I'm fine.
No ... honest, I really am.
I mean - just think of how many folks are losing their homes during this economic downturn. Think of the people who are worried ... significantly worried ... about making rent this month. Or wondering how they'll afford their next gas or water bill.
I'm just unemployed is all.
It's just ... I don't get to play here anymore.
And that's what the loss is - it's not the job. It's the people. It's Paul D promising me he'll make up some "believable lie" as to me being a good employee if I use him as a reference. It's Amy R catching me as she's walking out and saying "see you" and me saying "yeah maybe" and her face dropping as she says "No friggen way". It's Bruce J saying "I saw it the work order but I still can't believe it". It's Christine M telling me that I'd better be back in the SF office when she returns from sabbatical in 6 weeks. It's Dylan M who just now has caught me quietly welling up at my desk while I type this. It's even Allister L who wrote to me last night to see if I'd be his commute buddy and calling me in disbelief this morning after he'd read my response.
And it's Tim. Spencer. David. Ernie. Jason. Scott. Andy. Jenifer. Dustin. Steve. Deborah. Jennifer. Jason (no, not that one - a different one). It's Lance's biceps and knowing that joke means nothing anymore.
I'm officially a weeping mass.
So yes, I will be alright - but for right now, I intend to lose it just a little bit.
********************
"So I turn myself to face me, but I've never caught a glimpse of how the others must see the faker ... I'm much too fast to take that test."
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Wanna rant?
Dad has, in fact, gone mad. It's true. Danny Evans, the genius that is Dad Gone Mad, has once again taken the pulse of his readership and decided it was time for a general ranting.
Danny's post on July 28th, which I may have successfully linked above, is a general rant of things he just needed to get off his chest. It's a good post, with some significant emotion behind it.
His readers, however ... I mean WOW. The comments, all 99 of them (thus far), make for some GREAT reading. There are a lot of pissed off people in that one little space. (*ahem* I'm the 99th post, btw.)
So - I think I have a total readership of like three people. But I'll be willing to bet, if you read through those comments, they'll inspire you to use the freedom of a fake name and just post away.
It's Therapy Tuesday ... get your rant on.
Danny's post on July 28th, which I may have successfully linked above, is a general rant of things he just needed to get off his chest. It's a good post, with some significant emotion behind it.
His readers, however ... I mean WOW. The comments, all 99 of them (thus far), make for some GREAT reading. There are a lot of pissed off people in that one little space. (*ahem* I'm the 99th post, btw.)
So - I think I have a total readership of like three people. But I'll be willing to bet, if you read through those comments, they'll inspire you to use the freedom of a fake name and just post away.
It's Therapy Tuesday ... get your rant on.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Baggage I'm not checking
This will likely be the last blog I write on my laptop. Well, on THIS laptop, at least. As of July 31st, unless something wonderfully incredible (or incredibly wonderful) occurs between now and 5pm on Thursday, I will join the ranks of unemployed. As such, I will need to return this laptop. Soooo, I’ve been spending my time doing my very best to move files, clean up cookies, transfer bookmarks, backup music and all kinds of other computer-related things that I’m incredibly unqualified to do.
In doing all this mandatory organization, I’ve come across more than 6 years of material from my work – and personal – life. I have, quite literally, every expense report I’ve submitted for reimbursement. I’ve been to Scottsdale, Chicago, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Portland, Sun Valley, Reno, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Amelia Island, and Orlando (to name just a few locations). I’ve met and worked alongside some incredible people … and some real jerks, too – don’t get me wrong. It’s just – the great folks outshine the morons, which is nice.
If I look it up, I can pinpoint the exact day (and time) I met Tim, and Jen, and Scott. I can trace the conversation where it was first suggested that I be part of the Gulf Coast response team for my company. I have the email conversation of having a chat with one of “my guys” in San Diego, while I was in the attic in my sister’s home in Big Sky, MT in April years back - I was complaining of the heavy snowfall and the wild moose. I have the ability to pull up the email I wrote when I learned of my Great Uncle’s death – and my first Niece’s birth.
Now, even though this was a laptop issued to me by my employer, it also has quite a bit of my personal life (and personality) stored on it. My desktop design is very much NOT standard issue – it’s supposed to be the corporate logo or some damn thing, but I just … never could bring myself to do that. The screen saver also is supposed to be corporate-issue but again, uh – no. I have photos of family, friends, pets, food, and such. I have funny comic strips, jokey-stuff, and notes to myself on here.
I have an electronic journal – buried deep inside various folders and very obscurely named (to protect the innocent and the very incredibly guilty) – that I’ve been writing over these past 6 years. And I have sub-chapters from that journal, from situations that caused such deep emotion that I felt that they required their own pages. And because I have grown up just a bit since I started this journal, I know better than to review what I’ve written. I'd be too tempted to re-write the past - literally. But I do recognize the validity of what I wrote - and what I felt. And so, it will travel with me to my new laptop, and I'll continue the "story", such as it is.
