Reflection

Good Things About This Week:

1. Mine was better than either of the men in this household!
2. I got my list of "Books-to-Read" typed up and organized in Excel so now I can sort by year, author, title, order of entry, etc. I need to get checked for OCD. This is nuts.
3. My biennial (biannual?? whatever: every other year...) bone-density scan is done. Also made all the doctor's appointments for annual checkups, including the dentist.
4. Found out the guinea pigs are pregnant.
5. I'm not likely to wither up and blow away anytime soon...unfortunately.
6. The sun was out for most of the week.
7. Angel owes me. Big-time!
8. I have a helper for the data-entry stuff at church.
9. The Spelling Bee semifinals.
10. A whole pint of Culver's custard. For me.

REALLY NICE MOMENTS:

• The frost on the treeline at the edge of the subdivision, and elsewhere, yesterday morning was incredibly lovely.
• I saw a cardinal about an hour ago.
• Kathi's bulbs are peeking out the ground.
• Realizing that we handled the Sparky's crisis on Wednesday like really mature adults: no shouting, threats or stupidity.
• Being Above It All this morning with one of the Sparky's (female) torturers from the MEES spelling bee and watching her wait for me to Bite Her.
• Not breaking my Lenten promise. Yet.
• WARM WARM SUN SUN WARM SUN SPRING IS COMING WINTER IS OVER [this was a more-than-once moment, pretty much every day this week]
• Remembering that no matter how hectic or awful things get, they can always be worse...

Upcoming Things I'm Happy About:

1. A fun Sunday School lesson--finally.
2. Someone to fill in at the School Store for the rest of the year!
3. Lotsa books to catalog.
4. March (as in "no more February") hallelujah
5. Buying plane tickets to England for Ruth's wedding.
6. Lunch with Arlene.
7. Guinea pig babies.
8. Seeing our bald and muddy "lawn."

Ash Wednesday

...and Comments have disappeared from everyone's blog.

Are these two facts connected?

Time to go learn about new kids' books for 5 hours. At least I don't have to sit by Bathes-in-Perfume Woman!!

Surfin' junk

I guess now I know about blirting.

And now I know this too:

You're Thailand!
Calmer and more staunchly independent than almost all those around you, you have a long history of rising above adversity.  Recent adversity has led to questions about your sexual promiscuity and the threat of disease, but you still manage to attract a number of tourists and admirers.  And despite any setbacks, you can really cook a good meal whenever it's called for. Good enough to make people cry.
Take the Country Quiz at the Blue Pyramid

I'm not sure what to make of the description!!

Yet another book to read:

You're The Guns of August!

by Barbara Tuchman

Though you're interested in war, what you really want to know is what causes war. You're out to expose imperialism, militarism, and nationalism for what they really are. Nevertheless, you're always living in the past and have a hard time dealing with what's going on today. You're also far more focused on Europe than anywhere else in the world. A fitting motto for you might be "Guns do kill, but so can diplomats."

Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

And what am I doing in the northern Midwest when I should be here!?

Yes, now it's time to get back to bed and GET HEALTHY...

Saturday a.m.

Feeling much better today. Perhaps I've learned something: don't eat 4-month old fundraiser candy!

Anyway, I think I can actually do all that needs doing today:

Toys R Us (for birthday present & card)
Menards (see yesterday)
Wolf Camera (see yesterday)
Sam's Club (for the biweekly buyout)
Farm & Fleet (pet pen for the [guinea] pigs)

Oh, and CALL MOM!!! sheesh I'm a bad girl.

Read one and a half books yesterday, though...

Friday

Well, I didn't work all day. I was there from 7:50 till about 9:45 before I had to leave. My g.i. tract is totally not happy with me. So I came home and crashed for two hours, lulled to sleep by the well-drilling rig across the street (third time for that house!!). The Beast at work downstairs.
[There apparently was yet another "gang" incident last night at the library. Tell me, what kind of a gang ensures that the library is on its turf?? How geeky is that!]

Then ate a bit of chicken soup while watching VH1 I Love the 80s, even though:

1) They were ok. I don't know if I love them. Think about the bad hair! On the other hand, those were high school/college/new marriage years....so maybe I do love them after all.
2) I don't remember some of the stuff they talked about! Hey, I was THERE people; this stuff you're pulling out is obscure!

