Update Time!

Back by popular demand...okay, so not popular demand...but because Shannon wanted me to update. So here it goes:

Work is good. Last Sunday was the History Channel shoot. Long story short - Mount Vernon (George Washington's home) is building a new educational center. Apparently, good ole' GW had part of a canal with a lock or two on his property. So the folks at Mt. Vernon hired the History Channel to produce an educational video for their new edu. center. They wanted to explain the whole concept of what a lock is & how they worked & film a boat actually going through a lock. Well, since I work at such a cool place where we actually have a working original canal lock on site that we take a boat through - they came to film us doing just that.

It made for a long and exhausting day. I was at work at 5am - along with 5 other brave souls & the History Channel crew. Coffee was a must!!! It wouldn't have been too pretty without my faithful friend of coffee. The shoot went well. We weren't done with the actual filming until about 1:30pm...& I needed food in a bad way. I went from happy & having fun to grumpy & hungry & shaky almost instantly. Don't stand between me & a meal...it never turns out well. Finally at 2:30 in the afternoon I was leaving work after a 9 hour day! A person just should put in a 9 hour day & be finished that early in the day. Thank goodness my normal time to report to work isn't until 9am!

This week is opening week for the boat at work. It's been slow so far, but we're open a week or so earlier than normal.. The newbie's are doing awesome!!! And why wouldn't they be? They've had an awesome trainer...me!!! & the returners too of course. In other work news, I had my 90 day review this afternoon...went well so that's good...but I've been working my butt off over the past 3 months so I'd be a little upset if it wouldn't have gone well.

Let's see - what else? Randy ditched me for the weekend. He's left yesterday for a wedding in VA. I couldn't go since it's our opening weekend & all...new crew still not to the point to be left without a helpful watchful eye...but their getting close. So I'm on my own until Monday. Rented a couple movies last night...one more to watch tonight. My couch & I get along really well!!!

Took in some playoff hockey last night. Wings tied up the series with Edmonton at 2 games a piece. *Phew*. Watching the Montreal vs. Carolina game right now...2nd period, Carolina's up 2 - 1.

Working the weekend...no real plans afterwards. Maybe I'll go hang at Sal's for movie night tomorrow...if that's going on...I should probably check my e-mail about that... Nothing else much to report.

Hockey & Life

"The defense department regrets to inform you that your sons are dead because they were stupid."

That's pretty much how my hockey teams playing right about now. Taking stupid penalties. What's up with that?! Come on boys, play like ya have been all season...last game in the regular season isn't the time to be stupid. Bonus points for you if you know what movie that beginning quote was from...kinda sums up the beginning of this 2nd period of hockey. Come on Wings...don't disappoint us now!

In other news, work today was exhausting, but good. The mules are back for the season!!! Woo Hoo!!! The first pratice runs of the season went great! I'm getting anxious for the season to get under way...maybe then things will calm back down a bit.

Easter was good. Busy. But lots of great food and great company! I'm finally getting back into a reading groove again. I think I've just been choosing books that I'm not in the mood to be reading & therefore they aren't holding my interest & making me get the urge to read. Maybe once I'm done with this one ("woebegone Boy" by Garrison Kellior) I'll put my library card to use again. Maybe I'm just not excited enough with my own collection...so I'll start in on my tax dollars book collection until I am.

Good money news - got & deposited my tax refund. Bad money news - paid 6 months of car & renters insurance...& rent's due next week, which means electric, cable & phone will be here the week after that. Sometimes ya just can't win when it comes to money. Such is life. I guess I shouldn't complain...I'm pretty responsible with my money so it's not really a stressful issue. But it just kinda sucks to see so much of it leave me in such a short time span.

The latest episode of No Reservations last night was another hour of well spent time with Anthony Bourdain. Quebec this time. He ate lots of duck liver, a seals eyeball, & even put on some skates & gave a go at goalie in hockey. Good times. Not much interesting to report. Catch ya later.

Nap Time???

Randy & I just got back from our first of 3 family events for the easter weekend. It was a good time, but made for kind of a long day. I slept really well last night (didn't get up until 9am this morning, which is late considering the time I've been getting up for work in the past few weeks). That was good...the night before I spent most of the night only half asleep...& I'd worked my butt off all week, so I was pretty exhausted by the time I actually went to bed last night.

Work these past 2 weeks has been insanely busy! We open for the season in only 1 week! There's been lots to get done, and we've done pretty well getting much of it done on schedule. A lot of it has involved using my muscles that haven't really had any practice doing much of anything since last November. But surprisingly, I haven't been too terribly sore - which means I'm in better shape than I'd thought I was...which is of course a very good thing considering how physical my job will be from now until November.

