Ponderings and Musings

I am hearing the leaves rustle in the wind for the first time in 2011. This is making me very happy. It is bringing my mood back to center, where it should be. Monday mornings occasionally make me lose focus. The rustle of the leaves is a gentle reminder that all is right with my little world.

I am not a morning person. As much as people tell me that it’s easy to be a morning person, I fully believe that you are wired to be either a morning or a non-morning person and all the talking in the world isn’t going to change that fact. My work schedule dictates that I must go to bed when I am really just waking up. My body screams for supper at 11 at night, even if I’ve already one or two suppers beforehand.

The way for me to get through the pre-lunch hours of a Monday is with silence. Just let me be, let me sort out the cobwebs in my head and let me find my bearings on my own. Luckily, my work environment allows for this approach in a fairly acceptable way. Just give me either silence or a gentle, distracting sound and I’ll be fine.

The leaves are still rustling. The breeze is gentle. The smile creeps back to my face.

Good morning.

I think people in general have lost their minds. And I blame the Internet for this lunacy. What was once a safe haven for geeks and an easy way to exchange porn has become a mammoth machine of idiocy perpetuation. Anyone with a computer smarter than a toaster can broadcast whatever they please on Internet. This, in turn, seems to have given everyone the license to embrace all that’s idiotic and disregard any sort of common sense.

Some signs of this lunacy:

1. I was passed by a man driving a beat up car in a rather haphazard fashion this morning. He was moving at approximately 75 MPH. His path was erratic because he was steering with his foot so that he could use both hands on his mobile device, which was poised in either texting or donkey kong mode. I couldn’t tell as I was still trying to process the foot on the steering wheel thing.

2. Two bloggers that I have enjoyed over the years have basically reduced their blogs to a second rate episode of Bewitched, specifically the one where Agnes Moorehead and Mercedes McCambridge basically cackle wickedly at each other in attempts to see who can be the most witty and catty at the same time. All I want to do is read about the bayou and admire the ginger beards.

3. Another vehicle spotted on the commute today proclaimed that during the rapture on 5/21/11 his vehicle would be available for transportation since it would be empty. Sorry, but I’m not driving to wherever I’m suppose to be regardless of what happens on 5/21/11. Someone can drive Me.

4. People are croaking that they want to see the dead body of Bin Laden because it’s not good enough that the president said he was dead, we must have proof. A human being is dead people, regardless of the fact that the man is a monster and deserved what he got, he’s still dead. Would you walk up to a casket and shake the body just to make sure? Of course not. The president can still be trusted even though he’s not white, not old and not Republican. Would we have asked for the same proof if George Lite was in office?

5. Gas stations in the area are now modifying their price displays to show the price per gallon if you also buy a car wash or use their discount card. This makes the price appear lower when taking a quick glance. Deceptive. If you can afford to lower the price of gas when using these added benefits then you can afford to lower the price period. I want to take a solar panel and use it to aim a death ray at every gas station sign in the country. I’d be power my green car up while in the process of taking aim, of course.

6. Is the nuclear situation in Japan over? Are the people that were suffering from the aftermath of the quakes all better? Does anyone care? What’s happening to the people in the south? The country is being ravaged by storms this season but people don’t seem to really care about it.

2011 is right on schedule. And it’s full of nuts.

I’ve been doing a lot more reading than writing lately. I have always loved to read and I clearly don’t have enough time during my work week to enjoy it as much as I’d like.

I have found at I am growing tired of reading books about technology; this is where the Internet shines, because if I want to read anything about technology I am able to do a quick Google search and start reading away. I like that. Reading about Linux or whatever in a book though? That’s not my thing anymore.

I am reading a couple of books at the moment, one of them being my favorite science fiction book of all time, “The Demu Trilogy” by FM Busby. The characters feel familiar because I have read this book over two dozen times since my mid-teens, but I still find nuances and the like with each new visit of the book. I also recently finished a never published story from the Tom Swift series I read as a kid; this particular series in question was about Tom Swift’s adventures in space. I used to get quite excited when I would see a new book in the series on the shelf at the B. Dalton book store. I stumbled across a couple of PDFs that contained unpublished stories a few months ago and I have been enjoying them. The characters feels familiar in these new stories, it’s a nice blend of old and new. It’s kind of like stumbling across an episode of an old sitcom that you’d never seen before.

There are a couple of other books that I’m interested in pursuing this summer. I have found that audiobooks do nothing for me; I have to lose myself in the printed word. It’s a good feeling.

My energy level this week has been surprisingly high, despite the fact that we haven’t gotten much sleep the past couple of nights due to constant thunderstorms, pounding rain, a scared cat and weather warnings come over the EAS radio in the kitchen.

Honestly, I love this stuff. This is my kind of weather.

I’m sorry to read about the storm related deaths elsewhere in the country, though. Very sad This is where social media like Twitter and Facebook can be handy; follow the right folks on your Twitter feed and you have storm notifications long before the National Weather Service releases them.

Mother Nature has had a lot of energy this week and for the most part her displays have been fantastic. Just be prepared for when she gets overly cranky. Know the safest place in your house and keep your eyes and ears open.

