Chapter 1282: Wherein Dee feels like crud

Yep.

I do.

I think I'll spare you the gory details, but the reason for yesterday's lack of post is that I got to work after spending all morning trying to get rid of a headache, and things just got bad from then on. Bad enough, in fact, that I had to get people to last-minute cover for BOTH of yesterday's programs.

I did at least do the set-up, so that takes a little bit of the edge off of the last minute guiltitis. I don't like having to ask people to cover my programs because I don't feeeeel well, you see. Makes me seem like a whiny five-year-old.

To me, at least. To my boss? Well, he more or less greeted me with why are you here? this morning.

Why am I here? I dunno. Guess I thought that trying to get a few things done while my head and stomach would allow it was better than feeling sorry for myself at home. Although if I were home I could be curled up under the blankets right now instead of wondering how long I can remain upright in the office...

Why am I here, exactly?

Ah well. I'm here, I'm apparently whiny, and since I don't really have the head for driving in to my father's place at the moment I imagine I'll be missing from Blogland this weekend. I know that my two fans will be terribly devastated to miss a couple of days of the I Don't Feel Well whinge.

If it's too devastating you can always check the archives. There's plenty of whinge to be had there.

You can also try poking the Ontario office with a stick to get a post or two out of her, I guess. I haven't had much success with that method lately, but maybe if you told her that I've done nothing but whinge all over the place she might at least drop by to try to clean up a bit.





Um, anyway. I think it's best that I stop typing pointless drivel now and get back to typing work drivel.

See you in a day or two.

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Edited because I just had to say that the Challenger Disaster is one of those where-were-you-then things for me, like the Kennedy assassination was for the generation before mine. I can vividly remember what I was doing when I heard (I had a spare first thing in the morning that day, so I was being a bit late with doing my hair. I had the launch on the television as I fiddled with the curling iron), I can still feel that disbelief followed by that kicked-in-the-gut sensation... and I'm in complete denial that it was twenty-five years ago today.

Things on my desk

The pointless photo is not of things on my desk.

I bet you had that one figured out, though.

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I've talked about the things on my desk here at work before, but it's been a while so I thought it might be an idea (not necessarily a good idea, but an idea nonetheless) to give you a bit of a more current list of the things you could possibly find on the desk of a working professional (makes me laugh a little to type that part) naturalist.

Ok? Here we go:

• Tissue. Pretty boring so far, right?
• A tape dispenser and a hand-held shredder. For all those top-secret nature documents, don't you know.
• A candy basket. Kind of a psychology experiment, that. I mix my candies because I like to see what sort attracts the most coworkers.
• A levitating pen.
• Three tubes of Power Pritt adhesive. Because you can never have too much adhesive.
• A miniature bean bag chair, which is currently holding a purple manipulative toy.
• Clacker balls. Not the on-a-string-takes-dexterity type, no. A noisemaker for preschoolers that looks disturbingly like some sort of sex toy.
• Silly Putty.
• My monitor lizard. It's a lizard-shaped bean bag that keeps my monitor from getting lonely. Its companion frog stays at home.
• A small wooden elephant that's missing a tusk.
• Computer monitor and speakers, obviously. I'm not doing this blog thing by telekinesis.
• An origami cat.
• Blue therapy putty.
• A deck of cards, featuring a cardinal. The bird, not the priest.
• Two post-it note pads, one of which can be played with like a Slinky.
• A resin model of a beaver.
• A lanyard with a broken clasp.
• A Galileo thermometer.
• Way too many free notepads from charities that my father donates to. Good on you for recycling, me.
• A list of the building's phone extensions.
• A phone and phone book. The phone book is mostly just to put the phone on. Can't remember the last time I used it.
• A coil-bound notebook that I write in starting from the back. Lefty, remember?
• A magazine file with phone lists, electronics warranty info, a giggle stick, and a foam disc shooter.
• Two small water pistols.
• A hiking pack.
• Blue fabric strips, laminated pond critter keys, and a net bag that all need to go out to the pond kiosk come spring.
• A very large kraft envelope with assorted done-for-work/done-at-work/work's-intellectual-property-so-don't-accidentally-take-home drawings that I've done over the years.
• A partial sheet of unglazed mosaic tile. It, um, works well for mineral streak testing.
• A magazine file with pamphlets and brochures from other sites.
• A build-a-spider model made out of day-glo posterboard.
• A tube containing an owl pellet poster that I should have taken to be laminated well over a year ago but somehow haven't managed to yet.
• A small stack of the current school programs brochures, event calendars, and newsletters.
• A set of test sheets for some posters I'm working on.
• A black and white photo of a burrowing owl given to me by a former coworker.
• Way too many reference books. Yes, some of still use books occasionally.
• A bag of percussion instruments, We'll maybe talk about those if I ever get around to the maraca discussion I mentioned yesterday.
• My travel mug and tea infuser.
• Messless fingerpaints.
• A stack of empty mineral collecting boxes.
• A loupe.
• A plastic cast of a bat skull.
• My business cards.
• A cat food tin that's been made over into a suet feeder. Yes, I'm serious.
• Assorted shells and fossil casts.
• Blue tack.
• A magnetic dart board.
• Sticker books.
• A typing stand. Weird, that one, because I have no idea where it came from. I use it, though.
• A box of Triops that we really should start one of these days. Office pets.
• A light for the Triops. If we ever do get them started.
• Work paperwork that's too boring or too specific (or both) to bother with detailing.
• A dead hummingbird in a box.
• A melodica.

