Am I Being Thin-Skinned?

I've been wondering this past week if I am being a bit thin-skinned. A couple of weeks ago my daughter's friend was given an assignment at work. She was supposed to update a report that was originally written by one of their regional managers. She had no idea about how that could be done and my daughter volunteered to help her out.

Personally I thought she should have told her manager the truth; she doesn't have a clue as to where to even start and probably couldn't do an adequate job. This girl is a bit light in the loafers in the intelligence department to begin with. I don't mean she's exactly stupid, but she has no interest in this kind of heavy thinking and analysis. However, she was not willing to do that. She figured my daughter could update the report, then she'd take the credit for it at work.

Well, my daughter started and figured out that she can't do it either. Given enough time she probably could have done something that would be at least adequate, but while she's very bright she's not a writer. So guess who volunteered to help out? I've been doing this type of research and writing for well over 20 years. It wasn't exactly rocket science despite me not having access to the expensive statistics the original writer had.

The report took me about four days to research, think about, then write, edit and assemble. At my current billable rate, that would have cost the company quite a bit had they hired me to do it. It's an acceptable analysis but nothing exceptional in keeping with the idea that this woman is going to present it as her own work.

Now we come to the gist of this story. Even though I kept the vocabulary and even the depth of the report on a level with what she might be expected to produce, it still turned out a lot better than anything she could have managed. Some of the things I discovered and wrote about will be useful for the managers who are using it for planning for the upcoming year. The problem is this young lady doesn't understand much of what I wrote. She was supposed to sit down with me and ask questions so that she understood well enough not to look stupid if her manager questioned her. She never did. She turns the report in later today (I'm having another sleepless night which is why I'm writing this at 2:00 in the morning).

So to my question: am I being a bit thin-skinned because I am miffed that this girl has never spoken directly to me about this project? She's never asked a question, commented on the quality of the report, or....the big one....so much as said thank you. I don't expect her to act as if I'm some wonderful person etc. for helping her out of a tight corner, but is an email saying "thanks for the report" too much to expect for four days work? She was here picking up some of her things last night and never even bothered to say a word to me though we were in the same room several times.

When I get paid for my work, I still generally get some comment on the quality of the work I do and often get thanks. Is it too much to expect a simple thank you when someone bails your ass out of a tight situation? Again, I am not talking anything effusive. Just two words to acknowledge that I bothered to take the time and effort (which I will not do again as a result of this).

Political Ads

There are two political ads showing up on the cable channels recently. One has a woman claiming to be the mother of a soldier serving in Iraq and the other is supposed to be a soldier serving over there. The gist of their comments is that the current "surge" is working, showing amazing progress, and laying a path for the end of the war, and more or less imploring people to be more patient and that things are working out. More or less same stuff different day.

But then the tone changes, and they each begin explaining that the reason we have to stay in Iraq has to do with 9/11 and they try very hard to say without every saying it that Iraq was somehow involved in 9/11.

This is a very old administration tactic that has been repeated continually even while those saying it are confirming that they know this is a lie. The Bush administration wants very much for us to tie the 9/11 attacks to Iraq so they have some justification for their continuing this war. It's unfortunate for them that it's been proven beyond a reasonable doubt by anyone including Mr. Bush that this simply is not the case. So while they cannot make the claim directly, they can make it indirectly by talking about the two events in the same context without ever saying that they are related. Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney do this constantly.

So what has this to do with these ads? I wanted to know the same thing. There is a new website out there called politFact which resides at politfact.com; I went there and posed the question to their people, describing these ads and asking who was behind them. That was this morning. This afternoon I heard from the Washington Bureau Chief for the St. Petersburg Times. He said he had heard that these ads were going to be coming out, but didn't know that they had hit the air. The person behind them is Ari Fleischer, Mr. Bush's former press secretary. By extension that means at least that the Republican National Committee has its mark on them somewhere.

