Category Archives: miscellaneous

memories, miscellaneous

A Shot in the Arm on a Dull Sunday

Leave a comment

I had my flu shot a little over a week ago, but that’s not what I’m referring to.

This morning we had a good sermon, a great service, and a great Life Group class (that I didn’t have to teach). It was a difficult lesson, and my co-teacher did a wonderful job with it. But that’s not what I’m referring to.

After church, we dropped off recyclables, which is on the way home. That’s a once or twice a month Sunday ritual. Then we had a simple lunch. I pulled out the piano and vacuumed behind it. Then I vacuumed one little place in our bedroom that needed it. I paid a couple of bills and walked them to the post office, about a 2 mile walk. Thence it was re-hydrate with some ice water, and to The Dungeon to see what I could accomplish. Many things to do, including write this blog post, and not enough time to do them in.

First thing I did was check my e-mail. Ten new ones, which I figured were the usual junk and “who cares” type of e-mails. But there, in the middle of the ten, in the “from” line, was the name of a high school and college friend I’d lost contact with. Actually we’d all lost contact with him. By “all” I mean every single one of my high school and college friends I still keep in touch with. Every time we get together we speculate about ________, wondering if he was alive or dead (an awful speculation, one that will only grow through the years), where he was, what he’d done with his life, etc. I had looked for him on FB and not found him.

He found me. Said in his e-mail he was organizing old negatives, found a couple with me in them, went looking for me on the Internet, found my website (I guess) and thus my e-mail, and sent me the photos. We’ve now exchanged a couple of e-mails, and have caught up a bit. Turns out my February business trip will be to his current city of residence. Hopefully we’ll be able to see each other.

It’s always a shot in the arm to reconnect with someone after four decades. But what’s even nicer about this is he tried to find me. That has happened so rarely in my life that I’m sure I could count them on the fingers of one hand. Sorry for the cliche.

That wasn’t what I was going to write about today. I had two other things that crossed my mind and would have made good posts, but this seemed better. Hopefully the other ideas will come back to me at some point.

miscellaneous, Writing

I Need A Rest

Leave a comment

Well, another week went by and I didn’t do my mid-week blog post. I don’t suppose the excuse that I was in two days of off site (though in-town) meetings would make any difference. Days like those are enough to fry the brain and dull the senses. Wednesday was the first day. I came home and don’t remember if I came downstairs to the desktop, which is where I usually write my blog posts.

I’m not writing much today. Yesterday was a busy day, though not as busy as some Saturdays have been of late. At the end of the day the house was more of a mess than it was at the start. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? We took some things off the walls in preparation for selling them. That’s good, though having them in other places in the house is bad. We went through my shirts and found 21 XXL that are too big for me now, and took them out and prepared them for sale or donation. That’s good in two ways, except that’s bad in that these shirts are now hanging from the bar in the kitchen, and a couple fall off almost every time we walk by.

Some other good things happened, however. Lynda put a couple of ads on Craig’s List for things we have for sale, including for a general, private sale of all the many kitchen and linen items. The garage is more stuffed than ever, but having the ads up gives me hope.

I’ve put all writing projects on hold for now. I found myself being too easily provoked and way too irritable when minor things go wrong. Today, after returning from church (where we had an excellent brunch during life group and so we didn’t eat lunch at home), I went to the sun room, plunked myself down in the easy chair we just moved there, put my feet up on the hassock we just moved there, and read in my book of A Conan Doyle letters. I think it’s been a year since I did that. I read about five pages before falling asleep, and maybe two or three after waking up.

It’s amazing what a nap will do for your outlook. I don’t think it was more than half an hour, but I felt much better. I came downstairs and, instead of a writing task, I completed all my budget entries on my budgeting spreadsheet. I even went back and picked up the tiny interest deposits that go monthly into our HSA and money market accounts. All three accounts are now fully entered and balanced. I still have a stack of papers to file, but will try to do them over the next couple of days.