 I guess that's about it at the moment. If it sounds really cluttered... well, it's a large, L-shaped desk so it's only actually partially cluttered. And if it sounds like there's a pretty high volume of toys for a work site? All I can say is that you've never worked at a nature centre. We get fidgety now and then.

At least, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Back to non-fidgeting for me, now.





Oh, and I apologise slightly for the lack of links above. Normally I like to illustrate the weirder things, and my two fans know, but I just don't have the time right now. Everything should be reasonably searchable if you're interested, though.

Although I do have to admit that I'd wonder why you were interested...

So, about this working at work thing...

Today's pointless photo? Well, it seems that my father's back alley is some sort of cat highway all of a sudden. I suppose it's better than having a rabid wolf highway, though.

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The problem with actually working at work is that when you take a break to blog you usually (ok, I usually. I don't know what you usually) don't really have a well-formed topic in mind to blather about.

Today, for instance, I've had fleeting thoughts about telling you why I was sorting my popcorn last night (yes, I even eat popcorn kernels in a certain order. It's fun being a habitual snack-food sorter, you know), wondering why I'm still allowed to use the paper guillotine even with my lefty-disaster track record, and talking about maracas.

Yes, maracas.

And no, I've never cut off any portion of my body OR my clothing with the paper guillotine. Just so we're clear there.

Anyway, it's obvious that absolutely none of the above adds up to a blog post. Well, the maracas might... but at this point I think that it might be easier just to save them for another day, really.

If you want some maracas in the meantime, though, you might try this.







Aaand I guess that's all I have. Back to work for me, then.

Pointless photo and that's all because it's too late in the day to actually post:

And yes, I know that it's not really late late, but once it's past a certain time of the day my brain just can't be bothered with blogging.

Late program tonight so I didn't come in to work until an hour or so ago, in case anyone was wondering.

Which you're probably not, but that's ok.



See you tomorrow, probably.

I think we have enough snow

Yep. The picture was taken yesterday. Very... winter-y, is all I can say. Ah well, at least the temperature's a lot more livable than it was for a while there. Gives a person hope that in a couple of months (yeahrightwhatever) all of that white stuff will be far, far away.

So. What should I be telling you today? Well, I spent a little while this morning playing with my Inktense pencils again. Just a flower doodle in the sketchbook, which I've posted on the other blog (but the scanner completely took the life out of so it won't give the idea at all. I'll probably just delete the off-looking thing). I'm still getting the hang of the permanence since I'm used to being able to re-wet watercolour pencil sketches to move the pigments around. Looks like once I get the differences (as in, these are ink pencils not watercolours, silly woman) through my skull the pencils should be a lot of fun to play with, though. It's nice that they can be worked over once they're dry, for sure.

And that, folks, is about all I've got.







Ok, yeah, the piano thing. I sat down at it for a little while last night. Still in good shape (and reasonable tune, considering that it's been about a year since it was serviced)... and it's still good to sit down at the piano for a little while.

Damn.

This whole giving-away idea would be easier if it hadn't felt good to play. Oh, I'm rusty as hell of course -- I wouldn't have wanted witnesses to my reaction to the surprise five-sharp key change that I forgot was in one of the songs I was faking my way through -- but after so many years of playing it can't help but come back to a person. There's definitely muscle memory involved.

