Some sunlight through the beveled glass of the empty china cabinet. ...and a not quite random bit of cat fur.

Ya' wanna' know one of those 'people things' that chafes my hide? I didn't think you did...

But just so I can get it out there: outfits whose design people come up with wonderful boxes with cut out 'handles' in the sides. ...and whose packaging people carefully tape over those handles when they seal the boxes for shipping.

Arrrgghh...

Onesome. Lions! Can a lion tame its mane? What about you? Tell us your worst hair memory... Of the many hats I've work at work, being the plant manager was certainly one of the most interesting. Early one very rainy morning, I came to work to find water leaking into an upstairs office. I got my rain gear on and headed on up to the roof to deal with it. After I got the blocked drain cleared, I came back inside somewhat worse for wear. ...to be greeted by one of the admin types with, "My gosh! ...and I thought I had bad hair days". Thirty minutes in a downpour will do that to you <g>.

Twosome. Tigers! Can a tiger change its stripes? Can people really change? Yepper! Most definitely. We are a work in progress. Stories abound! (...but not this morning <g>.)

Threesome. Bears! Who's a grumpy bear? 'Fess up - what makes you grumpy? People. Sometimes they just yank my chain. ...and since I don't live on an island, it's often a daily thing. Why? Petty stuff mostly. ...and failure to apply thinking to a problem. ...and failure to plan. ...and--nope, gotta' stop: gettin' grumpy.

Which yellow brick road are you on today?

Maybe a little dualist action as I wind the day down...

I was doing the Costco gig; and while I was talking to the checker about the new building we're putting up in the downtown area, I realized that I started my twenty-fifth year with this outfit today... Man, that's like forever in dog years, Internet years and just about anything contemporary.

...and then, there's the thought that I've only ever worked in one type of job since 1969: the emergency services.

When I started with these guys, I was the thirteenth employee hired. ...and part time at that. I'd been with the fire service, first as an engineer and later as a medic (1975), and I was just looking to supplement my call volume. I mean, fifteen calls or so on a seventy-two hour shift was okay, but I'm one of those who craved the calls and I could easily add on that many in a single twenty-four hour shift with the ambulance.

...and I remember they hired me and gave me an orientation that day. ...and invited me to the company party that night as they'd just been in business for a year and a month (they'd split off from the 'big dogs' in town because they thought they could do the job better; they must have been correct, because in 1984 we bought out the assets of the old firm). At the party, I won a raffle prize; and I received a lot of good-natured ribbing about how I hadn't worked a day for the firm and I was already cashing in <g>.

Six months later, I was looking at a transfer to a fire station that would be lucky to run fifteen calls in a month. Decision time: pull off of being a medic and go back to the westlands to my fire engine and the scorpions and tarantulas (actually, rather attractive) or keep my medic license and go private sector... One or two of you out there might know how easy the decision was to make...

I left the field from a regularly-scheduled shift in 1990 when Shelley and I got married. Something about having kids and working the streets didn't compute well in the hind brain. My final recertification was in 1992; and in 1994 we retired County Paramedic Certification A-003.

...and this year would also seem to mark the end of nearly twenty years of teaching EMT courses: the college hasn't called and I haven't missed it. Much...

Still, before I left this morning, I was talking about the old days in one of our rural contracts with a medic I trained way back when (she's a nurse now, a single mom who has raised four kids and put herself through school on her own. ...and still prefers the streets). ...and that brought back some serious memories.

...of a time well remembered.

Just something for my favorite per diem stalker...

I just walked out in the living room to supervise (after a 'tag' from Shelley) to find Brad crouched behind a recliner with a die in his hand.

Monoply Junior, 2002...

A quick bit of information on the Klez worm and how it may affect you:

The worm is known to use addresses pulled from the address book (and other files on the infected machine) as the "From:" address; this essentially allows it to 'spoof' addresses:

NAI's Information
Symantec's Information

The result is infected emails from accounts you may or may not recognize, as well as from dormant, bad or old email accounts still available from someone's address book or perhaps even from their Internet cache files (anecdotal but strong evidence).

In the case from last weekend, bounces (due to a virus) to a web developer's account tracked to a dialup account in the United Kingdom. The machine there apparently was infected and was sending out emails with the developer's address as the "From:". Those emails hit the sender's ISP and were bounced due to the attached virus. ...and those bounces were sent to the developers address, causing some concern.

Viewing the 'Full Headers' for the email may allow you to backtrack the source if you are of a mind to notify them...

Inspired by Sheila's Faces in Stone, I going to see where I can go with Places in Stone. I found these two scenes recently:

I went blading yesterday, even though I was really way too tired to go out. The week had pretty much done me in. ...and what the work week and the jumbled mess of family stuff didn't knock out of me, the seasonal allergies did. So by the time the evening came around, I was about done with things in general. But, since I'm this overweight guy in his early fifties who works in a sedentary job and doesn't get out like he used to...

So I went for it. ...and ya' know why? 'Cause I can do it at whatever pace I choose. ...and that's why I blade (and practice yoga) instead of the gym thing. There's no way I can hit a gym with any regularity.

I switched over to blades from four wheel skates six or seven years back as a test. I liked setting my own exercise times, but I wasn't able to get the distance I wanted in with the older skates. I tried a bargain pair of blades to test my balance and basic 'fall factor' and discovered I could survive reasonably well. As I learned more and discovered which wheels and which bearings worked best for me, my ability to set my cardiac rate improved. ...and as I changed shells out, I gradually found one or two brands that had the best geometry for my style.

So Saturday when I was pretty much done in, I was still able to get out. ...and while I didn't expect to have one of those Zen skates I like so much, I was able to get rolling at my 'slow but steady' pace and just enjoy the scenery. Usually when I'm tired, I have to remember to skate on nothing but style and let my body handle the speed. Style for me means making sure I keep my body mechanics as clean as I can make them so I don't injure myself. Most days that's automatic; tired days, it's not.

But the usual occurred as I rolled though the neighborhoods I frequent: as I concentrated on the feel of the blades against the street and keeping the workload balanced between each side of my body, I found myself changing my pace. As my body worked into the groove of things, it automatically increased the workload to a comfortable level. ...and what started out to be a run on the short route turned into a normal distance run, although at what I figured would be a much slower pace.

Heh. When I came back around the last corner and checked my time, I was only about two minutes slower than my usual. ...and my heart rate had moved up into my target range for all but about those two minutes.

...and I'd been smiling the last few blocks.

I did manage to archive; that should help the dial-up crowd a bit. ...especially as I may photo blog this week if things stay as hectic as they've been.

Back in a bit...