Guest Blogger 1/4/2015

Bahamas

Part I:

Wednesday Night

I was sleeping so beautifully.

It'd been a nice evening. One of my friends came over, bringing dinner for us from Boston Market, and then we watched a movie. After she left, I did my evening tasks and went to bed. And I was dreaming of the Bahamas, sultry air and chilled drinks and the waves lapping on the shore...

Wait. Those waves are here.

I awoke with a start to the soft, intermittent sound of water. Tink. Trrtlrrr. Tink.

I stretched and got up, looking at the clock to see that it was 12:24 in the morning. Expecting to find the dog into something wet, or that the cat had managed to turn on a faucet, I followed the sounds into the master bath.

And stepped into a lake.

The master bath floor was awash; the water sounds emanated from the lip of the floor vent in the master bedroom, just outside the bathroom door, and the shower had a merry mostly-silent waterfall cascading into Lake Master Bath. As I stood there, in shocking wet feet, I realized the water level was rising.

Aaaah! The water poltergeist was at it again! I cursed H-2-Uh-Oh and got a bucket and a beach towel. That didn't soak up everything on the floor (but it did stop the water from getting into the bedroom) and I quickly found I hadn't the strength to wring it out, either. So I got another, smaller towel.

That one, too, was unwieldy wet, so I went looking for a hand towel. And as I searched for one, I thought about Physics. A stable body of water cannot overflow unless it has more water coming in. The river doesn't flood unless there's a nasty local storm, or too much runoff from upstream.

Our septic tank has been in trouble for about a month, since we discovered one of the covers had fallen in. The tank is apparently the original one that came with the house and is made of wood. It's beginning to crumble. We had a septic place out and they will replace it - when the ground dries out enough to support one of their trucks. Since we've had so much rain since then, there's been no chance to do that. Today (er, yesterday) was the third sunny day in a row and that's been a long stretch compared to what we've had. The ground is still not dry enough.

But even so, unless more water was coming in, the tank shouldn't be backing up. And the water in the master bath didn't smell bad, either.

I looked outside through the master bedroom window. No, it wasn't raining.

I followed the hidden-underground pipe trail. The bathtub in the hall bath had standing water in it, about six inches deep. I set the stopper to closed. The sink was fine. The kitchen sink was fine, too.

Aha! The garage sink was about half full. This one holds a *lot* of water. The water softener must have cycled, sending its weekly overflow into that garage sink. (I certainly wasn't doing laundry or anything in my sleep! Who does laundry while they're in the Bahamas?)

If I didn't empty the garage sink, the water would simply find its way out onto the bathroom floor. I got my bucket and a coffee can and started bailing. One full bucket, and I paused. Today (er, yesterday) I'd received what I think is a junk email saying someone close to me has taken out a contract for my death (one of you, perhaps?). It was to my email address, but didn't have my name, just "What Ever You Call YourSelf" so I think it's junk. Maybe. Sort of. But I kept it in case I should suddenly die and the Feds need a clue. The note said not to come outside after 7pm.

And here I was, way after 7pm, standing in my robe and bare feet in the garage with a full bucket of water and nowhere to dump it except outside. A death threat, and a flooded bathroom. Coincidence?

I stood there a moment, weighing options (not many) and beliefs (was it junk?) and decided to do what I must.

I opened the door and invited the dog to step outside.

He refused to go.

I pushed the dog outside.

Nothing happened to Bounty, so I stuck my head out and peeked around. No black-clad assassins waited for me. So I gathered my courage and stepped out, then dumped the bucket and went back for another.

Two full buckets. Then three, and a fourth. The water in the garage sink went down, and down and down. Finally I was getting only half a coffee can per dip and I expected to start scraping the bottom of the sink soon.

But it didn't happen.

One half coffee can full at a time, I filled the bucket a fifth time. And then a sixth. I began to wonder if I was in a bad horror movie, or a Candid Camera episode. A seventh bucket. The water level in the garage sink was NOT going down.

I took the seventh bucket full outside and dumped it. Then I studied the garage sink. The water was bubbling back in so fast I could see the current at the drain!

So I came in to check the house. The bathtub looked unchanged, which was good because I'd stopped it. But the shower! The shower level had dropped about two inches and was no longer coming over the edge. Apparently I had stabilized the water level, and our house isn't as sloped as I'd thought.

I figured I'd finish the task in the morning, then after the sun was up I'd investigate whether my septic is finally full (after that partial dirt/wood collapse) or if the pipe is clogged. I got a glass of water (why not?) and I went back to bed to try to return to the Bahamas. But I couldn't sleep; this Drivel was running around in my head. So here I am, writing to you what happened. Now I'm off to bed once more and I'll finish my tale for you tomorrow (er, today).


Part II:

Thursday Morning

It's been over twelve hours since I stumbled out of the Bahamas and into Lake Master Bath. The septic tank is not full, but a lot of muddy muck is visible, so I think the entry to it is plugged. I've called the septic company and they'll be out to look at it (and probably snake it clear for now, since they still can't get a truck in to replace the tank) sometime today. I've got a call in to our water softener folk, too, so they can tell me how to turn off the cycling in
case it's a nightly thing (that would be bad).

So for now, it's handled. And this Drivel wouldn't leave me alone until I finished it, so now it's done and I can go back to my business PC and get some work done.

Anybody want a poltergeist?


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 12/28/2014

Jobs

I love my job! Even during the "bad" times, when those around me ask me with overwhelming concern in their eyes, "How are you doing?", I love my job. There's been some stress, but I think I still don't know enough to be truly as stressed as I ought to be, and there's been some uncomfortable decisions, but as long as those decisions don't get me fired, I'm fine.

I have two people who sort of report to me. I'm not in charge of their human resources items, but I oversee the system and workload that they're responsible for. When workload or system decisions are needed, they come to me. This last month, that's been just about every day.

I'm learning both how to oversee a process and how to be a boss. It's very strange.

My team is still very happy to have me with them, and I'm overjoyed to be part of this team.

I even love my other job, doing stuff for my husband's family business. Though there are times when that's stressful, too. For instance, in January I have to create the 1099s. I remember last year's attempts...

The year before, we let our payroll company do it. We'd send them the information for each 1099 recipient as we paid them. If we wrote a check to Mr. Jones, we sent in Mr. Jones's information and what we'd paid him to our payroll on the regular payroll day. They kept track and at the end of the year produced the 1099s.

Incorrectly.

Not only did we pay Mr. Jones, we also paid Mr. Jones's son. Somehow, Mr. Jones got all the 1099 dollars, and none went to his son.

I spent until early March trying to correct this. So this time, I figured I'd do it. Certainly I couldn't do worse.

In January, knowing they had to be out the door by the 31st, I began to hunt for how to do these. I did the research and found what the current reporting rules were. I found all the people we'd need to send one to. I was ready!

