The Big Flood...

There is considerable talk about a major flooding event in this area. I'm not surprised and feel its quite omnimous. My cousin Eric IM'd me on Facebook last night letting me know the water is "coming my way". LOL. He and his wife and kids live between New York Mills and Ottertail south of Rush lake and reported they've got water over the roads there already. All water flows to this area eventually it seems, going up the "Red River of the North". Now I think it's more or less a wait and see game while communities gear up for likely flooding problems. With the amount of snow we've gotten this year (one of the highest on record), it's inevitable. Living in Ada, MN means I'm in the flood basin where high flooding years seems to want to refill the ice age Lake Agassiz lake basin. Overland flooding is a huge concern and it darn near devastated this town in the spring of 1997. I'm used to roads being closed because of flooding and often during the highest flood moments, there is not way in or out of town without going through some water covered highways.

My field study is coming along. I'm waiting for my data analysis committee to get back to me with their contributions. Then it will be my task to analyze that and finish up the thing. I will be extremely happy when it is done. I am so busy and every waking hour that I don't have to be doing something else has been concentrated on getting it done.

My apartment is a MESS and I don't forsee that changing for at least another month until I'm finished with the graduate school stuff and all the stuff I have going on at school. I'm working with the state department and PACER (parent advocasy group for persons with disabilities) on some transition issues and programs, and that starts next week. It will be a great experience, but likely a time consuming one...maybe not time, but surely mental energy will be mostly needed. Nevertheless, this spring is a great testiment to my ability to juggle many balls and compartmentalize stuff -a great skill to have in my desired line of work. And if my apartment stays messy, I guess that's not that big of a deal at the end of the day.

I took a sick day today because I'm feeling run down and like I'm starting to relapse after getting over my sinus/upper respiratory infection a couple weeks ago. It has helped me very much. I've got enough sick days accumulated to be sick until the end of the year, so I might be more apt to take these sick days now and then this spring instead of being a martyr and showing up for work even when I should be at home. The last thing I need is to get very sick and have to take off more than one day in a row, especially with the transition work coming up, 4 out of 5 of my students trying to graduate this year (I feel I need to be there to keep them on track and encourage them to take advantage of opportunities to pass their classes), and my program possibly being discontinued. There is much to do at the transition school to "close it up" if that should happen to be decided by the board this month.