Last year, for my division’s Halloween potluck, my wife kindly volunteered to make kitty litter cake; it’s basically white cake and spice cake crumbled up together with vanilla pudding, but it’s the Tootsie Rolls — microwaved for a few seconds and hand shaped — that really make it. It was a big hit in my division.

This year, Jennifer volunteered to make cat poop cookies; basically chocolate cookies which are rolled into little logs and placed in a bed of Grape Nuts and served with a litter scoop. They weren’t as big a hit as the kitty litter cake, but I don’t think anyone was outright offended by them.

But it was during the awards portion of the division Halloween party that I got my biggest surprise: the quarterly PEER award, which stands for “Professionals Earning Employee Recognition”. It’s essentially an “Employee of the Quarter” award, and there’s a rather complicated process of nominations and review involved in getting the award. It was pretty cool. It’s nice to feel appreciated.

I really enjoy my job, because I feel like I’m actually accomplishing something and it’s always challenging. There are times when I wish for more variety, but no job is perfect.

Anyway. It was a good day. And now there’s one hour left until National Novel Writing Month starts.