I'm back!

Just flew in late last night from a week in Hawaii. I sorely needed a little bit of sunny paradise and it looks like I took the perfect week of cold and snow warnings to ditch the gray skies.

It's hard to readjust to this shabby looking little world I left just a few days ago. This morning, looking out my window to the blowing winds and gray little winter neighborhood, it looks like a scene in black and white after all that technicolor turquoise ocean, brilliant tropical jungle flowers, lush vegetation and colorful paradise. January in Seattle is not nearly as pretty, it looks bleak and dead.

I'm glad to be back to my lonely little cats and fluffy bed. But the pile of work I need to plow through today is huge and I miss the beach already. The very worst part of vacations is the first day back home - unpacking and laundry, replying to all the calls, emails and whatnot, catching up and getting back into the groove. By the second day, you're in the swing. Today I'm still floating on the waves and not ready to get started.

Just dusting off the cobwebs in here and checking to make sure it still works. Then I'm finishing up orders all afternoon. I'm even optimistically hoping to get the last little polishing touches done on the mailing and over to the printers - but if I'm being honest, it's not going anywhere until tomorrow.

Standing on the white sand beach, the vast and powerful ocean lapping at your toes, and the limitless, mysterious universe of stars overhead . . . well, it's an awesome thing. Just a tiny speck. Even less than a speck, I am. Peaceful was what I took away from it. No big breakthroughs or life changing moments. Just a calming, a frolic in the warm sun, and a little check on the list of things I've always wanted to see. It's beautiful there, the people are so friendly and helpful, but I'm not a big rum and fruit juice drinker and I think they need more consonants or less vowels in their language. Every word we tried to pronounce had multiple a,e,i,o,u's and a few k's and l's - sounding more like we were suffering some stomach ailment.

Not complaining - I'll go back any time. Tomorrow even.