I tried to find the form I'd need. The IRS site has downloadable forms. What luck! I went out there and downloaded both the 1099-MISC and the 1099-INT, since I had at least one of each. I downloaded the instructions, too, since someone had told me these things had to be typed, and I haven't had a typewriter in years.

I opened and read the instructions, but found nothing about typing the things. Well, maybe that was on the form itself.

So I opened the 1099-MISC form.

The very first page says in big red letters that you can't use this form to actually send anything to the IRS. (So why have it available?) So where was I supposed to get the form, then?

There's a number on the IRS site, so I wrote that down. Of course, when I was doing this was too late to call, so I called it from work the next morning.

"Thank you for calling the Internal Revenue Service," a pleasant female voice said. "For English, press 1."

I pressed 1.

"Thank you for calling the Internal Revenue Service. For English, press 1."

Hadn't I already pressed 1? I did it again.

"Thank you for calling the Internal Revenue Service. Our Web site is www.irs.gov. Goodbye."

And the pleasant female voice hung up on me. I tried it again, sure I'd done something wrong. I got hung up on a second time. I was frustrated and began to panic, but I couldn't do any more about it from work.

That afternoon I called my accountant. "Oh," she said, "I can send you some, no problem."

I sighed with relief and watched my mailbox. Within three days, I received the forms. They didn't look any different.

However, I still didn't know if I had to type them (it hadn't occurred to me to ask my accountant).

I looked over the IRS site again. Nothing there was helpful for me. I looked over the actual forms I had, and there was another number. I called but they were closed.

The next morning from work I called the number. I got someone very helpful (and real) who told me where to find the actual filling-it-out instructions and that while they preferred typed, hand-written was okay if it was legible. I thanked her.

The next day, Saturday, I began to fill out the pesky forms. My accountant had also sent me two 1096s, which I hadn't known I'd needed. Everything went well until I started on those. I needed two, one for the MISC and one for the INT.

But after I'd filled them out, I couldn't tell if I could send them together or not.

On Monday, I called the helpful number. They weren't so helpful this time; it was Martin Luther King day and they were closed. So I called my accountant again.

Of them all, she is definitely the most helpful.

Finally, the task is done, and I'm confident I did a better job of it than my payroll company.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

     

Guest Blogger 12/21/2014

   

Memory Pool

I thought we were set for any sort of power crisis. We have a backup generator, and it powers the house automatically after the electric supply has been interrupted for sixty seconds. It's rather fun, because the reaction when the lights go suddenly dark is for everyone in the house to start counting. We stop whatever we were doing (we can no longer see it anyway) and breath quietly to ourselves, "One, two, three. . ." At thirty, the generator starts. At sixty, the house lights come back on.

So when we heard about three vicious storms heading our way last weekend, we weren't concerned. Friday morning at just after 6:30 a.m, the power went out. Harry started counting. He got to thirty and the generator didn't start. He got to sixty and the house lights didn't come back on. He waited a bit longer and then went to check the generator. It wasn't running.

He stood in the soaking rain and bitter wind and took the cover off. He tinkered with a few things, checked the air filter, spark, and connections. Everything looked good. The meter said the generator had forty-two hours of running time on it, which isn't much. He flipped the switch so it would try to start.

It tried. Chug, chug, chug, bleh. Ten seconds passed and it tried again. Chug, chug, chug, bleh. Everything looked good, but the generator wouldn't start. He went back in the house and dried off, then called the generator service place. A few hours later, three guys came out to look at the generator. They did the same things Harry had done, with the same result. We'd have no power this time until the utility company restored it.

Discouraged, Harry came back in the house. He was wet and chilled through. We spent some time cuddling, getting the circulation back into his fingers and toes. After that, we tried to figure out what we could do. The power had been out for almost twelve hours. The house was dark, except for the candles scattered about. (Candles don't put out very much light.) All the usual entertainment options were not options this time. We obviously couldn't watch television or a movie, but we also couldn't read a book or put a puzzle together due to low lighting.

But there was one thing in the house that didn't require power: the billiard table. We could play pool!

Excited, we went to the Fox Room, set some candles up on the beer shelf on the wall, and eagerly uncovered the pool table. We got the triangle and the balls. As Harry racked the balls, our excitement faded. It was too dark to tell much about the balls from a shooting distance. We couldn't get the candles closer, as the table has space around it for play room. Setting candles on the edge was not as useful as you'd think, and in the way. Undaunted, we started a game anyway.

The stripes were pretty obvious, as they have so much white on them. The cue ball was easy to find, as were the three ball (yellow) and the four ball (orange). The rest of them were problematic. After the break, we got close to the table and squinted, finding out which one was the eight ball (black). After that first shot, we kept an eye on where the eight ball went, and either one of us could point to it almost always. But each shot, we had to re-evaluate the layout and find the stripes or solids we needed.

We had one help; a wind-up flashlight. When it was my turn, I'd eye the layout, find the eight ball, decide which balls I thought were fair game for me, and then have Harry shine the flashlight on the pocket I was aiming for. Then he'd turn it off, and I'd make my shot by memory. Voila! Memory Pool was born. For Harry's shot, I'd do the same for him.

It was fun, too. We played several games, and I even won one!

The power was out for fifteen hours, but thanks to Memory Pool, it was an experience to treasure. (And the generator motor has been sent off for repair.)


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

  

Guest Blogger 12/14/2014

     

Shorn For Love

Now I know how sheep feel, but more about that in a minute. First, a work update: I love my job! I love my team, I love the work, I love being there, and it's been way too long since I felt this way (about work, anyway).

I still don't know much about what I'm doing; every day is a massive learning engagement where I suck up everything I can around me, from Analysts trying to fix things to Processors going about their daily job. Terms are unfamiliar, programs are foreign, and everything is often confusing.

Take, for instance, reprocessing a packet. Sound pretty easy, doesn't it? Just re-send it out, right? Well, no. We only reprocess when there's been a change (otherwise it would be "send a duplicate" which is easy. . . I think). Before we can send the revised packet, we need to verify the change has been made.

So we run a sample packet for what it will "look" like, to see what it will, well, look like. While that's generating (because it's really slow), we go check our maintenance system (think: big database) to see what it says about it right now. You'll note that "right now" and "what it will look like" are two different things and often aren't supposed to match.

Then we check the maintenance system against the piece of paper we have that requests the reprocess (and tells us what the change is). We check this, check that, check that over there, check this thing, check that date, and then check this other thing. We write all these down because we'll need them all again when we view the sample. Now we change screens and check some other stuff, writing it  own, too.

OK, over to the renewal system, to check the sample, which may or may not be ready by now. When we can, we verify that what we've written down is showing accurately on the sample.