Now I'm just hungry but afraid to eat. I mean, I think this is because of the last Halloween candy. I threw most of the bowl out last night, except for this Chocolate Rose. It was made in Cedarburg. What the hell?! Suddenly it's everywhere. Isn't there anyone or anything from Englewood or Cedaredge out there?? At this point I'd even accept Waukesha...

Enough. Tonight is Mardi Gras night at MEES. Tomorrow the boy has a birthday party to attend (not to mention a gift to purchase). We need to organize our tickets for July, stop at Menards and get the $#%^* chains for the light fixtures, and maybe actually get our extra memory card from Wolf after 2+ months of waiting for Ritz Camera to come through. We've given up: BOO, Ritz Camera.

But I still don't feel good...back to bed.

Weight

Been thinking about this a lot lately (see earlier entry). It's funny; when I was a kid, I was skinny. Not just thin, either. We all were. Took after Dad's side of the family. Actually, I shouldn't sad we "all" were. Ellen wasn't. She took after Mom's side. I never thought she was fat, just pleasantly huggable and less angular than the rest of us.

I could count all my ribs all the way through high school. High school graduation weight was 119. Pre-pregnancy weight ten years later: 129.

Then reality set in...

...and, now, tennish years later, I weigh more than when I was 9 months pregnant!!

I have so thrown away the scale in our house! ;-) And now I prefer the British measuring system. My target weight--according to the insurance charts--is 10 stone. There. Doesn't that sound much better? (...not that I'm actually AT my target weight...)

HOWEVER. Most of the time I don't care what I weigh. It's only when my clothes don't "look right" on me, or I have to buy the next size up that I get depressed. Not depressed enough to actively diet, usually! [Oh, and swimsuit-time sucks too, but I don't know a woman over 25 who doesn't hate swimsuits.]

This goes along with the rest of my 'philosophy' of girliness. If you know me at all, you probably know that clothes/makeup/hair is not my "thing." (Well, hair is, kinda....ahem...only cuz I know how many hairclips and barrettes I own). Not only don't I care what you're wearing, I don't really care what I'm wearing as long as it's comfy. So please don't get insulted if I don't notice your new designer stuff. I'm pretty clueless. My nieces and a very good friend have been giving me ongoing remedial lessons. I don't think anything is sticking very well...but at least I don't wear polyester or muumuus! And bless them for trying.

Pop me in jeans and a tshirt, with cloggy kind of shoes and I'm a happy little camper. Luckily, this outfit comes in every size....

Thursday

Post-Gang Fight. hah

Stopped for Dr. Pepper this morning: no thumb-ring. (What, did you go and threaten the boy, SW??)

London Calling (The Clash) seems especially fitting today. Goes with Adrian Mole's Cappucino Years in the truck. It's Brit despair day.

Wednesday Nights

This place is insane on Wednesday nights. I actually will miss this (sort of) now that I won't be here in the evenings!

So far we have seen:

I. A new face in the homeless pantheon. Hopefully she'll get herself together; she looks a little too clean to be hanging around with these guys. But she's clearly homeless: asking about the shelter, no proof of address/temp "computer user" card from the next town over, etc.

II. An old face in the homeless pantheon. But he's taking a class of some kind!! Hurrah hurrah. He needed to use the computer to type an outline up for an assignment.

III. The reappearance of the Dreaded [City] Gangs. A just threw out some guys who (in his words) were "posturing" and preparing to fight. Great. Next job we fill is security...for the nights when A's not here! Of course, T knows all these kids from subbing at the high school. And, darn, I missed it all, back here in Catalog-Land.

Last night should have been Wednesday. It was voter-registration-for-procrastinators. People from Canada, people whose parents are naturalized citizens so why can't they themselves vote?, and people who moved across the county but don't have any ID with their birthdate on it. And now that the registration process is done, we get to start hearing from the politicians themselves. Whee.

Tuesday

Life is hectic.

Saturday: Worked all day (9-6). Came home and finally watched Survivor. Weird episode. Crashed into bed after a bath.

Sunday: Promiseland. Church--good sermon, on forgiveness, how-to. The Beast ended up filling in to count money. I ended up chatting up the rest of the congregation. VN asked again, "How's the house?" She is SO angling for an invitation... ;-) Somehow I think I volunteered to copyedit the Powerpoint sermon stuff for the pastor. How does this happen?!