Yes, writing is shoved aside for now. Perhaps in two or three weeks I’ll be ready to get back into it, in a small way.

memories, miscellaneous

Saying Goodbye to an old friend

2 Comments

045We are assimilating the “stuff” of my mother-in-law into our house. Her large furniture has been sold, or put in use in our house: one bedroom set and three easy chairs. In the garage are a mattress and box springs (surplus), and an extra box springs (bought by someone years ago but never picked up). In the house are mostly smaller items, including linens and paper items. Those will take time to go through. The garage is full of her stuff spread out on tables, mostly marked for sale. When the sale will actually take place is a mystery, but hopefully soon. Part of our work yesterday was more work going through the pantry to see what might be too old to keep, seeing what was now duplicated, etc.

Meanwhile, the need to de-clutter has been on our minds. We knew we had to start, so that we don’t leave our kids in the place my dad left us, with a houseful of stuff to be sorted, priced, and sold or discarded. Yet, saying you will de-clutter is easier than actually doing it.

I made a little progress two weekends ago. I moved things around in the basement storeroom to accommodate a spare bedroom set. While doing so I found four suitcases we’ve had since heading to Saudi Arabia in 1981. These are well-traveled suitcases, but still in good condition. We originally had 12, of two different sizes, but through the years the others have been damaged and discarded. Even though we have new suitcases, we kept these because…why did we keep them? I suppose because they were in good condition and we thought we might use them someday. I pulled them out and set them in a place where I can easily take them upstairs when we have the garage sale, which hopefully will be soon.

Then, behind where the suitcases were, I saw my old trumpet. I bought this in the fall of 1963 (6th grade), with my own money, Dad later chipping in with some money he owed me (that’s a long story), and played in the school band from 6th grade through 12th grade. Truth is, I was never very good, and in high school never made it past 3rd trumpet. But I enjoyed it and I played.

Then came adulthood and children and overseas adventures. The trumpet went in storage twice while we were out of the country, and otherwise was in whatever storeroom we had in whatever house we lived in. Here in Bella Vista that’s the basement storeroom. The last time I played it was about 20 years ago. The interim of no practice hadn’t made me a better player.

So I thought, “Time to de-clutter; unused trumpet.” Two and two went together. I thought I should donate it to a school district for a kid who wanted to play but couldn’t afford one. The problem was the case was really beat up. I once rammed it into a fence post while trying to avoid hitting Adele Palazzo with it between home and school (another story, not so long). That gave it a crack, which later expanded, and a small piece of the case was lost. Then, around 1997 I loaned it to a family at church who couldn’t afford to buy one. It came back in a few weeks with several long cracks in the case. And when I pulled it from storage, a 7-inch piece of the case was on the floor under it. Would anyone want it with a severely damaged case?

I decided to check. One of my wife’s step-sister’s husband works at a Catholic school system, was a music major years ago, and is involved in music with the school. I asked him if his school system would like it, damaged as it is, and he said yes, very much so. I told him I’d bring it to Oklahoma City next time we were there, and he said he’d actually be passing through our area soon and would pick it up. That happened yesterday, and it is now gone, somewhere in Norman, OK, waiting to be used by some student who can’t afford one and can live with a bad case.

So I say goodbye, old friend. Sorry I never gave you a name. You were part of my life for 52 years, though admittedly I’ve neglected you for the last 45. You were money well-spent. Yesterday it was nice to see your valves still worked after at least two decades without maintenance. May you find love in a new home, and help some kid to come to appreciate music. And may your tones bless the world for decades to come. Over the next year, no telling how many of your storeroom buddies will also find new homes.

goals, miscellaneous, Short Stories, Writing

The Busyness is Overwhelming

Leave a comment

Right now, I simply can’t commit time to blog posts. I’ll still slip one in once in a while, but unfortunately I won’t maintain a regular schedule. Life has thrown many things at me right now, and just now I have to process through them. An example: the lock on our front door no longer works. We discovered this Friday evening. Rather than call a locksmith then and perhaps pay extra, I’m doing it today. I’ve looked them up, have three choices written, and will call shortly. Then I’ll have to call home and tell them whether a locksmith is coming. Such a pain.