There wasn't much singing last night since it was just after supper and my throat was completely cruddy, but I'm certainly game to have a go at the Mozart (or the Cole Porter, as the case may be) next week.



OF COURSE I AM. It's so typical. I'm thinking of getting rid of the piano, so OF COURSE the piano instantly becomes valuable again in my life. I really, really wish that I  that I wasn't so predictable.

So what am I going to do? Well, I think that when I go back to work I'll try putting out a request on Twitter and Facebook (erm... Wheat can do the Facebook part. I'm not on Facebook -- not even for work -- very much by preference) just to see how many other easily-accessible pianos there might be out there. No takers? Hey, have my piano. Otherwise... yeah, I'm thinking of hanging on to it for the time being.



I completely knew this would happen, you know.

And on that note, I think I'll go get some lunch. Or look at some of the Illustration Friday entries. Or keep singing along with the internet radio. Anything that doesn't involve thinking about a piano, at this point.

Pointless unhelpful thought of the moment:

I don't think I can give up my piano.

Pointless probably useless post of the day:

More quality photography from the DSi, if anyone was wondering.

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So, yeah. I'm not sure I have much of a blather today because I've let myself get annoyed by something and it's never all that great an idea for me to post when I'm annoyed. It always leads me to want to break the rules.

Oh, you didn't know that there were rules here? There are. My rules, so they could easily be changed if it came right down to it, but once I set a rule I don't like to mess with it.

The main rule here (besides the one that says if the blog ever comes to a point, it will turn into a pumpkin)? Thou shalt not delete posts.

That's right. If something gets posted here it doesn't get deleted unless the whole blog gets deleted. Oh, it can be edited... but only for grammar and spelling, not for content. The rule doesn't apply to the Ontario office on the rare occasion that she actually posts these days, of course. And it doesn't apply to the other blog. I can delete whatever I want from the other blog. In fact, the other blog had four years -- years -- of posts deleted when I decided to use it for arty things instead of general blather. I guess it shows that I'm not terribly attached to my internet past. It also shows that the no-delete rule has nothing to do with wanting to leave some weird cybermark for the world to see.

It's to keep me from second-guessing myself.

I'm the type of person that would delete over and over again if I had the chance, you see. I'd say things to get them off my chest, go back and read them later, and decide to put them in the bin. I'd probably also develop a habit of deleting posts because they weren't somehow flipping works of art, given the opportunity. Oh, this isn't good enough. Delete. Why was I talking about that trivial nonsense? Delete. Someone might be offended by that. Delete.

Ok, maybe not the last one. I couldn't really give a rat's bum about what people think about most of the stuff on the blog. Yeah, I keep my more blatant opinions to myself anyway so there's nothing here that's likely to cause a stir, but that's not by design. I just don't think that the internet needs to know what I think about everything.

I do think, however, that I should never post anything on topics that I'm going to be ashamed of posting later. That's another reason for the no-delete rule. There are a few of my two fans that I genuinely care about and that read the blog regularly, and if I find myself about to post something that I'd feel awful about them reading once I cool down a bit, I stop. The fact that anything I post here is not going to be deleted probably prevents me from becoming a giant internet douchebag.

I don't know if you've noticed, but the internet has a few of those already.

And I know that the last couple of paragraphs probably make me sound like I'm contradicting myself somewhat, but frankly? I'm doing fairly well at sounding reasonable for someone who's just spent a considerable amount of time taking various deities' names in vain.

And why? Oh, that's so none of your business. And it's pretty minor. When I said above that I'd let myself get annoyed, that was being honest. I let something get to me that really shouldn't have, and that sort of thing DEFINITELY isn't worth a blather.

Which isn't necessary now anyway. Funny how trying to type myself out of annoyance has more or less resulted in an accidental blog post.





Can I be done now?

I think so.

And it's my rules, after all.

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One more thing before I go, though. Regarding editing: Should I admit that I'm anal enough to correct things in posts that are YEARS old and will probably never be read by anyone besides Yours Blatheringly unless someone out there types in some pretty bizarre search terms and stumbles upon them by mistake?

Yep. I thought it was a bit much.

I do it all the same, though.

Welcome to my olf life.

Put another nickel in

It's been a music kind of day, I guess. My brain is currently playing HMS Pinafore (not as weird as it might sound when I tell you that I performed in not one but two youth theatre productions back in the day), and I'm thinking of giving away my piano.

I suppose that last needs a bit of explaining?