We don’t get to choose our baggage. We only get to choose what we DO with it.
In doing all this mandatory organization, I’ve come across more than 6 years of material from my work – and personal – life. I have, quite literally, every expense report I’ve submitted for reimbursement. I’ve been to Scottsdale, Chicago, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Portland, Sun Valley, Reno, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Amelia Island, and Orlando (to name just a few locations). I’ve met and worked alongside some incredible people … and some real jerks, too – don’t get me wrong. It’s just – the great folks outshine the morons, which is nice.
If I look it up, I can pinpoint the exact day (and time) I met Tim, and Jen, and Scott. I can trace the conversation where it was first suggested that I be part of the Gulf Coast response team for my company. I have the email conversation of having a chat with one of “my guys” in San Diego, while I was in the attic in my sister’s home in Big Sky, MT in April years back - I was complaining of the heavy snowfall and the wild moose. I have the ability to pull up the email I wrote when I learned of my Great Uncle’s death – and my first Niece’s birth.
Now, even though this was a laptop issued to me by my employer, it also has quite a bit of my personal life (and personality) stored on it. My desktop design is very much NOT standard issue – it’s supposed to be the corporate logo or some damn thing, but I just … never could bring myself to do that. The screen saver also is supposed to be corporate-issue but again, uh – no. I have photos of family, friends, pets, food, and such. I have funny comic strips, jokey-stuff, and notes to myself on here.
I have an electronic journal – buried deep inside various folders and very obscurely named (to protect the innocent and the very incredibly guilty) – that I’ve been writing over these past 6 years. And I have sub-chapters from that journal, from situations that caused such deep emotion that I felt that they required their own pages. And because I have grown up just a bit since I started this journal, I know better than to review what I’ve written. I'd be too tempted to re-write the past - literally. But I do recognize the validity of what I wrote - and what I felt. And so, it will travel with me to my new laptop, and I'll continue the "story", such as it is.
We don’t get to choose our baggage. We only get to choose what we DO with it.
Monday, July 21, 2008
What I do when I have nothing to do
Let's assume for a moment that on a non-work day, I have no appointments, no lunches, no quick trips to the market - literally a completely task-free calendar for a 24-hour period.
The following illustrates how I spend my day ... or, more accurately, how my day is spent:
***
6:42am - Wake up and throw on my "Virgin" teeshirt (which I purchased as an item of irony but these days, I wonder ... can "it" grow back??), clean out any remains of dinner that Hobbes and Minnie ignored from the previous evening, slop in some new food for breakfast that they can ignore, change out their water dishes, and walk back into the bedroom to try to convince Hobbes that the breakfast meal is, indeed, worthy of his attention. I'm smart enough to only set his food down - because Minnie is still outside from the previous evening.
***
6:51am - I visit the washroom, splash some water on my face, brush my teeth and hair, and head to the front door to get my paper and let Minnie in, if she is waiting for me (which she is). I set her food down and walk to the back room (the "music" room) to open the blinds. Minnie is standing at my feet, so I walk her back into the kitchen to remind her that breakfast has been served. She does not care about the food - apparently my sole reason for being here today was to serve as her door-person.
***
7:02am - Toss the paper on the bed and head back to the music room, to open the blinds. Minnie is still walking between my feet so I open the glass door and she goes bounding out. My attempts to cajole her into eating the breakfast I've provided have failed and she immediately curls up for a nap on the deck chairs. She will be completely, 100% UNinterested in waking up, even if food is involved for the next 14 minutes, unless of course she changes her mind. She will let me know when she is ready to dine and, until then, I should leave her be. (I note that, for a formerly "wild" cat, she sure wasted no time in getting me trained.)
***
7:05am - Walk back into the kitchen and pour myself a glass of orange juice to take with my morning pills. It will be at this point that I realize that I have already brushed my teeth and "minty orange juice" is not a great flavor to start ones day with and that I have left my morning pills in the bedroom. I pick up Minnie's food from her serving area in the kitchen, so that Hobbes doesn't "taste" it for her - and I bring the orange juice with me back to the bedroom under the pretense of taking my pills while reading the paper. This, of course, will not actually happen - but it's a plan at least.
***
7:07am - Snuggle back into bed to start on the paper. Glance at the clock as I thumb through the first section and realize ... yep, those are my pills right by the clock - across the room - and my orange juice is sitting on the table right by my bed, but it's too high up to reach unless I un-snuggle and dammit all if the covers don't just lure me to ignore the problem for a bit.
