Ponderings and Musings

Happy Friday! The sun is shining here in Upstate New York, Mother Nature’s colors have taken on a very slight autumn hue and our friend Ernesto is making his way into the Mid-Atlantic States, promising to keep my on-call weekend very interesting.

I say “Bring it on, baby”.

I’ve amassed enough comp already this week to take Tuesday off, so I have something to look forward to. A nice roadgeek exploration trip to the western part of the state. Why? Because it’s there.

I’ll probably be quite chatty this weekend as we keep it to home base and do some work around the house, but I wanted to take a moment to say: Have an enjoyable and safe Labor Day weekend!

Today I saw a “thug” type young man help an old lady cross the street. She didn’t beat him with her purse, he didn’t try to steal her money, he just helped her across the street as she made her way through the crosswalk with her walker.

I needed to see that.

Last night Earl and I had some family over for supper. We hadn’t gotten together in quite a while, my sister’s boyfriend is off to Russia this coming weekend to play hockey on one of the Moscow teams and we all thought it’d be good to get together.

I needed that too. Because even though my relatives can be a pain in the ass sometimes, they are family and I wouldn’t trade them in for anything.

The sun is out today, the cat’s skunk smell is finally dissipating and my first jab at education in 20 years is just around the corner.

I think my funk has found it’s end. Look out life, here I come.

I’ve been in this weird, pensive, slightly apprehensive mood today. And here I am rhyming about it on my blog. I can’t put my finger on the cause of this little bit of a funk I’ve got going on today. It’s nothing really bad mind you, I’m not going to go out and go crazy or anything like that. Perhaps I sniffed too many bleach fumes while I did laundry earlier today. Maybe the last vestiges of the skunk smell on the cat has gotten to me. Perhaps my head got jostled around yesterday on the ride at the State Fair.

Whatever it is, I’m sure it’s going to pass so I’m not going to worry about it. Let’s hear it for the new work week!

So the whole animal experience continues on. If it wasn’t bad enough that the garage, which was temporary housing for Tom, stunk to high heaven with that unmistakeable skunk smell, I padded down to the kitchen to get started for the day and found a dead bird lying at the door.

Lovely.

I look out over the swimming pool and find two beautiful deer standing next to it, ready for a picture. Except the camera is upstairs.

So I go to get the camera when I look out the front door on my way to the stairs and there are over 30 turkeys of various shapes and sizes standing in the driveway. I continue my trek to get the camera when the deer dash off and the turkeys start heading around the other side of the house.

I lost all interest in the photographic moment at that point.

So now it’s lunch time and Tom smells decent enough to be allowed in the house, but the garage is still stinking. I have bowls of vinegar all over the place, as I read somewhere on the internet that that is what you’re suppose to do. Hopefully the house will smell much better when I get home from work later this afternoon.

I think we’ll go out for supper tonight.

Earl is out of town on work. He’s expected home tonight, so that has put a little spring in my step, but gosh I miss him when he’s not home. You’d think after 10 years of this I’d be used to it, but I’m not. That’s a good thing, I suppose.

When he is out of town I get to embrace the loner side of me. I go into full geek mode and play on the computer night and day. Daily chores get tossed aside as there are too many things waiting for me in the realm of bits and bytes; web sites need to be updated, e-mail needs to be responded to and there’s a Sim City awaiting my run as a mayor without cheat codes.

As I delve into the controlled chaos of my own little world, that little sense of loneliness follows me around. It’ll be good to see Earl’s smiling face tonight.

Driving home from work just now I followed a motorcycle up the street before jumping on the expressway. There’s a few lights between work and the on-ramp and this motorcycle didn’t try running the lights at all, the rider followed all the rules of the road to the letter.

He looked to be in his late 20s, muscular arms, wearing a pair of jeans, a t-shirt and an open faced helmet. He had a passenger, a young boy, presumably between eight and 10 years old. The boy had his arms wrapped around his dad, and hung on to him tightly as he displayed the utmost confidence in being a passenger on that motorcycle.

I was reminded of me being that boy thirty years ago, with my arms wrapped around my dad and with all the confidence in the world as we rode through the tiny village on his ’69 BSA.

