Day Off

Posted on October 8, 2008 by Frog

I had an 8:15am doctor appointment today and decided to take the whole day off. No one need know that the doctor’s office is about a mile from my office and I could have easily been to work around 9:15. Instead I went to the new Whole Foods (beautiful) and Trader Joe’s (parking lot nightmare). I didn’t go too insane on purchasing things but I did manage to spend about $100 today. We’ll be eating some amazingly fresh looking vegetables over the next few days and rib eye is on the menu tonight. I also found gas for $3.04 and so filled up the car.

I’ve been spreading milky spore around the yard and decided to take a lunch break. I have a bunch of lime to spread afterward.

After I got home from my traipse around the West End, I put up an Obama/Biden sign down nearish to the end of our driveway. It went out around 10:30. I’m making a point of writing down the time because I’m not all that sure that it will stay out there. I’m a bit nervous some idiot is going to pull it up or steal it. The better-half said if that happens he’ll go get another one and we’ll keep putting signs out. We’ve never posted a sign for a candidate before but this is definitely a strong Republican area and so I won’t be surprised if there is a reprisal for being so bold as to buck the voting trend.

Update:
We had this for dinner along with baked potatoes and my special broccoli dish (with garlic, soy and red pepper flakes). The rib eye recipe had to be modified because where there’s a steak, there will be grilling. Or, should I say if it is more than 16 degrees Fahrenheit outside, we’re going to grill.

Posted in Gardening, Generic Thoughts | 2 Comments

Best Raffle Ever

Posted on October 6, 2008 by Frog

Today I bought a $5 raffle ticket off someone in one of my classes. I occasionally consider buying raffle tickets to be nice. A lot of times I lie and say I gave at the office and keep my $5 to spend on beer.

Well, wouldn’t you know that some creative person has figured that ploy out. I bought a $5 ticket tonight for a raffle in which the grand prize is a wheelbarrow filled with 50 liquor bottles. Not only do you get to keep the wheelbarrow but there is an assortment of booze in it. 50 bottles o’ assortment.

I swear to you if there is a raffle I was meant to win, it’s this one.

Posted in General Spleen Venting | Tagged | Comments Off

Two Things That Have Cracked Me Up

Posted on October 5, 2008 by Frog

First there’s this. The money quote is, of course, “Did she just wink at us like she was America’s cocktail waitress?”

The second item is this.

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Egads, neighbors

Posted on October 4, 2008 by Frog

I got up from my desk around 3 today because I was just sick of the paper. It’s a good thing I did because in re-reading the first half (the only half right now), I realized a gaping hole and so, tomorrow this paper will practically finish writing itself. Too bad I don’t have some little gadget that I could attach to my head tonight while I sleep and have it finish the paper.

I got up from my desk so I could cut the grass. It’s been overdue and it’s beautiful outside. Also–cutting grass=not writing paper!

I had finished the yard portion and decided to go ahead and cut the part out along the road. I was about a third of the way finished when I realized the damn neighbor was standing in the driveway. The damn neighbor, her son and another neighbor were hanging out waiting for me to come over to them. Egads. The neighbor and her son technically live next door to us but it’s more like behind us and we’ve never met them. We wave but that’s it. As I’ve mentioned that’s the way I like it.

Anyway, she had gotten our mail today and the other neighbor (the cranky man’s wife) had gotten the other neighbor’s mail so it was a massive cascade fail on the part of the mail carrier. The fail that made me have to actually engage in small talk with neighbors. I should have knuckled down and finished writing my paper and then I could have ignored the doorbell when the neighbor drove up to hand over our mail.

Procrastination bit me in the ass this afternoon.

Posted in Generic Thoughts | 3 Comments

I Do Not Care

Posted on October 4, 2008 by Frog

I’ve procrastinated all morning and have done a tiny bit of work on a paper due next Thursday. A tiny bit. I have to write a paper on organizational learning at NASA. I do not care one wit about this. It has nothing to do with NASA–fascinated by them–it’s just that I don’t care if any organization shows organizational learning unless it’s the organization I’m working in or will work in. I know, short-sighted. It’s all about my learning, blah, blah, blah. Still. I do not want to write this paper. I do not care.

