Finally, A Day Off

A bit more than a week ago I was fully prepared to give up my usual day off and work for Chickie who was on vacation at Yellowstone National Park and attending a family reunion in Montana. She had a great vacation and will return to work today, giving me back my weekly day off. Last week's agenda was completely tossed to the trash by family circumstances, but I'm anxious to enjoy my day today.

The hot springs are part of what makes Yellowstone so famous. Pretty cool, aren't they?

Oh, I'll have phone calls to make and laundry to do. I'll have groceries to buy and banking to drive to. And I'll have the chance to write and to talk with Aearwen late this afternoon. It's a chance to try and recapture my equilibrium and I really need it.

It seems like DH finally may have gotten a good night's sleep last night. He was totally wiped out early last night, but we caught up on last week's Master Chef and he seemed to get more alert again. He knows that I get REALLY CRANKY if I get interrupted in my early morning blogging and emails, so he was going to try to get back into his normal schedule of getting to sleep between 11 and 12 pm so that he could sleep through until 6 am or a bit later.

I'm having Le Tour withdrawl, but the USA Pro Tour starts on August 19th. Best of all, it starts with two days in Aspen, my old home. I've been really homesick over the past few years and most of all, I've been wanting to see the mountains of my youth in that little mountain valley cut through by the Roaring Fork River. At least I'll be able to see more of it than the pictures I get from my monthly Aspen Chamber of Commerce newsletter.

Night skiing down Aspen Mountain is always spectacular. I prefer Aspen in
the summer, but winter is nice too.

Maybe next year I can take some time to go back out and visit. I need to do some on-site research for one of my novels... The problem with Aspen is the expense. Far from being the sleepy, deserted mining town it was when I first started going there each summer before I was ten, it is now a high-priced getaway destination for the rich and famous. *sigh*  But, today I write, clean and relax.