Posts, that is.
As promised, I am returning for some before bed ramblings...mostly about various things I made notes of for future reference (now). Yeah, I forget a load of things that I think might make good rambling material (or hell, just rambling material) unless I write them down.
I really only spent a half-day at work today, which is exactly what I wanted to do. I never intended to stay the entire day today, and I don't intend to do so tomorrow, either. It wasn't looking likely at points in time Wednesday evening when Murphy's Law seemed to strike with a vengeance. Of course anything that could go wrong did go wrong. I was ready to throw things out the window (Printer Toss anyone? Speaking of which, I still need to convert those VHS tapes to DVD). Since I haven't done a Printer Toss since August of 2000, you might say that the need is there sometime. After all, there's really something soothing about throwing obsolete equipment from a second-story brick building window to a paved parking lot below.
Anyway, as I had anticipated, upon calm return to work on Thursday (and a diligent hour and a half of patient work), the situation was resolved and things were back on track again. About a half-hour later than I wanted them to be, but that's not too bad considering the time that was lost Wednesday afternoon.
Anyway, I left work around 1:15 and after making some stops around town, managed to get home around 2. Not too bad, and it was a welcome thing (but more about that later).
I seemed to be plagued with various Internet troubles today, though. By and large, they weren't too bad, but just really annoying. First off, while I was at work...I needed to upload some pre-release installations for a client. Normally this isn't such a big deal, but for some reason today the ISP at work decided I couldn't upload very fast. In fact, for some reason (it may have been routing-related, I didn't care enough to check), I was really limited to about 15K/sec, which is incredibly slow compared to the normal rate (of at least 50K/sec). So, considering it was 11MB of material, it took significantly longer than I had expected. Fair enough, I was able to clean off my desk a bit... But anyone who's ever been in my office (at work) understands that my desk pretty much remains in a pristine state at all times, so a clean-up doesn't take long at all. Ah well, c'est la vie.
So anyway, I get home and it was going to rain soon. Not that big a deal, but when the atmospheric conditions are right, my satellite link (for Internet service) goes on the fritz. Fortunately today it was fairly intermittent (I don't believe it ever lasted in an offline state for more than a few minutes), but it always happens at inconvenient times. Not that I was doing many incredibly important things (short of paying a few bills and doing some annual research), but it's still a bit frustrating. Ah well, at least it wasn't going out when I uploaded pictures to Flickr or while I'm writing this post, so I have that for which to be thankful today. :)
Anyway, when I got home today I decided (seeing as how it looked like it was going to rain soon thereafter) that I should go out and feed/water the dogs (and give them attention) right away. I also took the time to gather and remove the garbage (which was starting to pile up a bit). No more than I got those tasks complete and returned to the house, and it started to rain (pretty good for a while, too). Go me! It's been kinda funny this evening -- I see Koshka periodically in her doghouse (which she only does when it's raining or hailing), but Kurva is hiding under one of the barren apple trees, devoid of any shelter from the rain. Koshka hangs around outside most of the time (unless it's not misting or sprinkling), so they're both just wet and ragged looking. I'm sure they smell fantastic too! :)
Anyway, upon my return to the house (when it started raining), I managed to sit down at my desk and do some organization and cleaning. Namely going through items which had not been filed or needed organizing (bills, paid items, etc.) Of course, there are insurance documents and changes in plans, etc., with the arrival of Kirstin, so I consolidated all of that business and got it filed away. Just miscellaneous things I've already looked at but hadn't organized properly. So that was good to get out of the way.
I then managed to spend the remainder of the day (or evening, rather) catching up on other things. I actually got to sit on the couch for a while and read yesterday's paper, giving George much-needed attention, and giving Kirstin some dad time (short of putting her to bed and keeping her occupied when Beth needs to attend to other duties). So that was a good time. I also got to watch some TV...prior to the few minutes before I shut off the TV in the bedroom.
So yeah, this is my wind-down time for the day. It works.
Oh yeah -- before I forget -- we got a package in the mail today, the contents of which happened to be a really nice big quilt for Kirstin. Very cool stuff! So, Kim, if you happen to stumble across this post before I catch you some other way -- thanks! You rock!
Anyway, I wrap up this post with a bit of irony (or impatience, if you will). Some time ago (about a month ago, actually), I received an invitation to judge at a theatrical event of sorts -- for the county 4-H clubs. I got referred by one of our neighbors (who happens to be on the advisory committee) who happens to know a bit about my background in theatre (and the fact that I'm qualified to judge theatre and speech for the Minnesota State High School League). Anyway, the point is that I (of course) accepted the invitation and sent the county 4-H coordinator an email to confirm. Well due to an unknown reason, I don't recall ever receiving any confirmation. And honestly, I'd forgotten about the event (although I found the invitation this afternoon while cleaning up and filing papers) until I heard a promo for the event on the local radio station yesterday. So anyway, this morning I sent her an email to find out if I was still a part of it and whatnot. Well, she replied pretty much right away and informed me that she'd sent a letter out the day before and I should have it either today or tomorrow (with the final information). Seeing as how it only had to travel 15 miles, it of course was here today. So, ask and ye shall receive, I guess. It was just a bit ironic to me that after the time lapse in communication, the two methods came together on the same day (hell, the same morning, because our mail comes right away in the morning, many times before I even leave for work). Go figure.
So I'm looking forward to that event on Saturday night. Should be a good time. But in the meantime, it's time for me to get to bed, so until the next time...
--MZ