This is something I care about:

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Looking for food in all the right places

Posted on October 1, 2008 by Frog

We started feeding a black and white cat this summer and with much originality called him Blackie.

The cat is stand-offish and only signals his need for food by standing in the yard and staring. I’m a sucker so I usually comply with the order. I’ve never been able to get near enough to the cat to pet it.

Recently, I thought progress had been made because the cat started sticking around longer and I thought we were working up to actually making friends with each other. Then, we realized there are two black and white cats coming around for hand outs. So, Blackie became Adolph because of his mustache and the other cat became Blackie. The picture above is Adolph from last night and I had to up the lighting on the picture so that’s why it’s fuzzy.

Simon doesn’t approve of either one of them.

Update:
Here’s proof that of the two black cats. The one on the right is the friendly cat. After I took this horrible picture, we ended up feeding this one because the other one had gotten to the trough first. Eventually, the friendly cat came up to see us on the back steps, licked my thumb and then ate some more food.

Posted in Eating | Tagged | 1 Comment

Frustration for no good reason

Posted on September 29, 2008 by Frog

Since I have worked at my place of employment I have had to compile and send a monthly report to our client. Every single month I send an email to everyone who is supposed to update our shared Excel spreadsheet reminding them to submit their data by Noon on whatever day at the end of the month. The email is always sent days, if not a whole week, in advance.

The deadline for September’s report was Noon on Friday the 26th. That was last week. Today at 2pm I get an email from a co-worker stating “Oh I noticed October’s report the only one available and there isn’t a September one in the archive yet so I can’t update”.

It’s a good thing I’m separated by miles instead of steps from this person. She’s worked here for a few months less than I have so for her entire tenure this report has come due. I have talked until I’m blue in the face, developed handouts, talked at staff meetings, bitched and moaned and done everything I can think of short of going to each person with a loaded gun pointed at their heads to get people to fill out the spreadsheet. I could give a rat’s ass about the report but I’m shackled with this “other duties as assigned” task and so by God I’m going to do it and do it well.

So when I get an email an entire day after the report was due and then the email tells me she was going to update an archived report, I nearly blew out an artery. Any wonder why I waffle betweeen hating my job and hating the people I work with? Fill out the spreadsheet because when you don’t you make my job harder than it needs to be and when you don’t do that simple thing for me it makes me a)want to kill you b)want to never help you again (and you freaking ask me all the time for help).

I must either start drinking at work or learn some meditation.

Posted in General Spleen Venting | Tagged | 1 Comment

I think everything did just rise and converge

Posted on September 28, 2008 by Frog

Holy cow…a Flannery O’Connor recording from the early 60s.

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Yesterday turned bright and sunny

Posted on September 28, 2008 by Frog

Guess where we went yesterday:

If that’s not enough of a clue, here’s another one:

Posted in Gardening, Generic Thoughts | Tagged | 2 Comments

Matt Damon

Posted on September 26, 2008 by Frog

Around the time Good Will Hunting came out I went to Boston with a group of 14 or so other people for work. I hadn’t seen the movie yet and so had no idea what all the other women in the group were talking about. We went to Boston to learn how to train a huge amount of people on how to use an automated resume system. I would work with those people again in a heartbeat.

One night we left Jillian’s and really had no idea how to get back to the hotel. I was driving one of the mini-vans because, believe it or not, I was sober. We were so lost that we stopped and asked a cabbie in the middle of the street. We ended up paying him since he gave us such good directions–yes, we handed money out of our mini-van into the cab. Whatever, we got back to the hotel.

While we were driving around aimlessly, we went through Southie and saw some of the sights from Good Will Hunting. Everyone, but me, pointed out the landmarks. Then they talked about Matt Damon’s teeth. The man has nearly perfect teeth. Seriously, check him out.

Since that time, I frequently mention how perfect Matt Damon’s teeth are. So, somehow all of this story relates to this video. I have to say I’m not a huge Sarah Silverman fan but she gets extra gold stars for this:

*** I should tell you about my after-hours visit to a potato chip factory at some point–a training job definitely has perks.

Posted in Generic Thoughts, Listening | Tagged | 1 Comment