Electronics Fear Me!

Apparently, I am so good at my job that my mere presence can resolve problems with the electronics. Here are two examples:

1. My coworker, in the next cubicle, was getting an error message when she was starting her computer this morning. Also troublesome, was the fact that her normal array of desktop icons was not showing up. After attempting to reboot twice she asked if I could take a look. All I did was stand there and watch while she rebooted again, and everything worked perfectly!


2. About a half hour later, a manager from one of our dining locations called and let me know that their card reader was "completely dead". Turns out it wasn't powering up, and she wasn't sure if it was the power cord or the reader itself. I quickly reprogrammed a reader for her location and grabbed a power cord so I could test both possibilities. When I arrived at the location I plugged the original reader into the original power cord (for testing purposes) and it worked just fine. Both the manager and the cashier were baffled because they had tried three different power outlets (one on the other side of the building) and couldn't get it to power up. Yes, I did leave the back up reader and power cord there just in case, but it's been a few hours and I haven't gotten any reports of it being broken again!

You just have to love days like that, when your mere presence just makes things better. And now that I've jinxed my golden touch, all I can say is that I hope you are having a great day!

Letting my inner Betty out

In case you hadn't heard, yesterday was Betty Crocker's 90th birthday. I'd say the lady has aged fairly well.

(Image from the Betty Crocker website)

While I'd love to make the trip to Golden Valley to thank her for the dozens and dozens of her brownies I've had over the years, that just isn't going to happen. So, instead, tomorrow I'm going to let my inner Betty out and try a couple of recipes from the Betty Crocker website.

I'll be trying Rolled Italian Meatloaf and Broccoli with Sweet Red Pepper and Garlic. Well, I'll do my own variation of those recipes anyway. You know I can't NOT make adjustments. If we're lucky I'll have another blog post about the results on Friday. Which will herald the comeback of "Foodie Fridays"!

I sure hope these turn out delicious as they look!

Our Laundromat is Haunted

The laundromat TheHusband and I go to is haunted. Not in the scary poltergeist-y kind of way, because we would totally NEVER go there again if it were (because you want to have clean clothes after a visit to the laundromat and not, well, you know).

Casper's dryer is the one
with the sign on it.

Nope our laundromat seems to have a benign little ghost. We call him Casper. He likes to play with the dryers. Well, one dryer specifically. He'll turn it on and off even when there aren't any clothes in it. Mostly though he likes to play with the lights/exhaust fan in the bathroom. There can be no one anywhere near the bathroom, yet all of a sudden the light will pop on and the exhaust fan will start to run. Then just as suddenly the light & fan will turn off.

Now you may think that an overly sensitive motion sensor is to blame, but you'd be wrong. On several occasions I've seen people walk into the bathroom and nothing happens. And by nothing I mean the light won't come on until they actually manually push the little button to turn it on. I've even had it happen to me.

Faulty wiring or a playful ghost? You can judge for yourself, but now that I think about it nothing strange happened on Halloween while we were there. I guess Casper must have been out trick or treating.

The Empties Speak

(A bit of a flashback from sometime during 1996 through 1998. This poem was written for a Writer's Workshop class taught by Phil Dacey.)

The Empties Speak

We were hand picked for what only we
could offer, a sweet innocence our
lovers drank to fill their bodies' needs.
They spent their money on us, for us.
For the price of a drink they wanted
us to open without protesting.
They found that we had built defenses
to protect ourselves from the world.
But they were patient and overcame
our walls. We had learned to trust and poured
our secrets out to them. We offered
sweetness on their lips and refreshment
for their souls. Time and again they came
to us for our pleasures, leaving us
drained of everything we had to give.
Now we sit here, empty, alone, void
of almost all value, to be kicked
around until someone decides
to pick us up and refill our souls.
We are the forgotten lovers left
in the garbage to be thrown away,
or recycled and used again.

(a syllabic poem)

Reigniting an old hobby.

Recently TheHusband and I have discussed me finding some things to do besides spending hours on the computer. Yes, I still work 5 days a week, but the pain from the spondylitis has been getting worse and I spend much of my time at home in my recliner (where I have the least amount of discomfort).

I do a lot of reading (my Nook and the internet), watch Netflix, and play Facebook games, but let me be honest, I can only spend so much time on any of those activities before my mind and/or body start to get fidgety.  So today I've been really thinking about what types of things I can do while sitting in my recliner.

I've decided that it's time for me to dust off the needlepoint skills I picked up as a young girl. I have all sorts of supplies in the basement and should be able to find a fun project or two in no time. In fact, I may just start with something like the emoticon coasters I found over at mrxstitch.com.

I think they are adorable and would probably make a great gift for someone. Perhaps I'll even start creating my own designs with the cross stitch program I've had for a while. Who knows what the future holds?