Konnichiwa, shoukun! Or whoever may be reading this.
Time is a weird thing, isn't it. Like ... it's a measurable quantity that doesn't change, right? So how can it be so subjective? A year go by so fast and a couple of hours take forever. 30 seconds is completely different if you're waiting for a computer program to load, or waiting for a bomb to count down. Yet it's just 30 seconds. I heard somewhere that time is supposed to be the fourth dimension. A line is the first dimension, say the X-axis. A flat surface is the second dimension, say a wall or the floor, defined by the X- and Y-axes. A box, or space, is the third dimension, defined by the X-, Y- and Z-axes. But I can't get a grasp on the fourth dimension. How do you go beyond three-dimensional space? My mind can't grasp that concept.
Lately time has been moving a little too fast for my comfort. I have too much I need to do in too short a space of time and I find my subconscious worrying about it. So I wake up between 1:00 and 3:00 am wrestling with work problems. This morning it was something to do with how to report Vitamin D if we measure D3 and D2, 25-Oh and 1,25-diOH. Just stuff that's not even been part of my conscious thoughts. So I suppose the way my subconscious deals with work stress is to worry at obscure problems.
Oops, no more time to do this.
Monday, March 9, 2009
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Migraines
This is exactly why people have blogs. So that they can talk to themsleves all day long about stuff no one else cares about. *laughing* Don't say you weren't warned. I'm gonna talk about migraines.
Yes, I'm a migraine sufferer, and anyone who has them will tell you that the 'sufferer' part is an understatement. I had one yesterday, so I have a minor migraine hang-over today. Not too bad, though.
I'll describe the process. It starts with a disturbance of the visual field, in one or both eyes. The 'disturbance' for me starts out as a bright sparkling dot that makes it hard to see. It can occur anywhere in the visual field, but it makes me unable to focus on whatever I'm working on. I can still kind of see things as long as I don't look directly at them ... kind of like looking at things from the side of my eye. The bright sparkly dot begins to grow and encompass more of the visual field. My Dad calls it a bright, jagged-edged arc. (He gets the visual effects but not the pain ... lucky dog. The so-called 'silent migraine'). Anyway the sparkly spot does become an expanding arc of jagged crystalline sparkles, that for me pretty much always crosses my visual field from left to right and eventually disappears off the right side. The time this takes is probably about 15-20 minutes. I've never actually timed it because I'm always trying to accomplish something else during those minutes ..... like get home to a dark room. I know that I'm going to have that visual effect span of time to remain functional.
The pain doesn't start until after the visual effects are gone. By the end of the visual effects and the start of the pain, my brain starts short-circuiting. I can't hang onto thoughts, can't follow a logical progression of thoughts. They pass through too fast for me to catch them and understand. I just get fleeting glimpses of complete thought processes, things I might be thinking or need to be thinking about, what I intend to do, what something means and what I should do about it. I simply cannot connect any dots. So even shortly before the pain starts I'm often confused and struggling to understand.
Once the pain starts it overwhelms everything else. All I can do is curl into a ball somewhere dark and wait for it to end. My eyes are photo-sensitive and my entire head is touch-sensitive. The pain usually starts at my temple. If the visual aura is one sided, the pain will be on the opposite side on my head from the effected eye. It spreads quickly from the temple backward to the back of my head, to the top of my head, down toward the neck. I can't think, I can't pray even if I would. I just lay huddled under blankets and endure.
Over the counter pain-killers don't have any effect at all on this pain. Once I took half a bottle of acetaminophen, before I knew acetaminophen was liver-toxic. Neither that nor an equal dose of aspirin at another time even touched the pain.
I'm lucky. I have migraines rarely, and they've become more rare as I've gotten older. I had them frequently when I was in high school. My very first one was one of the worst. With that one I had the classic symptoms, including arm and leg weakness on one side of my body, slurred speech, tingling in my face and hand. I thought I was having a stroke, and apparently migraines and TIA (transient ischemic accident) (or a minor stoke if you want to call it that), are frequently misdiagnosed for each other.
My doctor has prescribed drugs for me to take when I get the visual aura, the intent being to stop the pain from occuring if possible. Unfortunately they've never worked for me. They don't stop the pain. They do make me nauseated, which seems like insult to injury to me. I don't take them any more. Yes, I should go back and talk to him about alternatives. If I had a lot of migraines I probably would. But I will go back and see when my last migraine was. I just want to make sure they're not increasing in frequency.
Yesterday I took a hydrocodone that I had left over from a mouth surgery 4 years ago. I remember starting to get the headache, and then waking up on the couch about 5 hours later. :) Good drugs. Well, good for the pain, but obviously I won't be able to take them if I have to drive to get home, or would like to keep functioning. Still, I'm very grateful to have been spared most of the migraine effects.
