A Brief Gulp of (Cold) Air

Hello, Chickens, as one of my favorite bloggette's is fond of writing! Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I wanted to write a quick note as it seems like it's been forever since I've posted anything. Okay, probably not THAT long, but it sure seems like it to me. Some of you are probably thinking it's not been long enough! Anyway, here's the scoop.

Last week I had a wonderful, mostly-relaxing, almost-blissful forced vacation from work that we who work at the University fondly call "The Furlough" (insert scary music here). Aside from that pesky little thing called "NO PAY," :( I really enjoyed myself. I used to think that I was never cut out to be a stay-at-home mom, but now, I really think I could! Provided, of course, that the children were all in school, that they were all capable of getting themselves up and off to said school, and that said school didn't release until 6:00 or even 7:00 p.m. each evening. But I digress...

Fun, Furlough Monday I woke up to a foot of new snow (and no, I am NOT exaggerating. All the previous snow had been completely melted) in the driveway with no end in sight. Ahhh... did not matter one whit to me! I didn't have to drive to work!

But then the kids and Tom also saw the snow and decided that surely, school will be cancelled and the canyon to work will be closed. The 2 younger kids missed the bus (although Evan gamely went off. Lest you think he's turned over a new leaf and was being studious, I think it had more to do with wanting to spend time with his new crush) and Tom dilly-dallied around FOREVER worrying about road conditions (you've got 4wd - you'll be fine!). On MY Monday, where I was supposed to have time all alone. By myself. No one else! After some mild nagging, err, cajoling, errr... loving encouragement from me, they all finally headed out.

I had big plans for my week off: spring cleaning, laundry (sigh - it's a regular staple), organizing (not just closets but entire rooms!), scrapbooking (both paper and my newfound digital kind), reading, relaxing, and scanning thousands of old photos into the computer that I have organized into loose eons of time. Although I managed to do a little bit of all, I didn't get near as much done as I had hoped. But boy was I relaxed!

As I said before, the only downside to this whole thing was the fact that I'm losing out on a week's worth of pay. But God is always faithful to provide: What the University taketh away, the good Lord giveth back! Days before the furlough I had not one, but two, of our Ph.D. students come to me to see if I would be willing to do their dissertation reviews, and then yesterday a Master's student also came to me with his. Heck yeah! I have been working diligently on the first (two long chapters to go!), have the second waiting patiently on my desktop, and the third in hard-copy which I am working away on in 5-10 minute increments (at a long stoplight, during breaks, and especially while I wait for my stupid, s-l-o-w home computer to decide to boot up so I can work on the other two. Grrr....).

All this to say that I promise to be back soon, if I ever come up for editing air. In the meantime, enjoy these pictures that I took of our snow day. We had 30 inches, yes, 3-0! in less than 24-hours. Interestingly enough, it's all almost melted away again. Which is only fair considering I'm back at work and have to drive again.

March 17, 2009

7:00 a.m. 4:00 p.m., and still snowing!