So I am posting this on my lunch hour, and I am not at home. I am sitting in a Brueggers and using my laptop, just like all the cool busy people. Of course, I had no real reason to need to do this. But I have a laptop and I can!
Halloween blew up into a real issue at work. An email came out yesterday saying that anyone who had children trick-or-treating could leave at 4 today. I thought I'd be a smart-ass and replied that my daughter was trick-or-treating, so I thought I should leave early. Even though she's in college in another state. So then my manager talked to the VP and he said maybe they should just not let anyone leave early. And then my local boss talked to my manager and ... it was just suddenly a big issue. A later email came from the President saying essentially the same thing, though, so it's not like my region can just change a Home Office rule.
I didn't mean it to be a big issue - it wasn't that important to me. But I do think it is discriminatory, and contrary to best HR practices. After all, when they say we can leave early for Christmas holiday, they don't limit that to just the Christians. Oh well, I guess it will blow over.
Jason came over last night and borrowed a white shirt and tie so he can dress up "as something really scary - the Geek Squad!" The amusing thing is that he borrowed the tie from his sister. She still had a plain black tie from her Saddle-Seat competition days. She has also taught some of the boys she knows to tie them. It amuses me.
It's a lovely day today, so maybe I'll sit out on the front porch to hand out candy. The last time I remember doing that was the year before the Halloween blizzard. I'm VERY glad we don't have to worry about 3 feet of snow this year.
Nothing much going on this weekend. Russ has a meeting most of the day on Saturday. I do have plans to take my new picture of Beta to be framed. I'm so excited about that. It's a pastel portrait from a photo - my friend did a really good job and he looks awesome. I'll have to take a photo of it to post. I had totally given up on ever getting the portrait, so it was quite a shock when she left a message that it was done.
And since it's supposed to be a really nice weekend, I am looking forward to long walks, and possibly a dog park...
Happy Halloween!
Friday, October 31, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
7 more days
We've gone from that beautiful fall on Saturday to snowflakes on Sunday, 40 degree highs, 28 and frosty when I walked this morning.
And now it's only one more week to the election. Yes, as my acquaintances recently said, I'm tired of this election. Tired of the leaflets stuffing my mailbox and especially all the negative ads on TV. However, an acquaintance also said "I don't know anything about [candidate] but I would never vote for him because of all the leaflets he sends me". My response - don't vote, then.
Ok, if you are a party-liner, yes, I support you voting for your party's candidate. I may not like your party's candidate, but I understand voting on party lines. But you should still know something about your party's candidate, or at least your party's philosophy. If you're going to vote, know why you are voting.
And voting for the independent candidate because you don't like the party candidates' ads - well, I don't think that message will get to the candidates, but at least it's a reason. I don't like the negative ads either, and I take all of the allegations (on both sides) with a very large grain of salt. But I think elections are extremely important, and worthy of thoughtful decision.
By the way, that response of "Don't vote"? That's what I SHOULD have said. What did I actually say? A couple of party-bashing statements. That when I get the RNC robo-calls, I pick up, set the phone down on the couch, and wait until it asks me if I want to make a call - because I figure that if I just don't pick up, the RNC doesn't have to pay for the call. That I can't imagine voting for a 72-year-old cancer patient when it would put that nut-job "mavericky" colossally inexperienced and unfit-for-office Sarah Palin a heartbeat away from the Oval Office. Both are true, but unlikely to change anyone's mind. When I get annoyed at other people's attitudes, I tend to say either too much or too little. Or both.
And by election day, it will be light during my morning walk! Yea! But dark by the time I get home from work. :-(
Short days make me sad. Good thing I don't live any farther north.
And now it's only one more week to the election. Yes, as my acquaintances recently said, I'm tired of this election. Tired of the leaflets stuffing my mailbox and especially all the negative ads on TV. However, an acquaintance also said "I don't know anything about [candidate] but I would never vote for him because of all the leaflets he sends me". My response - don't vote, then.
Ok, if you are a party-liner, yes, I support you voting for your party's candidate. I may not like your party's candidate, but I understand voting on party lines. But you should still know something about your party's candidate, or at least your party's philosophy. If you're going to vote, know why you are voting.
