In my e-mail a few days ago, from B:

One is shocked and amazed that Random Jane has not been updated to indicate the loosing of your corporate tether. One may only assume that new life of leisure is still too novel and filled with daily lie-ins, chocolates pilfered from office candy bowls and stored in preparation for the lean months ahead, and fanciful outfits to get down to the business of writing. Not a neiner neiner in sight…sigh.

This is an excellent point, and some explanation is certainly in order. So here are the last two weeks in review:

My final week at work was, like so many other weeks, busy, stressful, and long. This poor little site didn't stand a chance, especially when you add in the alcohol-fueled (and much appreciated) going away parties. S actually came to the office at 10:00 p.m. on Friday to help me transport six years of accumulated hooha, including some housecubeplants that have done startlingly well, considering the total absence of sunlight in their environment. I was working up to the moment S arrived. And then I wrote a couple of e-mails from home. This is how tightly wound I was.

By 9:30 the next morning S and I were on the road to Leavenworth, which in Washington is a faux Bavarian village rather than a prison.

We were there to celebrate J's birthday, which coincided with Octoberfest. There are many fine beer gardens in Leavenworth, but I can't recommend going to them during Octoberfest - they are packed to the rafters, and the presence of a nearby oompah band playing "The Chicken Dance" is not, in my view, sufficient consolation.

However, I can heartily recommend the hospitality of W & J. Somehow I missed the part of college that involved the Luge and thanks to W I am now thoroughly acquainted with it (and thanks to T for not going overboard while on pouring duty).

So in case it isn't obvious, I didn't get much rest during my first weekend post-corporate tether. And, as usual when I pack too much activity into too little time, I got sick. It's like the stress was actually holding illness at bay, and soon as the source of the stress was gone, the impending sinus infection sprung into action. I spent my first few days of freedom either logy and headachy, or hyper from the Sudafed. By midweek I was much improved, but I was also acutely aware that I hadn't take more than a few days off since December...I don't count going back east to attend my grandmother's funeral in January as R&R.

In short, I desperately needed a break from work in all its forms, including getting down to the business of writing. But writing - and its related business - is what I'll be doing on Monday, and all the days that follow until the money starts to run out.

Wish me luck.