The joys of Christmas!

The last week felt as though it lasted an entire month. Saturday the 19th B, J, J and I departed to return the J’s to Provo. Lil'J was a sport, even if we did have to stop many a time for him. We capped off the day with dinner at Café Rio. Which I am pleased to say met my expectations (the last few times I had gone since leaving Utah had been a disappointment). Sunday we watched little J and went visiting. Monday morning was a flurry of activity as we did Christmas shopping on behalf of mother Svz and prepared to leave at 1pm. We had originally planned to stay longer but a storm was approaching and our window of opportunity (according to the internet) was small. By the time we left at 2pm we received the unfortunate news that the storm would probably meet us at Tahoe, but B, JG’s cousin I and I forged on. Little did the poor boys know that they would end up being the official chain gang. Highlights – lunch from Kneaders as we drove out of town, the ‘Wheel of Time’ audio book, ‘Wait wait don’t tell me’ podcast, getting pulled over and not getting a ticket, taking 3 hours to cover what should have been 20 min of distance.

The most interesting occurrence was probably the non-ticket. I have now been pulled over for the very first time in my life. Honestly (besides being exasperated that the highway patrol would waste their time pulling me over when I wasn't going ten miles over the speed limit) I was a little thrilled at being pulled over. I guess I am grateful they pulled me over then and not ten min earlier when I was going over 95mph. The officer was nice:

Asked how to pronounce Svz – just like it sounds
Where were we coming from – Provo, returning home to CA
What had we been doing there – Returning pregnant sister and young nephew home before Christmas
What was the rush – The approaching storm

“Normally I wouldn’t bother pulling someone over going 84, but there was a switchback and it has been really slow out here”

At this point I actually wondered if he MIGHT give me a ticket.

“So do you have any questions?”

Phew! “Nope” giving what I hoped was a pleading smile. Officer chuckles “Well the speed limit is 75”. Guilty smile on my part – as there is no way I am going to stick to 75 the whole way home. Off we went. B of course immediately phoned mother Svz to relate the adventure. No matter how fast we went it didn’t make up for having to drive under 30 for miles through the Sierra’s.

My next Christmas story comes from the Svz family gathering – J this is for you.

The S grandparents are sometimes infamous for their gifts – examples, a charming box my grandfather personally made using yarn to sew postcards together, a breakfast bottle of ketchup and hot sauce from a Reno hotel breakfast buffet, bottles of lotion and shampoo/conditioner from a recently or not-so-recently visited motel...you get the idea.

In 2009 we did a surprise gifting. My grandma wrapped a number of gifts and we each went up and picked one. You did of course have the option of stealing the gift of one relative or another. This “game” my mother instigated last Christmas using different candy bars. It was such a hit my grandmother created her own version using random items. My turn arrived and I picked a moderate sized box. Once unwrapped I found a box of stationary, or so it seemed.




I began to open it in order to examine the selection of cards inside when my ear caught a shuffling noise from within that did not indicate the movement of paper. Grandma then spoke up warning everyone that my gift was “unique”, and that it was.




Containing signature items of the Svz grandparent’s household. Anyone could see from the contents my Grandmother's love of freebies. She collects anything anyone hands out at the senior center – just in case. At some point during visits to the grandparents a bag of goodies will appear and we will be offered an array of pencils, key chains, stress balls, etc. The Christmas smorgasbord did not disappoint:

A pull-a-part Pizza Cutter (with RSVP printed on it)

A key chain from the Engineering Division of the City of South San Francisco which included a small level

A purple letter opener from the Health Insurance Counseling and Advocacy Program of San Mateo County

A Wells Fargo keychain

A night light from the Sutter Mills-Peninsula Senior Focus

A visor sunglass clip from the United States 2010 Census

Two pens from the Mission Hospice

And three pencils:

“Discover San Mateo County Parks – Volunteer www.eparks.net”
“AAA www.aaa.com”
“BA GoGreen RideBART www.bart.gov”




And finally a roll of quarters worth 5 dollars (not pictured as it has been deposited in the piggy bank)

All my Christmas wishes are fulfilled.