More Sunday: Ate BK in the library staff room with the family. Worked 1-4. Chaos at circ. Ref was steady but under control, except for the Jobs PC which has apparently blown into kingdom come. Flashing lights, power off, different flashing lights, power off, more flashing lights....nevermind. Sparky stayed and "did homework" while I worked. Mostly he really was, although Z and his sister were there for a bit.

Still More Sunday: "Can Z spend the night?" Ugh. Fine, so pick him up on our way home from work. Home--Sore feet, pizza from P*ul##'s (Z actually ATE at our house!!), Beast in full crash-and-burn mode with sore everything. I end up staying up till 11 and forcing the kids to sleep at that point.

Monday: Into town to return Z to his house. PowerChurch for 90 minutes. Home. Back to town to take Sparky to Ch@llenger Center for program on Mars. Home. Back to town to pick him up, stop at store for 5 things. 10-items-or-less line is apparently dorkville--takes 15 minutes to check 3 people through and I'm trapped. Home. Leftover pizza with fresh salad (from Dorkville). Beast is at volleyball, Sparky is dictating his Young Author story to me while I word-process it. Three chapters done, he hits the shower and then we Hobbit. He goes to bed at 7:30.

Monday late: The Beast's doing taxes--I am totally "See ya!!" Bath therapy for me. Come back downstairs and write note to family out of guilt--still haven't called MOM!!! Too late now. Lights out for me at 10. Beast too! ...amazing we actually went to sleep at the same time...course, he was up at 4... Must be that nap he got yesterday...

Today: Out of bed--only one snooze--at 6. Left for school/work at 7. Phones not working, Crazy Cat Woman calls in "sick" as usual on the day after a Monday holiday so I'm at desks for 2 hours. Nothing gets done. My desk is a train wreck, fly box overflowing, TWO carts full of cataloging to do and more coming, and reserves out the wazoo.

And more work tonight.

THE GOOD NEWS? This is my last week of working nights, possibly for over a year! Hurrah hurrah hurrah. I can eat meals with my family for a change--that means I need to get my meal plan organized instead of higgledy piggledy. Which reminds me, I have meat defrosted and must make something of it, not to mention the Young Author panting down my neck with Chapter Four.

Read? Haven't been. But I have--somehow--lost weight. These pants have been friggin' falling down all day. Annoying.

Boy do I hate Bush et al.

Cost of the War in Iraq

And this just scares me. Hands-off the bod, boys.

Grr. GRRR.

Presidential Match

Hmm, this is per Kristen (q.v.) and I'm now thoroughly confused about my politics.

In order, the closest match to my beliefs:
1. Sharpton 100%
2. Kucinich 100%
3. Kerry 91%
4. Dean 86%
5. Edwards 80%
6. Bush 17%

OK, the END of it is right! But Sharpton. Wow.

Flashback

Johnny Gage.

PG Librarian just whipped past and said those two words. If you're clueless, you're younger than us (or never watch reruns).

My first TV crush.....

Library's are safe. NOT

Need proof?

Reminds me of the Library Management class when we spent one whole evening talking about library staff who have been hurt/assaulted/killed on the job. Maybe that's where my pathological fear of library management came from! Sandra Lockett, you have a lot to answer for!

Isn't it Friday yet?

Boring meeting.

Annoying Stephen King book (oops, no it's really by Eleanor Druse, a Maine psychic....wink wink).

Did the "fun" new books. Now it's lunchtime. Which means when I come back it's all about the Spanish books. Or Hornblower. Either way...zzzzz...

Thursday fun.

That's irony, for the uninformed...

I'm all about lists today.

Prelim: Alarm will go off at 5:55 which on my clock means 5:45 a.m. Snooze at least once. Race around getting self organized for 7 a.m. departure for MEES (I'm sure either the boy or I will forget something, as usual). Castigate self for not getting up earlier (at 5:20) and exercising. As usual. Promise self to do better, and stop for liter bottle of Dr. P at CuteGuy MiniMart (this guy is downright fricking amazingly gorgeous)(and half my age).

