What a beautiful weekend here. It was sunny and in the 80's with a light breeze. Played golf on Friday (poorly I might add). On Saturday I went to the beach and it was just gorgeous. On Sunday, DH and I saw "Dial M for Murder" an old play, but still good. The actors did a great job.

This week will be full of meetings (sigh).

lala, I'm glad your presentation went well.

Hi, Susan, Pam and Melissa.

Good morning from rainy, but still beautiful Seattle.

It was rainy here, muggy too, but we managed to do indoor and outdoor things...Unfortunately not as much homework as we wanted to. Oh well. Pretty pathetic when you go to work at 11pm on saturday night to look for a disc to install software at home and look for documentation.

Er, my talk went well, but on Friday am, my boss came into my office and said we did well, but the next time we gave a talk, we needed to let her "managerize and detechnicalize it", er, we were giving it to scientists, not managers...............She just dug herself in deeper and deeper. She's really amazing sometimes. By the time she left my office I was basically ready to cry and my colleague and I were pretty prissed off. I am sort of hoping for a little coup here...

Anyways, the day got better because software has miraculously appeared, we got a grant funded (none of the grant writing was done by her, thankyouverymuch) to do something that is very cool, we left early for happy hour and by 6 pm, i could not feel my feet.

I sometimes think I missed the boat when it came time for mentoring and getting good bosses....

I made these really fabulous muffins this weekend from this food blog -- food porn is more like it.

They are definitely not core or flex, well maybe you could call them 6 pt muffins -- need to the math, but they are interesting none the less...

cocao nibs and raspberry muffins from chocolate and zucchini

I would have probably increased the raspberries and decreased the sugar a scootch bit and added the cocao nibs to muffin batter.

I had one. But lets not talk about the rest of the weekend. Maybe I need to go to a meeting on Saturdays too.

Lisa -- the beach sounds glorious. I'm sorry golf wasn't very good, but at least you got a nice walk, right?

Hi to everyone else out there. Try and drink some water and get out and away from your desks today!

lala

lala, Glad your talk went well, but sorry you have a goof-ball for a boss. We always said that the managers are so goofy because when they get up there, it's all that rarefied air! Some of them just can't leave well enough alone; they have to get their two cents in. Now watch her take credit for the grant.

The muffins look divine.

I did leave my desk today and walked over to the employee art exhibit. I'll tell you we have some talented people in our company. There were some impressive pieces.

Morning...

Wish me luck and send good vibes this am. Roya the cat appears to be failing so I'm going to take her to her vet. DP who took the 5 pm train last night is on the 7 am train this am.

I'm remarkably calm considering. This is a amazing cat who has lived a fine and wondrous and happy life.

more later...

Good afternoon everyone!

My vacation went well and as Lisa mentioned last week the weather was gorgeous! Sunday was a little hot/humid for me but we weren't outside for any major length of time so I didn't have to worry about sunburn. My GF and I had a great time--the kids are adorable and I've decided I'm not ready to be a grandparent any time soon I had a long day yesterday and had a long layover in Cincinnati (3 hours) and didn't get back home until 10:30 p.m. Needless to say, my brain is mush today and I've got a bit of a headache. Too many late nights and early mornings!

I did WI before I left and was up 1.6# and wasn't happy with that since I had been walking and doing my exercises and even cut back on the snacking. Anyway, I'm hoping that this week will be a little better but we'll see. TOM is due at the end of the week so who knows what the scale will reflect.

I'll write more later on. Hope everyone is having a good day.

lala, good vibes, good vibes. How old is Miss Roya?

Melissa, welcome back. I told you the weather was great. I'm glad you enjoyed yourself. How were the tea rooms?

Welcome back Melissa! Sounds like you had a nice time. Remember, its just airplane fluff.

Well, roya is not well, she's 18.6 years old and the vet thinks that she may have a tumor and kidney faliure. This is the cat who spent a good long life as the princess cat. DP is coming in a few hours so we're probably going to the vet right afterwards to make a decision. What a hard day this is turning out to be.

lala

Hi all. It's grey and overcast today. I'm hoping all the crappy weather will play itself out so that it doesn't rain on the weekend. Cooler weather is OK, but I don't want another day like we had last year for the local marathon. Keep your fingers crossed. OK for me, I'm only doing 10 km, but my friends are doing the half, and of course there are those who do the whole 42 km.

lala: I'm sorry to hear that Miss Roya is failing. She's had a good long life - most of it as a princess I hear - but it doesn't make the thought of life without her any easier. Hugs.

