I went for an outing last night. A friend of mine in choir had given another choir friend of mine his pair of tickets for the opera Julius Caesar. She had never been to the opera, and begged and pleaded for me to go with her.

I have been to the opera several times, but the thought of going to see this one was not high on my list of priorities. But she prevailed and with the agreement that we could leave early because of my having to work the next day, we went.

This opera was written by Handel, and in the era that this opera was written in they used many castrati for the leading roles. Since the number of men who can actually sing in the castrati range is very limited, the practice now is to use women, sopranos in particuliar, to play those roles.

The role of Tolomeo (Cleopatra's brother) was played by a countertenor. When he first sang, i thought he was female. But when there was a duet between him and Cleopatra, there was a tone in his voice that underlined the fact that he was male, but had the most marvelous upper range.

The thing that gave me the giggles, unfortunately, was the contralto that played Julius Caesar. As true contraltos usually are, she was of large stature. The arias that she had to sing consisted of a large number of trills and runs. While she sang those, her bosom heaved in time with the notes in them, pausing only when she took a breath, when her shoulders tried to meet her ears. She was also very stiff in her movements, like she was trying to be masculine in her movements, but failed miserably, looking only stiff. Also, her voice was not one that made me sit up and take notice.

We left after the second act, at 10:55 p.m. figuring that the third act would sound quite similar to the first two acts, sung in Italian with super titles above the stage so you knew what was happening on the stage.

My biggest complaint was that the opera had far too much soprano and counter tenor, and not *nearly* enough bass and baritone. We did really enjoy people watching there, since there were many different styles of dress present.

Fortunately, this experience didn't put my friend off of opera, but made her look forward to the next one.

^_^

This is a saying that i have been telling some people for the last couple of years. I'm not sure where or when i came up with it, but i have used it in many situations.

Take the recent death of my MIL.

BBB and quad bro have been telling me about how the other members of their family have screwed them over in years past.

Step-sister from Montana arrived on what turned out to be MIL's last day. She loaded up some items that MIL wanted her to have and spent the day visiting. That night, MIL went to sleep and her heart stopped.

The following day, we found out MIL had died because we called!! And it didn't sound like niece (who was MIL's caretaker) had even been planning on calling to let us know anytime soon.

According to step-sis, niece had told horrid tales about how BBB was verbally abusing his mother and calling her all kinds of names. How he must have stolen some gold that MIL had stashed for step-sis, because it was there in the cabinet last she had seen it and how he was bringing over a level 3 sex offender to help him clean out the house now that MIL was gone. And finally, how he was trying to run her life and she wasn't going to let him.

First of all, BBB and his mom had a difficult relationship overall. Up until 3-4 years ago, he'd had nothing to do with her. These past couple of years, he's been exceptionally helpful to her and never asked anything of her, mainly because of the relationship between her and quad bro. Basically treated her like any other older person that he takes the time to help. However, he has always called her "old bag" or "older than dirt" or something like that. She returned similar verbal sparring, regularly flipping him off.* We are figuring that because he didn't treat her like an invalid and acted like everything was the same, niece took that as "verbal abuse" (though some of the names reported were nothing that he would ever have called her to her face). Matter of fact, if he had gone in and NOT treated her normally, and did the "poor you" thing to her, she wouldn't have lasted the day. She was a crusty old bitch and was rather proud of it.

Second, the only thing that we are concerned about is quad brother. MIL received his SSI checks and turned around and paid the nursing facility where quad bro is living. I now have POA to do his business dealings for him, and his mail needs to be forwarded to me so i can make sure that the place is paid. (whee! That's a whole 'nother JE)

Quad brother heard from an independent 3rd party that niece and her brother (who had screwed quad bro over when we let him rent the house in E WA two years ago) were hauling things out of the house. Now, this house and most of the things in it, belong to quad-bro. The land and trailer were placed in my name, due to the fact that if the state figured out that he was living in a care facility, the state could (if they so chose) take the property in exchange for the care that he's getting. MIL had been living in the house since her husband had died, her only rent was paying the monthly bills and the real estate taxes.