Whoops! Something isn't. Where we go to fix it depends on what it is. If it's this, ask Information Technology. If it's that, ask Group Data Entry. If it's this thing, we can fix it ourselves. And if it's that stuff from the other screen, we set the whole thing aside and wait. Why? Because sometimes these things magically fix themselves overnight. Truly.

Then tomorrow, we start over, because any of the data anywhere except on the printed paper could change. Ack. The scary thing is the people who do this (that I'm learning from) can pick up a reprocess request sheet and do the whole thing in under five minutes. Sometimes less than one minute, if the sample is generated quickly enough. Amazing!

When I learn the ins and outs of what they're looking at, I suppose I'll get it. Until then, I'm pretending to be a sponge and simply sucking in information. Even with the drawback of having access to four (yes, four!) email in boxes, I'm loving it.

I left the job I love a bit early today. I had an appointment with a woman named Melanie, who cut off my hair for me. Again, truly!

I've sent my long locks to Locks of Love, a not-for-profit organization that makes wigs for kids (and some adults) who have lost their hair for some medical reason. Visit them at www.locksoflove.org. Perhaps some child will enjoy that twelve inches of hair more than I did. I was forever catching it in things. Under my purse strap on my shoulder. In the shoulder seat belt in the car. In the headrest at the massage parlor (don't ask). Oh, and in a few other places I can't decently mention. Now it's short and bouncy and just above shoulder length.

Tomorrow morning I'll have to let my donation to the children warm my heart, because I'll no longer have hair to warm the back of my neck. Why did I do this in winter?

Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 12/7/2014

     

Dangerous Living

The Annual Billiard Bash went well. This year was a lower turnout, around 23 people, but they all seemed to have a good time.

For me, this event is a form of dangerous living; allowing people - as many people as want to come - into my living space. alaHouse becomes an open house, and people wander in and out all day long. It's not easy for an introvert to do.

Each year, as the event draws close, I wonder why I do it. Each year, as the Bash swirls around me, I say I'm done and want to go home. And each year, after it's over, I'm glad I've done it.

It's an odd thing, but I think I actually enjoy it, even through the anxiety and terror it can create.

This year's Bash is now over, and I'm not the only one living dangerously.

I have a new cleaner shrimp in my reef tank. He's very small, about as long as a Bic lighter but not much thicker than a Bic pen. He reminds me of San Diego during the fires of 2007.

You see, living conditions for the shrimp and living conditions for the people in the San Diego area have a bunch of similarities.

* The shrimp, and many of the people, have been mis-placed; forcibly removed from their homes
* the shrimp, and those in evacuation centers, have taken up residence in an alien environment
* and the shrimp, and many of the people, are currently living in precarious circumstances.

For the people, it means watching and wondering if they'll need to evacuate from the evacuation center, waiting and worrying whether their home is still standing, watching and worrying about friends and family members and pets lost in the shuffle and smoke.

For the shrimp, it means hanging out in the shade of a sea anemone. I don't know why he chose that particular corner to take up residence, but so far they seem to be getting along. He's cautious about foraging, and the anemone doesn't eat him. Yet.

Like conditions in San Diego, who knows what tomorrow will bring?


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 10/26/2014

     

Chemistry

I tried to kill myself yesterday.

For the last several days, the aquarium has been looking a bit cloudy. When I first noticed it, I peered into the sump, that 30-gallon tank housed in the aquarium stand that serves as a filtration unit for the entire system. The water in it was bubbling along, and looked clear. How odd, I thought, and promptly forgot about it.

Two days later, yesterday, I noticed that the cloudiness had not gone away. If anything, it appeared to be getting worse. So I looked into the sump again. In the water, nestled against the pipe that brings water back in from the tank, was one of the under-cabinet stick on fluorescent foot-long lights. Ack!

After my momentary panic, I remembered that those two lights were battery-operated and not electric. No power cord was attached. The lights are those slim fluorescent tube ones, with double-stick tape Velcro attachments. The idea is to stick the Velcro under the cabinet, and then you can easily take the light down to replace the batteries. All eight of them. Each.

I opened the other side of the stand to check on the other light.  It was also in the sump, next to the outflow pipe, the one that shuttles water back into the aquarium.

Certainly those lights weren't good for the tank and were probably the cause of the cloudy water. I hesitated to pull them out, unsure if the whole water-electric-cord thing applied to battery fixtures.

I called Harry. He told me it would be okay to pull them out, since they weren't plugged in. I told him if I suddenly stopped talking, he should call an ambulance, and thought how we'd make a lovely "dropped call" cell phone commercial.

When I picked the first light out of the sump, it retaliated by dumping out a bunch of really black water. I tried to stop some of it from going back into the sump water by cupping my hand under the flow and rushing to the kitchen sink. All that black water didn't look healthy in my hand, either, so I hurried to clean it off. Then I went back to get the other light, which did the same thing.

I don't remember saying goodbye or when I hung up the phone with Harry.

I checked the tank and the water was really cloudy. All that black water wasn't a good addition. My hand ached, likely a psychological result of having all that icky water in it. I went into the bedroom and did something. (I can't remember what.)

When I came out again, the living room reeked of rotten eggs. Where did that come from? The only change was the lights were out of the sump and in the kitchen sink. Contrary to popular belief, the dog does not smell that bad. The lights, it had to be the lights. I scurried to remove them from the sink and put them outside. Then I opened all the house windows and the back door into the garage (and the door from the garage to the backyard, which let in a decent breeze).

The air in the house cleared and the aquarium water began to clear, too. I called my aquarium guy who told me to put carbon bags into the sump so I called Harry back and had him stop by the pet shop to get some.

Today, the water is much clearer, though we might lose some coral. All the fish are looking fine. Even I survived, though I'm not sure I deserved to. Who knew salt water and batteries made hydrogen sulfide gas? Good thing it smells badly.

Perhaps I should have paid better attention in chemistry class.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 10/19/14

  

Moving Day

If you've seen The Secret of NiMH, maybe you remember the scene when the tractor starts. "Aaaaaah!" screams Auntie Shrew. She rushes around, shrieking, "Run! It's Moving Day!" (If you haven't seen it or don't remember, well, then the image won't help you any. Sorry.)

Now I know why she shrieked and ran around in circles.

When lives hang in the balance over a move, it's something to shriek about. And rush. And so it was in alaHouse. That day was Moving Day for our aquarium.

When we originally set it up, we ordered the shorter stand. We wanted to still see that little window into the kitchen from the front room, and this was the only way to do it if the aquarium was to live against that wall. For almost two years, it's been fine.

Then the protein skimmer died. Wedged into the 30 gallon sump within the aquarium stand, there was no way to get it out. We tried replacing pieces, but it's old enough the parts were unavailable. The only way to replace it was to take the aquarium apart.

