She's so funny

I have a sister who likes to remain the "smallest" in the family. When I say I don't want candy, this is wht she does. She purchases the biggest box of candy she can find. This is what she gave me for Christmas. I am not surprised by her antics. This is her nature.

Uh...that is not me holding the box of chocolates. I do wear glasses, but I don't have as much facial hair. I don't think. I snagged this photo for emphasis of the box size.

I watched "Lincoln".  I had to watch it twice. I should probably watch it a third time. The first time on the TV and the second on my PC. It was difficult to hear what he said from time to time so a second viewing was important to me.

It is interesting to read this article if you have seen the movie. I was a bit taken aback when they made that remark about the fifty-cent piece. imdb.com also has several "goofs" from the movie.

Tilapia

First time in my life I have fixed fish (other than the frozen, breaded kind). My niece fries hers, I baked this. It was fantastic. I'll be doing this a lot more often. My Mom hated fish. I worked in a restaurant that was known for its deep fried fish.

I have yet to try grilling fish. I baked this. I want to go with more seasonings and less butter. I followed the suggestion on the bag. Sweet basil and salt/pepper to taste. I want to try lemon butter next time.

This was my treat after a long day of wrapping last week.

Growing families

Perhaps every family goes through stages such as this. For a long time it feels stalled. Nobody having babies or one having a baby and nobody else for five years or more. Then the dam breaks and everybody is having a baby or hooking up with a lady who has a child or two of her own and the family mushrooms.

Such is the case this past year and damn, to me that is a good sign. Cripes I feel like I am acting like Jock Ewing. It seemed that all that guy ever wanted was grand babies.

For the first time since moving to my house in 2002, I am not hosting Christmas eve. I think. Yep. I am almost positive that each Christmas eve I have had my daughter and my niece and nephew here and my sister (niece and nephew's mom) when she was not incarcerated.

This year my nephew is hosting the event. YAY! He met a lady who has a young boy and my sister lives close to him and my niece with her new husband live close to them, also. It would be silly for all of them to travel to my house Christmas eve when now it is just my daughter and I. We can travel to them.

My daughter's beau is in Florida visiting his family for the holiday.

If  you travel this holiday, may your roads be dry and clear. (And "rein"deer free.) If you are feeling sickly, may you have a respite long enough to enjoy the time with loved ones. If you are feeling low may the spirit visit you and fill your heart with love and joy until you swell with the feeling of all that is good and promising in the world. May you savor a taste of good food, good drink and good conversation.

Just one moment to relish in the moment - to know that we are all one with each other. We all feel pain, we all feel joy, we all cry, we all bleed, we all want what is best for our loved ones and the world at large. We all suffer loss at some point in our life. We know that it passes. Time heals. Our brains are equipped to diminish the pain over time, but to also allow ourselves to remember the good times and hopefully learn from the hard times. 

For this holiday season and all to come - prevail. Ups and downs, good times and bad. Let us prevail.

Ha! ha!

This photo is far better than any I have taken recently. Sister 1944 took the photo and this is her latest grandson. (She has 3). This little tyke was deemed to sick to go to daycare but sure was happy about staying with Grandma and Grandpa for the day.

May you see joy in the faces of your family this holiday season. And, may they see joy in yours.

Hazard in my home

I still have one of these in my bathroom medicine cabinet. Yep. A health hazard. I cannot even throw it in the trash. I have to dispose of it properly. Maybe I'll just keep it. And here I am thinking if anything was going to be a health hazard it would be the mold in the basement. Or at least, the kitty litter box.

We used to play with mercury in a bowl when I was young. My brother would break the thermometer and we would roll the mercury around in a big white bowl and watch it bead up and separate and reabsorb itself back together. We poked our fingers into it to make it separate. My best guess in late 60's or very early 70's.

Kept us fascinated for an hour or two before just washing it down the sink drain.

And the mercury in my teeth? I have a lot of fillings. I was more fortunate than my siblings (being the youngest). I received the best dental care and was introduced to dental hygiene at an earlier age than they were. I am the only sibling without false or at last partial teeth in my mouth.