My most memorable migraines include .... the first one. It was mostly memorable because I didn't understand and was scared. Once I had a migraine just as I hit the top of a hiking trail in Utah. So I still had to hike back down. Along with happening on the first day of vacation, that one was memorable because of that brain-short-circuit thing. About halfway down I tried to catch a thought that kept escaping me. I really felt like I needed to figure it out, that it was important for me to understand. The next thing I knew I found myself crouched down in a little patch of shade beside the trail, trying to remember and understand. I don't know how long I was there, but decided to continue hiking back to camp. Another memorable one was in the middle of teaching a lab on electrophoresis. Another time that I couldn't just drop what I was doing and run home. To this day I don't clearly remember the end of the lab and the drive home.
My migraines freak my friends out more than they do me. Probably because they're not used to seeing me confused and struggling to understand what's going on. I suppose it would be a little freaky. From my perspective, the emotions I run through are: massive dismay (oh, shit, don't tell me...), massive irritation (not today, damn it ....), mild panic (have I got drugs, can I get home), determination (okay I've got to keep it together until .... x), confusion (what was I doing, what should I do, what was I thinking ....), and finally pain (I should have taken something sooner ... just endure) or lack of consciousness.
I don't know what causes my migraines. It doesn't seem to be related to what I eat, where I am, what I'm doing. Yesterday I was in the middle of typing an email to a friend. Probably they're related to stress, although early in a vacation is not an uncommon time for me to have one. I am under a fair aount of stress at work right now, but no more or less than I will be for the next several months. So what triggered it yesterday? Believe me, if I could figure out my specific trigger, I'd never have another migraine.
Over the years I've heard a lot of ways to treat migraines, including some pretty far-fetched ones. In this day and age of the internet, there are more than 600,000 people or groups who will be glad to tell you how to treat them. I've even been told that taping a cold banana peel to my forehead would do the trick. Which makes me laugh, but then, as much as I believe in modern science and medicine, I really know better than to laugh at what may work for someone. I'm pretty sure I won't be taping cold banana peels to my forehead though. And not just because I don't keep bananas in the house.
Had enough? I guess I can quit now.
Yes, I'm a migraine sufferer, and anyone who has them will tell you that the 'sufferer' part is an understatement. I had one yesterday, so I have a minor migraine hang-over today. Not too bad, though.
I'll describe the process. It starts with a disturbance of the visual field, in one or both eyes. The 'disturbance' for me starts out as a bright sparkling dot that makes it hard to see. It can occur anywhere in the visual field, but it makes me unable to focus on whatever I'm working on. I can still kind of see things as long as I don't look directly at them ... kind of like looking at things from the side of my eye. The bright sparkly dot begins to grow and encompass more of the visual field. My Dad calls it a bright, jagged-edged arc. (He gets the visual effects but not the pain ... lucky dog. The so-called 'silent migraine'). Anyway the sparkly spot does become an expanding arc of jagged crystalline sparkles, that for me pretty much always crosses my visual field from left to right and eventually disappears off the right side. The time this takes is probably about 15-20 minutes. I've never actually timed it because I'm always trying to accomplish something else during those minutes ..... like get home to a dark room. I know that I'm going to have that visual effect span of time to remain functional.
The pain doesn't start until after the visual effects are gone. By the end of the visual effects and the start of the pain, my brain starts short-circuiting. I can't hang onto thoughts, can't follow a logical progression of thoughts. They pass through too fast for me to catch them and understand. I just get fleeting glimpses of complete thought processes, things I might be thinking or need to be thinking about, what I intend to do, what something means and what I should do about it. I simply cannot connect any dots. So even shortly before the pain starts I'm often confused and struggling to understand.
Once the pain starts it overwhelms everything else. All I can do is curl into a ball somewhere dark and wait for it to end. My eyes are photo-sensitive and my entire head is touch-sensitive. The pain usually starts at my temple. If the visual aura is one sided, the pain will be on the opposite side on my head from the effected eye. It spreads quickly from the temple backward to the back of my head, to the top of my head, down toward the neck. I can't think, I can't pray even if I would. I just lay huddled under blankets and endure.
Over the counter pain-killers don't have any effect at all on this pain. Once I took half a bottle of acetaminophen, before I knew acetaminophen was liver-toxic. Neither that nor an equal dose of aspirin at another time even touched the pain.
I'm lucky. I have migraines rarely, and they've become more rare as I've gotten older. I had them frequently when I was in high school. My very first one was one of the worst. With that one I had the classic symptoms, including arm and leg weakness on one side of my body, slurred speech, tingling in my face and hand. I thought I was having a stroke, and apparently migraines and TIA (transient ischemic accident) (or a minor stoke if you want to call it that), are frequently misdiagnosed for each other.