The day after MIL died was the last time we heard from niece, she disappeared and wasn't answering the phone. It took her almost a week to finally call us. The excuse was that she got scared, staying in the house that MIL died in.** I had to explain to her that it was a viable excuse, but not letting us know what had happened and basically dropping off the face of the earth was inexcusable.

I also mentioned that step sister had told us things that she had said about us and she was upset and wondering why step sister would say such things "I hardly talked to her".

Hence the "the truth is somewhere in the middle". Until we are able to go up there and see for ourselves what is happening, we won't know for sure if anything is really missing.

We are also going to be bringing a rental agreement, so that if niece chooses to live in the house, we will have legal recourse if she tries to do something stupid, like her brother did.

Whee! My life is so much fun.

BBB had to ask me if i regretted getting involved with him, because of the roller coaster that we've been on lately. I snorted at him. We may not be married, but i accepted him, for better or for worse. This is merely a pothole in the road of our lives.

^_^

------------------------------------------------
*The last picture we have of her was three days before she died, where she is flipping him off.

**To be fair, she's 27 and this is the first death she's ever had to deal with up close and personal. (though she's expressed an interest in getting into hospice care, so i had to tell her that she'd need to get used to it)

We got our severance packages today, and our separation date is March 30, 2007.

I'm going to take the money and RUN!

^_^

This has been the week from hell.

Got a call from BBB's niece, who was also the caretaker for his mom. Mom was not doing well at all, and she didn't know what to do. (mom had lung cancer)

We dropped everything and drove to the wilds of eastern washington to help niece with mom. We couldn't bring his quad brother, because going over there are 3 or 4 passes that we have to cross and we would have to take our short bus to transport, not to mention trying to be caretakers for him and *then* deal with mom.

I won't bore you with all the details, because lung cancer that has metastasised isn't pretty. We were able to spend a couple of days with her, and she was quite lucid. We helped her organize and pay for her cremation and there wasn't much left for us to do, so we came home to care for quad brother. (which now has another whole can of worms opened up)

This morning i called caretaker niece and found out that BBB's mom passed last night at 10:40 pst.

We had been hoping that she would hold out until we could bring quad brother over the first week of April (after my job ends), but their step sister had arrived yesterday morning and loaded up some of the things that mom wanted her to have, spent the day with mom and that evening mom went to sleep and her heart just stopped.

We figured that she had resigned herself to the fact that she would never see quad son again, and since she was able to see step-daughter, it was time to go.

You know, life sometimes sucks, but death sucks even worse.

^_^

I have to tell you this story, because it made Talinom have a brain cramp to the point of him being incapable of speech.

I received a letter in the mail today. It said, "Dear Redhead-Kitten, Hello! My name is Ed. In a very short time, it will be time to turn in your Nissan Leased Vehicle."

WHAT??? Excuse me?

This came as a huge surprise to me, since i *purchased* the vehicle from the same Nissan dealership that this letter was sent from.

Sadly, i felt compelled to call "Ed" and figure out what posessed him to send me this letter.

After pointing out the fact that there was no lease on my vehicle, he proceeded to offer me the option of trading in my car (for which he would give me the best value) so that i could purchase a new one from him, because the new Sentras were out and had all of these "nifty, new features" and a new body style.

I made the mistake of saying that i was perfectly happy with my Sentra, "and i thought i heard that the new Nissan whatever was replacing the Sentra anyway". He proceeded to continue to extoll the virtues of the Sentra and "wouldn't you like to come down and test drive it?"

I explained that the only reason that i wasn't still driving my '92 Sentra was the fact that it was rear-ended and the insurance company totalled it. And the only way that i was going to be buying a new car would be if someone ELSE totalled the one i was driving now.

He proffered his niceties and begged that if i was ever in need of a new car to look him up. And then he said . . .

