August

1: Bonza
2: shoe painting
3: learning about the ship the album Mignonette was named after
4: piggyback through the bosque
5: peachy sunrise, orange midnight moon
6: already recognizing some new places thanks to Google street view
7: driving tour of Charlotte with my roommates
8: games and chatting with some people in my hall
9: playing a space shooter video game while it storms outside
10: watching workplace safety videos and wishing they were the JonTron parody
11: biking down a tree-lined street toward uptown
12: visiting other Habitat builds in the city
13: putting up posters he sent me
14: hammering up in the attic we built
15: him taking me along virtually on his commute to work
16: meal prepping for the week
17: busting into the boarded-up house next door (and immediately reinstalling the locks)
18: installing cabinets
19: settling for "good enough" on nitpicky adjustments
20: the fact that the caulking gun has a hook that perfectly fits ladder rungs (very helpful while up on the ladder)
21: glovin' up for tub scrubbin'
22: trying out chairs at the ReStore (or, "Sweet Seats" irl)
23: 100 Humans
24: putting in new doors
25: random and slightly creepy findings among the things left behind in the abandoned house
26: finding lined-paper pages of an unknown person's novel
27: getting into the deep existential discussions with my work teammate
28: jamming to Akrasia while rolling some fresh paint on the walls
29: new desk setup
30: black bean sweet potato chili
31: talking about my options

July

1: discovering the "meat store" is also a little hole-in-the-wall natural grocery
2: digging down to the lava and corruption layers
3: family Hamilton streaming
4: biking back after sundown surrounded by boom-pop-crackles, sparkle-flashes, and gunpowder scent
5: throwing down that random bean & rice dish a second time
6: pedaling along the highway at night
7: taking on the illagers with an army of wolves
8: cringey Disney binge
9: his soft spot for the dogs (and their soft spot for him)
10: steel-toed boots
11: playing Minecraft side by side (just like the old days)
12: a hike around the crest
13: talking about how dinosaur reconstructions from fossils are likely wildly inaccurate to what they actually looked like
14: Cloud Atlas
15: hanging our heads out the window on a stormy summer afternoon
16: Island Saver
17: watching movies while he sleeps next to me
18: the dogs (sensing my anxiety?) huddling near me
19: dad and bro coming to help when my car got fucked up
20: accompanying Dad to the auto parts store
21: scrolling through subreddits
22: undone
23: gaining the dogs' trust bean by bean
24: fucking up on a truck driving simulator
25: bike tinkering with the help of fix-it videos
26: "cheating" with a premade sauce
27: my nut-allergic brother sharing some chili pistachios
28: clambering over rocks in Embudito Canyon
29: hiking Black Volcano and looking over the city (and the place we first hiked together)
30: accompanying him to his favorite joint (Whataburger)
31: climbing up the foothill boulders and getting buffeted by the wind