Tolkien is doing much better. The morphine may not have done anything for him, but the other pain killers allowed him to settle down. Between eight and eight thirty he fell asleep on his bed while I punched away at the computer, writing my paper. I could tell he was asleep by the loud snoring that shook the room.

Annie called last night as well. She talked to me for about two minutes before she started chucking (hopefully in a toilet). She told me about her day along the way, and I strangely longed for her to come home so I could take care of her.

Tolkien woke me up around eleven when he got off his bed. I was sleeping under the Harley blanket next to his bed to keep him happy. I'm a putz. Well, it was then that I realized the power had gone out. He went out and decided to stay out for a while. I woke up several times to see if he wanted back in, and have no idea what time it was when he came back in. He settled back into his bed, and I went back to sleep on the floor. I was surprised that I wasn't uncomfortable. At almost exactly six this morning the power came back on. It was almost like it was planned... Anyway, Tolkien has stopped whining and yelping when he moves, although he still has difficulty walking. He's doing well, though, and I think he is enjoying the increased attention. He's drinking some water, but he won't eat.

I got a call this morning about Annie's breakfast. Apparently, Annie is terribly fond of the way I make oatmeal. She made it through the whole day without vomiting, and Tolkien has been pleasantly lounging around. In fact he is so comfortable that he has begun itching, again. We have to get a handle on that...

Annie is wandering around holding a bucket, but she seems ok. I'm not sure that she is not working the sick thing with me, but that thinking has led resulted in vomit on the bed before. I don't think she will be able to go to school tomorrow... Then there is the fact that I'm getting a bit of an upset stomach myself. Hopefully, it's just all this talk of vomiting...

Pulling everything together...

I believe I now live in California. You know, the Golden State, Land of Sun and Surf... So why have I had a fire going not stop in the fireplace for four days? Each morning I stir the coals, add a few sticks, and try desparately to get some heat in the house. The fireplace isn't the best in the west, and coupled with bad windows in the living room, I can barely get the room warm, let alone the rest of the house. The furnace kicks on all the time, and it sounds like a cash register. I dread my next propane bill. I haven't been this cold for this long since I left Missouri.

It is not uncommon in the winter to see frozen puddles in the valley, but we haven't had it get that cold at our house since we moved here. Yesterday morning, Tolkien's water bucket was frozen over. Not just a little bit, it was pretty thick. I don't think the chunks of ice every completely melted during the day. It's been gorgeous outside, though. Sun and blue skies, it's just been freakin' cold.

Meanwhile, the room continues. I had stretched muscles that had long been dormant last weekend when I put the backerboard down. Unfortunately, I did some more reading on the backerboard (beauty and curse of the internet), and discovered some steps that I didn't take. My first thought, was tough, it will work. As the week wore on, I decided I would not be happy if I didn't fix it, so Friday night and yesterday I took it all back out, and started putting it in right. My muscles are really not feeling like forgiving me.

I did get a little ticked last night. You may have heard me cursing from wherever you are. I was taking a break, and admiring the walls when I noticed a stress fracture in the drywall around the bathroom door. I guess my plastering days aren't over after all. It will have to wait, though.

One step forward, two steps back, and then trip and fall backwards...

Last night I gave a lecture to the Santa Clara Valley chapter of the IEEE EMC Society. After working all day, I really wasn't in the mood for it. I kept wishing for some horrible health issue that would relieve me of my obligation. Of course, no such issue arose, and I drove over the mountains. I parked and walked to the meeting place. I went in and made a pitstop at the restroom. I then began psyching myself out. That is often necessary when I do these things. Everyone mingled, ate, had a few beers (except me), and generally had a good time. Finally, it was my time to talk. There were about sixty people there, and I was ready. When I present, I look like a mixture of fire-and-brimstone preacher, self-help guru, and stand-up comedian all while staying grounded in the relevant physics.

I got home after nine last night. I had already made arrangements for Annie to stay at a friend's, because I wasn't sure when I was going to get home. Unfortunately, I was completely wired from being "on" for so long. It was 1:30 in the morning before I finally fell asleep. I'm running a little slow today. At any rate, I took the time to go through my evaluations, and was very pleased with the comments that were written. Not everyone makes comments, but I like it when they do. Here are several:

Great combination of very complicated subjects and simple examples.

