Of offices and asbestos

So, a couple of weeks ago, I decided to work late. However, I then started hearing people running up and down the hall calling for Mike, our custodian. Then water starting running under the door of my office. Turns out a hot water pipe burst a couple of offices down and there was water all over the place. The custodians had arrived and there wasn't really anything for me to do, so I decided to go home. The next day, my office looked fine, but apparently there was asbestos in the water. I was getting conflicting reports on what was going to happen as far as clean up in my office:

a) Nothing, my office is fine
b)They are going to paint around the base of the walls
c)They are going to rip out and replace the drywall and sheetrock on the bottom 2 feet of all the walls.

I decided to just keep working in my office and assumed that they would tell me if they were going to do work in my office. But when I came back from class, my office looked like this.


Turns out they are also removing my sink because it was one of these sinks that caused the initial flood.


I don't know when my office will be restored to working order, but for now, I'm kind of bouncing around between a lab, the library and my apartment. Oh well.

Valentines Day

This post is coming a bit after the fact, but it was a blog worthy day. I didn't think that the romantic dinner and flowers and chocolates was really the way Cia and I work, but I wanted to do something special. So, instead, I took her to a park. http://www.co.rice.mn.us/parks/cannon.php This is all the information you can find online about the park. Doesn't say exactly where it is; doesn't say how to get there. The only reason I know about it is because I stumbled on it during a training ride a couple summers ago. Because it's such an obscure park, it is fairly rustic and there were only a few other people there. It was a beautiful day and just cold enough that there was lot's of cool ice formations.


Being little kids at heart, we spend quite some time kicking the ice at the edge of the river to watch it break and float off.


To make the day extra fun, we had a fire, because burning stuff is always good.


It was a fantastic day. I'm so glad the weather decided to cooperate with my plans.

Madison

Cia has interim break this week, so I drove her home to Madison and then spent the weekend hanging out with her and her family in Madison. It was a wonderful weekend for a number of reasons. Obviously, it was fun because I got to hang out with Cia and her family was just as enjoyable. To make things even better, the weather was absolutely beautiful.


On Saturday, we went into downtown Madison and walked around. Wisconsin has pretty much the coolest capital building ever. It has 4 axis of symmetry. When you stand in the center, the different branches of the building look so similar that they have to be labeled with the compass directions so you don't get lost. There is also a really cool art museum. One part of the building had glass walls and a glass staircase.


Among the other neat buildings there was a picnic shelter at a park near the Cia's house. I think it totally looks like a sniper tower, but I might have an overactive imagination.


Of course, I had to climb it.


We also walked out on a frozen lake, which I always enjoy for some reason.


It was a beautiful weekend.