Melissa: If you're exhausted, then you had a good vacation!! Don't get too stressed out about the gain. You were probably retraining water due to TOM.

Lisa: Going to the beach sounds delightful. We won't be doing that until July, and even then we can't really swim cause the ocean doesn't warm up until September. We get about a week when you can enter the water without losing the feeling in your feet, then the cool autumn winds start.

I haven't weighed myself. I went out yesterday and bought some second-hand clothing to wear. Not very much. I have no intention of feeling this crappy for much longer. When, oh when, will the real "click" happen? Tonight? Tomorrow?? Pray for me...

Susan

Hi everyone,

We brought Roya home. The vet hydrated her and gave her prednisone. She's still dying, but he thinks that she was not quite ready to die. Does that make sense? Anyhow, we're making her comfortable, she ate a bunch and she's resting. I was feeling pretty good about this when he was explaining it to us earlier, but then I took a nap, woke up and realized that my cat was still dying and will never get better.

I hope we made the right descision. I do trust our vet and he thought this was the best course. DP is going to teach me the ways of sub-cut fluid giving as its a twice a day thing now.

Thanks for your kind words and keep roya in your thoughts. If you see an iris, think of her, she likes to nibble at their leaves. Our siberian, pacific coast and beared irises are blooming now, so this is especially hard for me.

Susan --- I'm sorry you had to buy some new clothes, but they were old so its okay. You'll be out of them in no time. I sort of have heard the click, but still need to buckle down, stress is not helping.

Wel,, I'm going to plod through my statements of significance for my building surveys and try to be in bed by a decent hour. I have all day training downtown tomorrow. yikes.

lala

Hi Ladies,

The weather here is gorgeous, bright and sunny. This is such a busy time of year with graduations, first communions, dance recitals etc. Don't think we're going to have a free weekend until after the 4th of July. Yesterday was nice, the company I work for had a picnic for it's employees and some of our vendors. The weather was perfect and the food and good. I was pretty good, only one cheeseburger, a little potato salad and a little pasta. Skipped desert entirely. Can't wait for the weekend, DH and I are going to Nantucket for a little getaway and then I am on vacation all of next week. Not much planned in terms of day trips, but a lot to do around the house.

Melissa welcome back, I'm glad you enjoyed the visit with your GF. Hope you get "settled in" today.

Susan Buying a few things from the thrift store was the way to go. Good luck in the marathon.

Lala I'm so sorry about Miss Roya. 18 is a long cat life. Just try and keep her comfortable and know she had a nice long life with you.

Hi to Lisa.

Well ladies time to head out the door and get to a meeting. Hope your all having a nice week and I'll talk to you soon.

lala, I'm sorry about Roya. I just wouldn't want her to suffer. We become so attached to our furry and feathered friends. Stress doesn't help me with watching what I eat either. I'm not one of those who loses weight during stressful times.

Susan, I hope the weather shapes up. Of course you don't want it to be too warm. : ) Well, at least you didn't buy any new clothes! You are saying the same things that my GF, Donna, is saying. She wants to know how to get that click! I told her that for me I just didn't want to buy bigger sized clothes. I was just disgusted with myself.

Pam, the picnic sounded nice. We're having back-to-back meetings here and they brought in a two-ton German chocolate cake yesterday. I didn't even try it. I even ate a Chicken Caesar salad for lunch.

Hi, Melissa.

I really hope the weather stays good here. DH and I are in a golf tournament on Saturday.

Here's a grrrr. We have a satellite dish (Dish network). Yesterday it just stopped working. I tried myself (DH is not technically inclined) to get it to work, but no dice. I called Tech Support and now a repairman has to come out. I need to take off work as DH is working. I really don't care to ever watch TV, but DH is a TV-head, so now I'll have to sit there all afternoon on Friday waiting. The system is a little over a year old; you'd think it would last longer than that.