My doctor has prescribed drugs for me to take when I get the visual aura, the intent being to stop the pain from occuring if possible. Unfortunately they've never worked for me. They don't stop the pain. They do make me nauseated, which seems like insult to injury to me. I don't take them any more. Yes, I should go back and talk to him about alternatives. If I had a lot of migraines I probably would. But I will go back and see when my last migraine was. I just want to make sure they're not increasing in frequency.
Yesterday I took a hydrocodone that I had left over from a mouth surgery 4 years ago. I remember starting to get the headache, and then waking up on the couch about 5 hours later. :) Good drugs. Well, good for the pain, but obviously I won't be able to take them if I have to drive to get home, or would like to keep functioning. Still, I'm very grateful to have been spared most of the migraine effects.
My most memorable migraines include .... the first one. It was mostly memorable because I didn't understand and was scared. Once I had a migraine just as I hit the top of a hiking trail in Utah. So I still had to hike back down. Along with happening on the first day of vacation, that one was memorable because of that brain-short-circuit thing. About halfway down I tried to catch a thought that kept escaping me. I really felt like I needed to figure it out, that it was important for me to understand. The next thing I knew I found myself crouched down in a little patch of shade beside the trail, trying to remember and understand. I don't know how long I was there, but decided to continue hiking back to camp. Another memorable one was in the middle of teaching a lab on electrophoresis. Another time that I couldn't just drop what I was doing and run home. To this day I don't clearly remember the end of the lab and the drive home.
My migraines freak my friends out more than they do me. Probably because they're not used to seeing me confused and struggling to understand what's going on. I suppose it would be a little freaky. From my perspective, the emotions I run through are: massive dismay (oh, shit, don't tell me...), massive irritation (not today, damn it ....), mild panic (have I got drugs, can I get home), determination (okay I've got to keep it together until .... x), confusion (what was I doing, what should I do, what was I thinking ....), and finally pain (I should have taken something sooner ... just endure) or lack of consciousness.
I don't know what causes my migraines. It doesn't seem to be related to what I eat, where I am, what I'm doing. Yesterday I was in the middle of typing an email to a friend. Probably they're related to stress, although early in a vacation is not an uncommon time for me to have one. I am under a fair aount of stress at work right now, but no more or less than I will be for the next several months. So what triggered it yesterday? Believe me, if I could figure out my specific trigger, I'd never have another migraine.
Over the years I've heard a lot of ways to treat migraines, including some pretty far-fetched ones. In this day and age of the internet, there are more than 600,000 people or groups who will be glad to tell you how to treat them. I've even been told that taping a cold banana peel to my forehead would do the trick. Which makes me laugh, but then, as much as I believe in modern science and medicine, I really know better than to laugh at what may work for someone. I'm pretty sure I won't be taping cold banana peels to my forehead though. And not just because I don't keep bananas in the house.
Had enough? I guess I can quit now.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Why isn't it Friday?
Yes, yes I understand the answer to that question, but it's been such a long week that it feels like it should have been Friday already. At least tomorrow is Friday. It could be worse.
I was sitting and busily working away about 11:00 this morning, when I happened to glance at my calendar. What I saw there froze me in shock. Tomorrow's the last working day in February! Oh. Shit. Yes, I know Feb's a short month, but it cannot be over. Do you know how many work projects I promised to people by March 1st? Let's just say, one working day isn't going to allow me to make those deadlines. I wish I knew where this month got away to. I do have two of the Mar 1 projects well on their way to complete, so they'll only be a day or so off the deadline. Just need to look up references for some of the statements, create a figure, polish up some of the passages. Basically final details on a couple manuscripts. I'm not really horribly behind, I just thought I had more time than I do.
I was bitten by a spider Tuesday evening. I think it was a brown recluse although I didn't see the spider. It tagged me while I was rearranging DVDs that hadn't been moved in a while. It wasn't a painful bite, more irritating, but the tissue around it discolored blue within a couple of minutes. That whole section of my finger is still kind of a mottled blue/purple, like I caught it in a door or something, but it doesn't look like it'll ulcerate. I'm greatful for that favor. The pics you see on the internet of recluse bites are scary. Of course they always show worst case scenario. Whatever kind of spider it was, I'll be alot more careful rearranging DVDs on those shelves from now on. One might even say paranoid.
Here's a picture of the girls not happy with me for distrubing their nap. The center of the bed is where they spend their days. It's amazing that they can sleep so much. It's also interesting that they sleep together like this when I'm not in the bed, but when I'm there they get really territorial and each has her space where she allows the other to lay. Spoiled little brats. I don't know how that happened.