Excellent speaker and topic.

David is the kind of speaker who fills meetings - we need more like him.

The speaker is very knowledgeable in the topic and able to present in a very interesting manner. The audience is very attracted and paying attention during the presentation.

In my simple life, these kinds of comments make me keep going... It really is nice to be appreciated every now and then! Heck, I even got a consulting job offer!



Feeling pretty good professionally... at least outside work...

I just finished putting up the last of the ceiling trim. This was probably the most difficult piece. It was about twelve feet long, and went flush to the ceiling. While Annie was still here, I cut some smaller pieces to determine the angles. Yeah, that's necessary. No two angles in the freakin' room were the same. After determining the angles, I measured the distance, and added a quarter of an inch to play with. Here came the hard part. I put the ladder at one side, and the step stool at the other. I had Annie climb the ladder and hold the piece to the ceiling while I held the other side to determine length. She was nervous with the height, and after five cuts to get it to what I hoped was right, I simply decided I'd make it work no matter what. It was raining, and every time I went to the garage for a cut, I was worried that I was damaging the wood. I didn't even check the last cut.

I stained it, and applied the finish in hopes that she would still be here when I was ready to nail it to the ceiling. Unfortunately, that didn't work. I had fifteen minutes to go on the last coat of finish when she was picked up to go to Mommy's. I finished work for the day, and went at it. I put the ladder as far as I could, and balanced the trim on it. I put the glue on the ceiling, and pushed up my side of the trim. I shifted it around until the fit was right, and slammed a nail into it. I moved down and measured the distance and punched another nail in. I moved to the end. At this point, the second nail came out. I'd gone too far for the weight of the trim. Fine. I went to the end of the twelve foot piece, and fit it in place. I pulled, I shifted, and then I nailed. I quickly went down the line and placed a few more nails. It was what it was. By some strange miracle, it came out perfectly. Both sides mated beautifully to the adjacent trim, and the other required spacing was consistent. It was amazing, given that the piece seemed a little warped to begin with. I guess it was warped in sync with the ceiling! I couldn't believe it. It had to be the energy that Annie put in to holding it to the ceiling. Egyptian pyramid builders couldn't have been more pleased with how the pieces mated together. I think I owe it all to Annie, and her help and patience.

No, still no pictures...

So close to having a real room...

Lord, I wish this post were about Annie... Before I picked up Annie today, I hit Home Depot and got fuel for Stitch. I had intended to get groceries as well, but the store folks I had to deal with were high on the idiot scale, and it took me longer than it should have. So, Annie and I went to the grocery store and two more hardware stores before I found what I wanted. She fell asleep before we hit the store where we bought moulding/casing, but was good about getting up and going in to pick out what we were going to use on my room. She picked the trim for the ceiling. No, I am not doing crown moulding. There are too many angles and changes. We chose a casing that I think will look just fine. If you don't like it, don't look at it.

Well, when I ordered the casing, I specified the lengths of the boards. Unfortunately, the company was not permitted to sell me lengths shorter than sixteen feet if they had sixteen footers in stock. As a result, I brought home a butt load of sixteen foot stock. I had two cuts that were very long, and was worried that I'd not get them right if I had to balance them by myself. I called on my little helper, and she did a great job of balancing the casing while I cut it. She carried one into the house, and I carried the other. After that, she went back to playing, and I decided to try to make the remaining cuts by myself. I placed the ends on the saw, and stuck out a foot. I balanced on one foot, and lifted the wood with the other in a sort of a pirouette. I clamped my left hand onto the saw, and made the cuts with the other. I'm sure it was comical to watch, but I think the end result was pretty good. We'll find out tomorrow.

Suddenly have a strange need to watch the Nutcracker...

