steady rain on Sunday

My mother had her surgery this past week. Apart from the usual snafus and indignities visited on patients a thousand times a day by overworked hospital staff -- an entire day of taking blood pressure in her arms when doing so is specifically counterindicated for mastectomy patients, just as one example -- she came through beautifully. Went home on Thursday evening, takes her many, many meds religiously, watches many bad movies in fifteen-minute increments, reads a bit, does various puzzles one clue at a time because her concentration is shot to hell, and is altogether out-of-it enough that she hasn't had a chance to be bored. Which is a good thing! And she is fine, she is with us, and it turns out that is all we really needed to make this a good week.

With that one thing taking up most of my time, there are things that have been pushed to one side, one being regular yard work, which. I didn't know until very recently that I'd been spoiled by the drought which has lasted the entire length of my term of homeownership, but it is true, because I spent a solid two hours yesterday afternoon weeding my freaking sidewalk, which the cracks have sprouted up nicely in the recent rains, and since my front walk is composed of eighteen-inch hexagonal concrete tiles, THAT IS A LOT OF CRACKS, MY FRIENDS. On the one hand, nice not to be on water restriction any more; I plan on washing my car three times today alone, just because I can. But on the other hand. If I have to spend an entire summer WEEDING MY SIDEWALK just to keep my house from looking abandoned: I can see the merits of desert living, is what.

Also, I've been inexplicably obsessed lately with written Burmese, which to my eye is the prettiest language imaginable, so satisfyingly curvilinear and uniform! I don't expect many people to have thought about this with great depth or energy, but I'm gonna put the question out here anyway: what is your favorite written language?