I was sitting and busily working away about 11:00 this morning, when I happened to glance at my calendar. What I saw there froze me in shock. Tomorrow's the last working day in February! Oh. Shit. Yes, I know Feb's a short month, but it cannot be over. Do you know how many work projects I promised to people by March 1st? Let's just say, one working day isn't going to allow me to make those deadlines. I wish I knew where this month got away to. I do have two of the Mar 1 projects well on their way to complete, so they'll only be a day or so off the deadline. Just need to look up references for some of the statements, create a figure, polish up some of the passages. Basically final details on a couple manuscripts. I'm not really horribly behind, I just thought I had more time than I do.
I was bitten by a spider Tuesday evening. I think it was a brown recluse although I didn't see the spider. It tagged me while I was rearranging DVDs that hadn't been moved in a while. It wasn't a painful bite, more irritating, but the tissue around it discolored blue within a couple of minutes. That whole section of my finger is still kind of a mottled blue/purple, like I caught it in a door or something, but it doesn't look like it'll ulcerate. I'm greatful for that favor. The pics you see on the internet of recluse bites are scary. Of course they always show worst case scenario. Whatever kind of spider it was, I'll be alot more careful rearranging DVDs on those shelves from now on. One might even say paranoid.
Here's a picture of the girls not happy with me for distrubing their nap. The center of the bed is where they spend their days. It's amazing that they can sleep so much. It's also interesting that they sleep together like this when I'm not in the bed, but when I'm there they get really territorial and each has her space where she allows the other to lay. Spoiled little brats. I don't know how that happened.
The demon cat isn't coming around as often although he still makes occasional appearences. The girls will venture outside now, but I still have to keep an eye out. The other day I found the demon on his way into my house. The girls were having a snack and had just come inside about 10 minutes before and I hadn't closed up the house yet. He was not happy that I shoo-ed him out and shut the door in his face. He sat out there a while before he continued on his rounds.
Tommorrow should be fairly quiet at work. It's inspection day at our other campus, so most of the lab admin staff will be out there with the inspectors. Luckily, I got out of this one. I have a talk to give in the morning (want to know anything about bilirubin?), a noon faculty meeting, and then my usual Friday afternoon signout. That should keep me out of trouble but doesn't allow a lot of free time to work on manuscripts, etc. Probably I can use those broken up pieces of time to crunch some data from the steroid project. I'm really ready for the week to be over ... at the same time I wish I had more time in it.
This weekend is calendar-changing time. All my 2-months-on-one-page calendars get changed, as well as the monthly ones. Tanoshii. *laughing* Maybe I'd better start now though, considering how many calendars I have. Nope. Not a calendar freak. I'm a pretty-anime-picture freak. Shikatanai.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
pet peeves
Everyone has pet peeves, right? Something, usually trivial, that just irritates the hell out of you. Probably because it's something that happens frequently and is just annoying enough to build up an 'annoyance reserve'. One of my pet peeves was just activated. Someone paged me, and then was not there when I called back. That wouldn't bother me if I called back more than 15 minutes later, but I called back right away. And no one could find the person who paged me. Fine. I don't mind sitting on hold for extended periods of time. Of course I don't. Finally I hung up and called them back. They couldn't find her. Two minutes later I got another page from the same person to the same phone, which says "can you page Krystle at 62020?" (which by the way activated another pet peeve .... of course I CAN, but will I?) So I called her back and she wasn't there! And I was on hold again. Really a bad idea, since she was calling to ask me for something. Needless to say when she finally got to the phone, I was less than friendly.
I wonder why certain actions by people are more irritating than others, and why everyone's pet peeves are different? A person I know cannot stand kids misbehaving in restaurants. This doesn't bother me at all. I simply tune it out. She's been known to grab a kid running by and tell him to sit down. Another pet peeve of mine is people in the service industry who are too busy conversing with their co-worker(s) to wait on the customer (me). This includes waitresses, sales clerks, anyone serving the public. Maybe it's simply a matter of frequency. The first several thousand times someone was too into their private conversation to do their job, I just blew it off. But the 7001 time, my 'annoyance reserve' overflowed.
Actually that's probably the case. I would say it's a combination of frequency and magnitude. I can't imagine something that happened to you only once, or even a few times, would cause you to want to remove someone's vocal cords or rattle their brains. But by the thousand+ time, enough is enough. And they're small things because the big things cause you to react immediately. Small things you're fairly successful at blowing off, as long as they don't happen a lot.
I think this is the same forces at work as when you don't really know someone until you live with them. Tiny habits that you don't like can be blown off if the person is just visiting, but day after day of that particular habit wears at you and adds to your 'annoyance reserve'. Eventually it's going to overflow, and if something else is adding to the 'reserve' also, you're probably going to explode in multiple directions.
