My dear neglected blog readers: Once again, I apologize for being a blog slacker. Life just gets busy as I'm sure you can understand!! But I'm back and I promise to keep you updated on my life in the past few weeks.
The main event of recent days was that I was assigned once again to cover POTUS's summer vacation in Martha's Vineyard. Not too many people felt sorry for me that I had to go to the Vineyard for 11 days and get paid for it. And when I think about it like that, I agree. But it still is work and as you know, I had that honor last year so in all honesty, I wasn't that excited. But as soon as I got there, I realized that I was indeed blessed by being in a beautiful work environment and not behind my desk in either the WH or my bureau.
You'll be happy to know that we didn't have to stay at a place that specializes in colonics this year. We didn't have to negotiate the ability to have solid foods in the house. We rented a big house that was brand spanking new. Absolutely no character and if you look at the IKEA catalog, you'll see exactly what it looked like. But it had air conditioning and forks and only one crockpot and no hydrotherapy room so I count it as a step up!
Things around the Vineyard were just as I remembered them. I instantly recalled where everything on the island was and the best places to get some form of lobster. The first night we were there, I decided to get as much in as we could just in case the trip got crazy work-wise. So we went to Menemsha to watch the sunset and eat lobster on the dock. Then we went to Back Door Donuts which might be the best thing on MV. It was a pretty cool evening!!
We did a ton of liveshots and that was before there was really any news!! 
But the best part of this year's trip was that I had a special visitor for a few days!! Let me back up and say that last year, Brian surprised me by sending me cookies (a.k.a. one of my favorite solid foods) and it might have been at that moment that he won my heart. :) But this year, he topped that and actually showed up himself. There was extra room in the big house so it all worked out quite nicely!
Since I was working, he rented a bike and explored the island. And because Mr. Gadhafi decided that Sunday was the best time to cede control of Tripoli, he had plenty of time to do just that. But on Saturday night, we were able to go to the MV Agriculture Fair. Now, I thought that being in MV, it wouldn't be your typical fair. I thought it would be a more upscale event where instead of fried food stands, they would be handing out lobster and vegetables. But I was wrong! It was exactly what a typical ag fair should be. Vegetable growing contests, pig and chicken shows, frog jumping contests, and of course lots and lots of fried food and rides and games.
We looked at the veggies (and both decided that some of Brian's vegetables from his garden would have won!) and looked at the animals except for the miniature horses (which I was surprised how many miniature horses there were on such a small island) because they made me hyperventilate, as you know. Then we ate something fried and then tried our hand at a couple of games.
We ran into a couple of my colleagues and had Whack-a-Mole competition. I beat my colleagues but didn't win overall so I walked away without a 3-foot hot pink plush bear that was definitely worth less than the $5 entrance fee.
Brian and I also had a quick chance to walk around Oak Bluffs for a few minutes and we made sure that we went to the Flying Horses carousel. It's the oldest merry-go-round in America and definitely a step back in time. I learned the exact meaning of "reaching for the brass ring" as the carousel went around and we grabbed rings, hoping that we would find the one brass ring so we could get a free ride. We would have attempted it more than once but since we were the only ones there without kids and we didn't have much time, we decided that we could cross it off our list and we moved on. 
As I mentioned, the Libya situation was getting out of control so I worked a long time. Luckily, Brian thought watching breaking news was considered a fun activity! I finished work about midnight and then had to be back at work at 5a. Brian rode all over the island exploring. At the end of my 14+ hour day, we met back up and decided to drive to Aquinna to see the lighthouse and watch the sunset. It was beautiful!!! I had only slept for a few hours so I'm squinting a bit but it was such a wonderful evening!
Brian left the next day and I continued to work and do liveshots for the next several days. On Friday, I was in travel pool and all ready for a long day of hanging out with POTUS. With Hurricane Irene approaching the US, POTUS made a statement on his vacation compound about the storm. 
Right after that, we went to hold on my favorite bus from last year and I was getting ready to get settled in. But then the WH announced that POTUS was leaving early because of the storm. So my long day in travel pool came to an abrupt end!! I had mentally prepared myself for hours on that bus and getting through a major portion of a book I'm reading but instead, I launched into crisis mode to figure out a way to not get stuck on MV!!
