Archive for June 12-18, 2000Musings of My Mind
Sunday, June 18, 2000
Happy Father's Day to those of you who are fathers!! Here in Northern California, it is a bright and wonderful day. The temperature outside, on our new outdoor thermometer is 83F. Coincidentally, it is that exact same temperature inside the apartment! That is a good and rare thing these days, indeed!!
This morning, Brian and I headed to the mall to get thermometers for in and out of the apartment-- we needed to know what temperature we were suffering at in the worst way this week and with our furnace thermometer stopping at 90F, had no idea to know exactly how tortured we were this past week! We were at Sears and saw a couple of box fans that we had wanted to add to our collection-- never can have too many, can you? The problem was carrying them to the truck, literally, at the other end of the mall! So, because Brian was now getting tired and cranky and anxious to get to work on the book, we left to go home via Orchard Supply to pick up the thermometers and a plant for one of our hanging pots. (The birds are apparently setting up a new nest and decided to take the majority of sprigs from our nice plant!)
Anyway, when we got home, I ate a quick lunch and headed back over to Sears to get the two box fans-- I parked at the Sears end of the mall, needless to say. Then I went to the grocery store to pick up some veggies and a couple of other things that we needed to start our week. Brian has decided that he likes the idea of sandwiches when its hot so I'm all for it, needless to say-- I picked up some more sliced ham, turkey and cheese for him today. He's easy to please-- sometimes!
With all of that done, I had the bills to pay when I got home so . . . now I'm completely caught up with the weekend's errands and such. I'm feeling mighty pleased with myself so I'm going to knock off early for the night. I can't decide if I'm going to watch stupid movies or read: I've got four books lined up: Fannie Farmer's "Welcome to the World, Baby Girl", "White Oleander", "Left Behind" and "The Loop". Now, I've just got to figure out which one I want to try to read next-- that is not an easy decision for me. I've been away from this for too long again!
Have a great evening!
Saturday, June 17, 2000
(Update)Fooled ya!!
I know I never post this early but, here I am! So whatcha gonna do? Make me leave?? HAH!!
Anyway, today is unfolding differently than I had expected. I had a reaction to either the Amoxicillin for the infection or the Acidophilus to avoid other things that I hadn't expected. Not pleasant in either case and I don't know which one to blame it on so I'm just trying to live through this treatment so I can get past it! As a result, I'm left hanging around the homestead instead of shopping or cycling or whatever. Not fun! Oh, well, can't be helped I guess.
I was making "okay" progress on my desk and then Tom called and now I don't feel like finishing . . . maybe I'll do it in shifts and get it done over the weekend . . .eventually. Yeah, that'll work for me!
Family Reunion
I've heard from one of my sisters in Michigan and we've got a firm time and place for the Dykstra Family Reunion in August so it must be official: Brian gets to worry about meeting uncles and aunts and cousins that are gonna look him over, up one side and back down the other! He's already nervous!! I am loving it, of course!! The remaining uncles and aunt of my father's siblings will give him the once over but he'll get on Uncle George's good side by mentioning that we fish a lot and all will be well with the world. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone-- its probably been 15 years since I've seen the majority of them so it'll definitely be fun!
Email Dribbling In
My email is still dribbling in from Tuesday of this week. Again, if you were expecting an email from me but haven't received an answer yet, hold on-- it'll get here or there eventually!
More later as things progress . . . hang in there!
As I said, I am back but only briefly. Brian and I finally finished watching the Blackadder series of tapes that he got me for my birthday present this year and I've been reading on and off all day and playing computer games and dozing but only once. I'm within a 100 pages of finishing "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver. And they said it couldn't be done!! (Did you hear the echo?) This has been a very hard book to get into but now that I'm into it, it is difficult to put down-- a typical Kingsolver book, then. Ah yes!
Well, I want to get back to it. I hope you have a great night, wherever you are.
Friday, June 16, 2000Hot to Cold
EVERYTHING that I had on my desk has suddenly frozen over-- I swear, every customer has gone on vacation or taken a long weekend or something!! I'm bored out of my mind!!! I hate this-- I'm waiting on other people and don't have much to do as a result. Me, the impatient one, trying to figure out what to do next!! ARGH!!! This also, unfortunately, leaves little to tell you about, as well. Blame it on Father's Day weekend-- blame it on Rio!! I don't know!!
Sounds like fun, eh?
