new year resolution?

ah, the throws of another year are upon me and i find myself trying to explain to my mother and niece why i haven't updated by blog since the fourth of july. i don't have much of an answer for them, to be honest, but i do have hopes that a more regular schedule will mean more regular updates. it seems like those things should go together, right?

so, after fourth of july was the ERP bootcamp in Davis and a botched trip to Eugene. i don't think either of those things need recounting at this point, except to say the Davis trip was about 6,000,000 times better. and matt gets 5,000 brownie points for driving me to columbus, driving home, calling me right after he walked in the door and talking me out of tears, and then redoing the 5 hour round trip drive to come get me from the airport that i was just dropped off at. there were a variety of travel games played on the way home that involved recounting songs, movies, writers, etc., to keep us awake.


this is kind of a sidebar, but as i was looking through the pictures from boot camp, i realized how funny i think these pictures are where people are pretty much just doing silly poses in the background. i think there are a few websites that focus on this kind of thing, but you can imagine my delight when i found that this unknown stranger had made an extra effort to be a part of our pic. thanks, random davis guy. you make me smile.

since then, the big news has been ashley moving in (she's adorable) and matt officially starting to live the life of dr. vess. look at how excited he was when we pulled into athens on move-in day:

you can't fake excitement like that, people. i was waiting to take pictures of the inside of the apartment until it was furnished - which would have been this weekend. unfortunately my camera batteries died, so you'll just have to live in anticipation of that moment. but the outside of his part of monticello village is cute. and the view is great. it looks right down on athens. and you really can't see it so much from the other picture, but matt has said that some days, he can walk over and see how busy the golf course is before he decides if it's worth venturing out or not. how about that. . .

this past weekend i was in athens again for labor day. on sunday we ventured over toward parkersburg, wv where we met up with peggy and visited the historic blennerhassett island. not only did we get a beautiful day and i learned a lot of things, but we also saw a bunch of deer AND i got to drive a sternwheeler. yup, that's what i said. i got to drive. matt only jumped in for the picture because the captain (or should i say my cocaptain) made him.

glad we got that picture snapped before my batteries died.

so, now it's back to the grindstone. more running my dissertation study and trying to write up papers this month and then next month the grant renewal has to become a priority. so, send your productivity vibes this way if you can!