Weekend/Future/Life Updates

Welcome from the winter wonderland in Illinois. It is past 1:00 a.m. and a balmy 18 degrees (feels like 2 degrees) outside. We had a strange week where the temperature was around 0, then went into the 40's, then back very cold again.

My youngest daughter's boyfriend was coming to visit from Pennsylvania Friday night. His flight to Chicago-O'Hare was fine, but his final leg downstate kept getting delayed because United could not find the flight crew! After delays of a few hours, the customers were told that the flight was canceled. So ... what to do ... After exploring some not-so-great options, we had the boyfriend take Uber about halfway to our house. My daughter and I hopped in our van at about 12:30 a.m. and headed north to meet him and bring him back. Nothing like a night run when the temperature is hovering around 0 degrees. Fortunately, everything worked out okay. Unfortunately, I have today (Monday) off and have to drive him to catch a bus at early this morning. Such is the life of a father!

I have been planning to take a trip to Las Vegas in February, but for some reason had not pulled the string on the visit. I have hotel reservations (some might change) and finally got my plane ticket Saturday night. I'll be heading to Las Vegas on Saturday, February 3 and staying for almost a week. The first two nights are still up in the air as I have reservations at two hotels, including the Lucky Dragon. If I decide to rent a car for the week, I might stay in Henderson for the first two nights. After that, I'll be staying at Bally's on The Strip during the week. I'm formulating some plans for the trip already, so if you want to potentially meet up, hit me up!

Long-time readers might recall that in May 2012, I took over as head of my department at work when a change of direction was badly needed. I finally stepped down at the end of last April after five years in the job. An interim director replaced me, but now two job searches have come and gone without finding suitable candidates to replace me. Search number three is now underway! Meanwhile, I have enjoyed not having so much responsibility hanging over my head, and am now about to start a countdown to my retirement -- 28 months to go! That might sound like a lot, but I have been working at my present place of employment for 23 1/2 years and have been working professionally for 35 1/2 years. It is strange even thinking about this since I have not been without at least a part-time job for over 40 years.

And what will happen after I retire? Right now, it appears that we will sell our house and move to ... Las Vegas! We want to get out of Illinois and move somewhere warmer. It looked like Phoenix/Scottsdale was going to be the place, but now it is looking more like Las Vegas. This all seems a tad unreal. I don't know if I am quite ready to begin the countdown. I do know that I am tired of working and welcome the opportunity to be doing something else, be that working some sort of part-time job that would be quite different from what I currently do or finding some volunteer work that would be fulfilling. That and having a bit more relaxed time for poker would be excellent!

Looks like I should get some sleep so that I won't be sliding through the snow when I drive in a few hours. Thanks for reading!

A note: After all the kidding I got for having my hair slicked back (I got called "Ditka" more than a few times at the poker tables!), my wife convinced me to go back to my regular hairstyle. Ditka no more!