Shutdown Diary: Day 16

It's looking like I may get to go back to work either tomorrow or Friday. Woohoo!!! In the meantime, I spent today hiking with my friend. We headed out to the Appalachian trail, and it was gorgeous and perfect weather and we loved it! Plus! Fall colors! After getting home late afternoonish I did some housework and then headed over to another friends' house for a Bunko night. There were several lovely ladies there that I know sort of through church, so it was super fun to get to know them better. And BONUS! I won this super cute pumpkin candy bowl! How did I win that, you ask? I won by completely losing at Bunko. Seriously. It was bad. Anyway, better head bedward just in case I do have to get up in the morning.

Shutdown Diary: Day 15

Well, although you probably can't use the word PRODUCTIVE to describe today, I did shower and leave the house. So that's good. After a nice run (love 65 degrees and sunny for running in!), I headed out to Leesburg to help at the open house for the Louden Free Clinic's new space. Volunteers all wore white carnations and showed off our beautiful new space. Between the run and the being on my feet all afternoon, though, I'm pretty tired. Which is good since my sleep schedule is completely out of whack and there's some hope that I'll be back to work later this week (PLEASE!!!) so I'll be going to sleep before midnight and setting an alarm for the morning. SO, so ready for this to be over, but aside from yesterday's brief slip into a Shutdown Fatigue stupor of pajamas all day, I feel like I've made pretty good use of my time off.

Shutdown Diary: Days 12-14

The weekend was really busy with chili making, meal delivering, game nights, church attending, Relief Society teaching, and firesides. The best part was the news that I'm an Auntie for the fourth time! Love it! Today, though, the "my life sucks because I don't have a job" was too much to overcome with positivity and enthusiasm and I stayed in my pajamas reading and watching TV all day. Well, until it was ballet class time. The good news is that ballet has totally motivated me to be productive tomorrow.

Shutdown Diary: Day 11

Here's today's rundown: laundry, dishes, finishing Oakley's blanket, making cookies, and watching Gravity at the Alamo Drafthouse with those tickets I got last night, hanging out with Melanie all evening drinking hot chocolate, talking politics, and watching a movie. Good times were had by all, and another good day spent mostly out of the house.

Shutdown Diary: Day 10

I was actually really busy today! I got out of the house around noon to meet Tim for lunch (sorry for keeping you out too long, Tim!), and then headed straight to the Costley house where it was clear that I was needed. Then it was out to Glass Half Full Taproom for a trivia night hosted by one of my friends. My team (pictured above; I totally stole the photo from the "Geeks Who Drink" website) was called The Raging Gingerholics, because of my tendency to order ginger ale at bars and happy hours, and we placed a respectable 6th of 12 teams. Well, okay, probably not that respectable. Anyway, bonus, the bar was attached to the Alamo Drafthouse movie theater and we scored some free movie tickets which we are planning to use tomorrow! Anyway, long story short, I was out of my house most of the day! Hurrah!

Shutdown Diary: Day 9

I got caught in a do-nothing vortex this morning, despite making sure I showered almost as soon as I got up. It was bad. I may have to make a fifth rule about no TV. Luckily, about the time I was about into head into the abyss of I've-done-nothing-today despair, it was time to get ready to go to the clinic. I totally over-dressed for it -- even wore heels despite the fact that I spend most of the evening on my feet -- because I needed to feel like a normal person. It worked. As always my time at the clinic was really rewarding my fellow volunteers and the staff there are really amazing, and I'm able to use my professional skill set that has provided me with such great career opportunities to give back to the community. A way to say thank you, you know?

I am cautiously optimistic that congressional and White House meetings tomorrow will start to make progress on getting me back to work. I miss it!

Shutdown Diary: Day 8

I broke my "shower within an hour of getting up" rule today, mostly because I really wanted to go on a run and it was too cold until about 11. But don't worry; I totally did go on that run. Today's other at home project was to rearrange my bedroom. I wanted to create a space for at home "barre" work and stretching, but that required walls and the way my house is currently arranged, there weren't walls available. Now there are and it's a lovely little space. In the afternoon, I headed over to the Costley house and tried to lend a hand to managing five kids and dinner while Mr. Costley is away. In all a very fulfilling day. It was nice to use some of my extra time helping out in a meaningful way.

Shutdown Diary: Day 7

I was restless today -- couldn't do one activity for more than an hour or two at a time. This morning I cleaned the kitchen (my house has never been so clean for so long before I swear) and then made a quiche (asparagus and bacon with a sweet potato crust). I painted my toenails with watching Covert Affairs (mostly because it's too hard to decide what else to watch), worked on Oakley's blanket (could have finished it probably, but I ran out of binding), read for a while, talked to my boss for a while (she wanted to check in with everyone and make sure we were doing okay), called  my brother and dad, and went to ballet class. Today was also a dark, gloomy sort of day which I don't think helped with the restlessness.