Hmmmmmm. I knew there's a reason I'm single. Maybe that's also why older people (including me) tend to be crankier. Our "annoyance reserve" is always right below the overflow line.
*laughing* Or maybe I'm simply searching for an excuse for being a bitch. Yeah. Could be.
I have another going away party to attend this evening. No not another person leaving, another party for the same person. Luckily I'm over my hang-over from last night. Last night I did an attitude adjustment in a hot-tub with beer and mexican food. Tanoshii. My attitude was great when I got home. And I slept until 8:00 this morning! That's like a miracle for me. I get up at 4:30 on weekdays and 6:30 is about my limit for weekends. Of course I was a little hung-over this morning, but coffee pretty much solved it.
I need to try to figure out what to wear this evening. Hmmmm. I also need to try not to drink to much. It's a fairly good drive home (30-45 minutes depending on traffic), and I don't want to strain kami-sama tachi's abilities too much. I should be fine with one or two drinks.
It's supposed to drop below freezing here tonight. I hope that's the last time this year. Everything is beginning to bud out now. I guess I trimmed my rose bck a little early because it has a lot of new groth on it. I'm sure it will be damaged by the frost tonight .... although hopefully not too badly.
I wonder why certain actions by people are more irritating than others, and why everyone's pet peeves are different? A person I know cannot stand kids misbehaving in restaurants. This doesn't bother me at all. I simply tune it out. She's been known to grab a kid running by and tell him to sit down. Another pet peeve of mine is people in the service industry who are too busy conversing with their co-worker(s) to wait on the customer (me). This includes waitresses, sales clerks, anyone serving the public. Maybe it's simply a matter of frequency. The first several thousand times someone was too into their private conversation to do their job, I just blew it off. But the 7001 time, my 'annoyance reserve' overflowed.
Actually that's probably the case. I would say it's a combination of frequency and magnitude. I can't imagine something that happened to you only once, or even a few times, would cause you to want to remove someone's vocal cords or rattle their brains. But by the thousand+ time, enough is enough. And they're small things because the big things cause you to react immediately. Small things you're fairly successful at blowing off, as long as they don't happen a lot.
I think this is the same forces at work as when you don't really know someone until you live with them. Tiny habits that you don't like can be blown off if the person is just visiting, but day after day of that particular habit wears at you and adds to your 'annoyance reserve'. Eventually it's going to overflow, and if something else is adding to the 'reserve' also, you're probably going to explode in multiple directions.
Hmmmmmm. I knew there's a reason I'm single. Maybe that's also why older people (including me) tend to be crankier. Our "annoyance reserve" is always right below the overflow line.
*laughing* Or maybe I'm simply searching for an excuse for being a bitch. Yeah. Could be.
I have another going away party to attend this evening. No not another person leaving, another party for the same person. Luckily I'm over my hang-over from last night. Last night I did an attitude adjustment in a hot-tub with beer and mexican food. Tanoshii. My attitude was great when I got home. And I slept until 8:00 this morning! That's like a miracle for me. I get up at 4:30 on weekdays and 6:30 is about my limit for weekends. Of course I was a little hung-over this morning, but coffee pretty much solved it.
I need to try to figure out what to wear this evening. Hmmmm. I also need to try not to drink to much. It's a fairly good drive home (30-45 minutes depending on traffic), and I don't want to strain kami-sama tachi's abilities too much. I should be fine with one or two drinks.
It's supposed to drop below freezing here tonight. I hope that's the last time this year. Everything is beginning to bud out now. I guess I trimmed my rose bck a little early because it has a lot of new groth on it. I'm sure it will be damaged by the frost tonight .... although hopefully not too badly.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Dear Diary
*laughing* Give me a break. It does seem like a diary. Except that this isn't where I write all my deep, dark secrets. Mostly because I don't have any deep, dark secrets. Is that kind of sad? Hmmmmmm. Deep, dark secrets ... deep, dark secrets.
Nope, I think I fessed up to a big part of my weirdness last blod entry. You know, that I believe in fairy-god-persons. :D Hopefully they won't take revenge for that 'fairy' part. Jodan, jodan.
I've been mildly productive the last two days. I finished working out my taxes and sealed them in their little envelope in preparation for mailing on Tuesday (Monday being President's Day Holiday). I'm glad I held off because I had more charity aknowledgements come in. I cleaned out cabinets in the kitchen, threw out stuff I don't use and straightened up the rest. I also trimmed back my peach tree. Now I may be able to mow under it this summer without being mortally wounded every time I mow. It's a little cooler out today than I like, but not bad weather for doing some minor yard work. I've also started this week on a campaign to keep the cats brushed several times a week. They'll be going into full shedding-mode pretty soon. My house will be filled with clouds of cat fur and my clothes will become cat fur magnets.