1. Reference Staff meeting. At 8 a.m. Thinking about printing off last Sunday's page from RefGrunt and using that as my Show-and-Tell. Will The Boss appreciate the humor?? Our last meeting before The Pregnant One departs into Motherhoodland.

2. Catalog State Literacy Grant 2003 books, about 60% of which we already own at least one copy. Can you say redundant and wasteful? sigh... Plus they're a pain cuz they're all in Spanish and the subject headings are inconsistent and frequently sucky.

3. Catalog new books with holds on them. More fun than #2.

4. Listen to annoying people talk loudly behind me while I try to work. This is not really number 4; it will be going on while I'm doing everything else. And even if I decide to listen to Celia as loud as I can stand, I'll still be able to hear...SOME people.

5. Eat a piece of 5-day-old shower-cake. Eat two pieces. So much for South Beach. Eat another small piece. THAT one is lunch!

6. Explain to The Boss how I fixed the problems she left on my desk today. Explain why some of the problems aren't. Problems, that is. Try to figure out why Mil. keeps saying "The Golden Age of Network Radio..." is a Book on Tape when it's really a Book on CD. Pull hair out.

7. Leave work, pick up Sparky, go home, open fridge and say, "Looks like leftovers tonight!" Hope the soup thaws by then...

8. Clean the damn house so the cleaning ladies can clean on Friday.

9. Pet a guinea pig. Or two. Change shirts after one (or both) pee on me. eieew...

10. Watch Survivor, run a hot bath and read till I doze off. Get out, go to bed, read till book bonks me on the chin and reminds me to close it and drop it on floor. Sleep.

Good ending at least.

Sad story

Meant to post this last night. Two of our regulars at the library, an older couple who also came to my church occasionally when they felt churchy, were found in their garage last Friday. Dead. She had cancer and I guess I understand her reasoning. Not so much his. But they had clearly been planning this for some time .... now some of their behavior becomes obvious. They had had their son exhumed (he died long ago) and cremated in December, for example.

I'm very sad, but also rather proud of them and amazed. I'm not surprised. At all. They were rather (er) DEFINITE people. I could never picture my mom doing this. Or me (whose tagline at work right now is something about being decisive. Or not). I rather think (hope?) they won't be exiled from heaven based on this final decision, so I guess that means I can't be Catholic. Whew.

Something to ponder. Been meaning to blog something about a letter in Newsweek...I'll get to that later.

PUBLISHERS

I have a new one to hate: Little Brown's imprint Back Bay. It's a two-fer. They've republished all the Hornblower books so many times they apparently think, "Hey it's a paperback of 'Hornblower and [blah blah blah].' No one will really care if it's 263 pages or 380, so why use up a perfectly good new ISBN on it!" Ergh.

Want to check for yourself? This is a prime example (FirstSearch): 0316289124!

'Course, it would help if catalogers were a little more (ahem) consistent too....

Thank God for the Kumbia Kings. They are keeping me sane right now, which is amazing since I really only need one brain cell and some teenage hormones to pay attention to them!

Meetings

Sometimes people at meetings just make you want to bring the Magic Duct Tape, the kind that will fly out of your hands at the merest hint of droning on or hysteria and attach itself to the offending mouth. It needs to be unremovable by the Offending Mouth's hands, too.

Oy.

At least Amy had decent scenery from her end of the room. Oh well. Can't wait for my tour of duty to be up so I can sit as a member of the rank-and-file and gripe about leadership.

I had a bottle of Tylenol in my pocket, and I forgot to take any before hand. Big mistake. In retaliation, my body has decided that it's Carpal-Tunnel-Time, so my left wrist keeps twinging. And my headache just returned, 11 hours later.

So. Time to get a few things done. ha ha ha

I hate kids...

...especially pre-adolescent twerps who don't cheer for my (of course) ab-fab son during spelling bees. I really want to kill some of them. Well, one would be fine too, but I'd have a hard time deciding which one. I think I'm co-dependent.

Incidentally, he came in second. Lost because he missed on "harpy" and "polychrome." Grrr, made the same mistake on harpy as he did the other night: '-ie' instead of '-y'. But he got "auditorium" right... Noogie-brain. ;-)

He really is a great kid; the great rumbling in the audience didn't seem to bother him at all. Even when they hoorahed at his misspelling. He makes me proud.