Shutdown Diary: Day 6

General Conference was glorious. After a long walk this morning listening to Mere Christianity, I reached out to Tim to see if I could schedule Human Interaction for the day. He was hosting a lunch for his ward's choir between sessions, so I joined him at his church building for both sessions, plus free lunch and choir practice. It was lovely. And. I totally followed all the rules today -- mostly because I count watching General Conference as productive. Go me! Although it was Sunday, so... pretty much it was an easy day to keep the rules. Tomorrow is going to be the real test, I think.

Shutdown Diary: Day 5

I'm not sure if weekends should count for the shutdown diary, but since there hasn't been any agreement I think government is technically still shutdown so I'll include them. Mostly I spent today doing General Conference stuff. Getting ready for my semi-annual conference waffles party (it was small this this, just five people, but we did more expiriments such as cooking a waffle around bacon. Genius.) and then watching Conference and getting things done between sessions. Wrapped up the day skyping with Katie, chatting with frielounds and getting in an episode or two of Covert Affairs. On the bright side of shutdown stuff, the House passed a bill guaranteeing back pay for furloughed workers, which appears to have Senate and BO support, so that is kind of relieving, but I'd rather actually, you know, earn my pay by going to work. Because I like work, and it turns out I don't love being at home all day.

Shutdown Diary: Day 4

This morning I woke up sorely tempted to stay in pajamas all day. I had books and I'm still signed in to Amy's Amazon Prime account and it would have been super easy to succumb to that. But I also know myself really well and I know that if I ever give into that I will end up miserable and depressed by the end of the day. So instead, I went to the temple. Which, of course, was awesome. The session was completely full, which I'm not sure is normal for a Friday morning. I have a feeling there were a lot of other guvvies like me trying to make the most of their free time. The temple president spoke briefly at the beginning and reminded us that at times of "noise and tumult" the best place to seek peace was the temple, and I know that I found it there.

Re,latedly, seeing as this thing doesn't have an end in sight and I could be looking at being home for a while longer I've come up with four Rules for a Shutdown

1.) Take a shower and get dressed every morning within one hour of getting out of bed (or be out exercising in the same timeframe).
2.) Leave the house for at least 45 minutes every day.
3.) Speak with another human at least once a day.
4.) Do at least one productive thing every day.

Shutdown Diary: Day 3

I'm officially bored. It's been two and a half days and I'm simultaneously in danger of becoming a couch potato and going absolutely stir crazy. Went out for a run/brisk walk this morning. The weather was perfect (note to self: morning, not midday for this business) AND I saw a woodchuck! Virginia is woody and so I've seen all kinds of woodland creatures before, but this was my first woodchuck sighting! FUN! He was like five feet away from me when I first spotted him, but obviously by the time my camera loaded, he'd started scampering off. I spent most of the afternoon working on my Auntie Jules blanket for soon-to-be born Niece #3, but I ran out of thread about the same time that it was time to go work out with Amy Lou. Except then we didn't work out. We watched Doctor Who instead. And Amy and Mel loaned me a giant stack of books, which I'm sure that I will be grateful for. I'm ready to go back to work.

Shutdown Diary: Day 2

I folded all my laundry this morning for the first time in at least two months. Probably three. I also ate way too much chocolate cake and went for a run at lunchtime (not the best decision I've ever made, given the unseasonably warm weather we've been having). My friend Emma invited me over to hang out with her and her kids for while, so I did. We spent a lot of time talking about how ridiculous the shutdown is generally, how ridiculous Congressional entrenchment is getting on both sides, and how absurd the blame game is getting. Doesn't matter who's at fault, what matters is finding a solution which is going to be made MUCH more difficult if you keep publicly name calling. Just saying. I'm also kind of annoyed that right now the only thing on the table is a continuing resolution. Yes, I'd like to get back to work as soon as possible, but I'd also like to not have to face this situation every three months so maybe let's pass a real budget or something. Anyway, finished out the day at my volunteer gig, so I feel like I at least made a contribution to society today.

Shutdown Diary: Day 1

 
 Went into the office today for a 4-hour "orderly shutdown," then was home a little after noon. I filled the rest of my day Skyping with Amber, attending to some neglected housekeeping, and finishing the first season of "Under the Dome" which was annoyingly addictive. Ames and Mel came over in the evening to have dinner and watch Castle and Doctor Who.

It's starting to sink in that this is a for-real affecting my life sort of thing. Fingers crossed that it's resolved quickly.