A Shining Knight

How can it be Tuesday again already?!  Oh yeah, that’s right…I’ve been busy getting ready for my new job, new home, new life!  Family and friends in the DC area have been helping me with the countdown.

Last Wednesday it was “Wavery and Liz Do Morton’s DC!”  This is always a festive time.  Kelly the bartender and Danny the manager have always been very, very good to us, and last week was no exception!  This was a particularly festive night at Morton’s, with a cigar fundraising dinner for Sen. Menendez (D-NJ), a private media dinner (didn’t see who was in the back room), a member of the Singing Sergeants who also is a waiter cranking out a few arias (gotta luv..ahem…those tenors), and then we noticed we were sitting at the table next to Secretary of Defense Gates in the main dining room.  No matter where you turned your head something was happening — it was like a Fellini movie (okay…a Fellini movie inside the Beltway).  Our nights at Morton’s are something I will definitely miss!

Saturday morning I took my 20.5-year-old cat to the vet for his pre-flight clearance.  Rudy will become a jetsetter this Thursday when we fly together to sunny, funny California.  Since I’ll be shipboard for four months, my “only younger sister” Cynthia will be his foster mommy.  I’m grateful he’ll be with someone who knows and loves him, and who he knows and loves.  Cynthia’s terrific at giving him loads of ‘mooshie-mooshies’, which is nuttin’-but-good to him!  We’re not sure how many lives he’s been through so far, or how many he has left…keep your fingers crossed!  Hopefully he’ll be glad to return to his home state of California (I got him in 1988 when I was living in Los Angeles) and thrilled to be soaking up those fabulous California rays again!

Sunday it was brunch with my “only older sister” Jeanellen (aka Geeg), her husband Gary, my nephew (notice how he is “my nephew” and not “their son”) Jon, and our friends Donna and George.  It was quite the send-off — complete with beach ball, sand bucket, and fluorescent green inner tube!  Am I ready for the Hawaii portion of my new adventure, or what?! 

Sunday night there was a fire (not really a fire, just an idiot who broke the sprinkler head) in my apartment building on the 10th floor, so we had to evacuate the building.  Although it’s good to know the sprinklers work incredibly well, it’s not so good that everything got soaked throughout the building — all the way down to the lobby.  The firemen were still there at midnight, and the elevators were turned off (apparently electricity and water don’t mix), so I got to climb 11 flights of stairs to get back to my apartment.  The first five flights weren’t so bad, but I (wheeze) got considerably slower (hack) with each flight (cough).  Note to self:  I hate stairs.   

Last night I went out with some work friends — Allen, Bob and Cindy.  We had a good time reminiscing about our experiences on this project.  If you can have fun talking about this project you know you’re with great people! 

And now…here we are…and it’s Tuesday again.  I don’t know when the next post will happen — there’s just so much going on between now and August 10, 2008.  I’ll pop on when I can and give you an update. 

So…until next time…sleep well, gentle reader.