Since that is such a chore, we decided to replace the stand with a taller one. A much taller one, because if we were going to block that little window, we were going to cover it completely. That led to another question, because the lights in the canopy are so bright. What if the lights were visible from the kitchen? You're not supposed to look into those lights, and if they were there, right above the sink, how could you miss? We had plans to cover that space with stained glass or shelving or both, if that was the case.

The guy that services my tank showed up around 9am. One of his co-workers (from the pet shop they work for) showed up just after 10am. The dismantle and setup process took the entire day; about twelve hours. They had estimated six, but they didn't realize the entire infrastructure had been glued. Most aquarium people use Teflon tape and threaded connections, but the guys who set up the aquarium originally used some kind of blue glue. On just about everything. So this time, the guys had to hacksaw the pieces apart and rebuild them. Not a quick process, since they were very careful with everything. They didn't want any damage, or any leaks.

I missed most of the disassembly due to a conference call. Before the phone rang, I watched Greg start taking things out. He had a garbage can for the fish, a garbage can for the rocks, a garbage can for the extra water. He had several kitty litter pans for the coral, the invertebrates and the fish that weren't going back in the tank, plus any extra things that came up. All of these items were new to avoid contamination. Sea life is delicate, and we wanted to avoid stressing them as much as possible. I only got to see the first few rocks moved. Then the call, and when that ended, all that was left in the tank were sand and water.

Though Greg looked carefully, he didn't find our mysterious clicker. (Something clicks in the tank, loudly, and I think whatever it is is responsible for many missing fish and shrimp. I was hoping we could catch it with this move.)

After the water was drained, the guys took things apart. While they were cleaning the tank out front, I cleaned the aquarium corner and wall. Things get dusty when you don't move them for a few years. Then the reassembly began, and I swept the floor about every half hour. The sand got into everything! The hardwood floor would not appreciate having the sand ground into it. (The guys probably think I'm a clean freak or something.)

Finally, the time came to put things back in. I was worried about the fish, who'd been in a garbage can all day, and had a momentary coronary when Greg listed the fish to his buddy. One was missing; my "Fraggle fish," the starry blenny. "What about the blenny?" I asked.

Greg looked at me blankly for a moment. "Was it in there?"

"As of last night," I replied. As one, we turned to look at the garbage can with the fish. Then at the garbage can with the rocks, which didn't have water in it, except for a very small amount in the bottom.

"I didn't see him," said Greg. "He probably hid in a rock."

My poor blenny! I watched the rocks go back in, hoping and dreading to find his poor dried body curled in a hole. We were also taking a second chance for finding the clicker thing. Each rock was picked up and inspected. All visible holes were checked. Drying sea life was removed (mostly pieces of sponge). No clicker. No blenny.

Then when we got down to the small fragment pieces of rock, there was the blenny, swimming around in the five inches or so of water in the bottom of the garbage can. Rescued! I won't ever know if he got lucky by having hid in one of the first rocks to be removed (and therefore in one that was in the water) or if he flopped out after removal to land in the water. It really doesn't matter; he made it!

We found no sign of any clicker thing.

So now it's days later and things have gotten clearer. The water, because we have a new working protein skimmer. The issues, because we also have a thumb-sized glue smear across the front of our tank. The guys say they can remove it, and I asked them if it could happen before our yearly party. We'll see. Other things have gotten clearer, too. The answers, because the view from the kitchen is fine. You cannot see the light bulbs, the aquarium puts a massive amount of light into the kitchen, and the back of the tank is black plexi, so the candles reflect in it wonderfully. And finally, the hearing, because the new chiller is a lot quieter and you can hold conversations in the living room again.

We still have some touch-up work to do, but overall Moving Day was a success. So far, I've not lost any coral or fish, except for the ones I sent away. I've not heard the clicker thing. Everything's still a bit grey, but I think it'll be fine. In a week or so I can start adding things again.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

 

Guest Blogger 10/12/14

     

Bump

Alone, I typed away on the keyboard. Well, mostly alone. The dog slept at my feet, and the cat was around somewhere and of course the fish tank lit up the living room. I killed another axe-wielding goat and dodged an arrow from a blue woman in tattered clothing. Ah, peace. Just me,  the animals, and a relaxing game of Diablo. The game's music played quietly in the background, the goats bleated as they died, and the women screamed and turned into vapor. Some of my best moments are spent this way.

Then I heard a sound which didn't come from the game. A chilling sound, one which I shouldn't hear in alaHouse when I'm alone.

The sound of the toilet seat.

Our toilet seats are always down.

Toilet seats which are down don't make noise.

I froze, and the goats and blue women in Diablo beat on my motionless character. I strained my ears to hear any other sounds from the bathroom. Was there someone here? Would a burglar stop to pee?

The dog continued to sleep at my feet. I frowned at him and a goat bleated. No further sounds from the bathroom . . .

I got up, leaving my character to his online fate, and cautiously approached the nearest bathroom. The dog followed me.

Upon the toilet seat, tail curled delicately around her front feet, sat Kona. My mysterious noise was just the cat jumping onto the (closed) toilet. "Meow," she said. Then, "rrt, rrt, rrt, rrt." It's an odd noise, that one. It's the sound she makes when a butterfly floats past her window, or a spider crawls up the wall past her reach. I think of it as a plea for the would-be lunch to come closer.

This time, she's directing it at Bounty, the dog.

I think she's finally grown into the cat she can be. She's discovered Garfield's secret: that dogs are fun to annoy. Trouble is, Bounty doesn't annoy. He accepts what Kona does as playtime and he's always willing to play. This one was no exception and as I returned to my besieged character, the dog and cat began a game of Chase Me.

Sometimes I wonder what those games entail, and I think they play more serious ones when I'm gone. Wednesday when I came home from work, I found both animals locked in the computer room. Kona was in the window and Bounty was barking to be let out of the room. How had the door closed? What had they been doing in there all day?

Perhaps they'd spent the afternoon having a relaxing game of Diablo.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 10/5/14

     

Writer's Retreat

It wasn't at all what I expected, and in some ways it was ever so much more. A friend and I went on a two-day writer's retreat in the Sierras, close to Donner Lake. It ran for part of Friday, all of Saturday, and part of Sunday. The ad had said something about nature, but I had no clue what I was getting into.

The retreat leader held our gathering in a lodge just off Donner Pass Road. City-born and -bred that I am, I had some difficulty with various parts of the lodge. First, we parked the car just "off the road." There is no parking lot for this lodge the way I'm used to them. There are, instead, wide spots of dirt to either side of the road. At just after 3pm, the spots on the lodge side were already full, so we used the ones a bit further down on the opposite side. After we'd parked, for a moment we stared back up the road, looking at the lodge sign partway up a steep mountainside and wondering where the way to the lodge was. A woman in a small pickup nearby saw our lost looks and came over. It was the retreat leader!

