August Quiet

I'm enjoying the quiet of a weekend ALONE....J. took the kids to Los Angeles to visit family for the weekend. The main impetus for the sort of last minute trip is using the driving time for H. toward his license requirements. Little did we know the DMV is so backed up (apparently due to the closures caused by the state budget situation - offices of many agencies are closed most Fridays of the month these days), we can't get an appointment for H. anytime in August and September isn't looking too good, either. So we will be driving H. to school for the first month - and hoping he can catch a ride home with a friend. Oh well. More reason for us to be up early and get moving around here.

I am working - I did work a bit today at home but it isn't working too well...forgot to bring home the power cord for my laptop and I need both my personal PC (so I can print things I move to a flash drive) and my work PC - and only one power cord. So tomorrow, I will trudge into work and just plug away most of the day. I'll need to come home to check on the dog a bit since she will be alone.

Chloe is taking her 'protecting Mama' role very seriously this weekend. Our new neighbors are working very hard on the backyard and doing some renovations in the kitchen - a constant stream of noise and people in and out the side door of the garage. I'd never realized how little time our previous neighbors spent outside until new ones moved in - Chloe is beside herself with stress and frantic barking at every little sound. She is making me nuts....and my nerves are totally on edge. She will suddenly break out into a 'ripping your head off' barking attack - startling me to death...

This morning, there was a really pretty cat in our backyard - with a collar, so at least I knew it wasn't a stray. I watched it walk the perimeter of our yard and thought I was seeing it holding something in it's mouth....sure enough, as it jumped up the fence, I noticed a long tail hanging from the left side of it's mouth. A MOUSE!! IN OUR BACKYARD!! Nice to have a cat around to hunt and get them out of the yard.

Summer is winding down. School for H. starts next week. B. starts the week after. B. and I went to LPC on Wednesday and got most of his books - $300. Not too bad though most were used and all were paperback. That's a lot for 4 books. We still have to order one more book that he can pick up at the bookstore next Wednesday when he attends the freshman orientation.

I miss the beach. I miss guacamole and chips for lunch everyday. I miss feeling relaxed. It didn't last very long, really...that post-vacation 'hopeful' feeling. I'm back to being fully entrenched in year-end and it sucks. Playa del Carmen seems a lifetime ago.....

I'm 49 years old and I won't retire until I'm 67. 18 more years of trudging through day after day.......seems like forever. I know it's not - and I really do love my job and I know that right at this moment, it seems forever but it's really not....

J. and I are already planning our adventures for when he retires (about a decade before me) - and for me, two weeks in Playa del Carmen annually will be a must. We'll just budget for it in our monthly budget and save up and every July, head south for a couple weeks of sun and surf and R&R. With or without the boys tagging along.

I can do this. As long as I know there are two weeks of beach time in the plan each year, I can do it.