"Thank you, Lisa".

LISA??? Who the *hell* is Lisa?

He had hung up too quickly for me to respond, but it just drove home the fact that car sales people got their reputation *honestly*, since the only reason he continued to talk to me was the smell of a sale. Once he realized that i wasn't the sale he was looking for, he didn't even care enough (if he ever did) to get my name right.

I am saving the letter, since i want to make sure that i know who i will NOT be buying my next car from.

^_^

People have been wandering around my building at work measuring the windows and tapping on them for *months*. You would think that they would wait until the weather is a little more, well . . . dry before they replace them. But nooooo. It's the new year and we are getting new windows.

Tuesday they started replacing some of the windows, starting at the door and moving toward the bank machine. At first it was in the lobby, where the escalators going up to the bank branch are located. Before the wall with a locked door that leads into our office space.

After lunch yesterday, they started walking around tapping and looking at the next set of windows that needed to be replaced and someone finally thought to look *through* the window and noticed that there are two desks directly on the other side of the windows, one of which is mine.

Panic ensues.

They are now trying to figure out how they are going to proceed with the next stage of the project.

You see the way that they have to remove the glass in order to replace it is to remove the anchors and swing the pane *in* to the office space. There is only about 12 inches of space between the glass and the cubicle walls, which is not enough to manuever the HUGE panes out and the new panes in.

The glass company has been speaking to someone about the project, but no-one has thought to coordinate with our people in order to get the two cubicles moved. *sigh* My supervisor is trying to deal with the branch manager and the site coordinator to get our computer terminals moved temporarily while the windows are being replaced. (i'm being a pain, because i want to move *back* when the windows are done)

Ok, glass company can't replace the windows in the order that they set everything out, so they have to improvise. They bypass our windows and go beyond the bank machine to the emergency doors that need some panes replaced.

Today, the problem isn't resolved and to make matters worse, the branch has decreed that the window people CANNOT work on Friday or Monday, due to the fact that those are the busiest days for the branch. (Personally, i can't figure out why replacing the windows on the first floor would affect the workings of the branch that is located on the SECOND floor, but that's why I don't get paid the big bucks.)

The glass company, not wanting to waste any time, decided to replace some of the other windows. One was on the side of the escalators and caused much banging beyond our locked door.

The other window they replaced was one that is above the bank machine. This caused problems of its own, due to the fact that the door to the bank machine room is locked and alarmed. (when one unwitting maintenance person opened the door and heard the alarm and then quickly closed it, we had the police arrive since no-one was there to disarmed it)

Today the branch manager opened the door and disarmed the alarm and the glass guys proceeded to work on replacing the pane. This room is a mere 6 feet beyond my cubicle and with the door propped open, i could hear everything that was going on very clearly and with the open window it was *very* cold.

I did not envy these guys at all.

The pane of glass was very heavy and the bank machines were put in and the room enclosed AFTER the original windows were put in. So, there was a wall partially blocking one side of the pane, and the fact that they were working *over* the bank machine and night deposit box, about 5 feet off the ground and the pane turned out to be NOT SQUARE . . . lets just say that I was entertained for three hours this afternoon.

I must say that the workers were *very* easy on the eyes. And i took the opportunity to apologize if they heard me laughing, because i truly AM easily amused. After that, they smiled at me more and made a couple of comments simply for my benefit.

Knowing that my job will be ending March 31 and with all of the problems** leading up to the transition, this was definately a bright spot.

^_^

-------

** Said problems include, but are not limited to: 1) learning a new computer system which has been in operation only 3 months and trying to adapt my processes to the new system. 2) my supervisor coming up to me yesterday to find out how long it would take me to train someone to do my job (8 days, estimated) *knowing* that the person i would be training will only have the job for a limited amount of time before the job is being transferred again to another location. 3) knowing that the people we are transferring our jobs to are *already* saying that if something goes wrong, they will just blame it on us saying that we didn't train them right. 4) My job ends in 59 days and they are *just now* talking about training. 5) et cetera, ad nauseum.