Friday

The library board thinks it's funny that I wear a hat at work that says "Go Away." [Well, actually, it says "Leave me alone."] So glad The Boss told them....hope she clarified that I only wear it in the workroom, at my desk.

Usually, though, it's the noise-reduction headphones (thanks, Beast) and something boppy on the Walkman. Today's selections: Simply Red (already listened through once) and The Skatalites. I am a Pata Pata junkie, even when it's called Skata Skata. hee And if I have time: Celia Cruz.

Today's fun:
1) Working through the gift cart.
2) Finishing the records Gl. downloaded (I hope) this morning.
3) Sending him yet another file of donated items not in Mil. yet.
4) On-Desk for 2 separate hours.

Spelling Bee day today at Sparky's school. Instead of lunch. Must bring in Techie Librarian's shower gift at some point....

Church

Well, my meeting was called off. Don't know why. The Beast's meeting, however, was not, and it has begun to snow. His drive home should be fun. And not just because of the snow...

He told me, as he was putting on his boots, that despite the apparent One-Big-Happy-Family atmosphere at the end of the last meeting, someone has since told him there has been "sniping." Outside the church. Sounds like in a somewhat public venue. Maybe overheard? I'm trying to stay out of the particulars, but it is obvious that Beast's pretty ticced off. I told him that whoever reported this to him needed to be popped in the nose, along with the "snipers." Grr.

And grr again. Don't piss around with my family, people. Grr GRRRR.

And so, after an amazing recovery as a result of last week's talk with Kate, I'm now back to general aggravation with much of the congregation. Beast has said he gets an upset stomach walking into the building, and I am pretty much emotionally checked out. We have to leave if this doesn't improve PDQ. Spring and the consequent end of Promiseland can't come soon enough.

Speaking of which, I need to let people know that I won't be there Sunday. Somehow I'm not too upset or guilt-ridden....

On a slightly up note, I did get Techie Librarian's baby stuff wrapped. The box weighs a ton! Wish I could be there Sunday to see her open it....dang.

But Oliver! should be good, Tribune review to the contrary. Sparky will love it, and probably annoy us by knowing all the lyrics and much of the dialogue.

Speaking of which, where is he...?

The 70s. Question for that decade: "Why?"

Weight Watchers has a lot to answer for. My mom's diabetes, for one? :-) Actually, we had one of the WW purple daisy-shapped stickers on our fridge for many years. Not that it stopped anyone from pigging out...

For me, the 70s were really all about Farrah Fawcett hair, combs in the back pocket of jeans (boys' and girls'), Gunne Sax dresses, and the Doobie Brothers everywhere on the radio. Actually, just listen to that Everclear song A.M. Radio. Come to think of it, the drink du decade was Everclear...foul stuff.

And disco. Let's not forget "You Can Ring My Be-ee-ee-ee-ell" and "Boogie Fever."

[I am embarrassed to admit that I agree with Simon Cowell about anything, but he at least gives disco some due.]

It's weirdo day at the library, so I'm leaving before the sun goes away. Sharon J is coming to the board meeting tonight to tell them how rude, uncooperative and mean we were to her the night she refused to leave at 9:15. And Mr. Dork, who is on the rural board, just snagged the director's ear for about 20 minutes about how books on CD, and books in general, are "luxuries" and we need more computers, dammit. He'll be at the meeting tonight, too. If I wasn't involved with this library, it would be a fun meeting to observe.

Instead I get a Personnel meeting at church. Bo-ring. While The Beast gets Genesis in the next room. Wonder which meeting the pastor will be at...?

Sometimes, to be a good parent, you need to remember stuff like this.

More weird stuff:
"While sitting in your chair, lift your right foot slightly off the ground and move it in clockwise circles. Now draw the numeral "6" in the air with your right hand. Your foot will involuntarily reverse direction." Thanks to the Librarian in Black.

Checking in on My Inner Geek has proven that I am indeed a geek, but not a major, extreme or dysfunctional one. Whew!

This is also cool. Can try to put it in here when I'm not supposed to be working.... ;-)

My excuse is that I'm waiting for OCLC records to be downloaded. See, there, I have reasons for slacking.

British Vacation

OK, a little help from anyone and everyone:

What is the Top Spot to see (or Place to go) in Britain, i.e. England/Scotland/Wales? I've been there several times, so has the hubby. We are going for a wedding but then want to use the rest of our vacation for "fun."