Hi everyone,

in training. i love metadata and databases. they are all very important for data management.



roya slept through the night, she actually went down stairs in the middle of the night to use her litterbox and then slept on her downstairs bed. She did eat and drink and DP gave her fluids this am. I have to say having her home this week is great for me. She's soo supportive.

Lisa - I don't have a dish. I wish we did. I hope it works soon.

Pam -- I understand being overscheduled! DP is at Woods Hole in June. I wish I could join her....

Hi to Susan.

i'm thinking of going here for lunch....salumi. Its either that or starbucks.
ech.

back to ioos and data management.

lala

Hi everyone! Another bright, sunny day here. Temps are cool (59) but that's okay. I'm still tired and am hoping that after tonight I'll be back to my normal self. It doesn't helpt that TOM is due to arrive Thursday/Friday. I'm always sooo tired just prior. Oh well.

Lala: I hope Roya rallies for you. It's so hard to let go. My sheltie had kidney failure a number of years ago and it was so hard. The main thing is that she's comfortable. I'm glad someone likes databases--it's not my bag although this time of year we're doing a lot of data entry for our orientations.

Lisa: Here's hoping the weather holds for you for the weekend. It's supposed to be nice here--we're going to the Highland Games on Saturday and part of that will be a rugby tournament which is always fun.

Susan: I hope you find your "click" although sometimes I think we look too hard for it. It'll be there it's just a matter of being the right time. Look at the positive things you're doing--running, etc. I admire those who do it and enjoy it. Just think where you'd be if you weren't running.

Pam: I hope you have great weather for your weekend get away and that next week is equally nice while you're off. Good for you for behaving yourself at the picnic--it's hard to not pick.

I was down .4 at today's WI which really surprised me because when I did a quick check on my home scale I was up...I'm not complaining though! I'm still a little tired but I think that tomorrow will be better.

Here's a rundown of what/where we went. Our main goal is to get to tearooms so we went to Davis & Daughters and Main Street Tearooms on Wednesday. Main Street was really nice and the tea, scones, sandwiches were wonderful. It's a great way to relax and catch up. We went to Davis & Daughters for iced tea and dessert later in the afternoon after doing a little shopping. Thursday morning we were up and met up with 2 more friends at the Royal Tearoom in Tampa, which is one of our favorites. The owner, Denise, is really nice and very accommodating. We took my GF's 2 children with us and they were really good. From there we went to our friend's house and went swimming followed by Chinese out. Friday was yet another tea at our friend's house and then a recital in the evening. Now mind you, we love tea, so Saturday we drove to Plant City to have tea at Southern Belle Tea Room. We had homemade lobster bisque that was delicious and the scones were perfect. (Lisa, this place is a gem and the owner is really nice.) We did some shopping and then went back to my GF's house and ate pizza and watched Shall We Dance. Sunday we took it easy--went to lunch at Jack Willie's and had a great blackened grouper sandwich. The rest of the day was spent at the lot where my GF and DH are building their new home. The time went by so quickly--Monday before I left we went to International Plaza just by the airport and did a little shopping. There's a great gelato place there and from what I read it's the only one in the US. The person running the place said that all the ingredients are imported from Italy. It was delicious! Anyway, the trip was great--I've found I don't have the energy that I had before to keep up with a 5 yo and 3 yo... but it was great fun. The youngest was cute and gave me numerous hugs before I left. It was good to sleep in my own bed though.

Well ladies, vacation time is over and I need to focus on getting myself back on track and back to where I want to be so I'm going to focus on keeping up with my journal this week and work on getting the veggie servings in. Have a great evening!!

lala, the pancetta looks good. Glad to hear that Roya is up and about.

Melissa, Congrats to you on the loss and after vacation, too. Please let me know where the Royal tearoom is in Tampa. Also, the Southern Belle Tearoom. Maybe I could take my mother to either one. Did you dress up when you went to the tearooms?

I've had that gelato. It is very good. I love International Plaza.

I'm jealous of all the tea rooms.

I did a half of a fennel salami sandwich for lunch/dinner and a small plate of fava bean and chard bruschetta.

Really should incorporate some water and veggies in to my diet tomorrow. I only have training and not class and training.

DP just shot up roya with fluids. She was not pleased. She's really not eating, so I have no idea how long she will be with us. This really sucks.

Well, time to clean up the kitchen, do a bit of declutter and go to bed.

night ladies.

lala