***
7:36am - It's been more than 30 minutes since I brushed my teeth so the taste of orange juice should be more orange and less minty by now. Walk across the room to get my pills and wonder if Minnie is ready to come in. A glance outside the music room doors onto the deck show me that I waited too long on my offer of breakfast, as the area is now strewn with feathers of what appear to have belonged to a Steller's Jay. All the good parts of the bird are gone, so I'll have feet, tail feathers, and a seed-gullet to clean up later. Oh, and some hard, almost green small organ that I still think is a kidney, but I'm not all that curious to look it up. Minnie is, of course, waiting by the door to come in, so I open it for her (as is my assigned task) and she heads immediately to the kitchen to see what has been served. I follow her into the kitchen, set her food down, pour some water into a glass, and walk back to the bedroom, only to see that I still have my orange juice, which is what I was gonna take my pills with - I remember that part. I pour the water into a hanging ivy in my room, which immediately causes a spill onto Hobbes who was sleeping quietly on his kitty scratching post (which sadly happens to be placed underneath said plant). He is not amused and will spend the next 18 minutes licking every hair back into place and glancing at me as if to be muttering "damn dirty apes" under his breath.
***
7:37am - I hear the pitiful cries of Minnie at the front door, begging to immediately be let outside for some emergency that she simply must attend to. I glance over to Hobbes, who is too busy on his apperance to care about the issues around him, and trudge to the front door to let Minnie out. She bounds out urgently and stops two steps outside of my door. She sits, and begins to clean. It is simply a kitty mystery as to why this cleaning could not occur inside, but it's not my lot in life to ask such questions. I walk to the kitchen to again pick up her food, and head back to bed.
***
8:02am - Oh, crap - my pills. Right - THAT's what I haven't done. I glance to my clock, where they aren't. They're also aren't by the orange juice in my bedroom. A 10-minute search will have them turn up on my reading table in the music room, where I must have set them down in my viewing of Minnie's breakfast al fresco. I take my pills in my left hand, hold them out so that I can actually SEE them - and walk directly into the bedroom to my orange juice, which I take into my right hand. It's taken me 40 minutes, but I have at last taken my morning pills. I've accomplished something. I will reward myself by climbing *back* into bed to read the Entertainment section of the paper.
***
8:02:08am - As I unfold the Entertainment section of the paper, the cries of Minnie directly underneath my bedroom window tell me she's ready to come inside. I walk to the music room, let her in, place her food down and as I'm returning to the bedroom, I pass Hobbes, who is ready to eat his breakfast now. What will really happen, of course, is that he'll look at his breakfast, which has been down for his review for an hour, and he'll decide it is too old to eat. Even 'tho Minnie's food has also been uncanned for an hour, it is - in his TINY little kitty mind - fresher and, as he is the top cat here, he'll push her out of the way and eat her food. She won't care because, after all, she still has a belly full of fresh birdie. She goes off to her latest favorite place to snooze.
***
8:28am - It's time to get moving. I've read the paper, even the international sections that I don't totally understand but do my best to keep up on, so yes, it's time to get moving. I turn on the radio as I head to my purse to get my blackberry. Though I don't have to work today, I will get no fewer than 72 emails on an average day, and I like to know what will be waiting for me when I do have to be at work. While my blackberry syncs up to divulge the waiting emails, I sit on the edge of my bed, barely able to hear the morning DJs over Hobbes satisfied snoring. He is back asleep on his cat scratching post, with a full belly of Minnie's breakfast. I notice my blackberry light is flashing red, indicating the individuals in the world who wish to talk with me. By the time I've completed browsing through these emails, I will notice that I'm completely back under the bed covers - with no recollection as to having climbed back under them.
***
8:58am - Committed to being "up and about" before 9am, I throw off the covers and stand upright, which causes Hobbes to glance up at me. I turn off the radio and get dressed, walk to the bathroom to brush my hair and find myself brushing my teeth ... again. "Aw well" I mutter, as Hobbes strolls by the doorway. I imagine that my movements around the home are just as confusing to him as his are to me. I walk back into the bedroom to retrieve my blackberry and, for just a moment, I wonder if I have, in fact, taken my morning pills. Happily I remember doing so - with water or orange juice or something - so I walk to the kitchen and see that Minnie's food is down. This is good, because it means that she is inside. I know that I've let her in a few times already this morning, so the only way I can remember if she is in or out is by her food bowl. I grab my purse and head out the door because, while I have no SCHEDULED events, there is but one automatic must do. I drive to Starbucks.
***
9:22am - As I walk back through the door with my coffee, I wait for Minnie to come running up behind me to be let inside, except this does not happen. As I close the front door behind me, a quick glance into the kitchen shows me that she's already inside, because her food is down. I enjoy my coffee for a bit, log onto the 'fun' non-work related sites of my laptop and turn on some music to enjoy.