The guy from the site is now checking this out to find copies of the ads and to determine exactly who is doing what. I kind of like that. While my part in exposing this is teensy, it allows me a temporary illusion of being a politico or perhaps a mini-reporter. Talk about fulfilling a dream. *big ol' grin*

I was a little self-indulgent

I'm not generally the self-indulgent type. I buy things because they are something I need and then I toss something else out so the dresser and/or closet doesn't get overloaded. However, yesterday I bought something for no reason other than it was really pretty. It's a nightgown and robe set. Off white with pink and purple flowers on the hem and a few other places on the gown, and as the base of the robe. It's soft and feminine. Not two of my better traits generally. I haven't worn the robe yet, but the gown is really soft and nice.

Today I've been working on the area we just cleaned out. I've almost finished tossing all the old mail, bags, boxes, etc. Will do that by the end of today. If/when we do get my things out of storage, I already have an area mapped out there for my big oak bookcase. It will replace two smaller and not very pretty ones that sit there now. Lots more space and looks better. We're just chipping away at things and they are getting done. I like that.

Today I need to run up to Office Depot for some folders. I need them to finish the reordering I'm doing in my own room. It's like 90% finished now. Makes me feel good and it really looks organized and cool. Yay for organized and cool.

I really do need to measure and figure out where to get insulated curtains for my bedroom. That would look terrific and would be a boon this winter when it gets really cold in here even with the small heater. Every time I try to find something the sizes are all wrong or the hardware is ridiculously overpriced. I really do want something very very simple.

It's Another One of "Those" Days

I have bored to death today. I am not exactly sure why since it's not as if I don't have plenty to do all the time. It's more a matter of deciding what I can manage to get to every day than finding things that need to be done.

I still want to get more organized. I tend to pick away at it and it gets a bit better as time goes on, but it's more two steps forward and one step back. I really want to write more and I'm working on that. I've managed to do something like a page a day on my book the past several days, which is nowhere near what I actually want to accomplish. It's funny. I typed that last sentence, noiced a messy spot on my desk and stopped typing this to lean the place up. It looks a lot better and now a lot of things I don't really need are resting in the waste basket to be tossed out tomorrow morning.

The good news is that I will finish another project probably within a week and a half. That's one less major thing to worry about. It will reduce the number of afghans I have to make for Christmas to three, one of which is quite small--more of a lap robe than a real afghan, but a very pretty pattern. I also have my daughter's present to sew, but as involved as it appears to me at the moment, I have a sneaking suspicion that once the zipper is in properly the rest will follow.

My daughter's friend moved her junk (well a lot of it anyway) out of the house today. She's been using the place as an unpaid storage unit and Susan got tired of it, particularly after her boyfriend again attacked my daughter verbally calling her some pretty foul names and then obsessing over the size of her boyfriend's penis. That last one strikes me as odd as I can't imagine why he would care if the guy even had one or not.

This boyfriend (her girlfriend's boyfriend) is a time bomb as far as I am concerned. He's already shoved her around a couple of times, and has been extremely verbally abusive to her as well. The girlfriend is a nice enough girl but she's one of these people who allows life to simply blow her from place to place and she simply sticks wherever she lands for as long as she can before she's blown on. One of these days he's going to go over the edge and we'll be visiting the friend in the hospital. It's not a matter of if, but merely a matter of when. The guy becomes more abusive every time he has one of these episodes.

It's still cold and damp here, but the weather is due to take a turn for the better and might actually break 80 sometime toward the end of the week. We haven't had much of a summer but when I see what the rest of the country got, I am not going to complain too much. Ours is preferable to theirs any time.

Right now I am going to read for a few minutes then get my butt into bed. I promised to take my daughter to the park and ride in the morning since her regular ride will be on vacation this coming week. I don't mind. It will give me a perfect excuse to stop by Starbucks on the way home and treat myself to a special coffee. I don't do it often, but I think I will this time. I deserve a treat to start my week off.