Yesterday my DVD/VCR player stopped working correctly. It stopped responding to the remote. So you can put a movie in and push play and you're fine, but if you want to change anything, like languages, subtitles, or move to a different scene or episode, you can't. Even beyond the language issue, this is a problem. If you have a DVD with 7 episodes on it and you've already watched 5, you don't want to have to re-watch those 5 just to get to the 6th one. So I did all the logical things: tried several different DVDs, changed the batteries in the remote and then changed them again in case the new ones weren't any good, powered the system down and then back up a couple of times, even unplugged and replugged it, checked all the connections I could find. Then I did the next logical thing .... went to Fry's and bought a new one. A new DVD/VCR player, not a new remote. What's the point of getting a fancy 'universal' remote that I may or may not be able to get to work with my system even if it's the remote that's broken.
I also discovered that DVD/VCR's are out of style. That really doesn't surprise me. Even I am not replacing my tapes when they die, or if I really liked the movie, I'll look for it on DVD. Fry's only had a couple of different styles, on the very back wall of the store. I figure this one will probably last me as long as my tapes do ... tabun. In general, I have more trouble with the DVD part not working than the VCR part of systems. All my systems are hooked through my 'home entertainment' system with the 'surround sound' so that the sound comes from there, but the DVD player in that system hasn't woked for years. I had it repaired once but when it broke again, I just bought the first DVD/VCR player. I guess the one I bought yesterday makes about three of them I've owned.
I was sitting on the floor with a flashlight behind the TV routing the new player through the cable box and the TV and the sound system, and I forgot it there when I got the system to work. I found it again just before I went to bed last night when I was trying to figure out where the light was coming from.
We're such a disposable society. But really, electronics are sooooo inexpensive, and it's difficult to find anyplace that will repair them, unless you send it back to the company. And if you take it or send it to be repaired, you're without anything in the meantime. From the time I realised that I wasn't going to magically make my system work yesterday, until I had the new one in place and working, was probably less than 2 hours.
I'll tell you a secret. Last summer I upgraded my phone. I didn't want to. I really like my phone. But nobody has batteries for it. I tried five local places, and each one said the same thing. "We don't carry them any more. Just upgrade your phone. It's free." Yes it's free, if you're okay with the phone they want to give you as a free upgrade. So I resisted, but at the fifth place, I succumbed and said 'fine, upgrade me.' So I walked out with this 'new, free phone'. This phone is so ........ let's just say that calling it 'flimsy' would be a significant understatement. A plastic coke bottle is better constructed. It just feels like if you handle it the least badly, you'll be holding pieces of a phone. So I tried to use it and it wouldn't read my SIM card. I took the card out and put it back in, waited for it to read, no dice. When I got home, I moved the SIM card back to my old (current) phone, went on-line and ordered batteries for it. I then carefully packed up the 'new' phone and threw it in the back of my closet. And my phone carrier charged me an $18.00 'upgrade fee' for my free upgrade.
Why didn't I go back to the store? Because I didn't want to explain to them again that I don't want a new phone, free or otherwise. At least in the back of my closet they can't give that free piece of junk to anyone else.
Heeee. I guess I am telling secrets here. Do I have any others, I wonder. Probably, but if I put them all in one blog then my future blogs will be even more boring than they are now. Scary.
Anyway, I'm going to cut this short today. I'm in the mood for some on-line shopping and cst is getting impatient.
Nope, I think I fessed up to a big part of my weirdness last blod entry. You know, that I believe in fairy-god-persons. :D Hopefully they won't take revenge for that 'fairy' part. Jodan, jodan.
I've been mildly productive the last two days. I finished working out my taxes and sealed them in their little envelope in preparation for mailing on Tuesday (Monday being President's Day Holiday). I'm glad I held off because I had more charity aknowledgements come in. I cleaned out cabinets in the kitchen, threw out stuff I don't use and straightened up the rest. I also trimmed back my peach tree. Now I may be able to mow under it this summer without being mortally wounded every time I mow. It's a little cooler out today than I like, but not bad weather for doing some minor yard work. I've also started this week on a campaign to keep the cats brushed several times a week. They'll be going into full shedding-mode pretty soon. My house will be filled with clouds of cat fur and my clothes will become cat fur magnets.
Yesterday my DVD/VCR player stopped working correctly. It stopped responding to the remote. So you can put a movie in and push play and you're fine, but if you want to change anything, like languages, subtitles, or move to a different scene or episode, you can't. Even beyond the language issue, this is a problem. If you have a DVD with 7 episodes on it and you've already watched 5, you don't want to have to re-watch those 5 just to get to the 6th one. So I did all the logical things: tried several different DVDs, changed the batteries in the remote and then changed them again in case the new ones weren't any good, powered the system down and then back up a couple of times, even unplugged and replugged it, checked all the connections I could find. Then I did the next logical thing .... went to Fry's and bought a new one. A new DVD/VCR player, not a new remote. What's the point of getting a fancy 'universal' remote that I may or may not be able to get to work with my system even if it's the remote that's broken.
