Where did my weekend go?

I wanted to enjoy the weekend - but somehow I developed this huge amount of stuff to do that basically killed any dreams of relaxation.

Thursday night DH and I met with the kitchen designers. They are awesome. They had prepared a whole drawing of what the kitchen would look like, and had cabinet door samples and price quotes for everything. Then I decided that I wanted a totally different cabinet look, which ruined all their hard work. In retaliation they told DH and I to go pick appliances. Now, I do know what dishwasher I want (had to have a handle, not one of those clicky things you grab like a car door), but the refrigerator is causing major drama. Side by side? Bottom Freezer? I know that I want a stainless steel fridge (because they don't usually have high-gloss black, and I can't stand the textured black look). But I am having major problems picking out fridges because of the handles. So many choices, so few true options. Don't even get me started on cooktops and wall ovens.

Friday night we had to study for the SCUBA exam we had to take Saturday morning. Saturday we took our aforementioned SCUBA exam, then attacked the front lawn. Because the front lawn looked like the picture above - except with longer grass and more dandelions - it was insanity. Sunday was more lawn work - this time in the back yard.

All that, plus grocery shopping, pet food shopping, a trip to Home Depot (absolute HELL on the weekend), laundry, assorted weekend home cleaning tasks, and Eliza literally puking all over the staircase and entryway made for an exciting conclusion.

Vacation anyone?

Isn't LL Bean from Maine?

Apparently, LL Bean is moving to the Caribbean. Its new summer catalog features the beach where DH and I got married - Trunk Bay on St John.

Just compare the pic above with this link - clearly its slightly cropped on the catalog,and they covered the little house with trees (you can totally see where they copied and pasted trees), but there is no doubt it is the same beach.

The same beach I'll be sinking my toes into in just 14 days.. :)

20th Anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster

The NY Times has a bit on Chernobyl - making me realize that today is the 20th anniversary of the reactor explosion. I was only 10 at the time - I don't think that I was ever aware of it in that time period, but I'm nonetheless fascinated by it now.

Not too long ago I saw the National Geographic Channel's "Seconds from Disaster" about the Chernobyl explosion. It was absolutely riveting. I highly recommend checking it out if you have the opportunity. I think almost everyone is aware that Chernobyl exploded and released radiation into the air - but I think that most people's impression of this kind of disaster is that it was as violent and deadly as a nuclear bomb, which it really wasn't. That's not to say that people didn't die - and that they aren't still dying from the radioactivity released by the explosion - but it wasn't huge mushroom cloud explosion with many instantly being zapped dead in a flash (like in the BBC movie "Threads" or ABCs "The Day After").

I kind of have a sick curiosity to see Pripyat - the little town closest to Chernobyl that was evacuated. I mean, it would be a perfectly preserved slice of life under the late Soviet empire. A time capsule. Just incredible. There are tours that take you there, giving you personal dosimeters and Geiger counters to make sure that you don't absorb too much radiation. Fascinating.

Somehow I don't think that I would have many travel companions on this trip.

P.S. Here are links to the Washington Post's article about Chernobyl's observations of the anniversary and the Wikipedia article about the disaster.

I'm so bored again (sung to the rhythm of "On the Road Again")

This hurry up and wait game is brutal! After having more than a month of steady, if mind-numbing, activity, I’m back to having little to nothing to do.

Check whether houses in the neighborhood have sold, read Washington Post, read NY Times, read about Virgin Islands, read friend's blogs, do a little work, eat lunch, remember personal errands and do them, read more internet, do a little more work, walk around, do the hokey pokey and turn myself around, is it 5:15 yet?

This picture is really cool, though. I can’t wait to see one in 16 DAYS!

Do I work... or do I plan

Sadly, my return to work looked much like my departure - all day meetings for seemingly meaningless tasks. Today, I took a little mental time to daydream and have come up with the following items:

1) I think that it would be neat to pick my own bananas, mangoes, limes, coconuts etc - whatever fruit I can find on vacation. Not that I think that I could make a full mean from it, but still. So I tried to Google to find out when all of these things are ripe (there are banana and mango trees in the garden at our rental villa, and there are coconut trees growing on all the beaches). I've determined that I must be looking up the only information unable to be quickly found via Google. Depressing.