She introduced herself and helped us get our bearings. We took some of our stuff and started across the dirt. Crossing the road was a nervous-making thing. The visibility to the left wasn't very good, so we trusted to sound more than sight for when we could cross. Once across, we rounded the side of the hill and saw the trail up to the lodge.

About four feet wide, it was well-pounded dirt and rock, with railroad ties set crossways into the dirt at about ten foot intervals. These kept the path from washing away during storms, I guess, because the pathway was steep. Along the right side, a rope followed the pathway. I think the rope is meant as an assist during winter when the path could be full of snow or ice.

We trudged uphill, stopping three or four times to try to catch our breaths. Try, I say, because my lungs did not like the altitude and began to hurt in a very short amount of time. I felt like I wasn't getting enough oxygen, and worked at calming my breathing. This became a common occurrence during the whole retreat, especially during our nature walks.

Finally, we crested the top of the path to behold a rustic, huge lodge. Rough-hewn timber graced its outside walls, and a sign proclaimed that we'd arrived. We crossed the grate at the entrance and opened the door...

... to find stairs.

Up the stairs we went, following the signs that said "Office." Up two flights, and no more sign. We wandered around on that floor but found no place that looked like an office or said 'Office' on it. We found the chore sign-up and the accommodation listing. We found a huge room dedicated to Lewis & Clark, and more stairs. We found the Dining Room and the Kitchen. But no office.

The leader came to our rescue once again and pointed us in the right direction. We'd passed the "Office" several times, but the wooden half-door had been closed so we hadn't seen it as the office. As I recall we wondered about it but there were no door knobs so we couldn't open it and look.

The office person, who was apparently in charge of the entire lodge, checked us in and explained where we were to go. We had cubicle 7A and 7B, and briefly I thought how much those sounded like airplane seats.

We dragged our stuff up more stairs. We found the Men's Dorm and the bathrooms, and then the Cubicles. When I saw the "room," I understood why I'd thought of airplane seats. The room was 5 x 8, and the beds took up about half of that. Bunk beds, and a small bench, were all the contents. (Not that anything else would fit.)

I took the top bunk, my friend (C) took the bottom, and we tried to fit our stuff in as best we could. Since the cubicle doors don't lock, lockers were available for things we wanted to secure, so we figured out what we could leave and went back to the car for the rest of our stuff. On the way, we found some lockers we could use, after abandoning the idea of using the ones in the men's area.

My lungs hurt and I was tired, hot, and felt cramped after we'd gotten everything settled. I'd left my computer at home after much internal debate and was glad I had. The only outlets in the place (for guests) were in the Library, down the hall from the Lewis & Clark room. Plus I couldn't leave the computer in my cubicle when we were traipsing across the country, so it worked out well not to have brought it. But oh, how I missed it! My hand doesn't like writing the old way anymore. Every guest is asked to sign up for one chore per day, so we signed up for after-dinner dishes as our daily chore and relaxed and wrote and puttered until dinner.

The call bell rang at 6pm and we went to the Dining Room. Mess hall-style service, but the food was excellent. Vegetarian lasagna, garden salad, garlic bread, bread pudding and cheesecake. The only thing missing was something to drink besides water. Hot tea and coffee were available for a 50-cent donation, but no sodas or anything of the sort that I could see. Several people brought their own wine. Our writing group sat together, except for G, who was running late because of a big accident on the freeway. We saved him some food.

Afterward C and I helped with dishes. The lodge has no garbage disposal, so the guests were asked to scrape all excess food off their plates and then slide them into the kitchen. There was a large opening into it from the Dining Room and the surface was stainless steel. We slid our dishes across the steel into the kitchen area. The main dishwasher person put the scraped dishes into the sink and sprayed them off with a commercial-type sink sprayer. If you've seen one, you know what I mean, but if you haven't think of a kitchen sink with an elephant-trunk spray nozzle and you'd be close. Then the dishes were put into a round plastic thing that you'd think went into a round dishwasher, except it went into the Sanitizer. This stainless steel monster was hissing and gurgling when I entered the kitchen for my part of the chores.

I was quickly taught to empty the Sanitizer by sliding out the plastic tray of dishes, drag it aside to drip-dry a minute, and put another full one in. Close the very hot steel doors, flip the switch, and I was done with it until the Sanitizer quit hissing and the light went out. Then I was to do it again, and if I was nimble I'd have emptied the drip-dried tray in the meantime. After everything was done, the kitchen closed up by dropping a roll-down shutter across that large opening. We had a little bit of time and then the writing group met in the dining room at 7:30pm. We were quite a mix. C and I, S the leader, F the EMT, and G the landscaper. Our ages ranged from 23 to at least 61, but we were linked by the passion and drive of our writing. We began our adventure, learned a little about each other, made some tentative plans for the next day, and did two exercises' worth of writing and sharing. We worked until about 10pm and headed off to bed.

There I found the cubicle did have a light switch, but not much else in the way of convenience. The top bunk was incredibly high to my 45-year-old body which never did like trees much. (For the bottom bunk resident it wasn't high enough; you couldn't sit up in the bottom bunk.) No ladder greeted my eyes when I tried to figure out how to get up there. A handle offered promise of assistance, but I found when I tried to use it that the top screw was halfway out and the handle itself was in the wrong place. When I was halfway up, my hand on the handle was close to my right ear. Not at all a good place for support or leverage. With a grunt and a heave and a prayer, I threw myself into the bunk. Once there, I realized it had no shelf for stuff. I ended up sleeping with my book (what little sleep I got) and hanging my glasses on a nail.

I lay there for awhile in the dark, trying to get comfortable in a strange place, wondering how in the world I'd managed to sign up for the monkey bars in place of a bed. Then, out of the dark, a thin cry.

"Mommy...."

The cubicle next to ours had a child in it, and she wasn't at all happy. She moaned and wailed, called for a mommy that never seemed to show up, begged for water, and cried for quite a while. I went from feeling sorry for her to being willing to commit murder. And just as I was thinking this, someone finally gave the kid the water she wanted and suddenly I heard the most awful gurgling choking noises.

Oh, my God, I thought. Someone *has* killed her.

An anxious silence, then a gurgle, a sput, a cough, and someone vomiting. Several times. Then tortured crying as the child regained her breath.

And so it went throughout the night. The poor kid was sick, so none of us within earshot (and I heard later that even downstairs her misery could be witnessed) got much sleep. For awhile there'd be silence and then it would start all over again. Two or three times, someone took the kid out for a bit, but it wasn't ever for long and the child came back crying and wailing the same as she'd been doing when they left.

