Weeknotes: July 20th - July 26th 2026

Disclaimer: It should be mentioned that Weeknotes are always a snapshot of the week itself and lack the fullness of life - as is the case with any personal blogging.

✨ Happenings

• Outside of work, I got up to my regular leisure activities, including going to cafes, playing video games, and reading. Much of the activities for the week were interrupted by the poor AQI and illness. Beyond that, Taylor and I celebrated our 7th Wedding Anniversary on Monday by going for dinner at Khao San Thai Kitchen (after we went for ice cream and came home to play Civilization VII together). I also went for a working lunch to Tokyo Street Market with Raneem and Rosemarie.
• For mid-day Friday, Dan, James, and I tried out the board game Arcs: Conflict & Collapse in the Reach (thank you again James, Jan, and Judy!) and enjoyed a great Brooklynn Chopped Cheese from Munch on 17th. As the day progressed, however, I came down with the illness that Taylor is still recovering from. After that point, for the rest of the weekend, I tried to manage my illness by trying to get rest and keep myself distracted. I had an extraordinary amount of hot baths, drank lots of tea, beat the main campaign of Teardown, and read the rest of "Pure O" OCD: Letting Go of Obsessive Thoughts with Acceptance and Commitment Therapy.
• For reading, I finished a bunch of books this week (and hit my Goodreads goal of 24 books read for the year), including the following: Luke Kemp's Goliath's Curse: The History and Future of Societal Collapse, Mac Barnett's Make Believe: On Telling Stories to Children, and Chad Lejeune's "Pure O" OCD: Letting Go of Obsessive Thoughts with Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. As for video games, I played the opening hours of Oblivion Remastered, played Civilization VII with Taylor, and beat Teardown.

📷 Photos

👣 Taylor's Footnotes

• I only have an annoying cough left over this week, meaning that I could finally re-enter the world! While I have been either miserably sick or working (most often both) for the past few weeks, this week was a huge pivot.
• On Monday, I got to spend time with my love for our anniversary! He covered it above, but as always, it was wonderful to take some intentional time to spend together.
• On Wednesday, my parents made a bit of a surprise visit to drop off a lovely gift to Chance - a new denim jacket as a celebration of his new job! It was also great on a busy day to be able to take some time to chat with them. As I have said many a time before, I love them so very much and miss when we can't all spend time together. It meant a lot to me that they chose to come down here on my Dad's very rare times off to spend the lowly half an hour I could make work midweek to have tea and lunch. Love y'all!
• On Friday, I was able to join Alexis for a super cute Chinese Stone Seal carving workshop - thank you so much Alexis for inviting me along!
• Saturday evening I joined my DnD buddies for a game online! It's been two months since we last played and it was nice to catch up.
• On Sunday, Alexis made plans to host a Fruit Exchange Potluck Party! Though Chance was not feeling up for it, I was able to represent the Davies at the inaugural event. Many a wonderful fruit was has on St. Patrick's Park. On our way back Alida and I ran into the Day of the Dog celebration in the East Village, which was a pawsitive experience!

As a much longer note, I am really grateful that Chance started this blog, as it now already holds so many incredible memories of time spent together with our family and friends. It's a precious gift to have, as it's incredible to me that already 7 years have passed since we were married, and almost a decade since we met. As a person who has had an incredibly hard time remembering to document life (despite having an absolutely terrible memory, compounding the regret), and who has never regularly taken pictures or used social media, this is an incredible means for capturing the good, the bad, and the mundane. So much of life is spent in the ephemeral - the small moments, the space between holidays, birthdays, deaths - events that draw people close, like sand pulled through an hourglass. And while I do want to remember what our first date was like at every age of my life, I also want to remember our favorite sandwich shop. Chance and I used to do something, perhaps cringe (but I don't care) where we would say "Hello Camera!" and then take a short video marking some important moment to us. We would chat for a few minutes, offering an update on the past to our future selves. We did this multiple times on our first trip to Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, and during the early days of Covid-19 - when Chance thought it might last a few weeks, and me the ever pessimistic optimist, believed it would last a few months. We said "Hello Camera" in our empty apartment before moving to Winnipeg (and many times in the proceeding weeks and months), a few times after winning a tricky video game, and truly just whenever the mood struck. It's been a few years since we have continued this tradition, and I am glad to have such a fulsome alternative. I hope one day this blog will also help to serve everyone in our lives, as we seek to journal a small portion of what it meant to be alive... now. But in every entry, I know that there will be one constant. My love, forever, for Chance, and for the world of lovely folks that we are so incredibly grateful to share this time with.