09_05_2014 Just Hanging Around

Thought I'd drop in a blog post since it's been a little while. We've both been busy. After Dave hiked to Grays and Torreys, he headed west for some climbing on the East Side of the Sierra as well as in Tuolumne. He was gone several weeks and home only about a week so I wasn't able to get photos from him - yet. Those blogs will be up in late Sept or Oct. After being home a week, he took off north to the City of Rocks, Leavenworth and Squamish British Columbia. He's there now climbing and won't return until late September. So no photos about that trip yet either. What have I been doing you ask? Working. Lots of working and getting lots accomplished. Before I yap about work, I want to note I'm still at the gym regularly (has to be scheduled or it'd never happen) and climbing well. Hopefully will be getting stronger and climbing harder soon. I generally don't even mention work here on the blog. This is an exception. Work is going really well. I do very much like where I am and the people I work with. I recently (end of May) was appointed Associate Dean of Faculty Affairs at the School of Public Affairs. This is a very interesting new role and one that drops my teaching to a 0/1 load. :) < - - - :) Yay. I also have completed my dossier to go to Full Professor. Happy that is done as it is so time-consuming and tedious. Official word is all that remains for the promotion. I have a very strong case so I'm happy with the ordeal. Aside from climbing and working, I did find time for a movie recently. I love love love Rio, so I rented Rio 2. I brought the birds out to watch it with me. At first I thought it'd be too noisy for them, but they really loved it. I had two birds on me and two on the perch. That picture I posted is cool for a couple of reasons. One because it is of birds watching a bird movie. That's fun! Two because it is Clover and Henri sitting next to each other happily! Later they snuggled in a wee bit too. Henri generally doesn't want Clover next to him, but Clover adores Henri. They sat there and watched the entire movie! Grace and Gabbie sat on my shoulders and watched. Grace was a bit nervous and Gabbie did better than I thought he would (he's a worrier). They asked to go home about half way through. It was super fun watching the movie with them. I may pull out Rio tonight to see if they'll do it again!