Okey-dokey, then

Life has gone crazy AND calmed down a lot over the last two weeks.

Let me explain how the office works (or doesn't) for three weeks in August. What is normally a three-person office becomes a one-person office, registration and the first week of class combine to kick my ass. I have to answer the phones and see the students. This year, consider the cherry on top of that fun sundae: I have to pack said three-person office and the 20-person computer lab and move it to a brand-new building where we combine it with the other 15 people in my department. Originally our department was spread across three buildings while we waited for the new building to be built.

So, all this happened since the last time I really wrote anything. I always forget that the UNpacking is so much worse than the packing and I was sore for four days!

The world is finally right-side up again and it's beautiful to just see the sky. I saw the mountains this morning and realized that I hadn't seen them for a month or so. Gotta raise that head every now and then. Although my office is smaller and has no window, I'm really ok with that since it's so pretty and everything matches and is clean. I now am able to hire an admin assistant now that everyone realizes how busy it really is. What that really means is that they are tired of answering the phone and trying to sign in visitors. The paperwork is now in HR...so I'm just waiting for the applications to pour in.

Our building is BEEEEEEoootiful! You can view more info on it here.

I think I've finished some knitting projects since last time, but I've also spent a whole lot of time just surfing the web like a zombie. Ripping knitting back is called "frogging" since the sound the frog makes (rip-it) is what you are doing and when a project is frogged back to the beginning it's sent to the "frog pond." I sent three projects to the frog pond twice on each one. Apparently when you zombie-knit it creates a very unattractive item.

Today I got some custom-dyed yarn, time for more guessing! This is from Scout's Swag and it's scrumptiously soft and squooshy and yep, these are all for gifts. It's so hard not to begin a new project with this, but Must.Finish.Current.Projects. I'm so glad I bought this last month, it was a nice surprise in the mailbox! Will edit and add pictures when the battery on the camera is charged.

King Typo has been to California working on a bid for one of the national labs. The dogs completely don't know what to do with themselves when he's not here. I almost have to beg them to step away from the door and eat. Then when he returns, they glue themselves to him and I cease to exist.

We are loving the organic CSA; I signed up for another four weeks and hope to do a quarterly membership next time. This week we got Pluots which were yummy, juicy yet firm. Found the BEST recipe for chard; carmelize onions and then wilt the chard on top. The sweet, sweet onions seem to balance the strong flavor of the greens. The King declared it good and he hates cooked greens because they're too bitter. Learned how to make Sambar from the Tamil Nadu region of India. It's been great for using up the summer squash, eggplant, green onions and tomatoes. We manage to have a big pot of it every couple of weeks and the King has declared it good.

I have also indulged my perfume oil addiction. And, of course, I had to have the "perfect" place to store it so I got busy on that cigar box that I got in Honduras. I'm also awaiting delivery of orders from Possets and Happy Housewife Soaps Sundries. I love that I can order the sample size bottles for a little $$ and get a sniff. Then later order the bigger bottle and at $10 I don't feel guilty about smelling good.

The only thing that really sucks right now is that one of the little clips under the spacebar on my laptop is broken. So, please ignore the words that might be stuck together, I've got to call Dell and see what to do to get it serviced under the warranty.

OK, I'm leaving the spacebar AND the laptop and going to knit now that I actually have a brain and I'm wide awake again. BTW, if you call me, my cellphone is not ringing for some reason. Just leave a message and I'll call you back. Waiting on new phone again.