Ah…. the coffee is kicking in. I can put my thoughts togethers a little bit more coherent now. This was one morning that I practically needed coffee to be able to pull together to go out to get my coffee.*

I have an excuse. It's not that I'm addicted to caffeine, although the Darling Husband would have you believe otherwise. My brain has been absolutely fried lately.

I volunteered to put together an event for our Regional Science Olympiad competition, on a subject that I knew pretty much nothing about. I've done other events in the past; I can learn enough to put together a 50 minute test, right?

Kick me if I ever put myself in that situation again.

Well, to be truthful, it is probably 'when', not 'if', and it wound up going alright. I was better pleased with the results than I was afraid I was going to be, although I could create something even better next time! ;-)

But it has meant several very late nights this past week as I try to pull together all the cramming that I've done over the past few weeks into something cohesive and reasonable. Two hours of sleep Thursday night and a short night on Friday also meant that as I was going into the Regionals yesterday morning, a migraine hit as well. Hooray for Better Living Through Chemistry; I have the correct prescription and although I prefer not to have to do it, I can stay on my feet in these circumstances, which is a Good Thing.

Pulling the event together was also compounded by the earthquake in Japan. This distracted me from working on my Science Olympiad event for far too many hours, which contributed to several of the very late nights. The Girl spent a year studying in Sendai, so we're more connected to the area than perhaps most. In addition one of her dearest friends moved back there with her husband to teach, and for the first day, we had no indication of their status.**

What a week.

So I NEED my coffee this morning*** to help recover from the migraine and the events of the past few days.

And that's my story and I'm sticking with it!


*Saturdays and Sundays I get my coffee out at the local coffee shop. It supports a locally owned company^ and gets me up and dressed.

^no, not Starbucks. ;-)

** While we have not heard directly from them, we have heard indirectly that they are alright. Specifics of what 'alright' consists of are still pending. We have not yet heard about other acquaintances there. It also turns out that The Girl had another friend in Tokoyo who is also fine. I didn't even *know* I needed to be worried about her!

*** as I sit here drinking my (very rare) second cup of coffee (decaf - I'm not THAT bad).

Batten down the hatches; we're in for a blow.

The weather forecasters have been promising a return to rain all week. More specifically, Cliff Mass is predicting the start of spring, duly noting that our spring tends to be cool, wet, and last until July. (http://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2011/03/weak-convergence-zone-and-sun.html)

I hadn't heard much in the way of predictions for thunder, but we've gotten that as well. There was a peal yesterday afternoon (and also quite a downpour; glad I didn't have to be outside in that!) and another this morning which quite upset the Black Cat.

Today the forecast is for winds. Sounds like another good day to stay inside.

Of course, what I'm really watching is Friday's forecast. The Boy returns home over the mountain pass with a schoolmate driving. Fortunately, all current signs point to that being the best day of the bunch, with actual sunshine as part (although not all) of the forecast. I'm reasonably sure that given the mid-day start that they plan to have, they will be fine. I'm also working very hard on learning to let go and not to worry...

I saw an old friend yesterday. Our fathers had gone through their medical residency together, way back in the day, and the two families stayed in contact as both added kids pretty much in parallel. L. & I paired up as the two oldest sisters, then her brother was pretty much Sister No.Two's age, and their youngest sister was in line with our youngest (leaving Sister No.Three kinda unpaired again, but we all ran around together anyway, so it really didn't matter).

L. and I also had kids pretty much in parallel; her boy is the same age as The Girl and her girl is a couple of years younger than The Boy. But life was busy and we didn't keep in as close a touch as our parents had, so I've only seen them once or twice since coming back to the Puget Sound area, with mixed results. Both families seemed to be going in different directions, and with young kids and both sets of parents working, there wasn't a lot of time to keep up with each other.

Several weeks ago, she dropped me a note on Facebook (love it or hate it, Facebook has brought an amazing number of people back in contact) telling me that they'd be up in this area for a few days as their boy was graduating from his technical training program up here. Was there any chance we could get together?

I admit to trepidations. Would we have anything to talk about? Had we gone too far in completely different directions? Were we just trying to maintain contact based on our parents friendship?

We managed to pull our schedules (alright, I admit it: *my* schedule) together in the same direction yesterday afternoon, finally. Sister No.Two came up and she & I met L., her husband, their daughter and their niece on the waterfront. The two girls split up from us oldsters (How did we manage before cell phones?!?) and so the "grownups" spend the afternoon wandering around Pike Place Market, just chatting and catching up. Her husband has a wonderful sense of humor and it was good to catch up. The Darling Husband and The Girl joined us in the evening on a wild restaurant hunt (there was *no place* in the area that didn't have a 2 hr wait!); we finally checked one of my favorite places and found we could get in. The evening was late, the food was good and a nice time was had by all. We'll have to not let so long a time pass before the next time we get together. It was good to see them.

I have disappointed a cat.  We just got home, after a 2+ hour traffic jam, and I wanted to get some cocoa.  My World's Greatest Megalomania mug* was upstairs from when I had cocoa last night.   As I was heading up to get it, I heard The Girl exclaim, "Look at the happy cat!"  I called back, "Which one?"


"The one following you", she replied. 


Yes, the Black Cat was bounding up the stairs after me, thinking that I was heading off to bed.   I don't even think he registered that it was early; he was just happy that I was going in the right direction.  Poor sad kitty is still upstairs, sitting in the dark, waiting....


I feel moderately guilty.


* the best mug for cocoa, of course.