Ponderings and Musings

It was officially announced at work today. My co-workers found out that I have resigned from my position, effective December 29. I’ve decided to go to school full-time starting in January and I don’t feel that I can fulfill my work obligations and my personal goals simultaneously. I had tended my resignation on December 3rd, but kept it quiet from my co-workers until the management team could figure out what to do.

I’ve been in this position for about 2 1/2 years, though it feels as if it’s been a lifetime and I mean that in a positive way. I hope to maintain friendships with many that I worked with. With the internet, instant messaging and whatnot, it’s easier to do that these days.

I’m more excited than ever of the road that lies ahead.

The madcap rush of the holidays continues tonight as Earl and I join my sister and Mom in Syracuse for dinner. My sister is leaving for Moscow tomorrow, where her Canadian hockey player boyfriend is currently located as he plays hockey for a Russian team. So tonight it’s a little bon voyage party and we’ll do Christmas as we did last year: over the webcam.

I am finally on my way with Christmas shopping. One of my gifts for Earl arrived yesterday, piquing his curiosity as the box is quite heavy. This is really our “together” gift that I bought for both of us outside of my allotted budget. I look forward to more packages arriving up until the holidays, because nothing says “Merry Christmas” like some well-placed pointing and clicking.

I had a big meeting this morning with the manager of the department I work in. It was a good meeting. I’m looking forward to what the future holds.

Now, back to the holiday rush.

Here it is Tuesday lunch time and I’m sitting at home without a luncheon date. Earl asked me out to lunch last minute yesterday, so I didn’t get a chance to get home and write a witty entry about my latest observations.

I find it quite amazing how quickly time is passing as we approach the holidays. Yesterday was just chocked full of merriment. After working 7 to 4 I had to go to the health center at college to turn in my health paperwork. Since everyone that has ever pushed, pulled, spindled or fondled my body in a medical capacity has shredded my records, aside from my current doctor, I have to get a measles vaccination. I wonder how long they’ll keep me in pediatrics.

After that glorious news, I headed over to the Adult Education (without accompaniment from Hall and Oates) Department and met with the advisor. I’ve signed up for my courses and have been formally accepted to the school. There’s one more step I need to take before the end of the year, but we’ll save that for a more appropriately timed blog entry.

After school I met up with Earl, we had a quick supper at the local diner, where the Tomato Soup should have been called the Tomato Rinse, since it was the consistency of tap water, and then we headed over to First Earl’s to help him with his computer. That was really wild, as I have not been in First Earl’s house (where I lived at one time) in about ten years. But Earl, Earl and I had a nice visit and I showed First Earl how to efficiently print Christmas labels and secure his network. I also showed him where all the good porn was.

Today it’s another rat race with school after work and then off to bed so I can get up and do it all over again tomorrow.

Dorky Hat Season.

Originally uploaded by DJSuperCub.

I hate wearing hats, but here’s the evidence that it’s officially “Dorky Hat Season”.

It’s that most wonderful time of the year at work. It’s the time when everyone is feverishly working hard to use up their vacation time before the end of year. We have this crazy little “use it or lose it” rule when it comes to our benefit time. I don’t really feel the crunch to do as many of my co-workers do because I happily use vacation time throughout the year. I think it’s one of my shining skills when it comes to my employment. I might even list it first on my resume.

What completely boggles my mind is that some of my co-workers don’t like taking time off from work. When our supervisor is telling us what time we need to use before December 31, they sigh and roll their eyes and say things like “I guess I can take the next three Fridays off.” What? Are you mad? Why the hell wouldn’t you want to take the next three Fridays off. Heck, go crazy and throw in a few Thursday too! I’m considering putting an entry in the dusty suggestion box in the break room: “Employees are free to share their vacation time with other co-workers. It can be used as a bargaining trip for favors such as taking the calls of the more cranky customers or putting the trash cans out in the hall.”

Since it’s mad rush time, everyone that sits near my quarter of a cubicle is off this afternoon. I’m all by myself at our end of the room.

It’s the perfect time to get started on my holiday shopping.

The snow is coming down like crazy as I type this. As I made my way home from school in the Jeep, I trudged through three or four inches of snow on our unplowed roadway. I had to make a quick stop at the gas station to fill up the tank and I noticed that there were several people in and out of the parking lot as I was pumping gas; they were all picking up gallons of milk.

Predictable. I did forgive the hottie that was fueling up at the set of pumps next to mine. Our eyes met, he smiled, I smiled. It was a gay thing. But he still ran in and bought a gallon of milk. The cap color indicated it was whole milk. Perhaps my gaydar is off – what gay man drinks whole milk?

The National Weather Service is predicting possibly a foot of snow or more in selected locales in our region, courtesy of that big snow-maker we call Lake Ontario. I often wonder if my fellow citizens forget that we live on the edge of the Lake Ontario snowbelt and that heavy snow at this time of the year is not uncommon. As I said before, they may be lactose intolerant and on the Atkins diet, but by God they need to stock up on milk and bread!

I’m hoping the snow tapers off and doesn’t bury us tonight. I’m not plowing the driveway before leaving for work tomorrow, regardless of how much snow we get, and with Earl out of town, I won’t have to worry about getting him on his way tomorrow morning. If it does snow a lot, I’ll just shoot out of the garage like the Batmobile. Perhaps our cat Tom can dress up as Robin and sit in the passenger seat.

