At the beginning of December, Alex and I bought a house. It is a lovely house – a dome house, which is unusual and suits us, and a well-loved, one-owner, handcrafted sort of house, which has been mostly a delight. Everything is very thoughtfully designed, I have a dedicated office that is not in a closet for the first time in twelve years, and our split sleep schedules no longer mean we each have to spend four to six hours of the day in perfect silence. (The apartment we were in previously was… small.)

But, you know, it’s a house. Houses generate to-dos. I spent the first weekend in the house sanding off the horrible dark-beige faux finish in the master bedroom so I could prime it with some heavy-duty odor-killing stuff because the previous owner smoked. A lot. In the bedroom. And the woman we bought it from was a widow – her obviously handy husband has passed away ten years ago, and it’s pretty clear that no one has picked up a screwdriver here since. There are a lot of little things.

Today’s chore was to measure the… cat door? Elf hole? Portal to Narnia and/or the reading nook? in the master suite so that I can build an actual door for it instead of wedging a piece of foamcore against it with a footstool. (The elderly cat is living in solitary splendor in the master suite, and the rambunctious boys are forbidden from pestering her.) It is nine and a half inches by 22 and a quarter inches. I really, really don’t understand it. But my to-dos are much more interesting these days, at least.