End of the Lull

Last week, things felt oddly quiet. Not so, this week. It almost felt like being back at work, juggling several tasks, some with deadlines. A brief blip, or a sign of things to come? It doesn't matter, it just felt good to pick up the pace a little.

My sister has taken on my professional website as a class project, and her updated, redesigned efforts are in an entirely different league from my current website (which I patched together from a very basic template). If you would like to see the "before" picture, go to The Wordchemist. Linda and I live almost 3000 miles apart, so we collaborated via email and IM across three time zones. Both of us got a useful review on being clear and specific in our communication with each other. Over the space of a couple of weeks, the website evolved from "nebulous concept" to "this looks really good!"

The new design is being critiqued by others in my sister's class this week, and it will go live after we tie up a few loose ends. The new website includes a science blog, which serves as a prod to get me back into writing professional-caliber pieces on a regular basis.

A couple of my former co-workers from the American Chemical Society still freelance for the ACS website. I'm filling in for one of them while he is on vacation. This week, I got my first assignment. It wasn't difficult, but I had to make sure that I could log in, and I had to make sure that the template they provided worked with OpenOffice. Other than those two rather low hurdles, I got back into the swing of things rather easily. We will see how the next couple of weeks go.

The usual domestic chores, bill paying, journaling and reflection sessions, yoga classes, discussion group, and a half-day science policy symposium (plus downtown commute) added up to make a week that was eventful, but not overwhelming.