I also discovered that DVD/VCR's are out of style. That really doesn't surprise me. Even I am not replacing my tapes when they die, or if I really liked the movie, I'll look for it on DVD. Fry's only had a couple of different styles, on the very back wall of the store. I figure this one will probably last me as long as my tapes do ... tabun. In general, I have more trouble with the DVD part not working than the VCR part of systems. All my systems are hooked through my 'home entertainment' system with the 'surround sound' so that the sound comes from there, but the DVD player in that system hasn't woked for years. I had it repaired once but when it broke again, I just bought the first DVD/VCR player. I guess the one I bought yesterday makes about three of them I've owned.
I was sitting on the floor with a flashlight behind the TV routing the new player through the cable box and the TV and the sound system, and I forgot it there when I got the system to work. I found it again just before I went to bed last night when I was trying to figure out where the light was coming from.
We're such a disposable society. But really, electronics are sooooo inexpensive, and it's difficult to find anyplace that will repair them, unless you send it back to the company. And if you take it or send it to be repaired, you're without anything in the meantime. From the time I realised that I wasn't going to magically make my system work yesterday, until I had the new one in place and working, was probably less than 2 hours.
I'll tell you a secret. Last summer I upgraded my phone. I didn't want to. I really like my phone. But nobody has batteries for it. I tried five local places, and each one said the same thing. "We don't carry them any more. Just upgrade your phone. It's free." Yes it's free, if you're okay with the phone they want to give you as a free upgrade. So I resisted, but at the fifth place, I succumbed and said 'fine, upgrade me.' So I walked out with this 'new, free phone'. This phone is so ........ let's just say that calling it 'flimsy' would be a significant understatement. A plastic coke bottle is better constructed. It just feels like if you handle it the least badly, you'll be holding pieces of a phone. So I tried to use it and it wouldn't read my SIM card. I took the card out and put it back in, waited for it to read, no dice. When I got home, I moved the SIM card back to my old (current) phone, went on-line and ordered batteries for it. I then carefully packed up the 'new' phone and threw it in the back of my closet. And my phone carrier charged me an $18.00 'upgrade fee' for my free upgrade.
Why didn't I go back to the store? Because I didn't want to explain to them again that I don't want a new phone, free or otherwise. At least in the back of my closet they can't give that free piece of junk to anyone else.
Heeee. I guess I am telling secrets here. Do I have any others, I wonder. Probably, but if I put them all in one blog then my future blogs will be even more boring than they are now. Scary.
Anyway, I'm going to cut this short today. I'm in the mood for some on-line shopping and cst is getting impatient.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
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. 
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Birds and stuff
*laughing* So it turns out my cats' absence from the back yard has very little to do with the plethora of birds out there. My neighbors hung a birdfeeder! It's right by the fence, almost hanging in my yard. So that explains the flocks of doves and cardinals and sparrows (14 vying for baths in the birdbath the other day) and bluejays. I've also been seeing birds I don't usually see around here like junkos and black-capped chikadees. Or they could be Mexican chikadees. My bird book doesn't show either species as wintering here, but the cap is pretty distinctive. It has to be one or the other. If I see it again, I'll try to figure it out.
Zoe is just mesmerized by the birds ... when she's brave enough to go outside. Luckily she's way too fat to catch anything. She just lays and watches them with her tail twitching. When the mockingbirds are here, they taunt her. They'll strut around the yard catching bugs while she stalks them for hours. Then when she rushes, they fly up to the fence then back down to the other end of the yard, and she stalks them again for another hour. They're definitely not worried about her.
I also have barn swallows that come around every year. They used to nest over my front porch, but when I had siding put on the house the guys doing the work closed off the little space the swallows were building in. I put some fake ledges up there, but they haven't nested there again. At the end of the nesting season last year, a pair of them were checking it out though, so maybe they'll come back there this year. We'll see.
Birds are interesting creatures. Last summer in Utah my friend and I were lucky enough to spot California Condors. Too bad we didn't realize what they were at the time or we would have taken pictures. They drifted close overhead while we were on the Angel's Landing trail in Zion. Instead we just stood and watched them circle (who takes pictures of buzzards?) and wondered why they were radio-tagging buzzards. It wasn't until a day or so later that she found a book on the condors and the release program in Utah. We freaked. Interestingly, my bird book talks about how they're gone from the wild, and only a few are left in zoos. (copyright 1990!) It may be time to buy a new bird book. The ones we saw were juveniles, so they didn't have the distinctive white underwings yet.
