Of Moose And Men
The Best Laid Plans Of Both Often Go Astray

Got some much needed cleaning done today, after giving an impromptu tour of the apartment & complex to a co-worker who is looking in the area. She and I had chatted Friday about the neighborhood, and then I ran into her on the street this afternoon while heading home from brunch so I invited her in to see the place. Was a tad embarrassing that I’d let it get so dirty, but hell, I’ve been sick for three weeks, I think I get a pass there.

Does mean I’ll try & call the cleaning person my neighbor recommended, though. I just don’t keep up with this enough, and I have to say I miss having someone else clean up every other week.

Brunch was fun. No mimosas, of course – still have antibiotics in my system and am not going to mess with that. Next week maybe? Very, very tired of being sick now. It’s just a minor lingering thing now, but still, enough already. Plus, would be nice to have it gone before I go see the ENT a week from tomorrow. Not that inflammation isn’t expected, but just the normal stuff, please, and not the cold on top of it.

Set up the exercise bike in the living room again, hoping to get in a ride, no matter how short, in the morning. Several weeks of inactivity have taken their toll and I’m ready to try and start up again.

Definitely feeling much better today. Mood improved, a tad more energy, though still not up for real exercise yet (and I feel like an absolute slug from the lack of exercise. Ugh). But it’s getting there, which is the important part.

Got kicked out of work even before the early dismissal time we got because of the storm here in DC. About half an hour before my 2 hour point da boss called and told us to get the heck outta dodge because the snow was worsening and traffic was starting to turn into a real clusterfuck. I managed to catch a bus, so rode home rather than walking (I was prepared to walk – duck boots and all – but glad for the ride). Traffic was definitely horked, but our driver was pushy and got us through without too much delay. Seeing the news reports from lots of friends without power tonight I am very, very glad I bought close to downtown where the power lines are all buried. And if I do ever buy in an area where the lines aren’t buried, the place had better have a working fireplace and room to stack some wood.

Our newbie program is coming together now, and I think it’s going to be a good one this year, certainly better than last year’s (which I think we let slip some, to be honest). Now that I’ve finally gotten more brain power back I’m putting together some of the training materials to supplement our plan, and liking how it’s coming together. Oh, and I got registered for the USAT coaching class in April, so I’ll be going out for coaching certification then. Not sure how long it’ll take once I take the course and turn in my test to get the results back, but I’m hopeful I’ll get certified and then we’ll have a coach for the newbies finally, like we’ve been adding coaches for the more “advanced” programs we’ve started.

Still haven’t been able to fully motivate back into training yet. When it’s hard to tell if the heavy breathing is from being de-trained, the cold temps (and dry air) on ye olde lungs, or some odd combination of the two, it doesn’t leave me very thrilled with the idea of going out for a run. I have been continuing to bike into work, throwing on some long underwear bottoms, heavy wool socks, and old jeans, and that’s been fine to keep my legs/feet warm enough for the ride in, but the top of the hill at 10th street is kicking my ass in the cold. I end up breathing heavy until after I get into the building and decently heated air.

Give me heat and humidity any day of the week. It’s a shame I’ve forgotten so much of my Mandarin or I’d see about applying for jobs in Taiwan again. Even with the pollution I think I’d prefer the weather.

The familia seemed pleased with their Giftmas largesse. And Mom seems quite pleased with her b’day Kindle. I was a bit worried on that, because she didn’t seem to show much interest in mine when I showed it off back in November, but went ahead with it anyway. The email tonight (she got it this afternoon) was most enthusiastic. Looking forward to geeking out with her on it. Wonder how much Dad will end up trying to steal it from her.

I think I’m going to be able to shoehorn a cleaner into my budget now that we’ve gotten the first paycheck stub of the year. I got a modest increase in pay thanks to a performance increase (and no thanks to the powers that be killing off our COLA for this and next year), and between that and the tax adjustments I think I can swing it. My bathroom certainly needs it, as does the kitchen. That’s one of the things I miss most from living at the Woodner – we paid two women to come in every other week and clean. It was worth every penny. I have a couple of names from neighbors, so I think it’s time to start interviewing.

Speaking of the powers that be, the new Congresscritters are in town now and while it was mostly quiet on that front this week, I did get an email just before I left tonight alerting me to an issue and a proposed powwow with our various appropriations staffers over it. Expected, that with the divide among parties, we’d start getting some crazy, but I was enjoying the lull before the storm. It’s not going to be dull for us the next two years, that’s for sure.

The ink is healing nicely, going through the slightly itchy stage as the scab does its thing. Not bad so far, and apparently no allergies to the ink.