And voting for the independent candidate because you don't like the party candidates' ads - well, I don't think that message will get to the candidates, but at least it's a reason. I don't like the negative ads either, and I take all of the allegations (on both sides) with a very large grain of salt. But I think elections are extremely important, and worthy of thoughtful decision.
By the way, that response of "Don't vote"? That's what I SHOULD have said. What did I actually say? A couple of party-bashing statements. That when I get the RNC robo-calls, I pick up, set the phone down on the couch, and wait until it asks me if I want to make a call - because I figure that if I just don't pick up, the RNC doesn't have to pay for the call. That I can't imagine voting for a 72-year-old cancer patient when it would put that nut-job "mavericky" colossally inexperienced and unfit-for-office Sarah Palin a heartbeat away from the Oval Office. Both are true, but unlikely to change anyone's mind. When I get annoyed at other people's attitudes, I tend to say either too much or too little. Or both.
And by election day, it will be light during my morning walk! Yea! But dark by the time I get home from work. :-(
Short days make me sad. Good thing I don't live any farther north.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Dog Park
It was a gorgeous fall day today. Bright blue sky, perfect temperature, just a little wind.
I decided it was a great day to go to the dog park. I have recently found that the park district has set up off-leash areas at several parks. I went to Bryant Lake last weekend, and Carver today. Both were fully fenced, with a double-gate entry system to foil escapees, and a small-dog section available. Bryant is much smaller - about the size of the Bloomington park we'd been using, but nicely laid out. Carver is huge - about 27 acres, I think it said. Mostly grass land, but there is a hill in the middle, and they've mowed paths through the grass. Bravo just loved it, yet he didn't want to be too far out of my sight.
We started walking around the park with a younger Golden and his owners. About halfway around, I had lagged a little behind and Bravo was around the bend, and ahead of the other two people. When he spotted me coming around the corner, he got quite excited. He did his little racing-around-in-circles-at-full-speed thing, and got both the Golden and a Great Dane to chase him. He can be FAST when he goes all out. After that, I continued to be behind the mother and daughter who were with the Golden, and Bravo kept running ahead, and then checking back to be sure I was there. It was quite cute.
After one circuit, though, Bravo decided we were going to leave. This has been his habit at the other dog park, as well. Today he actually got out into the exit area when another dog was leaving. I had to go get him, and then we went walking some more, while I took more pictures.
He found a tennis ball along the trail, and I threw that for him a bit. And when we got back to the entrance, I made sure that I took him well away from the gate to put on the leash. And that he waited nicely to be invited through.
Hope you all enjoyed the day, too.
I decided it was a great day to go to the dog park. I have recently found that the park district has set up off-leash areas at several parks. I went to Bryant Lake last weekend, and Carver today. Both were fully fenced, with a double-gate entry system to foil escapees, and a small-dog section available. Bryant is much smaller - about the size of the Bloomington park we'd been using, but nicely laid out. Carver is huge - about 27 acres, I think it said. Mostly grass land, but there is a hill in the middle, and they've mowed paths through the grass. Bravo just loved it, yet he didn't want to be too far out of my sight.
We started walking around the park with a younger Golden and his owners. About halfway around, I had lagged a little behind and Bravo was around the bend, and ahead of the other two people. When he spotted me coming around the corner, he got quite excited. He did his little racing-around-in-circles-at-full-speed thing, and got both the Golden and a Great Dane to chase him. He can be FAST when he goes all out. After that, I continued to be behind the mother and daughter who were with the Golden, and Bravo kept running ahead, and then checking back to be sure I was there. It was quite cute.
After one circuit, though, Bravo decided we were going to leave. This has been his habit at the other dog park, as well. Today he actually got out into the exit area when another dog was leaving. I had to go get him, and then we went walking some more, while I took more pictures.
He found a tennis ball along the trail, and I threw that for him a bit. And when we got back to the entrance, I made sure that I took him well away from the gate to put on the leash. And that he waited nicely to be invited through.
Hope you all enjoyed the day, too.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Mankind in its infancy
Guest blogger Russ is back...
For no apparent reason I recalled today that I've heard somewhere that
"mankind is in its infancy". I don't know why it occurred to me, but I was
struck by how much that phrase explains. It explains all the yelling, all
the fighting, the inability to settle disputes, the selfishness, the
recklessness and, above all, why we make messes and don't seem to have the
ability to clean them up ourselves. Now, please don't think I'm being sexist
by referring to "mankind". I am being literal. I think womankind is much
farther along in its maturity. I think of womankind as the responsible teen
age baby-sitters for mankind and it's a shame they're not in charge more
often.
