tecosystems

On My Winter Vacation I…

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Cherry Creek Trail

Originally uploaded by sogrady.

A couple of you have asked what I’ve been doing, so herewith is an account of my spectacularly mundane vacation. On my winter vacation I…

  • Got stranded on the East Coast by the Denver blizzard
  • Slept late(r) just about every day
  • Replied to a month’s worth of unanswered personal emails
  • Shipped off the Christmas presents that got stranded back in Denver
  • Spent a week with my family
  • Coped with the Denver blizzard(s) primarily by walking a lot
  • Switched my American Airlines credit card over to a Frontier one
  • Saw a lot of my Denver friends
  • Threw a New Year’s eve party (and even cooked for it)
  • Rebuilt a personal site using WordPress, Mediawiki and Google Apps for Your Domain
  • Went snowshoeing in Keystone
  • Threw mice and golf balls (she loves them) for the cat to chase
  • Migrated to the new WordPress theme here
  • Drank a fair number of Smithwick’s
  • Sorted (partially) four months worth of unopened mail (I know, I know)
  • Bought tickets to Flogging Molly and Heartless Bastards shows
  • Got a ton of new music (Beck, Beirut, unreleased Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, live Decemberists, unreleased Radiohead, The High Dials, etc)
  • Saw the Forty Year Old Virgin no fewer than 6 times – funnier each time
  • Found the missing charger for my camera, but took no pictures with it
  • Pondered how to use the 110,000+ Membership Rewards points I’ve accumulated (new chair is the leading contender)
  • Discussed selling my apartment with my realtor (decision is – probably – not to)

Not exactly two weeks in paradise, I know. But that’s the price one pays for spending substantial portions of four months on the road: there’s a lot of catching up to do. So what’s the plan for my last weekend of freedom?

Fly to Boston, naturally. The good news is a.) that it’s Boston, and b.) that this flight earns me (yet) another free flight on JetBlue. Will be there for a friend’s bachelor’s party this weekend, which fortunately should be fairly mellow (for me, anyway), then it’s back to the grind next Monday.

Regrets for this vacation are twofold. First, I did not disconnect from work as much as I would have liked to. I’ve worked for at least an hour pretty much every day that I’ve been out. This was partially unavoidable because there were several things still up in the air when I left, but I also could have done a better job of not checking my email. Looks like I’m going to need a no email policy similar to my no fly policy. At least I still don’t have a crackberry.

Second, I didn’t do a lot of writing. I’ve got a significant backlog of non-work stuff that I’d hoped to tackle but haven’t. Oh well, maybe on the plane tonight.

So that’s my vacation. Thrilling? Maybe not. But reasonably productive. I’ll have more fun next vacation. I promise.

3 comments

  1. Hi,

    Who takes care of the cat while your on the road? Thinking about having one, but afraid I’m not home enough…

    Morten

  2. Morten: i’ve very lucky, in that Az is fine for two nights on her own. in a case like this, where i’ll be gone for three nights, i have my best friend check on her once or twice while i’m gone, but overall she’s very independent.

    i leave enough food and water out, and she looks after herself. not all cats are this good, but as i said i’m quite lucky.

    it’s also worth noting that some cats apparently get very angry when their owners leave for extended periods of time and will destroy furniture or crap outside the litter box in what’s best characterized as petty revenge.

    the worst thing Az has done while i’ve been gone is unwind a roll of toilet paper and shred it up, and that was just once.

    i’d tend to think that if you got the cat young enough (i got Az as a kitten) and acclimate them to being on their own, you’ll be fine.

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