Sunday afternoon I took a sledge hammer to the ice that had built up at the end of our driveway, so that our truck didn't feel like it was going over a cliff every time we pass over it. I broke the ice up, and then shoveled it out. It took a little less than an hour.

When I went back into the house, I carried my briefcase and a small box downstairs into my office. My shoes were off, and my feet were hot and a little sweaty from the work I'd just done outside. Put one foot down, turn (with the box under my arm and the briefcase in my hand) to shut the door to the stairs, shut the door, turn back and take another step...

... or try to, anyway. My heel caught the edge of the step, and slipped off. Before I even realized I'd missed it, my butt was bouncing off of the edge of the step directly underneath me, and I slid down to the bottom and crashed into the wall at the end of the landing!

Now I'm just a little sore. When I first landed on my butt, I felt the discs between my shoulderblades compress. When I finally hit the floor at the bottom of the stairs, I couldn't breathe! I was afraid that I'd hurt my spinal cord, but it turned out that I'd had the wind knocked out of me, and I was laying in a very awkward position. When I finally righted myself - in a panic - I was able to breathe again immediately.

Today my back's a little sore (between the shoulderblades), but the worst part is my poor aching butt. I didn't hit the end of my tailbone, thankfully, but just above it, and it's very sore! Sitting is a chore, so it's been difficult to work today as programmers don't do much besides sitting.

Ironic, isn't it? I worked for almost an hour on the very wet, slippery ice on our driveway without falling even once - swinging a heavey sledge hammer no less - and then I fell and slid down the stairs that I walk on at least 20 times per day.

This weekend, Jed, Mark, and Darren drove Darren and Angi's stuff up from Texas, now that their house is sold. Today, we took everything out of their truck and packed it into a space in my Dad's warehouse, where it will stay until they buy a house. For now, they're living in a furnished rental house in Shelter Harbor (an area in Westerly, Ri).

Combined with being sore from my stair-sledding experience yesterday, today's been a washout, I haven't been able to get any work done. (Tomorrow! Tomorrow! There's always tomorrow!)

After we were done, Darren offered to take all of us (Mark, Jed, Dave, my Mom and Dad, himself and Angi, Corinne and myself) to dinner to show his gratitude for helping with the move (even though the ladies didn't help with the truck, we all wanted them to go with us). Unfortunately my Mom already had Dad's dinner cooked, and Corinne was sleeping so she didn't answer the phone. Darren gave us a "snow check", we'll do it another time, perhaps this weekend.