Reading about mercury poisoning, I can pretty much blame every problem I have on mercury poisoning. Yep. I love the one about children - a symptom of mercury poisoning is that they do not respond to their name. LOL! Then, every kid I ever knew and know has it!

Anyway, the thermometer reference means I am sick again today. Ear ache and sore throat and tired. I hate waking up tired. I have no motivation at work. Not since the latest incident. Sucked the joy right out of my work. I called off Monday, and wanted to go home yesterday. Another co-worker beat me to it and I said "Oh, heck with it. Just tough it out the rest of the day." 

Advil, coffee and a shower. Hey, I wonder if you can get a false leg with a boot that can kick you in the rear? You know, just attach it to your bathroom door like you would a mirror. Whenever you need a boost, just push a button and turn around - bam! One kick in the rear. Well, it may just make somebody a million. Well, what? There was that pet rock thing! And that god-awful singing fish on the wall!

Absorption

I can only handle a little at a time. For the first few days the blaring headlines and a few sentences in was all I could read before I began to get sick.

I do not have cable (or air) TV so I heard no news. If a web page began their video spewing prior to my clicking play , it was immediately paused. I want to hear nothing.

Three days in, I was able to read a paragraph or two - before I read something that horrified me so I had to quickly turn away and do something or read something else.  

Personally, nobody knows if more control will stop this madness or not. Nobody has a crystal ball. Perhaps we just feel that we have to do something instead of nothing.

The link to the above map:  

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/07/24/interactive-map-the-us-shooting-epidemic.html

Breathing

Not my photo - swiped it from the Internets

So there I was Sunday. The day after the party. I was uncomfortable. I was finding it hard to catch my breath. Really? I only drank half a beer and one tiny kamikaze. Which was very delicious, I might add!

I fixed dinner. I dabbled on the computer. I watched a Christmas special. I washed some clothes. Other than that I just didn't feel all that good. No headache, though. Just a tightness in my chest and short of breath.

I went to bed at the usual time. I woke up earlier than usual this morning. Hmmm. Tightness in chest is gone. I feel pretty good. I get up - take the dogs out. I had two hours before getting ready for work. I get on the computer, catch up on some stuff. After about an hour I feel that tightness in my chest again. And, that smell! Ugh. That air freshener I found in the Christmas decorations sure lasts a long time!

I had sprayed some holiday scent on Wednesday when I put the tree up. It is one of those tiny cans from Bath & Body scented in winter holiday or something like that. Yuck! That can got tossed, turned my fan on and am trying to air the room out. It is warm outside but not near warm enough to open a door or window. It is also wet and damp.

Smells have always been an issue for me, but now that I get fewer headaches I thought I could stand a spritz of holiday freshness. Can it.

Which brings me to the lovely picture I have posted above. Not very festive is it?

Brother 1953 loved bugs and snakes and frogs. He collected many different creatures of that nature. He wanted to keep them all so he kept them in jars of formaldehyde in our basement. Our basement shelves contained canned tomatoes, green beans, carrots and pickles on one side and on the other - spiders, snakes, frogs, and salamanders in jars of formaldehyde. When my friends were allowed to come over they wanted to go to the basement to see the bugs and snakes. Needless to say their parents always wanted me to come to their house instead of the other way around. Could be they heard of the bugs and snakes in our basement (along with the dad with the drinking problem).

Anyway, one time nephew 1972 must have been angry or just being a kid - broke all the jars in  our basement. Probably early 80's. Our house smelled of formaldehyde for a long time. I was away at the time. Somebody else picked up the critters, but the liquid was all over the floor and shelves. I can imagine how that smell must have affected the few of us still living in the house. Along with our coal fireplace. My mom loved that fireplace in our dining room. 