***
10:17am - Hobbes emerges from his mid-morning nap for a quick snack (from Minnie's bowl, of course), and a bit of attention from me. After I've received enough kitty love, he strolls back into the bedroom, to begin his late-morning nap.
***
10:28am - I take a last sip of my mocha and realize that Minnie has still not surfaced. This isn't unusual, but I do take a moment to glance in on Hobbes, with the idea that perhaps she is napping with him. As he looks at me with an annoyed expression,
I see she is not there. I decide it's not a problem (yet), and head back to my laptop.
***
10:42am - I am ready for a hot chocolate refill and, while I wait for the milk to heat, I walk to the music room to glance at Minnie's usual resting spot. She is not there.
This is a little strange, as this has been her latest favorite place to nap. I walk back into the kitchen and, with my full mug of hot chocolate, I walk into the front room to look behind the small bi-level drawers near the front door 
- but there too - no Minnie
***
10:59am - While wondering if my only conversations today will be with my Starbucks Barrista and my cats, I look over at the drapes in the front room, hoping to see a curled up Minnie Cat making the pleats fall strangely - but they are straight and true. I have officially lost my cat - somewhere inside my home. This is different then misplacing some pills, and I decide to take a moment inside to search. It is, afterall, very possible that she's really outside and I perhaps just forgot to pick up her food. (It's happened before.) In fact, I decide to take a look at her dining area, in case she's decided to top off her breakfast with a mid-morning snack.
No dice ... or, rather, no cat.
***
11:03am - At the risk of again waking Hobbes, I stroll quietly into the bedroom and open my closet door. There is, on the floor of my closet, a box from an Amazon order that was, for a time, a favorite kitty sleeping spot. This led to many hours of wondering where the cat was, only to hear sad little mewing from deep inside the closet. I would feel awful, and she'd work it up to be far worse than it was. I look inside the box,
which is cat-less. Hobbes moans deeply while I slink way, in full cat-search mode.
***
11:09am - With the second hot chocolate warming up, I wonder if I'm suffering from "cat blindness". I have long suspected that Minnie and, to some extent Hobbes, have a secret kitty-dimension that allows them to navigate unseen throughout these rooms. I rub my eyes and glance at pillow on top of the bi-level drawers near the front door.
This pillow was placed specifically for cat napping (in order to discourage the use of the footstool for that purpose), and clearly it is still being ignored. There is a void of cats here, too.
***
2:02pm - I've spent the past 2 hours crawling under my bed, looking behind every door, moving furniture, unpacking boxes that were destined for the garage (but just haven't made it there yet). I have checked the bathtub, the sinks, the oven and dishwasher (clearly desperation had set in). Except for ordering coffee today, the only things I've said out loud is "no matter" under my breath and "here kitty kitty kitty" throughout my home. Wherever she is, I can now rattle off a long list of places where Minnie isn't. I pour myself yet another mug of hot chocolate and sit at my desk, wondering if I'd missed something - somePLACE - obvious.
***
5:18pm - Having spent the better half of a day imagining all kinds of awful things (including one where the relatives of the Steller's Jay return to the back deck for revenge) I am racked with guilt when my temporary apartment-mate walks through the door. I will now have to admit what has happened to another human who also cares deeply for Minnie. As I am screwing up my courage, I watch as Jesse sets down his bags and walks over to the cat toy box
to pet Minnie. "So", he asks me while scratching her head, "what'd ya' do with yourself today?"
The following illustrates how I spend my day ... or, more accurately, how my day is spent:
***
6:42am - Wake up and throw on my "Virgin" teeshirt (which I purchased as an item of irony but these days, I wonder ... can "it" grow back??), clean out any remains of dinner that Hobbes and Minnie ignored from the previous evening, slop in some new food for breakfast that they can ignore, change out their water dishes, and walk back into the bedroom to try to convince Hobbes that the breakfast meal is, indeed, worthy of his attention. I'm smart enough to only set his food down - because Minnie is still outside from the previous evening.
***
6:51am - I visit the washroom, splash some water on my face, brush my teeth and hair, and head to the front door to get my paper and let Minnie in, if she is waiting for me (which she is). I set her food down and walk to the back room (the "music" room) to open the blinds. Minnie is standing at my feet, so I walk her back into the kitchen to remind her that breakfast has been served. She does not care about the food - apparently my sole reason for being here today was to serve as her door-person.
***
7:02am - Toss the paper on the bed and head back to the music room, to open the blinds. Minnie is still walking between my feet so I open the glass door and she goes bounding out. My attempts to cajole her into eating the breakfast I've provided have failed and she immediately curls up for a nap on the deck chairs. She will be completely, 100% UNinterested in waking up, even if food is involved for the next 14 minutes, unless of course she changes her mind. She will let me know when she is ready to dine and, until then, I should leave her be. (I note that, for a formerly "wild" cat, she sure wasted no time in getting me trained.)
