Adventuresome week

Well, it has been interesting to say the least. I got my grading done in two marathon days at home sitting amongst piles of notebooks and papers. I have TA's, but I can't ask them to do it all. There's just too much. The grades for my class were all very high. Next semester, I may have to toughen up a little, or take some weight off of participation and notebooks. Most people had "B's" before I added those in, and then the majority went to "A". Not a problem from the students' end, I'm sure!

I've met so many new people this week, I can't count them all. Everyone from local authorities to school district officials; Georgetown is such a nice little town, you can get to know everyone!

Debbie wrote an e-mail today. She said she had gotten a sunburn from sitting by the pool at her hotel in Addis Ababa for too long. I want to go to Addis Ababa. I just went outside, and here in Central Texas, at 9:00 p.m. there is already ice forming on the cars. I think we have been bamboozled! (Hah! I like that word.) Plus, in Addis Ababa, I know this girl...

Tomorrow is our work Secret Santa party. I need to go in tomorrow, but I suspect there will not be a lot of work done at UT in general this week. There are some people at National Instruments who want to come see me to get a quote for their corporate pamphlet though. That should be fun! I'll be published. I'm just waiting to be discovered. Of course, if it's someone reading the NI pamphlet, it's more likely I'll be discovered by someone looking for an engineer who doesn't mind working in a highly radioactive environment...on the moon. Hmm, at this point, I might take a pay cut for that job.

Well, there's news, but not much fit to print, so I guess I'll call it a night. Everyone think of/pray for/send positive vibes to (depending on your particular belief system) Debbie. I wouldn't mind some thrown my way either, and don't forget the kids (especially the kids, one in particular.)

BJ

Cold!

Yesterday it was almost 70 degrees when I woke up and went out to get the paper. It got to around 80 by noon. At three o'clock it was 56, and by the time we got ready to go to bed last night it was snowing. Go figure. Only in Texas. Tonight it will get to the low 20's. It is bright and clear outside though.

I'm tired. It has been a long day. I'm getting ready for my tax season work, and I had training tonight. This year I am going to use the money to buy a plane ticket to Rome. Debbie and I plan to meet there when she can take some leave. Hopefully, I will make enough this year to get the ticket and a nice hotel room, or rent a small house. That would be ideal. It's something to look forward to anyway.

Short entry tonight, because I need to get to bed, but I will be home tomorrow and Friday to finish grading notebooks and papers.

Goodnight all. Debbie, if your internet speed picks up and you ever get back here, I love you and miss you. Sleep well.

BJ

Sorry for the lack of Posts

The end of the semester has got me running. It occurred to me several times this weekend to get on the laptop and put something up, but in the end if found myself either running madly from place to place or sitting down and rocking back and forth while drooling on my shirt. It was an interesting weekend. Debbie left for Ethiopia on Friday afternoon and arrived safely at about 1:30 p.m. Saturday (8:30 p.m. Ethiopia time). She called when she arrived, but I wasn't at home. David, to the surprise of all, remembered to tell me though. I got an e-mail yesterday that said she was safe in her hotel room and had been out to eat (risky, but necessary) and hoped she was not going to get sick. About two minutes later she sent another e-mail that said her wall socket had blown up and she was running on battery power. Considering that she is using an Army issue laptop, that probably went south about 30 seconds later. I just hope the hotel didn't burn down. I received the e-mails on my Blackberry, which I had purposefully carried into church with me in case Deb wrote or called. I quickly responded before she lost battery power. I think the good Lord will forgive me although I'm not so sure about Rev. Mike. I DID have it on 'vibrate'. Anyway, our hopes of video calling from her room are fairly well dashed. If she blew a circuit with an e-mail, I don't see getting the bandwidth for even voice, let alone video. (For all you engineers out there, I realize that current is independent of bandwidth in the PC itself. That was a joke. Other humans laugh at them.)

Caitlin and I went out to eat Saturday night. We went for Sushi. She likes eel and Spider rolls, but not octopus. That's strange...I thought she'd like octopus.

I got up early this morning. I decided to give myself an extra half-hour or so to get ready since I happened to roll over earlier than normal. NOT! Here's a synopsis:

Sometime this weekend our new resident, Pumpkin the cat, disappeared. She was wild when we found her, so I figured she could take care of herself absent getting eaten by a wandering coyote or the fox that lives in the woods behind our house. Still I wondered why she hadn't come back. She hasn't missed a meal since she moved in. The second related thing is, last night our dogs' best friend,Ginger, came to visit. Ginger is an escape artist and dearly loves to come over to our house to play with the girls. This happens often enough that I have come to know her owners and have their phone number. So, at 11:00, I called them and they came to pick Ginger up. Ginger, seeing that she was going to be in trouble, took off and was gone in the woods not to be found that night, so I told her owners to just go home and when she came back I would just put her in the back yard to be picked up in the morning. So, on my way out to get the paper this morning, intending to use my extra time to get it read, I hear a distress MEOW! coming from some indistinct place. Back inside to get a flashlight and a few minutes later I spot the cat, stuck on the roof. She is just a kitten and couldn't figure out how to get down I guess. I retrieved a ladder, rescued the cat, took her inside and fed her. Back out the get the paper, and here comes Ginger. I let Ginger into the back yard with the our dogs, and went back inside to feed, water and medicate the various canines. Back out to get the paper...

By the time I got the paper inside it was time to leave for work, where I am currently avoiding doing the work I put off doing all weekend.

As Kilgore Trout puts it, "So it goes..."

Deb, if you get to read this later, I love you. I hope you (and everyone else) have a great day.

BJ