Air fresheners and household cleansers can be very obnoxious to people with sensitive sniffers.

http://www.livestrong.com/article/208333-health-risks-of-scented-air-fresheners/

Phthalates

http://healthwyze.org/index.php/component/content/article/184-how-air-fresheners-are-killing-you.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formaldehyde

Annual Christmas party

Photo courtesy of nephew 1977.

We had a record 37 show. Oldest is 70 and youngest is 10 days. The ten day old one barely opened his eyes the entire time. With a crowd and noise level like this, I don't blame the wee, little one. Keep your eyes closed. You are not ready to deal with this mess, yet.

The group was unmanageable. I lost control early into the evening. The games were sporadic at best. I did better playing the games with the bar staff - they were much more interested. This group (my family) were out of control. They were having a good time. And, that is much more important than any games or regime. Games are good if folks are bored - but this was not a bored crowd. They (we) entertain ourselves.

The kids were numerous this year. YAY! Our family is producing again! The three in the photo below are extras to the family - no blood relation at all. LOL! We (as a family) don't care. We love everybody. The more the merrier!

 

Photo courtesy of niece 1982.

 

I picked up flashing sunglasses that were "cartoon-themed". Here are three rambunctious boys showing off their shades and their latest gangsta movies. Or, dance move  - I don't know. I can't keep up.

My cheeks hurt from laughing so hard. I like to see folks having a good time and when we dispersed there were the younger ones still at the bar. I got more "alcohol-related" hugs than ever. I mean hanging on to me for dear life hugs. I guess they were trying to stay in an upright position. All had designated drivers, and all got home safely. Though I am getting the impression (from reading facebook) that something went down with a cop and Taco Bell that I am trying to pull the story out of my niece. Hee, hee.

An addict is an addict is an addict

I tell everyone "I hate to shop."  Actually, I am an addict. Probably. I don't know. I am a binge shopper. I was a binge drinker. You can go through life and never have a drink again. You can't go through life and never shop again. Not realistically. I have to be very careful when I shop.

I don't quit.

Christmas is the hardest. I have to start late because I do not quit. I have to keep buying gifts for people. I love to give, give, give.

We are having our annual family party tonight. At a restaurant. A record 40 are showing. There are a few friends coming, but still...mostly family. And their significant others.

And, babies. We have new babies this year. YAY!

Out of the immediate family two nephews cannot make it.

All 8 children will be there. I have to find my cameras and get them charged up!

I stole a couple of games from the party I went to on the first and I made up one of my own. I watched The Grinch carefully and came up with 10 wacky questions about the show. From the easiest "What color is the Grinch?" to the hardest "How many years has the Grinch put up with the Who characters making noise?"

We are in a new restaurant this year. They have promised us a private room. I tell them that there will be singing, laughter and noise. I don't want to disturb the other patrons.

Hopefully, I will have some pics to post tomorrow.

Vacation!

I have been on vacation this week. Either I am doing a bunch, or I am not doing anything. Sort of a balance, I guess. But, no posting. Huh? What is up with that?

Road Trip

East to west. Route 70 today. Three sisters in a car. There will be lots of stories and lots of laughter. Sadly, no shopping. More of a personal business trip for sister 1949.

Games

My family enjoys playing Left,Center, Right and Tripoley after the Thanksgiving meal. I notice that football was scratched from the menu this year. I did hear somebody  mention it, then somebody else said "Wait until after this play" as they were watching football on TV. They never got back to the actual going outside and throwing the ball around. One person did duck out at six and go shopping. She came back by nine with stories to tell us about the chaos.

Left, Center, Right is safe enough. We play with nickles. Only about five of us played that. When the Tripoley board came out, though - it turned to eight and nine. We only play with nickles and it always take a few rounds for us to get into the "swing" of things as we never remember how to play until two or three hands in.

I tallied up that if I had never won any of the money on the board and if we played (I estimated) 25 rounds, and having to pay an average of ten cents at the end of each game the most one could lose was about  $12.50 total. Not too bad if you are working, but for those not working it may be hard. I think the only one we had not working this year was the six year old. My sister made certain that he had his little satchel of nickles, though. He was slow, but most of us were patient. The trick is to wait out the players. Most had to bundle up and leave and the die hards that stayed until the end had the best chance of winning. I was spending the night so I was in for the long haul.