Got the mortgage company on the phone yesterday, finally, and figured out what was up with their odd escrow payment record. They record the payment in the month they receive it, not when it was due, so if I pay “early” (before the first), the escrow is credited when they cash the check. Hence August showing two payments, and June showing none. Ugh. So I suppose I need to time my mailing of the checks so they get there consistently at the beginning of each month, rather than just sending them in when I get paid, so the escrow looks “normal”. Again, would be nice if they explained these things better up front.

I got an award at work, from the Head of the Big Gubm’nt Agency himself. Was kinda cool, and unexpected. Got a pretty clock & certificate for it, so I have stuff to show off in ye olde office, too. Always nice to get recognition for your work, especially when it’s coming from the head honcho.

Otherwise things are ticking along fairly well. New couch came in on Saturday, old couch went out about an hour later (thank you, Craigslist!). Very, very much enjoying having a ‘lounging’ couch again. Being able to sit back and read on the couch is so much nicer. I liked the old couch, but it was not loungeable. This is much better.

To celebrate it (and add some color to the black beast), I got it a pair of cushions:

They’re perfect, both for the space, and for me. Nice and geeky/gamery, and quite fun.

Earlier this week was a bit crappy. The weather was cool and wet, and that set off a bit of SAD, and triggering my body’s “OMG, it’s winter, must EAT!!” urge. Grrr. Not a happy time. Thankfully I’m feeling much better today after talking my appetite back down. And some sunlight. And winning the general counsel’s annual award for legal excellence.

The office gives out three awards a year, one for a line attorney, one for support staff, and one for management. I won the line attorney award for this year, which was pretty darned snazzy, if I do say so myself. It’s nice to know the effort with the stimulus bill was seen and recognized.

Have a teeny bit of pre-race jitters going on this week, too. It’ll be fine once race day is here, but in the meantime this is normal, and it’ll pass. Got laundry done this evening, and just need to do a little grocery shopping, drop off the bike on Saturday, and then the race. Easy peasy.

Keeping myself busy with work and training and attempting to get sleep. Last night was the first good night of sleep I’ve had in about a week and I’m hoping to follow up on it with another good one this evening. Between a weather front that’s been passing back and forth over DC (hot, cold, hot, cold, and always wet) and just being drained at work I was a mess the past week. It seems to be evening out finally (though the oil spill is not helping…), and I keep reminding myself that the work front should be busy but in a different way once the other fiscal attorney comes on board after Memorial Day.

I’m a bit disappointed with where my biking is at the moment. I’m mostly happy with swimming and running. I took a run clinic earlier this month from the guy who wrote the book on the style of running I use and that was enormously helpful. I’ve continued to try and focus on form while I run, and just by that I’ve been a bit quicker than I was before, though I’m having to watch the heart rate. The beepy-thingey has been my constant companion (a metronome like thing that allows me to try and turn the legs over at a certain rate), much to the amusement of other people on the trail I’m sure. Swimming’s been okay, and the changeover I did to 100s, with each one a focus on a particular aspect of the stroke, has also helped. Biking, on the other hand, I feel behind on mostly due to scheduling things on the weekends. Not sure where I’d make it up, though if I keep waking up at 3 am and not being able to crash I might just do it in the morning rather than the weekend. Silly body.

Continuing to read like mad on training stuff. And I’ve started doing some reading into Buddhist notions of the self. Interesting take on things, and one which seems to resonate. Not sure where that will go, but the reading is interesting.

Trying to play through the video game Infamous on both hard mode and trying to play it as the good guy, and it ain’t easy. My old tactics while playing the evil side (blow ’em all to hell as quickly as possible) don’t work; I keep getting an “execution” bad karma hit that throws the entire mission off. Very annoying. But, challenging, and I’m keeping at it off and on. That might go to the side though, I just got a copy of Prototype to try out.

Had a date or two. Trying to decide which way a crush is going. But nothing definitive on that front at the moment. Which may be for the best; once the new triathlete stuff is done this year, training starts to ramp up a lot.

I have been experimenting with my usual snacks at work. I keep some ‘deluxe mixed nuts’ at my desk for those times I’m craving salt, and they’re usually fine, but occasionally I seem to get an upset stomach. I suspect it may be the cashews, so I’ve been working through the nuts one by one, eating some and not others. Today was the last of them, the cashews, so we’ll see how I feel later tonight. If it’s the cashews I shall be miffed (they’re a fave), but also relieved to know what it was that’s been screwing with ye olde tummye. Would mean more almonds, less mixed. Or giving cashews away to co-workers. Either way works.

