Re-Settling In

Hi All. I've been a very lax blogger as of late, but October has been a whirlwind month. I flew home to Boston last week for a multitude of reasons: a wedding, a birth, a funeral, putting a house on the market--sounds like a bad British comedy, I know. It was a hectic and stressfull week in Beantown despite a number of nice chats, visits and events. The visit started off with the craziest Southwest flight I've yet been on, and never care to repeat. The plane stopped in: El Paso, Austin, Baltimore, and then, finally, after 8 hours, Manchester, NH. Ugh! But all worth it when I saw the smiling face of Steve in the waiting area.

I spent the week hastily gathering research at BC, running around for the house, seeing friends, and scrubbing. It was strange to return to BC and not have any sort of affiliation there. Students, friends and former colleagues looked like they had seen the ghost of Libby past, it was funny. I do miss teaching though, and will (somewhat reluctantly) leave Santa Fe for the wilds of Maine winter around Christmas time. I did get to write my first real academic department memo this week, which was a fun experience!

Although it rained in Boston all week, Kate had a lovely day for her wedding--sunny, crisp and cool--the epitome of New England Fall. A good time had by all, except for Chrissy's smashed window in the parking lot of the international. Mr. and Mrs. William Travis Morgan are currently vacationing in Bora Bora, and I wish them well!

Our house is now on the market--feel free to purchase it--it is a buyer's market as they say! So Steve and I (though Steve had done the bulk of the work by the time I got home) scrubbed like Cinderella and moved yet more useless possessions to the storage unit to get ready for our open house which had a grand total of 3 visitors--competing with upwards of 70 open-houses in Framingham that given Sunday. Good times. We'll just keep our fingers crossed and pray to the St. Joseph statue that my mother has promised to bury in the yard.

It was funny how stressful it was to return to reality--all of my organic eating, non-diet coke drinking, gym going habits went out the window. The challenges of incorporating the ease of my Santa Fe life into my "real" life will be many, I think. But it is easy living here, and save the absence of Steve, I am really very happy in SF. I couldn't ask for better colleagues than Chris and Jonathan, and we have a lot of fun together, coming up with new dishes--like O'Keeffe Apple Cobbler (from the tree outside), pear cake (from Chris's casita pear tree) and my experimental Southwest baked ziti with roasted green chiles from the farmer's market. I like the various types of people who wander the streets of Santa Fe--always something to see. I need to start up on sightseeing again, which I've been kind of lax about since working. A drive to Taos is on the agenda soon, and the scholars are being treated to a trip to O'Keeffe's Ghost Ranch on Halloween (how appropriate)! This weekend, I think I will head up to the ski basin and go for a little hike among the aspens before all of the leaves fall.

It is most definitely fall here--very chilly and breezy with many yellow leaves. It tends to be in the 30s in the morning and at night, and then rise into the 50s and 60s during the day. Lovely weather, really. Nice to be wearing sweaters again, though it is rather funny to see all of the Santa Feans wearing winter hats already--I mean, come on, I just put my flip-flops away!

Have Happy Weekends. Go Sox. Go Pats!