Approaching Holiday Season

I am proud to say that I have, in fact, purchased a few Christmas gifts already. With Christmas Day still well over one month away, this is quite an accomplishment for me. I like to live one step at a time, so I'm still on a timeline to be gearing up for Thanksgiving.

This Thanksgiving, I fear, will be a tough holiday. Last year I spent Thanksgiving with the people who had become part of my DC family. Included in that group was my current roommate Cat, "former roommate" Jenny, and Jenny's mom Laurie. We borrowed a friend's home for the day and made a traditional Thanksgiving feast for 40, though there were only 6 of us around the table. It was a truly memorable occasion. I am so thankful for the beautiful pictures we have from that day.

As many of you may already know, my dear friend Jenny went home to the Lord after a long battle with cancer. She was a wonderful person who will be missed by many during this holiday season. Cooking was always something Jenny found joy in and we had so much fun last November. It was great recalling that memory with a handful of people at Jenny's funeral services. Apparently she had already shared that story with those dear to her. I'm honored to know that she cherished that day as much I do.

Cat will be traveling to Colorado to celebrate Thanksgiving with her immediate family. Father Abraham (as I like to call him) paid for half of her flight home so she was able to fly back on some of the most expensive flight days of the year. I did a quick search today to see what a ticket to Omaha would be...the cheapest was $610 with 1 stop each way, while a non-stop ticket was $1,500. Yep. That's right! One thousand five hundred dollars for the long-weekend, round-trip fare. I could hardly believe it myself. I'm sure you can understand why I won't be making a cameo appearance in the Midwest for some turkey and mashed potatoes.

I'm still uncertain as to where I will be spending the holiday, but I am hopeful that my plans will work themselves out before the big day arrives.

Promotions

I apologize in advance for the obscure connection I've made and will share with you below. Yesterday after receiving sad news about a dear friend and wanting to journal about it here, I realized that I had not yet blogged about the review at work I had almost two weeks ago.

Subject 1: The Good

My review at work was a delayed one-year review. My boss was full of positive feedback and said she felt like I've learned and grown a lot while working for her. I was a bit taken back by what she was saying as I've been feeling busy, yet overwhelmingly unchallenged at work as of late. Luckily for me, my boss agreed that my time has come for more substantial responsibilities in the office. She said we would work together on coming up with a few issues that would be just mine and that she would begin delegating more of her responsibilities (but just a little at a time!) to my co-worker and me.

Because she felt I've done well with everything that's been given to me and is expecting bigger and better things to come, I also received a substantial pay increase. Hooray for a raise!!! But in all seriousness, I am equally excited about more challenging work and a bigger paycheck. Although my official title remains the same, I consider this to be a promotion. For that, I am very thankful.

Subject 2: The Bad

Yesterday's sad news is about my friend Jenny who has been battling her second fight against cancer since the beginning of this year. Although she's had surgery and endured countless variations of chemotherapy, the disease has gotten the best of an amazing girl. Her dad called us last night to let us know that Jenny had been admitted to the hospital after having trouble breathing. Testing results revealed that her right lung is no longer functioning and it would only be a matter of time before she would be unable to continue breathing on her own. Jenny's made it very clear that she does not want to placed on any means of life support, so she's currently on hospice care until our Father calls her to heaven.

My thoughts and prayers continue to go out to Jenny, her family, and all of the people who hold her dear in their hearts. We all know that's she fought the good fight and will understand when it's her time to be released from this world of constant battle. Jenny deserves her promotion to a better life, and we will celebrate all of the blessings she's provided in our lives.

Although you may struggle with the connection I've made between these two subjects, please understand that it makes sense to me. This week's message at my church was to remember to keep the big picture in mind - to not let Satan draw your attention away from God's purpose for you. Jenny has fulfilled her purpose and is being called home, but I'm still seeking where to join God's work. Until his plan is revealed for me, I will continue to focus on my blessings. And I challenge each one of you to stay focused on the big picture and remember to count your blessings.

