Raincharm’s Weblog

I think all I have done for the last two days is be in meetings. Add a few customer questions that were not so clearcut that I could answer them in a flash. I am almost happy that I had a walking date (4 miles) immediately after work so there was no choice to stay and finish out. The walk was FAST and necessary for sanity. Then I went to cool off (get cold) watching Carl play baseball (11-5 win). The longest days of the year are great. 

Dr. Goat
By Georgiana,
Copyright 1950 by Whitman Publishing Co.

Doctor Goat put on his coat.
And went out to make some calls.
He went to the house of a mouse with mumps;
He cured a frog who had the jumps.

He fixed a fox who suffered from measles.
He did the same for two small weasels.
Busy old Doctor Goat!
Then he warmed a worm whose tail was cold.
And felt the pulse of an elk who was old.
Pink pills for an owl with fuzz on his tongue;
Blue pills for a bat who was very high-strung.
Wonderful Doctor Goat!
He helped a beetle who had the croup.
He cured a chicken who couldn’t eat soup.
He gave a walrus a mustard plaster;
And saved a turtle from great disaster.
Hurrah for Doctor Goat!
Early one day in the month of May
The doctor got out of bed.
He felt his throat and then his head;
“I think I’m ill,” the doctor said.
“I must find a pill to fix my throat.”
Atchoo! Atchoo!
“Oh, what’ll I do? I gave my last pill to Grandmother Goat.”
Poor sick old Doctor Goat
Got into bed
With a cloth on his head,
And another around his throat.
For a whole long day
In the month of May
He slept, did Doctor Goat;
His bag on the floor
On the wall his coat.
While he slept his friends cam in;
They swept the floor neat as a pin;
They fixed the fire; they bought some food;
Then fondly brushed the shabby coat
Of tired old Doctor Goat.
And– the very next day
He was on his way.
Three cheers for Doctor Goat!

I have had that feeling all day. But most of the time I don’t remember that I have a bandaid in the middle of my face, across the bridge of my nose, just below my glasses. I think most engineers have the tape on their glasses, not on their face.

The soccer game yesterday was fun, but one of the headballs I attempted ended up being more of a faceball, and my glasses cut my nose.  Not so bad, but it is the third time I have done this, so maybe I need to invest in some sports glasses.

Anyway, all day people have been looking at me more closely. We decided the soccer story was sort of lame, so it is now that I cut myself shaving my unibrow.

You can click on the pictures for a larger version. I am still trying to figure out how to add pictures best.

Our friend Dennis graduated from the UW today. It was a good day for a graduation too. Dennis got a BA. The funny thing about Dennis’ degree is that the last class he took from UW was in 1978. Apparently when he started school there was a requirement that you take a foreign language class. For whatever reason, Dennis took all of the courses and credits required to graduate, except for a foreign language class. And while he was in school that requirement had been removed. Anyway, graduation did not happen in ’78.

Fast forward a few years. Dennis wants to get his degree and contacts the UW to figure out what he would need to do to complete his degree. They could find no notation that he had not completed everything earlier, and no mention of the long ago removed foreign language requirement. So – graduation beckoned.

Cap and gown, diploma and dinner. A good day.

No, not my mother. But who thought that bugs at a picnic could be so cute. We saw a performance of Bugz, performed by the John Rogers kindergarten class. It was very cute and very well done. Eve, one of Carl’s kids until Kindergarten, was a horsefly. Can you believe it, of all of the bugs I have swatted. She had red cowboy boots, a straw cowboy hat, fringe, and didn’t forget any of her lines! The maggot and stinkbug got most of the laughs. It was a great show, and I didn’t even have a kid performing.

Update, stop the presses! The sun was out – at noontime, and it warmed a body up! How intriguing.

I guess we will have to stop calling it Junuary.

It is still spring here, in every way possible. And I mean early spring. We may get to 60 degrees today and it has been a steady drizzle. It is colder than Siberia and Fairbanks (per Seattle Times). It snowed at the I-90 Snoqualmie Pass enough to get the snowplows chained up and operating.

The ski resorts are closed, and many of the campgrounds are not thawed yet, low tide was last weekend, what is a person to do?

Rey said when he went to a work orientation yesterday it was cancelled due to the cold and snow in Missoula.

Gripe, gripe, gripe. But like a good northerner we are going to do a 5-mile tonight after work, rain and cold be damned. Oops – maybe the sun will come out because I forgot my sunglasses.

Put the little one on the early boat this AM. Most amazing she was ready to leave at 6 AM. She didn’t need to be to the ferry to Victoria until 6:30, but I had to be back home to get my carpoolers by then, so off we went.

She texted me to say that a poster of things you could buy in Canada had a pair of the little sewing sissors I have that are shaped like a crane/heron. I told her I thought Mom and Dad had picked them up on one of their trips to Spain. I think this is right because I thought Pooh’s pair said Toledo (and I don’t think they went to Ohio to get us little presents.) Ashlan said she had finished her book, so I hope she got to see some whales on the trip across.

This is the favorite part of our job descriptions. Today I had a Board meeting to attend and hoped to get some other work done while they contemplated the state of the District. Had I consulted the agenda I might have realized I would probably need to pay more than passing attention. And as it turned out I ended up being the minute taker as well, since our normally fabulout minute taker was busy being a grandmother once again. (Now those are other duties that might be fun – but no hurry here.)

Torrential rain, a little sun (while it was raining) followed by windy winds made the drive home interesting.