***
7:05am - Walk back into the kitchen and pour myself a glass of orange juice to take with my morning pills. It will be at this point that I realize that I have already brushed my teeth and "minty orange juice" is not a great flavor to start ones day with and that I have left my morning pills in the bedroom. I pick up Minnie's food from her serving area in the kitchen, so that Hobbes doesn't "taste" it for her - and I bring the orange juice with me back to the bedroom under the pretense of taking my pills while reading the paper. This, of course, will not actually happen - but it's a plan at least.
***
7:07am - Snuggle back into bed to start on the paper. Glance at the clock as I thumb through the first section and realize ... yep, those are my pills right by the clock - across the room - and my orange juice is sitting on the table right by my bed, but it's too high up to reach unless I un-snuggle and dammit all if the covers don't just lure me to ignore the problem for a bit.
***
7:36am - It's been more than 30 minutes since I brushed my teeth so the taste of orange juice should be more orange and less minty by now. Walk across the room to get my pills and wonder if Minnie is ready to come in. A glance outside the music room doors onto the deck show me that I waited too long on my offer of breakfast, as the area is now strewn with feathers of what appear to have belonged to a Steller's Jay. All the good parts of the bird are gone, so I'll have feet, tail feathers, and a seed-gullet to clean up later. Oh, and some hard, almost green small organ that I still think is a kidney, but I'm not all that curious to look it up. Minnie is, of course, waiting by the door to come in, so I open it for her (as is my assigned task) and she heads immediately to the kitchen to see what has been served. I follow her into the kitchen, set her food down, pour some water into a glass, and walk back to the bedroom, only to see that I still have my orange juice, which is what I was gonna take my pills with - I remember that part. I pour the water into a hanging ivy in my room, which immediately causes a spill onto Hobbes who was sleeping quietly on his kitty scratching post (which sadly happens to be placed underneath said plant). He is not amused and will spend the next 18 minutes licking every hair back into place and glancing at me as if to be muttering "damn dirty apes" under his breath.
***
7:37am - I hear the pitiful cries of Minnie at the front door, begging to immediately be let outside for some emergency that she simply must attend to. I glance over to Hobbes, who is too busy on his apperance to care about the issues around him, and trudge to the front door to let Minnie out. She bounds out urgently and stops two steps outside of my door. She sits, and begins to clean. It is simply a kitty mystery as to why this cleaning could not occur inside, but it's not my lot in life to ask such questions. I walk to the kitchen to again pick up her food, and head back to bed.
***
8:02am - Oh, crap - my pills. Right - THAT's what I haven't done. I glance to my clock, where they aren't. They're also aren't by the orange juice in my bedroom. A 10-minute search will have them turn up on my reading table in the music room, where I must have set them down in my viewing of Minnie's breakfast al fresco. I take my pills in my left hand, hold them out so that I can actually SEE them - and walk directly into the bedroom to my orange juice, which I take into my right hand. It's taken me 40 minutes, but I have at last taken my morning pills. I've accomplished something. I will reward myself by climbing *back* into bed to read the Entertainment section of the paper.
***
8:02:08am - As I unfold the Entertainment section of the paper, the cries of Minnie directly underneath my bedroom window tell me she's ready to come inside. I walk to the music room, let her in, place her food down and as I'm returning to the bedroom, I pass Hobbes, who is ready to eat his breakfast now. What will really happen, of course, is that he'll look at his breakfast, which has been down for his review for an hour, and he'll decide it is too old to eat. Even 'tho Minnie's food has also been uncanned for an hour, it is - in his TINY little kitty mind - fresher and, as he is the top cat here, he'll push her out of the way and eat her food. She won't care because, after all, she still has a belly full of fresh birdie. She goes off to her latest favorite place to snooze.
***
8:28am - It's time to get moving. I've read the paper, even the international sections that I don't totally understand but do my best to keep up on, so yes, it's time to get moving. I turn on the radio as I head to my purse to get my blackberry. Though I don't have to work today, I will get no fewer than 72 emails on an average day, and I like to know what will be waiting for me when I do have to be at work. While my blackberry syncs up to divulge the waiting emails, I sit on the edge of my bed, barely able to hear the morning DJs over Hobbes satisfied snoring. He is back asleep on his cat scratching post, with a full belly of Minnie's breakfast. I notice my blackberry light is flashing red, indicating the individuals in the world who wish to talk with me. By the time I've completed browsing through these emails, I will notice that I'm completely back under the bed covers - with no recollection as to having climbed back under them.
