Happy Halloween 2014

I don't usually celebrate any holiday except for my birthday. Birthdays are REAL holidays. You don't share those with anyone else you know, usually. YOU are the star of the show.

Other holidays are too commercialized for me. Halloween too, but not as bad.

But I want to wish anyone who goes all out for holidays a Happy Halloween.

*throws glitter*

I am giving out candy and chips.

Chips, Now & Laters, and bite-sized snickers. I will ruin some child's teeth for sure tonight.

I went looking for full sized candy bars, but I would have to buy a box of 48 bars. It is not going down like that. I only have 10-15 children come through. What the world will I do with a couple dozen of left over full sized snicker bars? I will not be bringing those to work. No way. Negroes who really don't like me would be up in my face, cheesing at my desk. Nope.

The local Whole Foods have... interesting pumpkins. 

Interesting.  Heirloom fruits and vegetables are pretty popular. But these look diseased.  A regular pumpkin would do just fine. Thank you very much.


One of my cubicle mates Lady S is always up for holiday decorations at her desk.

I was very much mesmerized by the witch ink pen in front of the Easter Basket.

I joke with her, whispering "I'm gonna put a nice bible verse up here on your desk."

She usually has a voodoo doll. Not this year. So I will save my bible verse for next year.

The folks at work, in the building next to mine, like to decorate.

They put their shredded paper in a pumpkin plastic waste bag. 

Someone even built a scarecrow.

He has on a workplace lab coat. That reminds me to order new ones.

And here's a display at the local mexican restaurant near the job...

He looks a little sad or tired.

And that's how I feel and look after a long hard day at work... minus the liquor and cigarette and the sombrero.

LOL

Anyway, if you are out and about this holiday weekend, be safe... on purpose.

Word Play 5

Today we have a HUGE word:

magnetoencelphalograph

That is a BIG word.

8 syllables long!

And it's a type of instrument. Sort of kin to an x-ray machine, CT scan, MRI and the like. I think in this case magnetism is used in order to measure the electrical currents of the brain. And it looks as if some of the data was used to dismiss the whole notion that we use only 10% of our brain.

Something like that. I just know when I saw that word, I thought...

Dang! That is a huge word.

And I can use it for my 30 minute word exercise.

Let's see if I can get over 100 words in 30 minutes.

magnet, harp, net, mag, tone, cone, game, name, graph, rap, hag, gap, gape, halo, par, gel, note, net, lace, mace, hall, log, hog, rag, rape, goat, help, peal, goal, tone, agent, tame, came, cell, lame, collagen, call, mall, pro, heat, meat, neat, oat, pare, care, tare, tear, creep, ten, men, lean, goo, pool, cool, hoop, grope, rope, cope, hello, melt, goal, coal, rage, cage, parent, apparent, place, gent, gentle, lap, cello, pone, one, omen, once, loot, moot, mean, poll, placate, tonal, lent, meant, cent, pent, tempo, temporal, recent, logo, noon, moon, tangent, clap, clop, lop, gel, caller, hope, let, nap, pan, pane, cane, mane, halogen, alpha, mantle, camphor, camp, got, germ, gem, garment, cement, remote, large, march, arch, mange, gram, ram, tam, tome, gene, aloha, roll, toll, mole, pole, logger, hogger, tonal, local, mat, mate, pat, cat, grate, crate, rate, pleat, carpet, mono, monogram, champ, chap, hamper, camper, planar, plane, trace, grace, cram, telephone, phone. groan, moan, loan, lone

159 words.

I thought I would have done better than that. But I found that I needed a "s", and an "i".

Oh well. I learned a new word.

Of Pam and Motorcycles

So my car Pam has a few isshas from time to time.

That's her from her good side. The other side... well the tires have no hubcaps. I need to drive her more. Right now I may put around 500 miles a year on her.  I am sorry, but I have become a little more high class now. I like Lucy Jr. the Lexus' leather. Yes I do. But I jump in Pam every once in awhile.

Recently she needed some new front tires. It looks as if there were some dry rot issues.  They were REALLY old.  I bought some new tires a few years ago, but I like to buy two at a time.  That same day my brake switch broke. That's not that big of a deal. It is responsible for the brake lights going on and off. And with it broken, the lights stay on.

I could drive it, but I would have to unhook the battery for the night so the brake lights wouldn't drain the battery.

No big deal. I just order the part off of amazon. It is only $40.

So my cubicle mate Cowgirl Cre's father "Daddy Cre" takes care of that. Here he is the last time.

I am not limber enough to take care of all that. So when it broke this time, I called him up early on a Saturday morning. He told me to come on over. So I had to jump out of bed and shower and hightail it on over there before he left out for the day.

They only live 10 minutes away. So I made it over there in 9 minutes, lol.

Anyway, I like to go on in the house and chat it up with Momma Cre while Daddy Cre fixes my car.

And I like perusing the beautifully framed pictures on the dining room wall.