At the same time I’m trying to maintain a little bit of a writing schedule. I published a short story last weekend, and last week I worked on my two Thomas Carlyle projects. I have that mostly worked out of my system at present, but not fully. Maybe by the end of today I will, then will put those projects back on the shelf for six months. But today I pick back up my book Seth Boynton Cheney and begin to make edits for it, and then to prepare a color edition for printing.

So, my couple of faithful readings, feel free to check in from time to time. Just don’t expect posts to be coming on a regular schedule.

miscellaneous

Brain Dead

Leave a comment

I know I was supposed to publish a post on Sunday, and another one today. Truth is, however, that I’m brain dead right now. I couldn’t force out a post if I wanted to. Yet I have work to do this evening, writing work.

I’ll try to be back on my regular posting schedule next week.

miscellaneous

Getting Back to Blogging

Leave a comment

I’ve been away from the blog for a while. Today is the first time I’ve been here in over three weeks, and it’s been longer than that since I’ve posted. I haven’t been idle, however.

July 24-26 was my wife’s high school reunion back in Meade, Kansas. That was a fun weekend. The July 31-Aug 2 was her paternal family reunion in Dodge City, Kansas. I was the reunion planner for that (go figure).  We stayed the full week in the area between the two reunions.

I want to write a couple of blog posts on the family reunion, but need some time to get those together, along with some photos. I’ll be back with those posts.

I also have two or three book reviews to do. Again, I’m not quite ready to write those yet. Hopefully I’ll get one done on Wednesday.

And, of course, I need to do an update on what’s going on with my writing life. I do some of that on my Facebook author page, but will also add some posts here as well. Again, I just need some time to get to them.

So, here I am, finally back at my blog, not able to do much more than tell you what’s coming up. Hopefully I can be regular at blogging for the next month or two, at least twice a week.

miscellaneous

The Religious Freedom Acts Debate

1 Comment

I don’t often get into politics on this blog, but will today. Those who come here to read about my writing life, or engineering, or anything but politics, just gloss over this. I just discovered I have never created a blog category for “politics”, which shows how I avoid the discussion. I was going to blog about belt loops today, but will save that for another time.

Right now the raging debate is on religious freedom acts coming from State legislatures. As I write this, Indiana has passed one that the governor has signed. Arkansas has passed one that awaits Governor Hutchinson’s action. These two states thus join 19 others that already have such a law on the books. It’s also said these laws are similar to the Federal law passed in 1993 by bipartisan votes in the Democratic controlled Congress and signed by President Clinton. The laws from the early 1990s were for the purpose of making sure a few Native Americans could smoke their peyote (how fitting based on who supported it), and has no relationship to the current debate.

The debate centers on whether these laws are thinly veiled attempts to legalize discrimination against the homosexual community. Somewhere in the USA a baker refused to make the cake for the wedding of a same-sex couple. That case is winding its way through the court system, and is now, I believe, awaiting SCOTUS action. The homosexual community and others are against these laws, and believe that a person in a public business should not be allowed chose who they will serve and who they won’t.

Others debate that the laws are necessary because a person should be allowed to make a statement about whether they support a cause or not. Partaking in a cause through serving it as a business could be interpreted as supporting it. Hence, they want the right to refuse service as an expression of religious freedom and free speech. Refusing service is not discrimination, or if it is a person’s right to free speech trumps another’s right not to be discriminated against.

Both sides discuss this in relation to racial discrimination, some saying it’s essentially the same, others saying it’s very different. Refusing service to a person of another race is and should be against the law, all say. Some say refusing service to a person based on sexual orientation is the same as it is based on racial reasons; other say no, the two are very different. That’s the arguments, as I understand them. I could be wrong in some of these points, or over-simplifying. I have not researched this or read any of the laws involved. All I know is what I hear on television and read in the news.

My thought about this: I don’t care. Pass the laws or don’t pass the laws. Defend my free speech or take it away from me. Defend my religious liberty or take it away from me. I don’t care. How I live my life will be exactly the same.