Earl is out of town on business until Friday night. I think he purposely schedules his business trips to coincide with my on-call weeks so I won’t go traveling after work or something. It’s his way of keeping his eye on me, I suppose. Quite frankly, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I kicked off the night be picking up some Chinese food. I tried to talk myself out of it during my last hour of work by surfing the internet for the caloric stats on my favorite dish, General Tso’s chicken with pork fried rice, but the research information on this dish fit my criteria: the calorie count was less than four digits.

So I’m enjoying my combination platter number 19 and catching up on my blogs and other sites I keep an eye on. I feel like this holiday season has been especially busy but I have nothing to prove for it. Oh well, I still have 19 days to find the perfect gifts.

Since Earl is out of town for two nights in a row this week, I’ve already planned my special meal for tomorrow night and that would be a bowl of popcorn. Now I’m not referring to this insta-radarange crap in a bag but rather real popcorn, popped in oil and prepared perfectly in our West Bend drip-a-fat classic popcorn popper. Outside of the movie theatre, that’s the only real way to make popcorn. As a connoisseur of this delicacy, I can assure you that popcorn prepared by pushing buttons and flapping a bag is like whipping through a burger bomb drive thru for prime rib.

Other than my planned meal excursions, I have no other plans for the next two nights. Perhaps I’ll do some Christmas shopping online. Watch my credit card for burn marks.

I was chatting with my friend Sean in Albany via e-mail this morning and the subject of one of our mutual friends, a fine woman named Pat, came up. Sean was commenting that while he keeps in touch with Pat, he and Jeffrey haven’t been out to visit her in quite a while. Earl and I are guilty of the same exact scenario, which reminds me, I need to write a letter to her.

Anyway, Sean made the remark that during their last visit, his lover Jeffrey found some of Pat’s pictures decorating her apartment to be rather amusing. It all boils down to algebra.

J.P. + Tom D (eeks, that just makes me kvetch to see that since I’m not referring to our cat) = 1987
Tom D – J.P. = 1989
J.P. + Derek = Reboundish fling + “what the fuck was I thinking”
J.P. – Derek = Tom D + Derek * (nickname of “Durweed”)
J.P. = Not Amused
Tom D – Derek = end of J.P.’s glaring
If Tom E + Sean != “yes” then Tom D + Sean = 1990 * (J.P.’s washer + dryer)
Tom D – Sean = Tom E + Tom D
Tom D – Tom E = loss of interest on all spectators involved

Apparently Pat has some of this progression of boyfriend swap documented in photos posted about her apartment, with a picture of Tom and Sean and then Tom and Tom and most likely a picture of Tom and myself and then a photo Earl and I. I hope she has them in the right order. Nothing says “reminder of your foolish years” like photos posted in glorious technicolor.

I’m just happy it all got sorted out and Sean and Jeffrey got together in Albany and Earl and I got together back when we did and everything makes sense now, because the math just makes my head swim.

By the way, Pat has written two books, “Blooming Is Tricky Business” and “The Present Is A Gift”. Both are a collection of her short stories from her time in a mental institution and the recovery since. I find her writing to be very optimistic and inspiring.

I’m very excited by the winter like weather that has arrived. Imagine this, winter like weather on December 4th! The nerve of Mother Nature. We have a total of two inches of snow on the ground. Naturally, motorists are disregarding all traffic laws and citizens are flocking to the grocery store to pick up milk and bread, despite their history of lactose intolerance and the Atkins diet.

While I find all this needless mayhem amusing, I’m rather excited because it’s Dorky Hat Season. Around this time every year, those of us that choose to be bald find the need to adorn our freshly shaven scalps with a wool hat. I’ve never been able to wear a winter hat well. When I was very young I secretly wanted one of those hats with a long tail and a ball on the end but that wasn’t very farm boy like. I was usually given a hat by my grandmother who with all her love and care knitted or crocheted something out of yarn found at the bargain bin at Switz’s, a virtually sea of craftiness that would be today’s “Michael’s” or “AC Moore” to shame. Even though I appreciated the love and care that went into the creation of these hats, I never felt confident wearing them. Despite the red, white and blue yarn I didn’t feel patriotic nor did I feel comfortable in the orange and green hat that matched our shag carpeting.

A couple of years ago I decided to brave winter’s worst without a hat while we were in Times Square. Earl and I made a spectacle of ourselves as he chipped the ice off my skin. At least it matched the icicles hanging off my mustache. I did learn a lesson from that experience though: thaw before chipping.

It’s fun to see what folks are wearing on their heads to fend off Mother Nature’s chill. Why it was just this morning that I saw a hat on a woman that would have made Little House on the Prairie’s Mrs. Olsen very proud. There were many feathers on this red and purple hat. I even waved to the peacock that was looking back at me. He didn’t look happy as he sat up there, trying to look dignified.

I haven’t chosen my hat for this winter season. The temperature needs to drop a few more degrees for me to sucumb to the need for cranial adornment. I’ll be sure to post a picture when I’m ready for show and tell.

I have several random thoughts I’d like to share.

1. I find Christmas shopping more pleasant when it involves a few clicks of the mouse and the depressing of the key ENTER.
2. Kaufmann’s is still Kaufmann’s even though they try to ghetto it down with the name Macy’s.
3. Weathermen need to calm the hell down and stop trying to go for ratings. This wild winter weather that was going to change life as we know it amounted to a bunch of wind and mild temperatures.
4. Two beers in a queer on a Friday night at Tully’s does not a driver make. I’m going to bed.