Stay tuned…
To catch a varmit.
Stay tuned…
Category: Bad things
Never forget.
Fourteen years. So much has happened. In each of our lives. In the world.
But in an instant I am taken back to that day. That morning. Aren’t you? The sunny, stunningly clear blue September sky. Getting ready for the day.
I have tried before, unsuccessfully, to write what I felt on that day. I cannot. It was a powerful mix of emotions. Anger. Sadness. Pride. Fear. Uncertainty. ANGER. Pain.
But here is what I can share….
I watched the planes hit and the towers burn. I called my family. I prayed. I went to work. I talked with colleagues in NY. TVs in the hallways were tuned to the news. We were glued to them. Three planes. Maybe more. The pentagon was hit. One tower collapsed. 2 towers collapsed. Heroes on Flight 93 gave their lives to stop even more carnage.
Flights all across the country were grounded – a business trip the next day and a flight to Seattle for my mom’s 70th birthday celebration were put on hold. And I was ok with that.
I went home from work. Put a flag up in the window. Mostly I remember the numbing, profound sense of national mourning – and pride – watching what unfolded for weeks.
We must hold this in our hearts and Always Remember.
There are so many memorial reminders today. A friend shared this with me today, and it touched me. So I share it with you here.
Hug your loved ones, ya’ll.
It’s always something.
This morning a crew showed up to repair our failed sewer line. By dinner time we were back in business. The upside: I am just very happy that this issue arose now and will be fixed before a big family gathering at the house in a few weeks. 
#ItsAlwaysSomething
Oh, Mercury, give it a rest!
I took this photo last weekend on the lake, right before the last bit of seemingly relentless rain storms passed. It has an ominous look to it – fitting for how I’m feeling today.
Have you heard tales of bizarro things happening when the planet Mercury is in retrograde (which happens a couple times every year)? If not, you can read about it here. Well, Mercury has been in retrograde since May 18, and will be through June 11.
Here’s a short list of things I’m writing off as Mercury’s doing during this period of retrograde:
– historic flooding (since around the 18th……hmmm)
– the docks at our marina have broken in places due to the flooding and storms, so the dock our boat is on Is in limbo, unable to be brought back to shore for the time being
– our anchor rode snapped unexpectedly while pulling up the hook 2 weeks ago
– I found a bat in my office at work yesterday (the Mexican freetail kind, not the Louisville slugger kind)
– the sewer drain at the house up and died last night (freakiest – and grossest – of all)
And we still have almost another week of this. Have you any bizarre happenings to share?
Uh oh.
As I walked down the hall on my morning commute, I saw thus:
So I looked out the window and then I saw this:
All is well here, but, sadly, not so for one of our neighbors. Seize the day, folks.
Another weather indicator.
We’re in the midst of another blast of cold weather, sleet and ice. You can listen to weather report to get the latest. Or, you can look at googlemap’s traffic view. Yuk!
What I got for Christmas…
I have one more week of vacation left. And I get to spend it …. with the flu. Bleh.
The fever has been up to almost 104. But now am on tamiflu. Merry Christmas!
Sunday sunrise.
Hello September, and… good morning! One of the nice things about anchoring in Arky cove is that you are treated to beautiful sunset and sunrise views – this was the view off the port-side of Nirvana, as I was drinking my morning coffee.
Back at the marina, we popped into Shades for lunch for the last time this season, after this weekend they close up shop until next spring. This is the sobering view of the marina from the restaurant. The lake is at 620′ and some change. Just 6 feet from the all-time low for Lake Travis of 614.18′ in August of 1951. Less than 3 years ago, the lake was brimming at 680+ with the lakewater lapping the parking lot. With the LCRA’s mismanagement of this incredible natural resource, and with no rain in the future, we’re sure to go much lower than that this year. All docks are now moved out, off-shore, accessible via shuttles that leave from the courtesy dock. No electricity or water on the docks for the forseeable future. This is sad, not only because we love playing on the lake, but scary because this is Austin’s drinking water supply, quickly disappearing downstream.
Pray for rain.
Prayers for a friend.
A dear friend gave me this lovely tatted thumb rosary the last time we saw each other. It reminds me of her each time I see it. This morning she let me know that her doctors found a potentially cancerous mass yesterday and have scheduled her for surgery today.
I know that is a lot for a person to learn about and process in a terribly short time. But she’s in good hands. Prayers are on the way, girlfriend!
First world problems.
We, in the modern and developed “first world,” enjoy luxuries that are inconceivable by those living in developing “third world” nations. In the real scheme of things, any woes that we complain about related to technology are nothing more than noise. But it doesn’t make them less annoying because of that…
Our latest first world problem: when I use the treadmill, our DSL modem drops its connection to the internet.