[Not that the wedding won't be fun, but I don't think my niece and her fiance/husband want us following them around for 2 weeks! ;-) ]

Feel free to poll friends, relatives, coworkers, whatever. Keep in mind there is an 11-year-old in the mix -- but his only request is to run at all the barriers at Kings Cross Station. There's a hour killed...

People have suggested a Harry Potter movie-location trek, but they filmed all over the bloody place!

TIA!

New books

In order of appearance:

The Big Splat: or How Our Moon Came to Be (Mackenzie)
The Secret Life of Sharks (Klimley)
When Life Nearly Died (Benton)
The Zero Game (Meltzer)
"Are You There Alone?" The Unspeakable Crime of Andrea Yates (O'Malley)

Me: freaked out. And teary.

I hate how these books stack up sometimes. Really, I just do them by size--these are all 24 cm.

Having just had another one of Those Talks with Sparky last night, the kind where you take several layers of enamel off your teeth while trying not to blow the vocal cords screaming....I still don't understand Andrea Yates.

Which is probably good.

Except I understand enough to know that it isn't unimaginable.

And it makes me so sad. For the kids, for their family, for people who knew them, and for her. What a tragedy.

DALE IS A GOD!

Our techie just 'splained how to change the size of the text on the desktop. We recently got new flat-screen monitors in the work area, which are very cool, but they do seem to have shrunken everything a bit. Well, or we are all old (very suddenly). But our real oldie, Vera, went home yesterday because her eyes were tearing and hurting. She never goes home because of stuff like that (bless her wonderful workhorse heart).

So now if I want to admit my eyesight isn't as good as it used to be, I know how to make everything bigger. Or smaller, if I'm really masochistic.

PLUS, he showed me how to make the Millennium windows all open to the same (screen size) width. Pretty simple, but I hadn't found the right place to do the little click that fixed that. Woo hoo.

Give that man a beer!

New Thursday Next book out this spring

Hurrah! It is obvious that my ulterior motive for taking on the book orders is to see what new books are coming out....Nevada Barr's got something too, as does Robert Parker (but it's not a Spenser, I don't think) and Jennifer Crusie. Guess I can write off this spring as a productive season!

Friends' stuff

Forgot, then remembered then forgot again:

Katherine and Alan are what in high school we called "pre-engaged" and talking about moving in together. Who-eee. Can't wait to hear what her grandma has to say about that. Katherine is rather concerned about her mom's reaction to moving in sans marriage license. Whatever. Glad The Beast & I never had to have that conversation with parents.... whew.

I wonder if I'll be doing this to the boy in 15 years....

Talked to Jenny yesterday--looks like we'll be able to get together in the resort town to the north of me. Hurrah. Now if only I could figure out the digital camera. On the other hand, I think I'll just take pictures and sort them into envelopes, sort of pre-album. Then it's just a matter of slapping them down onto the pages, but that's the easy part.

Off to school with Sparky.

Convergence

I just discovered another weird combination: John Philip Sousa's tune "The Liberty Bell" is the theme from Monty Python's Flying Circus.

We have 626 current outstanding reserves as of this morning. My head hurts. And again RPL is not sending stuff we requested for our patrons. Once again I will spend 3 hours moving reserves from their items to other people's. I don't mind moving them when it's not just one library; everyone has a bad day or whatever. But this is city-wide, not just one branch. And inconsistent--they've sent some stuff, and not other stuff....

Whatever. Looks like I'll be here for 9+ hours again today.

Ralph

Complainer Tech slammed in this morning with "Hi."

[grumble from me....I can hear what's coming]

"God, what a terrible morning! People drive so stupidly in snow!
And my driveway wasn't plowed [it is about 1/4 mile long so that's a problem, but she's here early for f---s sake!].
And there's no tubs from [the library system] again.
Hey, did you know that MEMTech can't stand [one of the shelvers]? She told me Sunday that...."

Voice in my head: Good morning. F off. Where's my "leave me alone hat?" Where are my headphones??

OK, I'm done venting.

And she wonders why people 'accuse' her of negativity....

Travels

It's eerie how whatever you think of eventually appears on the Internet:


WORLD TRAVELS


U.S. TRAVELS:

[Thanks Jen!c@]