Plenty of time has gone by. I cooked my Sunday dinner and the food was delicious. I made my salmon with tarragon and it was really good. I made wonderful hollandaise for my broccoli. We ate on the Rockwell Kent plates and everyone loved it. Ken thought I was generous to let him use such a valuable plate. I got up early and Ken came to install the deck railing. I was actually helpful and hammered part of the railing. I was pleased with my hammering and hit the nail every time. yeah me. The railing actually doesn't look horrible, though it doesn't match the rest at all and looks pretty stupid. But it's there and the appraiser came, took a picture and left.

I went to work Monday and Tuesday, cataloged like a fool. The board met Monday night, had a marathon session. They went into executive session with the attorney to discuss "personnel matters," which means they decided whether or not to pursue disciplinary action against me for the alleged "incident" of October, 2003. I don't know what they decided but so far I haven't received a memo from the director, which is what form the discipline would first take, presumably. Perhaps not, though--I really have no way of knowing and just wait for the shoe to drop. Not a pleasant sensation but there's nothing else I can do. I can hope that the board realizes how queer it would be to pursue something that happened a year ago, that wasn't much of anything, a comment that I supposedly made, which I deny having made anyway, which would cost the library a few thousand dollars in legal fees because I would grieve any action they took. But I'm still uneasy and must wait for time to pass. They have 18 months from 10/03 to do anything. Of course, if they discipline me I'll also demand that they request another staff member who admitted calling members of my department fat and lazy. What a pleasant thing the whole mess is.

So that made Monday night nasty, and Tuesday morning I was nervous but the director left at 11 with no memo appearing in my mailbox. Now it's Monday and still nothing but that doesn't mean a thing.

I left for Rhode Island on Wednesday morning, dropping Jackson off in Plattsburgh first. Had to take him to the huge commercial kennel because I called too late and my vet was full. I don't really feel sorry about it, I have little compassion for this poor old dog--I just feel that he's lucky he gets to live with me. It's been very pleasant to be without him all these days. I pick him up tonight after my chiropractor's appointment, paying $90 for the pleasure of being without him. The trip to RI was fine, no traffic and no real rain. It went quickly because I took a bunch of CD's to listen to. My hairdresser taught me an exercise to do for my sciatica and I can do it in the car, though it's dangerous while driving, but it helps so much I do it anyway from time to time. Oh yeah, I got a perm on Tuesday night, out of sheer desperation. It looks ok, it's just a body perm, not a lot of curls, just height. So now I'm 5'4". My hair is too short to do much with and still doesn't look great but it looks better. I'll grow it a little longer and it might look better with this perm. I don't know what to do with it, it's so limp it just hangs.

Thanksgiving was fine. We had a nice time but it was a bit tense with Mark's sister, her husband and 2 sons. Mark, Liza and I had fun preparing for it. Mark made a huge and beautiful centerpiece, 2-tiered with real fruit (grapes dripping). He of course set the table. He and I went in search of whipping cream, lima beans and more squash--went to 4 stores in opposite ends of the area with no luck, came back with a bag of ice. Anyway Marilyn is having marital problems and problems "finding herself" right now so it was sort of strange but we had a good time anyway. The food was delicious and there was plenty of it. Marilyn and Don brought 5 pies. I ate so much I felt ill. After they left we collapsed. That night we watched Bend it Like Beckham and picked at the turkey a little bit.

Friday we made our traditional pilgrimage to The Christmas Tree Shop, have our usual fun wheeling a cart through the entire store, aisle by aisle, commenting on everything we saw and buying Christmas presents. I got things for the people who work for me plus a few other things. I was searching for the perfect wine glasses to give to Bill for our Sunday dinner table. Since that store is 40 minutes north of Liza's it's pretty much an all-afternoon affair and that's all we did (Mark worked in the morning). We watched Arrested Development that night, but they both went to bed early and I stayed up late, knitting at watching episode after episode.

Saturday, after a lot of discussion about where we should shop we decided to shop in Wickford, the little seaside town I used to live in, where Mark's shop is now located. It has small shops, where everything is expensive but fun to look at. We had a great time and it was easier on Liza than Friday's expedition because the stores weren't loud and full of people and we went outdoors a lot so she got fresh air. We went to a few antique shops and I found the perfect goblets for Bill. Expensive and no one else liked them but I'm happy with them. First I bought 5 small glasses that went with some plates but Mark really wanted them so when I found the goblets in another store we were really pleased that I could sell him the original glasses. Successful trip. There's one store Liza and I always go to that has tons and tons of small stuff packed into it and we had a great time there. Mark looked at charms to give to his niece and I remembered how important my charm bracelet was to me when I was a kid. He finally decided to get her a horse because she's taking riding lessons right now. Each of my charms had special meaning from a special trip or occasion.

After shopping we tried a new fish market for lobster, one that's right in Wickford. The guy working there was wearing a sweatshirt that said "Champlin's Wickford" so maybe they're owned by the same people we go to in Galilee, I don't know. Anyway we had good lobster for dinner that night. Liza went to bed but Mark and I stayed up and drank a lot. A whole lot. He had to go to work at 10, though, so then we drank a lot of coffee. After he left I did the dishes and Liza got up to notice that we drank nearly the whole bottle of Limoncello ("You drank all THAT?"). oops. Anyway we had a good time. Yesterday I slept late, since I didn't get to sleep until 2 and wanted to get enough sleep so I wouldn't be sleepy on my drive home. We did our usual read-the-Sunday-paper routine together before I left. I left around 1 and had a fine trip home. Rained most of the way on the Mass Pike but the traffic wasn't as bad as it could have been. Moderate but not fierce. Got home at 7, making good time even though I didn't race.

The house was 47 when I got home and my wood stove is misbehaving terribly, smoking up a storm when I open the door. This may mean the stovepipe needs cleaning, I don't know what to think. I can't get it cleaned until I have my closing or get paid, whichever comes first. I get paid on Friday, at least. I don't know what's going on but maybe I shouldn't use it until I have it looked at. I finally got the house up to 63 by turning on the heat in the library, kitchen, bedroom and living room. Now THAT won't cost too much. Tess was very excited to be home and raced around for a long time before settling on my shoulder on the couch, under the down cover Jenica gave me last year. Like a parrot.

And now I've cataloged old crappy videos for Schroon Lake and will move on to gift books that are mediocre children's books and shouldn't be in their library. They're really proud that their interlibrary loan volume is so high but the reality is that it means they don't have the books their patrons want to read so they have to borrow everything from other libraries.