Orange you happy?

In the time that I have been gone, #1 son bought a house, quit his job and got a new job.  #2 son gave up his house, bought an RV and made plans to spend the next year as a nomad student CRNA.  Daughter ended a long-term relationship.  #1 granddaughter learned to read and tell jokes and #2 granddaughter learned to smile and roll over.

And now comes the announcement that I will greet #3 grandchild in October.  Last I heard they were calling the baby Clementine (but all I have is a stolen orange, so it will have to do).

I have been counting the days all along, because it's the only way to keep track of them.  I work an ocean at a stretch, but there aren't many markers. One more Deans' Memo to go.

Tonight was the Alumni Ball, which I skipped.  We had a formal dinner and the waitstaff even had special shirts for the occasion.  They went all out on dinner, and people wore clothes they had bought all over the world.  I wore a length of rayon from Burma, which someday will be a real skirt, with a scarf in matching colors I bought in India, earrings from South Africa, and a bracelet from Ghana.  Men wore suits they had made in Viet Nam.  Women wore traditional dress from China, India, Vietnam.  (Along with the usual skirts so tight and so short they left nothing to the imagination.)  There was a slide show I would have liked to see, but a friend asked for some help.  Then a dessert buffet that was like walking into a patisserie.  The ball itself was crowded, noisy, and full of flashing lights.  I checked in on the CCTV just to make sure there wasn't anything I might regret missing.

At this point, my only regret may be not bringing a bigger suitcase.  My main duffel is packed almost full of souvenirs (half of it taken up by the silk comforter I bought in Japan).  Today was another hard day as people decided to send their possessions home at $7.50/pound.  My office became information central for such questions as "You said in the Deans' Memo the scale is 15 pounds off.  Is it 15 pounds lighter or heavier?"  Yes, we are now the Bureau of Standards.  And the Bureau of Redundancy, answering questions with facts we have repeated over and over in the Deans' Memo.  Tonight a student was hurt that I didn't recognize him.  He said, "I'm the one who wanted to have a pizza party and you said I couldn't."  Get in line, Buddy.  That was one of 30 pizza parties and 50 taco parties I refused.

The Field Office has three doors, but all of them go through another room to get to the central reception area.  I have told people at least a thousand times they can go through our office space, no need to knock, go right in, no, second door, not the first one, I don't know if Karen is in, go look.

This afternoon, Karen came through and I said, "Quick, shut the door.  Or I will kill the next person who comes through it."

Karen said, "Just a second, I need to make a phone call."  Her days are pretty high stress, too.

We have not had very many lovely sunsets, so I took this one of the penultimate sunset.  The last one may not be worth a photo, and if there's one thing I've learned on this voyage, it's don't wait for a second chance.

Orange, I'm happy.