A Rambling Sampler

Heidi (my wife) and I have agreed that every time we get money from a tax return that some of it will be spent on fun stuff. It's kind of our way of celebrating temporary wealth within a life of less income. We do put roughly half of it into savings, but you gotta have fun, right?
My biggest purchase this time was an iPod Nano. I just got a case to protect the thing from dings and scratches--I'm currently working a lot of construction style work--and have been enjoying the benefits of having music with me all the time. I've been able to reinforce my taste for soundtracks. This was reiterated by Rae's recent request for song recommendations. I love Last of the Mohicans and Gladiator. Firefly also had an excellent soundtrack, but I must say that I'll have to post specifically about Joss Whedon's glorious show perhaps at a later date.
I also got a lot of books. It's created a little bit of stress because I have things that require my time, including family, work, etc. that takes away from reading time. The backlog of books kind of tugs at my brain, but I'm placating myself fairly well, so far.
The other thing that seems to be adding greatly to my angst is waiting for info from grad schools. I've allied to BYU, UC Boulder, and U of U. The Y said that they would be letting me know by mid March, but that doesn't keep me from worrying now.
I am trying to keep this from being a cathartic, dump my problems on the world at large blog, but some of my concerns deserve to be voiced, especially considering that I started this as a way to keep all informed on my current schooling, especially regarding grad school.
So, this is a touchstone, my way of making sure that I don't forget about this thingie I've started.