Things

Posted on March 22, 2016 by Frog

So, there’s some work stuff going on that makes me tired. My work buddy and I talked today and we’re tired of the atmosphere. There are some people working really hard to keep moving forward and then there’s someone who is actively undermining. It doesn’t help that this person is in management. My work buddy and I are both in need of a vacation. I’m getting one of those soon–yay! Work buddy will have to figure out a mental health break.

Last Friday we held a happy hour at our house and it was super awesome. We’ve talked about having my department come over and so we invited everyone and some other folks too. We were thrilled to be able to open the back doors and let people mingle in the house or out on the deck. Hello, unseasonably warm days!

Our ability to estimate food needs some work, though. There were so many leftovers. The beer and wine leftovers were pretty significant too, but they’ll keep. I learned later that a girlfriend of a co-worker had been having a really bad day, but after coming to our party she felt much better…and no that wasn’t alcohol talking. It’s the tiny things, you know? People being happy is a good thing.

Tomorrow, the better-half and I are celebrating our 20th anniversary. Wow.

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What TLC will get you

Posted on March 17, 2016 by Frog

A coworker left her pointsettia behind when she left the company. No one was gifted the plant and so no one paid attention to it for months. I got sick of the plant languishing and moved it to my desk. Behold the power of TLC:

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It’s already the middle of March

Posted on March 11, 2016 by Frog

What have we been up to for the last three months? Working. Going out to dinner and listening to bands. That’s it. Wonder why content here is so light? That’s why.

Here’s our list of concerts so far this year:
1/12/2016–Matt Goss at Caesar’s Palace (I was alone for this one)
1/31/2016–Howie Day and Anna Rose (the two of us and a good friend)
2/6/2016–Mack Avenue Superband which included: Gary Burton, The Christian McBride, Tia Fuller, Christian Sands, Dominick Farinacci and Carl Allen (the two of us)
2/27/2016–Patty Griffin, Sara Watkins and Anais Mitchell with David Pulkingham (the two of us)
3/3/2016–Jesse Cook (the two of us and a good friend)
3/10/2016–Bonnie Raitt with California Honeydrops (the two of us and a good friend)

Holy cow was Bonnie Raitt good and she started with an INXS song. You know I nearly lost my mind.

Posted in Listening | 2 Comments

Interesting

Posted on February 8, 2016 by Frog

I know. It’s been a bit of a dry spell here.

I just updated my reads page and realized that every book I’ve read or am reading this year has been written by a woman. Cool.

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I Went to Vegas, Baby.

Posted on January 17, 2016 by Frog

I went to Las Vegas last week for a conference. I can honestly say that I don’t need to go back. If the better-half and I ever go to the Grand Canyon, we could spend one night in Vegas and that would only be because of the stellar food. The rest of it is so over the top that it’s hard to describe. Sensory overload is too small of a phrase to describe it.

On Thursday, I took a long walk because I had a gap in my conference schedule. I finally got to see him:

On Tuesday night, I went to a show and the performers were on Cleopatra’s barge. The barge sits in water. Here’s part of the barge as it extends out into the hallway:

Wednesday night, I wandered around outside after I realized I hadn’t been outside since I arrived on Tuesday afternoon.

And, just as there is a little bit of Paris, there’s also a little bit of New York:

The lunar new year is just around the corner and this dragon was 20 kinds of awesome:

There was a SNAFU with my flights home so I flew to Dulles instead. As part of the SNAFU, I ended up with a window seat in the bigger seats up front (not first class, but better than the cattle call area). Lake Mead:

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January walks and things

Posted on January 10, 2016 by Frog

We took a walk through Hollywood Cemetery last weekend. I have no memory of ever doing this. It seems shocking when you consider how many historical sites we were dragged to as children. An interesting note, it was breezy and cold last Sunday when we walked through the cemetery. As I type this, the windows are open.

The river was high and swift because it rained every single day in December (I kid, not kid):

I really like this shot of the train tracks winding by the James:

Hollywood Cemetery has something like 8,000 confederate soldiers buried in it. I grew up around here and have zero reverence for the debacle of 1861-1865. So, being me, I stood in the field of a gazillion small white stones and said aloud, “we have a black president and he’s in his second term”. Then, I swear to you, the earth churned as a bunch of really dead dudes rolled in their graves.

The debacle’s monument:

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Year in Review

Posted on December 31, 2015 by Frog

This year has flown by much like every year, I suppose.

Here’s a quick run down on some of the things we did this year…click to make the images larger.

We walked in Amherst, tossing leaves in the Tye river, and hiked Crabtree Falls with the Nieces. We also went to the holiday light show at the botanical garden with them. They had fun goofing around. There were amazing sunrises in Duck, NC and a fun luau in Hawaii. It snowed a bit in Virginia this year and we were semi-snowbound one night in Blacksburg. There was a super-huge bike race in Richmond and we saw a lot of musical acts. We also walked in four 5Ks this year.

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Merry Christmas and all that jazz

Posted on December 25, 2015 by Frog

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Downtown

Posted on December 18, 2015 by Frog

We were on 4th street the other night and I snapped some pictures, rather quickly.

I had forgotten this part of the Media General juggernaut included paper names of old:

I turned around and took this shot. I have taken this building’s picture for years. I’m glad the building is in use again–and it looks as good as new.

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Stressful

Posted on December 9, 2015 by Frog

The past little bit at work has been awful. Someone who has been challenging to work with because she rarely completes work on time is finally moving on to something else. That sounds like a good thing, but she’s not leaving those of us who have to pick up the slack much of anything to go on. That disappoints me not for the reason you may think, but because I was really hoping this project was going to be her redemption project with me. It ain’t.

I am working on 5 instructional videos that are due in January. That’s a boat-load of work to get done between now and the end of January. There is a huge gap in time because of the holidays. And, it’s 5 things due in January that entail a bunch of moving parts. Luckily, everyone I’m working with is committed to getting their piece done in time for me to pull everything together into video format. The person leaving is/was responsible for some of the work on two of those videos. I put on my “Seriously, I’m an Instructional Designer, Hear me roar” hat and whammo. One of those videos is nearly done…in a couple of days. Nose meet grindstone. And, bye Felicia to my co-worker.

Yesterday I was so mentally tired that I had to stop working for awhile and listened to this song about 10 times in a row.

Today, I bought the rest of her album. I may need it to get through the next few weeks.

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