The healthy eating bit is moving along fairly well this week. I am maintaining am building new eating habits again. They don’t really stick unless you’ve done them for at least 30 days in a row, and it’s only day 10. Ock. The only issue I’m having right now is I have a constant urge to gnaw on the side of my desk or something because I am always hungry. For lunch I had a beautiful sandwich made by the husbear and a little granola square chocolate thing that I ate in two bites. I have an apple waiting at my desk for when I get back to the office, despite the fact that I am not a teacher. Nevertheless, I am hungry right now, have been hungry for the past 20 minutes (since the completion of said granola square consumption) and I am eyeing the myriad of drive thrus that currently surround me. I am reciting the venomous chant of “saturated fat, saturated fat” to keep me motivated.

I added fruit back into the diet yesterday: a banana at breakfast and an apple at lunch. First of all, I am discovering that I’m not really an apple fan unless it’s in a pie or in a crisp. Raw apples do very little for me. I blame the fruit for making me feel hungry; I always feel hungrier after I eat the fruit versus prior to eating it. I do okay with bananas but the thing that bothers me about a banana is the “banana stomach” that comes about 30 minutes after consumption. Plus, I’ve heard that bananas might not be the best fruit for one to snack on. It’s got to be better than durian.

I’m trying to decide if the oncoming headache is related to being hungry or instead to the fact that the outside temperature yo-yos between 30 and 70 depending on the hour. Today I’m wearing a winter coat, tomorrow I’ll probably be want to be wearing my shorts to work.

I think I need to go through the DD drive thru and get an iced tea or something. I don’t want to be surly.

As we entered the office a week ago last Friday, we found one of our third shift co-workers holding the door open and watching for an ambulance. One of the technicians on the floor was experiencing chest pains, numbness and shortness of breath. The ambulance arrived just after we did, in the meantime I went int my stash of aspirin and offered the technician two of them, because I heard that’s what you should do when you’re having those kinds of symptoms. The ambulance came and the technicians did their thing before taking him away on a stretcher. They took him to a hospital in Albany.

I had spoken with this person only a couple of times since our shifts didn’t really allow us to cross paths, but he seemed nice enough and appeared to have a pleasant disposition. He probably would have been considered a ‘straight bear’. He had thanked me for the aspirin.

He passed on this past Friday evening. He had been in the ICU since arriving at the hospital. We had taken a collection for his family to help with the cost of staying in a hotel near the hospital. This morning one of his sons was given the money to help with the cost of the funeral arrangements. Services will be out of state near Chicago.

The cycle of life.

The kitchen is starting to look like a kitchen again and Earl and I are both thrilled.

Friday evening we received word that the dishwasher and refrigerator had arrived, so on Saturday morning we headed out to Syracuse and picked them up at the warehouse.

Saturday afternoon it was all about teamwork as Earl and I disassembled, moved and then reassembled the refrigerator in the the kitchen. The installation only took an hour or so once we had it in the general vicinity of where it needed to go. After that was done, it was onto the dishwasher where we installed that like the home improvements experts that we strive to be. No leaks on the first try on both the refrigerator and the dishwasher, so we were pleased.

Today we’ve spent most of the day getting the kitchen back into shape and finding new gadgets and doo-dads to populate the countertops.

The observant viewer will notice in the picture above that we are still without a stove. That’s coming from Lowe’s and it will be here within the next couple of weeks. In the meantime it’ll be about the panini grill and the crockpot when it comes to supper assembly.

I just had two pieces of pizza for lunch. This isn’t very healthy, but it was for one of the charity organizations at work and I always support these groups at work when I can. Today’s charity was suicide awareness and prevention. I should get more involved.

For five dollars we got two pieces of pizza of our choosing, a tossed salad with dressing, a beverage and a dessert. I opted for the cheese and broccoli pizza (called white pizza in these parts because of the lack of sauce), balsamic vinegar on my tossed salad and a diet pop. I also selected the smallest cookie I could find. I feel I made healthy choices given the circumstances and will adjust my supper choices accordingly, probably by sucking on a breath mint and inhaling the vapor given off by an African violet. I jest, I’ll have a small veggie sub from Subway since I’m in bachelor mode tonight and we have no appliances in the kitchen. So basically I’m swapping lunch and supper. A crude deal-a-meal approach, without the sequins, glitter and bad Afro.

When spring finally began to show it’s face I found myself motivated to be healthy again and I was pleased to see that I have lost five pounds in the past two weeks. If you follow along with my Twitter feed you’ll see that I do quite a bit of walking during my breaks at work and I am getting back into cycling again. The guys at work have asked me to join them on some rides this summer and I’m considering it. I miss riding my bike. The five pounds feel noticeable to me. The walking, along with my morning exercises feels good. I think my mood is lighter too, which is always a good thing.

When I mentioned my delight in trying to be healthier to Earl, he remarked that he was happy that in was being sensible about it; no fad or crash diets, no Slim Fast, no protein powders or no declarations of vegetarianism. This new tendency to stay away from speaking in absolutes is slowly taking root. I feel like I’m progressing again. This makes me smile.

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