Circus

There's a lot going on these days, and it's getting harder and harder to keep you up-to-date. Pardon me if this entry is a boring list of events. I just want to get some of this stuff recorded.

Notable happenings from last week include a Cirque Du Soleil show on Tuesday. We brought our now departed houseguests with us. The baby was very well behaved, probably as bewildered by the amazing show as the rest of us were. We had a book club meeting on Thursday at which we discussed The Motorcycle Diaries. I wasn't crazy about the book because it read like a list of events, sort of like this blog entry :).

On Saturday I videotaped a frisbee game, just to have it for future editing, although it wasn't the best game to tape because the current heat wave slowed everybody down. In the afternoon we went to a going-away party / sale held by our Boston-bound friends, S&Q. Q is an artist, so we bought some paintings and photography from her, as well as some books and a Turkish rug, all of which were a bit of an indulgence considering that we too will soon be downsizing our living accommodations.

On Sunday I attended my last Delaware Independent Filmmakers (DIF) meeting, which was sad because this group is what I've been looking for since about high school. Hopefully Santa Barbara has something like this too, although I probably won't be as lucky to get involved with it right as it's starting up. I won a contest at the meeting for having posted more times on the club's message board than anybody else during the month of April. Apparently I'm more vocal online than I am in person. Or maybe I just really wanted that $15 gift certificate from iTunes as a prize.

This week we are going to the Italian festival a couple of times to meet up with a few different groups of friends. Suddenly our last chance to say good-bye -- this week and weekend -- is upon us.

The move is coming like a steam engine. Most of the planning has been fallen onto R, and she is doing a marvelous job of handling it all. We've been trying to lighten the load (e.g. we sold the mower and trimmer over Craigslist.com, gave some clothes to Goodwill, etc.) and get ourselves organized, all while keeping the house in decent shape so it still looks good to potential buyers, however few of them there may be. We've had about 6 people come and look at the place so far. We'll be lowering our asking price this week for a second time. So much for making any money on the deal. Now we're just concerned about breaking even.

Work has been plenty busy. I'm only planning on taking one day off next week for the move. I will be working out of our temporary housing in Santa Barbara next Friday. The Oracle buyout is still in progress. The biggest change for me, as a result of the deal, is that I will be becoming an hourly employee, which means I will be paid time and a half for any overtime. That is excellent news. If the next year is anything like the last, I will make out pretty well. Either that or they will not want me to work more than 40 hours a week, and that would be nice too. My job title is also changing. As of July 1st I will be a Senior Consultant. That's still pretty vague, but I'll take it over Business Analyst, which I never felt accurately described my job.

I better go. As life slips into panic mode, this blog is going to slide down the priority list.