Raincharm’s Weblog

Just the work week.
What started in the wee hours of Monday morning will end a bit past midnight tonight. Bookends at Sea-Tac.

I had plans to get some much needed home administration tasks completed, filing and taxes. But neither got so far as up to the desktop.

Instead the week has been work, dinner, dishes, lunch making, tv and Soduko. This filled the usually 3 hours before bedtime.

I still have this evening, and bedtime will be much delayed today.

I guess it takes more than a few days to transition to a more efficient evening routine.

On a somber note I want to acknowledge the passing of author Sir Terry Pratchett yesterday. His work has afforded me hours of entertainment. I may even still have one of his books in the glove box, waiting for a drive with Rey.

This is the third day of the time change. I go with the spring forward/fall back mnemonic, but I couldn’t tell you whether we are now in PDT or PST.

This has been my easiest change springing forward that I can remember. I think it is because we actively accepted the change and more or less planned for it. We got up relatively early both weekend days. To watch soccer. And went to bed reasonably early. As soon as we got home from the soccer game on Sunday night. (Sounders 3 – New England Revolution 0. And besting New England in just about any sport is a good thing.)

Opening Day 2015 – Our view from the red circle

The more alert change was not because we are forward thinking planners, but because Carl had a flight that required a 3:30 wake-up call. That’s right. He is basking in the Arizona sunshine.

And I will admit that last night about all I managed to do was make dinner. Hopefully tonight I will get to those chores that I planned to do during my time.

The evening all started because yesterday my carpooler said he was not planning to go “home” after work today. He was planning to go to West Seattle, but could drop me off downtown where I could catch a bus.

As it turned out Carl did not have work in the evening due to a grandparents arrival.

We hatched a plot to meet downtown and go to the Seattle Art Museum to look around in general, and specifically see their new Indigenous Beauty exhibit.

Like all best laid plans, my carpooler decided not to go to West Seattle and Carl was running a bit behind schedule.

Plan B – Meet at home, bus downtown, see the exhibit, grab some dinner, bus home.

It turns out that first Thursday is a free Art Museum month.
When we arrived it was fairly quiet, but when we left the museum was buzzing. And the exhibit had some really nice artifacts, and some newer creations as well. The basketry was especially intriguing.

When we got to the grab some dinner step, our plans changed again.
We had planned to go to Tacos Guaymas, just a few dozen steps down from the museum, literally. We were dismayed to find the restaurant was gone.

The restaurant across the steps had a 45 minute wait, a bit too long at 7:30 PM.

Luckily, the restaurant at the top of the steps was only a 2-minute wait.
It’s name is 1000 Spirits, (thirsty thursday?) and they did have a wall of bottles. And some advertising artwork. Including a Strohs Beer ad. I stuck to wine, and Carl to beer. (On a work night too.)

A full meal, and it was time to wander back to the bus.
Nice to not have to drive home, or deal with parking.

We got ourselves out into the sunshine by 11 AM this morning.
Not bad considering we had made breakfast, Skyped with the boy, worked on our ticket technology, and finally made it out the door. It was a rather unhurried morning, unlike the rest of the week. Yesterday Carl was so multi-tasking out of the house that he wore his belt inside out. [Try it. It is not as easy as putting your shirt on backwards. But he managed. I think it is because he was using a right-handed belt.]

Beautiful sunshine, but a breeze to aid the nip in the air.

I had read a review of a new meat-centric restaurant within a few miles of our house that sounded intriguing. So we started in their direction. However, the boy had pointed out to the man that the UW baseball team was playing a double-header, and there did not seem to be enough time to eat first. So we took note of the actual location, grabbed a cup of joe from the Starbucks across the street (of course), and headed over hill and dale toward the campus.

There were all sorts of collegiate sports underway. Basketball, track and field, rugby, and baseball. We arrived at the ball park near the bottom of the first inning and found our seat in the sun. I would get hot, and then chilled, and then hot … I finally put my jacket over my shoulders. We basked through to the seventh inning stretch, and decided the Huskies could hold their 16-1 lead over North Dakota.

