Autumn is in the Air

Thank goodness the long hot summer is over and Autumn is breathing it's cool crisp breezes on us at last. This is my favorite time of year. It's almost time for our trip to Oak Glen to pick apples and see the changing of the season in the colorful foliage. The days are shorter now, the street lights are still on while I'm driving to work. I don't mind...bring on the cool weather of the harvest season. I'm looking forward to all the season holds.

Happy Birthday Karo!

Happy Birthday to my little sister! I am so thankful for my sister. I don't know what I would do without her. She understands me like no one else and loves me in spite of it. Anytime I talk to her I can be assured of a good laugh, sage advice and a willing ear for all my troubles. I would go so far as to say she is my best friend in the whole wide world. I wish her all the happiness in the world today, on her birthday, and always.

Our Latest Project - So Proud

As everyone knows the city of Houston has been hit by Hurricane Ike and much of the city is destroyed. As well as everything else traffic signals were wiped out. My company maintains the traffic signals for the City of Houston so, of course, they turned to us for help. The Texas office is fairly new and the work load was tremendous, too much for them to handle. The call went out for volunteers to go to Houston for 3-4 weeks, camping out in uncertain conditions at a prevailing wage schedule much lower than California (by $10 per hour). Twelve men stepped forward and said "I'll go." Leaving the comforts of home and family is enough of a hardship, but the living conditions and needs of 12 different personalities is also in the mix. Never mind the wage change.

I am so proud of our men for their willingness to put personal comforts aside to help out in a time like this. My company will no doubt reimburse them for their efforts and they will also get the recognition they deserve, we're just that kind of people.

I would have loved to see the convoy that left here two days ago. Eight white Republic ITS utility trucks on the road to Texas...Breaker 1 9...we're headed for the Lone Star State...we'll catch you on the flip flop....we gone...bye bye.

Bunny Patrol

My kids are going away this weekend and I'm on bunny duty. Imagine...me...not big on animals of any kind and only partial to the ones in our family, namely my sister's little white mutt. But I am left in charge of two little lop-eared bunnies. I am to feed them and give them fresh water and make sure they stay alive while the "parents" are gone from Friday until Sunday. The pressure is great, but I think I can handle it. On second thought, I'll have to pick up Tim and have him go with me...he's good with the bunnies and if they happen to get away from us he can chase them! :)

Middle Age Is Not So Bad

This morning I pulled out of the driveway and heard a "flip, flip, flip" sound as I was pulling away from my house. Hmmmmm. Flat tire...or at least a very low one.

Now, a few years ago this would have been a major set back to the start of my day. A hassel. A tribulation. But not today. At this point in my life I have been a card carrying member of AAA for many years and have a very trustworthy mechanic available to me. Older and wiser, that's me.

Not only did I not panic, feel frustrated or upset about the whole flat tire scenario...I actually thought...well ok...I get to go into work late this morning. :) I turned around and went back home, called AAA and waited for the nice man to remove the flat and install the spare. Then I tooled on over to my mechanic and had the tire repaired in no time "flat" (pun intended) for free! I purchased the tires there so they have a policy of free flat fixing....fabulous! I am out of pocket no money for this entire deal.

I arrived at my job to find a nice orange traffic cone reserving my favorite parking spot! Can you feel the love? I saw a co-worker (demoted used-to-be manager)walking in from the street where he had parked and as I drove closer I rolled down the window and politely asked him to remove the cone for me. What a day! I'm still smiling about that one.

Moral of this story...There are a few perks to living long enough to have the sense to take care of the small things before they mess up your day.

Ever Have One of Those Days?

So, I get to work this morning all ready to attack the piles on my desk with all the gusto I can muster at closing time and....my computer was dead.

Now we have a saying around the office that whatever's going to happen will happen during closing. It's crunch time so the office machinery goes on strike, the air conditioner breaks down, the Sparkletts man doesn't show up...you know. Inevitably our accounting software needs to be updated....right in the middle of closing...and it can't wait one week until we're not so busy. And believe it or not some of the project managers (the ones with the answers to the questions we need answered so we can get finished) go on vacation during that time...go figure.

So it didn't really surprise me to come in and find my computer on the fritz. It had been complaining for a couple of weeks and I'd been griping about it, but ignoring it for the most part, so it just quit. By the time a spare was rounded up and loaded up and ready for me to work it was 10:30. It doesn't sound that late, I know, but I start work at 6:30 so half my day was gone.

After I waited for all the updates to load (it was a very old spare computer) and finally got busy I found that my local printer was not responding to the remote desk top. I notified the powers that be but they were busy on another crisis so I went back and worked on anything I could without a printer for a few hours. When the I.T. guy finally showed up it was 2pm and he was still working on it when I left at 3pm. Sheesh!

The upshot is...I will probably get a new computer. I have to make do with the slow running spare for a while until it arrives or until they fix my old one, but I should be up to speed before too long. In the meantime I will appreciate all the hard work my little computer did before it gave up the ghost. I miss it already.
The email program on "the spare" notifies me of new mail with a little gray box, for heaven's sake. I'd forgotten what that looked like. No pretty blue fade in and fade out boxes, only a gray box that says "you have mail, do you want to open it?". What do you mean???? Of course I want to open it!!!! It's the highlight of my day, you moron! It might be an email from my son or daughter-on-law, my sister or one of my neices, for Lord's sake!

I'm A Blooming Idiot!

For several months now I have been nursing a plant in my office. Let's just be clear here, I do not have a green thumb. Every plant I have ever owned has died within of week of being left in my care...a quick thirsty death. I have never been a plant lover...I mean I love the fruit of plants such as tomato vines and peach trees, but I have never aspired to being a grower or nurturer of botany of any sort.

For some reason, God only knows why, I decided to try to grow the little cyclamen plant I received as a token of appreciation for a job well done on "Administrative Assistant's Day". That was April 23, 2008. I will have you know that not only did the little plant survive it has grown to three times it's original size and has been repotted. That was amazing until I came to work this morning and found that the tiny bud I saw when I left here on Friday had blossomed into a full flower! I have proudly shown off my prize to anyone who would listen and look because I am more amazed than anyone that I managed to grow this lovely bloom. So now I am showing a replica of it to you so that you all can see how my efforts have been rewarded.

I know it's a small triumph, but at my age you take what you can get! :)

Fall Cleaning

Happy Labor Day one and all. I am spending the day laboring because I really don't labor very much on the other days. I'm speaking of housekeeping, of course, because I must labor at my job or they wouldn't keep me. Since I already relaxed yesterday due to a change in our regular Sunday Schedule I decided to spend today doing the things I'm always going to "get around to". The dust is flying but the vacuum is sucking it up. The spiders are skeedaddling for cover or else dying in the attempt. The laundry is piling up from the cleaning cloths that are getting used up. I even washed down the back of the house, windows, screens and all and watered the lawn while I was out there.

Lest you think I am overdoing it you should be aware that I have a very unigue work schedule...I work awhile and play awhile...then when I am rested from my labors I work some more and then I sit and play some more, all the while planning my next work session. This seems to work for me. I can get more accomplished than if I try to do it all at once. I set the laundry going which makes me think I'm still working while I'm playing Spider solitaire of some other mindless game on the computer.

While dusting I came across my Yankee Candles and it makes me realize that fall is just around the corner and soon I will be using them again. Now that is a thought that keeps me on the right track.