Lost and Found - Playing Catch-up

I don't usually lose things, but in the last month I seem to be gaining some expertise. I've now lost my PDA, which is a total bummer. Not that it was my lifeline or anything, but it was a fantastic tool (and it wasn't cheap!) and it is now on the loose. The backup battery was freaking out and I kept getting messages telling me that it was malfunctioning, which was annoying, and Dell doesn't make PDA's anymore so I couldn't do anything about that. It may have been on its last legs, but, in any case, I hope it turns up. Somewhere.

Christmas was a blast. My folks came out here for about a week and my mom got all excited about going to Schnucks four days in a row (or was it five?) Jason, Lara, Linden and Karen joined us for a non-traditional lasagna dinner. Then we went up to Chicago on the 27th to visit with Neil's family. We brought the cats and because we stayed at Andrew's place, we got to watch Arlo and Odin (Andrew's cats) stalk Arthur and Penny. In the photo below, Arthur (on the left) is facing Arlo, who is in the little cat tent. Odin is the one in the middle.



After a few days, the constant hissing and growling quieted down and they were almost civil to each other! Besides eating lots of food and going to Thai Pastry (yum!) and playing with presents, we went downtown to Macy's and Neil bought a suit:



We also visited Northwestern where we got fabulously lost in the library, saw Spencer's office, and wandered around one of the music buildings (odd place). Too bad I'm not looking to go back to school in about four years when they will have a brand new, $90 million something facility with a view of the lake. Anyhow, the music library stacks are awesomely creepy.

I've gotten all but one grad. application in and I'm feeling guilty for not working on the last one yet. It's not technically due until March, but I probably should have it done by now. Meh. It's nice to have a little break.

Happy birthday to me! On the 7th, Neil and I went to Szechwan for birthday comfort food and it was SO good: potstickers, Ma Pow Chinese Eggplant and Sole Fish with Pine Nut. Neil gave me the first season of Scrubs on DVD and it is also SO good.

My cousin gave me an official Inauguration t-shirt for Christmas, which I wore proudly on Jan. 20th. I was able to watch most of the festivities online or on tv, though just as Obama was being sworn in, I was called away to help someone. Grrrr. But no biggie.

Neil has been getting his cluster headaches - they haven't been as bad as in the past, but they're still pretty awful. He gave a recital last Wednesday at the Arts Council gallery thing and it went well. Luckily, no headache for the recital!

We went to the Bernina store this past weekend and I finally got started spending my gift certificate money -- when we went to buy the sewing machine two years ago, I got a $300 gift certificate which I haven't spent yet. I know that's lame, but it never expires, so why not wait until you know what you need, right? Well, I went to Circuit City the previous weekend in order to exchange a mouse I got for xmas and it happened to be the very day that they went out of business -- I was unable to make my exchange (had I gone one day earlier, I could have done it...arrrrg). I decided then that I had better go spend my $300 before the Bernina store unexpectedly dies (not that it is going to, but I'm just paranoid now). I've ordered an extension table for my machine which will make quilting easier. Woo hoo! There goes $90...what else should I get!?

Otherwise, things are kind of boring and annoying. The house is a mess, the tree is still up, the dishes keep getting dirty, and the laundry still won't do itself. It feels like things are just beyond my control or grasp: the failed mouse exchange at Circuit City, the PDA being missing, the house always being messy and disorganized, having stuff disappear in the aforementioned mess, not being completely on top of my applications, Arthur and Penny having rather violent spats, not really knowing what to do with myself at any given time, etc. I think we're ready for the spring. These winter blues are getting old.