It’s good to be reminded of those little things.

Every day I have another reason to believe that the world has completely lost its mind. Today is no exception. This is really old news that I was just made aware of, but the fine folks at Ford now recommend a particular brand of gas for their vehicles. This recommendation is made by emblazoning the gas cap with the said oil company’s brand colors and a recommendation statement from Ford emprinted on the gas cap.

Detroit, we have a problem.

If I were to own a 2006 Ford Focus, I would be going against the manufacturer’s recommendation for my fuel needs because it would be at least 150 miles in any given direction to get this brand of fuel.

Now that puts the “convenience” in convenience store.

Why does Ford feel that they have to recommend a particular brand of gasoline to their customers? Do they really recommend this brand or are they getting paid lots of money to recommend this brand? What makes it better? Are they encouraging their customers to shun the local Mom and Pop store down the street in favor of this huge oil corporation simply for the sake of sponsorship money? Gag me a dipstick.

Marketing and commercials have become entirely out of control. I can’t get onto ebay now without a popup asking me if I want an ebay credit card. Dude, I just want to browse and waste some money on some junk. You can’t watch a movie in a theatre without being bombarded with commercials for up to 45 minutes before the previews even start. Attractions at the State Fair are all sponsored: “Welcome to the Verizon Center of Progress Building.” Like Verizon and “progress” have ever gone hand in hand. What’s next? Hospitals slapping a sticker on the forehead of a newborn, “This hospital recommends Pearly White Toothpaste for all children”?

When does this insanity stop?

I just realized I had just emptied the dishwasher during my lunch hour. I find this most shocking. I always avoid the dishwasher during lunch hour.

What’s kind of freaking me out even further is that I considered starting a load of laundry before heading back to work, but luckily I remembered that the washer (2 1/2 years old) is making some really odd grinding noise that sounds like the bearings are shot. Anyone want to bet when the damn thing starts spitting grease on our clothes? I can’t even shout out grease. When the washer started making the beginnings of it’s odd rumbling noise a couple of weeks ago, I did some research to see how much it would cost to fix it. Apparently, you buy a whole bunch of preassembled parts from Frigidaire, gut the washing machine except for the door and the cycle selector knob and then put it all back together with the aforementioned new parts.

Said parts and labor would be $100 more than a new washing machine.

But I don’t want to buy a new washer. This one is only 2 1/2 years old and they don’t make this model anymore, so the dryer that’s stacked on top would become an orphan. I wonder if I can bolt that to the wall somehow.

So it’s a crapshoot as to when it’ll finally give out. In the meantime, I only run it while we’re home in fear of it otherwise breaking down, scaring the crap out of the cat and flooding the downstairs of the house.

Such adventure.

Driving into work this morning I caught up on the world news via the local NPR station program, “Morning Edition”. The timing of my commute allowed me to bypass the headlines filled with bombs and war and instead afforded me the opportunity to hear what I found to be an amazing story of a woman with autism.

You can take a peek at her story or hear it here.

Here it is early in the morning (at least for me) and for once my blog entry isn’t about how I’m not a morning person or any of that. In truth, I feel absolutely wonderful this morning. It’s not because it’s Friday, though that certainly does contribute to the mood, but rather it’s because of my fashion choice today.

I get to wear jeans to work.

Once a year, our company has a “Jeans Day” to help raise money for the United Way. You pay $5.00 to the receptionist, she gives you a permission slip and I get to feel like myself at work for the day. It’s a wonderful feeling.

There are many places and situations where I believe a person should dress “nice” for the part. The work environment is one of them. Another is a Broadway show, but it seems people don’t do that anymore, opting for shiny velour instead, but that’s another story. While I don’t mind wearing my “professional” clothes at work, I admit that I feel most comfortable in a button down shirt complimented by a comfortable pair of 501s and my work boots.

The work boots are another story. I wear them just about all the time outside of work. Even with shorts. I’ve worn my work boots with my shorts since 1990 and I don’t care what the fashion industry says, I’m never going to stop doing it. Unless I’m at the beach, then it’s a nice pair of flip flops or sandals.

So today is going to be a comfortable Friday. Viva la casual clothes!