Category: blood

Family, easy!

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something about christmas songs

There’s something about Christmas songs. Well, the traditional ones.

By “traditional,” I guess I mean the ones you’d expect to hear in church. Songs like “O Come, All Ye Faithful,” “What Child is This,” “Angels We Have Heard On High,” and, most of all, “Silent Night” knock something loose inside me. If they’re sung right, these songs can illicit the most striking, unbidden, emotional response from me. Especially “Silent Night.” A well-done version of that song and I’ll have trouble holding back tears. I don’t know why this is, or how the association got made in my subconscious, but it’s for-sure there. This Sunday at church they did a run of mostly these holiday tracks and my chest swelled as I sang along. There’s just something about Christmas songs.

Ahem… do I get to keep my man-card? OK, moving on then.

We’re supposed to get our car back Wednesday, but if things aren’t looking good I’m going to rent a vehicle to get us through Christmastime while my folks are here. Something of comparable size to the out-of-commission Acadia, on the off chance we want to do something as a family while my folks are in town (in my head I see us doing a whole lot of nothing, but you never know). The bill came to $6,000 or so of damage… although it was all superficial and the body shop says there’s nothing wrong with the underlying chassis of the vehicle. All the same, I’d rather it never had been in an accident, let alone just a few months after we’d gotten it. But, such is life. We can roll with it.

As predicted, work has slowed considerably this week. As the holidays approach there are less and less cars in the parking lot each morning. By Thursday the place will be a ghost town. All this makes for and environment that’s 1) very quiet, uninterrupted, and work-conducive as well as 2) hard to stick around long in, even being super productive. The desolation and thoughts of everyone else being at home enjoying family or a good book just makes a man want to cut-out early and call a few hours work “good enough.” Maybe, since things come so easy in the silent solitude, I can justify a few hours work as equal to a busy interrupt-drive day’s full eight hours? Yeah… that’s the ticket.

Goodnight.

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better late than never

Late is better than just writing.

Back from the other side of the Earth (if this side is your side, leastways), and not long here before we have to hit the road again this weekend for the Thanksgiving week in Florida.

Yeah, our trip to Florida. Turns out there as some fairly major complications with our itinerary. Apparently, the communication wires got crossed and Sharaun’s family thought we were set to arrive on Friday, whereas we’ve always been scheduled to come in Saturday. Unfortunately, with them thinking we’d be there a day earlier, her brother and newly-wed sister-in-law had scheduled a fancy late reception bash for their wedding earlier this year – inviting all the family and basically scheduling it around our visit home. Thing is, they scheduled it for Saturday evening at 6pm and our flight doesn’t get in until Saturday evening at 6pm. Since the airport is about an hour from where the party will be going down, this means that, even if we can find a ride (all the family will be at the reception), we’ll be at least an hour and a half late. Sigh…

This news really has Sharaun bummed. Like… really, really bummed. I can understand why, I mean the whole crew thinks we’ll be there and now we won’t. It was only Saturday night that the issue dawned on us, reviewing arrival times and dates. I did my best to look for a way out, or around, the problem. We called the airline but our tickets aren’t “full fare” (when you pay two grand to go anywhere in the continental US, I’d argue that should, by default, be considered “full fare”) and are completely not refundable or transferable. Just for the luxury of changing them we’d be socked with a $450 charge, not to mention any difference in fare to the new tickets – and, of course, everything available for Thanksgiving week at this point is more than dear. We looked for other flights we could take and just “skip out” on the outbound part of our round trip, but the airline assured us they’d cancel us out of the return trip if we tried.

So, after all the trying, it looks like we’re stuck. I mean, maybe we’ll be able to get there late… and maybe folks’ll still be around… and maybe it won’t be that bad… but I know it’s really under Sharaun’s skin and I don’t blame her. Stupid airlines really are stacked against the consumer, in my opinion. And after all the dough I’ve poured into them going home and elsewhere around the globe. Better late than never, in the end though.

