The Infinite Project

Eww! Did not see that coming. Neither did the old man.

I have a project at work that I do not want to do. The guidelines change and no one is cooperating. Employee turn over does not help either. The project is important to the boss. I've shown him more interesting things that I've worked on but I get a "that's nice, but how about this project?" It seemed like a neat project when I volunteered but the factors mentioned above have ruined it and the idea that seemed sound initially has morphed, upon reflection, into something not so good. The meeting effect - dumb ideas sound brilliant in a group setting. Unfortunately, I cannot seem to convince anyone that approach originally suggested will not work very well. I work on the project in short bursts. Things change that alter the project. This thing could go on forever. A lot of ink, time, paper and energy will be wasted. Time for a career evaluation.

I bought "Resumes that Knock Them Dead" and "Cover Letters that Knock Them Dead" at a garage sale. I got them for free because the lady did not want to break a 5 dollar bill just for 25 cents. This inspired a gag. I can't get a job because my resume and cover letter keeps killing potential employers. The resume serial killer strikes again! Just HR people - no big loss.

I really need to update the resume and learn to write a cover letter. Some aspects of this job nibble at my soul.

Cramps and Comics

Visited the mothers this past weekend, mine on Saturday and Walter's on Sunday.

Codeine enhanced Sunday's visit. I attempted to kill some pain - some of the worst menstrual cramps ever. I took large doses to kill the pain. The pain went away after I took 1,000 mg of Ibuprofen. My liver will suffer but at least the pain stopped.

The Bible says women have those pains because of Eve's sin. Something is seriously fucked up about that logic.

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What the hell is happening in panel 2? My artistic skills are lacking but damn it Giella, you are a professional! Is this what cartoonist Alzheimer's looks like? Perspective goes out the window. I'm glad that both characters are female. The character arrangement in panel 2 is making my head hurt. Curses upon you, Giella!

Huh!? Explain this joke and I'll send you some original A Perfect World artwork. Seriously, I'm running out of room to store the pages and I really want to understand this joke.

This joke would have been really hilarious in 1991 (Star Trek VI - The Undiscovered Country) or maybe in 1994 (Star Trek: Generations or Star Trek: Oh, Look Dramatic Cinematic Lighting!). What prompted this gag? The remastered original series (totally cool), James Doohan's missing ashes, the third anniversary of Enterprise's cancellation, rumors of a Star Trek movie prequel? Why this gag now?

Running Log

This week I ran 10.11 miles, burned 1151.6 calories and weigh 175.9 pounds.

All times 35:00
Monday - 3.12 miles
Wednesday - 3.04 miles
Friday - 3.11 miles

Ran intervals this week. Managed to make it to 7.5 mph on the treadmill.

Received my Runner's World magazine. The June issue has a training program I find interesting and worth trying.

I good at English

Your English Skills:

Punctuation: 100% Spelling: 100% Grammar: 80% Vocabulary: 80%

Does Your English Cut the Mustard?

Cartoon Update

I will post a new cartoon tonight. I did not feel like posting an update after the board meeting.

To make it up to you, I post the first image that came up from a Google image search using the terms "Cute Animal"

Picture appeared here: www.coachella.com/forum/showthread.php?p=188854

Host site www.coachella.com Some kind of music festival.

Last Board Meeting

I conducted my last church board meeting last night. Next month's meeting I sit around and look cute and offer occasional bits of wisdom as immediate past president.

The meeting went relatively smoothly. Next year's board president has stronger organizational skills.

I would do it again if asked. I would do some things differently. Familiarize myself with the by-laws. Make fewer unilateral decisions. Devote more time to preparing for meetings. Pay attention to more details.

Fortunately, I served with people who have strengths to counteract my weaknesses. I've grown from this experience and I think I helped make a real difference in the future of the church.

I look forward to the next phase of my ministry.

Loki and the Boston Terriers

I discovered that Abbey likes to go on walks and use the bathroom during those walks. So I put her leash on her and tried to walk her in the back yard. Loki had to participate by grabbing on to her leash. He walked her around the back yard a bit but Abbey did not enjoy it. I took over and decided to try the front yard. Naturally, Loki had to go with us so I put his leash on him and went out the front door.

After untangling Abbey's leash from around Loki's legs we walked around the front yard. Abbey did her business and received a lot of praise. The Boston Terriers from across the street ran over to check out Abbey. They sniffed each other and then the Terriers went back across the street. Loki wanted to greet the Terriers but he wrapped his leash around a tree.

I unwrapped Loki's leash. He spotted the Boston Terriers across the street. He laid down and they approached. The male Boston ran up to Loki and Loki wrestled with him. This was a huge mismatch - 80 pounds of Loki vs. maybe 15 pounds of Boston Terrier. Loki used his mouth to pin the Boston Terrier and toss him a bit.

