So, um, I may have decided at the last minute to join tomorrow’s 24-hour readathon. I may not go the full 24 hours, and some of that time definitely will be spent listening to a book rather than reading one, but I figured it would be fun to participate again. (And, no, this doesn’t substantially differ from any other weekend… You’re absolutely right… ) I’ll be updating some tomorrow with bookish news.

I’ll also be spending some time at the garden this weekend, mixing up the soil Rudi and I bought last weekend. Expect a few photos by Monday to show the before and after.

And we’ll be heading out to brunch to celebrate Sarah‘s birthday (which was today) on Sunday. Sarah gave her blog a new identity for her blogiversary earlier this month, and I bet she wouldn’t mind if you popped over to wish her a happy birthday weekend.

Finally, Grey Kitten and his husband, David, adopted some new kitties last week. Rudi and I have nagged on a pretty much daily basis since then for photos and Grey Kitten obliged tonight. Check out his Flickr page to see the new additions (Roger and Shadow) and how their resident feline, Kady, reacted to their arrival.

I have been tired from playing with kids before.

I have been tired from spending all day out in the sun before.

I can’t think of the last time I had to spend all day out in the sun entertaining kids. It lends a whole new meaning to the word “exhausted.”

More tomorrow…

The upcoming week looks busy. Good thing I slept in yesterday morning…

Monday is the White House Easter Egg Roll and, once again, my coworkers and I will be there to ruin all the fun of a day off for the kids by running educational activities for them. Actually, what we have planned isn’t too bad, so hopefully at least one or two kids will enjoy what we have cooked up for them. Rudi and I hope to follow this up with some gardening, a trip to the library, and a pizza before settling in for Monday night tv.

Tuesday is the NCAA Women’s Basketball National Championship and we have discovered that our internet provider has teamed up with ESPN to stream the game live. Go, UConn!

Wednesday, I hope to get to knitting group. I haven’t been in weeks and would like to get back to regular attendance.

Thursday, Rudi and I are heading up to the Avalon for a movie screening (of a film from the 1940s). Should be tons of fun!

I feel like we have plans on Friday, but I might totally be making that up…

Saturday and Sunday — who knows! Next weekend is so far away! There might be some bed shopping. Possibly be some gardening. Likely some reading. Oh, and a Sarah birthday extravaganza…

Much of my evening fun is predicated on getting out of work on time this coming week. Think good thoughts for positive news from our vendor and a smooth conference call Tuesday morning. They’ve gone quiet on us for several days, which makes us a little nervous…

I don’t get great cell phone reception in my office. I can sometimes get text messages and occasionally a phone call will even sneak through, but generally the service bars just disappear. So, it was fortuitous that yesterday I opted to take a late afternoon lunch break. It was the first day I’ve had time for one since we returned from Utah and I desperately wanted a few minutes outside in the warm air.

Getting outdoors allowed my phone to reconnect with the world and to alert me to a surprise message from my college roommate. She and another college friend had made a last minute trip to town and were wondering if we were here, too, and, if so, did we want to meet up for dinner?

But of course!

The day progressed in such a way that I was able to escape for the day at a mostly reasonable 6:30, and Eri and Eric, who’d rented bikes, pedaled up from the Mall to meet me outside my building. (It’s sad to say, but I was so tired that I originally told them my office was at a totally different intersection. Yikes!) Rudi, who’d had Good Friday off, biked down to join us, and the four of us set off for dinner.

We had a leisurely ride to Dupont Circle, where we landed at Luna Grill’s outdoor patio and a nice long time to catch up. We traded news of family members and of friends and snippets of work-related tales. We talked politics and cycling and D.C. and New York. Later, a bit chilled and ready for dessert, we pedaled over to ACKC, a local chocolate shop, for macarons and cocoa. Minutes and hours passed until we found we’d shut the joint down. Reluctant to end a perfectly lovely evening, we even stood on the sidewalk, bikes in hand, in front of the darkened shop until nearly midnight when we all agreed that really if we ever planned to get up today we’d have to go home. So we parted ways, but with a promise to meet up again soon.

It was a very good night, the best I’ve had in ages.

Just a note for anyone who might read both our blogs: Keep the Coffee Coming was ousted from Blogger, but Kat has made herself a new home on WordPress. Head over to visit her new digs!

Arriving home last night at 1:30 in the morning and needing to be up and working (from home for the first bit) at 7:30 this morning was … painful. Luckily, my boss was a dear and sent me home when she left because I just wasn’t concentrating the way I should have been.

Three more days of work left this week… And they just can’t be done with soon enough…

The good news is that warm weather arrives after tomorrow and daylight extends quite a bit in either direction of my day. Maybe toward the end of the week I’ll even feel up to a pre-work bike ride down to see the cherry blossoms before they all fall off the trees!