Home from another fabulous FKO! Made the drive back in an impressive 9 hours and 20 minutes, which included getting briefly lost in suburban Buffalo. (I'll note I did stop to ask for directions.) Ordered and quickly consumed pizza. Found our bedroom trash can overturned and its contents scattered around. Gee...did someone (specifically two furry "meep"-ing someones) miss us? Tivo appears to have recorded Numb3rs and BSG. Yay.

More when I can assemble a con-rep's worth of coherent thoughts.

Home. Tired. Braaaaaaaains.

Taking comp day tomorrow to recover.

In my usual scatter-brained way, I managed to post about New Years Eve, but of course blithely skipped over the rest of the weekend. Granted, much of it was spent around the house, but that was OK since I finally caught up on a bunch of things that needed doing. For example, raking the rest of the front yard, cutting up the branches that had fallen off our tree, and carting stuff over to the dump. Also got in a couple of treadmill sessions and guitar practices. Meanwhile, watched the Terps lose (bleah!), the 'Skins win (woo-hoo!), Michigan win (I can hear the cheers from my friends up North!), and USC leisurely stroll up and down the field.

But most importantly, we did have a filker in town--catalana, for the APA conference. We shuttled her up to Stately Zeve/Andrews Manor for dinner and hanging out. starmalachite and stevemb joined the party. We had an excellent dinner at Liberatore's up in Owings Mills. Lots of food--big dinner plates and the salad could almost have been a meal in itself. A most enjoyable evening was had by all.

I've heard it said that what you do on New Years' Day determines what your year would be like. In my case, that would mean I'll get lots of exercise (used the treadmill), make lots of music (played guitar), and see lots of sports (watched bowl games). I think I can deal with that! 8-)

Sneaking in a quick update before running out the door to 3LF...fairly quiet and lazy weekend here in Lake Wob...er, Rockville. Sallied forth on Saturday to finally mail in my passport renewal (which expired just *before* FKO--a fact which escaped the notice of both Canadian and US Customs) and to acquire a new lightweight jacket for wetter commuting days. Saturday evening we watched "Shaun of the Dead" on DVD. Much fun, and I was only squicked out once, surprisingly. Interestingly, since I'd finished a disk of '24' on Friday and Sheryl finished a disk on Sunday, this marks the first time since we started on Netflix that we have *no* disks in the house. Sunday I mostly spent either reading "Eifelheim" (on free download) or filing and cleaning stuff up in my study.

Other than that, not much to report. Have recently joined the ranks of those not sleeping well. Need to look into that. It's not life or job, both of which are going well.

Most of this week will be devoted to preparing for our looming trip to Seattle. We'll be spending Labor Day weekend sightseeing (Space Needle, EMP, Pioneer Square, possibly the Aquarium or Zoo, maybe a day trip to Rainier). Then I'll stay on the rest of the week for one of $EMPLOYER's three-times-a-year board meetings. We're quite looking forward to it. As some of you recall I spent two weeks on business in Seattle back in '98, with a side trip to Orycon. I enjoyed the city itself despite the fact the job assignment itself totally sucked. This time, at least, I'll even enjoy the working part of the trip too! 8-)

Winding down a weekend hosting Sheryl's parents for their traditional summer visit. All things considered, a fairly relaxing and quiet weekend (other than Sheryl's dad having the TV on so loud we can hear it over all three floors of the townhouse...) They arrived Friday evening, and we met my mother and her current beau for dinner at nearby Thai restaurant Benjarong.

Saturday was mostly spent lazing around the house. We made an early lunch and supermarket run, followed by a walk around the neighborhood. Sheryl, her dad and I actually racked up about a two-mile stroll (her mom turned back earlier). Later we went to dinner at the Legal Sea Foods at Westfield Montgomery (Montgomery Mall to us old timers). Other than that, I spent the day catching up on newspapers and other miscellaneous stuff.

Today we headed up to Baltimore to visit the National Aquarium in Baltimore, which was fun. I had been there once before, but that was probably 15 years ago and predated the Aquarium's various expansion(s). We caught the dolphin show (although we sat safely outside the splash zone) and browsed the exhibits. They currently have an exhibit on Australia that is as much birds and reptiles as it is fish, but still interesting.

After the Aquarium we met my father and Bobbie for dinner at Sabatino's in Little Italy. Dinner was excellent, although the portions were sized for an NFL linebacker--either the dinner salad or the entree could have made a full meal in itself. I had enough of my eggplant parmesan & veal left to package up in a doggie bag and bring home for lunch. But I guess we got our money's worth.

That's about it for the weekend. And yes, I know I still owe y'all a full Archon report.

Bunches of Happy New Year wishes for all! Lazy morning (well, afternoon now...) here watching the Tournament of Roses Parade and reading LJ. We went to the Nookery for the annual New Year's party. Bunch of local folks including katrinb and thelongshot, Steve & Crystal, Steven Joel & museinred, and beckyfeld and osewalrus. Played a round of Munchkin Bites/Super Munchkin, which Chastity won. Ate pizza, turkey, and many many desserts (including both fudge and lemon bars made by France).

( Summing up the year )