I yelled at Loki to let go of the Boston Terrier and I pulled on Loki's collar but that did not work. I yelled at the neighbor across the street to get his dog. The Boston Terrier yelped and Loki did not let go. The neighbor kept mowing his lawn, oblivious to my yelling and his dog's yelping. Walter came out and freed the Boston Terrier. The Boston Terrier ran back across the street. I don't think he was harmed, he just yelped a lot and probably had the scare of his life. Thankfully, the Bostons were smart enough to stay away.

I gave Loki to Walter and continued to walk Abbey, who sensibly stayed as far away from the fray as possible. Abbey completed her business and everyone went back inside before the mosquitoes ate us alive.

Loki remained a bit hyper after all this. I guess some sort of adrenaline rush. I certainly got one.

In the future, I will have to make sure that Loki cannot interact with dogs less than 20 pounds. I'm afraid that despite the fact that I obey the leash laws Loki will be the one who gets in trouble if a small dog gets hurt. Hopefully, training can help with the small dog issue.

Abbey escaped from her kennel last night but I fixed it and put her back in. She was much quieter and was still asleep when I opened the door.

Ziggy

Tom Wilson did not have space to draw the crest feathers but the bird depicted in this Ziggy cartoon is a cockatiel.

The bird has the cockatiel attitude. The scale in comparison to Ziggy is correct, in the mind of a cockatiel.

This is not Ziggy's regular pet bird.

Abbey and MSNBC

Abbey is not house broken. Oh joy. It has been a long time since I've trained a dog not to go in the house. I don't know how a dog manages to live five years without knowing where to go. I can guess one of the reasons she was surrendered by her owner.

I don't know when Abbey sleeps because she would not stop whining last night. There were brief interludes of silence but I'd think she would figure out that whining is not going to get her the attention she wants. The neighbors will think we are torturing a dog.

Then the damn dog looks at me with her brown eyes and sad face. I pet her and she is happy. She just wants to be close to people and petted but I wish she would learn not to make a mess on my carpets and sleep quietly in her kennel.

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I watched a bit of Joe Scarborough on MSNBC this morning. He trivialized the death toll in Iraq. He jokingly complained that it was a poor segue into the important story about Paris Hilton. Made a cartoonish "wa-wa-wa" sound after his comment about the Iraq death toll. I no longer have the energy to be outraged by these idiots.

Abbey the Beagle

Abbey the Beagle arrived at my house yesterday. Yes, she is a bit chubby but we are working on her figure. Abbey is 5 years old and loves to lay around near people. She snores but not too loudly. Abbey barks, howls, whines and just lets people know what's on her mind but we are training her to speak when appropriate.

She did not eat much this morning but I think that's because she's still trying to orient herself to the new housing, people and animals.

I learned this morning that she is a must go outside first thing in the morning type of dog. Walter learned the lesson first, then I was informed.

Juggling eating styles will be interesting. Loki believes that food put out must be eaten immediately whereas Abbey so far appears to be a grazer. The trick will be to convince Abbey to eat a few bites while Loki is busy eating his own food. I have to remind Loki that he has his own food when he begs for me to put down the bowl for Abbey. Abbey and Loki haven't interacted much yet as far as play but we'll see what happens.

I will need to get back to the taking the dog to adoptions routine. I hope the Petco dog bar treats don't give her stinky gas like all my previous fosters.

If you're interested in adopting Abbey or any of her friends check her out on Saturday from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm at Petco in College Station, Texas. You can also check her out on the web at http://www.woodstocktexas.org

It's back

My site is back, hooray!

Crap

Crap. My web site host is down again. This is annoying. The second time in less than a week. One day's worth of updates were lost the first time; I restored them yesterday. Now, the site is down again. IPower has been quite reliable for the past 3 years so I don't understand the problems this year.

I took Salvador to church for the blessing of the animals. He did well. Chirped a bit, stayed quiet during meditation and refused to make any noise during the one song about birds singing. The other people attending the service enjoyed listening to him chirp. The whole adventure tired him out. I let him out of his travel cage and he flew straight to his regular cage for a nap.

I will foster a new dog this summer. She is a Beagle named Abbey. A very fat Beagle. She was an owner surrender. I'm sure she will be lots of fun and a nice companion for Loki.

Running Log

This week I ran 9.41 miles, burned 1195.5 calories and weigh 173.6 pounds.

Monday: 3.26 miles in 35:00
Wednesday: 2.40 miles in 25:00
Friday: 3.75 miles in 45:00

I skipped Saturday because I was tired. I did not run as fast on Friday because I had not fully recovered. Since I'm not training for a race I plan on backing off on the amount of time spent running. Focus on shorter but more intense running sessions and weight training for awhile.