We've seen a lot of interesting wildlife out in Utah. The baby Horny Toad in this blog is an example from this year. One year we came across a small herd of bighorn sheep. I have lots of pictures of those but of course no digital photos. I'll have to scan some of them. I've seen turkeys while out there hiking, and wild turkeys are BIG. The adults stood nearly thigh-high on me. And of course there are always the usual animals, deer, rabbits, chipmunks, squirrels and lots-o-lizards. I've only once come across a rattlesnake.
Utah's got some magnificent places for hiking. I keep going back to my favorite places there, Zion, Bryce, Capital Reef and Arches National Parks. I may not go this year though, depending on a lot of things. Maybe I'll just go to Colorado instead and be lazy for awhile at my sister's place. It's too soon to decide. I've got too much happening between now and then.
I'm thinking about vacation right now because I'm borderline over-whelmed at work. One of these days I'm really going to learn to say 'no' when people ask me to do stuff .... maybe. I'm just really feeling the need to escape .... but instead I'll just suck it up and get everything done somehow. And my stress will manifest as weird dreams. Last night I dreamed I was helping someone move, which morphed into cleaning out my closet, which morphed into trying to find the right dress to wear to a formal ball, which morphed into being at the ball, which morphed into one of my recurring (re-occurring?) dreams ... that I'm fighting a guerrilla war, setting explosives. Most often I'm blowing up either munitions dumps or bridges. I guess it's my subconscious' way of handling problems in my path. Generally I'm not wearing a formal ball gown in the guerrilla war dreams though. I remember being amazed in my dream at how easy that dress was to move and run in. I must not have been wearing heels.
Zoe is just mesmerized by the birds ... when she's brave enough to go outside. Luckily she's way too fat to catch anything. She just lays and watches them with her tail twitching. When the mockingbirds are here, they taunt her. They'll strut around the yard catching bugs while she stalks them for hours. Then when she rushes, they fly up to the fence then back down to the other end of the yard, and she stalks them again for another hour. They're definitely not worried about her.
I also have barn swallows that come around every year. They used to nest over my front porch, but when I had siding put on the house the guys doing the work closed off the little space the swallows were building in. I put some fake ledges up there, but they haven't nested there again. At the end of the nesting season last year, a pair of them were checking it out though, so maybe they'll come back there this year. We'll see.
Birds are interesting creatures. Last summer in Utah my friend and I were lucky enough to spot California Condors. Too bad we didn't realize what they were at the time or we would have taken pictures. They drifted close overhead while we were on the Angel's Landing trail in Zion. Instead we just stood and watched them circle (who takes pictures of buzzards?) and wondered why they were radio-tagging buzzards. It wasn't until a day or so later that she found a book on the condors and the release program in Utah. We freaked. Interestingly, my bird book talks about how they're gone from the wild, and only a few are left in zoos. (copyright 1990!) It may be time to buy a new bird book. The ones we saw were juveniles, so they didn't have the distinctive white underwings yet.
We've seen a lot of interesting wildlife out in Utah. The baby Horny Toad in this blog is an example from this year. One year we came across a small herd of bighorn sheep. I have lots of pictures of those but of course no digital photos. I'll have to scan some of them. I've seen turkeys while out there hiking, and wild turkeys are BIG. The adults stood nearly thigh-high on me. And of course there are always the usual animals, deer, rabbits, chipmunks, squirrels and lots-o-lizards. I've only once come across a rattlesnake.
Utah's got some magnificent places for hiking. I keep going back to my favorite places there, Zion, Bryce, Capital Reef and Arches National Parks. I may not go this year though, depending on a lot of things. Maybe I'll just go to Colorado instead and be lazy for awhile at my sister's place. It's too soon to decide. I've got too much happening between now and then.
I'm thinking about vacation right now because I'm borderline over-whelmed at work. One of these days I'm really going to learn to say 'no' when people ask me to do stuff .... maybe. I'm just really feeling the need to escape .... but instead I'll just suck it up and get everything done somehow. And my stress will manifest as weird dreams. Last night I dreamed I was helping someone move, which morphed into cleaning out my closet, which morphed into trying to find the right dress to wear to a formal ball, which morphed into being at the ball, which morphed into one of my recurring (re-occurring?) dreams ... that I'm fighting a guerrilla war, setting explosives. Most often I'm blowing up either munitions dumps or bridges. I guess it's my subconscious' way of handling problems in my path. Generally I'm not wearing a formal ball gown in the guerrilla war dreams though. I remember being amazed in my dream at how easy that dress was to move and run in. I must not have been wearing heels.
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