Sunday, March 8, 2009

Spring Forward!

What a wonderful weekend to gain an extra hour of daylight. Though I've never understood time zones, much less daylight savings time, I had a great time basking in the sunlight until after 7 today. I've spent the last two time changes in Georgia on Eastern Standard Time...I'm not quite sure if that means I've lost or gained an hour or two in the span of my lifetime...oh well!

Week 5 at CDC was decently uneventful...some conference calls, a seminar or two, more conference calls to discuss when the next conference call would be, and some more work on my project.

This has been a nice relaxing weekend. I was a bit stir crazy by 5 o'clock Friday afternoon, as the day had been beautiful, and my 15 minutes of eating lunch outside by the stream at CDC didn't quite cut it- all I wanted to do was get to the house and sit outside!

Saturday, Emily B. was in town for a wedding shower, so I met her for a little while- it was nice to see a familiar face from home on my last weekend in Atlanta. I then went to a few fabric and furniture stores I'd been hearing about, and had a really really late brunch (3 pm) at West Egg. It was perfect, as I sat outside and enjoyed the pimento cheese grits on my blue plate breakfast.


Saturday afternoon, was spent reading on a blanket in Grant Park watching packs and packs of kids and family reunions enjoy the weekend. Today, I did the same, but picked a spot near the Zoo Atlanta entrance where I could hear the man playing the bongos outside the gates and hear the occasional zoo train whistle! This morning, I went to my fourth church (a different one for each weekend I've spent in Atlanta), a small and new congregation that is actually not very far from the house!

Not much else to report...I'm looking forward to my last week at CDC and finishing the project I've been working on...and then heading home for good this weekend!

Monday, March 2, 2009

Pictures!

Here are some pictures from the weekend:

The cul-de-sac covered with snow

Joel and I in the blizzard



Andrew and Joel wrestling in the snow

Staying warm and happy indoors!

Meanwhile, back in Atlanta...
The big blue ostrich in Anna's backyard, covered with snow! (reminds me of the time I saw an emu run across the street in our old neighborhood...)

Also, I found this article online that tells a bit about the branch that I'm working with at CDC: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/02/health/02deat.html?pagewanted=print

Snow Day for some (unfortunately, I didn't get the e-mail)

Since I'm sitting at a closed CDC this Monday morning with the two other people in my branch that didn't get the memo: "CDC's Atlanta campuses will open at 10 am Eastern time Monday, March 2, due to inclement weather," I thought it would be a good opportunity to update my blog!

Last week (week 4 of 6) was a bit more varied than the previous weeks...I went to the Georgia Aquarium with a USDA veterinarian, went to a meeting in Conyers, GA between USDA, CDC, and some state of Georgia veterinarians to discuss funding and projects, and accompanied the USDA vet (from the Aquarium trip) to a horse farm east of Athens on Friday. The Friday trip was fun, and it was nice to be out of the office, though on that particular day, "out of the office" meant "standing in the rain." But thankfully I had my new rain jacket that I got for Christmas, and I stayed dry!

Joel and I met again in Birmingham this weekend, and I decided that I wasn't going to let Atlanta traffic beat me again, so we devised a new way for me to get out of town. Joel was sitting at his desk in Starkville looking at Google maps and Atlanta traffic cams, guiding me down some back roads to avoid the two hours of traffic that I ran into last trip. I'm not quite sure if this way was faster, but at least I was moving the speed limit the entire time, so I felt like it was!

In Birmingham, we enjoyed a really really lazy weekend, and woke up to a winter wonderland on Sunday! We were glad we were at Andrew and Amy's for the surprise snow, because Joel and I certainly wouldn't have been building snowmen and throwing (as many) snowballs if it has just been the two of us in Starkville. I'll post some pictures from the weekend tonight from the house!

Well, I guess I'll go now- only 1 hour and 4 minutes until people should start showing up at work!