Only a few more hours of 'freedom' left before it's back to the grind for me. Ugh. I really hate the last day of an extended vacation. It almost feels like the day before school starts. At least while I was in school, I could look forward to having months off during the summer months. Not so much being a career man now. Until the next Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday season, I'll only have the scheduled federal holidays that occur only about once a month. Of course I do have some vacation leave, but we don't have anything planned yet so there's really nothing to look forward to.

I've definitely enjoyed the time off I've had from work. I'm fortunate to be in a position where I can leave work at work (and not have to bring it home with me) the majority of the time. So it's been a nice break, being able to take an emotional and intellectual break from work these past couple of weeks. Although I confess that I did think about whether Peter Jackson accurately portrayed the dam break at Isengard in The Two Towers, and wondered momentarily how much flow (in cubic feet per second) was being released as the Ents tore down the temporary dam. See how much of a geek I am?

I've enjoyed the last couple of days visiting with my family. We've spent time taking the Kiddos to the park and watching movies. They left late Friday night and made it home safely Saturday evening despite a broken muffler and a brake job on my parents' van. Speaking of movies, I scored quite a big haul of DVDs over the past few months that I've finally given out during this holiday season. So far the tally includes: Finding Nemo, Sleeping Beauty, Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, The Lion King, Little House on the Prairie Season 3, The Hobbit, The Neverending Story, The Little Princess, The Secret Garden, Back to the Future, Digital Video Essentials, X2: X-Men United, Pirates of the Carribean: Curse of the Black Pearl, Antwone Fisher, Bend It Like Beckham, Celine Dion, the Wizard of Oz, and Gone with the Wind. Most of them were acquired through Deep Discount DVD (20% off), Best Buy (2 for $10), or Movie Gallery's B2G2 free on previously viewed movies. I think that brings my DVD collection to over 100 titles now, with an average of less than $10 per DVD. Although I have been contemplating a spring cleaning of my less-watched and violence-prone movies.

Another addition to my entertainment system over the Christmas holidays was the introduction of a karaoke player that was a gift from my parents. Thank you again so much you guys! It has hookups for two microphones and the unit hooks up directly to my home theater receiver. So that's definitely been a fun diversion but don't expect to see me on American Idol anytime soon.

One big change that I've made fairly recently is the decision not to play computer games as much anymore. I was trying to quit cold turkey from violent games such as Battlefield 1942 and Diablo II. The first couple of weeks was difficult, but ever since my hard drive crashed, I haven't even installed a single game on the computer, if you can believe that. And you know what? I really don't miss it all that much anymore. It was definitely a big step for me and I've spent my time more constructively as a result.

New Year's resolutions? Well, I suppose my resolution to play computer games less frequently can considered a New Year's resolution even though I made it a couple of months ago. Another resolution is to try to be more productive at work and to get to work at an earlier hour instead of the last possible minute. I've already taken steps to achieve the first part by willingly having my internet access shutoff so there's no possible for me to waste time by surfing the web. That was a very difficult decision in itself, but again, I'm already seeing benefits in spades because of it.

The hours are dwindling yet some more, but I feel somewhat re-energized to tackle the work that I have waiting for me. I just have to remember to take it a day at a time, a day at a time.