This was a rush of a week.

I had a bunch of things to wrap up for work while preparing to leave town for two weeks. No matter how many lists we have to keep us on track, that last night at home and the few hours before we leave are always chaos. I love going places, but I hate the anxiety that comes with preparation and the actual travel. 

Now that we are settled, I can breathe. Yes, I will be working remotely for the next week, but the grandparents are providing daycare services and I can sneak out with my laptop to work on their screened in porch if I want. (Or even sit on there lawn. Their grass is that suspiciously soft kind that feels really nice on the toes.)

I have a sneaking suspicion that I'm going to be more productive than usual this week. First, there's no worry about daycare drop-off and pick up. Second, a new workspace always comes with productivity vibes. Third, I saved a bunch of work I know can be done in smaller bursts. Finally, the following week is vacation time and I always have the urge to clear out my task lists before logging off.

Dare I say, I am excited about this work week? I love my job and rare is the day I grumble about work. But there is something about this week that has me hopping.  I'm eager to get a bunch of things done.

Now I get why my brother is enjoying the digital nomad life so much.

We are on the road to visit my in-laws. This is a split trip where one week we are working remotely and the second week we are on vacation. Our kiddo gets two solid weeks with grandparents and I know she is going to love every moment. I am looking forward to getting to work outside with my feet on their very soft grass.

Here's what else has been good lately:

• Mass market paperback sized books. So easy to hold.
• Citrus fizzy water
• Kiddo decided to eat her veggies when I called them "twirly bites." 
• Our daycare parenting text group
• Being able to grab COVID rapid tests from DCPL
• Making lists
• Crossing the 500 newsletter subscriber threshold!
• Better than expected movies
• An empty laundry room when I need it
• Raisin bran for breakfast

We were supposed to be joining friends to celebrate a birthday in Asheville, NC this weekend. That was relocated to New Orleans and we're not ready to take the kiddo on a plane. Since I already had remote work approved for next week, we decided to venture to my in laws a week early. Now, we'll be at their place for two weeks. We're both going to WFH one week and then take leave the next. The grandparents are kindly providing their own version of daycare. Kiddo is going to love it!

I am in the midst of menu planning and packing list checking. Long gone are the days of packing in an hour. Now I've got to make sure we've got everything for the kiddo (and enough snacks and battery power for a 7+ hour car trip). Thank goodness the Husband had the foresight to maintain a constant packing list. Makes things a little easier.

Here's what else I've got going on:

WORK

• Research Assignment Design: I am on my last round of individual coding. I'm also getting my code book in shape to share with the team. Then, we're going to meet and decide how we want to do our collaborative coding.
• Presentations and Publications: I am making notes for my webinar on how to improve your photography skills. I'll just brain dump everything into a document and organize it later.
• LibGuides: These are on pause for now. I can only do so many at one time. That said, I am promoting all of the new ones.
• Instruction: We are in the lull before the Fall semester overload starts.
• Administration: I made a list of things I want to tackle while I'm WFH next week. Hopefully, I can plow through some things while catching up on webinars.

PERSONAL

• Estate Planning: Nothing. 
• Email Newsletter: I decided to start using Substack's automated posting to Twitter. I also broke the 500 subscriber threshold today. I am very happy about that. I decided to use this as a promotional opportunity and shared the news in a few places.
• Home Projects: I built our new sofa table. It's very nice, but one shelf arrived with a bit of a dent in it. We're trying to flatten it out with heavy books. It's not bad enough to send back to Wayfair, but we figured this was worth a shot.
• Hobbies: I wanted to spend at least an hour of my short birthday vacation coloring, but I never did. Probably not going to get any time on this until we're back from our trip.

Death by Dumpling
Vivien Chien
 
I'm not normally a mystery reader, but I saw this on the shelf at the library years ago and the cover stuck with me. I’ve decided I’m going to read her whole Noodle Shop Mystery series. It was easy to spot who the murder victim would be, the suspects are lining up, and we've entered the whodunit pages. 

This falls under the "cozy mystery" subgenre and I'm finding it quite enjoyable so far.

The lovely recommendations from Wowbrary strike again!

Somehow, our daughter managed to make it through three exposures and a week of test-to-stay without testing positive for COVID. We are, understandably, relieved to have dodged the virus again. While we know this is more luck than anything else, an article I read in the Washington Post [gift link] about those who haven't gotten COVID yet got me thinking.

