Archive of Marcia's Musings June 18-24, 2001Saturday, June 23, 2001
Continuation . . .
I actually woke up with this killer headache yesterday morning but it did, thankfully, go away during the day at work yesterday. Like I said though, when I got home, it struck with a vengeance and hasn't really gone away completely yet. I go in and out of having the serious, heavy-duty throbbing but for the most part, its just a dull ache in the back of my brain.
I went for my nail fill and pedicure today and, believe it or not, that didn't relax me enough to get rid of it! When I got home, I layed down for an hour or so cuz, Brian and I took Grammy to dinner tonight and I wanted to not have a headache for the most part while we were out with her. Well, for the most part, I succeeded-- I only had an intense throbbing for a little bit before dinner and a little bit after but overall, it was okay.
Grammy loves the restaurant Gervais in San Jose-- she took us there a couple of years ago and we've been wanting to go back with her ever since that time. We had intended to go there on Mother's Day but they weren't open on Sunday so we postponed that time until tonight-- a belated Mother's Day gift for her. She ordered the filet mignon with bernaise sauce while Brian had the rack of lamb and I had the filet mignon in a beaujolais sauce with capers. I was excited because I never get capers at home-- I was so pleased to see them on my filet! It was definitely a melt-in-your mouth cut but the lobster was wonderful, too. Yes, I do have a lunch for next week at work one day wtih the left-overs, let me tell ya but it was wonderful to have their delicious cuisine and enjoy Grammy's company, too. She told a story from when she and Papa Phil were married in the 30s and 40s and I love to hear her stories-- that alone is a good reason to go to dinner with her.
Well, promptly upon arrival at her house, my head started pounding again so we came home. "Gone in 60 Seconds" is on the tube tonight so tomorrow night will be "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"-- hopefully. Hope you have a nice evening,too!
Friday, June 22, 2001Patience . . .
About ten minutes after I got home tonight, I came down with a sudden, throbbing headache and although the bad part of it has left, I've still got remnants of it. As a result, this is all you're going to get for a post tonight so bear with me until tomorrow sometime. I'll get a little more info up, okay? Thanks!
Hope you had a nice evening!
Thursday, June 21, 2001It Happened AGAIN!!
One of the sales reps that I work with in my region sent me a gift!! I was really shocked-- I had no idea that anything was coming!! Judy is a sales rep out of our Atlanta office and she has had some trying customers, to say the least. Today in the mail I received a card and gift from her!! The card has a panda on the front, munching on some bamboo and on the inside, along with her hand-written note, it says "Thanks a munch!!" Too cute!!
Now for the gift: There's a scan of part of it-- a set of 48 "knowledge cards" about Claude Monet!! Too cool!!! The pictures are that of his garden, from which he based his paintings. This is a really neat gift, needless to say-- its made by Pomegranate Communications, Inc. in Rohnert Park, CA (down the street here a bit). If you open the image above, you'll see the size of the cards and on the back of each is a bit about the picture you see-- I think its a really neat gift and another reminder of why I really enjoy my job!! Now I've just gotta figure out a way to be able to look at them and be able to read the backs, too-- any ideas are appreciated!
Yes, yes! I know-- remind me of that next week, okay?
Another One!!
Well, tonight I checked the thermometer when I got home-- it was 92F. Yes, the Weather-Liars say that we're headed into a "cold snap". My kingdom for a cold snap!!! No, I didn't ride my bike tonight and yes, I am quite frustrated about that, actually. But soon I will be able to ride again . . . that almost sounds like a threat, doesn't it?
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And another short post-- now that I can open the door and sit by the computer for a bit without the light on, I want to work on the play while the light is good enough to see without turning a light on. Turned-on-lights attract bugs and Marcia does not like bugs!! Yuck!!! So I'm going to get to work on it and I'll catch up with you again tomorrow. Thanks for coming by and have a good evening!
Wednesday, June 20, 2001Big Mistake!!
An alternate title for this would be: "Stupid Woman" or "Duh!!". Ya wanna know why? Cuz, ya see, that temperature thingy at the top of the page? Yeah, well, that's a temperature that's being taken about 8 miles from here over by the botton of the San Francisco Bay. Ya know what?? Its always cooler at the Bay than it is eight miles away and, stupidly, I forgot that today.