2) The "Lost" and "Amazing Race" season finales are on during my vacation week. Do I tape them at home to guarantee that I don't miss them, or do I incorporate them into my vacation? Decisions, decisions.

3) Since we will be on St John during a full moon, I am hoping to see the bioluminescence caused by the polychaete worm spawn (gloworms) that happens 2-6 days after the full moon. Glowing worms - trippin' man!

4) ZIP in "ZIP code" stands for "Zone Improvement Plan." I know you had to know that.

5) I'd better get my car emissions inspection done soon. Hmmmm.

My day dreams get less interesting as the days go on.

Last week, when I was away in Denver, the MARC train that I take to work hit a woman - she had layed down on the tracks to commit suicide. I feel really bad for my train conductors - there's no way they could stop the train, and it has to be a really rotten experience. I want to say something to them - but there's kinda a code, where I say "Good Morning" and they say "Good Morning" and then I say "Have a nice day" when I'm getting off the train and they reciprocate. Poor guys. They are so cute in their uniforms, though.

Official vacation preparation has begun! Just 19 days left!

I know that I go on and on about going on vacation, but right now this vacation feels like to only thing I have to look forward to; that is until Tuesday when we meet with our kitchen designers!

Anyway, we've officially started packing! Agh! The suitcases are open, and we've thrown in stuff like our bathing suits (I bought a super cute tankini at Kohls yesterday that was on a super sale! And I actually was happy with it! Amazing!), beach towels, suntan lotion and aloe, etc.

One challenge we've found is that our SCUBA fins don't fit in the suitcases that we have (we normally can get everything into our little carryon bags). So we're faced with a dilemma. Do we get a slightly larger suitcase that has to be checked in? Do we leave our fins in their SCUBA gear bag and carry that on, but still needing to check a bag? Oh the decisions!

I don't know how I am going to get through the remaining 14 days at work!

VW Commercials... whoa

Not DH's car, but a cousin

I love VW commercials... they are some of the best, most memorable commercials I've ever seen. There was that one I think that I have mentioned before, with the wedding and that haunting music. There's the hilarious commercial where the guy dive tackles a shopping cart that is about to hit his new VW. The da da da guys... the trash pickers... I could go on.

These new VW commercials freak me out though; if you haven't seen them yet - you won't believe them. One second, they show people riding in the new Jetta, chatting as aspiring upper middle class yuppies are wont to do. The next instant there is a violent crash - and you see every bit of it. Last, you see the shaken passengers standing outside the car, clearly okay.

The point is to advertise the safety features of the new Jetta, which I will admit was one of the reasons that DH chose his Jetta over a Civic, with the side airbags and all. Still, these commercials are really upsetting in their realness.

I can only hope that we never have to test the safety of our Jetta.

P.S. You can watch the spots here

Travel Tale #4 - My own personal Amazing Race

Yesterday, although my class was scheduled to end at noon, I was able to get to the airport by 10:30am. There were two Frontier flights to DC - one leaving at 11:45 and my flight at 4:55. I wanted to get on the 11:45 - but I had to go standby.

So I waited at the gate. And waited. And waited. 11:44 comes, and I started to feel like a racer on The Amazing Race, trying to get a critical flight. I was fidgeting. And then, at the last moment - I'm on! Yippee - I'm getting home six hours early!

So I called DH and let him know I was going to be home at 5:00 rather than 11! He nearly didn't pick me up at the airport - which would have been a real bad choice on his part, but in the end he made the smart decision and picked me up. Traveling out to Shady Grove from National at rush hour with luggage would have made me have to kill him.

I watched the flight tracker again on the way home. This time, my altitude at landing was 5 feet above sea level, rather than ~5400 feet. Much better. My nose thanks God for it.

