...that I was successfully able to Be Stupid today. In a good way! In the "I'm just going to jump in and do things and ask questions and whatever happens, happens" way. And it was, in fact, Not Stupid to do so. Huzzah!
Toronto was fantastic. I'm in Chicago now and am probably going to be decompressing through most of the next morning and afternoon, catch up tomorrow night and Sunday morning, and be back on top of my game by the time I hit DC late late Sunday night.
I'm also going to try to avoid dwelling on the discovery that I will actually be in the Philippines the weekend of my cousin's wedding (which I'm glad to make!) and will therefore be compelled to, ah, wear appropriate attire (which I'm somewhat less thrilled about). I'd kinda hoped that I could skip that part. If I am exceedingly good with these negotiations, I may be permitted to wear pants. Maybe. If I'm really good and lucky and various people feel merciful (or just exasperated, as I've grown more stubborn over time). This has never worked before, but I should at least be able to prevent them from buying me a gown, because (1) dress shopping is not how I want to spend my time in Manila, and (2) I will never wear it again.
So there's figuring out that, and getting my bass and celebrating my dad's birthday. It's Halloween, and it feels weird not to be dressing up for Halloween; it's such a great excuse to go completely overboard with costume hackery. The most utilitarian one was probably my first year of college where I wore pajamas and built a frame behind me and attached sheets and pillows and my blanket so that it looked like a vertical bed (as if you'd stood up and your mattress remained attached to your back, with local gravity still working appropriately).
It was also the day a big lab was due, so I'd pulled either a double-near-triple or triple-near-quadruple allnighter right beforehand, so during my classes on that day, I leaned back, found a pillow already under my head and a blanket already around me, and slept...
And that's exactly what I'm going to do right now.