Yosemite

On Saturday I nearly died...well it felt like it. C and I went hiking at Yosemite with two of my students. We hiked the upper falls trail for a little over 4 1/2 hours. It was beautiful, but my legs still hurt and the huge bruise I have from falling down is rather inconvenient. I don't know who in the park service had the brilliant idea to pour sand over the rocks but they should have realized it would be a slippery safety hazard.

Clone Please!

Why is it that I can never seem to do enough - yet I seem to be busy all the time? Perhaps it is because I spent SO much time organizing and planning things for other people. The resulting haste to organize and manage my own compounded life becomes more complicated as a result.

Right now there just seems to be more going on than I can handle. My request - I would like another me to help get everything done. Oh, to be twice as productive!

Though neither one of us would want to do all the "put off" tasks. And come to think of it with two I would probably try to cram four times as much in.

Plan B - simplify!

Promotion

Almost a year ago the director of our department said, “K, our entire staffing plan is dependent upon you being here for the next year” and she  promised me a promotion. Said promotion has been in-process since. It was finally approved last week. I get a lovely stipend covering 9/1/08-3/31/09 (of an unknown amount) – which will go to my tuition. Then my raise and promotion apparently went into effect on 4/1/09. I have yet to understand why the process took so long; I guess I should consider myself lucky that at a time when the university is making big cuts they can still give me a promotion.

What is interesting is that finally having a codified job description will theoretically mean less work for me. I am not sure how that happens – the responsibility is heaped on and then when you actually get your position description half of the stuff you do is not on it – the mysterious “other duties as assigned”.

Now that I have almost survived my third summer working here and finally gotten my 3rd promotion I have resolved to do my job, not that I wasn’t before, but I am going to do my job and NOT do everyones jobs.

Officially (I think) my job should just be to coordinate the International Commercial Law LL.M. program, basically meaning that I manage an entire graduate program from beginning to end myself, and to work with another co-worker to coordinate another summer program for foreign lawyers no in the LL.M. program. Having just come through the craziest part of the year I must say that I love my responsibilities and the students, there is a LOT I would change outside those two elements. So we will see how long I will continue to make it.

For now I am going to celebrate!

My Branch

I am enjoying my new branch more than I can say. Surprisingly even though it is only a branch it feels bigger than the ward in Davis was. I am still "getting used to it" and have been so busy with the students that I haven't been around much, but I have a feeling it is going to be great.

Here is a small sampling, posing after working on quilts for the humanitarian aid part of the California YSA Conference that was this weekend.



Goldfish racing for FHE



I love having JA in the branch - it is great to have someone I know so well.



Despite a late start my little fish did win this race.



At the State Capitol Building

Still Going Strong

Well the students have now been here for 4 weeks and tomorrow more than half will leave to return to their countries. About 50 will remain, but life will become a little more normal, whatever normal is. I will be glad to have time to do my laundry and sleep, but I have enjoyed spending every day and almost every evening with so many fantastic people.

A's Birthday at Bistro 33 S, me, A, H, F, and E
@ Symposium Pizza w/ S and J
With some of the OAL Students at the Davis Farmers Market

They're Here

The students have arrived - farewell to normal life for a while. Talk to everyone in August once life goes back to normal and I stop wishing they would stay longer.

Weekends

I have been thinking about bookends and contemplating how the weekends really are huge stabilizers for me, even if they are sometimes full of chaos. Work is about to get crazy, it has been for the past few weeks but it will ratchet up to a new level tomorrow-luckily I love all the students who will shortly arrive. Last weekend I had a nice long four-day weekend which was self preserving with the move and gave me a chance to relax. It ended Monday night with FHE at the capitol and dinner downtown afterward.

(Insert crazy week here) This weekend begins with dinner in Fair Oaks with C and a movie afterward.

Granted I did respond to some work emails at 2 am when I got home, sad I know, but it was a nice break. Especially since I do not get a single complete day off this weekend. Went into the office this morning for a couple hours and have meetings all day tomorrow. Sigh! Thankfully once I get there it will be great.