Somewhere in there I realized I had to go to the bathroom, and immediately also realized there was absolutely no way I could do that without breaking my neck in the dark. I was never so grateful for anything as I was for the first peek of the sun's rays illuminating our cubicle so I could see to get down.

The second day was much better than the first. More writing, more good food, no hauling of bags up the slope, and some quiet, slow walking up the nature trail in back of the lodge. The area abounds with Stellar jays and chipmunks, and I enjoyed watching both whenever I had the opportunity. Pine trees contrasted well with the deep blue of a clear sky, wildflowers added fireworks of color, and the freshness of the air made up for the low volume of oxygen in it. I also noticed the "hostel-style" description on the lodge sign, and think maybe if I'd known that up front I wouldn't have been so surprised. The first time I ever heard of elder hostels, I thought it was "hostiles." Now that I've stayed in something similar, I'm not so sure I was wrong.

The writing sessions were incredible, and I was happy to have all talented writers in my group. You never know what you're going to get, and I think the five of us complemented each other well. Our leader gave us enough time to ourselves in the afternoon, which I spent napping in the bottom bunk of the cubicle I moved into; I couldn't
face another night trapped near the ceiling. She kept us busy and thinking when we were all together. She gave us some techniques we can use on our own, and showed consideration for everyone in her flexibility. Day Two offered five writing exercises, and the chance to share the writing for each.

The second night I slept better in the other room, since at least on the bottom bunk I could get up if I needed to and had somewhere to put my book and glasses. I helped with morning food chores since we wouldn't be around for dinner. C and I had to be out of there around noon.

The group met for three hours on Day Three. We stayed around the lodge rather than hiking, and managed to squeeze in three writing exercises and the sharing of them, as well as watch a Stellar jay try to peck its way into G's lunch bag.

Was it worth it? Definitely. Would I do it again? Probably not, if it was held in the same place. Somewhere else, certainly. Would I recommend it to you? Well, that depends on how athletic you are.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 9/28/14

     

The Journey

It's been a long wait, hasn't it? Almost a month has passed since I told you I had applied for another position within my company. I thank you all for your patience, and your prayers.

Today, I was offered a position. It's not the one I originally went for, though. Therein lies a tale, and so I'm here Driveling it.

I originally applied for an Intermediate Operations Specialist position. (I am currently an Intermediate Business Information Analyst.) This new job had a primary function which would take up most of the person's calendar, with a bit of space left over for the odd analyst-type task. It was within the team I'd been ripped away from a few months ago, and while I didn't know the primary function I was sure I could learn.

Just after the time of the interviews, the race was between myself and one other person; one other person who was currently doing some of that primary function and had had some training in the rest of it. He was stiff competition and I bit my lip and chewed my nails as both of us waited for a decision.

Time dragged and it seemed as if things were thrown in the way. "No news today, we're waiting on x." became something I heard often. Then about three weeks ago, when I was about to stop asking for fear I'd be disqualified as too much of a pest, the hiring manager and her manager took me aside.

"We've decided to offer the position to him," the manager's manager said, and then added without pause, "but we received approval from the big boss to open a second position." Then they explained to me that they were short-handed enough, and had such good prospects apply, that they wanted to hire us both. In order to do that, they would give the other person the slot originally opened, since he was already doing some of that work, and open a second, senior, position.

I didn't have to reapply or reinterview, but I would have to wait for the week to pass that is required for a job posting. If anyone qualified applied, I would have to wait for them to stagger through the interview process.

That time came and went, and the hiring manager went out on vacation. I got sick and spent three days not caring about any position at all, and when the following Monday rolled around, the Human Resources person setting everything up (including preliminary questions for prospects) was on vacation.

Another week to wait!

Well, not quite. Here it is, not quite a week, and I've been offered, and accepted, the second position to open. Once negotiations with my current boss are completed (about when I can start and how to handle the old workload during transition), I will be a Senior Operations Specialist.

It's been worth the wait (though I may not have thought so during it) and I am looking forward to waking in the morning eager to go to work.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

Guest Blogger 9/21/14

     

The Hope of Change

For a long while I've had nothing to say. Work was the same, alaHouse was the same, and the days blended into one another.

Then on a bit ago, my computer's hard drive died. I hadn't done backups as religiously as I should have, so I sent my computer to a data recovery place. Even knowing the PC wouldn't boot, it was hard to watch it walk out the door with some stranger.

After what felt like forever but was really just short of two weeks, I was told they couldn't save any data.

Ultimately, after receiving my computer back, and putting stuff back on it from backups, it looks like I lost two weeks' worth of data. (Plus the time that I didn't have my primary system, so I have stuff to move and integrate.)

Two weeks of accounting, two weeks of Desk Drawer stuff, two weeks of Journal Entries. All gone. Some of it, of course, is replaceable: the bank statements tell me what the accounting program is missing, the archives kept track of Desk Drawer for me, high scores on video games are fleeting things anyway, but one thing can't be reconstructed.

My Journal for those two weeks is gone. Tragically, I'll never know what I was thinking.

The PC is almost totally put back in order, and at the tail end of all this excitement, our television and DVD player decided to conspire against us.

Perhaps it's some sort of electronic flu.

Harry and I decided to get what he's been wanting for awhile, so we called some places for quotes on a home theatre. After a week or two of dealing with inept service folk (and just after doing this with the ones who tried to recover data off my broken PC - some truly idiotic people), we found someone really good. The final result is surprisingly amazing.

A 50" Samsung plasma HD television now fills (*really* fills) the Green Room closet. The old entertainment center is moved out, and a new console holds all necessary equipment. New speakers have been recessed into the ceiling, and the old ones moved to the Fox Room.

alaHouse is wired for sound.

On the work front, I've applied for another position (in my same company) and this one I passionately want. I've had one interview (twenty-two questions!) and there's to be another tomorrow.

I don't know how many applied, but I feel like my first interview went well, and I have high hopes. Keep me in your thoughts and prayers as I work my way through the hiring process. The wheels turn slowly, so be patient for news.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

Guest Blogger 9/14/14

     

Statistics

I've been reminiscing. As I look forward to the end of this year (where did it go?), I remember last November was full of a novel, as I again "competed" in National Novel Writing Month.

Yes, I "won." I managed to write over 50,000 words during the month of November. The statistics on participation are impressive. Writers from all over logged in and wrote during the month; a staggering 79,813 signed up. Of those, 12,948 made it to or over the 50k mark. That's a 16.22% win rate. The site www.nanowrimo.org counted 982,564,701 words.

From my own writing list, 16 members participated, and 8 made it to or over 50k words. Our win rate (50%) is better than average!

Harry's new rig is on the road, bottling wine. We have some new statistics to report for that, too. With the added seven feet from the Volvo, the truck (with trailer) is now 65 feet long. It weighs a whopping 63,690 pounds.

