On the first week of my sabbatical: The fishing was a bit slow. The water temp is still pretty cold in most places around here (mid 40s), so the trout are fairly sluggish. I did get to check out some new locations, and I landed three, hooked but lost four more, and had more strikes…

This was my week at work to wrap up and hand things off before starting my sabbatical. I ended up getting a surprise project on Wednesday. It was fun but challenging, and I worked on it for three full days, and delivered what I had at the end of the day Friday. Now I’m winding…

I took it slow at work this week, focusing on handoffs since my sabbatical starts March 31. The brain fog got better as the week went on, but my energy levels still aren’t back to normal. I even took a nap on Saturday, which is very out of the norm for me. Follow up with…

The big thing this week: I was in the hospital Monday through Thursday. I woke up with severe pain in my left side around 3:30am Monday, which I thought might be a kidney stone given family history. The pain escalated to the point of making me vomit and writhe, so I went to the ER.…

My birthday was this week! I wrote a birthday post and later that night we went to Bridgeview Tavern in Tarrytown, one of our favorite places for a burger. They also are one of the few places around there that always has Hill Farmstead on tap, which I think is the best brewery in the…

I spent M-F this week in Southport, NC, at a team meetup for work. We stayed in the beautiful Cape Fear House on the Cape Fear River. Unfortunately, it was unseasonably cold and we canceled our planned outing of taking a ferry to explore a local island. We did check out two local museums and…

I make all of my chicken-based soups with ground chicken + stock now. It is much faster and doesn’t dry out. Tonight’s edition is chicken and wild rice, my take on the Panera one. More snow! More sleet! More ice! We’ve had more precipitation this winter than the last five we’ve been in Peekskill. Ready…

Long week. Charlie was home 3/5 days of the work week (sick, then doctor, then snow storm), and work was very busy with a lot of people out sick or with kids home with school closed. I feel like all I’ve been doing at work this week is reacting and adapting to unplanned things. Multiple…

We have ice on the Hudson again, which is refreshing after having no ice last winter. Today the eagles were out hunting on the ice. I’ve enjoyed seeing photos of the Hudson River Ice Yachts. I’d love to try one some time! We are going through a phase where dinnertime has been a struggle most…

We woke up to a total of ~7 inches of snow on Monday and a couple hour school delay, so Charlie and I suited up and went out to shovel, clean off the car, and play. The past two weeks have been in the teens and single digits (fahrenheit). It finally broke freezing this afternoon.…

Snow is coming down heavily as I write this. We have about 4″ now, and it is supposed to continue until around 4am. We picked up a snow shovel that is “just my size” for Charlie, so after dinner he wanted to go out and shovel, even though it was still coming down. I’ll never…