Well, the first Monday for this blog, but today is my last Monday at work. That in itself is an extreme delight — and will continue to be so all day. Mondays are typically slow for me in terms of meetings, so I don’t really dread them, but they are still Mondays and the beginning of a work week.

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Today’s featured delight is water, specifically my first sip when I am mildly dehydrated. I tend to wake up 4 to 5 hours after I fell asleep, often this is around 2 am. This morning was one of those 2 am wake-ups. I also tend to not drink enough water during the day so I often wake up parched. This morning was also one of those parched mornings. I poured myself a glass of water and took a sip. To me, that first taste of water at 2 am in the morning (or whenever I wake up), is often the most exquisite taste in the world. Better than a good glass of white wine, better than my favorite cocktail (the Last Word), better than subsequent sips of water at any other time of day.

Have you read The Search for Delicious? It is a children’s illustrated chapter book by Natalie Babbitt about a ruler who is on a quest to find the perfect definition of delicious. His subjects name their favorite foods but soon everyone is arguing with each other about the definition of delicious. I always think of that book when I have my first sip of water at 2 am.

Click here to see how The Search For Delicious ends and what the perfect definition of delicious turns out to be.

Eventually everyone agrees, after a drought, the perfect description of delicious is that first sip of water after being thirsty. So someone agrees with me!

Other delights of the day were a ripening fig on our fig tree and a sweet note from a developer at work who learned I was retiring.

I heard you were leaving, Dona. If it’s retirement, it’s well deserved and congratulations! Good for you, bad for us—you will be missed. I’ve really appreciated working with you and the rare level of detail and quality you provide on a constant basis. Thank you so much for your direct contribution to so many project successes, and making it look easy. All the best in your next journey Dona.

-Nick