You ever think maybe conversations — and, by extension, blogging — are easier when you’ve got things about which you need a shoulder to cry on or an ear to gripe in?

I never blog when things are going perfectly well, I guess. Daily life leaves little to get all ALL-CAPSY about. Unless you want to devote extreme emotion to commute frustrations, but that really seems like a waste, don’t you think? And I thought I’d be blogging more about the upcoming election, but, frankly, I feel like this is the most unintentionally satirical campaign season I’ve lived through yet. The fact that it’s not satire leaves me cold.

The truth is, things are pretty good, almost all the time. Rodney’s diabetes is under control, my job is proceeding in an unforeseen but secretly hoped-for direction, and I live in a place where the weather is always, always, always awesome for someone who likes jackets and sweaters. (I say this knowing there are people who dislike even our most desperately needed rainy days. Those people are silly.)

So let’s talk about 5 things I’m loving right now, prompted by Shut Up + Run:

1. NEW COUCH, NEW COUCH, NEW COUCH. (Oh, hey, look — all-caps for a Good Thing.) It’s gorgeously orange (gorange?) microfiber with a hint of a corduroy feel to it. It’s less like corduroy than my orange corduroy trench coat, but that feels more like velvet than like corduroy, so there you are. We also bought the matching recliner, but I’ve never gotten very excited about chairs. Also, those throw pillows with purple and orange in the same bold print make me irrepressibly happy. (It’s true. Try to repress me right now. YOU CAN’T!)

2. I’m loving my new running schedule. I’ve crossed over into that space where you miss running on your non-running days…and there are only two of those days a week now. I’m running every day except Wednesday and Sunday, and it’s working out really well so far.

I KNOW. I am still a huge, huge, HUGE believer in the Doctor Mama’s Maggot Method and I think you should use it, especially if you’re just starting to run. But in the time since I moved back here, I haven’t been able to sustain an every-other-day schedule — not once. It was easier when I was only working around one schedule; in Alexandria, there was no dog to walk, no BART to catch, no one else trying to sleep while I futz with my alarm clock… I needed a set daily schedule that doesn’t shift from week to week, something we could plan around. Right now, this seems to work, and it’s a good time to set a new schedule (my job, team, and boss change in a week — more about that later).

(Probably more about running later, too.)

3. Caprese Salad…well, a version of it. Tomatoes, little balls of cold, fresh mozzarella, and the barest spoonful of pesto. Related: ALL THE SALADS. Also, sweet potatoes, edamame, almonds, apples… Okay. Food. I’m loving food. The thing about running again is that my appetite explodes, but veers away from french fries toward stuff that my body likes to run on.

4. My Samsung Galaxy Nexus is the first smartphone I’ve ever had that hasn’t immediately pissed me off about something. On the whole, it does every last thing I need it to do, and probably a lot more than that. This is partly due to the better range of apps available, now that Android’s market share is up, but the phone helps, too. The flipside, of course, is that loving my phone means I use it more, which means Graham doesn’t love my phone all that much.

5. I love living on a waterfront. I don’t know if it’s sustainable past this lease, but for right now, I’m grateful for the Bay Trail, the ferry, the view, the wind, the sun, the multitude of questionably captained sailboats, the pelicans, and especially — MOST especially — the one dock in the Jack London Square Marina that harbors a wee little rowboat instead of a yacht.