Back up to the top of the campus, where we found a Ski Hill, black lager, and bratwurst at Shultzy’s.
The remainder of the walk really did become a slog. Mostly up hill, and burdened with our meal.
About 7 – 8 miles in all. Not bad for a lazy, sunny weekend day.

Now I am ready to sit back and massage my feet.

Last weekend never happened. At least like any two days in a row that I would recognize as a week end. In 21st century terms. A break after the week.

Since the 23rd, recognized by most as Monday, I have consistently thought it was Friday. Yet I still had to get up in the morning. In addition to dealing with the realization that it was not Friday, to be followed by a break, I have been trying to squeeze in all of the work at home usually done on the weekend.

But we are finally nearing the end of these 5 work days, to be added onto the last 7.

The question now is whether to tempt fate by planning something for the weekend, or look for work to bring home (and then not do it).

In the reverse commute

New bridge from the old bridge

End of the new bridge

Marina, trust me

Portage Bay

Home

My commute. (Notice the difference in the sky.)

From Friday at approximately 3:30 until about 12:40 this afternoon I, and others at work, have been in response mode.

I am essentially exhausted. More mentally than physically.
Friday afternoon I took a call from the lab where we send our water samples for testing. We take 60-70 samples per month, so nothing strange at the call. Except they were reporting one sample showed EColi.

This is bad.

Luckily I was able to grab two of our water crew as they were driving away. In short, we took more samples that evening, called a planning meeting for the morning, and notified about two dozen folks to either report on Sunday morning, or be on standby. If the new samples also showed problems we would be in a boil water situation. (We re-test because there are reasons you can get false positives, and that is what’s usually found.)

The lab results were supposed to be available on the new samples between 10-11 am Sunday.
The minutes ticked away. 10, 11, 12 noon.
The lab is not answering their phone.

We finally resorted to sleuthing on the internet. Identified the owner of the lab, got his home phone number from whitepages.com. And called. He finally went to the lab to get our results.
NEGATIVE ALL

A huge sight of relief.
In retrospect the past 48 hours were excellent training, and more than a few employees earned some overtime.

Me, I would have preferred to take a few walks in our balmy 50 degree weather.

(The lab results were delayed because their worker was at church.)

I think I may have a drink.
No, not water. But coffee made with water, and a little something extra added.

Yeah

My most frequent decision today may be whether to wear my glasses near the bridge of my nose or on the tip of my nose.

I had enough old lady comments from Carl yesterday to last a year. (Tip of the nose predominated.) And it seems to be developing a bit of a scab now.

Or

Potential for neck problems exacerbated by multi- focals.

Definitely self-inflicted problems.

We had one family birthday last week. And now another – how time marches on.

Carl was saying how old his brother is getting to be, until I pointed out that I am only a few months behind his brother.

Today is as spectacular as yesterday was weatherwise. I am sitting in the sun on a bench at a schoolyard, reading about health care choices, while Carl throws batting practice to high school kids.
We walked here, about 4 miles. This was our second sojourn of the day. The first was about 2 miles, and included purchasing a new pair of walking shoes. The second walk was to check out the new kicks.
Yesterday was great fun except for a small incident with a soccer ball and eyeglasses and a nose. My nose to be specific.

Still trying to put together a good story where I don’t look the total fool.

Carl is the romantic in our family. So I have been treated to notes in my lunchbox all week.

Monday on the right, Friday to the left.

And a candy bar on Friday.
(It was supposed to be in the picture,but my carpooler was itching to leave so I compromised my idea.) ((It was certainly not because I had finished it already.))

We are celebrating the day by starting at the acupuncturist. Then we will find breakfast, and hopefully a nice walk to work off breakfast.

After that the day will unfold however it does. But no work. I have to balance out for Carl’s whole week.