Post Christmas - January 2008

I apologize for the delay in posting. We returned from Iowa and the holiday festivities just this past Sunday night. Ken had Army this weekend, so we decided to just stay put in Iowa for two weeks. It also gave him a chance to use up some of his vacation days before leaving his job. In short, it was a nice holiday visit., and I'll try to get some pictures posted this weekend.

We had the chance to see many family members on both sides. Christmas eve day and evening was spent with Ken's family in Oelwein, IA where we all took part in the traditional Christmas soup selections--much to Ken's delight. This year we had 4 crockpots going: Chix noodle, vegetable beef, and two chilis (bean and no bean). There was so much good food that no one even made it to Evelyn's desserts: apple pie and an enormous pan of frosted chocolate brownies. I even took part in a game of Scattergories with the tween/teen girls in the family.

Christmas day found us in Cedar Falls with my family. We all gathered at sister Melissa and husband Jeff's new house and took part in our traditional rowdy game of "steal the grab-bag present." This year, we had an added twist. In addition to everyone bringing a nice new gift to exchange, everyone was supposed to bring a basement, or white elephant gift, that was supposed to come from your basement and be something you want to get rid of. I ended up getting an old pink boom box/radio that was orginally mine when I was 8 years old. (Cousin Alicia and I had matching ones from Grandma. When I was about 15, I loaned mine to grandma so she could practice her line dancing to her tapes. At a later date, she gave it to uncle Roger who used it for many years in his tractor and who this year returned it to the Christmas gift exchange. Imagine my shock at seeing the old girl again after so many years! I stole her back and feel better knowing she's back home with me -- even if she is a bit faded from the tractor and her antenna is broken off. She still works!!!)

Now, it's back to work and back to seriously thinking about moving and dissertating. Unfortunately, I can't do any of that until after Wednesday and the annual Teaching & Learning Symposium is done. I'm swamped with working until Thursday. Yesterday, I braved the storms and tornados on the Amtrak to get to Normal and back home so that I could help out with Symposium items. The trains were running very very late last night. I ended up getting off the train in Dwight, IL instead of Joliet and having Ken drive to pick me up because the delays into Joliet were so terrible. In short, they couldn't guarentee that I'd be into Joliet before midnight. Ken and I arrived home by 10 pm. Today, I'm staying home until this afternoon at which time I get to go to O'Hare and pick up our guest speaker and his wife and take him to Normal for the event. I even get to go to a fine dinner with the CTLT head honchos, the guest speaker, and people from the Provosts Office. I'll be staying in Normal with Claire and Tom tonight and Wednesday night to be closer for the event. Busy busy.

On the plus side, I have done some good drafting on my dissertation, even getting about 30 pages written on my Analysis chapter over break. I'll finish that draft this weekend and send to the "Director." That will leave me to write my conclusion and then I'll have a first full draft of everything. I still have to revise everything of course, including my horrible Methodology chapter which I loathe and never want to think about again. I did get two chapters back from the "Director" recently which didn't have as many terrible comments on them as I thought. I look forward to revising those and sending along to the other readers soon. Time's running out on that thing and I need to get done or at least get it ready to give a whole draft to the committee. Hopefully this weekend will afford me the time I need to just sit and get my brain wrapped around it again.

Okay - I have to run and get ready. Need to go to the post office and pick up held mail and then pack for the next couple of days. Will try to post holiday pics soon!