Skip it

So nothing happened the week before last. I swear. That’s why I didn’t write anything.

Nah, that’s not true. The thing is, it was an emotionally exhausting week and I basically tried to recuperate last weekend and didn’t get around to it.

We’re having some big (or potentially big events) the first and second week of September and I was at the reins for the news conference.

It went extremely well – we only have three media outlets here – but one person wasn’t happy with how it went down. She wasn’t present at the event and … anyway, I don’t know or want to go into it, but let’s just say it was exhausting.

Not stressful, though. It’s kind of weird. All that – and it was A LOT – just didn’t stress me. If anything, it made me more apathetic. I thought it was very odd for me to react that way, but ah well.

So, although I wouldn’t say the thing is under control or anything, it’s moving along in a way that hopefully will go off all right.

This past week has extremely busy, not that most of mine aren’t these days. I routinely work 12-14 hour days and make my little commute (across the parking lot) home at 9:30 or 10 p.m. after starting the day at 7 a.m.

But this week I had a couple of meetings that knocked me out of commission for the regular stuff, so I had to carve out time out of the air to get that stuff done.

We’re trying to figure out how to parlay a $25k donation into $100k, so I’ve been working on that. My supervisor and I did some brainstorming and next week I need to follow up on that kind of stuff.

Really, I feel like I’ve been in meetings for two weeks. I’m not really sure what “routine” is, but I’d welcome it.

I did take a day off (at least mostly off) yesterday. My sitemate and I headed down to Bismarck to meet her boyfriend, who had Guard training.

Her highlight was seeing him, but mine were otherwise: I got to eat Cracker Barrel *plus* I learned there’s a 5 Guys. Woo-hoo!

So I had the CB Saturday special (chicken and rice – I LOVE that stuff) and we went to see “The Campaign,” which I loved but Ashton hated. I laughed through the thing but she felt it was the stupidest movie ever. It was dumb, I admit (c’mon – it had Will Ferrell in it), but I really needed the humor.

Bismarck, it seems, doesn’t have a whole lot more than Minot, but we did fine. We went to a museum, to DQ (this was before I learned they had 5 Guys) and to the mall, which was dead. However, they had a used CD spot in the mall and I got Keith Urban and Mark Willis’ greatest hits plus a Rodney Atkins one – the one with “When You’re Going Through Hell.” They had a lot, so maybe if I go back I can check it out again.

Bismarck is only an hour and a half away, which I didn’t realize. I thought it was more of a solid two, but it’s really an easy drive. I almost commuted that long on 696 from Hazel Park to Novi when it was rush hour for softball.

Next week – tomorrow – I’m taking my car to get $1500 in body work done – I’m fixing the dent that Bob (accidentally) gave me and the key scratch I got at the ranch, plus getting a $35 piece of plastic to replace the one that fell off sometime when I was in Indonesia. It goes where fog lights would go if I had fog lights.

The plan is to drop it off in the morning then have Ashton pick me up there and take me to the 8:15 meeting. After the 9 a.m. meeting, I have to hope I can get a ride back to Hope Village. I was thinking my supervisor would be there, but I’m not so sure – he’s speaking today in Williston and I wasn’t sure if he was headed straight back or not.

But either way, there are usually 2-3 people who make their way back to Hope Village after those meetings so I’ll figure it out.

The car should only take three days or so to fix, so I probably won’t even miss it. Yesterday, when I went to go to Bismarck, I realized I hadn’t driven it since Monday’s meetings. A spider had even set up residence on my side mirror.

I evicted him.