Life is full of statistics. Sometimes that's all we can hold on to, and sometimes they mean nothing at all. I can't put numbers to the joy shining in my dog's eyes when I throw a toy for him, or wrap a statistic around the contentment I feel when I've spent the day in the candle-lit quiet of my home. I can't weigh my husband's love or measure the worth of my cat.

It's a good thing, then, that I don't need to.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 9/7/14

The Search For Custom.dic

It began innocuously enough -- subtly, gradually. But soon the need consumed me and I was helpless before it.

Ah-ah, get your mind out of the gutter. It may be keeping mine company, but that's not a good place for it.

I refer, of course, to the file that lists the words that I've added to the spellchecker in Microsoft Word. Custom.dic. If you have Word, you have a custom.dic.

It's not my fault they named it that.

First it was funny -- Wherehouse Entertainment comes up as Whorehouse  Entertainment and I decide quickly that 'Wherehouse' is something I'd better add to the custom.dic file. Then there's all those employee names I'm always using. Roger, and Sheryl, and Fran, and Debbie. Gotta add those, too, otherwise you're forever telling the machine, "Yeah, I know Fran and yes, it's spelled right!"

Then little by little, you find you're adding words by the dozens and can't seem to stop. What's one more word? Anaheim, sure. I'll use that again. Solipsistic, yeah, gotta have that one.

Soon you're adding acronyms. DPA, PD0, and CAC certainly need to be there.

Then one day, you're checking a letter and Pow! the spellchecker throws a word up there that you've never seen before. It wants to change 'Barstow' to 'Barctow'. Barctow? How in the world did Barctow get into the custom.dic as a proper word?

Thus begins the search. To find the custom.dic and rid it of irregularities.

You look on the d:, and the s:, and the k: drives. Not there. You look on the c: drive but can't find it there, either.

But it must be there; Word is based on c:, so it has to be with Word.

Wait! Here's a Find File feature in File Manager. Could it? Would it?

Trembling fingers type in the word 'custom.dic' and press enter.

One file found! It's hiding on c:, but in a subdirectory of a subdirectory of a subdirectory. Custom.dic doesn't want to be found.

You wouldn't believe the words I took out of there. Some were recognizable, barely. Others had no place in the English language.

Today I have a slimmer, trimmer custom.dic and it's clean as a whistle.

Unlike your mind.

Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 8/31/14

     

The Trucks Just Keep Getting Bigger

I admit it.

We have a truck addiction in our household.

First, there was the glory and wonder of that little tan Toyota 4x4, the one we bought when we were young and stupid. We paid and paid and paid for that truck because we had no credit and didn't know enough to dicker at the signing table. Still, the truck served us well and we had many years good use out of it.

Then, enter the amazement of the Tundra. Toyota's first true full-size truck (the T-100 was a joke; nice enough, but *not* full-size). We snuck in on the ground floor of that, purchasing one of the first year's models. It's sitting in our driveway this very moment, with about 70,000 miles on it. I'm still in lust with that truck.

You can see the progression, right? Start small, then move into the stronger stuff, then . . . then what comes next? You got it! The hard stuff.

Sigh. Today we signed papers for something a bit bigger.

It's a Volvo VNL64T300. For those of you who know truck-talk, it's the front half of a tractor-trailer rig, with three axles. It's a day cab, in white, with a short nose.

Whether you know truck-talk or not, I think Harry said it best, "This one's torquier."

I hope there's nowhere bigger we can go with trucks . . .

Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

 

Guest Blogger 8/24/2014

Work Update and Cat Lessons

A few of you have asked, so I'll tell you all: work is... work. Some things have not changed in my new department. I still work mostly with databases, and the to-do list I had twenty-odd days ago when my old department dissolved continues to be my ongoing to-do list today. Well, mostly (more there in a sec).

Some very good changes have been made, as well. I no longer have to travel to the other office at least every other week. In fact, I should rarely need to travel at all. I can still work from home if my workload or the urgency of something demands it. I have a very small team, but I do have a team, which some folk in the office aren't fortunate enough to have. (If you need to understand better why having a team is important, see me after class.)

Some not-so-good changes are happening, too, and today I felt the first rumblings of the mighty landslide I was hoping wouldn't occur. Briefly, I felt surrounded by a cloud of dust. You see, over the last while, my previous half a Manager spent a lot of her half Management time helping myself and another Analyst develop and maintain a process
for what we do. A standard way of seeing that all the work gets touched, at least, even if it doesn't all get done. A fair way of making sure all database requests are handled based on a similar "script," a sorting and prioritizing method applied to each and every request no matter where it originated.

Now, under the new hierarchy, that other Analyst and I report to different bosses. My new boss's boss hinted early on about the "great things" I could do, now that I was on their team.

Over the last week, my time has been consumed by a project I was supposed to have a very small part of. The next couple of weeks looked to be more of the same, with maybe a little time to do the "other stuff" on my database plate. (Currently, the Database Team's inventory has about twenty-five or so items.) Then today I was snatched out of that project and hustled into a meeting room, where several agitated people were sure I could save their day for them.

How? Build them an emergency database.

Within a week, a torturous manual workflow will need to be done again, and they envision that a database could import two files from Excel and magically do most of their manual work for them. Well, yes, it probably can. "But what about...?" I started to ask.

Every one of the agitated people threw a comment into the pot. "Maybe they can do without you for a few days." "We can't wait." "We have to report on this straight to the top."

Sigh.

And so tomorrow (or maybe tonight) will find me working on a database which is not on the database request list. And a project and twenty-five (or so) previous items lie untouched. The landslide begins, and I see no way to save the work we'd done to build a request process that was successful. You all know how it happens: once one thing becomes an exception and makes it to the front of the line, that sets a precedent for the next important item to be an exception, too, and soon there might as well not be a line. Sadly, that's the environment we started with, where anybody anywhere could request a database change and the ones that got worked on were the ones which originated with the people who were the loudest, the highest, or had the clout in some other way to shove to the front. I find myself disheartened to think we might be returning to that way of business life.

However, while work may sometimes be discouraging, home life is not. The kitten, Kona, grows like a weed and is starting to look like a cat, rather than a big-headed kitten. She and Bounty have worked out how to play together and mostly they do well, although Kona is not yet allowed free run of the house when no one is home to supervise. Likely that will happen within the next week or so. She is learning daily lessons, and teaching me some, as well. I think it's time to share a few with you.

Kona's Lessons:
* If it moves, it's a toy.
* If it doesn't move, it's a toy.
* If it's attached to the dog, it's a toy.
* If it has a hole, stick your paw in as far as you can; it's a toy.
* If it doesn't have a hole, make one. It will be a toy.
* If someone says "No!" do it again, faster. It must be a toy.