At about 3:30 this afternoon, I saw that it was 91F in Sunnyvale-- "Cool", I thought to myself, "I can go bicycling tonight after work!!" Because of my cold, I haven't been bicycling so I was anxious to go. I came home from work, changed my clothes and headed out-- I didn't stop to look at the thermometer. If I had done that, I would've seen that it was, in fact, 96F and I wouldn't have gone bicycling. In a way, it was okay that I went because I needed to do it but, I shouldn't have gone in this heat. I came home and was just plain hot-- the heat had radiated up from the pavement, feeling like it was frying my legs!! I cooled down for about a half hour and realized that I was now nauseous so I layed down for about an hour. I'm not as nauseated but, it sure is hot AGAIN!!!!
Little Visitor
A guy at work is trying to adopt a friend of his-- a little furry grey kitten. The kitten is soooooooo cute!!! I like dogs the best but this kitten was so cute!!!! If it weren't for the fact that we can't have pets, we would have a little kitten tonight-- that is if he could survive this heat!!!
Spelling Lesson
Thanks to Bob Thompson who helped me out this morning-- P-A-T-O-O-T-I-E. I knew the way that I had it spelled was wrong-- it just looked wrong, ya know?
Life is good, ain't it?
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I know this is a short post tonight but, I'm still a little fried so cut me some slack, okay? Thanks!! You have a nice evening, too!
Tuesday, June 19, 2001Internet Daze
Ya know the thing I like about the internet? Okay, yes, besides the fact that I met the Man of My Dreams on the internet-- there is more to it than that!! I like the fact that there is email. Because of email, I am able to instantaneously communicate with a sister who for years, I was unable to reach except for the occasional hand-written (in my case hand-scrawled!) letter that took weeks to get back-n-forth between Michigan and Brazil or California and Brazil. Nowadays, I can send and receive email within minutes, depending on how long-winded she and I get, with letters. I like that a lot, ya know?
In fact email, as a whole is pretty cool-- you can send email, receive email, filter email, delete email, retrieve email, and stop email from being sent-- its all really cool. I guess, because of the conversation I'm having with my sister today, I'm just really glad to have email today.
NDA? SchmNDA!!
Some of my regular readers will recognize this as something I think I've mentioned a time or two: I hate when customers threaten me!! I guess, as a child, my mother must've told me "If Judy jumps off a cliff, are you going to follow her?" a few too many times. She created a major non-conformist. Now, I'm to the point where when I hear the words "Well, all of your competitors are signing the document without changing it", the only thing I want to say is "So???" Geez, people-- get a new line of work!!! Threatening me doesn't do anything!!
This is the scenario: Acme Computer signs an agreement because they don't give a rat's patuty (is that how you spell that?) about the confidentiality of their software, financials, etc. Don't assume that telling me that is going to get me to give up the gold of my company's info!!! It won't work!!! Never has, never will.
I had a customer tell me that she couldn't approve executing the document with removal of the word "indemnification" so she'd have to go to her CEO. So, as I told her "Okay, fine. Ask your CEO and let me know what the answer is. Then, I'll let my sales rep know what to do and how to demonstrate the software. I'm okay with that-- not a problem." Apparently, that wasn't the answer that she was expecting. She hesitated and said she'd call me back when the CEO was out of the meeting-- "I sure hope the meeting ends before the demonstration" she added as a second veiled threat. "Well, we can always reschedule the demonstration if it doesn't work out for today." (Don'tcha just hate it when someone is so flexible on scheduling demonstrations? ;>) )
I talked with the inside sales rep and he conferenced in the outside sales rep and between the three of us, decided that the demonstration could be done without using their software so, we could agree to signing our document but not their letter for indemnification. Cool!! That had me covered and that's what counted. I started to re-work the document in Word and (thanks to Caller ID) found out that she was calling me back!! (What a surprise!!) Her CEO had come out of the meeting early (oh, really, huh?) and upon her advice, they agreed to waive execution of their indemnification letter and just sign our NDA. "Oh, hey, great news!!" Yes, my tone was dripping with enthusiasm (and scarcasm!).