Even more pathetic, the highlight of my week was setting up remote access to my desktop at work through my laptop. Seriously so excited. I have been begging for this for years!

Blog Backlog

July 4th
Since the folks are out in Utah visiting the Gs, I spent the 4th with C's family in Woodland. It was lovely - there was tons of food and it was so nice to meet everyone. They all knew about Clearlake (and my car breaking down). I had heard so much about them it was nice to meet everyone.
It was also the first morning waking up in my new place. There was a stake pancake breakfast at 7:00 AM - and I actually went. I even know three people in the stake who I saw at the breakfast - which was nice.
Afterward there was more unpacking and then some lovely time with people from my branch here at J's pool in Woodland. Fun - and no sunburn!
Then it was over to the S's. A wonderful 4th!





July 3rd was the official moving day! It was chaos, alright it was not that bad but lacking sufficient sleep I was kinda a mess. Moving began at 7:45 when B gave me a ride over to the UHaul place to get the moving van. It was huge! We loaded everything up and took it out to Sacramento - thanks to everyone who helped!!!
It was a long day at 10:00 I was still trying to get things unpacked. Haven't finished yet. There is still quite a bit of stuff at my apartment in Davis - it will come over slowly.

What would be a move without multiple configuration's!

This was the sixth or seventh configuration and I have since moved a few items around, but I will wait for more pictures when I have actually moved everything over.

A couple Friday's ago B and I went down to see Okkerville River and Wilco at the Mountain Winery (down by San Jose). It was fantastic!


Then it was time for Wilco, their set was really long and absolutely rocked!

We were seriously twenty feet from Nels Cline. Amazing! The energy was fantastic and there was great interaction between the band and the crowed - with some lovely humorous moments.

Jeff Tweeny

The show was incredible!


And finally, from J and lil'J's visit, here is Grandma and lil'J.

MOVE

So the big news - I am moving to Sacramento, possibly as soon as this weekend. The girls I am living with T and B are great. T is putting new carpeting in my room (brown) and painting the walls a color of my selection (green) before I move in. The house is really close to campus and so clean! C and I went to check out my new ward yesterday. My old roommate JA is currently in the ward. I should clarify it is actually a branch, but one that has more people than my current ward does.

It will be wonderful to be so close to campus and since my classes all get out after 8pm I am sure I will think it is even more wonderful when the semester starts. I will still be driving to Davis for work, but since I would be driving out to Sac almost every night for class it works out well.

So here's to a week of packing!

Coming to visit in 9 hours.....

YEAH!!!!!!!!

Summer Weekend

It finally feels like summer! Loved waking up to this every morning....

Braving the cold and the bugs we spent two lovely nights sleeping outside on the deck. I explained to my grandmother that it was not freezing cold so it would be fine - she then turned to C and asked if she thought it was "freaking" cold?





We had a great time on the boat and the weather was beautiful. Tho the "crew" did have to wipe down the boat before the skipper would take us out. Dad lost his hat to the wind and we had a lovely time recovering it from the lake. Amazingly enough we did not breakdown on the lake.

Gorgeous weather!


While we were sitting in the swing on the deck G said "I solemnly swear to catch a fish before I leave", in about an hour there was a catfish on her line. It must have been there for quite a while as it had pulled her line out REALLY far.

If my dad is looking pretty pleased with himself in this photo it is because he almost scared me straight off the dock chasing me with the catfish. He had already gotten G to run up the ramp. Mom was yelling at me not to back up any farther or I would fall in. Everyone watching from the deck got a priceless moment.

Sidewalk Art

Maybe I stare at my feet to often as I walk - no doubt a result of so much tripping over my own feet - but I was totally caught off guard by lovely uses of pavement this week.





Some obviously lovely children covered about 40 feet of sidewalk in front of their house with chalk - the 15 foot hopscotch was incredibly tempting!

Golf

In anticipation of some lovely time at the lake this weekend I am reminiscing about last weekend's BEAUTIFUL weather - California really is wonderful! Even of it was raining a little as I left the office today. Here is what last weekend looked like from my seat.