That was my day-- I ended up leaving the office early because I was going to go shopping and then changed my mind on that half-way home. Instead, I came home, changed my clothes and cycled 6-1/2 miles-- even with my cycling, I beat Brian home from work! After I cooled down, I took my shower and announced that I was going to lay down for an hour before I started dinner. He woke me up an hour later with dinner in the pan!! He is soooo wonderful, isn't he? Neither of us had cooked all week because of the heat-- it would've been way tooooooo hot in the kitchen this week!! I had a real craving for FOOD though, not a sandwich and not snacky foods-- I wanted something of substance that could count as a MEAL!! Chicken with stir fried vegetables! Nummy-- sorry, there's no recipe: cut up the chicken, cut up the veg and fry-- FAST!
Weekend Plans
I do not, believe it or not, have any plans for the weekend per se. I still need to go shopping and I need desperately to clean my desk!! (Bob Thompson would be soooo proud of me!) I may go see a movie but I'm not real excited about that concept yet.
The problem with not having any plans for the weekend is that things tend to sneak up on me-- should be fun, eh?
Stick around for the ride!
Thursday, June 15, 2000From Work:
Miscellaneous Thoughts
Well, I'm giving it another try . . . assuming that I have no major upsets to cause undue pain today, I'll be staying at work today. The pain is less than it was yesterday and hopefully, it'll stay that way.
It appears that although PBI hasn't admitted it yet (as of the writing of this post on Thursday morning), there is another email problem. I have updated my email message above-- its quite annoying but, Brian is a little busy these days and has better things to do than set up an email server and avoid using PacBell. It is definitely something that can wait until the book is done and he has a minute to catch his breath.
Heatwave?
D'ya think? When San Francisco hits over a 100F, its a heatwave! When I got in the car this morning, KFOG was playing "Heatwave" which was cool-- unfortunately, not literally cool but, you get my drift.
On the mend . . .
It does appear that I am on the mend. I know that I "owe" you a lot of what's been happening the past few days. Well, here it is in a nutshell (a very common expression that I'm hearing a lot of these days):
Monday: Toothache started to flare up over the weekend so I called the dentist who could get me in on Tuesday. I came in to find that one of my co-workers managed to somehow tick off a customer in negotiating a non-disclosure agreement and I got the lovely little mess to clean up. How can you "argue" with someone over a non-disclosure? I don't know-- she didn't even pick the biggest fight that she could've but whatever she did, she picked the one that got him ticked off! The fight she chose to take up was one that we really don't care about nearly as much (oral disclosures and how to define them to be included as part of the confidential information) as protecting our software files and other information held as confidential. I was so terribly pleased, as you could tell.
Tuesday: Worked on the miscellaneous and sundry tasks around the office, trying not to panic about the dental appointment set for that afternoon. I used to require 10mg of Valium to go to the dentist but I've pretty much moved past that now. No, I don't require 50mg now-- I just found better dentists than the one that I grew up with so that I don't need to fear them as much.
I tried to explain to my "co-worker" that she screwed up on the NDA and how to avoid it the next time but I'm not sure she got it. What's really scary is that she out-ranks me-- I love training "up", don't you?
Wednesday: Trying to finalize the screwed up NDA-- this should never have taken three (3) days to do! The customer is so pissed that we're having to give up on getting any mutual disclosures covered or we'll lose the deal entirely. Needless to say, I'm equally pissed at my "co-worker". I've gotten permission from the director of the department to work up a procedure for non-disclosure agreements so that this doesn't happen again. Hopefully, this will get the point across.
I missed my chat session with my sister because of sleeping through the pain pill-- I called her instead so that made up for it, I think. We're planning the family reunion for when Brian and I go back to Michigan later this summer. A few details to work out about that, along with relatives to notify, etc.
Thursday: That's today. I know I spent the first ten minutes of consciousness this morning trying to figure out if it was Thursday or Friday today. I finally decided that it was, in fact, Thursday much to my chagrin.
I haven't been cycling since Sunday because of my dental problems mostly-- I could probably have done a short run after the sun went down but before it gets dark (betwen 8 and 8:30) if it weren't for the pain and the Vicodin. (Brian's so picky-- he won't let me drive or ride my bike or ANYTHING when I'm on Vicodin!!)
Today is supposed to be the beginning of the end of the heatwave so maybe we'll get lucky? Yeah, well, it could happen!
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From Home:
A Bit Much
It is a bit cooler this afternoon-- probably around 95F or so. I got home from work a little after 4:30 and by about 4:45, I was on my bike. Every time I rounded a corner, I told myself I could go home-- it wouldn't matter if I didn't do my five miles because it was really, really hot but then, I'd get around the next corner and didn't want to turn back. By the time I did that four times, I was almost home!! So, I did ride my five miles tonight. I was going to go the six miles but decided that since I hadn't ridden in three days, I'd better hold back a bit. I'm just pleased that I really could make it-- the heat is bad. Its not as bad today as it was yesterday but, it is still hot!
