Author Archives: Pamela

Here I am back in my equestrian days. I believe that’s my (late) Great Uncle Alton.

Yesterday I had drinks with co-worker after work. My car was parked by his house and as I went to get in my car to go home, this man came over and asked if I could help him find his glasses. He’d been walking home with his head down and a low hanging branch had swiped his glasses off his face and he couldn’t find them.

Co-worker hadn’t made it all the way into his house yet and I gave him a wave to indicate, “Please come over here just in case this turns out to be a creepy man who wants to club me over the head and toss my body into a ravine.” It was almost dark and the grass and walkway were covered with leaves. Co-worker got a flashlight and we proceeded to crawl around on the sidewalk with no luck trying to figure out how this man’s glasses could have vanished.

After a few minutes he thanked us for trying to help but he didn’t want to keep us. He was going to go home and return with his wife and see if they could find them. As he left another neighbor appeared with a giant flashlight. The light part was the size of a dinner plate.

This neighbor introduced himself as Joseph and he was a character in the best possible way. He was chatty and waved his spotlight around while telling us how he was cleaning his gutters before dark when he noticed glasses man lurking about. He’d been approached by some nutters recently so he wasn’t 100% convinced that lost glasses guy was legit. But he thought he’d at least bring a light over now that we’d joined the search.

There was a strip between the sidewalk and the street with big rosemary bushes growing on it. (How come my rosemary doesn’t grow like a bush? It just flops over. Is there such thing as a weeping rosemary?) Joseph decided that the glasses must have gotten stuck in the bushes and that’s why we weren’t finding them. He swept the flashlight back and forth through the rosemary and I saw a little glint and we found them.

But now glasses guy had gone home. Since he said he was returning we decided to wait for him. Joseph broke off the branch that started this whole adventure and told us a series of stories which included his gutters, the apple tree at his house and various things about the election that irritated him.

We finally decided that we’d waited long enough and Joseph thought he’d get a piece of string and some paper so we could leave the glasses and a note for the man. Joseph returned with a plastic bag that newspapers are delivered in and thought we could put the glasses in there and tie that in the tree. That way glasses man would find them and they would be safe.

Just about the time we’re rigging this thing, we see a series of flashlights coming down the block. It was glasses man with his wife and two little kids all waving their flashlights. Maybe this isn’t making the greatest story but it seemed pretty cool at the time. He was thankful we’d waited and we all had one of those neighborly moments that make you feel better about people when the election coverage makes people all seem like crazy jerks.

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In other news, in case anyone is paying attention. I’m not going to do National Blog Posting Month this year. Mainly because I’m so busy this month I am preemptively weeping and pulling my hair out about it. We have something planned every weekend day in November except tomorrow. Plus I am doing an informal version of National Novel Writing Month which I’m sure I will be freaking out about by Wednesday. My inner overachiever makes me miserable sometimes. Also Twilight starts this month and I will probably have to see it at least 3 times the weekend it opens. Unless it totally sucks and then I’ll only have to see it 2 times. This reminds me I haven’t written my Twilight predictions post yet. Maybe tomorrow.

I’m confident I could type something and click “post” every day in November but I think (and I actually have a rant about this which I decided not to type out) the blog posting thing is not only about posting but also about participating in the community and visiting new blogs and leaving comments. And there is no way I will have time for that this month.

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I have a piece of paper on my desk in my handwriting that says, “Bears are the new zombies.” Any ideas what I might have meant by that?

I don’t have time to organize my thoughts so I’m just dumping a bunch of stuff into one thematically unlinked post.

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I got to the office early this morning and I’ve been sitting here drinking my tea and reading. A few moments ago an announcement came through (this building has an announcement system?) informing me that the alarm had been investigated, it was a false alarm and it was safe for me to return to my work station.

What alarm?

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One thing about setting up a new office is we are bright shiny sales target. Everybody wants to set up an account or sell us furniture or sign us up for some sort of service. I loathe being sold to.