Well, I have a piano. That part is important, because otherwise the giving away bit wouldn't be that much of a deal. I have a piano that was bought for me when I was a child. I took a lot of years of both piano and voice lessons, and later on I spent ten years of my life teaching voice. All with the same piano. It's a good piano, and it's kept me musical company for longer than I'd care to admit. Ok, ok. Over thirty years.

The piano currently lives in my old bedroom at my father's place. I used the room as a studio when I was teaching, and now that I'm not teaching I just share the room with the piano when I'm there on the weekends. Just share, yes. I haven't played in a while. I'm not the greatest pianist to begin with, although I like to noodle on occasion, but the whole giving lessons thing put me off it. I'm like that. I get burned out on something, don't touch it for ages, and then come back to it at some point when it starts feeling like fun again.

And therein lies the problem with giving away the piano. At the moment I'm not using the piano. Well, I kind of use it as a table, more or less, but it's not making any music. It's sitting. There's somebody else who would be happy to have it, and if I look at things realistically that would have more than a few advantages for me. I'd know that my piano was being valued, I'd know that it was being used, and I'd know that I wouldn't have to try to find a place for it in the hopefully-far-away future when my father decides to give up his house.

I should say here for the benefit of one or two people that I mean the hopefully-far-away part. There's no sign of it happening anytime soon and it's not like I have to find something to do with the piano right away. That last fact sort of compounds my problem a little, but more on that in a second.

Right now it seems like a pretty good idea to give up the piano, but. But but but. But what happens when I'm back on the upswing and feel like getting back into music in a less casual fashion than I am now? I'm not saying that I'd give voice lessons again -- in fact, let's state outright that I WILL NOT GIVE VOICE LESSONS AGAIN -- but I may at some point be interested in getting the youth choir I had up and running once more. And even if I don't, I might just feel like playing. I have a cheap plastic keyboard at my apartment and I could easily play on that, but it's not ever going to be the same as my piano.

So it sounds like it would be a fairly stupid idea to give away the piano on a momentary whim, right?

Here's the thing, though.

The "person" who wants a piano isn't a person. It's a place.

A nature centre, in fact.

The nature centre where I work.

The nature centre that may possibly get a lot of use out of a piano during special events and things like that. Also, the nature centre where I would be welcome to visit my piano every single day. And if I was too nervous to play it when other people might hear (not out of the realm of possibility by a long shot. I hate playing when people are around. It makes me very nervous, and it was the hardest thing to get past when I was teaching) I could always come in after hours and do a bit of practicing.

Sigh.

None of this is really helping matters, you know.

Anyway, I'll be weighing the pros and cons over the weekend and we'll see what happens. If my past track record is any indication, I'll develop a complete piano obsession for a few weeks/months/possibly years and not be able to let it go, followed by a why in hell didn't you get rid of the thing when you could? moment of clarity &/or regret.

Yes, I'm that predictable.





Going now. Oh, and if anyone's confused by the post title, let's just say that my brain thrives on tangents...

Sorry. Just don't have time.

Here's a pointless photo at least, though.



Catch you later.

Nothing, really

Yep. I have nothing. Nothing really worth blathering about, that is.

Oh, I have things I could say. I could tell you that the weird patch of skin on my hand that's probably some form of eczema (I really should have it checked out at some point) is flaring up again so I went to bed with a huge bandage on it to keep myself from scratching in my sleep, but that doesn't seem all that interesting. Maybe it is to fans of dermatitis, if there are actually fans of dermatitis out there, but to me? I just wish I wasn't itchy.

I could, I suppose, tell you how frustrating it is to spend an hour of my life driving from pet store to pet store looking for crickets when I don't even like crickets. Unfortunately for me, the salamanders here do like crickets. Unfortunately for the salamanders, it was apparently Cricket-Free Day here in Alberta -- or at least my part of Alberta -- so they had to make do with some very small three-weekers until the stores get some new deliveries. At least the salamanders had a snack, though, which is more than I have with me for lunch.

And that is officially too much cricket talk. Especially since I am NOT having crickets for lunch.

Told you I had nothing.

But I have to admit that I did have a moment of amusement this morning when I opened up my e-mail and found several comments from people who apparently liked my chicken post for Illustration Friday. Just goes to show that you can never really guess what's going to strike a chord. Makes me think that I should be starting some sort of chicken-foot theme, really. It could be my next art project...





Or not. Later, all. I'll try to have actual blather tomorrow.

Knitted hat or something

Ok, I'm kind of in the middle of a work thing so this'll be short. I hope.