It's Good News

Today I took my daughter's dog to the vet for a checkup. The last time he was there his liver enzyme levels were so high they were dangerous. The vet suggested we try something natural first which takes the form of fish oil capsules and a dietary supplement called SAM-e. Today (two weeks later) we were going to see how this worked.

The word fabulously would be the best choice. From having levels elevated two and three times normal, everything is back within normal ranges. He's doing very well on pure dietary supplements. We'll take him back for a follow up about Christmas time or there about. The bonus is that the fish oil capsules also fixed a problem he was having with dry skin. Now his coat just shines.

It's about time we have happy news in this family. My daughter has lost two dogs in a year and a half. This one is her baby and his loss would have been utterly devastating. But for once things worked out. I'm a happy camper.

Sometimes Things Really Do Work Out

Last night my daughter and I were discussing an item in the news about a five-year-old Iraqi boy who was grabbed by masked men, doused with gasoline, then set on fire. He survived by is horribly scarred. The story spoke of how he went from a happy little kid to someone afraid to go outside, and said he was so scarred and ugly that he wanted to die, even at that age. The pictures bore out the horror of what had been done to him.

We both hoped that since this story was making the rounds on television and on the Website that maybe someone here in the U.S. would find the good will and the money to bring him over here and fix him. Today I got a note from her and went to find the story. Sure enough; a major burn center here in the U.S. is flying him over here and will pay all his expenses to fix his face and the other areas of his body that were so horribly burned.

The child's mother said that he's not smiled or laughed since the attack, but today he was running through the house laughing at the news. He is very excited, and what's most exciting for him, as I suppose it would be for any six year old, is that he gets to go on an airplane.

The burn center says it's going to be a long road for this child, but the prognosis is fairly good that they can make a huge difference. Sometimes things really do work out. Now if someone could only find those who did this to a child and douse them with gasoline. I would volunteer to be the one to toss the match.

Another Week Shot to Hell

I managed to get through another week relatively unscathed. I've been thinking for a while that I need to get away for a weekend or something like that. I'm not sure exactly where I would go though. I even considered checking into a hotel in the downtown area and then using it as a base of operations to visit the market, do some shopping, etc. Two things stop me on that one....first is that crime in that area is way up for some reason, and second because they are redoing the main freeway between here and there and traffic is an utter nightmare. There are other places. I shall persevere.

I planned to get much more done this week than I actually have. This isn't exactly new but things kept coming up. I finally got the cigarette lighter thingie in my car fixed. Well sort of anyway. They removed the broken lighter, which I don't need as I am not dumb enough to smoke (other than when I am on fire, of course) but I do need some way to charge my navigation unit. Now I have one. It was rather neat. I am considering taking the car back to the same place to get the heater repaired, but in this state we have like 4-5 cold days a year and the heater works on other than those days. Not sure what's wrong with it. It was a bummer when I lived somewhere where the temperature could be sub-zero for weeks on end.

More mess with my daughter's dog. His liver enzymes are way up. It has nothing to do with the last poisoning episode, and the vet doesn't know what it might be. We'll know more in a week. I would hate to see my daughter lose the last of her three dogs so soon after the last. This one is really her baby. For now he's a happy camper because he gets a new mini-meal in the morning when I give him the pills. It's easier than trying to stuff them down his throat. He weighs over 60 lbs. so you can see the problem.

I even managed to get stuff done on my story. I'll have Ch. 21 done today. This is progress. I really want to do some stuff on getting my car entirely cleaned out. For today that's going to mean getting stuff out of the trunk that's been there since half past forever, putting my roadside and first aid kit into a nice bag I bought for them, and bringing a couple of baskets into the house.

Other than that, I'm not interested in doing to very much.

