon (sat on the picnic bench on the decking in the sunshine, with the patio doors open). I only holed one of the inners, promptly remembered that set of tyre levers always does that, and added them to the charity-shop pile! The chair fits through the door comfortably! My wrists are still somewhat sore (my hand strength isn't great and these are Schwalbe Marathon Plus on 1" rims, okay), but I am pretty pleased with myself, and with finally living somewhere that all my chairs are actually trivially usable. Give or take getting another cushion so I don't gotta swap them around as much.
   
4. I absolutely adore The Ruin of Angels (the latest in Max Gladstone's Craft Sequence, the first five books are available as an ebook omnibus for under a tenner, highly recommended) to the point that I'm researching what the blue mineral most likely to be local to Kavekana is so I can Have A Relevant Theological Necklace. (I'm gravitating toward sodalite, but have tweeted the author to ask...) (... and he hasn't responded but I did on Etsy find an Exactly Correct pendant bead so, er, whoops? Whoops.)
   
5. I am having Feelings about the latest Check, Please! and partnership and mutual support and interaction. (Cup I - Playoffs, future Alex.)
   
6. When my baby brother got into the van at Bristol Parkway on our way down to Cornwall the other weekend, he handed me a milk chocolate trilobite that he'd picked up at a museum because it was a trilobite and obviously. Naturally I have not yet been able to bring myself to eat it, so I keep finding it when I'm shuffling things around in the kitchen and grinning again.
   
7. PASTA PASTA PROOF-OF-CONCEPT PASTA. Ricotta tortellini with sage butter; and then we ran out of ricotta, so tagliatelle with Italian Hard Cheese, pepper and Parsley From The Tub On The Patio (which is looking very cheerfully established, HURRAH). Turns out tortellini are actually easier than tagliatelle at least at the proof-of-concept who-cares-if-they're-all-the-same-size stage; I have learned Many Thing and am looking forward to trying again, and am genuinely impressed with how well the dough worked given that I arrived at it by eyeballing a Graun How To Make The Perfect... column and then fiddling with ratios to achieve a quantity I thought we could actually eat.
   
8. Having seen Night At The Museum 2 doing the rounds on Tumblr (specifically the scene with the Tuskegee Airmen and Amelia Earheart), when I stumbled upon Night At The Museum in a charity shop for £1.10 last week I jumped upon it, having got the two confused. Happily, today I discovered the sequel for £1 in a charity shop, so next time I am feeling Sad and want to Curl Up On The Sofa Watching Something I have that lined up. I will cry.
   
9. I continue Greatly Enjoying Pokemon, and am particularly smug because today I took part in a raid and ended up with a Suicune with shit IVs, so I... caught it on my second Pinap berry, for 12 candy, because double-candy event. (I will explain this in more detail if anyone is actually interested & doesn't understand!) (Also I really need to write up my Fascinating Sociological Study in Pokemon Go at some point, but for now suffice it to say that the person I've most made friends with is currently ill? And I ran into her mum outside the sorting office yesterday morning, and we had a brief chat about the world, because obviously.)
   
10. I am about to embark on a His Dark Materials reread, not least because A has acquired us tickets to An Evening Of Conversation in the relatively near future, with ticket price including a copy of The Book of Dust -- so given how hideously behind I am on new releases, I think I'm just going to do the reread and then read the new one once I have it. But AAAAAAAAH. :D