Past time to blog but nothing to say

I know, I know. I never have nothing to say. I can talk to a brick ... for hours ... about almost nothing. *attempts modest look* I know. It's a gift. It's so hard to be modest when you're really gifted.

A colleague at work asked me to go to the opera tomorrow night. No kidding. And I considered it because I like opera music. Well, I pretty much like music, with the exception of Country and Western *shudders*. Although, some progressive country music is tolerable. Side-tracked. Anyway, the reason I turned her down? I have absolutely nothing that I can wear to the opera. That is so cliched, but so unfortunately true. I've gained weight, so even if I could consider one of my nicer dresses, or even a cocktail dress, I couldn't possibly get into it. There's a good reason that I've been wearing exclusively slacks and tops to work for a while now.

Hmmmmmm. This may be just the excuse I've been looking for to do some serious clothes shopping. I've been wanting to do some shoe shopping, but I was planning to save the clothes trip until closer to summer. I have a trip to Innsbruck in June that's going to require some nice dresses for a number of functions. I don't want to shop too far in advance because what it I loose this weight, or *grimaces* gain more. Nope, too bad. I do need to wait until closer to June for the major clothes shopping. I can do the shoe shopping though. My pair of navy heels looks like they're losing the sole. And my black clogs are giving up the ghost. Those are two staples that must be replaced very, very soon. I also could really use some new closed shoes in black (as opposed to the clogs).

I spent all of last weekend down with the flu. I'm the absolute worst sick person on earth, so it was lucky that it was just me and the cats. I'm almost never ill, so I don't deal well with it when I am. And I was semi-irritated that I had it over the weekend. Nothing like spending an entire weekend huddled in misery in your bed. At least I was essentially over it by Tuesday, so I only missed work Monday. And thankfully I could work some Monday from home so I wasn't over-whelmed on Tuesday.

I'm glad tomorrow's Friday, even if it is Friday the 13th. I'm about as superstitious as a stick. LOL Of course I believe in curses and spells and karma and fate and alternate realities and demons and all that stuff. I just know that my guardian deities wouldn't possibly slack off so bad that anything would happen to me. It's that "usually outstanding karma" that I've mentioned before. Maybe it's that I believe in self-fulfilling prophecy. Believe that things will work out and they will. Believe that you're screwed, and you are. I expect 'luck' to fall my way, and it does. Simple. Can I harness it? No, or I'd be one hell of a wealthy gambler. It's not that kind of 'luck'. It's the ability to drive into a busy parking lot and get a front row spot. Or have great weather when I really want it.

Or even have a flat tire under ideal circumstances. This is a good example, actually. A flat tire is never a great thing. I'm not saying only good things happen to me. I get flat tires. My friend and I got a flat tire on our last vacation in the middle of nowhere, northern Arizona, in the middle of August. Okay, now that could have been a recipe for a bad time. But we got the flat right at sun-up. Enough light to see easily, not yet hot. We got it on the left side of the car. If it had been on the right, the right tires were in sand . Difficult to jack up without leaving the car on the roadway. (Did I mention a small two lane road with an almost non-existent shoulder?) The spare donut was full of air (even though I had forgotten to check before we left). It took us a half an hour to unpack camping gear, change the tire and repack camping gear. The next town we hit (Page, AZ) has a brand new Wal-Mart with tire service. Total delay from the flat tire, less than two hours.

That's what I mean about usually outstanding karma. I expect things to go smoothly, and most often they do. Granted I have bad luck too. I just think not as much as other people. And I suspect there are times when my guardian deities work overtime. I used to jokingly call them 'camping gods' or 'camping and weather gods' because they seemed to be most noticeable when I was on vacation. I'd always wake up at the perfect time without an alarm. If it was going to rain, it started after I got back from hiking. I'd always find the greatest campsites. All small details, but always happening. Then I began noticing that my luck runs that way pretty much all the time, so they morphed into guardian deities. Call them angels if you want. They certainly keep both eyes on me. Arigatou kami-sama-tachi.

I mailed another international package this week, and this time it didn't go quite so smoothly as last time. Remember that line that wasn't there last time. Boy, was it ever there this time! Of course it was a Tuesday about 3:30 pm. And I did get into an argument with the postal clerk. I mean Postal Clerk. Without the caps it looks like I'm using 'postal' to describe her mental state, when in reality it was probably closer to my mental state. With the line and the argument I was in that PO for 46 minutes, to mail one package. The clerk didn't like my box, and I didn't want to repack in her box. In order to prove her point about how poorly the forms fit onto my box, she even slopped the customs form on there crookedly. The thing is, this box was bigger than the first box I sent, and the forms fit on the first box. So I knew there was no reason for me to open and repack it. Still, it's unlike me to argue with Postal employees since my sister is one. I must have been still a little cranky from not feeling well.

I guess that's it for now. See. I had nothing to talk about and I went on about it for some time. This picture is from last summer's vacation ... a shadow picture. Or rather a picture of our shadows as we're standing on an arch at Arches. I'm the fat shadow.