Sheesh. Nobody told me my barrel bottom was rolling up on me!
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Halloween. At least, it is at work. A pretty good percentage of us showed up in costume since the school for the physically and mentally challenged kids up the road from us come by to Trick or Treat at lunch. In the five years I've been here, I've come as an Olympic medalist, a geisha, a medieval bar maid - all decent enough. The year I came as a geisha people walked past my door and did a double take, which is great for a store-bought costume. This year people are a bit puzzled when they see me - the orange satin is throwing them a bit, and they assume I have something to do with UT. But no, although I am a closet UT fan, today I'm representing the Tennessee state object - the ubiquitous orange construction barrel. And I'm having a blast :)
Researchers have confirmed what speakers, actors, and college students have known for years: Stress causes forgetfulness. Well, duh. Actually, I find it very comforting, since stress has been a diagnosed condition in my life for quite some time. Stress is why I have acid reflux and gastritis. Stress is why my heart has an occasional arrythmia. Stress can now be blamed for my geriatric episodes, such as not remembering if I set the alarm or took my medicine or put the coffee pot back in the machine before making coffee. I'll quit worrying that I have early stages of Alzheimers, since that just increases my level of stress.
Last Saturday I lucked up and inherited a pair of tickets to hear David Sedaris read some of his work to us. I had read some of his short stories before in the New Yorker - stories that will make you laugh hard enough to wet your pants. In fact, I think there should probably be warning signs at his performances to "go" before you settle into your seat for an evening of entertainment. On this particular night at Vanderbilt, there were signs - signs that warned you that the nearest restrooms were in the next building on campus. I probably should have made the hike. I was glad to be out of the rain, however, and eager to find our seats. We were three rows from the stage, which was great until we needed to leave early. No matter - I enjoyed the show. I've gone to NPR.org and listened to sound clips of the same material, but I have to say that they were much better when you could see the smirk on his face as he told the punch lines to his best jokes. It was a delightful expe
Training classes are sometimes fun, sometimes useful, sometimes boring. I suffered through five days of stuff, of which probably only 1/5 actually applies to my current job. The rest of it was installation, backup, and restore/repair, which I will never actually get to do. No matter, though - I understand the concepts, and I could probably wing it if I had to. Now I'll have to spend three days trying to catch up on loose ends - those things I couldn't do administratively from my remote location. October's almost over. It's maddening.
Yay! I'm healed! No more stitches, no more left-hand-only, no more one-armed showers! WooHoo!! And just when I thought life couldn't get any better, my boys won!!! WOOO-HOOOO!!! What an AWESOME blowout game!! I didn't think Coach Fisher had the killer instinct left in him - we've played so many safe and close (and lost). Wow. That was a great game without the benefit of alcohol. Wonderful stuff :)
Monday morning. Blah. My stitches itch and are coming out today if I have to do it myself. Fortunately, I have a doctor's appt at 4:00, if I can stand it that long. On a work related note, the upgrade is done, our folks are all happy, but other areas are not so happy. Once again, I'm manning the phones, discussing possible causes and their solutions with other departmental support people. But that's okay, I like this particular role, since helping is what I enjoy most.
Did you ever feel like you were standing on the deck of a sinking ship? Should you "bail" or should you bail? For now, I'm trying my damndest to bail water faster than it's pouring in, but it's hard. The latest project undertaken here at work has not been implemented well. They had high hopes for an automated install, which did not work as expected. They ran a scan to see if things were installed properly, based on the presence of an add-on, only to find that their logic was faulty - it turns out it's possible to have the add-on without the base program, which they didn't scan for, and it's possible to have the add-on located in different directory on the PC and still have it work. Welcome to Friday before D-Day. Tomorrow they are upgrading the server, come hell or high water. Monday all machines have to have the new client to work. My machines have all been tested by hand and are okay, so my folks are fine. I may find my weekend filled with bailing ou
"To sleep, perchance to dream -- ay, there's the rub"
I wish I could sleep - the damn wood chip hit my right arm, and my preference is to sleep in the fetal position on my right side. Can't do that - might pull stitches, not to mention even the lightest amount of pressure on that spot makes me want to scream. So I'm dozing on my left side, arm propped up on a pillow, swearing at the dog who's confused because I'm on the wrong sided of the bed and she can't get comfortable either. Sunday night was bad, Monday I dozed all day to make up for sleep deprivation, but Tuesday I felt I had to go to work and I was useless. Last night I gave in and took a benadryl, which did knock me out, but the side effect of the cure is worse than the disease, I'm afraid. Six more days and the stitches come out. Six more days. Six more days of one-armed showers, left-handed mousing, and general bitching and moaning. :)
Yesterday I learned a very important lesson about working with power tools. Not to panic, dear readers - I am still in possession of all my digits and limbs. However, I did make the astonishing discovery that wood chips being thrown by a power saw travel at very high velocities. I was holding one end of an 8ft board to stabilize it, while Michael was chipping away at the other end. I remember seeing chips flying my direction, so I turned my head. I felt something hit my forearm, so I looked down. (Note to self: don't look down - ever. It's always a BAD idea.) Much to my astonishment, there was a small hole, slightly larger than the diameter of a pencil, in my arm, about four inches in front of my elbow. (Note to movie makers: blood isn't always bright red. This was dark, muddy maroon.) So I'm standing there, blood dripping from my arm, trying to make sense of this hole in my arm - did it just nick me and fly away, or did it...no, let's not think about that. I'm