A productive weekend

I actually managed to get some things done this weekend. In addition to what I discussed before, I managed to empty my bedroom bookshelves, sort through them, reshelf those I'm keeping, and put four canvas shopping bags full of books in the other room pending a trip to Half Price Books tomorrow sometime. Tomorrow I'll do the same thing to my desktop, cleaning out the papers and things I don't need, tossing other things, and cleaning off the dresser. At some point my bedroom will be clean. This is a good thing.

I've been chipping away at my other big project, my car, for the past week. I have the interior cleaned out and have used Armor All on most of it. Still a bit remaining on that. I bought a bag the other day, and it will hold my roadside emergency kit and the first aid kit. Right now the emergency kit is in a big unwieldy plastic thingie. That's just the beginning. I have to get the entire trunk emptied out. That's when the real work begins. From there it needs to go to a place near here where I can vacuum out the entire interior and trunk. Then I'll run it through the carwash.

From there it needs to be polished. That's going to take me some time because I get tired. Finally, when all of that is done, I'll use some shampoo I have to clean the seats, and buy new floor mats. Mine are shot. Poor old car deserves some TLC. I already have the polish and the seat cleaner. It will be nice to see it looking more like a car and less like a rolling trash bag.

I'm rather proud of getting some of the detailed cleaning done. I have other areas in the house that need to be tackled too. There is a never-ending supply of them unfortunately. Still, it keeps me off the streets and out of the bars, so I suppose it's not all bad.

Finishing Things

I'm please that this weekend has been one in which I actually got some things finished. Finished is a nice word.

I always have a ton of projects going at any given time. I have a fairly restless mind and get bored easily. Lots of years ago I figured out that if I had many things going there was always something else to pick up if I got tired of what I had in my hands.

Right now, the infamous striped socks are finished. I finished two parts of a sampler afghan I am making for Christmas giving and I pieced together half of the finished afghan. This one has 16 pieces which are then sewn together, and finished with a nice border. It's pretty but it's fairly intricate. The piece I finished was the 9th piece. I have the 10th started. I still have three afghans to do by Christmas and one sewing project.

I managed to finish a major part (maybe all) of a chapter of a book I'm working on. This is important because with my sleep problems, finding the energy to be creative is often a difficult situation, and this was the second day in a row I was able to write and to write things that were fairly good. I have also been able to do more reading and more outlining and work on story ideas that have nothing to do with this particular story. I have three stories in play at the moment and two more in the background, all of which could be books if I could just get them finished. The current effort is on Chapter 21. It has some holes, but is more or less half way finished. One other story has 8 chapters finished, all quality work. the two in the background are fully developed stories, but only one has any writing finished, and that is a completed screenplay. The other is fully outlined and ready to go, but it doesn't feel ready yet. The last one is a work in progress. I have the basics in mind, but there are major answers waiting to come into being before I can consider it a story rather than just a good story idea.

I did something yesterday that is very rare for me. I found a pattern and bought some yarn to make something for myself. I rarely make things for me. I'm not sure why, but I just don't. This is what is called a "bed jacket". It's crocheted, which I was not happy with, as I'm on a knitting kick. However, it is perfect for what I want. I tend to like to sleep with my arms outside of the covers, and my arms get really cold especially in the winter. This will help. I am thinking of actually knitting myself a sweater in the dead of winter this year after I finish Sew's quilt and the pile of Christmas afghans and other handwork projects. If I can manage the time, I might make my granddaughter a pair of these crazy striped socks. Not sure since they are a lot of work.

Finishing things is important for me. I need to do more of it. I have a number of projects I want to get done. Some are handcrafts, but others are things such as cleaning out my bookcase, sorting the books and getting them back up in some sort of order, and hauling a pile of them to Half Price Books. I have way too many books and some are ready to wend their way to the book store where someone else can benefit from them.

Right now, however, I need to finish this entry and to get myself into the shower. I have quite a bit I want to finish today, even though it is Sunday. It's cloudy and cold today and has been raining, so working in the yard is out of the question today. I need to do inside stuff for a while.