If you go in many black family homes these days, there will be pictures of the Obamas up on the wall. There is a nice one on the wall there:

That is nice...

But the pictures that draw me like a magnet are the ones of Daddy Cre... on his motorcycle.

That's a cool picture right there.

But this next picture is the coolest of all...

Now that is an awesome picture. I love it!

"I think I took those pictures," Cowgirl Cre said, when I asked her permission to post them.

I can believe that. And I can hear him now. "Hold on Cre, let me put my foot up. Let me lean over. Now take the picture."

*Cre snaps picture*

And that was long before the advent of digital cameras and cell phone cameras. Those pictures are from cameras loaded with film. And the film had to be developed by the drug store's photo department.

Those pictures will never get old. They are full of character and originality.

And Cowgirl Cre said, "That's how I remember my Daddy."

That's how I remember him too. I know he doesn't ride his motorcycle anymore, but those photos are timeless.

And I hope they will always keep those pictures up on the wall.

Quote of the Day: Of Self Worth and Opinions

I heard a couple of interesting quotes on Sirius XM this morning. I don't have the person's name, but I think he's a financial and business guru. But I thought they were good quotes to write down...

Not one ounce of my self worth depends on your opinion of me. 

Now that's a good one.

You know, when I make decisions, or I am talking to people about decisions they want to make - especially positive ones or ones that move towards our purposes- it never fails that one big thing comes up: worrying what others will say or think about it.  There's that old fear of rejection, too.

And I always wonder... if what others have to say was out of the way, would we do more with our lives?

Just a question.

And all of this is complicated by people are experts on the lives of others... but are not fully aware of their own lives.

We are terribly judgmental, yet afraid to be judged. 

You know it's true.

So I thought that was a good post. Worth remembering...

Here's to a healthy since of self-worth. 

Friday Freestyles

Today...

Is...

Friday...

Thank goodness for that. For one, it is PayDay. Second, it has been a LONG week. Too much to post about. 

I have a ton of posts, and a ton of pictures. The problem is loading all these pictures. And I haven't felt like doing that.  So I may just do some abbreviated madness.

The biggest thing this week has been with your girl Callie Jo...

She is a long way from the little 0.3 pound kitten she was...



Her eyes changed color. When did that happen?  And thank goodness I don't have to clean her eyes everyday. She grew out of that.

She is 5.5 pounds now... all cat at 6 months of age.  And Wednesday she got...

SPAYED.

She had her ovaries and uterus removed. Ugh.

It is more than a notion. Lawd have mercy, remind me to only get boy cats from now on. LAWD. Neutering is a lot less intense than spaying. Oh my!

I will write more about that ordeal next week.

Right now she is a prisoner of love.

A prisoner of love... in her Elizabethan collar. And she is NOT happy about it. Not one bit.  You can tell by the way she has thrown all that shredded paper all over the place.

More on that next week.

I also, on the same day I dropped Callie off at the vet, picked Grandma up... Well first I got a phone call.

*phone rings*
"Hello?"
"Hey Lisa, is that you?"
"Yes," I said. I knew it was Grandma.
"The doctor called about my shoes. They said they are in"
"Uh okay," I said, as I remembered that she ordered a pair when I took her to the podiatrist last month.
"The doctor said my shoes are ready," she repeated.
"Okay," I said. "You have another appointment in a couple of weeks. We can get them then."
"But my shoes," she said again. "The doctor say they are ready."

So you know what this means... Grandma's shoes were IN and she wanted them as soon as possible.

So we went and picked up her shoes. This is a serious trek, as Grandma walks as slow as Tim Conway.


So I picked her up...

 Look at her... She was ready in her sweats and pullover windbreaker. I got there at around 8:45 am after dropping off Callie Jo for her spay. I thought I would have a couple of hours to just sit around and wait for her to get ready, but she was standing there ready. 

And we went and picked up her shoes...

Those are some good shoes. If I could slip my size 10s into her size 6s, I surely would.

And you should've seen the smile that spread across her face when she tried them on at the doctor's office. I wish I could've taken a picture. I reached down to make sure that her toes were in the right place and asked her to wiggle them. The shoes are just right for her feet.

She got up and walked around in them. It was like the scene out of Forrest Gump, when Forest walked around the office in his new leg braces (all 'cept Grandma didn't fall down).

She is happy with her shoes.

And I am glad I could take off to take her to go get them.

That was the pinnacle of my week. My feel-good moment.

And that is it for my freestyles. I don't have much going on for the weekend. I have to keep Callie Jo still for 10-14 days. That's not going to happen, but I will be eyeing her from a short distance.

I have a lot of reading to do. I came across something I have never heard of before... Fractal Geometry. It peaked my interests. I must investigate further.  I am also reading a book on the origins of ebola. Ya'll better get out here and read instead of watching all this manufactured news... hear me now, believe me later on that.

Overall, I am hoping for a quiet weekend. I hope the temperature gets up, though. Aren't you tired of this weather already? It is COLD!

Have a good weekend... On purpose!