While constantly testing negative could be immunological mixed with luck (lots of luck), I would posit that it is because some these folks (us included) are still taking the pandemic seriously. 

Our family has no known pre-existing conditions. We are fortunate to have jobs we can do from home. We are privileged to be able to send our child to a daycare that had a more conservative response then most. This all helps a lot.

More importantly, I think it's because we don't really go anywhere or do anything. We do not dine indoors. We do not go to large outdoor gatherings. We are careful with who we see and how. Crucially, we still wear masks everywhere. I'm in a cubicle in the office. I wear a mask all day. Our daughter still wears a mask at school - even when they went mask optional. Every time we step foot inside a public place, we wear our N95 masks. 

When we know we are going to see friends indoors, we ask about symptoms, vaccinations, and the like. We ensure that others are rapid testing before they visit. We test ourselves.

Essentially, we never changed our behavior. 

I don't fault anyone who tests positive at this point. You can do everything right and the BA5 variant can still get you. We know that, eventually, we will test positive for COVID. But I think the difference is, we have not yet given the pandemic the shrug.

Our kiddo got her second dose of Moderna this week. That Garfield Band-Aid on her arm is a measure of relief and gives us a touch more flexibility. We might start doing more things, but we're still going to mask. We may be the only ones doing so, but we don't care.

At this point, it's going to feel weird when the masks finally come off for good.

As DC endures its first real heat wave of the summer, I am so very grateful that we get to control the temperature in our home. 

Here's what else was good in my week.
​

• Getting mermaid blue toes during my pedicure
• Munching on flatbread dipped in tzatziki
• Pairing blanc de blanc wine with sushi on my birthday
• Lots of messages of love from my friends
• Plugging away at my to do list on my days off
• New sheets on the bed and new towels in the bathroom
• Finishing a highly-readable book
• Knee high rain boots keeping my feet dry during a downpour

It's my birthday. As is a tradition I created, I took several days off work. Having a summer birthday as a kid stunk. Rarely was everyone around for a party. As an adult, it rocks. I don't feel guilty taking off work. The weather is cooperative for outdoor things. And, popping a bottle of bubbly feels extra celebratory.

Here's what I'm focusing on.

WORK

• Research Assignment Design: Still more coding. We met to discuss our progress and thoughts. It was nice to know we're all generally frustrated with the qualitative research process. Also, one of my colleagues remembered that we also need to code the syllabi and assignments we're looking at. *sobs*
• Presentations and Publications: I submitted a proposal to provide a chapter for a forthcoming ALA Editions title Person-Centered Management in Academic Libraries. I want to provide a reflective chapter on the 5 questions I always asked my staff as a manager. I will be notified by the end of August if my proposal is selected. ​
• LibGuides: I put together an Asian Studies guide. This was a hard one. About halfway through I realized that I needed to define Asia. Technically, Asia includes the Middle East and Russia. I decided to focus on Central Asia, East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia, and parts of Oceania. Now I need to make a Middle East studies guide.
• Instruction: Provided another round of edits to the library instruction request form.
• Administration: Took a break from file renaming. 

PERSONAL

• Estate Planning: Nada. I really need to fix that.
• Email Newsletter: I did a bit of future issue planning to help me get ready for what is going to post while we're travelling in a few weeks. 
• Home Projects: I found a sofa table! I've been looking for over a year. It's not wood, nor does it have drawers. As I kept searching, I realized I was drawn to metal and black tables with clean lines. I ordered it from Wayfair and it arrived. Now I need to build it and post of our table for someone to grab.
• Hobbies: Nothing. I hope to get in some coloring during an upcoming evening.

A great way to make sure you're getting all the search results you need is to use the Boolean operator "OR." 

When you connect your keywords with OR - for example, by typing "climate change" OR "global warming" into the search box - your search results will contain articles that contain at least one of the keywords you entered.

This is a helpful approach when you are searching for concepts that have many synonyms or can be expressed in several different ways. 

It's an inclusive search technique that basically says, "I want it all!"

The Heir Affair
Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan

I’m glad I decided to read some fluff. My brain needs it.

​This is the second book in the author's riff on Kate Middleton and Prince William. I read the first book in two days. This one’s not moving quite as fast, but I’m still loving the absurd drama of it all. There is nothing remotely realistic about this book, but that's the joy of it.