I'm astonished my hit counter shows me with any readers at all after I didn't post for four months!

It has been a physically and emotionally exhausting four months. Much of it was spent in Massachusetts, where I continued helping my parents prepare to move out of their house, took my 17-year-old son on college tours and to classes and volunteer work, helped support my mother-in-law during and after two stays in the hospital, and navigated a series of household disasters -- all of which, naturally, cost a lot of money we weren't expecting to spend.

And in the middle of all this, a longtime friend committed suicide.

Somehow, blogging retreated to the back burner of my life. But I am feeling a reawakening flicker of interest in it, since recent months have given me so much to post. I'm also catching up on the latest from my blogroll.

I am grateful (and still surprised) at the people who have kept an eye out for me all these months! I'm back and look forward to hearing from you.