Today was busy. My temper has been a bit short with some folks in the office. But for the love of all that is holy, they need to stop throwing work at me! I am having a tough time keeping up with my own stuff. I suppose that job security is a blessed thing and I should be thankful. I am. Really, I am.  

Snow and ice was not too bad today. It was more pretty than hazardous. There were a few spots on the way in when it got a bit dicey, but for the most part it was just pretty. I put the car in 4WD and cruised in at 25-30MPH most of the way. Local schools were on a two hour delay this morning and I think that eased traffic quite a bit.

They say that there may be more ice tomorrow AM, but it looks like this is the worst of it. Then it starts to thaw out a bit. I’d like to try to make it up to the mountains sometime this weekend, if possible. I don’t know that it’ll happen, but I’ll bet it’s pretty there. My mother has a coffee maker that draws power from the cigarette lighter. Might be a good time to put it to use.

The cats have suddenly become very quiet. I don’t see either one of them in their usual haunts. I’d better go see what they are up to. Knowing those two, it can’t be good.

The snow is still falling, although wet and slushy and not likely to leave any real lasting effect. Mufassa is laying on the stacks of books resting on the sofa table and Little One sleeps in the floor in the main walkway through the living room, unaware that one mis-step on my part and she’ll be in severe pain. I sit here with a cup of Mexican hot chocolate and catch up on software updates that I’ve neglected to apply to the laptop over the last several months. (I’ve rebooted it seven times already.)

Sami finally went to sleep- she’s been excited and talkative all evening. I feel bad, just telling her to go to bed and we’ll talk in the morning. But if she had her way, she’d be up all night and after last night’s 4:30 AM bedtime (only to be woken again at 6:30AM), I needed the quiet time desperately.

I’ve got a full schedule again this week. So many places to go and so much to do. The holidays both thrill and exhaust me for this very reason. In the next three weeks, I have to finish my holiday shopping, complete my baking projects and candy making, get the holiday shipments in the mail, decorate the apartment for company, get the car in for an oil change, spend the night in Seattle, spend a full day and evening in Portland, and play ‘chauffeur’ to my daughter and her friends. (oh, and this weekend, we have the local holiday parade and my daughter’s boyfriend coming to town to visit…) I’m not sure I can fit it all in, but it has to happen. It just has to.

Perhaps, I should first run over to Borders. I always loved book shopping and face it- I could use a ‘How- To’ guide on time management.

We didn’t get out of the house until nearly 3PM. The I-5 corridor was sunny and clear, where the mountainous roads to the east were clouded over. Given the time and the weather, we decided to just drive up the I-5 corridor with no particular destination, just for the sake of driving… being out of the house and catching some sunshine. I really didn’t look forward to driving windy mountain roads in the dark- too many mudslides and fallen trees to worry about.

About an hour and ten minutes, we wound up in downtown Portland, where I just let Sami have free reign with the camera. She shot quite a bit until her boyfriend (oh, dear), Nathan called. I figured I’d lost her at that point and turned around, headed for home. Sami and Nathan chatted over the phone most of the way back. We stopped in Albany and picked up salads for dinner then drove the last few miles home.

It wasn’t a monumental day, but it was nice to see her having fun. There were no arguments on the way up- a landmark event for us!. I think she even had fun, although she’ll deny it, of course. None of her photos from PDX turned out overly exciting… it was getting dark and my poor camera doesn’t do well in low light anymore. But for her benefit, I’m posting one that she shot in the city…

And this one, which is my favorite of the day…. Photo credits go to Sami on this one, too.

The second photo was shot out the car window on the freeway as we passed a well lit shopping center. I reminded her to drop the shutter speed and then heard about a dozen clicks… apparently, she set it to a fairly long exposure without paying attention as she was also on the phone. The result…. well, it’s kind of pretty!

I’m off to do laundry. I have to return to work tomorrow and calling in nekkid just isn’t an option- at least not in my line of work.