And, maybe not quite on par with Sharaun’s frustration about the reception mixup is my own frustration over our spotty time at home since Mexico. I mean, not that I can really complain, since the time has been (and will continue to be) broken up by all sorts of fun things – but having onesy-twosey days at home here and there between travels is really detrimental to “getting things done.” Just not enough time to finish fixing the things I need to fix… and it frustrates me to continually come home to undone work. Again, no room to complain in honesty… but it’s been busy enough lately that it’s just gotten to me. Just too much unfinished. Even this week before we leave, every night is booked with something or other and any time I could’ve used to tool around the house is already pre-assigned to something else. So it goes.

OK, enough whining. I’ll have to save the cheer for another entry though, ’cause I’m done for tonight. Until tomorrow, love ya.

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cisterns, stanchions, & meade

Rivulets.Hey there…  guess what?  I actually had some time today to both do work and write a little bit.  Meetings at work were productive again, just didn’t last all day.  It’s better that way.

Let’s write some blog.

Sitting now in Henry’s Bar, Taipei Taiwan.  Haven’t been here in years but the place hasn’t changed a lick.  Even the same people working here.  It was a cloudy sometimes-rainy day today, but the weather stayed cool enough that walking around outside on the way to and from lunch (which, by the by, was delicious) was pleasant.  Walking around Taipei offers one something of the same kind of “big city” feel that traipsing around Manhattan would – the people, the traffic, the buildings looming on every side – it’s a very metropolitan experience and I enjoy it; makes me feel “grown up” and full of business (nod to Pat’s similar thoughts here).

Over the past few months Sharaun and I have done a fair bit of solo traveling. Her to Florida a couple times for a friend’s wedding, me to Oregon, China, and Taiwan. During these times apart we’ve sort of developed a habit of sending each other pictures via cellphone – well, the one at home with Keaton sends pictures to the traveler, at least. Overseas this week, I’ve really enjoyed getting pictures of Sharaun and Keaton from back home. And, even though they make a bit more pointed my missing my family, I find myself going back and looking at them on my phone at various points during the day. In fact, this week’s volley from Sharaun was good enough that I wanted to share. Here, then, are the pictures Sharaun and Keaton sent along to make my time away feel not so far way. Enjoy.

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Well that’s about it for today methinks.  Not much more time, not much more I haven’t already mentioned.

Goodnight.

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busy streets & busy days

Hack hack hack

Hi from the other side of the Earth, internet.  I miss my family.  Sharaun e-mails me pictures and it makes me miss them more.

Shanghai is pretty much like I remember it.  Even though it’s been quite a while since I’ve been here, it looks roughly the same – although the seemingly never-ending construction and population influx means things look even more crowded and dense, if possible.  I swear it seems like this city sprawls as much as it crowds, both growing outward and becoming thicker inside.  The streets teem with people; people walking, riding bikes, scooters, cars, trucks, buses – all of it a quivering ball of loosely organized chaos.  The people are as hospitable as ever, and the food is always delicious.

On the plane over I started feeling some sinus & respiratory discomfort – as I often do when flying, the tight space and recycled air, perhaps – but it’s gotten worse since being here and is annoying.  I have a sporadic cough and my nose is stuffed up.  Nothing major, no fever or anything, more like allergies or a reaction to the rough air and tight spaces.  Makes for a scratchy voice and sniffles though, and the occasional swimming head.  A guy at the hotel had some generic Wal Mart cold medicine he carried over from the states, so I popped one of those this morning in hopes the decongestant component will offer a little relief later today.  Either way, I’ll maintain.

I took some iPhone pictures throughout the first couple days (funny how, the more often you’ve been somewhere, you tend to be less and less picture crazy).  They’re not the highest quality images, but I had some time this morning so I uploaded a few for your enjoyment.  Check them out below:

[nggallery id=34]

Tomorrow I’ll work a half-day and then take the short flight to Taiwan to finish out the week there.  I canceled the hotel and will be staying with friends while in town, so am excited to spend some time at their new place and bumming around the city with them.

And there’s been work too.  In fact, the work I’ve ended up doing has proven really valuable to me.  Likely this tells me that I should get out here more often.  I’ve been cloistered in a room with the same five other managers now for going on sixteen hours but the output from our sessions makes me proud.  I guess sometimes there’s no real substitute for locking yourselves up and hammering on problems until you end up with a solution.