We need to subscribe to an electronic database for legal research. Co-worker got a card at NCAI for Westlaw and I called them and Lexis to see what they had to offer. Jeez, it’s like buying a used car. I had these raspy voiced Tony Soprano characters wooing me with great offers and special discounts. One guy came in and co-worker mentioned a set of statutes that we might look at in the future and he was whipping out his computer because if we decided by the end of the week we could get it for half off. I’m sure we’re talking thousands of dollars of books here which we don’t have the budget for, no place to put and we can access for free online or in a pinch, walk over to the law library and look at. If we’ve got three thousand dollars to throw away, here’s my wallet.

The whole process made me feel icky. Lexis has a better deal and I say Whew! because we used both at the old office (long story) and Westlaw’s interface is so horrific that I complained and they got some guy on the phone to “train me” which didn’t make the interface any less horrific.

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Today’s community service announcement comes via my new favorite blog Open Congress.

Free database for researching campaign contributions in local elections .

The National Institute on Money in State Politics is the only nonpartisan, nonprofit organization revealing the influence of campaign money on state-level elections and public policy in all 50 states. Our comprehensive and verifiable campaign-finance database and relevant issue analyses are available for free through our Web site FollowTheMoney.org. We encourage transparency and promote independent investigation of state-level campaign contributions by journalists, academic researchers, public-interest groups, government agencies, policymakers, students and the public at large.

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The stupid article of the day, again, comes from the NYT Dining Section. (For the record, I love the NYT, especially the dining section.) Apparently calorie counting is back in. Sure, “[c]ounting calories is so 1980s” a brainiac interviewed for the piece says, but turns out: “[e]vidence of the calorie’s resurgence is everywhere.”

People want some fun sexy way to eat as much as they can and still stay trim but after 20 years of fun-filled faddish formula diets, it turns out counting calories is the most reliable way.

Duh.

Read the article because every paragraph adds a new layer of stupid. A bunch of people filed a class action lawsuit against Applebee’s because its calorie content was more than advertised. I know when I think of having a delicious healthful meal, I think Applebee’s. Bob got their take out dinner once and the only thing good about it was I didn’t have to cook.

I could rant about this article all day but have been informed it’s time to get to work.

I found this at the Fred Meyer across the street from Trader Joe’s. I’ve seen various ethnic food sections but never German. That store is being remodeled and as I was running through, trying to pick up two or three things real quick, there were people hanging tarps and removing items from the shelves and doing something that was really noisy. I haven’t been back.

Bob and I love a good Knödel and no doubt this mix in a box will be disappointing in every way.

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The wall between my office and the office next door isn’t completely sealed. I can hear the guy on the other side talk on the phone, clear his throat or chew his Lunchables. Of course that means he can hear me too and I’m sure he appreciated the day I shouted across the office about artificial foreskins.

One day last week I heard a lot of banging around over there followed by an excessive amount of that “rippppppt” sound that packing tape makes. I’m a little concerned there might be a head in a box somewhere.

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One more office story so I can follow the rule of three. I have two 5 drawer filing cabinets in my office. These are the wide drawers where a small child could sleep. The catalog calls them lateral file cabinets. They are set end-to-end in a corner such that the front corners touch and there’s a dead space in the corner behind them. If I was at home I could draw you a diagram but I’m at the office so you’re going to have to try to visualize it.

Last week I wiped off the top of the cabinets because I am the kind of person who wipes off the top of cabinets and while I was on the stepstool I thought I’d peek into that dead space and see if any paperclips or other fun things had fallen behind there.

It’s filled with empty boxes of tissues and envelopes. Why would someone throw trash back there? I wanted to try to reach in and grab some of the topmost boxes but I was afraid I might fall and no one would know what happened to me until the body started to smell.

Two Things I’m Giving Up On.

1 – Fringe (TV Show). I really wanted to like this show. I kept watching thinking: this seems like the kind of show I would be in to. It became less and less interesting. The only character that I liked was the crazy doctor. Whenever they talked about “the pattern” I didn’t think, wow, how interesting. I would either think of the Amber books or I’d think it sounded stupid. Last night I was bored watching it while trying to figure out my checkbook. Show deleted.

