though your promise count for nothing, you must keep it nonetheless

I didn't need to drive the kids this morning, and got this idea in my head that I'd head into work early to free up some time in my afternoon.  

Instead, I picked up the boy after school, stopped at the sporting goods store for a return, picked up some groceries, stopped home, got changed, topped off the oil in my car, out again for gas, grocery again for the things I didn't get the first time, made dinner, and....it's nearly 7:30pm.

I've been procrastinating with some stuff lately.  Reading, my business, writing, working out, house & yard.... Mostly things I can catch up on okay, but I've also been neglecting things I really ought not.  Like staying in touch with people properly.  I can chalk it up to being busy -- which is true -- but I'm really trying to keep a promise to myself to do a better job of it.

we go out of the gray and into the blue above

I am spending the day in Monument, at the last forensics tournament of the year.  If you don't know, "forensics" is the name they give to a public speaking/performance activity in middle & high schools.  We didn't have any of this when I was a kid.  Then again, we didn't have a football team either.  Or a middle school, for that matter.  The girls did this for years, and now Owen is in it.  If you've ever been to a tournament of any kind, you'll know that the vast majority of your time is spent waiting for things to happen.  One benefit, I guess, is being able to revisit your blog after five idle months.

So it's February already, almost March.  We didn't have much of a winter, and I'm anxious for spring to get here.  I might just take the bikes down and give them an anticipatory tune-up.  The stated goal is to spend as many days as possible biking or hiking this coming year.

With spring break coming up, and the rare opportunity to actually get "away" for a while, you might be tempted to head to warmer climates.  But we like it here, and it's plenty sunny.  So we're heading up to the mountains for our vacation, and it's going to be great!