State of the--criminy I need more caffeine.

The last couple of weeks have been mostly school, work, and semi-disastrous attempts at knitting. I wish I could show you my semi-disaster projects, but my camera is broken.

I mean, it's been broken. I got it in 2003 and it's been broken in one way or another since about 2007, but now it's really broken. This camera has slowly been working its way toward becoming a battery-eating vortex for a while now. It started by burning through two sets of batteries in a week, then it ate three sets of fresh batteries in the half-hour photo shoot I did for my Sylvi coat, and now it's taken the next step and eaten the batteries completely. They're just gone. There were batteries in the camera a few days ago, and now - without the camera having moved from the pile of art supplies it was nestled in - the battery case is empty.

I'm taking this as evidence that my camera has progressed to full-on vortex mode, and it will soon begin engulfing other things, so I should probably get it out of the apartment before it gets the dog.

Unless the Roof Dweller snuck in and took the batteries. There's something living on my roof that creeps around at night, making the ceiling groan in a really unsettling way. Judging by how big it it sounds, the loping rhythm of its footfalls, and the turkey bones it keeps leaving on my deck, it's either a very large raccoon or a disturbed but ambitious neighborhood child. (A friend suggested it might be Spider-Man, but he's way lighter on his feet than that.)

Anyway, I had a point. Coffee, where was my point? Oh yeah. Camera.

I would replace my camera were it not for two very exciting but expensive things going down this week:

1. The vanquishing of the Stink. On Tuesday, Hobbes spent all day at the vet getting a dental cleaning and tooth removal - as well as some fine sedatives, which he loved because my dog is a fuzzy little junkie at heart. When I got him home, he spent 22 hours straight lying in one spot on a blanket in the living room, occasionally giving me "YOU DID THIS TO ME" looks. Now he's back to his old self, minus the Stink. I've held back on saying it because I was afraid the Stink would make a sudden resurgence like the supposedly-dead killer in a slasher flick, but it's been four days, so I think we're safe...

Ladies and gentlemen, the Stink is dead!

My dog's breath smells like dogfood and not like a repository for the stenches of every wild animal that's died in the last month. Which means that I'm no longer living with a creature that belches near-visible fumes as he walks across the room. I can't describe how happy this makes me. Hyperbole doesn't cut it.

2. Kiah and I found a new place to live! We sign the lease tomorrow and move in July. I'll hold off on squeeing too loudly about it until the signatures are dry, but I'll tell you this:

The ideal new apartment we were envisioning included: two bedrooms and a den/sunroom/smaller third bedroom for me to use as an office, a sane and responsible landlord, a decent amount of space for the two of us, nice neighbors, proximity to the bus lines we frequent in a neighborhood not too far from my campus, and a fenced-in yard.

The only thing on that list we didn't get is the fenced-in yard. Everything else exceeded our ideal by quite a bit. And the yard doesn't really matter, because the duplex is right across the street from a park. Right. Across. The street. And that has a truly epic playground, which Kiah and I are excited about, because we're grown-ups.

Further evidence that we're grown-ups: I'm planning on having a small potted veggie garden in the sunroom at our new place. When I pitched this idea to Kiah, she didn't even hesitate before responding, "I will put little dinosaurs in all your potted plants." Cue an excited conversation about how the sunroom will be the perfect place for our plastic dinosaurs because they need to keep warm.

I've got my fingers crossed that this will be an apartment in which we can be grown-ups for a good long while.

And that's what I'm up to.