So that was it. Denver wasn't really my thing. I mean, the mountains were pretty off in the distance, but meh. It didn't feel like it had its own character. Not that many American cities have their own character, truthfully. It's sad really, I think that corporate American is killing unique American identity wherever it might have existed. Gap, Banana Republic, Ann Taylor, yawn. Outback, Carrabbas, Lone Star, yawn again. So sad.

Anyway, I'm home now... but only for 20 days!!!

Travel Tale #3 - Positively Perfect in Every Way

Before the class, we were required to take a little quiz to determine how much we already knew about Project Management. I think I scored a 30%, considering that the quiz is mostly technical jargon and business-speak phrases that people in the real world don't use unless they've all taken this project management class (classic corporate training).

In any case, I had to retake the test tonight in order to receive a certificate verifying that I have completed the class. Needless to say (because of the title of this post) I scored a 100%. $3000 well spent by my agency? I think that that is yet to be determined.

Tomorrow I'm flying home - which I am really excited about. I mean, its nice to have been out of the office and all, but I miss DH, miss my kitties, and miss having good coffee.

Better than that - it's only 22 days until we leave on vacation! Gray skys are gonna clear up

Travel Tale #2 - It's all about showmanship

Back by popular demand... tales from Colorado

Every morning a couple of people from class are supposed to give presentations on concepts that we learned the previous day. Today it was my turn. I've never been one to shy away from public speaking, so I happily gave my presentation on MS Project.
Well, in addition to giving the presentation, the class also votes on who was the best presenter that day. Yesterday there were four presenters, and someone at my table won. And today there were 8 presenters - and I won.

As if there was any doubt. :)

The table I am at has six people: two older guys from EPA, one older guy from DoD, one Korean guy, and one girl from DoL. The older male duo from EPA are a bunch of troublemakers... but they are also so much fun. I've got to be the youngest one in the whole class; they tell me every day how much I remind them of their daughters. The facilitators of our class try and avoid looking in our direction, because we tend to give smart-ass answers to any and all questions.

On top of that, it's clear that I am an open book. I've already been labeled "the girl who knows everything," "the de facto leader," and "git 'er done girl." I don't know what the less complimentary labels are though, thankfully.

Good times.

Travel Tale #1 - How high am I?

I've been told that I have an uncanny ability to make a long, drawn out story out of anything, so here's attempt number one for my Denver trip.

I flew Frontier, as noted below, and they have those little Direct TV TV consoles in the headrest of the seat in front of you. Of course, it's $5 to watch crappy TV shows and $8 to watch even crappier movies, but whatever. The bonus is that the have "flight TV," which lets you see how fast you are traveling, the altitude, and where you are flying over. Pretty cool... I enjoy that.

So we've been flying at ~40,000 feet the whole way, and we're making our descent and approach to Denver. I'm watching the altitude drop, and thinking "Wow, I can really see a lot of detail at 10,000 feet." We keep dropping, and I see the runway - really close now - and the monitor still says ~6000 feet. I think, "hmmm, maybe there's a pretty severe lag between reality and what's on the TV."

Finally, we're on the runway and going ~50 miles an hour, and the altitude shows 5300 feet. It's only then (so much for being smart) that the altitude is feet above sea level rather than feet above the terrain below. Duh.

Still, it's pretty wild to see how high above sea level I am, can't wait to see it on the way home.

Welcome to Denver, Colorado

I flew Frontier, except my plane had a bunny on the tail

So I'm in Denver, CO this week. Well, technically speaking I'm not in Denver - I'm in Aurora, which is like 25 miles outside of Denver.

The weirdest thing about everywhere west of the Potomac is that there really isn't anything west of the Potomac - not that I could see from 40,000 feet anyway. I mean holy cow, Kansas looks like a square box partitioned up into hundreds more square boxes.

And Denver International Airport is like on the border of wilderness or something. Everyone told me to watch for the mountains... and all I saw were more square fields. Boring.

So I'm out here for some Project Management class, and yeah whatever, at least I am not in the office this week. And I think that it is supposed to snow on Tuesday, which is totally messed up.

I'm beat... so I'll regale all 4 of my readers with tales of travels some other time.

Oooh look at the pretty lights!