Working my way through a sock this week. Started it Sunday while waiting for the cable guy and I’m now into the arch increases (toe-up, of course). Did have to rejigger the numbers once when I discovered I was knitting a bit tighter than I’d thought, but that’s good, they’ll fit better that way and not be too long.

Got permission today to hire our first choice for the new attorney slot. Huzzah! So help will be on the way in a month or two (or three, depending on the admin process *sigh*). But yay, I get help!

Other than the Comcast situation, things are pretty good here. Training is going apace, I have a plan for my swimming (the weakest of the three legs for me). I’m a tad apprehensive about getting up to the right volume of long rides given my volunteer duties with NTP, but I think I’ll be there for Eagleman. I’m already up to it for Columbia, and I expect that race will go fairly well, all things considered.

We’ve passed two candidates up to the next and final round of interviews for the other fiscal law position at work. Hopefully the interviews will get scheduled soon and we can get him or her on board in short order. Took us longer to get the reference checks done simply because of the nature of scheduling at work the week before last.

Along the same lines, I’m trying to get a better handle on my work load so I can know what things should and can get passed along to the new person. There are several ‘what if’ projects I’d like to start laying out as well, getting reference materials together to make it easier for myself and others to find things related to our budget and the organizational structure of the BGA.

Hosted my friend Rob this weekend, up from Richmond. Mostly I let him wander on his own as I had club and cable stuff to deal with, but we did get to spend some good time together, which was fun. I’m afraid such events will become more scarce as August approaches and I become pickier about my training and recovery needs.

Signed up for a running clinic next month with the folks who established the style of running I’ve been trying to do. Should be interesting to get some feedback from them on how I’m doing with their stuff. I suspect I’m going to be told to turn my legs over faster, but that’s fine and doable. More worried that I’m just completely off on what they were aiming for, but that remains to be seen.

Started another pair of socks yesterday, and I got yarn and a pattern from a club on Friday to knit a pair of fingerless gloves (‘texting gloves’ as they were called). Fun and interesting pattern, and great yarn for it. Looking forward to making those, but want to get the socks done first, or at least well started since those can be a Metro project where the gloves are a bit too complex for traveling.

This week we’ve been interviewing for the other fiscal attorney that we advertised for last month, which advert closed two weeks ago tomorrow. Six down, three to go; we did the first three on Monday and Tuesday, with three today and three tomorrow. Da bosses decided I would be lead on the six final interviews, since I am the subject matter expert here, and I hadn’t realized quite how stressful interviewing could be. I mean, we have some set questions we’re asking of all the candidates, and have some clear top choices to send up the chain for our bigger bosses to interview and make the final selection, but at the same time there have been one or two where they clearly weren’t what we were looking for, but you still have to go through the motions. Plus the added factor of it being several hours out of your day where you the work is still piling up. Ugh. The political bosses are on vacation next week, so their interviewing will happen week after next (I hope), then it’s offer time and get someone in 2-4 weeks after that. So maybe in a month at the fastest, but likely more like 2 months, I’ll have help. And someone new to train on all the odd little programmatic authorities the BGA has. But hey, help will be help, and it can’t happen soon enough.

February just sucked gorilla butt.

Since I haven’t posted since mid-February here, there have been a number of changes, with the usual ‘things in threes’ as well. On top of the death of my grandfather, Mike and I broke things off, and I finally discovered what the third casualty was. In the mess in the middle of the month my office and I completely lost the invite to the GAO annual one-day update on the state of appropriations law over the past year. On Friday I found out it had happened the day before. Understand, this is the one bit of professional development I get to do each year which is actually relevant to what I do at work (as opposed to the annual CLE requirements & courses for the bar, which are a complete waste of my time), and I haven’t missed one since they started doing them until this year. So, yeah, February sucked gorilla butt.

March has been better. I’m on track to do okay in the half marathon next weekend, and by extension the 10 miler next month. I’m getting a good base built for the IM, setting the stage for that little challenge at the end of August. To keep myself on track there I’ve actually stopped drinking. I’ve found that when I do drink, even just a single drink, I tend to drag badly the next day, which prevents me from training (and puts me in a foul mood). The IM is too important to me to let a preventable thing stand in the way, so I’m not letting it. I’ve gone out a time or two to bars with friends now, and it’s actually not been bad not drinking.

Works’ been crazier this month than last, and we’re starting to run against political pressures on spending. Thankfully my office advertised for another fiscal law specialist, which closed Friday, so we’ll start setting up interviews for the next week or two. I hope the process goes quickly, I definitely need the help, and soon.