My Lessons:
* Cats are hard to catch.
* Dogs chasing cats are hard to catch.
* Dogs and cats can learn to get along. Sometimes.
* When you tell the cleaners to lock the cat up again when they're done, make sure you tell them it's Okay to leave the cat under the bed.
* When you and your husband want to make love, lock the cat out of the bedroom.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 8/17/14

The Department Dissolves

A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, a bunch of people got laid off and more people got rearranged. As one among the rearrangees, I was unsure about my place of work, and my role there. I had questions I wasn't brave enough to ask, and some which would have been futile to voice.

I didn't know anything about my Manager except her name, and that someone I disliked thought she was fantastic.

Time passed, and the discord settled into a team. Disorganization became order, and camaraderie developed.

Then people got rearranged again. Still among the rearrangees, I was told I'd report to half a Manager. I wasn't sure about reporting to half a Manager. How was that going to work? Which half would I get? What if I wanted the other half instead?

With trepidation I stayed on board for this next journey, over seas rough with learning curves. My new half a Manager put in more time than some full Managers, and she tried very hard to do what was best for her people. Working relationships developed and I learned to speak her language (or she learned mine).

Today, we've been told that the department is dissolving. As of next Monday, my half a Manager won't be mine anymore, and the other fourteen people who report to her will mostly report elsewhere as well.

I don't know what I feel yet. It's a big change, and while it's not a total surprise (rearranging of departments happens fairly regularly here), it wasn't what I was expecting today. I'll have to wait and see, watch what happens and get a feel for my new hierarchy. Maybe it'll be better than it was before, and maybe it'll just be different. I'll keep you posted.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

Guest Blogger 8/10/14

     

The Greatest Gift Of All

Now we're even.

Almost forty-five years ago, my mother gave me the gift of life.

Today, I returned the favor.

I left my friend's house up toward the border of the state at a little after 6 this morning, expecting to stop at my mom's (around 9), stay long enough to have lunch with her, then bring my kids (the dog and cat) home, and get myself unpacked. I arrived at my mom's around 9:30, to find her sideways in her usual chair, incoherent and making baby sounds and faces. She was drenched with sweat and cold to the touch. I tried to get her to talk to me, but I couldn't understand her words. I did get a definite "no" shake of her head to "Are you in pain?"

I called 911. Two fire trucks and an ambulance responded, and I didn't think of locking up the animals until the guys (six? ten?) arrived. By then, the dog was barking and the cat was nowhere to be seen and the front door was wide open. I spent some hectic moments answering paramedic questions ("Does she live alone?" "Were you here to see what happened?") and searching for Kona. I found the cat under my mom's bed, and locked her in with Bounty in the bedroom I use when I stay there.

The paramedics discovered that my mom's blood sugar level was 25 (normal range for her is supposed to be 80 to 130; she's diabetic) and once they'd given her some sugar solution, she started making more sense in her words and recognized me. She sounded surprised that I was there, and seemed even more surprised to see all those tall, handsome men in her living room. (Shame she won't remember them, eh?)

A whirlwind of activity took place in a mere fifteen minutes or so. We had trouble getting her to agree to go to the hospital, but she needed to and finally said yes. I stayed behind to lock up the house, gather a few things for her and then follow.

Parking at the hospital was hard; they had a parking garage but I wasn't sure the Tundra would fit. Turns out they do a valet thing (and triple park vehicles; smart) so that was relatively easy once I figured it out. It didn't cost any extra, either.

When I got into the hospital, she was already doing well. Making sense, unhappy at being in a hospital but even remembering what happened. She remembers checking her blood in the morning (54) and taking her daily insulin. She wasn't hungry, but knew she had to eat, so figured she would do that in a few minutes. The next thing she knew, all those guys were in her living room.

It took a bit, but we decided she should stay overnight so the hospital staff could keep an eye on her blood levels. I stayed with her awhile at the hospital, until they brought her a sandwich, then went back to the house to get some more things (and to eat; it was about 12:30 and I hadn't eaten yet). I gathered her glasses (folded and in the chair she'd been sitting in), her reading book, and some clothes. Back to the hospital.

The valet thing wasn't happening anymore and the guy said there was plenty of room at the top, so I drove (the Tundra, still) up to the roof of the parking garage but there were only two very small spaces left. I drove back down and one of the valet guys valeted my truck after all. This time my mom was in a regular room and I had more trouble finding her.

When I did, she looked good (she said they'd fed her TWO sandwiches) and was able to tell me stories of her week with the pets. She wasn't very happy about staying overnight, but would do okay.

I got home around 4:30. Tomorrow morning I go back to be there for when they release her.

Tonight I give thanks to God that my mother is still alive, and I count my blessings on my timing. I also have a reminder for all of you: The doctors tell us to do things because those are the things we should be doing. When a doctor says "with food," you'd best take that medication . . . with food.


Copyright 2014 Michelle Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/

   

     

Guest Blogger 8/3/14

My husband replied to my 'Departure' with his own version. With his approval, Harry's side of 'Departure:'

Arrival 

I sighed as I turned the corner onto my road. I am going to have the house all to myself. No Cat - No Dog - No Wife.  The animals are at her mom's and the wife is with our friend in Washington delivering a cage to friends at a bird rescue shelter. (Quiet, alone time...YEH maybe.)

Now most of you know that to me the cat not being in the house is me not having to cover my pool table for the night, or listen to the bathroom door being scratched to death. (No Problem.)

The dog, on the other hand, is so cute and soft and loves me so much that he can't wait to see me. So he barks with exuberance. Then he will bring me every toy in the house until I play with him. (Obviously if one toy isn't thrown, I want to play with another special squeeker, right?). NOoo! I AM TIRED so his attention is not needed either.

I sigh again as I think, the wife on the other hand, Michelle, won't be home either.  Normally, not a problem as I am away a lot of the time. I have been away on special occasions before but this day is our twenty-fourth wedding anniversary.  Most men would be either sleeping on the couch or going dry-dock for at least a month for such an offense. (Some both.)

But my Michelle is not like that.  She knows that when we are together again we will make That our special day.  I can say that we have grown to love each other more and more every year. Friends that know us, and most of my customers, will easily back me on this.

I believe that it is because we communicate.  We don't hide our feelings from each other. Not that we did this from the start.  I think every couple doubts themselves when they first marry.

Can I provide for the both of us?

Should we rent, or go into huge debt and buy a house?

Are you sure you really love me?

Is this where I want to live or is there a better place than Hell-Centro?

Is there life after Kmart?

The questions of life go on and on. This is just an "After Drivel" So I am not going to tell you about all of our life's answers, but this I will tell before I miss the turn into our newly-paved easement to our driveway.

In reality, I may be alone tonight, but my heart and my thoughts will be of our "Special Day."
 

Copyright 2014 Harry Hakala
http://www.winebird.com/