Why is it that of all the English-speaking countries that suffer through an extended winter, Canada seems to be (and note that I say SEEMS to be. If I'm wrong, tell me. I like learning new things) the only one that has a single word for knit hat/knit cap/ski cap/snow hat/whatever else? I mean, sure. We borrowed the word toque from French, where it signifies something a bit different, but that part doesn't matter. It's the having a single word that does. When you live in a place where a toque is necessary so much of the time, why would you want to waste so many words naming it?

Oh, and please note that I'm aware of the fact that some areas use beanie when referring to a knit cap. I've never seen it used as universally as toque is in Canada, though, so I'm not sure if it really changes my initial assertion.

Um, so there. I guess.

I need to get back to work now.





Bye then.

Um, dog?

No, not the pointless photo. It's not a dog. It's an iris. I wasn't in the mood for a snow picture today, really.

I'm at a bit of a loss as to blather today, I'm afraid. Normally this is where I'd be spouting off about my favourite drunken awards show, aka the Golden Globes, but honestly? Sooo boring last night, which was very disappointing. It wasn't nearly as loose as it generally is, and if it wasn't for Paul Giamatti I think I would have counted the entire evening as a complete loss. Well, Paul Giamatti and a couple or three other things, I guess.

Thing Number One: Bow Ties. My two fans know exactly how I feel about long ties being worn with evening dress so I won't go into that again. Suffice to say, I keep a tally of the men at awards shows who are smart enough to know that tuxes need bow ties or they're nothing but shiny suits. Last night? Bow ties won. Good for you, boys. Now if we could only convince Robert Downey Jr to at least take the time to choose a nicer-looking suit if he's not willing to go all-out formal.

Thing Number Two: Helena Bonham Carter. Yes, she dresses like she's completely out of her tree. Yay her. Things would have been even more boringer than boring without HBC wearing a partial tutu and two different-coloured shoes.

Thing Number Three, which is actually more about today than last night: Best/Worst Dressed lists. I look forward to these after every awards show because it's absolutely guaranteed that one "expert" will choose a best-dressed that another "expert" will completely pan. Last night? No exception. This makes me happy.

Note how Ricky Gervais isn't on my list of things? Yep. No doubt there are going to be some totally p.o'd people writing about his shtick today, and probably a fair number of defenders. Me? I just think he took the easy route. He's a clever enough fellow; he might have even been entertaining if he'd put a bit of effort in.

Ok, there's the Globes done. What else, then? Oh, I suppose I could explain the post title since I'm too lazy to go back and change it now (and that, boys and girls, is well and truly lazy). We had a visiting dog at the office today. Not terribly unusual -- dogs aren't allowed in the Sanctuary but they're more or less fine in the building. Several staff members bring their dogs in occasionally if they aren't going to be able to let them out during the day. Dogs aren't a problem here, is what I'm saying.

Except...

Today's dog was large, excited to be visiting a new place, and had a very big voice. I'm generally pretty good at ignoring that sort of thing, but there were a few people around here who were definitely getting unusually annoyed. Even I'm happy for the silence now, I have to admit.

Hmmm.

That wasn't much of a story, was it?





Guess that's probably my cue to stop typing and get back to work.

You know...

Or maybe you don't know, I dunno know. And yes, today's photo is completely pointless. I told you that I take pictures of stupid things with the Dsi. Consider it another self-portrait if you want to, I guess, since it is a pointless photo of myself...

Um. I think I need to start this again.

Ok, what I was going to say is you know, when I've been weather-housebound for a few days I juuust don't have that much to blather about. And I have, as promised, been stuck in the apartment. I've actually got a bit of work done while I was there (which is unusual), but being in my own company for a while still doesn't give me a whole heckuva lot to put in a blog post.

I'm not in my own company today, though. Even though it's still colder than a witch's whatsit I've been out and about. Yay me, I guess.

I figured that I may as well be out and about, since I had to move the car anyway. You see, the company that manages my apartment building (and boy, do I have a few interesting words about them. It's not very interesting out of context, however, so I'll avoid the temptation) has -- SHOCK! AMAZEMENT! -- actually arranged to have the parking lots cleared of snow today. This is a rare, rare thing. We're lucky to get one clearing a season, but I guess that even they couldn't ignore the damned near half a metre of snow we've had this week that's making the act of parking a very dodgy thing. We got the notice a couple of days ago that our cars had to be moved between 9 AM and 5 PM today, so since parking on the snow-covered street is almost as dodgy as parking in the lot I thought that I may as well spend at least a little of that no-parking time here at work since I haven't been in for a few days.