The meal was fantastic. We had way too much. My corn pudding went over very well. As did my cheese ball and tray. The tray consists of various sliced cheeses, pepperoni slices and trail bologna sliced up with spicy mustard. I must have picked out the extra hot jalapeno cheese this year as a lot of people were loving it. Not one of my favorites. I prefer brick/butter/muenster cheese.

Another hit was the cranberry nut bread that I made. I may make more of that today. It goes very quickly.

Today I plan to bake a turkey with all the trimmings. I don't feel like it. Yet. I slept in until 9:00. That is so rare for me. I did not sleep well the night before (being in a strange place) and now I am out of sorts. My head hurt all day yesterday and by evening we were getting a light dusting of snow. The day had started out at 51º . It became colder all day. And, yes - I did have to take a migraine pill later in the afternoon. Ugh!

Sister 1956 and I had planned to spend the night and chat with sister 1944 after the dinner because she is always so sad when it is time for everyone to go and she and her husband and my oldest brother are left in the house. Sister 1954 had to work Friday and was going back that evening until she got wind that we were staying. She was drunk before she even go to the dinner so she was determined to stay. She did until 3:30 a.m. and more or less ruined it for us. Again. She picks at things with us trying to get a reaction. I try to tell the rest of the family not to believe what she says. She starts rumors about family members etc, and my other sisters believe her. I told them the next day not to.

Side note: sister 1954 had a driver and she lives over two hours away. Whether she made it to work on Friday or not  has not been determined. I am almost certain she did. She only had to work 9 to 1 and she usually can function well enough to get by when she is hung over or drunk or both. She has had enough experience doing both.

Now, to go and get that turkey in the oven and peel some potatoes. I can't believe it is 10 o'clock and I have not even had my first cup of coffee. What is wrong with the world? My head will be in a fog all day!

Golden Delicious

May your turkey day be simple yet bountiful today. My favorite apple, the golden delicious. I can't find ones like this in the stores these days. One day I was shopping and the store had NO oranges. NO oranges. Can you imagine what life will (or would) be like if the produce stopped coming to the stores? Or a blight wiped them out? I probably won't sink my teeth into a golden delicious today, but I certainly will have a lot of other stuff to enjoy and be thankful for.

NAT the filter

Work update. It was "nat" the filter. It was NAT. I cannot explain why for a month every time I would by-pass the filter the end users seemed to work fine. Until Monday morning I found a tech group who were not going through the filter and they had this issue.

It was resolved in 24 hours.

It was NAT.

This school year brought in a lot (a LOT) of BYOD (bring your own device) and a barrage of iPads. Our network was not prepared for all the new requests for IP addresses.

Zero

Zero bids. Are you surprised? Actually there were so many pages of this product on the infamous auction site that I quit going through them all, but had to record this one.

"For a Good Cause" is open to debate.

Calm

Water has some calming effect. I also like to look at cute puppies and kittens when I am stressed. 

I want to thank all of you for your wonderful words of support and wisdom. When my head clears I will be alright. I am dismayed by the lack of help from my coworkers. I think that bothers me the most. And, my gruff demeanor of my management. 

I am not getting the cold shoulder as much as I thought I was. Other techs in other areas are reaching out to me to help me. They make me laugh. They are actually helping more than my coworkers. I guess in a way they are my coworkers.

Sometimes a little understanding goes a long way.

Going through the motions until I can get out of this disaster and begin the cleanup. My life is still flooded with this problem. Once the flood stops and the water begins to recede, then I will decide if I need to rebuild or start fresh somewhere else.

How long ago?

When was the last time you created a resume? Wow. Been a while for me. I have a few friends out of work and I heard them speaking of how they have to go to a class to learn how to create a decent resume (you know you have to earn your unemployment, now?). They said it is equivalent to a full time job - this unemployment. I have to say (and I hope I am not jinxing it) that I have never been on unemployment.