I truly hope that everyone had a wonderful Christmas filled with laughter and excitement. Annie and I definitely did. It was exciting, and yet peaceful. I think Lilo demonstrated this adequately as he lounged under the chair that had the previous night been attended by Santa. Santa snacked on some cottage cheese and a glass of Coke before taking a bowl of carrots and apple snacks (created for horses) to the reindeer. Santa was grateful, and left a long letter to Annie, on which Lilo rested his paw during the Great Opening of Presents.




Well, to the point of this post: It's very strange how the world works. We weave threads in our lives that involve other people, and frankly most of those threads become disconnected after a change in life or time. I've lost track and connection with many friends. I suppose that a lot of those friendships were made simply because of the circumstance. I don't hear from anyone with whom I was in Germany, and I've tried with a few. I have one, maybe two, friends from high school that communicate with me. I have one from college with whom I regularly communicate. My work friendships come and go. I have a few that I hope will withstand the inevitable changes in responsibility or employment. But the threads that create these relationships are unpredictable, and amazing.

Intending no desrespect to any of my friends, this post is about my friends Eric and Jenni. I don't consider them College friends, because they had already graduated and started working when I met them. Of all things, we were in dog school together. This is where dog slaves learn how to communicate better with their dog owners. This particular class was horrible. It had been raining, and the track where we were training (dogs or owners, I don't know) was a mess. I know I've written about this before, but it is just so freakin' funny, I have to tell it again...

If our dogs had to go to the bathroom, we were supposed to go off track, let them go, and then clean it up. Ok. No problem. Well, except that my very large Great Dane was very nervous and simply went into form while walking around the track. He was in complete squat with his ears down in embarrassment, and due to his nervous state, it was... um... not terribly solid. I didn't get him off the track, and in my concern, I didn't pay attention to who was behind us. I went to get paper towels to clean up the mess... there were three paper towels on the roll. That wasn't enough to wipe Soren's freakin' butt. I did the best I could, and finished out the class, thinking that I was never going to come back. Unfortunately, I'm crap about giving up. So Soren completed the course and got his Canine Good Citizen certificate.

At any rate, after class, with steam coming out of my ears, I took Soren to the little S-10 pickup for the ride home, and this lady walked up. She said how beautiful she thought Soren was, and wanted to know if she could pet him. Not paying attention, I said sure. Soren, who was an immediate good judge of character in his younger years, liked her instantly (he really didn't like my first wife). In the mean time, her husband comes up with their Black Laborador. He had the same look on his face that I had. This sucked. Of course, his look was partly because he was behind us in line and Soren almost crapped on their dog.

Despite my curse of memory, I don't know how it happened. Somehow, we started talking to each other. We had tremendous conversations, shared a few beers, and became friends. There are many great stories related to this, but in a futile attempt at brevity, I'll skip a bit. We have talked all through the years. Yeah, we aren't that old, but I don't have many friends that I can say have kept constanct contact for this long. Quite frankly, I don't even have family that have done this. They were the only people that were able to make it to my second wedding from any distance. We all watched the horror of 9-11 on TV, and dealt with it together. They have watched me, and helped me through some of the most horrible times of my life. We have laughed and shed tears together. All of this started with a couple of dogs being in a training class...

We don't exchange gifts normally, and haven't for years, although they generally send something for Annie, and being a horrible person, I forget their son. Long ago, I worked to give them a gift that rates high on the most important, dedicate, and thoughtful gift I've ever given. To this day, it brings a smile to my face for it's beauty, and a pang in my heart for the loss it now represents. It had to do with our dogs; both of whom have moved on to rolling hills, peaceful rivers, and meaty bones plentiful whenever desired.

This year, I received a package from them that was for me. I read the note on it before I placed it under the tree, and was a bit concerned. I didn't want Annie to see me upset on Christmas, but I knew I would be. Annie played Santa Claus, and handed out the presents. She was very in tune with making sure that I opened one every now and then. She was concerned about the fact that I didn't have very many. I was fine, but liked that she wanted to make sure I was engaged with the opening of presents. She handed me this large present, and I took thirty seconds to prepare myself. The note on the present was to the point of, 'so you know that there are people in Missouri who miss you.' I opened the gift, and extracted what was inside. It was a lamp.