And here I am. Yes, I was a dutiful tenant and dug my car out of its current snowdrift at nine this morning when it was still damned near -25C and I knew I'd be suffering for it later (which I did, but at least there was very little wind so the reaction wasn't too terribly bad. I'm pretty good at bundling up when I have to, as you can imagine). I didn't want to take the slightest chance that these morons could find an excuse to not clear my part of the parking lot, you see. Yes, it's that important to me. And yes, lot clearing really is that rare of a thing at my building.

I also don't want a repeat of the snow fence.

Last year, you see, they decided to do a surprise clearing after a particularly notable storm. It must have been a spur-of-the-moment decision, because they didn't send out the usual YOU MUST MOVE YOUR CAR OR BE TAGGED AND TOWED notice that they generally do (and I'd gladly pay you a hundred dollars if you could prove to me that they've ever towed anyone at my building. Even when cars have obviously been left for dead they never get towed). As a result, I didn't realise that they'd done the lot until I went to drive somewhere and found out that they had cleared around my car and left it in a pretty sizable fence of ploughed snow (and I wasn't the only one to suffer that particular fate, in case you wondered). I should make it clear at this point that as I live in an apartment building I do not own a snow shovel.

It was a very interesting thing to try to clear that packed-in mess with Dirty Moe's snow brush, I can tell you.

Anyway.

The car's been moved, I made it into work, I've got a couple of things done that I might not have otherwise, and they say that next week's supposed to be warmer so I may even be around blogland a little more often. These all seem to count as good things, so I suppose it's just as well that I was forced to leave my hidey-hole. Now if I could only figure out what to do with this week's Illustration Friday word.





Chicken? Seriously? Some weeks I really just don't get it...

Pointless photo of the day:

This is how Max and I play with the DSi.

He's not terribly convenient, Max.







Ok, I think that'll be it for the words today. To be honest, I have a bit of a headache just from going out to plug in the car and sweep some of the snow off of it (this is after my father had already swept snow off it when he was shovelling, so it wasn't a huge pile I was dealing with). It's awfully cold out there, folks, and that never really helps my spirits much.

Going to try to hit the road later today, which means I may or may not have access to a computer in the next while. See you when I see you.

Have I been wordy enough?

Old photo, by the way. If I took the same shot now it'd be nothing but a snow bank.

So, have I been wordy enough the past couple of days? I certainly hope so, because I need to get to work.

I know that the last phrase isn't exactly unusual here on the blog, but where I'm working today is. I haven't yet managed to make it back into town since the storm, so I'm going to attempt to do some work at my father's place.

It ought to be interesting.

I occasionally try to work at my apartment, but it's never all that successful. Oh sure, I'll get a few things done, but never nearly as much as I really should when I'm away from the distractions of the office. The problem, as you may have guessed, is that I'm not away from the distractions of my apartment. There are too many other things I like to do there, and it makes it hard to be disciplined.

Hard for me, anyway. I know some of you out there have absolutely no problem with the whole thing, but just remember that I'm a five-year-old with a short attention span.

Ah well. Here's hoping for better luck down here in the basement, where the only things to distract me are the computer (which I need for the work anyway) and the fish.

Personally, I don't think the fish will be that much of a problem.



Later, all. Oh, and it's cold out there, so that means that even when I do eventually get myself back to the city (tomorrow, I hope) I may not be out too much. Not out too much equals no computer equals no blogging, as my two fans know.






Seems to be becoming a theme here.

Weird things I do sometimes

I admit it -- there are definitely weird things that I do. Everybody does weird things, of course. Might not seem weird to the person doing them, but they'd appear weird to just about anyone else. Me? I'm proud of my weird things, for the most part. They make me less boring to myself.

To myself, yes. I'm honestly not overly concerned about whether they make me less boring to anyone else.

Now, some of my weird things are decidedly -- if mildly -- OCD. Making sure my towels are used in the proper rotation, for example. I know it doesn't have to happen and I don't freak out if it doesn't, but I'm happier if it does. My fondness for pattern also probably fits into that category. Pattern gives the OLF brain that aha! moment that keeps it interested and gets around the short attention span for a little while.

The particular weirdness I'm going to warn you about today, though, has to do with the pointless photography.

