Ready for Vacation...

We leave tomorrow for Colorado. When I left work today (at 3:55pm....I was SUCCESSFUL in my attempt to get out early!) I felt light and happy and weightless. So nice to turn the Out of Office Assistant on, and say that I will not have access to email or voicemail (whether the statement is true or not...totally different story).

I picked out two books at Barnes & Noble that I am quite excited about. The History of Love by Nicole Krauss, and The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai. I started reading the former, thinking it might the "lighter, faster" read -- but I think I am wrong. My thought was I would finish it over my travels and leave it in Colorado for my mom to read - but the first few pages proved to be denser than I expected. But very good. I am only on page 19, so I will reserve any more comment until I am further into it. But so far, it has pulled me in.

Over the weekend, Derek and I went out with one of the summer legal interns (that I am supervising), and his girlfriend who is visiting from DC. His girlfriend is about to start medical school at GW, and was so nice. As is the intern. He is only a few years younger than me, and one of hte nicest people I have ever met. Ambitious, down to earth, very together. Another friend of mine from work also joined us, along with her boyfriend. She is in one of the creative groups at work whom I do a lot of work with. Turns out, she is very creative. When not at work, she is a singer! She is about to come out with an album, and actually was previously on the charts in the UK (www.johannalive.com). Her boyfriend and her went to undergrad together, and he actually was a swimmer. He went to high school at a school where a number of my former G-town teammates swam in Arizona, as well as my closest friend from law school. Between the swimming connections and connections to DC, it felt like we all knew each other better than we actually do. And we had a great time. Lots of laughter, lots of great conversation (from politics to movies to traveling to television to subway stories to New York chatter to personal stories). I was really glad that last week, on a whim, I coordinated it. I had just been thinking that while I like keeping work and home separate in many ways, when you are committed to a place long term, it is nice to develop friendships outside of the office with some of the people that I like at work. Anyway, it made for a good weekend. That, and the 70 degree weather with no humidity helped. And the Sunday night bar-b-que with my building neighbors (at least five out of the eight units....the "originals"...the five couples in five of the units have lived in the building since within about a month of each other, the remaining three units weren't filled until a bit later).

Okay, I have to reserve us a car to take us to the airport in the morning. And I have to call my sister, who is having problems with her dog (Maddie is petrified of thunder.....think Marley and Me but 100 times worse and the doggie-downers don't do anything for her....) to try to come up with a solution. I hate that summer time is thunderstorm season in Colorado, and that her husband is such a pr*** about some things. If he gave Maddie more attention, the issue would not be AS BAD. So anyway, I have to call her and do my part to figure out a better life for Maddie. We might just have three dogs at our house pretty soon -- and hopefully Deuce can teach her how to bunker up in the bathtub rather than Maddie teaching him how to chew through dry wall....and more dry wall....and wood studs...and more dry wall. To be honest, what she really needs is a family who has time for her -- maybe even an older couple who need companionship and stay at home so she is not ALONE when she is scared. But that isn't her family right now, so we have to find a way to make her family provide her what she needs.

More after I get back from Colorado:)