I have long felt a special affinity for the Great Blue Heron. I consider it my 'totem,' my animal sprit, my te mana, if I recall my Tahitian correctly. I don't take it religiously, but it means something to me. When I moved to California, I used to see one on the way to work every day. After a while, I stopped seeing it, and told my mother that it had moved on because it knew I was alright. I came in contact with a lady who was a psychologist about five years ago who told me I should "really look at why I felt the Heron was my totem." She was a quack, so I never did. At any rate, I do love the Great Blue Heron for many reasons that I won't get into here given that this is already terribly long.

I extracted the lamp to find a beautiful cut of a Great Blue Heron. Yes, they have long known about my affinity for the Heron. They didn't know I needed a lamp for the study. It has now taken its place in the study next to my monitor, amidst the pictures of Annie, and the dragon sculpture given to me by Big Annie. I only wish I still had the Heron sculpture given to me by my mom and dad.

Thank you. It's beautiful, and I can't tell you how much it means to me.



You never know where the threads will connect for life. A dog class, playing tennis, living across the hall from each other in college, being single parents with kids in the same class room, a business deal, meeting at a conference, working on a project together... I don't know. It's all fair game.

In awe of the random nature of life...

Well, it's been a bit difficult today. Annie has been very anxious for night to come. She was a bit pouty this morning, but has gotten much, much better. I finished boxing in the windows this morning, but the stain and finish didn't come out very well. I just put them in anyway. When I finished that, we started cleaning the house to make it ready for Santa. Annie started the laundry, and I started the dishwasher. Only to find that the dishwasher has decided to stop working. We have four loads of laundry set out on the floor, and I'd like to bathe Tolkien tonight. As I was walking past the water system outside, I heard it gurgling... an indication that that, too, is about to go out. There are other issues, which I don't feel comfortable sharing right now.

I know these are small things, but it was very frustrating. It has all come around, though. We have a fire in the fireplace, Annie has taken out the bowls, glass, and spoon for Santa tonight. We have pizza in the oven, and are getting ready to play checkers. To top it all off, as I walked in with my brow furrowed with a load of firewood, I heard the movie that Annie chose for us to watch while we played; The Sound of Music. I know. I'm wierd, but it's one of my favorite movies of all time.

Well, pizza is about done, and laundry needs to be switched. I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas. Enjoy the holidays, and love those with whom you are fortunate enough to spend them.

Update: While eating just now, I knocked out a tooth... Merry Christmas...

Update #2: While bathing Tolkien, I reached into the medicine cabinet and pulled out the shampoo. In the process a navy blue bottle of nail polish launched itself out of the cabinet and shattered on the sink. It sent polish everywhere. When painiting Annie's nails, we could wait fifteen minutes and it would wipe off instantly. In the bathroom? It was instant stain. No, I didn't get it all cleaned off. Screw it. It's Christmas Eve. As I tried to get Annie to go to bed, she mentioned that maybe we could see Santa if we were on the roof. We had never done this before, but I said, "Ok, let's go to the roof." With trepdiation she stepped out of the study window, and we sat on the roof together. We spent a half hour looking for Santa. We knew from our internet search that he was on the East Coast at the time, but we were still hopeful. We saw and talked about the stars, the trees, the clouds moving in, and a variety of other things. Every time a light that was moving came into view, we watched it in anticipation. Apparently, Santa's bells are highly reflective. Finally, she decided that she'd better go to bed to better facilitate the arrival of Santa.

Strangely enough, I think he may have just arrived. He also responded to her rather lengthy letter. Gotta love Santa...






Feelin' the Christmas Spririt!!!