I've been doing some thinking lately about life and living, death and dying.

My significant other (BBB) has a brother that is a quadriplegic and is living in a nursing care facility. Last Sunday, since my huge sewing project was done, we went there to visit for an extended period. (during the project we did visit, but it was brief if i was along)

During our visit, his brothers roommate died. He had liver cancer and had been delusional for the previous 3 days, calling BBBs brother "mom" and pinching his arm, thinking it was the call light. We knew it was only a matter of time, but it was interesting to have it happen when we were visiting.

On the up side, the firemen and aid units were called, so i got my fix of firemen. On the down side, this man was a person that brother had known for 6 years and was a perfect roommate for him.

Yesterday was the memorial service at the care facility. It appeared to me that this was the only memorial that was going to be held because there was a huge number of outside people that attended, with only a handful of residents, BBB, brother and i.

The thing that seemed "not right" was the fact that this huge group of people were there moaning and wailing about the loss of their loved one and in all of the time that they were roommates, there were only two people that BBB and i had seen, and brother had only seen 4 visitors. (and if you are gonna miss him so *damn* much now that he's died, where the f$ck were you during the last 6 years?)

BBB and i had provided hot sauce, some food stuffs and sodas for the roommate, because his family very rarely visited. He was always grateful and paid us for things that he specifically requested. We also provided little "extras" as presents to him.

His daughter was in charge of the memorial, and made a great point of thanking brother and family (us) for all the support given. She also took the time to thank us personally, for all our help to her father. She didn't visit as often as she wanted to, because she was away at college, but he was very proud of her for that accomplishment.

His sister thanked us, saying that everytime she talked to her brother, he was always telling her what BBB and i had done for him or brought to him.

His twin brother said, "I thank God that you are around to take care of your brother and mine." (good thing, since you couldn't be bothered)

His younger brother said "I can see why nobody ever messed with you." (referencing BBB's sheer size and presence. he is well known around the facility for making things "happen" for the residents)

Watching all of this made me think about my family and the patterns that i personally had with my family. And the fact that since BBB and brother were reconnected, we have made a point of visiting at least twice a week, sometimes both of us, sometimes only BBB. On those rare times where we don't visit, we are in touch via the telephone.

I can really understand people being uncomfortable with nursing care facilities. Hell, *i'm* not overly fond of them and i spend a couple of hours a week at one, besides the times that my choir performs in them.

It's just a very sad statement that two strangers should end up having to take care of someone, merely because they have become friendly during visits with their own family member.

^_^

Since BBB and Sol and Blinder play WOW together, i get an opportunity once in a while to converse with them via the game. I have been involved in a very large sewing project, which she requested that i write about.

I have been sewing for a very long time, and from time to time have been known to take on projects which give me a little extra spending money.

This summer, i was drafted to sew for a friend's wedding. This consisted of: one wedding dress, three bridesmaids dresses, one flower girl dress, four mens shirts, two boys shirts, one mans kilt, two boys kilts, four drapes for men, three rosettes for women and one lap robe for a man in a wheelchair.

This was a Celtic/renaissance wedding where all of the womens dresses (including the wedding gown and flower girl) have a chemise (under dress) and an over dress. The men were wearing kilts, with the exception of the "man of honor" who is in a wheelchair, so he merely had a lap robe and drape in his family tartan over pants.

The biggest challenge here was the fact that only one of the women (the "best maid") was able to fit the pattern size that i have. All of the others, including the bride, were much larger. I had to adjust the patterns and fit them individually.

The other challenge for me was the flower girl. Do you know that they don't make renaissance patterns for little girls? I had to get a pattern for a fairy outfit, which had the bodice part and the rest was done without a pattern.

Now, that's not to say that the kilts were easy, by any stretch of the imagination. The tartan was Maxwell, and the fabric was *yummy*. It took eight yards for the groom's kilt, and it was a pain in the butt. The biggest compliment that i could have gotten came from the groom. He has an over-the-counter kilt that he also wears and he said that he could see why men liked the handmade kilts better. The one i made him fit him ever so much better and was way more comfortable than his store bought one.