My two fans already know that I consider pretty much all of the photos that appear on the blog to be disposable. And really, they are. You're not going to find much here that you're going to want to download and hang on your wall. And if you do? Well, let's just say that if I was concerned about the use of my photography I wouldn't be putting it on the internet. Or at the very least I'd be watermarking it. I spend a lot of time trying to make my autofocus camera take pictures of things that its sensor thinks it can't see, yes, but a great deal of that is the challenge of trying to get an intelligible photo in a situation where I really shouldn't be able to. Results are nice, but not always necessary.

Plus, I like taking pictures of spiders. That's, um, another topic for another day, however.

Would I like a fancy SLR camera that I could do more with? Some days, yes. But even if I had one I'd probably still find myself out in the garden trying out "artistic" (read: odd) angles with my trusty Lumix. Which, by the way, is a pretty good little camera considering the number of years it's been on the go now.

So having said that the quality or expense of the equipment probably wouldn't affect the weirdness of the photos you find here on the blog, let me explain today's shot (which, incidentally, is the closest I've ever come to a self-portrait in a post. That's me all right. And probably the most of me you'll ever get). I have a DSi. That's right -- I'm one of those people completely outside the demographic that Nintendo targeted very successfully, and I have a handheld gaming system. It was a gift, but it wasn't an unwanted gift. I like my DSi. I can do fun things with it.

Including taking fairly pointless photos.

Like the one above.

It has two cameras, you see. They're... well, I suppose they're comparable to low-end phone cameras. It's possible to take a recognisable picture with the DSi, yes, but I don't think you'd ever want to use DSi photos for anything more than, say, a wallpaper on the aforementioned DSi. Not super quality, in other words.

Which, naturally, has led me to start messing around with them. Taking pictures in low light levels (yes, like the one above. I think I took it by television light if I'm remembering properly). Using the impossible-for-lefties LED flash kit that I picked up for it at a liquidators a while back. Messing with the goofy filter software that's included with the thing. These are photos in the upper echelon of pointlessness, and they were never intended to be anywhere that anyone else would see them.

I uploaded them to my nerdstick on a whim this morning.

Yep.

Photography on this blog may just be getting a lot weirder.

Maybe.

Or you may just see multiple pictures of Max the cat, who sometimes "helps" when I'm playing games. We'll see what mood I'm in.

Don't worry, though. I'm not about to abandon my usual pointless photography routine in favour of taking cheesy pictures of the cat with my toy. I just thought I'd let you know that the cheesier of the photos that may appear now and then in the future are absolutely intended to be as cheesy as possible.

Mmm. Cheese.





I think I need to go have lunch now.

Bah

This is my car. When I went to bed last night, I could still see the entire car.

I can't anymore.

You can't tell from the photo (which, by the way, was taken only a few minutes ago), but the snow's still falling. Pretty, huh.

Yeah, whatever.

What you don't see is the forecast, which is telling me that this afternoon the winds are going to pick up and we'll have near-zero visibility and windchills somewhere around -25C. You also don't see that this storm started when it was still reasonably warm, so there's a layer of ice under everything.

WONderful.

*Insert expletive here* do I hate winter.

But Dee, you say, you live in Canada. It's winter all the time there. How can you hate winter when you've grown up with things that way?. Well, first of all, it's not winter all the time here, and at least where I live winter doesn't often look like this. It can be pretty cold, yes, but unlike Canadians to the east of us we don't often have to put up with cold and a pile of snow at the same time.

Um... sheesh. And just when I was working myself up to a good ol' snit, computer hang-up. Well, let's see if we can pick things up now that I've rebooted (and thank Whomever for autosave since I didn't completely have to start from scratch).

Where was I? Oh yeah. Hating winter.

For me, lots of snow has the same inconveniences as for everyone else with one glaring addition. I am, honestly and truly, allergic to the cold. For those new to the program, yes it's really possible to be allergic to the cold (it's called cold-induced urticaria, if you want to look it up. I'm not in linky mood today). There's a whole group of physical sensitivities like that: there are people who get hives from contact with cold, with heat (and I'm not talking heat rash here -- I mean really being allergic to the heat)... even from contact with water.

Yes, it's all pretty weird. But the human body's a complicated thing, and sometimes it gets set off by the unexpected.

Anyway, what this all means in regards to today's photo is that some may look at it and say "ahhh. Pretty." Some might wonder what the skiing's like. Some might be more pessimistic and figure that the roads are going to be crap. Me? I know (know, yes. Doesn't matter how many layers I wear; there has to be exposed skin somewhere, and that's enough to start things) that I'll have a reaction while I'm clearing off the car. If I'm lucky I'll just be itchy and swollen. If I'm not lucky it'll be worse and there'll be so much swelling that my blood pressure will go down. I have to admit that I've been very lucky in that I've never had a severe enough reaction to have it be life-threatening, but I do have bad enough reactions to feel like hell for hours afterwards.

What a stupid, stupid allergy to have in this country.

Ah well. What can a person do besides cope or move to Belize?







And if any of my two fans would like to contribute to my Belize fund...

----------

On a related note, and I'm asking this out of pure curiosity, for those of you who don't swell up like a balloon, what does a cold day feel like? Is it exhilarating? There must be a reason that people like to be out for winter sports, right? Is it painful? I really, honestly don't know. I mean, there was a time in my life when I could be out in the cold like a normal person (I didn't start reacting until I was nearly ten, and I'll have to blather out that story sometime), but it was long enough ago now that I really can't remember what it's like to just be cold without having to worry about the rest of the baggage I carry.

Oh, and for those of you in Europe who aren't used to the type of winter from hell that you've been blessed with this year, my sympathies. Really.

Winter sucks.

I'm not good at this

Blogging after a certain time of day, I mean. It's like my brain's decided that there's a certain window of time for pointlessness, and once we're past that it's back to being all serious, all the time.

Is anybody buying that last bit? If so, I have a few square kilometres of tundra I could sell you that would be perfect for your pet caribou. What's that? Well of course I could sell you the caribou as well...

Um. Sorry. Sometimes you have to let the voices come out and play, you know.

I was serious about blogging in the evening being a problem, however.

So.

I did say I'd try to post later, though, didn't I?

Silly of me to say that. Ok, here goes...







Geez. This is like the other day when I was trying so hard to... oh. Right. I wasn't going to talk about all of that stuff. Trust me, you'd thank me if you knew.

Well, then...



Oh, wait. I've got something. It's a brief something, but it'll do. I sort of lucked out at the gas pump accidentally the other day. I went to my usual full serve place (yes, full serve. I do full serve. And why? Wheat's wife says that pumping gas is a boy job (relax -- she's mostly kidding, I think) but in my case I'm kind of afraid of spilling gas on myself and having to smell like that for the rest of the day) which is usually the first one to put its prices up, sighed at the ridiculous amount I was about to pay for something I don't really even want anyway, drove off (well, paid first) and on my way to work found out that they were four cents a litre cheaper than the other stations I passed.

Four cents cheaper. At a full serve. Seriously.

And how sad is it that we live in a world where I found myself actually smiling about paying for gas?

I wish I never had to pay for gas.

Honestly? I wish I didn't have to own a car. I'm not a bad driver, but that doesn't mean I want to drive. Not much choice anymore, though. Inter-city public transportation sucks in this province, and in-city? Not much better where I live. For me, anyway. I could catch busses just fine not too far from my apartment, but there's nothing to catch that goes anywhere closer than about a twenty-minute walk to my workplace.

Bike, you say?

Have you met my knees?

Dirty Moe it is, then.





For those new to the program, Dirty Moe is my car. Long story.

Ah well. At least I saved myself four cents a litre on the great unwanted this time. And I came up with a blog post. It's an... odd post. Yep.







Guess it'll fit right in.

Slight post of the moment:

Didn't want my two fans to think I'd disappeared again (or missed the hospital SO MUCH that I decided to pay it a visit). I've just been busy actually working at work.

I'll try for a real post later tonight.

So hey

Hi. How's everyone doing? Oh, that's good.

Me?

Well, it's been an interesting few days. There was this whole thing with the hospital, and now I look like a heroin addict.

Why was I in the hospital, you say?

Well, to be honest I'm not going to tell you. I thought about telling you and there would be plenty to whinge about (and my two fans know how much I like a good whinge) but in the end, no. I don't want the blog to go all medical.

If it did, it wouldn't be pointless.

And then, as we all know, it would turn into a pumpkin.

So there you go. I had a bit of a scare but I'm fine (or will be in a day or two), and that's all you need to know. And as for the rest of this post... there isn't any rest. I need to get back to work, because I've been gone a while.

So... yeah.

I'd say see you tomorrow, but the way my week's gone that sounds like too much of a promise. How about if I just say see you a little more frequently than I have in recent history?

Ok then.