No, the two don't go together, it just so happens these are the two things I felt like writing about! Annie had her friend Sarah sleep over last night, and they have been great together. I can't tell you everything they have done because I was vanquished from their presence while they were playing. They claimed to need privacy while they played. This is code for "we're going to make a huge mess, and we don't want you to know about it until later." Well, they had one fuss. Sarah came to me as I was putting plaster on the walls to tell me that Annie had two pairs of Sarah's underwear, and wouldn't give them back. Is this a little girl thing? I know that they sometimes wear each other's underwear, but I just don't get it. The underwear in question looked like stuff that I had bought Annie, and given the fact that Sarah's mom and I probably shop for clothes at similar stores, I suspected that perhaps it just looked like hers. At any rate, lacking the wisdom of Solomon, I decided that since we couldn't be completely sure, Annie could give Sarah one of the pairs of underwear. All the while I was thinking, why would you want to wear underwear that has been worn by someone else? The feud was solved, though, and they went back to playing nicely with each other.

The singing part comes from another Annie comment, which in turn made me remember something else. I love to sing, although I don't do it in front of other people without some alcohol involved. At least, I haven't sung in public since I was a little. A few years ago, I got a really good compliment. I was at a party with some close friends where I knew very few people. Fortunately, after we had all consumed too much beer, we were all best friends. They had a big yard, beautiful living room, spacious kitchen, and the guys somehow found ourselves in the laundry room with a small stereo. I don't know why. Drunk logic has its own rules. At any rate, we were in the laundry room listening to music and belting out our version of the songs as loud and well as we could given the fact we probably had to shut one eye to see only one stereo. My friend Ellie was in the room with the "ladies" and one of them sat up and asked, "who is that?" Ellie (sober as she was our Driver for the evening) just said, "oh, that's David." "You're kidding! Man, if he would get on stage and sing in public he'd get laid!" (My apologies for being vulgar, I'm quoting, and it made me feel good, so deal with it.)

What brought that memory to mind? My singing has been relegated to when I'm in the truck or in the shower. I turn on music when I do my morning shower routine, and Annie walks in somewhere along the way and turns it off. A song came on the CD player of which I'm quite fond. It's called Walls by Brother Phelps. Much to my surprise and pleasure, Annie's eyes got wide and she exclaimed, "Daddy, that sounds just like you!"

Thank you, sweetheart...

Humming at the moment, not singing...

When my first marriage showed the signs of finality, I called all my credit cards and removed myself from anything that I was associated with through her, and had her removed from anything that was mine. God help me, these things come back to haunt you when the other person is a moron financially. I am currently trying to refinance my house. The last loan that I got was complete crap. My choice. My agreement. My penalty. I understand that. So, now while talking to a very dedicated person about creating a new loan that will last the test of time, I'm hit with a credit problem. Grant you, my credit score is in excess of 800, but anytime a flag shows up for a collection agency, eyebrows get raised. By the way, this is the second time that something my first wife has done has arrived at my doorstep. Idiot. After many calls with some very good customer service people, I think I have the skinny. I removed myself from the account back in 1998. The credit card company recently merged with another company, and they have been overly thorough with their information transfer. The end result is that my name has been reconnected to her account. It's just bad timing. Not only was I put back in association with her account, but she screwed it up, and I've been transferred to a collection agency. It happened so recently that they don't even have the account in their computers.

Fortunately, I have great people helping me take it off of my credit report. What a pain in the ass, though... More time spent as a result of a bad decision. It was my decision, I'll deal with it...

Biotch...

Despite what I'm about to write about, I've had an amazing day with ephiphanies that I can't describe online. Suffice it to say that they left me smiling even after what I'm about to describe.

Much to Lilo's dismay, given his constant talking while I was working on the room this morning, I'm very pleased with how the room is coming along. I spent yesterday sanding, and preparing for the second coat on one wall. It was a big wall, so shutup. Before I went to bed, I put a second coat on a section of the wall to see how it would take. This morning, it looked great, so I attacked the wall. Well, it didn't go as well as I would have liked, but I kept fixing it as I went along, and by noon, I had the second coat on that wall, and stood back and viewed it with satisfaction. I'd decided part way through that I'd have to do a third coat, but that was ok. A decision had been made, and frankly, I can fix anything... Just ask Annie. After the coat of plaster, I jumped in the shower.