I went into the office yesterday morning with my heart sailing above the clouds. There were two jobs within an hour of me that I could apply for. I felt good, I felt strong. Two hours later I was banging my fist into some scrap PC. Yeah. I have never done anything like that before. I certainly need to do something. I am making myself sick.

I let the company that makes the filter have it with both barrels again. They said they were going to send a message on company letter head for me to give my school techs informing the techs that all is not my fault. By the time I got the letter they had twisted the words around (of course to make it so they were not liable) but it ended up not being accurate in the least and I know if I send it out to my techs they will just shrug and say "This company sucks. And Peruby was wrong."

I am shunned. My morale is zilch. I must have really crossed the line with that message about "wasting my time" to the techs. I realize that I am not imagining the cold shoulder. The female techs are more sympathetic and I suppose one will tell me the entire story one day. But until then, I am going to be as gentle with them as I can and steer clear of any activity other than my job with them. Learn from this and move on.

LOL! My knuckles are sore but no damage. The side to the tower of a PC gives quite a bit. The funny part was I sort of zone out (of course when you are in a rage you do that) but I remember seeing big dust bunnies floating through the air, and I was like "Huh, where is that coming from?"  Then I realized what I had done. So much for canned air, huh?

I have only gone "into a rage" three times in my life. The other two were in my early twenties. See this post. Then I got a grip. Now, it seems that perhaps I need to step back and take a long look at what is happening to me and take the appropriate action to save myself.

Noo!!!!!

Sigh. Firing squad all by shunned me. Well, they did shun me. I guess that is even worse than shooting me. I got the cold shoulder. They more or less ignored me. I can read my environment well. I like the phrase "I don't need a brick to fall on my head."  Needless to say, I did not invite myself to go to lunch with them. When you walk back into the room and they stop talking it is a bit .... awkward. When I asked one girl tech where everyone was going for lunch, she seriously looked like she was in pain. I asked her if she were going, and she scrunched her face up in pain and said "Well, I guess so, since it is on my way."  No invite, no "Come on with us" - nothing. No, I don't need a brick to fall on my head.

Then I got a reprimand from my manager (the one who said I used the word "hell") in an e-mail to the local techs. Now, he says I was chastising a tech in an e-mail and he has to write me up. I said something to the tune of "If you don't let me know you are having an issue, then I figure that you are not having one. It is a waste of my time when I try to troubleshoot but I don't have the correct facts." Something like that.

One co-worker sleeps during meetings, one pretends not to know what is going on, the other ducks out every chance he gets and they write me up. At least I am doing something to earn a written warning, I guess. If I just lay and play dead like the others, then perhaps I would not have any written warnings, either.

Maybe my manager wants desperately to put me in my place. I had to smirk when I heard him say "Now, you are not getting written up, it is not going in your file, I just need you to sign it to say that we talked about the issue." Really? If it is not official then why do I need to sign it?

All he did was put the fire out. I had passion for my work. I mean real passion. I loved it. It consumed me. It is dead, now. Well, something had to give. I was too far in. 

Time for Peruby attitude adjustment. I did it before, I can do it again. I can bring myself around again. Nothing my manager said made me feel one iota better. He kept saying "You are not in this alone."  I brought up the co-worker sleeping and he laughed. He calls this co-worker by a pet name. If a man's name is Bob, my manager called him Bobby. Nobody else calls him "bobby". It is like a pet name. When my manager realized that I was not laughing with him, he said "Well, I think it is a physical issue. What you were saying was not boring."  Funny. He didn't sleep during any of the other's talking.

I can't keep rambling. Again, I am consumed. I am too close to the issue. I am thin skinned. I have to step back and realize this is temporary. My ruffled feathers will get smoothed over.

Like other jobs before me, I usually know the signs for when it is time to leave. I have all the signs. All the signs. Dammit to hell!

Written warning = 1; morale = 0.

