So yesterday was my last day at work and it was long and sad with some sweet surprises thrown in. I was tired from a long weekend of driving between Waterloo, Marshalltown, CR, and Dubuque so it was hard to get up for the Monday meeting. When we were done with all of the work related stuff we had going away cake and they gave me some gifts. Mostly practical stuff like sun block, pens, notecards, Easy Mac, toilet paper. All good things I'll need but the very best thing was this big journal that people wrote little notes and goodbye wishes in. It's fantastic. I love it. They must've been working on it for a while. I didn't have time to look at it closely then because I had to get to Jewett but as soon as I was done at the school I sat right outside in my car reading it. They probably thought I was some crazy person because I was laughing and crying just reading this book. They cut out pictures and stuff from magazines and put all sorts of random memories in here. And they photocopied something like 720 pennies and cut them out and pasted them all over the book--a penny a day for good luck every day that I'll be gone. Really very touched by this journal. It reminds me of a big yearbook from high school.
So the day started out great but when I got to work at 11 things went downhill. We were busy with customers and changing displays and trying to get ready for inventory and things just weren't going smoothly. Frustrating. Then round about 2pm Ernie comes in and brings me a yellow rose. So sweet. The day's getting a little better. Then an hour or so later I come back to the info desk and see a big bunch of red roses. They were from Adam and just so beautiful. Just what I needed to turn my day around. And then later on Symone sent some balloons with some Easy Mac as the weight. :) The rest of the day went very quickly, especially once the leads and managers and inventory people started showing up. I ended up not leaving until 10:30 or so. Just saying goodbyes and finishing up stuff and not wanting to leave. I knew once I started crying I'd be done for and I did ok saying most of my goodbyes until I came back to the breakroom one more time and started talking to Kate. And then I had to turn in my keys. And then I had to get one more hug from Tom. So then I just drove home with the radio off and me trying to balance two vases of flowers and keep the balloons out of the way. I'm so sad to be done working there but very happy and grateful for all of the memories.

Today I just took the day off and started a new book and took a long bubble bath and just did absolutely nothing all day. I did make it to yoga so I guess I did something, but nothing productive towards getting all my shit together and ready to go. Ah, well. There's always tomorrow.