I turned the dryer on, and headed down the road to hit some stores before I picked up my Pickle. I knew I was early, but figured I'd fill in the time with the myriad of stores I need to hit before Santa comes. I knew what I was in for... or so I thought. I went to Home Depot first. Ok. That wasn't Christmas, but I needed some stuff, and God help me, I've had really good luck with Home Depot the last few times I'd been there. Today was no exception. With a Christmas song in my heart and voice, I headed to my next stop: Toys 'R Us. I finally found a place to park, and walked in. I almost turned around and left. The lines were stringing out to San Francisco... 30 miles away. I decided that if I found one particular item, I'd brave it. I found it within a couple of minutes. Damn. I was moving through the aisles and saw a lady that had that glazed look on her face of being lost and needing to be driven to a bar. I laughed and told her that I thought about leaving when I arrived. She responded with, "it's going to be like this all the time, you might as well just suffer through it..." I ventured deeper into the store. I found one thing, and then another. But one of the things I was looking for, I simply couldn't find, and it was important to me. It was something that there should have been a whole aisle devoted to, but I freakin' couldn't find it. I looked long enough that I had to use the bathroom. I found a display on a shelf and just plopped my stuff on the empty area outside the display. I knew it would be there when I returned, and it was. Why did I know that? There were no employees on the floor. They were all working the registers. Hell had set it's ugly doorstep on earth, and had done so by the fact that there are too many shoppers that should have to take classes on shopping with children.

There were toys all over the floor. Either parents who had picked them up and just thrown them down, or kids that decided to play momentarily while the parents were busy, and didn't put them back. I stepped over dolls, games, and puzzles constantly. I'd have put them back myself, but most of them were so far from where they were supposed to be that I wasn't about to start working the stock. Kids were riding scooters and bikes around the stores, and then they would leave them half way across the store. I was looking at a display, and tried to move out of another customer's way when I tripped over a small bike. I will never understand the inability of people to think about their impact on others.

The 'thing' that I was looking for had not yet been found. I searched, and searched, and finally started scanning aisle to aisle. I know it doesn't make any sense, but I figured I'd just start on one side of the store, and move to the other. I left the baby aisle, and there it was. Just as I expected, a long shelf set of items dedicated to Play-Doh. I found what I wanted, and moved to the checkout area. I walked around the corner expecting the worst. Much to my surprise, after my long search, the lines had diminished. I found one that looked like it was moving well, and not too long. I might make it to the mall. In no time I was third in line. I stood there. And I stood there. And I stood there. The lady in front of me turned to me and rolled her eyes. She had left another line to be in this one because it appeared to be moving. We stood some more. I don't know what the lady in front was doing, but their was obviously a problem. After about a half hour, it was the lady in front of me's turn. She had one thing. It rang up at three dollars. My eyebrows raised. It wasn't an expensive item, but it should have been more than three dollars. She also raised a note of concern. She didn't have cash, and unfortunately had to charge it to her credit card. She picked up her item, and was reaching out for her receipt when the register attendent exclaimed that there had been an error with the scanner. She would have to go to the customer service line and have it corrected. You have got to be kidding me. The lady was pissed, but I would have been saying, "shoot me when I walk out the door, I'm not going to another line for this."

Yes, it gets better. While standing in line all this while, I started shifting my feet to balance the parcels I was carrying. I was three feet from the cash register. I lifted my foot... and it stuck. I pulled harder, and pulled it out of a wad of gum. I'M IN THE FREAKIN' CHECKOUT LINE! I muffled my irritation, and moved my foot out of the gum. I then shifted my feet again. I'D DONE IT AGAIN! There were two piles of gum right next to the checkout line, and I stepped in both of them. I want to find the people that did this, and put hot coals to their feet.

I finally exited the store, and decided that I didn't have patience for the mall. I went grocery shopping and even had a few moments in the grocery store listening to the store music, and the mist falling in the produce aisle. It was very soothing. Unfortunately, I had one of those weird moments when I left the toy store... I often sing to myself, and change the words to suit me. I started singing. 'Well, the weather in there was frightful. And, I'm feeling homicidal." No, I'd never have that in me, but I laughed all the way to the truck that I kicked that out the moment I left the store...

Still excited about the Christmas spirit...