Month: April 2008

Oooooohm

Once upon a time I took a meditation class. This came at the suggestion of one of my friends (and coworker) who suggested that I was wound a skosh too tight, and could benefit from some “time out”. To her credit, she at least had the decency to take the class with me. We sat on little carpet squares and tried to quiet our minds.

Ok, to be fair, it was a good and useful class, so I can hate on her too much.

Why am I telling you this? Well, as part of the class, the instructor told us to stop reading the newspaper and stop watching the television news.

At first I wasn’t sure I could do it. I’m an avid reader and I like to know what’s going on.

She reasoned that if there was something we needed to know, someone would tell us.

So I heeded that advice and over time found it was true. I was a lot calmer not knowing every little freaky thing that was going on that the media then blows up to epic proportions. There is a LOT of bad news in the world and the media thrives. “If it bleeds, it leads.”

I was content not to know the latest, and yes, folks always find a way to tell you what’s going on. It ended up being pretty good advice.

Lately I’ve been slipping back. I find myself reading the online versions of the local newspapers and scanning the Yahoo headlines frequently. And I can tell, I’m getting a bit bewildered by the world again.

I am a bit frazzled today as I have a LOT of meetings and to add to the fun, our organization is moving locations, so I have to be totally packed by end of today.

I needed a break from the insanity and I tuned in to SFGate.com to see what’s doing.

Here’s the headlines that greet me (actual cut and paste from this afternoon’s page):

Rape Suspect Phones Victim

Boy’s Skull Broken In Schoolyard

Apartment Fire Kills Boy

Europe Copes With Pump Prices

Pizza-Killing Charges Dropped

Woman clung to body to stay alive

This does not put me at ease! This does not help me be calm!

The only somewhat “good news” item is this:

Whale Wanders Into The Bay

Article says, “To the delight of onlookers, a cetacean spent the morning swimming between Fort Baker and the G.G. Bridge.”

I’m sure soon enough everyone will be freaked out that the little guy is lost and he’ll probably ground himself and we’ll get ongoing coverage of a dead and rotting whale.

Sure could use a little good news today…

Oooooooooohm!

Got the homesick blues

A friend back in Albuquerque sent this to me in an email.

I don’t know who took the photo but I’d happily credit them, it’s gorgeous.

The photo came with only this explanation:

“This is why we live where we do. Someone shared this with me recently. The photo was taken during the ’07 ABQ Inter. Balloon Fiesta and the Celebration of the City of Albuquerque’s birthday (400th, I believe). The city had high-intensity halogen lights up on the Crest that were only powered by small 12 volt batteries!”

I had to shrink it to get it into this blog space, but the full size is gorgeous. So gorgeous I actually wept a little when I saw it.

Image removed at the request of the photographer, Glenn Hohnstreiter. You can view it on his webpage. Go take a look. You’ll be glad you did.

Sphincteritis

Not the medical kind. The emotional kind. And, oddly, in this case related to medical personnel.

This morning I read this brief article in today’s ABQjournal: Hospital Officials: Prank Not Funny

My first thought was “I’ll bet it is.” I mean, really, office pranks are funny. And hey, a hospital is *prime* for good office comedy. Lots of ways you can go with that.

Well, in reading the article, I discovered the joke in question wasn’t actually all that funny, at least not to me. It probably was to the hospital workers who had put in a twelve hours shift and were punch drunk and silly. And generally an office prank arises out of people being 1) tired, 2) fed up and 3) both.

So these hospital folks were caught on the security camera putting a cartoon image of Stewie in the frame that had recently housed a photo of the Chief Operations Officer.

It might have been a loving, joking tribute to the employee who had moved on to other employment, likening him humorously to the baby bent on world domination. It might also have been an after-the-fact tacky comment on the nature of the hospital executive.

Either way, I don’t know and really, I don’t care. But I do think that the fact this made the newspaper and there is huffing and puffing from the powers that be at the hospital is sort of silly.

Office pranks are everywhere. I’ve done them. I’ve been a victim of them. Hell, I once aided and abetted my coworkers kidnapping a diminutive office mate and wrapping him tightly, still seated in his ergonomic office chair, in shrink-wrap plastic (except for his, you know, breathing areas). Round and round and round on the shrink wrap platform and we then rolled him over, green in the gills, to the pile of racks and equipment that were being moved to a new location.

Had the guy had no sense of humor, I suppose that HR wouldn’t have looked kindly on the prank. Huffing and puffing would have ensued. Turns out the guy has a great sense of humor, and our boss almost peed his pants laughing so hard.

What the hospital employees missed was a few vital keys to a good office prank: Timing. And know your audience.

Ooh, all this talk has me itching for a good interoffice prank. Sadly, my current crop of coworkers have NO sense of humor. The timing is good (the office is in shambles, we’re moving buildings) but the audience…not so much.

Safe in Colorado, Open season in New Mexico

Got an interesting link from The Good Man this morning. “New Mexico fights to protect the lynx” from CNN.com and same story under “U.S. Sued Over Lynx Protection” from the ABQjournal.

My first read was in passing only. Sort of a *snort*, “figures”, : shrug : kind of response you get used to being from New Mexico and being left out.

In a nutshell, a conservation and animal rights group is suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service “to force it to extend Endangered Species Act protection to the Canada lynx in New Mexico.”

Big deal, right?

“The federal government lists the elusive, furry cats as threatened in 14 states— but not in New Mexico.”

Oh? Ok. Well, fair enough. And then further…

“The Colorado Division of Wildlife, which has released more than 200 lynx in Colorado since 1999, tracked about 60 of the animals into New Mexico’s Taos, Rio Arriba and San Juan counties…”

60 divided by 200 equals THIRTY PERCENT of the released animals aren’t protected.

Ah. So none of those wildlife “experts” at Fish and Wildlife thought that the “elusive, furry cat” would, you know, roam?

Have they MET the western region of the country? You know, wide open spaces, mountains, nice weather, lots of small furry things that a big furry thing might like to eat?

Has the Mexican Gray Wolf taught us NOTHING about how animals will roam when looking for viable food sources?

So what’s kind of head shaking about the story is that if the “elusive, furry cat” is in Colorado, it is totally protected under the Endangered Species Act. Once it crosses over into New Mexico? Open season.

No one tell Neal Trujillo that, ok? Cimarron isn’t all that far from the Colorado border…

Photo source.

Hot or not?

Yes, I think hot.

Been getting a lot of compliments today at work about my outfit.

Well, one aspect of my outfit. My boots. They rock.

So why am I blogging about this?

Well. You see, I bought these little beauties about three months ago. I brought them home and quickly tried them on to show The Good Man. He looked at them, then gave me that sort of look you get when you sniff the milk carton well past its expiry.

He didn’t like them. Said I looked like a CHP Officer (and not in a good way).

And he has REALLY good taste in clothes, so I tend to listen to him.

With sadness, I put them away in my closet. They were so cool. I didn’t want to take them back, but I didn’t think I’d wear them if they give my beloved “that look” on his face.

Over the months I keep seeing cute little gals wearing same or similar kicks, and I keep thinking, “I have some of those…”

Something snapped over the weekend and I decided, “yes, I will wear them, curdled milk face or not.”

This morning I pulled them out from the closet depths, paired them with a fave springtime skirt and an appropriate top.

And as my love and I walked to the CalTrain station, he said, “Hey, I really like those boots”.

Umm hmm.

“I take you in sickness and in health, in odd fashion choices and when you rock the runway…” Can I get an I do on those vows?

Anyhow, here are the kicks in question: