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After I posted my “copacabanna” lyrical incident, my sister called me when I wasn’t home and – with no preamble or closing comment – sang what she knew of the song to get it restuck in my head. While I was planning a rebuttle, she emailed me the complete lyrics and again got it stuck in my head.

Problem being is that she uses her cell phone as her primary phone, so it’s tough to catch her at a time when she “wouldn’t” answer her phone – since I wanted to leave a message. She had class last night and I called and left her my own message. I sang the entire “Mandy” song all the way through and then hung up. Which is an extra funny selection if you know my sister.

She called me later that evening and was impressed that I sang it all the way through. We had a good laugh.

Swimming – I’m up to 6 laps in my thrice weekly swim – but I’m having trouble keeping track of the numbers. I was using varied strokes to help me keep track, but I only know so many strokes and I loose track easily. I need to get one of those lap counter watches.

Tomorrow is my birthday and I turn 34. Heading down to visit my folks for the day – should be a quiet, but fun, time.

Games – I got a number of gifts cards for christmas and have put them all to good use. Managed to score several “new to me” video games and I’ve been enjoyed them. Also picked up season 1 of Justice League – good stuff. I’m a big fan of the Flash, but when the Green Lantern says his oath I do get the chills a bit – it’s really well done.

Got a call from my ex-roommate’s mom. She’s been in the hospital and asked if I would take her mother to the store for a few things. So, I hopped in the car and helped out with the errands. While we were out, the following items were purchased:

1. a bag of ice
2. stamps
3. scratch off lotto tickets
4. lotto numbers
5. newspaper

So, there’s my good deed for the week. Did you see that one, God? Write that one down somewhere. “Helped little old lady buy lotto tickets,”

Granted, not as good as picking her up from Bingo during a driving snowstorm a few years ago – but still worth some good karma points.

Anyway, I was glad to help out. They’re both a little crazy, but in a fun and non-scary way.

Well, I’ve got a slew of meetings coming up now, time to get back to work…

I woke up this morning, after a series of dreams about work, with the song – “Copacabana” running through my head. I’ve been trying to scrub it out with some help from iTunes and YouTube, but even the most bubble-gum-ish top 40’s pop isn’t enough to purge it from my head.

In other, less disturbing news, I got a call from Dad with an update on Grandma. She’s home and doing better. I called her last night and we chatted a bit. Seems like she was in good spirits and we had a nice conversation.

I got a pile of gift cards for christmas this year – looks like I get a second wave of christmas this year while I do some shopping for myself. Which is always quite nice.

So, that’s about it for now – except that it appears that I’m the only one in my group here today. Could be a really quiet – or a really busy – day.

later…

I had a sort of pre-christmas with some friends, then headed south to visit the folks. My sister and her husband came over early for dinner, presents, and a trip to see the Zoo Lights in Columbus. The lights were really impressive, but after a while – when pretty much everything was covered in lights – it started to all look the same. So we headed out and called it a night.

Christmas eve – very late – I got a call that one of my friends had been in a car accident. A relatively minor one, but still worrying.

Christmas morning was just my folks and me – though my sister came back for lunch. We had all been planning on heading to Illinois – but my sister wanted to spend time with her husband and I wanted to head back to see if I could help my friend out – since his car was in bad shape.

So, we all headed out the day after christmas. I was able to help out my friend with some driving around and watched a bit of Dick Clark for the new year’s eve ball drop.

Might be my increasing cynicism, but the New Year’s eve show was kinda pointless. Dick Clark was not looking good and the rest of the crew seemed like they were having an almost enforced excitement. When you get down to it – it’s really just another tick of the clock. One funny thing – I called my folks at 12:07 to wish them a happy new year – they’d been asleep since 10:30. I felt bad, but it was funny.

What wasn’t funny was my happy new year call to my grandmother yesterday evening. I asked how she was doing and found she was headed to the hospital. She’d been hurting much of the day and the medicine wasn’t helping her. I cut the call short as my uncle was arriving to take her in. Not so much a happy new year for her – I hope she’s okay.

So, I’m back to work – got a meeting in a few that I’m not looking forward to, but those are the breaks. That’s it for now…

Last night I got a call at home from the boss. Seems like the changes we’d made to the home page weren’t working properly in IE. So, I had to go in and either fix (and it was code that I wasn’t familiar with and/or it was unfixable) – or restore from backup. The backup was the easier route and I had things back in a few minutes. Still, I was cranky about it.

We’ve got an interview today with a web developer – we’ll see how it goes. As a consequence, I’m wearing a tie. Well, not really wearing yet – it’s draped around my neck like a scarf until I’m done with my swim today. No way I’m tying this thing more than once in a day.

In other news… apparently, I’ve got a bit more shopping to do. Small things, but still needs to be done.

Watched the remake of “The Wicker Man” last night before my little trip back to work. Good movie.

I guess that’s about it for now. back to work…

Yesterday was the division wide holiday party. We had pizza, chicken, pasta, and lots of desserts. There was a visit from the school mascot – Zippy – and classical music performed by students here at UA. We also had a game show and prizes.

I was on the committee and it was a great honking pile of work. But, I think everyone had fun so it was worth it.

I didn’t go swimming yesterday – too tired, though I felt bad about skipping it. I’ll be going again on Friday and I may even try to go today as well – depends on how I feel and how screwed up my morning becomes.

Finished up a couple of Origami presents that I’d made for people and got them wrapped last night. Nothing real complicated, but I think they turned out well.

And finally, I’ve some new tires and wheels to put on my car this evening. Or rather, to have put on my car since I’m not going to be doing it myself.

That’s it for now… back to work…

I swam again today – and sort of felt bad about it. I was the only one in the pool and the lifeguards had to climb up in the little chair and watch that I didn’t drown. Got to be one of the most boring jobs on the planet. Couldn’t have been interesting to watch – swim to end, stop and pant, swim back. I did try to mix up my strokes a bit so that might have made it more interesting, but that was only because I’m not very good and I get tired.

And sore. This is the first time I’ve gone swimming in a while and actually been sore afterwards. Which is not a bad thing, just kinda odd since it didn’t feel like I worked any harder.

In other news… I got hit by a massive wave of ennui yesterday. Wikipedia says: “ennui describes weariness or annoyance over a long period of time”

I don’t know if a day constitutes a long period of time, but I was more weary and annoyed than those words can really cover.

I think part of it is the holidays – which haven’t really been a heck of a lot of fun for me in a while. They are so endlessly stressful and even the simple task of going to the mall – or anywhere near the mall – becomes a grueling experience. I’m essentially done with my shopping at this point and everything is wrapped – so at least that part is done.

Shopping for other people (not nearly as fun as shopping for ones self), trying to spend “just the right amount” and get “just the right gift” for everyone who ended up on my list, and then the travel – which I dread.

I’m trying to be festive and not bring the people around me down – but I don’t think I’m doing a great job of that. And hey! More guilt.

And I know I shouldn’t feel like this. It’s supposed to be a happy time. I’d try and chalk it up to some kind of SAD, but the nice weather refutes that.

So, apply Happy Face ™ and soldier on through. And I know that I’ll enjoy parts of if and will wonder why I was so cranky earlier. Still, it all feels a little empty to me. The Christmas spirit seems to have passed me by.

Enough of this rambling – nearly time to go home and do a bit of cleaning. Yep – I’m a party animal. Later…

I’ve got, as it may be abundently clear, a few issues. Not any real bad ones, just a few small ones that don’t have much of an impact on my life. One of those is a strong dislike for unfinished timers. Particullary on microwaves – where someone has had a timer going or had been cooking some food and stopped it before it went off – thus obscuring the clock that we would otherwise see there. Though I can resist it, I’d really rather hit that clear button and go back to the clock. I also enjoy setting clocks that have lost their way due to power outage or daylight savings time.

And I think I’ve finally figured out why these hidden or disrupted clocks bother me. On more than one occasion – and more frequently with the clock in the bathroom – I’ve glanced at an analog clock just after it ticks over to the next second. It may not have even come to a full halt, but I’ve caught it at the critical time and have watched the whole second from start to finish.

And, I’ve got to tell you – that’s a long freaking time if you’re paying attention. It feels like more than a second passes before the next tick of the clock.

At the quantum level, observation changes things. That’s one of the reasons a quantum computer – as super cool and powerful as it would be – is tough to build. If you look at it, things change.

And I guess a fear – or strong concern – is that if I hadn’t been watching the clock at that instant, would it have gone on forward? Maybe time only exists in a linear fashion because we’re watching it.

There are, fortuanatly, a lot of people here on planet earth and many of them are more obsessed with time than I am. Maybe that was my second to watch, to keep track of thing and keep them moving forward.

And if I can’t see the foward progression of time – like on a stopped timer on a microwave – what if I miss the next instant that I’m supposed to observe?

Would everything… stop?

It doesn’t keep me up at night – but it does give me pause. And whenever I see a stopped clock, I try to make it right. Just in case I need it…

back to work…

I recently walked past some construction and went to step over the Caution tape that had broken and was on the ground. The wind caught it and nearly got tangled up around my foot.

Then, I was in a restaurant and almost ran into a “caution: wet floor” sign.

And then, I almost slid on the partially melted salt that was supposed to protect me from the ice that had long since melted.

I’m totally going to be killed by my seat-belt before I can even get my car started some morning.

later…

I went to Eat and Park last evening for dinner – or rather, tried to. See, the new smoke free Ohio went into effect last night – prompting the short-term closure of the normally 24 hour restaurant. Eat and Park closed last night at 8:00 PM – and I had arrived at 8:06. They were closed in order to clean the smoking section of the restaurant – but why that necessitated closing the whole thing remains a mystery. Sandblasting of the walls? Sub-Sonic pulses to remove trace particles from the carpet? Concentrated mists of Lye in the air? I don’t know – and I ended up going to Steak and Shake since they have been smoke free for a while and weren’t affected by the change over.

Incidentally, the smokers in my building are already looking for loop-holes.

So, ultimately good – but also kinda stupid.

In the same catagory is the Loyalty Oath that’s come up recently. This essentially says that “I’m not a terrorist and I don’t help terrorists”. And you have to sign it before you can work here.

Which is great. I’d rather not work with terrorists – but it’s also worthless. Are they going to say, “Oh, sorry. I totally forgot I was a terrorist, I can’t sign this,”

Nope. They’re going to lie. I mean, if they really are a terrorist then a little lie on some paperwork is the least of their worries.

So, we get more paperwork, a little bit more fear that “they’re potentially everywhere” and then a little false sense of security that we’ve got some paperwork to protect us.

And on that note – I’ve got some forms to fill out. So, back to work…

I swam again today. Still only getting 1/8 of a mile, but I’m not as close to death as I had been – so, progress.

At the student union today I got sushi again, along with fried rice and some juice. It used to be that soy sauce was distributed in little packets – which were easy to stow in a pocket for transport. They’ve done away with those and switched to the following system:

An old-fashioned squeeze bottle (like for ketchup or mustard – except clear) filled with soy sauce, along with little plastic containers and appropriately sized lids.

You dispense sauce into said contain, acquire and affix the lid – and then hope to God that you’ve got the lid on there securely or you’ll be wearing the sauce in no time.

I managed, with some difficulty, to get back to my desk without spilling anything – but it was a windy and harrowing experience. I was annoyed by this.

And speaking of annoying – what is it with chicks and doors? I was entering a covered walkway and held the door for the woman behind me. She thanked me – then took off in a full-on powerwalking moded. And as such, she managed to get ahead of me – even with my height/long legs and impressive stride that I usually command. Still, I was only a little behind her when she exited the walk-way – and she let the door slam in my face with nary a backward glance.

grumble, grumble.

Well, that’s it for me now… time to get back to work…