winding down

This week has been quite a whirlwind.  With the big snowstorm this week, work was ridiculously busy. I ended up picking up some extra hours on Wednesday and worked from 11 am to about 1130 pm. In addition to it being an extremely long shift, I was running on only about 4 hours of sleep. But I survived the day, earned a little extra money, and made it to work and home again safely.

I did get into a few debates where I had to defend my undying love for snow. I firmly stand my ground - I love snow. Not only is it absolutely beautiful, but the sheer magnitude of the snow with this last storm was incredible. My only concession in this whole argument came after my drive home from work on Tuesday night. It normally takes me about 7 minutes to get home at night, but on Tuesday it took about 40 minutes. I didn't go more than 20 mph, and there were times when I could not see past the end of the car. However, it was never once the fault of the snow; it was allllll the wind.


Wednesday night, despite being exhausted after my extended, sleep-deprived work day, I stayed up extra late to chat with my friend, Joanna, who is currently teaching English in China with her husband Tomek. Steph came over and we video chatted on Skype. It is so awesome to not only be able to talk to close friends who live so far away, but also to be able to see them. We were able to see their apartment, but it also feels like you're sitting in the same room talking. So that was really nice for the 3 of us to get together like that. 


Friday I did some shopping with Alyssa and after taking her home, I had a friend over. We played some board games and got distracted by lots of different things, and I ended up not going to bed until 830am. Oops! Luckily I was able to sleep for a good portion of the day before beginning the best part of this week: Alyssa's 21st Birthday!


We did a little more shopping on Saturday evening and then the two of us grabbed some dinner. She had a  few friends over to celebrate before we went out to the bars at midnight. Afterwards,  I spent the night at Alyssa's. Sunday morning mom took Alyssa and I out for brunch and Bloody Marys. [I had requested off several weeks ago for this Sunday, purely to be able to celebrate Alyssa's birthday.] In the evening I went over to Alyssa's house again, where her and her roommates had a Superbowl party. Despite getting ridiculously nervous in the last quarter of the game, it was super exciting to see the Packers win the Superbowl!!! [And let's be honest, Alyssa couldn't have asked for a better 21st birthday present.] Afterwards we went out to the bars again to celebrate a little. One of the greatest things about living in Madison is that there is so much hometown [home state?] pride - we walked outside and we could hear and see people throughout the downtown area out in the streets celebrating the victory. Go Pack Go!


I can't believe that my little baby sister is completely grown up, and it was soooooo nice to be able to celebrate so much with her this weekend. One more time [because you can never celebrate a birthday too much]:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ALYSSA!!!!!

Now I'm off to bed to hopefully recoup!