I am not a happy camper!

It's a bit before 11:00 and I'm sitting here exhausted, both emotionally and physically. I just came back from leaving my daughter's dog at the vet. He poisoned himself again tonight.

Just what exactly is so damned hard about closing a gate? I have been finding the kitchen gates open repeatedly over the past few days and have asked those responsible to just be considerate enough to latch the damned things. We know the dog will get into almost anything. The gates prevent that, but not when they are open. I've caught him in the kitchen three times in the past four days, but luckily I heard him. This time I didn't. He ate a piece of cheese, a small amount of chocolate (bad enough) and at least a dozen raisin English muffins. Raisins can cause kidney failure in dogs. He had a huge amount of them, and the vet was only able to get a small amount by causing him to vomit.

So he's in the vet. He'll be there a couple of days. The vet can't say if he'll be ok because they don't really know what triggers the toxicity in dogs when it comes to raisins. They're hoping to head that off with close supervision, lots of IV fluids, and some other treatments. We won't know until the danger period is over and that's a minimum of 24 hours. Maybe as much as three days.

I am angry. There's no reason for an adult to be so damned irresponsible.

Random Musings

Today has been a busy day. Also one with a lot of ups and downs. I started by sleeping too late, which is an up for me since the night before I had not slept much at all. After coffee and breakfast I headed into the front yard to finish a project to root out all of the wild blackberry vines that had grown back since the last time. This was my second day of attacks; I did a large bunch yesterday.

Today the garden fought back and I wound up with both of my arms pretty badly scratched and two deep gouges in my right calf where I hit a piece of broken deadwood under some heavy foliage....twice. It is aching and is red and angry looking right now, despite me washing it and applying an antibiotic cream immediately after I came inside. But I won in the end and the area is blackberry vine free for the moment. A temporary victory but one I'll take. Tomorrow I will have to go out and pick up all the stuff I cut down today which will almost certainly fill the yard waste recycle bin again. Then I am going to water my garden and begin some modest pruning on the bushes out there. Over time I will get some control on the front yard and it will look very nice.

I decided to take a break after all the work and went to see the latest Harry Potter film again. After I paid for my ticket and a small popcorn, I concluded that I would be going to the theater for movies much less often. It's just gotten to a tipping point with me. For all but a very few movies (and those will be without popcorn *sob*) I will just wait and buy the DVD when it comes out. The cost is close enough to the same now that it no longer makes sense to go to the theater, as much as I enjoy it. They have simply priced themselves out of my market. Oh well.

When I got home I had an email that was a real ego booster. I retired last year about this time. Not because I wanted to, but because I couldn't find any work in my own field, though lord knows I tried hard enough. A couple of months ago I got a call for a 2-3 day job (I wrote about this previously so there's no need to go into details). That contract was up yesterday and they had talked about extending it for another month so I could pick up some other odd jobs for them.

Yesterday I gave a small presentation to the management team there about how to write. Today I got a request to extend my contract until the end of November. This means a lot to me. Not because this is a big important job, because frankly it's not. Rather it means a lot because these folks came looking for me by name, and because it allows me to retire feeling good about myself. I wasn't feeling very good this time last year. It's allowed me to regain a lot of my self-respect and confidence. It's allowing me to go out at the top of my game. That's not so bad really.

So tomorrow I start another phase as I try to get a handle on all of the things I am trying to do every day. I've got to get a bit of a system down so I can ensure that I get housework done, gardening because it's good for me and I like it, writing because it's my life, and then progress on all the stuff I am making for Christmas as gifts. It makes for a very very busy day. I'm busier now that I'm retired than I ever was when I was working full time.

For now, however, I am going to get this done and get to bed. I'm tired. My leg aches, and I need to put some itch cream on all of the other scratches because they are itching like mad. I look as if I lost a couple of rounds with a really pissed off cat.