20 August 2001
I'm back! Didja miss me?
I had, all in all, a very nice vacation. Matt and I managed to talk his mom out of going to the Norfolk Botanical Gardens in the 95-degree heat, and instead we went to the Mariner's Museum (where she immediately became obsessed by the lighthouses), and to the movies to finally see A.I., and to the outlets to go shopping.
Let's see... A.I. - Beautiful, beautiful special effects. I thought the movie should have ended about half an hour before it actually did. It would have been almost astonishingly moving, then, instead of leaving me with a "whaddafu?" feeling.
On the way home, we managed to drive into a torrential thunderstorm, and I found out that Jill really hates driving in the rain. I mean, really hates it. And I was riding shotgun so I could navigate. Joy. I spent half an hour or so trying to talk her through it while she inched along the interstate at thirty miles an hour. She was so panicked that even when we got through the storm and it was completely clear, she refused to go faster than 45.
Matt told me later that he was impressed with how I managed to keep my cool and stay calm - but really, what was I going to do? Yell at my mother-in-law to grow up, for petesake? Yank the wheel out of her hands?
Jill had wanted to go shopping to buy presents for Rachel and Evan, but she wound up not buying anything. I found an outfit for work, and a fantastic stewing pot (marked down from $65 to $25 - how do you beat that?)
Then I had a couple of days of rest, and then Karen came for a visit. I didn't mention it before because she'd wanted it to be a surprise. Ashby came down the next day to stay with K.T. and Kevin, and we spent several days lounging around with them and eating a lot. (I got on the scale this morning and discovered what ten straight days of eating whatever and whenever you feel like it will do. I need to lay off the snacks and desserts for a bit...)
K.T. had conceived a craving for turkey, so we had a turkey dinner Friday night. And even as we speak, my new stew pot is being put to work, making turkey soup from the carcass. That makes me happy. Of course, that means that tonight or tomorrow I'll have to pick through the meat to pick out the small bones, but homemade turkey soup - with carrots from my own garden, even! - is good stuff.
Ashby is actually still in town, but since Matt and I are both back at work today, and tonight we'll do the grocery shopping and then the Hall, we said our goodbyes last night after dinner. (Because we never seemed to get our separate groups together until well after noon, I think K.T. and Kevin didn't see as much as they'd have liked of Karen, or Matt and I of Ashby. Maybe next time, we'll trade off and have Ashby stay with us, and Karen with them. Though I'll probably forget that idea by the time they both decide to come again.)
So I'm back at work today. I'm not really sure what I should be doing. My e-mail has a list of changes that should be made, but those mails are dated very early last week, so they may well have already have been made.
Random is on his vacation this week, so I at least get the office to myself while I'm trying to get back into the swing of things. I'd rather my manager was on vacation, but I'll take what I can get.
Ah, well. At least I'm not feeling so terribly, awfully tense about things anymore, which was, to be honest, the whole reason I took the vacation in the first place. And now it's back to the grind.
Word of the Day:
factitious - produced by humans rather than by natural forces; formed by or adapted to an artificial or conventional; produced by special effort, sham
Currently Reading:
- nothing
Current Projects:
- drawing
- Hall stuff
- garden