According to Yahoo news... the world is coming to an end! A comet fragment the size of a car is going to hit the Earth! On May 25th. The day that Bush is going to attack Iran.

Well... maybe not. According to Bad Astronomy blog's refutation of the Yahoo news article, the comet might, just might, pass close enough, to create meteor showers on May 14th. And... we'll be on vacation then, in a place where there is virtually no light pollution to obscure the sky.

Except... the full moon is on the 13th, and that light might block some of the view. Eh. Can't win for losing.

28 days to go and my vacation is safe!

Yeah! Huzzah! According to CNN, Delta pilots and management have reached a tentative agreement, which likely means that there will be no strike, and my painfully early flight from DC to STT will fly as scheduled. Hooray!

Next week I am in Colorado, not quite as exciting, but I am treating it as a mini-break from the drama that is my life at work. Hooray again.

Looks like everything is coming up Milhouse!

Wow, Google Earth is cool

So, even though I am a dorky geek, or a geeky dork, or whatever, I am just discovering the coolness and armchair vacation possibilities Google Earth offers.

The cool stuff I'm just beginning to discover:

A satellite image of the neighborhood where I stayed in Florence


A satellite image of where I'm staying on vacation on St John (not as high a resolution, but whatever)


So cool... but I think I am like the last person on Google Earth to figure out how neat this is!

Clearly, I married up

According to this CNN/Money Magazine "article," DH has the number one "Top ten best jobs" according to stress levels, salary and growth expectations, etc.

Lucky Bastard.

Funny, being a government employee doesnt even make the Top 50 list. Somehow, I am not surprised.

At this point, I feel like "The Little Engine that Could." I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.

Can I make it?

This will be me soon!

Insane (adj): Doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results.

I truly think that I am on the verge of going insane. For the last two weeks I have been in 9-5 meetings in response to an OMB program assessment request. Every day I come in, work on this assessment for the whole day, then go home exhausted.

This weekend, just to add a little to the exhaustion, DH and I had our first weekend of SCUBA training. Which was exhausting. We left home ~840 Saturday morning, and got home ~10pm. Same story for Sunday – left home ~930 and got home ~915. Let me just say that doing two weeks worth of SCUBA trainings in three days is brutal. Physics, physiology, math – these are not things my mind was created to absorb – especially in 12 hour sessions on the weekends.

Last night, however, I did breath underwater for the first time, and it was totally wild. Sitting on the bottom of the pool, with butts and fins and boobs and bellies floating around (or, more often, into) me, breathing normally without having to surface. Totally wild. I can’t wait to do it for real and see schools of shiny silver fish instead of slabs of shiny white flab.

The most surprising thing about the class is that the pool sessions were conducted – OUTDOORS. Do you know how cold it was here on Saturday night when the wind was howling out of the north? The pool was like 97-98 degrees, but man, getting out was brutal. It was like being in Finland or something.

Anyway, with only 32 days to go (almost into the 20s!) I think that I can make it. Those damn Delta pilots had better not ruin this for me.

The socially-conscious vacation activity

So, with just 36 days left to go and a possible Delta pilots strike threatening to complicate my plans... I'm looking for happy vacation activities to keep me sane.

Luckily I found Wagapalooza.

Please, for the love of God, don't strike - results edition

According to this article, Delta pilots are set to decide today whether or not the union will authorize a strike. I haven't seen it in the news too much, unlike when Northwest (the worst airline in the world in my opinion) mechanics went on strike - so I am hoping that the general consensus is that the execs and the pilots' union will work things out. There are only 38 days left before we're scheduled to fly.

However, as a former girl scout, I do believe in being prepared.

I know that we bought our tickets with a credit card, so that if our flight is cancelled because of a strike I call Mastercard and tell them to refund me the full cost of the flight and let them battle it out with Delta.

I'm still tracking flight options to STT for our dates. Technically Delta should rebook us on another airline if they strike - but I am sure that that would not be pretty - or convienent. I am mentally prepared to make another flight reservation if needs be.

P.S. Well the pilots just authorized a strike as I was typing this... Laissez le bon temps roulez!