In the past 72 hours, I have:

• Gone hiking
• ..........(this time I did the Sinks Trail on Monte Sano... my goal is to do them all, eventually)
• Made cookies
• ..........(not Christmas cookies, just break and bakes... the good cookies will come when I'm home! :) )
• Organised my entire closet
• ..........(I bought rubbermaids and took everything out of my closet to sort)
• Realised how blessed I am
• ..........(I have some really amazing people in my life right now... and I can't express how much they mean!)
• Worked on moving on
• ..........(I found an Easter Egg Adam gave me last year in my backpack... not long after, Pete found the same one... I got over it... and threw it away.)
• Realised how much I've grown
• ..........(mainly from my conversations with Melissa and my mom)
• Decided to run a Marathon
• ..........(I will be training this year to run the Rocket City Marathon in December... I'm not concerned about time... I would just like to finish! :) )
• Tried Greek food
• ..........(I've had Greek before, but I was willing to try something very new)
• Thought about the things I no longer have that I miss
• ..........(this was probably the hardest out of all... I came across a card Alice and Jack sent me while I was at Camp one year... I started realising how much I miss what I no longer have... some are gone forever... some seem like they want to be... either way, I wish things didn't change so often)

So I guess you could say it has been a productive past three days. I'm looking forward to that plane ride home much more than words can express. While talking to my mom last night, I got even more excited. It seems like this time (as opposed to Thanksgiving) I realise I'm going home. Maybe it's because my work term is also ending. Anyway, Saturday can't come soon enough...

Hope everyone is doing well and that power outtages and snow aren't slowing you down! :) And PS, Thanks Tracy for the call the other day. I finally listened to my voicemail on my way to work this morning. It made me smile. :) Love to all!

Peace, Love and Making the Most of Things,

-m

Oh Weekends...

Thank God this week is done. I have five more days left at TBE for this work term and it seems that the lower that number gets, the more I have to do and the more stress I have. Maybe next week will be a little easier? I do know that next semester people are not going to want to do something and they'll say "well, I'll just give it to Megan". Heh. Ooops. Anyhoo. The big projects I was working on have all been turned in and have, for the most part, have had reviews. Seems like I did the right thing on them. Eh.

I was going to go jogging yesterday after work. Instead I let the puppy out, ran to Dicks and Target and then settled on making pizza for dinner and went to bed at 8:30. I didn't actually fall asleep till later and didn't sleep through the night (there will be a post after this one sort of related) due to dreams (both mine and the puppy's) and some other stuff.

I was planning on going hiking today. I asked Claire if she wanted to go with me and she told me as long as it wasn't as long as last time's. Yeah. I was wanting one a few hours longer. I seem to be able (or want to) push myself harder than she does. So I originally signed online right now to check trails to determine where I wanted to go. It's misting outside and rather foggy, but I'm still going to head up there, probably without Claire or Pete. I'm taking a pack with water and granola bars so Kimberly won't get all.... Kimberly, again.

There's a show at the planetarium that Melissa is helping with this evening so I think I'm going to head up there sometime. I haven't seen her since Pete and Fergie played together which didn't give us much time to chat. We're also having lunch at Papa Gyro's on Monday. I'm totally looking forward to it! :)

Anyhoo, I'm going to go get ready to head up to Monte Sano. Hope every is having a good weekend. Midwesterners: please don't freeze! And Southerners: go out and do something outside! It's super warm for December!

Peace, Love y Bill el Scientifico.
-m

K^2 is my hero.

I was pretty stressed out yesterday. I felt as if everything was coming at me at once.

My work report was due today; I knew it was due and I had been working on it. But I was worried about it not being just right.

Geof had told me before he left for Florida that he wanted me to think through some ideas for photography procedures for projects we are working on. I thought it was a "hey, brainstorm some ideas and we'll discuss them when I get back". Yeah. I got back to my desk from helping out in Manufacturing yesterday and got a text from him giving me a heads up that Mike, our big boss from Houston would be calling. My little red light on my phone was flashing and I already had an email. Turns out Mike wanted the ideas for a meeting Thursday. I sent him an email back with what I had come to the conclusion of after talking to people around here and then we discussed the ideas over the phone. After hanging up with him it took me about 3-4 hours before I could stop shaking. I had to get away from the office so I took the information home and worked on the powerpoint for a few hours.

I got my evaluation yesterday as well. I did pretty well. Overall I think my boss was happy with me being at TBE.

Before Geof left last week, he sent a presentation that I needed to work on. It is due by Friday for a Program Review next week. He told me to get all this information that I needed from and I quote "Kimberly, procurement, etc". You don't give someone who doesn't know what they're doing an "etc". I've sat in maaaaybe one of these via telecon and haven't had any exposure to gathering the information. Anyway, I worked on that for a few hours yesterday as well and I'm still no where close to being done.

After sitting in Kimberly's office this morning I think she knew I was getting frustrated. She called IT to see if she could get some help for me with software issues I was having. Turns out I ended up retyping everything again but I am grateful for what she had done to help. She also sent me earned value for the project that is being reviewed and I told her I wasn't so confident I could do the review; it's a pretty big thing. She told me I could do it, that I wasn't alone in this and if I needed anything she would help me get it. I felt a little better and told her while leaving she was my hero. She smiled.



So here I sit.
I went over to UAH and turned in my Co-op work report.
I've sent the photo requirement powerpoint off to Mike. He can now do what he wants with it.
And I'm working on the Program Review.
I'm slowly checking things off my list. And it kinda feels good.



I know I will be going jogging or hiking or something as soon as I can get home today. It might be too dark to hike, but I will for sure be doing something. It has warmed up here enough to be able to hang out outside. We'll see, though.

I hope everyone else is having a less hectic day.

Peace, Love and the Launch of Atlantis Tomorrow.
-m

Hey, Where You Goin'?

Have I mentioned how much I love Sara? Yup. Just in case I haven't (at least lately), I do. :) I'm going to try to see her when she comes to Memphis. :D I've been listening to Misfits and Spiritual Appliances over and over and over and over. Songs that didn't have much meaning when I was 8 suddenly mean a lot more, now.

Anyway. Its getting really chilly here. I'm glad we got our hike in this past weekend (we hiked for 3.5ish hours going about 10ish miles. I was ecstatic!) though I'm sure I'll probably go again this coming weekend. As long as its not snowing, which is pretty safe to assume. :)

Pete is becoming seriously attached to me. If he hasn't been in my arms this evening, he's been sitting at my feet or under my desk chair. I don't know what's up with him...

Hmm. Work is stressful. Okay, I can disappear if I need to but its everyone else who is stressed. People are complaining about each other. Some people are getting confused. People are just getting frustrated from all sides. Its hard because I like (mostly) everyone and when someone says something about one person I feel badly. *sigh* 9 more days. :(

I have Pete's and my plane tickets. I'm excited. He went to the vet this past weekend and is completely healthy and caught up on shots. He's finally on his heartworm meds as well. I'm thrilled.

I still really want to go to Africa. Random thought, I know. But I haven't been doing as much service and it's kind of bumming me out. If there was a group that would allow me to do Habitat with them, I would love it! I'm trying to think of other service groups here...

I'm sure there was other stuff I was going to write about. But I can't think of it, now. Phoey. Oh well. I hope everyone has had a good start to the week.

Peace, Love and Throwing Every Feeling Completely Into Music,
-m