Catch-up and Mustard...

Kitty cat roll call: Ziggy, Killer Shrew, Maus, Mewstradamus and Entropy...

Hmmm, where to begin???

Since Sunday my world has gone to "the place where the guy dressed in red with the pointy horns and pitchfork lives" and back... (Gotta be family friendly). Monday, I went into work and it all broke loose within the first 1.5 hours. I got the bragsheet (Rev 2) to the boss by the end of the day. OK, so the end of the day was 7pm, but I got it to him. I put my entire working life on hold for the afternoon and locked myself into a conference room with a large stash of sugar! It worked! Tuesday, it was still broken loose. One problem was waiting for confirmation of a fix, the other blow-up we eliminated some suspects and found a couple more... Today (I think we have made it to Wednesday), I sent Rev 3 of my bragsheet to the boss, still waiting for confirmation on the fix and the other problem seems to have narrowed to one suspect toolset. Finally, I have a chance to breathe at work! Hey, I may get out of here by 5 today :-)

I finally got my refill on my ADD prescription. I ran out on Monday, so I had to use a leftover dose that was half my normal dose. Yup, everyone at work noticed a HUGE difference... One of my friends here commented I was "flighty". Now, that may work well for an aerospace engineer, but it doesn't cut it in semiconductor processing...

Last night, I made it to our STITCH AND BITCH meeting... (Say it loud, say it proud!) We started working on our Jaywalker socks! Here are some pics from Scout and Carole.I am using Opal Rainforest with size 1 needles. Today, I am finally seeing the pattern. It is SO COOL! I will put up a pic of the progress when I have enough time to be home and operating a camera.... (Maybe Thursday or Sunday...) Why are people who don't knit so amazed at the work that people do while knitting? My boss thinks it is really cool (and has brought people by my cube while I am knitting on lunch because this is a really strange sight to behold...), co-workers comment on it all of the time... I don't understand it. I do this so I don't go off the deep end...

My kid was visiting some friends in Clovis over the holiday weekend. He came back with his hair dyed BLACK... Now normally, the kid has light brown hair, so this is still taking a bit to get used to. I asked him if he was going "goth" and he looked at me and said "Are you kidding me??? They are WEIRD!" Yup, that was the pot calling the kettle black... I should know, I proudly consider myself weird also!!!

Ice time - haven't had any... With the tool issue and the BS keeping me busy throughout the weekend (including going into work both Saturday and Sunday) and the beginning of this week, I haven't had a chance to breathe and sleep regularly, let alone skate. I am hoping to get onto the ice tonight for a bit and see if I can continue the streak of good edges and good skating. My Friday lunch skate is shot this week. We have a new engineer (that will be shadowing me next week) that we are taking out to lunch for a "welcome to the family..." event. My group here at work is absolutely the BEST! I couldn't ask for a better bunch of people to work with...

music meme!

List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they're any good, but they must be songs you're really enjoying now. Post these instructions in your journal/blog along with your seven songs. Then tag seven other people to see what they're listening to.
1. Intuition - Jewel
2. Wrap your arms around me - Barenaked Ladies
3. Landing in London - 3 Doors Down
4. How Do You Do - Mouth and McNeil
5. Beverly Hills - Weezer
6. You and Me - Lifehouse
7. Breathe - Anna Nalick

Ok! I want to know what everyone else is listening to, so consider yourself tagged!

HI!

Roxie says "HI!"

I know, it's not Friday

Yeah, I said I would update on Friday. Yes, I know today is Sunday. I know Friday is NOT the same day as Sunday...

This is our canary... His name is Godzilla! We found out yesterday that Godzilla loves figure skating. He was singing up a storm during both the men's and women's national championships.

This has been one of those weeks where "work/life balance" has meant that you still know what the folks look like who are also listed someplace on your tax return...

Right now, we are all in the process of writing final revisions of what are called "bragsheets" at work (abbreviated BS). Unfortunately, our raises, promotions and future with the company depends on how well we write BS. We lose a good 2 weeks worth of productivity every 6 months so we can take a break and craft the BS. In a couple of weeks, our boss is going to bring our BS and it's going to be compared to everyone else's BS and they rank your BS to see how well you have done this year... So for these couple of weeks, we all stress out and make the lives of our loved ones a living hell... Thank my higher power my boss doesn't read my blog ;-)

Friday was my first day back on the ice again... WOW! It felt SOOOOO good! I worked on my edges for the first hour then decided to play around and see what happened. My waltz jumps looked really nice. I was shocked that I was able to fire them off right in a row and land them solid. Then I started playing around with spins and for the first time, I was able to skate into them. I also played around with making up some footwork. I am learning my lesson on the ice. You can't force things, you need to take it easy and keep the balance and control and then things happen. When you try to "go for it" or push it, you make mistakes and mess up. Watching the US figure skating national championships taught me a lot. First, I learned that even the best skaters fall on jumps. The level of perfection that I had thought every senior level skater had was false. They learn, like I do. Yeah, they are a hell of a lot better then I will ever be (don't see me ever doing a triple axel/triple toe loop combo at any time in my life. I don't see me doing a triple anything in this lifetime), but they are not perfect. This illusion of perfection I had always had is truly an illusion. I also learned edges are the most important thing I can keep working on right now. The better my edges are, the more comfortable I am on the edges, the better EVERY move will look!

On the knitting front, not much going on. I went to Village Wools on Saturday am after work to pick up some needles for my socks. While I was there, I thought it would be nice to use the gift certificate I got for Christmas. I ended up picking up some Regia, 2 Opals, some Falk (trying a solid color for socks) and some new Addi Turbos for my attempt at socks on 2 Circs. I also found the sock book of my dreams called Sensational Knitted Socks by Charlene Schurch. I am working on a 6 stitch pattern from the book on 2 circs. It has been really fun to do. Since I am knitting this one top-down and I don't have any experience using Regia, I am not sure how long to make the top. I think I will err on the side of caution on this one...

They are predicting snow for tonight and tomorrow. I sure hope so, it has been way too dry this winter...