Nice and Sunny

We ended a busy work week, both on the floor as well as in our Committee, with a busy Thursday and Friday.

Yesterday I got a little side-tracked, and decided sleep was a good thing to have. The Conservation, Credit, Energy, and Research Subcommittee held a hearing on the proposals for the Conservation Title to the farm bill. I stood guard for a while, as this was our best attended hearing yet, but was able to put a simple note on the doors asking people to enter quietly about 2/3 of the way in. Yesterday afternoon slowed down some, but we were watching the debate as to whether Washington, D.C. (and Utah, adding 2 total seats) would be approved to have a delegate in the House of Representatives (which passed in the House, and is on its way to the Senate). During the hearing my good friends Al Franken and Dick Gephardt stopped by. Okay, while they are not my close friends, Franken really does have a sense of humor, you can hear his laugh halfway down the hall, and Dick Gephardt, well, he lost the presidential nomination for the democratic party to Kerry in 2004.

Today was kind of retying all the knots that came loose during the week. With three hearings in three days, we go through a lot of paper (while we print double sided, recycle into newsprint, mixed, and white, and conserve and reuse as much as we can), miss a lot of calls and emails, and have projects which were pushed back during the week all due at the same time. I got a few small things I had set aside earlier done this morning, but at noon I was kindly reminded that I had a book full of information due at 1:30. I was already done, so I was heading to lunch, when I was reminded that the book needed to be done in triplicate. I remembered this and frantically tried to put two additional books together in an hour and a half. Luckily, I had already printed off the materials for the final books, I just had to rearrange the pages, make tabs and labels, and get them all exactly identical. When the requester of my project walked in to ask me if I wanted to head to lunch at 1:25, I thought he was joking. "Oh, yeah, sorry, that meeting got canceled, [Member's name] took an earlier flight home." So I finished the books by 1:30 anyway since I was on pace to, and had a free afternoon to get ready for next week.

This weekend looks like it is going to be 80 degrees and clear. This will be perfect as a friend and I are heading to Baltimore to check out the National Aquarium, take in an Oriole's game at Camden Yards, and take the train back all in 12 hours. Why the National Aquarium is in Baltimore, I'm not sure, but at least it gives us something else to do! Amtrack is pretty affordable for the short 40 ride each way, so I looked up a ride to Minneapolis. It costs twice as much as a plane ticket and can last for 4 days! Thank God for airplanes.