If I run the Miracle Match Marathon in Waco in October I will need to resume training in June or July. I would like to attempt to train for a marathon solo just to see if I can do it. If not the Waco Marathon then maybe take another crack at a 50K if there will be one at Lake Bryan this year.

I recently acquired a book on running for women by the editors of Runner's World magazine at a garage sale. I got a lot of things for free this past Saturday because people did not want to make change for a 5 dollar bill just for a 25 cent item. For a fair number of people the effort to dig around for $4.75 (four $1 bills and 3 quarters) was not worth 25 cents. I will check out the training information in this book.

Random Thoughts

I did not update last night because I worked on church business instead. Some of the Board members are night owls. It all business leading to a couple of meetings. I do other things at church besides meetings and preparing for meetings. I will update tonight.

Is Mrs. Brownback a puppet? I need to look at the video of the interview again to see where Sen. Brownback's right arm was located. She looked very uncomfortable next to her husband during the post-debate interview.

Is it me or does anyone else see a resemblance:

Mitt Romney on the left, Lyle Waggoner circa late 1970's on the right.

I hope Fred Thompson joins the race. This would force Tommy Thompson to use "I'm not the Law and Order guy" as a campaign slogan. Would Fred Thompson be allowed to use the Law and Order "donk-donk" sound effect in his commercials?

(Sound effect from http://blog.rickbreslin.com/blog/law_and_order_doink_doink_sound.asp)

I had a confrontation with one of the dumbbell hogs at the gym. It was polite. I simply asked if I could do a quick 12 reps with the 10 pound dumbbells while she did her walking lunges with the 20 pound barbell? I did my 12 reps, put the 10 pound dumbbells back near her stuff and picked up another set of weights before she finished her walking lunges. I hope she learned a lesson that sharing does not have to interrupt your workout. As for the trainer hogging the weights - I think a letter to the manager is in order.

When did candor in a debate become equated with comic relief? No wonder politicians don't speak honestly; stupid people (journalists) analyse their statements and draw wrong conclusions.

Debates

I watched the Democrats debate on the web. Tonight, I plan to catch the Republicans live. I anticipate hearing from Ron Paul. Maybe he will stand out like Mike Gravel did among the Democrats.

I'm somewhat familiar with Ron Paul's voting record and writings. Paul is the most "libertarian" of the Republicans. Paul voted against the war in Iraq. More information about Ron Paul can be found on the Internet

Maybe Americans could have a real choice: Gravel vs. Paul.

A woman can dream.

Dead Battery and numbers

The battery on my pedometer died. Now I must walk without knowing how many steps I took. Can I live without that information? I can live without it until I can make it to the store and purchase a new battery. A small portion of my life is devoted to keeping track of numbers; weight, miles ran, miles walked, steps taken, calories burned, cartoons drawn, pieces of clip art produced. I rarely pay attention to the important numbers; bank balance, debt, costs, calories consumed, paycheck amount, gas mileage. Trivial matters rule my life.

Pain

My abs, quads, hamstrings and glutes hurt. Movement hurts. The pain awakened me at 2:30 this morning.

I did some weight lifting, focusing on my lower body, on Tuesday. I ran on Wednesday despite the soreness from Tuesday's workout.

My abs hurt the most. Once I get moving the pain in my legs becomes less noticeable.

Today, I'll focus on my upper body. Maybe the soreness after that workout will drown out the soreness in my legs and abs.

I won't work on my abs and legs until next Tuesday. That should give the muscles plenty of time to recover.

Whatever doesn't kill me makes me stronger.

Comic women

Looks like Harriet has had some work done. Maybe she used her third eye as stuffing for her top.

Too funny. As a kid, I remember watching a Popeye cartoon that featured the scenario of a woman U.S. President. Olive Oyl wore a pants suit and high heeled shoes and she looked good. Rather attractive according to my memory. She also exuded confidence in the way she moved about in the Oval Office. Popeye sort of stood off to the side. He wore a suit instead of the usual sailor clothes. I checked the Big Cartoon Database but came up empty. Could be the product of a fevered childhood imagination. I have trouble distinguishing childhood dreams, memories and T.V. shows. I used to think the "The Bugaloos" were one of my weird childhood dreams until I found outside confirmation. The work of Sid and Marty Krofft had that effect on a lot of people.

The Popeye sequence I think I watched was musical with Olive Oyl doing most of the singing. I'm sure it was a Fleischer produced rather than Hanna-Barbara. Does anyone else remember this?

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I'm feeling a little overwhelmed by church business but it's just all the things that need to be done before the congregational meeting. The feeling will pass.

How many of me?

HowManyOfMe.com

There are 76 people with my name in the U.S.A. How many have your name?

Animal, vegetable or mineral?

What is the animal on the right? A beaver or a walrus with really short tusks? Maybe a mutant beaver with tusks and buck teeth.