For no apparent reason I recalled today that I've heard somewhere that
"mankind is in its infancy". I don't know why it occurred to me, but I was
struck by how much that phrase explains. It explains all the yelling, all
the fighting, the inability to settle disputes, the selfishness, the
recklessness and, above all, why we make messes and don't seem to have the
ability to clean them up ourselves. Now, please don't think I'm being sexist
by referring to "mankind". I am being literal. I think womankind is much
farther along in its maturity. I think of womankind as the responsible teen
age baby-sitters for mankind and it's a shame they're not in charge more
often.
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Big Read redux
After I posted the book list recently, it was bugging me that I couldn't find anything about it on the NEA and Big Read websites, as noted in the source. I did some more searching today. At first, I found only copies of the list on blogs with similar attributions. Finally, a comment on one of the blogs led me, not quite directly, to this article from guardian.co.uk. Apparently, the list was compiled in March, 2007 with input from "The 2,000 people who took part in the poll online at worldbookday.com [and] nominated their top 10 titles that they could not live without." So perhaps that explains why there are some anomalies, like Chronicles of Narnia plus The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe.
No, Karis, reading does not make you a nerd, but perhaps the need to track down such details does. Not that being a nerd is a bad thing...
In other news, I just heard from Jason, and he is back in the US. Apparently they had a great time, and only a very short bout with intestinal difficulties (less than a day). I hope to find out more this weekend, and he says there will be pictures at some point...
No, Karis, reading does not make you a nerd, but perhaps the need to track down such details does. Not that being a nerd is a bad thing...
In other news, I just heard from Jason, and he is back in the US. Apparently they had a great time, and only a very short bout with intestinal difficulties (less than a day). I hope to find out more this weekend, and he says there will be pictures at some point...
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Bravo and the park
Bravo here. I wanted to tell you all about this park near our house. It has a really big green thing and a playground and other stuff. Julie takes me up there sometimes, but not very often. A long time ago (Julie says it was months ago, whatever that means. I don't really do time well), we went up there and since there was no one else around, she let me off lead. She doesn't do that very often, let me tell you.
Well, I ran across the field and there was a fence and a BIG patch of dirt and right by the fence there was a box with a ball next to it. Naturally I picked up the ball. It was different from the ones at home, though - heavier and not at all squishy. But still, it was a ball and I'd found it and I was going to have a lot of fun with it! Except, of course, Julie took it away from me and left it there. She can be a real spoil-sport sometimes.
Then not quite so long ago, Julie let me run at the park again. As soon as I got off lead, I went straight to the box and looked for the ball she made me leave there. I sniffed all around the box, but couldn't find it anywhere. Julie was really surprised that I found the same box so fast! So then she called me and we went to where there was another space completely surrounded by a tall fence. I'd seen a place like that before, and it had been covered with tennis balls. This one didn't have any balls inside the fence, but I did manage to find one under a tree nearby. It was nice and light and squishy, just right to chomp on. Julie threw it for me a few times, and then I carried it all the way home.
This morning we walked in that same park again. But this time, I didn't get to go off lead. And there were no balls to be found anywhere. Found balls are my favorite thing! Well, except food. And getting to meet new people.
Well, I ran across the field and there was a fence and a BIG patch of dirt and right by the fence there was a box with a ball next to it. Naturally I picked up the ball. It was different from the ones at home, though - heavier and not at all squishy. But still, it was a ball and I'd found it and I was going to have a lot of fun with it! Except, of course, Julie took it away from me and left it there. She can be a real spoil-sport sometimes.
Then not quite so long ago, Julie let me run at the park again. As soon as I got off lead, I went straight to the box and looked for the ball she made me leave there. I sniffed all around the box, but couldn't find it anywhere. Julie was really surprised that I found the same box so fast! So then she called me and we went to where there was another space completely surrounded by a tall fence. I'd seen a place like that before, and it had been covered with tennis balls. This one didn't have any balls inside the fence, but I did manage to find one under a tree nearby. It was nice and light and squishy, just right to chomp on. Julie threw it for me a few times, and then I carried it all the way home.