Outlook not so good

I became really sick over the week-end. I am coughing so hard I shake. That kind of dry cough that gets worse if you talk. Or breathe.

But, I'll be damned if I am calling in sick this morning. Today is our area meeting with the tech cords of my local schools.

I am going to be lynched. I talked them into staying with this filter company for one more year. I could never have imagined the issues that we have had.

Time to put my big girl panties on and a cough drop in my mouth.

Bring it. Hit me with your best shot. I have to take it. I'll keep my mouth shut until spoken to and then talk as sweet as pumpkin pie. I will no longer defend the product. I've had enough.

Let the naysayers from last spring have their glory this morning.

A little help here?

Please accept my apologies ahead of time for the use of profanity.

Remember my "thin skinned" story from a week ago? It still lives. My organization has been battling this issue for over two weeks. The school districts are fed up. Students will submit an answer in the middle of a quiz and lose the entire shooting match. Their quiz is lost - gone. Somebody asked me where it went? Did it go up into data land? I looked at them. A memory from 1983 came rushing back to my head. I was training my sister how to do my data entry at work (I was leaving) and because of a poorly configured computer system we lost our all work one evening and when she asked where the work went I told her it went up into data land. She reached up her arms grabbing the air "Can't we just pull them back down?"

Wow. It was that kind of moment when you realize that certain people cannot see the dimension. Nothing against them. It is like me with math. I cannot see it. I have not had an instructor who has been able to break through to me to see it. It was like this. 

Where does it go? I told the lady yesterday it was never there to begin with. Her head exploded. This was after she told me she was afraid the country was heading toward socialism. It was all too much for her to handle. I like this lady, I just do not share her beliefs.

Back to my story....this issue has become critical for my organization. Our clients (schools) are not happy. Since the problem is happening at many school districts we are the ones who have to fix it. It isn't "them" it must be "us".  "Us" looks for somebody else to blame and they chose my appliance. The filtering system. Which makes sense because my filters were down on October 22nd and the problems appeared on October 23rd. How can you fight with that logic? 

I have worked every day with a top level engineer from my appliance's organization. My luck has been lousy. Every time I can manage to get this tech on the line (he is on the west coast, I am on the east coast) I have difficulty getting a tech at a school who is also available. Then the rare chance that I get a tech and this engineer at the same time do you believe the fucking system will not trip? It is like the old adage of taking your car to the mechanic and it runs like a dream for him. The engineer observes the appliance while the tech browses site after site after site - with not one flipping issue. Ten minutes ago the tech could barely get anywhere on the Internet without getting "Page cannot be found"  or  "Cannot connect to the Server". It is maddening beyond belief. This happened so many times it was just spooky.

We had a department meeting yesterday. There were five of us in attendance. All know that this issue is critical crazy. My director (the one who reprimanded me for using the word "hell") asked me for an update on the problem. I began explaining what schools are having the issue and what schools are not. Some schools just plain do not tell me. This makes troubleshooting very difficult. At one point I looked over and one of my co-workers was sitting with his eyes closed. He is notorious for sleeping during meetings. WTF? Very nice. No help from him.

I continued. What do you do? Wake him up? Point him out? He used to be my manager. He used to sleep during meetings when he was a manager, too. For the record "I" did not sleep during the time he gave HIS update. Screw him. My next question was for a school in another county. Another co-worker (has always been a friend) took care of this district so I asked him, "Has school 'a' been having this issue?"   He turned and looked at me. "Having issue with what?" Jesus H. Christ! Mother Fuckity Fuck!

Seriously. This is a critical matter where the schools are going to lynch us. If we do not get this issue resolved we are looking at a gigantic break here. How long do we expect the schools to put up with this crap? He knows of what problem I am speaking of. What is wrong with this picture? I have to take the week-end and step back. Am I too close to the problem? Was  I being a bore? I tried not to go into detail because I can lose people in the explanations.

They have been working with me for the past two weeks. They are aware of the problem. Why are they acting dumb at this meeting?  Like I said - there is my thin skin issue again.