As a matter of fact, i got many compliments from the guests and bridal party. The one thing that didn't happen (which annoyed BBB) was a public thank you from the bride during the reception. In her thank yous, she even included one person whose only contribution was to put plastic up inside the garage because of some leaks, but she didn't manage to thank me for my sewing.

*sigh*

The up side of the wedding was that I got three new contacts for sewing. The man of honor wants a couple of shirts made up in black because his wife wants to get more involved in the ren circuit. There were also a couple of others that took my information and will contact me at a later date for sewing.

I still have more sewing to do (now, where did i put that brown lining fabric?) but i'm going to take a little time before i start the next old project. :-P

^_^

BBB and I were in the "short bus"* after completing an errand and were on the way to return it to where we store it.

Sitting at a stop light, I notice the woman in a van next to us rolling down her window and motioning me to roll down mine. I complied and she leaned out to me saying "Would Santa Claus wave to my son, please? He wants to wave back."

I turned and looked at BBB and he said "sure". He leaned over in his seat and waved at the little boy.

For the next couple of blocks, every time the traffic made us pass them or they passed us, he dutifully waved, because the little boy was waving.

After the van turned off, I turned to BBB.

"I wonder how that mother explained why Santa was driving a short bus?

As we are laughing at that thought, he piped up with "I guess I get to be the HD (Harley Davidson) Santa this year."

He then told me that he was shopping at a local grocery store a couple of weeks ago and a mother pulled her cart up next to him and asked if he would talk to her little girl. He said sure.

The little girl looked up at him and said "Santa, am I going to get a puppy for Christmas?"

BBB looked over the little girl's head at the mother, who nodded, and looked back at the girl and said "I can guarantee that if you're good, you'll get a puppy."

So, I guess that I get to be Mrs Claus if he's going to keep being Santa.

---------------

* We own a handicapped access bus, because BBB's brother is a quadriplegic and we like to be able to take him places.

This isn't anything newsworthy, but a couple of conversations that I wanted to remember at a later time. They fall into the category of "things that make you go Hhmmn".

----------

The first was a conversation a couple of weeks ago, where my friend was telling me that another mutual friend complained that she acted differently when she was alone, compared to when she was with her spouse. She tried very hard to convice me that *everyone* does it.

It was particularly interesting to me for a couple of different reasons, one is that I have also observed it in her. It's a big enough difference that it could almost be a personality switch. When she is alone she is a warm and outgoing person. When she is with her spouse, she is very reserved, almost wanting to fade into the background, leaving him to be the center of attention.

The other reason I find it interesting is that I see a past me in her actions. With my ex-husband, I suppressed my own personality, because he was not a people person. I (consciously or unconsciously) faded into the background so that he would seem more outgoing in contrast.

If you said something to my friend about it, she would protest that her spouse is a drama queen and attention slut and she's just stepping aside and letting him get the attention that he needs. I'm not buying the explanation tho. I believe it's more subtle than that.


The second was a conversation that I had with another friend. We were talking about lots of different things and she said something that totally blew me away.

She told me that I treat her the exact same way, every time I see her. It doesn't matter what situation I see her in, socially, work, privately or just running into her randomly. I always treat her the exact same and she has issues with that. She finds herself getting anxious because I don't immediately drop what I'm doing or interrupt my conversations to pay attention to her. She starts worrying that I'm unhappy with her or mad at her.

I thought that was intriguing, because I had never really thought about the way that I treat her. She is my friend. I treat her no better or worse than any of my other friends.

However, in the past she had been involved with a married man, and she allowed him to treat her as mere aquaintances in public as opposed to when they were in private. Eventually that relationship fell apart and left a bad taste in her mouth for the duality of appearances in relationships in general. (Oh, and did I mention that she's very young?)

