Some of you out there have no doubt experienced the “empty nest” syndrome. You know, the one where the kids move out and you finally have the house (and the teevee) all to yourself? It’s an experience that engenders mixed feelings. On the one hand, there are feelings of peacefulness, serenity, and privacy. But those are tempered with feelings of ecstasy and euphoria.

So, it takes a while – approximately three to five seconds – to completely adjust to the lack of pitter-patter (more like clop-clop-clop) of big fat feet pounding across the floor, the faucets no longer drip-drip-dripping because now they get shut off all the way (is that really so hard?), and the silence of doors not being slammed repeatedly because how many goddamn times I gotta tell you not to slam the freakin’ doors, all you gotta do is pull ’em until they click and the more you slam the goddamn things the more everything wears out and breaks and the harder they are to close, fer chrissakes! :slap:

Some of you may have also experienced something not so nice: having the damn kid(s) move back in. This sad state of affairs is something we were forced to endure this weekend. Seems that somebody decided to start a fire in the laundry room of the apartment building where my stepson lives at about 4:00 Sunday morning. The short story is that he’s homeless for up to three weeks, and therefore has invaded our space for the duration. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m very glad he’s OK (and thank goodness it’s only temporary), but I very much prefer the empty nest thing. He better remember this when I’m old and feeble and need a place to crash (and somebody to change my diapers).

Otherwise, it was a fairly good weekend. Sportswise, SU didn’t lose (because they had the week off), the Jets kicked the crap out of the Bills (who really, really suck), so that’s kind of a two-for-one, Donovan McNabb returned to Philly and won, and the Giants even won last night.

On the productivity front, I put in some quality tractor time on Saturday, and managed to finish off two more windows yesterday while getting my laundry done. Not bad. Two more windows to go.

Unfortunately, that all leads us to today, which, sadly, is Monday. Bleh.

But maybe I’ll get a closing date some time this week. That’d be cool, ‘cuz I’m looking for a quiet place to crash for the next few weeks.