I lived in Saudi Arabia for two and a half years, more than 30 years ago. At the time we couldn’t openly practice Christianity. There were no churches. Oh, in the western communities of Aramco there were unofficial churches, which met in Western school auditoriums, and for a while we were able to attend those. The government knew about them. Back in the early 1950s the king called in the oil executives, told them he knew all about their Christian gatherings and the pastors brought into his country as “special teachers”. You may keep them, he said, but if anyone ever tries to convert a Moslem they will be gone on the next airplane.

That had no bearing on our worshiping God, or practicing our Christianity. While we could we went to the “church” nearest us. When that was closed to us who didn’t work for the oil company, we got together with other Christians in our apartments or villas, maybe ten to twenty people, and worshipped how we wanted to. Those were very meaningful times of worship, more meaningful, in fact, because we were breaking the law to do it.

Typical of the debate I see, a Facebook friend (who I don’t really know, but I have an on-line connection to her through a common interest) posted this.

“Christians”, be careful who you condemn. You may find yourself in the next group denied service in a business because you may not be “Christian” enough to suit the owners.

I don’t know if she means this to be a warning, a prediction, or a threat. I don’t care. I find it interesting that she equates refusing to serve someone as condemnation. That is so far from true as to be laughable. Just because we oppose what someone is doing does not mean we condemn them. People in my office accept continuing education credits from vendor presentations. I understand this to be against the continuing education laws in most if not all states, and so I won’t accept those credits and encourage others not to accept them. But I don’t condemn those who accept them. We simply disagree.

But if this is a prediction or a threat, and service refusals to Christians are coming, I don’t care. Let them come. It won’t affect my worship practices one bit. I will continue to serve the living God in the way I see right. I will see being refused service because I am a practicing Christian to be a badge of honor, remembering that they did much worse to Jesus than to me.

Recently a homosexual hairdresser refused to any longer do the hair of New Mexico’s female governor because she came out in opposition to same-sex marriage. It actually doesn’t matter that he’s homosexual. He could be heterosexual and take the same position, refusing service for political reasons. I wonder what would happen to his right to refuse her service if these laws pass, or don’t pass. Of course, his reasons were political, I guess, not religious. Do we need a Political Freedom Restoration Act to protect his right to refuse to do business with a person who takes a political stand with which he disagrees? I assume he is not condemning her. he just doesn’t want to do business with her because of her political stance.

And that’s the crux of the matter so far as I’m concerned. Disagreement does not equal condemnation. At least it doesn’t in my mind, though it seems to in this friend’s mind. She condemns “Christians” for supporting these laws, even as she accuses “Christians” of condemning homosexuals simply because of a disagreement on same-sex marriage.

The debate gets coarser and harsher. Must disagreement be interpreted and labeled as condemnation? The sides are bucking up, not simply disagreeing and going on with their friendships and lives. All of which makes me less than optimistic about the future of the USA.

Engineering, miscellaneous

A Busy, but Good, Day

Leave a comment

This week has been a blur of activity, at home and at work. I won’t say too much about at home, except that the Great Time Crunch is coming to a head, and for a while I’ll have less time than normal, even less than I’ve had the last five months.

Concerning work, I’ve had lots to do. We had two training activities on Tuesday, both involving a guest speaker, which I was responsible for coordinating. One took place off site, an advanced class to a combined group of those I was responsible for and more that another person was responsible for. Then I went back to the main office and the speaker gave a basic class on the same topic, risk management, to a whole other group. Then I rushed back to the other meeting to make a half hour presentation on a topic.

On Wednesday I went back to the offsite meeting (continuing with the smaller group) to hear a particular topic. I’m glad I did, as it was the presentation of a problem  we are having related to one particular group. I listened, helped (I think) by my comments to clarify the problem  as it was being presented and to drill into the proposed solution with three options. No decision was made, but I was glad I went, listened, and contributed, because…

…today I was able to help someone come up with what looks like a good solution to the problem. I was able to contribute in a meaningful way. Will this proposal be the right solution to the problem? Don’t know, but it looks good. But whether it works or not, being part of the problem-solving team felt good. It felt good in part because no one asked me to be on the team. I simply decided I most likely had ideas to share if I knew what the problem was. I went out of my way to try to be part of the solution. And that felt good.