I had a great night out last night with a great friend from H.S. (Juanita). We went to dinner & ate far too much food. (Although I was famished from a hard, physical day at work & not a very big lunch). Then we waited about an hour and headed to location number 2 for dessert. We did lots of catching up. It was a good night. Last time I saw her was for a funeral, so it was nice to see each other under happier circumstances this time.

Thanks to everyone for your comments of congrats on my last post! I appreciate them all!!! I'm looking forward to my trip to this conference! I'm sure it'll be a great experience! And I'll take lots of pictures & post them here to share.

Another long day tomorrow. 2 family functions to attend & lots of good food to consume. For now, hockey & the couch. & bed early I'm sure...I'm exhausted! (I'm sure it has nothing to do with those 2 margarita's I had this afternoon sitting in the hot sun!)

Rockin' It In The Real World!!!

Woo Hoo!!!! I just found out that I'm getting a scholarship (a.k.a. fellowship) that I applied for a couple of weeks ago for work. Work is sending me to a conference in Baton Rough, LA in June. So I applied for a fellowship with the organization & actually got it! How cool is that?! I'll be saving work almost $600 big ones! Brownie points from the bosses - always a good thing!

Anyways, I'm pretty excited about it. It'll be a pretty big boost for my resume. And part of the fellowship agreement is that the recipients (that's me) have to write an article for the organizations publication that comes out 3 or 4 times a year. So on top of saving work lots of money & having the award to put on my resume, I'll also be able to say that I've been published soon too! Pretty cool stuff!!!!

More Pictures!

As promised a couple of weeks ago, here are more pictures from the conference I went to last month. These are from the Covered Bridge & Canal tour I went on during the conference. It was a full day, but it was cool to see the sites. It was nice to get to see some sites from Ohio's other canal for a change. And our tour guide was great! Anyways, enjoy! Maybe more farm pictures to come later...if I feell letting my country girl roots come out again.

An awesome cemtary we went to on our tour. It was great!

The cemetary was 12 sided. Notice the corner: no stones meet at the corners...that's a lot of crazy angles to carve the stones into. It was awesome!

The headstones had all been broken thanks to vandalism.

The gates from inside the cemetary.

Covered Bridges Galore!!!

A covered bridge from our tour.

A covered bridge we visited during our Canal & Covered Bridge Tour.

Float My Boat

Ah yes, yesterday was the first day of work for this years seasonal staff at work. Only 2 of them scheduled for the first day. 1 returner & 1 newbie. The day started something like this: Welcome to work, let's go put the boat in the water! Now, for those of you who have either been on the boat or have seen pictures I've posted from last season, you know this is no small boat. It does weigh 12 tons after all. But I must say, yesterday was perhaps the best putting the boat in the water experience I've experienced and/or heard about! All went extremely smoothly, and we had beautiful weather, even with the wind.

I've felt really good these past couple of days. It's the weather! I'm telling ya - my body loves being out in the fresh air and sun shine, even if it is a bit on the cool side. After spending the winter indoors looking longingly out the window and in meetings or staring at my computer screen at work all day, all I have to say is this: It's about freaking time spring got here!!!!

Today work was equally good. We had an all staff training for history department crew. I let bits & pieces of it. My boss is taking advantage of my camp experience & having me do Icebreaker games & eventually maybe some team building exercises...it felt good to get back to some of that. I also got to lead a mini tour of our site, with some practical need to know info & mixed some history into it.

I've just stuffed myself with a homecooked dinner (fresh...no boxed food thank you very much!) And yes, I'm enjoying yet another episode of No Reservations on TV. Just outside my window it's still really light out and it's after 7pm! At last!!!! My plans for the rest of the evening include spending some quality time on my couch with a good book (I just started reading "As I Lay Dying" a couple of nights ago...not too far into it yet...I need to fix that), and some great tea.

Sunday Quote Blogging & Other Stuff

"Sanity and happiness are an impossible combination."
~ Mark Twain
Another busy week, but I won't bore you with the details. This month is going to suck at work. Seasonals start Tuesday, which mean training out the butt. I think I'm going to start searching for another job again. My job doesn't suck, but I'm tired of not enjoying what I do as much as I've enjoyed other jobs I've had. I think maybe I just need to take a different path.

I have tomorrow off work & am debating whether or not to go to BG for some meeting I was invited to at Randy's work. It's work related, & I don't really want to be there, but it would be nice to get some more interaction between work & other local history sites. It would give me an excuse to spend a few hours hanging out at Grounds for Thought. But good coffee isn't exactly great motivation for doing something work related on my day off...& I can't put it on my time sheet 'cause I'm looking at way too many hours this month as it is. Whatever. We'll see.

For now, I'm going to go debate what to watch on TV: a new Grey's Anatomy or an out-takes episode of No Reservations. Decisions, decisions.