***
8:58am - Committed to being "up and about" before 9am, I throw off the covers and stand upright, which causes Hobbes to glance up at me. I turn off the radio and get dressed, walk to the bathroom to brush my hair and find myself brushing my teeth ... again. "Aw well" I mutter, as Hobbes strolls by the doorway. I imagine that my movements around the home are just as confusing to him as his are to me. I walk back into the bedroom to retrieve my blackberry and, for just a moment, I wonder if I have, in fact, taken my morning pills. Happily I remember doing so - with water or orange juice or something - so I walk to the kitchen and see that Minnie's food is down. This is good, because it means that she is inside. I know that I've let her in a few times already this morning, so the only way I can remember if she is in or out is by her food bowl. I grab my purse and head out the door because, while I have no SCHEDULED events, there is but one automatic must do. I drive to Starbucks.
***
9:22am - As I walk back through the door with my coffee, I wait for Minnie to come running up behind me to be let inside, except this does not happen. As I close the front door behind me, a quick glance into the kitchen shows me that she's already inside, because her food is down. I enjoy my coffee for a bit, log onto the 'fun' non-work related sites of my laptop and turn on some music to enjoy.
***
10:17am - Hobbes emerges from his mid-morning nap for a quick snack (from Minnie's bowl, of course), and a bit of attention from me. After I've received enough kitty love, he strolls back into the bedroom, to begin his late-morning nap.
***
10:28am - I take a last sip of my mocha and realize that Minnie has still not surfaced. This isn't unusual, but I do take a moment to glance in on Hobbes, with the idea that perhaps she is napping with him. As he looks at me with an annoyed expression,
I see she is not there. I decide it's not a problem (yet), and head back to my laptop.***
10:42am - I am ready for a hot chocolate refill and, while I wait for the milk to heat, I walk to the music room to glance at Minnie's usual resting spot. She is not there.
This is a little strange, as this has been her latest favorite place to nap. I walk back into the kitchen and, with my full mug of hot chocolate, I walk into the front room to look behind the small bi-level drawers near the front door - but there too - no Minnie***
10:59am - While wondering if my only conversations today will be with my Starbucks Barrista and my cats, I look over at the drapes in the front room, hoping to see a curled up Minnie Cat making the pleats fall strangely - but they are straight and true. I have officially lost my cat - somewhere inside my home. This is different then misplacing some pills, and I decide to take a moment inside to search. It is, afterall, very possible that she's really outside and I perhaps just forgot to pick up her food. (It's happened before.) In fact, I decide to take a look at her dining area, in case she's decided to top off her breakfast with a mid-morning snack.
No dice ... or, rather, no cat.***
11:03am - At the risk of again waking Hobbes, I stroll quietly into the bedroom and open my closet door. There is, on the floor of my closet, a box from an Amazon order that was, for a time, a favorite kitty sleeping spot. This led to many hours of wondering where the cat was, only to hear sad little mewing from deep inside the closet. I would feel awful, and she'd work it up to be far worse than it was. I look inside the box,
which is cat-less. Hobbes moans deeply while I slink way, in full cat-search mode.***
11:09am - With the second hot chocolate warming up, I wonder if I'm suffering from "cat blindness". I have long suspected that Minnie and, to some extent Hobbes, have a secret kitty-dimension that allows them to navigate unseen throughout these rooms. I rub my eyes and glance at pillow on top of the bi-level drawers near the front door.
This pillow was placed specifically for cat napping (in order to discourage the use of the footstool for that purpose), and clearly it is still being ignored. There is a void of cats here, too.***
2:02pm - I've spent the past 2 hours crawling under my bed, looking behind every door, moving furniture, unpacking boxes that were destined for the garage (but just haven't made it there yet). I have checked the bathtub, the sinks, the oven and dishwasher (clearly desperation had set in). Except for ordering coffee today, the only things I've said out loud is "no matter" under my breath and "here kitty kitty kitty" throughout my home. Wherever she is, I can now rattle off a long list of places where Minnie isn't. I pour myself yet another mug of hot chocolate and sit at my desk, wondering if I'd missed something - somePLACE - obvious.
***
5:18pm - Having spent the better half of a day imagining all kinds of awful things (including one where the relatives of the Steller's Jay return to the back deck for revenge) I am racked with guilt when my temporary apartment-mate walks through the door. I will now have to admit what has happened to another human who also cares deeply for Minnie. As I am screwing up my courage, I watch as Jesse sets down his bags and walks over to the cat toy box
to pet Minnie. "So", he asks me while scratching her head, "what'd ya' do with yourself today?"
Saturday, July 12, 2008
... and then some.
ok FINE ...
and I also made Raspberry. Couldn't be helped ... they were easily available and CHEAP at a local farm.