This morning we walked in that same park again. But this time, I didn't get to go off lead. And there were no balls to be found anywhere. Found balls are my favorite thing! Well, except food. And getting to meet new people.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
New toy
I haven't been posting much lately. But for the last several days, I have an excuse. On Tuesday, I my laptop arrived! No, I didn't really NEED a laptop. But my Dell desktop was pretty old (I checked - we got it in 2001). It was making funny noises, especially at startup, that made me worry about the hard drive. And it was slow! The last straw was when Jason checked it out and found out the memory was at 512MB, and it was MAXED OUT, and the processor was running at under 1 GHz. Of course, I do have a Mac desktop as well, that I was actually using for most things. But I liked my Windows version of Quicken, and I had one or two other programs that had no Mac equivalent. Yes, I could put Windows on the Mac. But frankly, I just wanted a laptop. My excuse is, now I can do the bills while watching television, so it won't be such a horrible chore.
Anyway, it's a shiny new Dell with 3 MB RAM, 2 GHz processor speed, and a 250 GB hard drive. (Well, not actually shiny on the outside; shiny in the Firefly sense. I got the blue color. Which is a little dark, but it's cool that it looks different when it's in the light.)
And I've spent tons of time this last week getting it set up. Loading the programs I want or need (which does not include most of the programs that were on the desktop, actually!) Transferring data from the old Dell and the Mac. Which was easy from the Dell (I had an external hard drive to use), but much more difficult from the Mac (couldn't connect the external drive too it, and for a long time, couldn't find it on the network). I'm proud that I was able to do all of that on my own. Of course, my tech support person was (IS) in Nicaragua, so I had to either do it myself or wait. And I don't do waiting well.
Now all my photos and music are nicely organized on the new computer. I have all the programs I need, and most of the ones I want, set up and ready to go. And have tried out all the important ones. I'm still using the Mac, but it is fun to play on the computer during commercial breaks, or like now, just sitting on the couch with the computer on my lap.
Yes, it was self-indulgent and unnecessary. I don't care. Another instance when I am not acting like an adult. (Oh yeah, I haven't actually posted the entry about being an adult yet. Maybe soon. Not sure it's ready for publication.)
I'm having fun with it. It's a new toy!
Anyway, it's a shiny new Dell with 3 MB RAM, 2 GHz processor speed, and a 250 GB hard drive. (Well, not actually shiny on the outside; shiny in the Firefly sense. I got the blue color. Which is a little dark, but it's cool that it looks different when it's in the light.)
And I've spent tons of time this last week getting it set up. Loading the programs I want or need (which does not include most of the programs that were on the desktop, actually!) Transferring data from the old Dell and the Mac. Which was easy from the Dell (I had an external hard drive to use), but much more difficult from the Mac (couldn't connect the external drive too it, and for a long time, couldn't find it on the network). I'm proud that I was able to do all of that on my own. Of course, my tech support person was (IS) in Nicaragua, so I had to either do it myself or wait. And I don't do waiting well.
Now all my photos and music are nicely organized on the new computer. I have all the programs I need, and most of the ones I want, set up and ready to go. And have tried out all the important ones. I'm still using the Mac, but it is fun to play on the computer during commercial breaks, or like now, just sitting on the couch with the computer on my lap.
Yes, it was self-indulgent and unnecessary. I don't care. Another instance when I am not acting like an adult. (Oh yeah, I haven't actually posted the entry about being an adult yet. Maybe soon. Not sure it's ready for publication.)
I'm having fun with it. It's a new toy!
Saturday, October 18, 2008
The Big Read
Saw this on Deb's blog, and of course I had to do it.
“The Big Read is an NEA program designed to encourage community reading initiatives. Of their top 100 books, they estimate the average adult has read only six.” (I couldn't find the list at either of these links, but I just copied and pasted this.)
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible - parts if it
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare - Most of the comedies and tragedies, some of the histories
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis - the first 3 or so
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
So there’s my list. I've read 53, and parts of 3 others. Some of them (like the Austen novels) I have read multiple times.
I do think it's strange that they list "complete works of Shakespeare" and also "Hamlet", and "Chronicles of Narnia" and also "The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe". I have never heard of some of these books, and don't want to read some of the others, but I've added quite a few books to my "to-read" list. Just what I needed - as if it wasn't already a really long list!
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