Made breakfast (egg bake) for the week. Prepped some chicken breasts for the freezer (pounded to an even depth, salted for a bit, then wiped down for freezing) because they had a good sale. Sautéed some squash for dinner & leftovers. Not bad. Also remembered that if one is getting tired of banana bread that topping it with vanilla ice cream is a good way to switch it up.

Men's knitting group was good. I'm at the point in this shawl where it took me almost two hours to do four rows. I don't even know how many stitches across it is, but I have another 50+ rows to go, adding 2-8 stitches per row. It's gonna be pretty, but man this is getting long.

Back to work after a week off. Hopefully my work laptop won't demand the damned bitlocker key again, which seems to be happening more often these days (it's happened now four times).

Good drive up, fairly uneventful, about 9 hours with lunch & pee breaks. Buying snacks ahead of time was definitely the right decision.

The immediate family is good. Wake is tomorrow evening, Mass is on Wednesday. Excellent dinner at a new-to-us Italian restaurant near the sister-in-law's house, that had gluten-free gnocchi. Very tasty.

The hotel is an absolute dive. An extended stay place where they acted insulted that we asked for another pillow. Definitely not staying here again.

Long day reviewing existing things at work so the new group to cancel them. Whee. Kept having to impress upon career people that this was a vibe check, that we're going to get sued, and so be it, we just needed to get through it and be done with it.

The husband continues to bake, this time a small olive oil cake. Very tasty.

Regular doc checkup tomorrow, and an appointment with the postal service to pay for and turn in my passport renewal. It's well over due, so I have to go in person, and this way they can do the photo, too. Getting the little card as well as the book, first as a just-in-case it's useful, and then as an added, more easily carried proof of citizenship. Because yes, I'm that paranoid.

Cortisone shot in the knee, which I babied the rest of the day (lots of video gaming, sprawled out on the couch). Back in four weeks to see how it's doing, and see if we need a referral to another physician in the practice to do a camera scope inside.

Ordered Chinese in, ate way too much for someone who's sedentary. Oh well.

A big policy document finally shook loose at work, so now we can turn to doing and back away from all the hand wringing. I am so, so very grateful that I recruited one capable, personable attorney from my old agency to work on my portfolio, and he in turn recruited another capable, personable attorney from our old agency for the same. Having backup that I enjoy talking to has been such a blessing, especially on days like today where I needed to be away and resting.

As the small gubm'nt agency continues to try and thread the needle of courts versus policy direction, I keep hearing about things and being told that people at senior levels are either asking the agency head if they can read me into something, or they're telling other people to come ask me questions about some policy they're developing. In the first case the agency head keeps saying no, which I interpret as him trying to minimize the number of people working on things, but at a certain point it starts to feel personal. In the second case I have nothing to add because I haven't been read into the policy (see case the first), so I have no clue what they're doing. So when it all blows up, it's not my fault, because they won't let me do my job. Whatevs.

Tonight after work was another stop at the local market, this time for some more zucchini to sauté, and sweet potatoes to boil & mash, to go with the leftover meatloaf, which heated up nicely in the toaster oven.

Had some friends over for games and a trip to the local Olive Garden. These were city boys who don't get out to suburban restaurants, so it was a treat for them.

The new drug doesn't seem much different from the old NSAID? Other than the fact that it's a 3x a day pill versus 1x a day, which makes it easier to forget to take. Knee is still being obnoxious for walking, and this morning my skin was irritated from the firmer brace overnight.

My credit union sent me a "you haven't used your credit card with us enough, so we're going to close it if you don't use it before this summer" letter, so I ordered the husband a doo-dad for his stand mixer (a cover that fits over the big whisk, that you pull down when you're done to clean most of the stuff off of it; he'll love it). Hopefully that'll mollify them.

Passed my 8k step goal today just from running around the office. Ended up staying later than I'd intended, but the husband and I still did comics and dinner out, albeit a late one. Almost forgot to grab my work shackle, er, iPhone, because it was sitting on the charger. Alas, I remembered it before I got out of the suite. I do appreciate being able to leave the computer at work now.

If I'm reading the budget resolution correctly (which is kind of a crap shoot, honestly) my agency might just be looking at a 4% reduction below the previous administration's planned budget for this year. It's hard to tell because those are written at a very high level (think "here's the total amount for all national defense spending, by year, for the next decade"; or here's the total amount for all energy spending, or all medical spending, etc. - no breakdown by agency). I'll try and quiz the budget office tomorrow to see what they've heard.

Went shopping for foodstuffs for the office, and I have to say that the canned soup selection at the local Wegman's was sorely lacking (I have a lunch crock pot I like to use in the office). Five gazillion types of wine, but a distinctly soviet feel to the tiny little soup section. I was hoping not to have to cart cans down from home. I'll try a couple and see if they're viable, but I may still need to haul the occasional can down as well.

We're expecting another big (for DC) snow storm tomorrow through Thursday. Four to eight inches (10-20cm), which is a lot for here. Work laptop came home with me, and I will take advantage of any and all "unscheduled telework" days that pop across, like the "Early Departure ?" DC area Federal offices status message that's posted for tomorrow (the question mark, present in the original message, was my favorite part; like they weren't sure they completely meant it).

Commuted in, met the husband in metro on the way home. Ordered pizza for dinner and watched the last half of season one of Big Boys, a British show on Hulu that we're quite enjoying. Probably an early night tonight as Tuesdays are traditionally busy days for me as people manage to catch up on their weekend/Monday emails and start tossing bombs at the lawyers.

The drive up to Massachusetts wasn't bad. We made good time, and only really hit traffic when we got to the Boston I-95 beltway during rush hour, and even then the maps app had taken that into account with the timing. Checked in, all good. Got an upgrade to a "suite" because we walked into our first room and there were a handful of tools (think hammer, etc.) on the counter, so they switched us. Not bad.

Then dinner took as long as the drive up here did because we had The. World's. Slowest. Waitress. Seriously, she was just bad at her job. Good food, but overly warm in the place and slow service left me slightly cranky. Felt good to get outside into the cold.

All unpacked and ready for whatever we're up to tomorrow. I have a video call from 1-3 for the training class, and the husband is meeting one of his college friends while I do that, but otherwise we've no plans until Saturday.

The husband was out late, and it's still gross outside from the snow, so I was up late last night to grab him from the Metro. But that's okay, because it meant I slept in this morning, so he had to walk himself to the Metro first thing to get to work. Karma.

Still walked on the treadmill, still made my morning meetings (that I'd forgotten until the work computer dinged at me), still got a lot of work done. Today was more of a 'leading people' day than substantive legal work, which is okay by me.

Then it was picking up the husband from the Metro, grabbing the weekly haul of comics, and enjoying pasta at the Italian place next door to the comic shop. I'll pay for the pasta tomorrow, but it was tasty. Apropos of that I ordered a new enzyme supplement that's supposed to help with digesting FODMAPs, and is aimed squarely at the ones that I react to, so here's hoping that's useful once it arrives.