11 1/2 pint jars
7 full pint jars
Seriously though ... that's IT now, dammit. Geez - to make 127 jars of jam in less than 10 days is enough. (If I put this much energy into looking for a new gig, or even updating my resume, I'd already have a job lined up.)
and I also made Raspberry. Couldn't be helped ... they were easily available and CHEAP at a local farm.
11 1/2 pint jars
7 full pint jars
Seriously though ... that's IT now, dammit. Geez - to make 127 jars of jam in less than 10 days is enough. (If I put this much energy into looking for a new gig, or even updating my resume, I'd already have a job lined up.)
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
FMD Count
Ok, since my vacation is officially over, below is the official the FMD July 2008 Jam Inventory. (I may make more this weekend, buuuuut I think I've had enough "fun" for now.) I made 109 jars of jam - with only 1 jar that would NOT seal properly. (I'll use it on ice cream tonight or on toast this weekend.)
I used a full flat of strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries, 3 pounds of lemons, and 7 pounds of apricots. I ... I don't even wanna think about how many pounds of sugar I used.
I made Apricot, Strawberry, Doubleberry (which is a Blackberry/Raspberry mix), and Tripleberry (which is 2 parts Strawberry, 1 part Blackberry and 1 part Raspberry).
Jar Count:
12 pints and 27 1/2 pints Apricot
28 1/2 pints Strawberry
1 pint and 8 1/2 pints Doubleberry
16 pints and 16 1/2 pints Tripleberry
If I hear of any family members or friends buying jam, I'm gonna be pissssssed ...
I used a full flat of strawberries, blackberries, and raspberries, 3 pounds of lemons, and 7 pounds of apricots. I ... I don't even wanna think about how many pounds of sugar I used.
I made Apricot, Strawberry, Doubleberry (which is a Blackberry/Raspberry mix), and Tripleberry (which is 2 parts Strawberry, 1 part Blackberry and 1 part Raspberry).
Jar Count:
12 pints and 27 1/2 pints Apricot
28 1/2 pints Strawberry
1 pint and 8 1/2 pints Doubleberry
16 pints and 16 1/2 pints Tripleberry
If I hear of any family members or friends buying jam, I'm gonna be pissssssed ...
Follow-up from April posting
In mid-April earlier this year (in this post, actually), I told ya' about a Habitat for Humanity event that I attended on behalf of my company. A gentleman (and gentle man) named Ken Arthur acted as master of ceremonies for the evening - and he was a very engaging - and a self-admitted nervous - one, especially when introducing the mayor of the city to the large audience.
It was a heck of an evening ... full of warm fuzzies that stayed with me, right up until a few days later, when I read about Mr. Arthur being killed not more than a few blocks from the home that he worked to create with Habitat. The area his family still resides in what is not the best part of town, and I admitted in my post that it would have been easy to shrug off Ken's murder as part of the price of living in his zip code.
In an effort to wrap up a lose end, I'll let y'all know that the San Francisco police believe that the man who stabbed Mr. Arthur was himself killed days later when he crashed his motorcycle into a pole.
Make of that what you will.
It was a heck of an evening ... full of warm fuzzies that stayed with me, right up until a few days later, when I read about Mr. Arthur being killed not more than a few blocks from the home that he worked to create with Habitat. The area his family still resides in what is not the best part of town, and I admitted in my post that it would have been easy to shrug off Ken's murder as part of the price of living in his zip code.
In an effort to wrap up a lose end, I'll let y'all know that the San Francisco police believe that the man who stabbed Mr. Arthur was himself killed days later when he crashed his motorcycle into a pole.
Make of that what you will.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
I be jammin' ...
The background story ...
It started with cheesecakes. I don't remember why ... I suspect that I had been watching the flavors the bakery sold the most of and thought "well hell - that's alright, I guess, but what if we made X too ...". Knowing that my little bakery would never be allowed to alter the menu, even to make something BETTER, I decided to make cheesecakes for my own fun out of my home kitchen. I'd bring in my various offerings to work, and come holiday season, was surprised to get requests for them to be served at people's tables, for their "official" desserts. It wasn't long before I was also making flavored truffles.
Now there are food laws to be observed when you sell a home-made product, especially when you also have a business that's in the food industry - and heaven help you if you want to create an at-home business creating food. Doing so, in my county anyway, means my home kitchen would be available for inspection at any time, for any reason and I'm just too private of a person for that kind of invasion.
I needed to create a seperate identity, completely untied to the cafe/bakery. I also decided that I'd never really SELL these products. I'd accept an order, request the individual wanting the product buy the cream cheese, or cover the cost of the chocolate, and beyond that, it was good by me. For the truffles, knowing I'd never be able to charge what they actually cost me to make, I decided to make them "charity chocolates". Donate to your favorite charity, educate me about it (if you'd like), and here ya' go. This was back in the 80's.