2. Podcasting. After Clarion West I thought that Escape Pod and Pod Castle would be a great way to keep up with stories. The thing is, I very rarely listen to things. I listen in the car, but I only drive about 100m a week and also don’t have an iPod set up for the car so that doesn’t work. I thought I’d listen more on the bus but sometimes I like to read on the bus and sometimes I like the sound of my own thoughts. Also the stories are never finished during the commute which offends my sense of order. Finally, of the ones I’ve listened to so far, I didn’t love any of them. I’m not sure if it was the way they were read, or just didn’t happen to be my thing. It has already become on more thing that’s piling up faster than I can consume.

Yesterday I went to the farmer’s market to get my second to last sausage sandwich before the market closes until spring. There was an Asian man with a nametag in line in front of me and I tried to see where he was from. I told him he was really lucky that someone turned him on to one of the best sausage sandwiches in the known universe and that they were really yummy.

He nodded and repeated sausage and yummy. He only spoke enough English to order the spicy spicy which is what I would have recommended.

I think this is an important service that all out of town visitors should be steered toward amazing food that they would never get to try anywhere else. This is what I expect when I’m an out of town visitor. I hate when you ask at the hotel and they send you to Pizza Hut like you couldn’t eat that at home.

Now I will reveal my deeply hidden sentimental side.

Yesterday was the most gorgeously perfect day at the market. If you were going to invent the most gorgeously perfect day, it was exactly what you would have created. The market is located on the park blocks which are filled with tall leafy trees. The sun shone through the yellow leaves. There was a busker playing the saxophone and a guy doing tai chi on the grass. Someone had raked up a small pile of leaves and the rake was leaning against a tree. People were buying apples and pumpkins. Every once in a while the breeze would stir the tops of the trees and leaves would rain down through the park. Amazing.

This morning when I got to the office there was a “magazine” in our suite. I’m not positive but I think this is something distributed to all tenants. It’s the kind of magazine where most of the ads are for luxury goods and plastic surgery. But since this is Portland in addition to the standard wine tasting and outdoor clothing articles, there are a million articles with the word green in them.

The U.S. mint hasn’t had much luck getting people to use $1 coins so now they’re trying to sell this as a green thing. Coins are durable and long lasting while paper dollars get old and cruddy and need to be replaced. We’re supposed to run to the bank and ask for $1 coins.

Here’s the thing: I like $1 coins. When I used to take light rail, every time I bought my tickets I’d get a handful of change in $1 coins. But the machines are crap and often would reject the coins but take paper money. Sometimes merchants would bitch and moan about the coins and when I started depositing them at the bank the bank tellers bitched about it, too. Good luck U.S. Mint.

How many times have I written about how much I hate the Parade Magazine that comes in the Sunday paper? Sometimes Bob will leave it out on the kitchen table just to hear me groan, “I hate the Parade!” when I see the cover.

They run these cheesy ads in the back for free Amish miracle fireplaces. These fireplaces keep you super warm and use almost no energy and don’t make pollution and cure diseases and make all your wishes come true. It’s hard to believe that they don’t sell these on every street corner. The ads include terrible photos that are so phony you can’t believe it’s not a fake ad. Check the company’s website .

They also have these promotions where you can get a free heater if you call in the first 48 hours. I’m really stupid and even I know that nothing is ever free. But that ad runs all the time, in the regular paper, too. Isn’t there some consumer group somewhere trying to put a stop to all this? I finally remembered to look it up online.

Oh hey, I was right. It’s a total crock. It doesn’t make wishes come true. Also it’s a free space heater inside of an Amish made mantle that you have to buy for a few hundred bucks. (Be sure to read some of the comments. Shill alert!)

Today was not as productive as I would have liked. I did a little bit of yardwork and brought in some apples so I can make applesauce tomorrow. I made delicious pumpkin muffins from a recipe from Eden and baked a loaf of bread.

Too bad my goal was to write a bunch of pages and catch up on crits. Maybe tomorrow.

On Friday I was sitting here working on writing and decided it was stupid to sit indoors when it was 70 degrees and sunny outside. And October. It’s going to start raining in a week or so and it’s not going to stop until next July.

I put on some shoes and got my camera and went for a walk.

A big wave of geese was coming through. I took a lot of photos but it’s hard to capture geese on the move. I couldn’t remember if my camera has a movie function and if it did how it worked (story of my life) which is a shame because they make a lot of noise.