Then it was my turn to blow her away, because I relayed the fact that I don't like all of the people that my best friend does.

BF and I have been friends for over 3 decades, and there are some people that she is friends with that I don't care for. At all. Ever. I may wonder in the back of my mind why on *earth* she would want be be friends with them, but it never bothered me that she was.

We ran in different circles in school and our lives have taken different paths as adults, but I never questioned her loyalty to me. The fact that BF has other close friends is a joy and delight to me, because I am deeply satisfied with my friendship with her and it adds another dimension and subject of conversation between us.

---------

In some bizarre way, these two conversations converged within me. I realized that I (try to) treat everyone the same, all the time.

I've been told that it is apparent that BBB and I are nearly joined at the hip, we're so close. Other than specific behaviours that I don't choose to make public, I treat him the same all the time.

My relationship with BBB made the first conversation land rather sour with me. It was also interesting that the person I had the conversation with had *no clue* that I didn't agree with her assertion.

This also brought to light the fact that I am getting rather good at playing the "sweet and stupid" role in conversations, also known as the "smile and nod". I choose my battles carefully, and disagreeing with peoples beliefs is something that I'm at peace with.

Sometimes I just gotta shake my head, though.

^_^

Why is it that when the tire store has a sale, it's never on the size of tire that I need?

The dealership told me that I needed new tires a couple of weeks ago, but I wasn't in any hurry until I drove through a rain squall on the way into work this morning. It's really unnerving when you are driving up a hill on the highway and you lose traction on your tires because you drove through the water coming down the road.

I could really tell the difference on the drive home from the tire store.

*dancing wildly* My baby's got new shoo-ooze!

I've been kind of silent lately, so I thought I'd take the time to give you a bit of an update. My work has also squashed down on excess surfing of the net. Some idiot thought it would be a good idea to do a fantasy football league using the work servers . . . All sports related sites have been blocked and we've been reminded that the web is to be used for work purposes, except for the odd break or lunch here and there.

On the brighter side of work, we got a 4 month reprieve. Our end date has been extended to March 31, 2007, instead of Nov. 30, 2006. However, the new computer system is due to go on line at the beginning of the month. There has been testing, but not of a full month's cycle, nor have they done any parallel testing. :-/ Oh, and training? Fuggedaboudit. We are going to be trained by our manangers, who have no real clue about what we do, and the new system is not intuitive. You need to follow certain steps in order to do the processing we need to do. Training manual? You guessed it. Fuggedaboudit.

*sigh*

I really must do something about finding a new job. (thanks for the tip, RW. I'm sorry I didn't get my resume out there)

I've been real busy at home too. I'm sewing for a midieval . . . ok, rennessiance wedding. Hrm, lessee, 6 shirts (2 child size), 3 kilts (2 child size), 1 lap robe, 6 drapes ( a couple with rosettes), 4 dresses consisting of a chemise and outer dress each (1 child size) and the wedding gown.

It has been a blessing that SolemnDragon and Blinder are playing WOW with BBB. The computers are in my sewing room, so while I am busy stitching (and tearing my hair out) he's in the same room, 'splaining the conversations, the leveling process and exclaiming about what treasures he's found or been given (Sol and B, you really *are* a gift to us too)

Oh, did I mention that the wedding is Nov 11? And the bride finds me on IM asking for progress reports . . .

So, enough of this blather and back to the sewing table.

^_^

I just found out that one of the people that I went to school with recently committed suicide.

She had years of problems with alcohol and depression, including several arrests and detox centers. About 4 months ago she went on a binge and drank so much that her blood alcohol level was .52. About 3 weeks ago, a schoolmate had spoken with her and she confessed that she knew that she had another relapse in her, but that she didn't think that she had another recovery in her.

Sure enough, last Saturday, she went on her last drinking binge and woke up in the local county hospital and was to be shipped off to detox once again. Before the van could arrive to take her there, she walked out of the hospital and went to an overpass and jumped. The bottom was about 3 stories below. (I remember hearing about the traffic tie up caused by the accident, but I couldn't find anything in the local web news about it.)