ALLLLLLL Better . . .
. . . for the most part unless something else on me falls apart on me soon. So, I'll be back for my regular post again tomorrow night and the night after that and the night after that and . . . well, you get the idea.
Have a great evening!
Wednesday, June 14, 2000I'm here . . .
Thanks for the well wishes from folks over the course of the evening and day today-- your kindnesses are appreciated. As I told Dan Bowman, I am a walking advertisement of why you should not smoke and why you should go to the dentist. As a former smoker, my teeth have problems; because of a fear of dentists, I have major teeth problems. Brian quit smoking early enough that he doesn't have the damage that I do but, I'm not going to have a fun couple of years trying to get my teeth fixed up.
I went into work today but, didn't last long. I'd rather have stayed there but the pain was too much so I left around noon-ish. We had started the AC in the apartment in the morning so it wasn't too bad by the time I got home-- or at least, it could've been better but was tolerable.
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I wrote the above at work earlier and I'm writing this tonight-- not in a whole lot better shape. Between the heat, trying to sleep through the pain and the heat, I'm not having fun. Hopefully more tomorrow when this is better?
Tuesday, June 13, 2000Unvirtual Post
Due to an unforeseen and horrendously painful dental experience this afternoon, there will be no post this evening. I am alive and will soon be enjoying a visit to La-La-Land with the help of pain medication.
Oh, and to add to the joy of it all, its like a 100F here AGAIN!
Sorry-- More tomorrow, I promise.
Monday, June 12, 2000Further Business
Now that the Netwidows Recipe Page is up, its time to get back to business, eh? Well, let's see . . . Work: busy as usual always an iron in the fire. Its just a little more helpful when the iron isn't inserted into the fire by a "co-worker" who is attempting to help but doesn't, unfortunately, succeed very well. Life: couldn't be better-- I'm having fun but I do miss doing some things with Brian. He's doing really well with the book though so its good to see him enjoying himself so much. Just another thing that he and I have in common, this work ethic. Nice to share things, eh? Family: I haven't heard a peep out of anyone from Michigan lately . . . I'm wondering if that might be email problems more than anything else. My sister, Karen, has just finished up another school year so she may be recuperating from that year-end-rush that happens every year! I think I owe one of my nieces an email. My sister, Sue and her husband have been traveling about a bit again but the itinerary appears to be slowing. They are planning to be in Michigan when we are there which is a good thing since they are half of the reason that we're going!
I think that about catches that stuff up . . . if I remember anything else later on, I'll let you know.
Fiction in the Making!
. . . or so he would have you believe, Bob Thompson (link), has picked up on my post from last night and responded with the following:
> And, of course, the stark simplicity
> reminds us all too well of why he gets
> grumpier and grumpier every time Barbara
> goes on a trip!Cooking was invented by women, and I refuse to play along with such new-fangled ideas. Back when men still ran things, a typical recipe would have been:
1. Find wooly mammoth
2. Kill wooly mammoth
3. Cut chunk off wooly mammoth
4. Eat chunk of wooly mammoth
5. (optional) Bury Fred, who was stomped flat by annoyed wooly mammoth immediately before its own demise.A few male-type meals remain, sushi and steak tartare for example. I remember in college we ate "cannibal sandwiches" which disgusted the women. Recipe was to spread raw hamburger on bread, add horseradish, and eat. Of course, nowadays that risks death from E. Coli.
Men did eventually assume some of the cooking techniques devised by women. But note that men still have a strong preference for food cooked over an
open fire. That is an atavistic preference, dating back to when men ripped off a haunch from the wooly mammoth and held it over the campfire until it was burnt black. It is no coincidence that men and barbecues are so
closely linked.--
Robert Bruce Thompson
thompson@ttgnet.com
http://www.ttgnet.com
The only response that is appropriate here is:Why do you write technical books? You'd be SOOOO goodHe is amazing, isn't he? (Now the reality of it is that he can't be that bad-- I suspect he is a whole lot of that "his bark is worse than his bite" theory in human form.)
at fiction!!Recipe Page is Working
Besides the recipe for "Grandma's Red Relish" which I found on Keri Beland's site, Shelley Bowman, Dan Bowman's better half (I'm certain of that!), writes to tell me that she is trying out "The Recipe" tonight. That'll be another group addicted to that goooooooooood stuff!! (Why do you think they call it "The Recipe"??)
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And, on that note, I'm going to have to call it a night-- Albert, the Housekeeper is due in tomorrow and I've got some junk to pick up around here. Brian did 98% of the laundry tonight so I said I'd re-make our bed which was completely stripped and turned for the season. In other words, if we're lucky, I'll get the bed back together by midnight!!
Take care and have a great evening!!
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