Shhh… Can you hear that?

It’s the sound of me. Just me. All alone. Well, not all alone. The cat is here. She often comes over to pester me while I’m sitting on the couch, but the sunspot in the dining room is apparently a more compelling entertainment, and so it is just I.

Solitary.

Singular.

Unaccompanied by family, for they have gone to Nana’s for the long weekend.

My wife, who is good to me in ways I can hardly begin to describe here, gave me this time so I could do stuff. When I was in graduate school, I relied on weekends like these to do the deep thinking and writing that was necessary to keep up on my coursework (they are largely responsible for the 4.0 average I carried throughout my M.Ed.) I am using this particular weekend to take care of a variety of tasks:

1. Turn my school paperwork around for the spring semester. Our school's Turnaround Day was confiscated for professional development, and I haven't had time to do any of the prep work that is really necessary for me to get this semester off the ground. I've done a decent job flying by the seat of my pants, but I need to get the scaffolding under my feet or I'm going to crash and burn when my kids come back from vacation on the 23rd.

2. Do some work on the Community School project. This is one of the things I think that's been responsible for my lack of quality sleep lately. I put a lot of this work off in the fall to focus on my presentation in Charlotte, but it's time to get back to it.

3. Finish my goals for the year. For some reason, this has been surprisingly taxing for me this year. I just need to sit down and make some choices, so I can be done pondering the possibilities. There are just too many at this point.

4. Hit the gym and the pool. I recently added laps to my pool distance (I'm up to 8/10 of a mile) and I got the chance to go for a run outside for the first time in two months. I'm motivated to do more, and this weekend presents the opportunity to spend some quality time training. It will be warm soon, and I want to be ready to get off the machines and on the road!

5. Write a couple of letters. Kestrel just sent us a wonderful newsy letter from San Fancisco, where she's doing a publishing internship. Several of my alumni and friends are due the same from me.

6. Work on my two blogs. Did you notice the subtle additions under the banner?

7. Give some blog love. I haven't had time to blog surf this week, and I know I owe several of you comments.

8. Review some material about foster care programs and schools. Related to work on the Community School project, this is stuff I've put off for a while that I've been meaning to explore.

9. Do some laundry, some dishes and clean the house. Wifeness really likes coming home to a clean house and, besides, the place really needs it. We were all busy this week, so only the basics got done. There are piles of $&!# everywhere and the carpet is disgusting. I may not get to all of this, but I'd really like to feel like I don't live in a complete sty.

10. Coalesce some thoughts on my long-overdue posts on family and marriage. No, Chili, I haven’t forgotten. It's just taken me a while to put my thoughts in order on these and, since these thoughts are parallel to thoughts I'm also processing about the Community School, they've been slow to taxonomize.

11. Sleep late.

Here’s to an ambiciously planned weekend, and the firm expectation that I will kick the pants off my to-to list! What’s your weekend looking like?