Ah yes. Quite a quandary. A recent development — and an unacceptable one. Imagine the fun we’ve been having trying to talk to AT&T about it for the last few weeks to get help with troubleshooting. So we’ve been trying to debug our modern conveniences ourselves to find the root cause. We suspect a new DSL modem which we got a few months back (a Netgear), because the old one (a 2wire) worked fine when the very same treadmill was on.
If we plug the treadmill into an outlet on the other side of the house, it does not interfere with the modem. So we could move either the treadmill or the modem. Both of which would be a major pain. So in the mean time, I hope to find another solution… i.e., finding another brand of modem, like the 2wire that we had for many years until it went kaput.
Anyone out there have a better suggestion?
Update: I think we fixed the problem!! (through no help of AT&T, by the way). After a month of trying to figure out what the problem was, in desperation and frustration I dug out our old 2wire DSL router out of the closet. It had worked (and coexisted with the treadmill) for about 10 years before crapping out this summer. When that happened, we replaced it with the AT&T-recommended netgear DSL modem product, which is the one we’re currently struggling with. In the old 2wire DSL modem box I found the original DSL phone line filter dongle thingies that we also replaced when we got the new netgear modem. The ones we got with the netgear modem say “Pace America” brand on them. In a desperate attempt to try just one more thing, I changed out the Pace-America brand DSL phone line filter dongle with the 2wire brand one that we had used with the previous 2wire modem for many years. And…(drum roll) it fixed the problem! I post this update in the hope that it will help some other poor schmuck that has resorted to google for help on how to fix their treadmill / DSL router interference problem.
Best of luck!
No words.
Amazonked.
I am addicted to Amazon Prime. I use it for purchasing nearly everything other than groceries. And I’ve been placing so many orders lately, the UPS man is wearing out the front walkway. I guess it’s time I took a break, though.
The clutter (virtual and physical) in my life is reaching a new peak. We have, admittedly, been processing a spike in household paperwork / accounting that requires more of my attention, what with the monthly household bill paying, insurance paperwork for the Audi, buying the new boat, insuring the new boat, registering the boat, processing Monte’s retirement paperwork, converting 401Ks to IRAs, moving the new retiree to my insurance, etc etc etc. We somehow misplaced one of the new ATM cards for our accounts that arrived a few weeks ago. I also have this nagging feeling that I need to double check our estimated fed income tax payments. I’m about 2 months behind on niece & nephew birthday cards (!). Work-work is piling up too, and traveling a week or so every month is not helping either on the household-organizational front.
The Amazon “stuff” just went on top of that pile.
I have been trying to get the return authorizations processed for 2 boat-related items that I ordered from Amazon recently that I wanted to return. Today I realized that I returned the wrong item to Amazon, using one of Amazon’s return authorizations. And I have the Amazon item here in my office with the return authorization for a 3rd party vendor. The nice UPS man came by and picked up the first item before I realized the mistake.
*sigh*
Luckily the nice-man at 1-800-please-help-me-Amazon said he’d figure it out for me.
I hereby impose a 2 week moratorium on ordering anything from Amazon. And I resolve to reduce the huge pile of paperwork piled up on my home office desk on one of the days I hope to take off around labor day.
Sheesh.
P.S.
I realize there are people struggling with real problems out there. This is definitely not one of them. But it just turns out to be something to feed my blog for today. 🙂 Enjoy the rest of the week!
Bye-bye Audi.
This was one of the hardest weeks for me in a long time. Very little sleep due to work. Long days, very difficult projects and meetings. And yet another critsit.
It was 7:00 tonight when I was finally able to get off the phone. Then I drove down to pick up Julie to take her out to eat. We had a lovely dinner at Zax. Everything they have there is delicious!
Some of Julie’s friends from school were eating dinner at another restaurant, and she was supposed to meet up with them there. So I drove her down to that restaurant, and just about as we got there…. Crash!
No one was hurt, neither us or the other guy.
I was a bit shaken from the accident. Ever so thankful that my guardian angel is still on duty. And sad to have to say good bye to my dear Audi companion of 15 years.
Grrrrrrrrr.
Today is my sweetie’s birthday. It’s bad enough that I’ve been out of town all week, but my itinerary today got me home by about 4:30pm. So we had made plans to celebrate this evening.
But, here I sit, in the Raleigh Airport. My flight was delayed, delayed, delayed… and then cancelled, due to problems with the plane. They’ve re-booked me several times, and now I won’t get home until about 11:30pm. Maybe I can make it to the house before midnight.
Happy Birthday, Monte! I’ll be there as soon as I can 🙂
Sheila365 