"Frankly, My Dear ..." Cheesecakes & More was born and the name was part of a nod to NEVER cutting fat, or sugar, or chocoate, or butter. My slogan was "The perfect answer to any diet" (which was a response to the silent rest of the title ... "I don't give a damn"), which was my way of saying "the Triple-Chocolate cheesecake that I make has base of 3 pounds of cream cheese. If this is a problem for you, then don't eat it. I will not make a diet version."
FMD has been around, in some fashion or another, for two decades. There were years when I skipped truffles completely, and I haven't made a cheesecake for about 7 years now, but the jams are my constant. With my company closing for the July 4th week, it's well understood by those I work with that I will return with FMD Jams. My "sales guys" would bring in bagels - without my saying a word - because they KNEW that I'd supply the spread.
Some years are better than others. One year I made two cases of what could, at best, be described as really good apricot syrup ... and sometimes my strawberry is too chunky for real "spreading" onto toast (which is how I like it) but that's part of the whole "home made" charm, I suppose.
So here we go ... the official FMD 2008 Jam Update:
I will have strawberry (which by the way were all this gorgeous looking)
and apricot (I needed to hold one, so they wouldn't look like peaches)
And there will be tripleberry (my fave - a strawberry/blackberry/raspberry combo)
I realize that the raspberries were outstanding this year, but the costs are still too high to justify using them alone - they'll go father mixed with the other two berries. That being said ... just look at these guys!
So there ya' go. I'll be ready to ship by the end of this month and typically ask ya' let me use the "slow boat" shipping method, just to keep my costs down. I prefer getting two flavor requests at once, in case I can't come through on your "top" request. And, since these will be jars going out, I make no promises that there won't be breakage, but will re-ship if ya' just say so.
It started with cheesecakes. I don't remember why ... I suspect that I had been watching the flavors the bakery sold the most of and thought "well hell - that's alright, I guess, but what if we made X too ...". Knowing that my little bakery would never be allowed to alter the menu, even to make something BETTER, I decided to make cheesecakes for my own fun out of my home kitchen. I'd bring in my various offerings to work, and come holiday season, was surprised to get requests for them to be served at people's tables, for their "official" desserts. It wasn't long before I was also making flavored truffles.
Now there are food laws to be observed when you sell a home-made product, especially when you also have a business that's in the food industry - and heaven help you if you want to create an at-home business creating food. Doing so, in my county anyway, means my home kitchen would be available for inspection at any time, for any reason and I'm just too private of a person for that kind of invasion.
I needed to create a seperate identity, completely untied to the cafe/bakery. I also decided that I'd never really SELL these products. I'd accept an order, request the individual wanting the product buy the cream cheese, or cover the cost of the chocolate, and beyond that, it was good by me. For the truffles, knowing I'd never be able to charge what they actually cost me to make, I decided to make them "charity chocolates". Donate to your favorite charity, educate me about it (if you'd like), and here ya' go. This was back in the 80's.
"Frankly, My Dear ..." Cheesecakes & More was born and the name was part of a nod to NEVER cutting fat, or sugar, or chocoate, or butter. My slogan was "The perfect answer to any diet" (which was a response to the silent rest of the title ... "I don't give a damn"), which was my way of saying "the Triple-Chocolate cheesecake that I make has base of 3 pounds of cream cheese. If this is a problem for you, then don't eat it. I will not make a diet version."
FMD has been around, in some fashion or another, for two decades. There were years when I skipped truffles completely, and I haven't made a cheesecake for about 7 years now, but the jams are my constant. With my company closing for the July 4th week, it's well understood by those I work with that I will return with FMD Jams. My "sales guys" would bring in bagels - without my saying a word - because they KNEW that I'd supply the spread.
Some years are better than others. One year I made two cases of what could, at best, be described as really good apricot syrup ... and sometimes my strawberry is too chunky for real "spreading" onto toast (which is how I like it) but that's part of the whole "home made" charm, I suppose.
So here we go ... the official FMD 2008 Jam Update:
I will have strawberry (which by the way were all this gorgeous looking)
and apricot (I needed to hold one, so they wouldn't look like peaches)And there will be tripleberry (my fave - a strawberry/blackberry/raspberry combo)
I realize that the raspberries were outstanding this year, but the costs are still too high to justify using them alone - they'll go father mixed with the other two berries. That being said ... just look at these guys!So there ya' go. I'll be ready to ship by the end of this month and typically ask ya' let me use the "slow boat" shipping method, just to keep my costs down. I prefer getting two flavor requests at once, in case I can't come through on your "top" request. And, since these will be jars going out, I make no promises that there won't be breakage, but will re-ship if ya' just say so.
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