I say, "that could have been me", because I have a history of alcoholism. My wake up call was a DUI in 1994, where I was caught with a .13 blood alcohol level. Instead of wallowing in my pain and the fact that I could no longer drink, I decided that drinking was no longer an option and quit. Cold turkey.

In September, it will be 12 years clean and sober for me.

My life hasn't been a bed of roses since. As a matter of fact, you may remember that I am currently facing a layoff and will be required to find a new job sometime in the future. (we haven't gotten our pink slips yet, just a "target date")

There have been ample opportunities where I thought "if I was a drinking person, this would be a great time to get shit-faced." I have always known that drinking could be my downfall, and if I started, I wouldn't quit. So I just don't drink.

It's one of those things that makes ya go "hmmnn". (and I'm really glad to be me.)

In other news, BBB had surgery to correct his tear duct last Tuesday. He's doing remarkably well at being "out of commission". Aside from being lightheaded and occasionally nauseous, he is healing rather well. The recent heat wave has not been helpful, however.

I thought that keeping the biker down would be a difficult task, but he's being rather graceful about accepting help. He's limited to lifting 2 pounds and cannot bend over at the waist. He also hasn't driven since the operation because of the lightheaded part and he can't wear sunglasses or his eye swells.

Looks like he'll be around to grow old with.

^_^

Last night, the Mariners played the Minnesota Twins. The pitcher for the Twins was Boof Bonser. BOOF Who names their kid Boof?

Word is, not his parents. He was named John when he was born. He legally changed his name to Boof

My doctor's name is Beard. When his lawyer wife was pregnant, they were discussing names for their first born. They were were talking first and middle names only, and when the little girl was born she was named "Anya Katherine".

It never occurred to them that anything was unusual until my doctor's FIL called him and asked "What's Anya Beard??"

What's the most unusual name you've ever heard?

^_^

p.s. What idiot changed the HTML format for italics to something other than "less than I greater than"?? And does anyone have a clue on what it actually is now?

As per my usual, I am wearing my tiara, and so far I've only gotten stares and no questions. I'm not sure whether it's because it's a lovely rhinestone tiara and not the cheap sequin one of the past (it broke) or whether people have just decided that it's more polite to stare rather than to ask.

Talinom has requested that I post pictures for ya'll. We'll see . . .

^_^

It's been a while since I've posted. It's partially because of laziness, partly because it's been busy and some of the the same old, same old.

Things are starting to get interesting now, so I thought I'd give you an update to show where I am.

The wonderful world of work
Due to the downturn in the property market and the upturn in the mortgage rates, my employer has decided that they really need to cut corners and consolidate departments. There were also a number of acquisitions in a short period of time, which caused redundancies that they want to get rid of.

It appears that my job will be going away, but we are a small department out in the middle of nowhere (the red-headed step-child, as it were) and they have not really addressed our department by name or site. We were included in a meeting that stated that certain functions will be moving to IL this year and then to SC next year, so it appears that we will be out of a job by the end of October, but we should know for sure by July 31 of this year.

Add to that, we are migrating to a new computer system on July 1 and the department that we are attached to is the lead in this switchover. IMO, they are less than competent to be initiating this project.

On the home front
I am going to be making a number of dresses (including the bride's dress) and kilts for a fall wedding. There is a mountain of fabric on my sewing table, and I'll be getting the tartan tonight for the kilts. On the other hand, BBB has been busy with his handyman work and won't be short of jobs this summer. (*RW, we need to get together with you to figure out what your plans are for the deck.)

We have a new pet. While helping a friend move, we were given a beta. I asked what his name was and was told "uh, fish?" So in honor of that, BBB and I have named it "Fishor Cut".

I don't want to bore y'all with a long JE detailing everything that's been going on, but I wanted to let you know I'm still here and still reading.

^_^