winter

It snowed today. It's not the first snow, but with my neighborhood being only 50ft above sea level, it's the first snow that has reached downtown so far.

It's been a bit strange getting into winter. We were going along with our autumn, minding our own business, and suddenly it's Halloween and then - bam! - it's dark at 5pm. It feels like it should still be light until 10! How did the last five months go so fast? But I'm finally feeling in my winter-time groove. I think I hit my stride a couple weeks ago when it got really cold and snowed in the hills. It felt like it was finally okay that I had to wear a scarf and sensible shoes, and even though there was a day last week it was 61º (crazy, eh?), I still feel like I'm in my winter mindset and hitting my stride.

Things are pretty routine right now, But in spite of that I feel I need to be really focused on what comes next. There are some pretty great things on the horizon for the next season of my life that are not at all related to my job, and I want to be ready and embrace them but still have the stamina and brainpower to be the best Supervisor I can be through our busy season (which is right around the corner). I have a couple trips planned for the spring (London in April and Kansas City in May), and impending travel gives me a nice little something to look foreword to when I start to feel the pressure of work. Right now I'm excited about the days I'll have off for Christmas and New Year's Day. I have my gift list pretty much settled, and now I'm just waiting for my Oregon tax kicker refund and the next paycheck to get it all purchased and ready for Christmas.

Routine or not, work is really intense again right now with training of new hires and the release of an upgraded feature to our in-house booking system that is still pretty buggy. If you think of me I would love your prayers for my sanity and that the stress-knot in my shoulder would not stay the size of a small European nation. The up-side of the craziness at work is that the day goes pretty quick since I spend it all putting out fires. The down-side is that I'm a brain-dead, drooling zombie by the end of the week. But from now until I go to bed tonight I'm in decompress mode. I would've done that yesterday, but we had a huge Christmas party at my friend Rachie's house for a big group of homeless people, and then I had to cut out from that to go open the building where Living Stones was doing a prayer gathering. I had church this morning, went to lunch with friends, and now I'm home and blogging before I put on my pajamas, chill out, knit and watch TV.

Thank God for Sunday afternoon.