I still have hives. And now I have a sore throat. Yes, I'm getting sick.

I took the train and my bike to pick up Lester today, it rained, but only I got wet. There's an amazon parrot named Laura who lives in the waiting room of the vet where Lester boards. While I was preparing to take Lester home, Laura climbed down to the bottom of her cage and got under the paper, just like Lester does. As it happened, Lester was also under the paper at the bottom of his cage. Laura began to talk and sing. Not one to be shown up, Lester also began to go through his repertoire. Eventually, Laura started to laugh, and then Lester laughed, and then everyone in the waiting room laughed. This went on for several minutes. It was, indeed, hilarious.

Today is my father's birthday! Happy Birthday, Padre!

I have hives, probably from the fabulous dim sum I ate with Lisa and Bill on Sunday. No doubt my very overexcited socializing is contributing as well. But other than that I feel quite good. I head back to San Diego tomorrow. Once I'm settled, I'll try to make sense of some of my notes from the conference and the readings. I've met people I wanted to meet, hung out with people I already knew and liked, and spent some quality time with old friends and with family. After much poetry and socializing, and many late nights out, and a thoroughly enjoyable New Year's Eve party, I'm feeling a bit sated and ready to go home.

So everything is normal.

I'm looking forward to seeing friends this weekend and to cooking. We do a pretty good job of managing to see and hang out with people around here--a very good job, actually--but the kind of casual socializing that comes with living in a city/not having to drive to get everywhere and knowing people a long time is tougher. There's now an age issue as well: it's harder to become friends with adults. But today I'm feeling optimistic about Carlsbad--I've felt alienated and alone (but not necessarily unhappy, no no no) everywhere I've ever lived, regardless of the number of friends and colleagues I've had around.

The hives persist. It is vaguely comforting to read that, in many cases, not even a doctor can figure out the source of them. I suspect it's a cocktail of several things (as Anne suggested in my comment box a few days ago).

I'm sure it's not just something I'm eating. But if it is something I'm eating, it has to be something that I eat on a regular basis. I'm quite attentive to food, I know what I've eaten, and I haven't eaten anything out of the ordinary. But it took years for my shellfish allergy to become bad enough to obviously be an allergy, so maybe that's the case here. This makes me nervous, though. I don't want to stop eating cheese, nuts, tomatoes, eggs, or any of those common triggers. But obviously I will if I have to. Blech. Really, I'd rather have my body manifest its sensitivity in other ways.