Nobody Knows Anything

Welcome to Diane Patterson's eclectic blog about what strikes her fancy

Moleskine notebooks

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I was inspired by two events—pulling out my old fountain pen, and realizing I don’t have very many people to talk to around here at the moment—to take up writing in my paper journal again, which is partially why I’m not writing so much here.

I’ve been doing a core-dump into the book, just writing down whatever’s coming to mind. Not even so much getting to the therapeutic aspects of keeping a journal—I’m just…kibbitzing. Hey, how are you doing, here’s what up.

I also haven’t done any serious writing for months, and this is taking the place of that for right now.

It’s fun to write by hand again. I highly recommend it. It’s physically involving in a way that typing simply cannot be.

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For anyone who keeps a notebook on hand for any reason, be it keeping a journal, keeping a nature diary, writing, or just taking notes about day-to-day life, I definitely recommend using a Moleskine notebook. The small ones fit in your pocket, the larger ones are a good enough size to tote around easily.

They’re hardbound, they lie open flat (if you’ve ever picked up one of those cheapie blank books you know how hard it is to get them to stay open), they have a sewn-in bookmark, and they have an envelope in the back to hold…whatever. I put in our tickets from the SF Zoo. The paper is also high-quality and the ink from my pen doesn’t bleed through (unless I get a huge puddle of ink, as happened on one page—c’est la vie). And there’s an elastic belt that keeps the book firmly closed when you’re not using it—if you’ve ever had your notebook open in your bag and get some other object wedged into it, you know what a feature the elastic strap is.

I’m having to stop myself from buying every fountain pen that strikes my fancy these days. I’m enjoying writing by hand but there aren’t enough hours in the day to use all of these pens.

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I was thinking recently that maybe I should transfer all of my old online journal entries (1996-2000) over to Movable Type. The period where the entries would most like be commented upon is gone, of course, but it would be nice to have the entries sorted by category. If you have any thoughts on the matter, drop me a comment.

Goats and tractors

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Monday and Thursdays it’s me and the kids, all day long. So today: the San Francisco Zoo. Good day to go, too: completely empty.

This morning, when I told Sophia we were going to the Zoo, she said, “I need a camera!” I said, “Wha’?” Darin filled me in: there’s an episode of Dora where Dora takes lots of pictures of animals. And he was right: as we walked around the Zoo Sophia kept singing, “Finding the animals,” which definitely had a Dora-esque ring to it.

When Darin and I were cleaning my office last weekend, I found an unused disposable camera and gave it to Sophia for today. She was thrilled. Want to make a tot happy? Disposable camera. That’s all I’m saying.

Today at the Zoo we discovered the Children’s Zoo area, which we hadn’t visited the last time. It’s pretty good. Well, the carousel made me dizzy, but Sophia loved it. And the petting zoo?

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It was totally great. Sophia was right in there, brushing off all the goats, petting the sheep, asking me once again if she can go ride a horse. (Have to find horse rides around here. Shouldn’t be too hard, with the Santa Cruz mountains and all their attendant stables nearby.)

Simon was not too fond of the animals, given that they were for the most part much, much bigger than he was. In fact, a goat came near him and he started to cry, which was understandable because goats are scary. (Have you ever looked in their eyes? They’re slitted. Seriously. Creepiest eyes I’ve ever seen.) But he did find something he liked:

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I could have left him there all day and he’d still be walking around with that thing. (He couldn’t quite ride it—every time I put him on the seat he slipped right off. But he liked walking it!)

We spent four hours at the Zoo today. Sophia made several new friends and was prepared to lay the smack down on me when I told her it was time to go.

I wish it weren’t so far away. We’d go a lot more often if it weren’t. They loved it.

Free the trash!

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All this week our trash company is doing a “free trash” day, so anything you wanna put out, they’ll haul away.

We’ve been waiting for something like this.

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We definitely beat everyone on the block. I’m just happy we’re going to get rid of the giant pile o’boxes and paper and what not that was piling up in our driveway (and had gotten a nice level of composting going on with the recent rains).

My question is: why do trash companies do this? In LA you get to pay for each and every bag you want to throw away, 52 weeks a year (unless you can sneak it into someone else’s trash, I guess). No free trash days there!