one shining moment

I know that I promised a longer post tonight, but it's slightly later than I intended, and I need to get to bed if I'm going to fulfill my goal of getting up early to write before work tomorrow. That may be overkill, given the sheer volume of work-related things I have to write tomorrow -- there are times when doing communications as my day job seems like it might burn out my word-production capabilities. But, if I'm going to finish the book by June, it has to happen.

So to briefly recap yesterday -- it was a lovely way to end my Midwestern sojourn, even if the bitter end (my delayed flight back to San Francisco) put a slight damper on it. I managed to drag myself out of bed, pack, shower, and get out of the house while only delaying the rest of my family by fifteen minutes (which wouldn't have happened if I had either not hit snooze twice, or rinsed out my fountain pens the night before). We went up to Uncle Mark's house for the traditional Easter dinner; they live north of Des Moines on an acreage out in the country, which is nice, and also conducive to doing an Easter egg hunt with minimal embarrassment. Uncle Mark, Aunt Kathy, and my cousin Drewbaby were there (of course, since it's their house), as were Aunt Becky and Uncle Brian (aka the scandalous uncle), Gram Wampler, Kathy's parents, brother, and nephew, and my parents and brother. Michael, Drew and I forced Uncle Brian to sit with us at the kids' table, which has gotten substantially more fun now that Drew is old enough to have a dry sense of humor but still young enough to embarrass easily over teasing remarks about his girlfriend. We had a delicious dinner -- ham, scalloped potatoes, green bean casserole, apple/snickers salad (not sure how this qualifies as salad, but whatevs), sweet potatoes, and rolls. Then, we all sat around for awhile before the real fun began -- as usual, we had an Easter egg hunt, despite the fact that the 'kids' now range in age from 16 to 28. Michael, Drew and I all managed to win $2 from the scratch-off lotto tickets hidden inside the eggs, and we had the fun of carrying on our family tradition for yet another year.

We hung out for awhile longer, and eventually left to take me to the airport (with stops at some car dealerships along the way -- just another typical Sunday afternoon activity in my family). As you know, my flight in Minneapolis was delayed, but I managed to sleep almost six hours last night (not counting the sleep I got on the plane and the inadvertent nap I took at Uncle Mark's), so today wasn't as painful as it could have been. Tomorrow will be worse, though; today I was just catching up, but I finally made a list of all the shit I have to do this week, and so I have to stop avoiding it tomorrow.

But, I left the office in time to come home, grab some groceries, and watch the second half of the NCAA championship game. I wish Butler would have won, since that would have been the ultimate fairy tale, but at least it was an excellent game and they didn't get trounced by Duke. After the game was over and I wiped away my customary tears after the "One Shining Moment" montage, I did some work, and now it's time for bed!