Getting sad out of the way so I can have a happy new year.

I am avoiding my bills. In a little while I will leave this little house with three dogs in it and pick up the Benster to continue avoiding my bills by going to see Yes, Man. Otherwise, I would curl up with Amelie. The others are at the ski chalet... having some winter fun. I have work work work, and I'm supposed to be paying my bills and getting some papers together to go see a banker or two. But, it is my least favorite thing in the world to do. Well, maybe I could think of some things I like less than Quicken and looking at my bank account totals, but nothing comes to mind right now.

If things go well, we will be flying to Addis in about six weeks. I can barely think of anything else - there are numerous and long to-do lists in my head. Though, I am proud of myself for being productive at work. We have a deadline coming up, and there is nothing like a deadline for getting things going.

We had a slacker Christmas... the house is in full-blown construction zone with at least three seperate large projects in midstream, so there was no thought of having anyone over for anything anytime soon. We thought about decorating and retrieved the box of decorations thinking we would get a tree, but never got around to it. We spent Christmas day with Steve, and then a weekend with my family in PA, so we just let the house skip Christmas this year. We didn't even wrap presents until Christmas morning, thinking the girls would sleep until noon so why rush. But, T called and said 10:30 was present time, so we threw everything in reused gift bags, grabbed our dinner contribution out of the fridge, picked up Ben and off we went. Hey, at least we had the presents before the big day, right? We continued Slacker Christmas by consuming chocolate truffles made by T, though we did get on the Wii fit to see where we all were in the health zone. I'll simply say that my BMI ain't what it used to be. For the record, T did NOT have a slacker Christmas. She made 300 truffles in 12 hours. She doesn't really need college with her chocolate talent.

Guess I should upload my pics and see if there is anything fun to add here. Or not. I'm feeling kinda sad for no reason. Or maybe because it is becoming obvious that all the plans I've had for many months have no chance of coming to full realization, and my next big adventure will be as by-the-seat-of-my-pants as every other adventure I have ever had. So many books not read, so many Amharic words unknown, so much stuff still cluttering the house, so little cash flowing in the right direction, so few conversations had, so many items not crossed off so many lists.

Maybe Yes Man will help me out of funkytown. But it just may be that the secret way out of my funk has more to do with saying No, Man. I did say NO to the kitchen remodel (just move this wall out four feet, and totally replace everything in here plus build a mud room, yeah). And that is why there are not FOUR major projects in midstream. Yeah. Mon.