In the brown bag class I taught last week, “How to Recession-Proof Your Career”, I said you do that by increasing your value to the company year over year, even month over month. I think I did that today, this week. Yes, it was exhausting, especially when combined with the busyness at home. But it was satisfying, very satisfying.

Carlyle, miscellaneous

A Pleasant, Snowy Day

Leave a comment

I should have written yesterday.

The weather forecast was for a wintery mix changing over to snow. It was a constantly changing forecast. First it was to hit Tuesday evening and give us 5 inches of snow. Then it went to Tuesday/Wednesday midnight and 2-4 inches of snow. Then it went to Wednesday morning and 1-3 inches of snow. All this change in the forecast happened in a 12 hour window on Tuesday. I went home Tuesday night not knowing if I would be able to get to work on Wednesday or not. So I brought some work home: a 1-inch thick pile of guide specifications that needed editing. But I parked my pickup up the hill, in case I decided to go to work in the morning.

Tuesday night, at bedtime, I set my alarm for the usual time. The forecast said rain through the night, changing over to the wintery mix around 7 a.m., and to snow around 1 p.m.  I got up at six, showered and dressed for work (in my black “dress” jeans). I checked the weather sources: no change in the forecast overnight. Then I went out with the dog to see what conditions were. This is not our dog; we are dog-sitting for neighbors who had a quick trip out of town for a funeral. Rocky and I walked up to his house, and then beyond. A very light rain was falling, quite cold against the face, but when we passed my pickup I saw the windshield was frozen over. I left Rocky inside his house, to allow him a couple of hours in familiar territory, walked home, and made the executive decision I wasn’t going to work.

Back inside I completed Bible reading and prayer, caught up on Facebook and let the world know where I’d be for the day, then went to The Dungeon around 8 a.m. By this time the rain had changed to sleet. By 11 a.m. it was snowing—hard, big flakes. I sat in The Dungeon, computer open to stock charts, portfolio list, and social media/e-mail, and began editing the specs. Through the window I saw the winter wonderland arrive.

Also open on the computer was a Word document, a family memoir I started a week or two ago. I looked at it a little, making a tweak here and there. It’s very early in this document. I’m trying to figure out family dynamics in my dad’s family, actually in his parents’ and grandparents’ families, to determine the influences that shaped him and his siblings and, hence, me and my siblings and cousins. I would say, however, I spent less than 15 minutes on this.

All day I alternated between specs and computer. By 3:30 p.m., with only a short break for lunch, I had made a major dent in the spec pile, had made one stock trade, read all e-mails, and thoroughly enjoyed myself. At this point I went upstairs and decided to go for a walk. The temperature was plummeting, down to around 25 by this time, and light snow was still falling. So I bundled up, told Rocky he couldn’t come, and walked up to the highway, about 0.65 miles away. The snow over the sleet gave good traction on our street. Then on the next two the City had plowed, knocking the snow away but leaving a lot of the sleet. The whole way I found that I had no problems with footing. The sleet was nothing like ice. I could walk fine whether it was on the snow or on the sleet or on the nearly-cleared pavement.

I walked at a good clip, probably around 22 minutes per mile, though I didn’t use a stopwatch. The entire way I saw no cars, no other humans. At the highway I stopped and stood for a minute or so. The businesses across the street seemed to be closed. Even though the highway was in good shape, no vehicles appeared. When I got home I took Rocky out for a walk around the circle. He seemed unfazed by the snow, either that on the ground or that still falling.

Back home I fortified myself with nuked coffee, went to my chair, picked up my Nook, and soon fell asleep. I love to sleep in this chair. No, it’s not real comfortable, but it seems like the place to sleep. Ten or fifteen minutes later I was awake, ready to…do something. Read some blogs, ate supper, watched some news, and put on a Harry Potter movie. At that point I multi-tasked, picking my Nook up again and doing some genealogy research into the families I mentioned earlier. I re-registered for the LDS genealogy site (at least I think I was registered before), and found lots of good information. I took notes, having no way to print anything from my Nook.