Yeah, right. Ho-hum . . . I'm actually pretty good at poker, too-- just don't put me at a black-jack table!! YIKES!!!!!!!!!!!
Man of Honor
There are things that you learn about your partner either through time or trial-n-error and, even though we haven't been married for very long, I've found things out about Brian along the way in these last three years. Most all of them are GOOD things so that's a Good Thing, okay? There have been no surprises along the way either which is also a Good Thing-- trust me, it is a VERY Good Thing!!
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So's you aren't completely lost: If you are totally confused, go over to his site at this link (Don't forget to hit the "Back" button to come back and finish reading this!) and you'll understand what I'm talking about.
Its okay-- I'll wait . . . hmm, don't I have a .wav file of the Jeopardy music? Nope, I don't-- rats!!
Oh, okay, you're back!!
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Anyway, while I don't like having to put our life on hold, he is a man of honor and integrity and ya gotta love 'im for it or at least, I do. I'm willing to tolerate a lot of things because he is honest with me and I would want him to be that honorable with any other situation as well.
We are a partnership and, as he so quaintly put it, no, I don't like the entire situation that we're in right now but I understand his need to be the way he is and respond in the manner in which he is responding.
Yes, as I said on our anniversary, I know when I've got a good one and I do have a Good One.
Good News!!
I got another Gold Star tonight at Weight Watchers . . . what does that mean? That means I'm at 20.1 pounds weight loss, thank you very much!! Yeah, the pounds are finally starting to come off!! Yippeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!
On that note, I'm going to go and enjoy my evening-- I hope you have a nice evening, too!
Monday, June 18, 2001Many Moods
Yeesh, the day I've had!!! First, I woke up in a "Nneh" mood which progressed into a very dark mood. I have no idea why but I was very much feeling like I could cry at any moment and for no particularly good reason. Yes, you can feel sorry for Brian but I wasn't around him so I think my co-workers could use your sympathy more except that I wasn't in a foul mood, just a dark mood. It progressed as the day went on to one of which I just felt like I didn't want to be at work. Of course, that eventually was resolved without too much trouble as it was time to go home. Since then, I've been pretty okay-- can't explain it and don't want to dwell on it too much cuz that activity might bring it back. For the most part, it has dissipated so this is a Good Thing.
It is another (YES, ANOTHER) hot day here in Silicon Valley. I think we might be practicing to be a desert in our next life-- this is getting really annoying. It seems to be a bit cooler than Saturday and Sunday but, it is only after 7:30 that I'm able to sit at my computer, out of the sunlight.
I had a negotiation today where I called the customer and left a voicemail, he called me back when I wasn't at my desk and left a voicemail; when I called him back, he was in his office so we talked. (I prefer to have the cost of the negotiation on my phone bill-- I think its appropriate, in an old-fashioned sorta way.) Anyway, to our standard software license, the attorney had made approximately eight changes. I reviewed the changes that he made and of them, there were two that we couldn't do as they were written. But, you know us-- we're the cooperative people so my approach is that we need to work out what it is that they need cuz there has to be middle ground in every situation.
Their attorney wanted "fully-paid, royalty-free, irrevocable" . . . well, it is fully-paid, it is royalty-free but it is not irrevocable-- if they breach the agreement, we get our software back. I explained that and we decided to reference in a parenthetical phrase the section that explained the breach causing return of the software. The next change that he had made was to throw the word "affiliates" into the assignment clause. This can cause a real kink for us if the affiliate is only 10% owned by the corporation that is licensing the software. So I suggested that we limit it to affiliates that are owned by 50% or more in a controlling interest capacity. That worked for him so there it was: Less than ten (10) minutes on one (1) phone call!
I'd like to think that today I was gearing up for the end-of-quarter. If this is gearing up and how my end of quarter is going to be, I'm going to be bored to tears by the 25th!! (Do me a favor and remind me of this day next week, okay?)
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On that note, I'm going to sign off for the evening. I've been trying to put some time in on my sister's play and, well, its that time again.
Have a nice evening!
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