New Laptop

I am proudly writing you this post from my brand new MacBook Pro. Yes, I've been talking about getting a new laptop for quite some time now, but I finally did it! I was finally able to overcome the *expensive* hurdle by rationalizing the expense with money saved by not going to Vegas with my kickball team over the long weekend. So as some of you were taking a leisurely federal holiday off and others were hard at work, I spent several hours of my Columbus Day in the Apple store securing my newest possession. She's beautiful! (See: http://www.apple.com/macbookpro) I spent a little time adjusting settings and so forth, but then I decided to watch the most recent episode of Gossip Girl :)

Most of you know me well enough to know that I've never been the most tech savvy child. Although I am extremely excited about my Mac, I have a lot of learning to do. More to come on how that's going at a later date. For now, I'm simply enjoying the glossy shine of my new computer!

Work has been quite hectic for the past month or so. We had a number of clients in Washington throughout the month of September and my bosses have been/will be traveling portions of 3 weeks this month. Scheduling (for clients and bosses) is one of my responsibilities, so I've been busy making sure all of the logistics are in order. Although I haven't had much influence or even been fully clued in to the business matters being discussed, I do see my role as an important piece to the puzzle. Hopefully all of my meticulous planning will pay off whenever my boss and I have a chance to sit down for my one-year review, which is approximately 2 months overdue now.

I don't recall all of my extra-curriculars since I last blogged, so sorry if you haven't had the chance to speak with me over the past month. I will let you all know that I experienced my first indoor wine festival last weekend. Considering I can count the number of wine festivals I've attended on one hand, it seems snobbish to say that I hated it, but I really didn't love it. Outdoor festivals are a million times better. You're welcome for the insider knowledge ;) Moral of that story: Most of the wines I liked at this weekend's event were ones that I had already sampled at previous tastings. I walked out with two bottles of red wine and a business card of a man who plans to tell me about his favorite wine festival. Maybe that event will be worth it!

My co-worker Ralph stayed home last Friday because he was feeling ill. He received his seasonal flu shot several weeks ago before traveling season began, so he self-diagnosed the cause as H1N1. It's very likely that he carried it back with him from Texas. We all panicked a bit in the office last week, but none of us are showing signs of the virus. Fingers crossed that my boss Barbara is not infected while in Texas this week and that none of you contract the virus this flu season.

Blog Recap: MacBook Pro = 2 thumbs up

H1N1 = 2 thumbs down

Season Change

The start of a new month was also the start of a new season. Cooler temperatures and sunny skies in DC have made for some lovely Fall September days. I've been doing my best to enjoy the outdoors. Yesterday I laid by the pool for a few hours, and on Friday evening I went to an outdoor movie. Hopefully the weather stays like this for a while, because I'm thoroughly loving it!

I attempted my Taming of the Shrew outing, but it turns out everyone and their mother also knew about the free performance. The tickets had all been given out by the time I made it to the theatre. Bummer. Maybe I'll need to justify spending some money to get a little culture in my life...

My friend Michelle is coming back tonight after a two-month summer hiatus. She was digging up bones in Poland and spent some time with her father in Germany. I'm sure she'll have some good stories to tell us judging from the pictures she's already posted. Another friend of mine traveled to Costa Rica last week. He had some pretty amazing photos to share as well. I can't wait until I have enough money to get to travel to places like these. Some day...

My boss returned from her extended vacation and came back to work on Thursday. As it turns out, I overlooked one of my projects to complete while she was out of the office. That didn't go over so well. It's one of those things that has been ongoing for a few months now, and I just keep getting stuck. I'm not sure how many times I've thrown my hands up and cried mercy, but I'm hoping to complete the task well in order to redeem myself with my boss. I should be having my one year review with her in the near future, and I don't want this to jeopardize anything. I'm sure that I'm probably making this out to be more than it really is, but I definitely don't like not pulling my weight. With Congress back this week from summer recess, I'm sure things will be back to busy Washington in no time at all. But then again, that's why I love it here :)