This took me up to after 11:00 p.m., at which time I took Rocky for a walk, and hit the sack. We had less accumulation than I’d hoped for, about 2 inches of snow on top of almost 1 inch of sleet. Possibly I should have gone to work. Since we didn’t have ice, even Old Blue Leaf probably would have found good traction. But I had a good day. I’ll charge half of it to the company, half to vacation.

And I didn’t even work on any creative writing projects, all day. If you don’t count my reading in the letters of Thomas Carlyle as research for a future writing project.

miscellaneous, The Candy Store Generation

Facebook Political Posts

Leave a comment

candy-store-ebook-finalLast night I was involved in a political dispute on Facebook. A friend from high school, who I haven’t seen in almost 45 year but with whom I’ve reconnected on FB, posted a political cartoon. In the first frame was FDR with the caption “Social Security”. In the second frame was LBJ with the caption “Medicare/Medicaid”. In the third frame was President Obama with the caption “Health Care Reform”. In the fourth frame was a battered and bruised elephant under the name “Republicans” with the caption “Opposed Each”.

I know from prior posts that this man is on the opposite end of the political spectrum from me, so I should have let this go. But instead I posted the following.

How’s that Social Security working out for us? Soon will be bankrupt. “Soon” as in measured by generations. It won’t be long till, like Greece, we will run out of O.P.M.

To which he replied:

Working out fine for me thank you! Medicare has provided me with the ongoing care I require for my cancer treatments. Please- just refuse to take the money and benefits if you feel that way….just try and cool it with the hyperbole. Better yet: just stay off my page. I don’t watch FOX so your opinions are mostly odious to me.

I didn’t read his whole reply. I stopped after the first two sentences; more on that later. Two others then came on and said more or less the same thing about being very happy they were receiving these benefits and believing all these government programs are working just fine. To which I replied:

Maybe it’s time to take a longer view than just ourselves. Yeah, when I start collectng something when I retire I’ll thank my children for paying for my retirement and healthcare. Just as I hope my dad thanked me. But some day we will either run out of other people’s money or other people’s will, and it will all collapse. Look beyind what’s best for you.

This failure of baby boomers to take the long view is one of the things I discussed in my book The Candy Store Generation: How the Baby Boomers Are Screwing Up America. Well, this post brought this response:

As long as you paid into it, you have every right to collect

To which I replied:

Not really. The government used my money to provide a subsistence level retirement to my parents and grandparents. They put nothing away for my retirement. That’s why it’s called “Social” Security (as in socialist), not capitalist security.

By “they” I meant the government and its program, not my ancestors. A couple of people replied to that, including one who said:

…make up your mind… A capitalist believes in survival of the fittest… A very selfish way of living. (In that regard) they don’t really care about “the longer view”

To which I replied:

Not true. A retirement security program that involves a combination of support for prior generations with a personal account is the right way to go. You look at corporate America which fails to look beyond the next quarter and you have a company that will fail in 10 years. The smart capitalist takes the long view first, the short view second.

It was at that point that I went back and re-read the thread, and noticed that the person on whose timeline we were writing had asked me not to post there. Shame on me for not fully reading his post. So at this point I posted:

———, I missed your earlier comment. I will henceforth stay off your timeline. Say the word and I’ll delete my posts.

That’s the last post in the thread at this point. The host hasn’t come back and responded to my offer, or to any of the posts other than the first one.

Personally I don’t think my original post was hyperbole. We will most certainly run out of other people’s money at some point, as Greece is learning, and as other European countries are learning. I don’t see any hyperbole in that. Obviously my friend posted the cartoon, not for critical discussion, but for providing evidence of his own views. That’s fine. His timeline, his purposes. Now that I know, I won’t be posting to his timeline again.

I think instead I will go herd some cats, which should be a far easier task than what I originally set out to do.