In summary, then: China is busy; went shopping and ate crazy Asian food; worked hard.

Goodnight.

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last day in mexico

Hi Internet.

Finally bothered to check for an open router near the condo side of the resort.

Found one.

Trip has been amazing, but it’s more fun doing nothing than blogging so I’m just here to say hello. And, goodbye.

See ya next week.

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as the week wanes

I could jump off and sail away forever...Tuesday night and I just got done putting Keaton down.  Sharaun had volleyball so we spent some time together listening to music, playing Jenga (a favorite of hers), and, in a late fit of productivity, deciding to make cookies.

Baking with Keaton is kind of a “thing” of mine.  We do it quite a bit.  Banana bread, cookies, etc., it’s just a good sharing, learning, constructive time together.  Tonight I asked her what kind of cookies she wanted and she answered, “Chocolate chip marshmallow.”  Hmmm… OK…. well if anyone knows if such a cookie exists, it’s gonna be the internet.  So I took to the iPhone and Googled, and up they popped, top return.  Like all cooks worth their stained aprons, we had to improvise a little.  Using shortening substituted for a lack of butter, and we scissored-up both Hershey bars and big marshmallows to take the place of chocolate chips and miniature marshmallows.  Unsurprisingly, they turned out divine, and we were vindicated in our experimentation.  Even Sharaun wolfed them down.

The weather here in Northern California turned Fallish today.  Clouds skittered around up in the sky, the temperatures dipped, and a wind came up.  Around 9am a friend popped on my instant messenger at work.  “I bet you’re loving today,” she said.  Yes, yes… my predilection for Fall is well known and well-documented here on the blog.  I’m excited about the work we’re doing on the house going into this end-of-year season; I think of it as “cozying up” the place or something.  I’ve written before about my strange attachment to the size and shape of our modest house, and going into winter I tend to think of it as a perfect little womb where we can hide away from the cold and wind and rain and be comfortable with what we have.  It’s part of the reason I like investing in improving the place… since I see it as one of those little “caves” I could live in.

Early gym tomorrow… gotta hit the sack.  Not before a few cookies though… need a reason to be in the gym, after all.  Goodnight.

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what might’ve been lost

Goodbye America!Good evening friends.  Good morning friends.

Back from Oregon.  Up at 4am to catch the train to the airport, I tried to build a “better” public transit schedule to the airport, ignoring the trains and times the website recommended and instead “discovering” a better route on my own, buying myself another half hour of slumber.  All worked well until the train which, just ten or so stops prior, had been marked “Airport” instead changed its destination sing to read “Not In Service.”

It was right around then that they kicked me out.  Miles from the airport, I asked the conductor who was turning me out why the train was no longer bound for the airport.  “Another train’ll be along in a few minutes,” was all I got.  Fifteen minutes later I boarded that “another train.”  Long lines at check-in and security found me sprinting (on dead-sore post-hike legs) to my gate, where I managed to board just before they closed the door.  Whew.

Common sense says I should be tired; should maybe be in bed already.  But instead I had all this nervous energy I had to vent.  After landing I went and got a haircut, then went into the office for the afternoon.  After that I came home, unpacked, cleaned the garage, and transplanted Pat’s hops into my backyard to tend while he’s away.  Our friends Pat and Cynthia were over, spending their last homeless night in the USofA eating dinner and waiting for their departure amongst friends.  Around 9pm we walked them to the car and waved goodbye, and they drove off to a new life in another country.  Before he left, and even though it started out as a handshake, I gave Pat a real hug.

A busy week ahead, and I’m all alone with Keaton for the last bit of it.  Sharaun’s off to Florida for a bachelorette party and it’s up to us to fend for ourselves for four whole days.  Payback, I suppose, for my weekend hiking in Oregon perhaps. I’m sort of excited about playing Mr. Mom, being responsible for every moment of the day… and then I also feel daunted by the task of doing what Sharaun does with Keaton.  I guess I can think of it as training for the weekend of the actual wedding… which is also this month.  Hat’s off to the guys raisin’ they kids, huh?

Goodnight.