The main event of recent days was that I was assigned once again to cover POTUS's summer vacation in Martha's Vineyard. Not too many people felt sorry for me that I had to go to the Vineyard for 11 days and get paid for it. And when I think about it like that, I agree. But it still is work and as you know, I had that honor last year so in all honesty, I wasn't that excited. But as soon as I got there, I realized that I was indeed blessed by being in a beautiful work environment and not behind my desk in either the WH or my bureau.
You'll be happy to know that we didn't have to stay at a place that specializes in colonics this year. We didn't have to negotiate the ability to have solid foods in the house. We rented a big house that was brand spanking new. Absolutely no character and if you look at the IKEA catalog, you'll see exactly what it looked like. But it had air conditioning and forks and only one crockpot and no hydrotherapy room so I count it as a step up!
Things around the Vineyard were just as I remembered them. I instantly recalled where everything on the island was and the best places to get some form of lobster. The first night we were there, I decided to get as much in as we could just in case the trip got crazy work-wise. So we went to Menemsha to watch the sunset and eat lobster on the dock. Then we went to Back Door Donuts which might be the best thing on MV. It was a pretty cool evening!!
We did a ton of liveshots and that was before there was really any news!! But the best part of this year's trip was that I had a special visitor for a few days!! Let me back up and say that last year, Brian surprised me by sending me cookies (a.k.a. one of my favorite solid foods) and it might have been at that moment that he won my heart. :) But this year, he topped that and actually showed up himself. There was extra room in the big house so it all worked out quite nicely!
Since I was working, he rented a bike and explored the island. And because Mr. Gadhafi decided that Sunday was the best time to cede control of Tripoli, he had plenty of time to do just that. But on Saturday night, we were able to go to the MV Agriculture Fair. Now, I thought that being in MV, it wouldn't be your typical fair. I thought it would be a more upscale event where instead of fried food stands, they would be handing out lobster and vegetables. But I was wrong! It was exactly what a typical ag fair should be. Vegetable growing contests, pig and chicken shows, frog jumping contests, and of course lots and lots of fried food and rides and games.
We looked at the veggies (and both decided that some of Brian's vegetables from his garden would have won!) and looked at the animals except for the miniature horses (which I was surprised how many miniature horses there were on such a small island) because they made me hyperventilate, as you know. Then we ate something fried and then tried our hand at a couple of games.
We ran into a couple of my colleagues and had Whack-a-Mole competition. I beat my colleagues but didn't win overall so I walked away without a 3-foot hot pink plush bear that was definitely worth less than the $5 entrance fee.
Brian and I also had a quick chance to walk around Oak Bluffs for a few minutes and we made sure that we went to the Flying Horses carousel. It's the oldest merry-go-round in America and definitely a step back in time. I learned the exact meaning of "reaching for the brass ring" as the carousel went around and we grabbed rings, hoping that we would find the one brass ring so we could get a free ride. We would have attempted it more than once but since we were the only ones there without kids and we didn't have much time, we decided that we could cross it off our list and we moved on. As I mentioned, the Libya situation was getting out of control so I worked a long time. Luckily, Brian thought watching breaking news was considered a fun activity! I finished work about midnight and then had to be back at work at 5a. Brian rode all over the island exploring. At the end of my 14+ hour day, we met back up and decided to drive to Aquinna to see the lighthouse and watch the sunset. It was beautiful!!! I had only slept for a few hours so I'm squinting a bit but it was such a wonderful evening!
Brian left the next day and I continued to work and do liveshots for the next several days. On Friday, I was in travel pool and all ready for a long day of hanging out with POTUS. With Hurricane Irene approaching the US, POTUS made a statement on his vacation compound about the storm. Right after that, we went to hold on my favorite bus from last year and I was getting ready to get settled in. But then the WH announced that POTUS was leaving early because of the storm. So my long day in travel pool came to an abrupt end!! I had mentally prepared myself for hours on that bus and getting through a major portion of a book I'm reading but instead, I launched into crisis mode to figure out a way to not get stuck on MV!! 
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