The mailman saw me wandering around and asked if I was lost. I said, “No, I decided it was stupid to sit indoors.” He asked about my camera so I took his picture. He brings us our netflix. For that, we love him.

Northern Idaho from last year’s trip

It seems like sometimes I drag my camera around and never take it out of the case. Then I leave it at home and numerous fabulous photo opportunities are lost.

Like this morning as I left the market there was a van in the parking lot and the company was called: Stoner Protection Systems. Then underneath it said: A division of Stoner Electrical Group.

Do you think it’s a person named Stoner who refuses to see anything funny about this? Or a person who thought an electrical company called Stoner would be a great joke?

The photo above is from the Idaho trip I did last November. The past two days were clear and gorgeous and I could have taken a million fabulous photos but I didn’t want to drag my camera along. I already had a laptop and an iPod and the associated cables and protective cases. And I never replaced travel backpack so I crammed all my stuff into one tiny bag with overflow in the laptop bag which was not designed to hold anything lumpy. We have a regular carry-on rolling travel bag but I didn’t use it. I can’t come up with a reason why.

Photo from the zoo and completely unrelated to anything in this post.

On the way into Safeway there was a spanger standing out front. He says, “Ma’am, do you have a dime so I can use the pay phone?” and I said, “You mean the pay phone from 1976?” Doesn’t it cost about a dollar to use a pay phone, if you can find one, these days?

I love my Safeway and have nothing bad to say about them. All the people that work there are super nice and helpful. Even one time I was in there the day before Thanksgiving picking up my last obscure ingredients for some new thing I was trying. A guy from the meat department wandered by and asked if he could help and he found what I needed.

This morning they were in advanced BrainFart mode. I have no idea what was going on. The meat department was being cleaned and there was no meat. I’m hoping this is some regularly scheduled cleaning and not the aftermath of a biohazard. Then they didn’t have the price on Pumpkin Ale and they said no price checkers were in the store that day. (?!) I said to just make their best guess and I’d be happy to pay it. I don’t want to stand around the market for 15 minutes.

Nope. Too late. The brainfart squad was in motion. Suspending my transaction, moving me aside and pulling out the red emergency phone to find someone who can price my damn pumpkin ale. I would have walked out of the store for ANYTHING except pumpkin ale.

The Portland Office in their Idaho Office

Oh, I was going to complain about the airport, too. God, I hate the airport. Luckily I only fly once or twice a year. One thing I noticed, it used be the TSA squad was a very ethnically diverse group. I couldn’t help but notice that this time around they were relentlessly Caucasian. Well, there was one black man but I bet he was relentlessly American.

Those people are obsessed with their stupid 1 quart resealable baggie. They don’t even look at it. You could have a baggie filled with three oz. bottles with skull and crossbones on it and they’d send you through. But boy, if you don’t have one, they’re going to be waving a baggie in your face. I swear I heard a TSA guy telling a lady in a wheelchair that there were terrorists smuggling nitro-glycerin onto planes in Gatorade bottles.

The other security thing that drives me batshit is that you have to show your ID and boarding pass to get in the security line. Then you have to take out your baggie, your laptop, and take off half your clothes, your shoes, your watch, empty your pockets. Then when you go through the security detector you have to show your boarding pass again. If you’re like me, you’re probably still holding your ID because when do you have time to put it away what with having only two arms and all? And they always hand it back to you and say, “You can put that away.” Oh. Can I?

Well, that’s enough hysterical wanking for one post.

I have to write a bunch of pages this weekend to be ready in time for the next writers meeting.

Update: this is exactly the reason I get so furious at airport security.

I’m going to Idaho for about 48 hours and all I’m bringing are my crits (6 including CM3’s) and a bunch of podcasts (and a file of work related items). We’ll see how that goes. I’m not enjoying my current book which is never good because that just means I don’t read very much.

I was going to write a post about how I’ve been saying I just needed one more day on the weekend to get my act together. And I had that day this weekend. And it really helped.

Except this morning I was all in a rush and ran out the door without my laptop. And then as I was leaving the office I had to spend about 15 minutes finding my keys and my bus ticket. So I made progress but I’m not ready to win any prizes.

*sigh*

I don’t know what to tell you.