Hi, remember me?

I know, I know, it’s been a while. Things have been rather hectic here in The Blog Cave and in the life of The Masked Blogger. Lots of working hours (18 one day), lots of family and friend things and…some other things. If you’re in my address book, you’ll hear about those in a separate e-mail later tonight or tomorrow, but for now be assured that there have been few empty moments in my existence for the last couple of weeks.

And I don’t anticipate any for the next month either, but then every November/December is like that, no matter how much I try to make it otherwise.

Here’s a condensed version of the past 3 weeks or so. I was handed two new and good-sized projects by my division’s director. One of them involved a reduction in force action for our entire division and that has not been easy or enjoyable. Stressful and time-consuming, it has been. I had to oversee a project that will put 86 people in the unemployment line next month, one of them from my own department whom I love dearly as a friend and a co-worker. This was not an unexpected situation; all of us have known that the job we are doing for the big government agency is one that we would eventually work ourselves out of, yet I guess we all hoped it would still be off in the future somewhere. Instead, it is now. Barring any changes, we will do it again in April or May.

As unpleasant as it has been, I have learned a lot about certain procedures, policies and people that will be helpful to me.

The other project is an on-going one that is also teaching me a lot about the division I work within. Though my department’s work touches others and I have picked up some things from them along the way, almost all of my experience has been in the one department that I supervise. This project is helping me add to my store of knowledge about the entire operation. The more you know, the less expendable you are…I hope.

We had a busy, but enjoyable Thanksgiving dinner with some 30 family members. I was so tired I didn’t even take my camera to shoot pictures. After eating and celebrating the November birthdays, my father-in-law, 3 brothers-in-law and I sat down and ironed out the plans for our first camping trip together in January. I’m looking forward to that.

On Black Friday after work (when the crowds were pretty non-existent) Blog Girl and I ventured out to have dinner and buy our Christmas tree. When we got back to the Cave we put it up in the stand to allow it to “fall out” overnight. It is a huge 8 foot Frasier Fir that looks much bigger here than it did at the tree store. Saturday I put up the lights outside the house and the lights on the tree inside, and then Blog Girl and Amber decorated as much of the tree as they could reach, and I finished the top. It looks very beautiful.

Sunday morning after dropping Blog Girl off at Lake Eola, I went to Amber’s new house and put up hooks all along her eaves and then hung her icicle lights. After that I returned to pick up BG from Lake Eola and then we went to meet our friend Rhonda at the Disney Marketplace where we did some shopping and visiting. It was Rhonda’s birthday, so HAPPY BIRTHDAY RHONDA!!

Today at work I got a really cool early Christmas gift from my friend Denise. If you’ve got a laptop and you’ve had to go searching for a Wi-fi signal so you could connect to the Internet, you know it can be a chore to boot up the laptop and go through all the steps to try to get a signal, only to find out there isn’t one nearby. Well, the WiFi Finder Plus licks that chore and makes locating that needed signal a breeze. Just push the button and within a few seconds the WiFi Finder Plus lets you know if there’s a signal and how strong it is. It also locates Bluetooth signals and has a little flashlight as well. Denise said she just couldn’t wait to give it to me and I’m glad she didn’t. I loves me my new toy! Thanks Denise!

Real quick; Egg nog is on the shelves!! Tomorrow the “Superman Returns” DVD goes on sale.

It’s late and I have to be up at 4:30 tomorrow, so don’t look for the e-mail with the “other things” news tonight. Probably tomorrow.

Busy, busy weekend.

Friday I got off work early to take Blog Girl and her wares to a festival where she was a vendor. After helping her set up her booth, I met up with my friend Dave, who lives nearby, and we went to dinner at Chevy’s and then to see “Flags of our Fathers“. Clint Eastwood’s latest directorial offering was noteworthy in its portrayal of the true heroism of Iwo Jima, but sometimes disjointed and confusing in its presentation. The movie finished up in time for me to return to help BG close up and secure her booth for the night and we got home around midnight.

Saturday morning I went to work for 4 hours, then returned to the Blog Cave, picked up BG and we drove back over to Winter Garden for the second day of the festival. We finished up there, packed up the booth and returned home around midnight again.

Sunday morning we were up and out to her regular weekly Eola Market gig. After setting up the booth, I left and did some grocery shopping, came back to the Cave and started a load of laundry. Then I drove out to Animal Kingdom to meet ZenGrrl and Rhonda. ZenGrrl graciously gave me the “Batmania” CD, which I will enjoy listening to during the next couple of days. While at Animal Kingdom I did a book release of the “Mayday” book I just finished reading for Bookcrossing. Then it was back to the Cave for about an hour before returning downtown to pick up BG and help tear down her booth.

BG did very well at the Winter Garden Music Festival and at Eola Market this week. I imagine she’ll write about it over on her blog.

Yes, it was a very busy weekend. And the thing is…this time of year every spare moment is filled with extra activities; family gatherings, holiday events, extra work, etc. It all keeps going through the end of the year, practically nonstop.

As the song says, “Knee deep in the hoopla, sinking in your fight.” I’m just trying not to sink in the fight.

Making Some Progress

Well, folks keep asking, “When will you post again?” so here’s a short entry and thank you for asking.

I really wanted to get everything just right here in the cave before beginning to fill it with posts, but my schedule has not afforded me much time to work on the WordPress program particulars to begin accomplishing what I want to as it pertains to decorating the interior of The Blog Cave. So far I’ve only added an “About” page and listed my favorite blogs over there on the right. By the way if I haven’t listed yours give me an e-mail “nudge” to remind me.

Last Friday afternoon Blog Girl and I had the honor of attending the wedding of Natasha, one of my co-workers. This was the first Hindu wedding ceremony we had ever seen (except for the one in “Bride & Prejudice”, a Bollywood version of the Jane Austen classic, “Pride & Prejudice”) and I found it to be very interesting and extremely enlightening. The ceremony is very ritualistic and full of symbolism, not only for the bride and groom, but for the family as well. The entire ceremony lasted about 2 hours and was as beautiful as the bride herself.

Saturday I spent at the first annual (hopefully) Orlando Comic-Con and I have posted a series of “live, sequential” entries from that even over at Orlando Metroblogs, if you’re interested in looking at that.

Saturday night we went to the reception for Natasha and her now-husband Kevin, along with some 350 family members and guests. We laughed, danced, drank, ate and, in my case at least, made a fool of myself by dancing with the belly dancer that was part of the entertainment. I may not have had the dancing part down, but I sure did have the belly part. I’ll be adding pictures from the wedding and the reception to my Flickr album and it will be added over on the right in the near future.

Oh, also over at Orlando MetroBlogs; on August 10th I had posted an entry about Disney raising its ticket prices on the heels of an announcement that they had just reported the highest profits ever for the company ($1.13 BILLION) and the following day the good folks over at The Disney Blog were kind enough to link to that post. Stop by and say “Hi” to them, they’ll appreciate it.