Thursday's Thoughts

It is Thursday and the worst is over for another week. Story time is over so all the little spawn have left, the building is picked up and all the toys put back, and it is QUIET! It helps that I have finished all of my chores and can play for the rest of the day.

I am returning to a well-nigh permanent rant for a bit, so please excuse the repetition. I have just been informed – AGAIN! – that as a single female I am not doing God’s Will. Seems that it is in the Bible that women are to be married and producing children while listening to their men folk about what is best for them.

Does "what a load of shit" mean anything to anyone? I get so freaking tired of this crap & it grates because I seem to have this mystical sign floating above my head that says, ”She Cares!” and “She needs to hear this!” Now, since I do not care & really do not want to hear anyone’s life story, I find this rather trying & my nerves do not stand the stress well. I am already fairly high strung, but this pushes every last nerve I have. Just because I say hello and have a smile on my face, oh, & actually look at people, does not mean I give a rat’s ass.

OK, that’s done. Thank you for bearing with me.

Change of subject now, but I just got in yesterday’s mail a wonderful surprise from a friend of mine. She sent me the “Firefly” series, along with a wonderful vanilla-scented candle, stickers, stationary, and an absolutely adorable note pad that I will probably take the cover & frame because I like it so much, and some odds & ends for my cats. Opening that box just brightened my day immeasurably.

Then, to help her gift counteract the evil miasma created by the hounding I have been receiving lately, 2 other friends sent me pictures! Yippie! 1 set was of a friend & her 4 month old adorable daughter. Those were fantastic!

The other set was an online album that another friend took while she was doing her missionary work in the Ukraine. Those pictures were enough to make me grateful for modern kitchens. Anytime I do not have to use a make to start the fire so that I can make breakfast, I am going to say a small prayer of thanksgiving. Every kitchen picture in that album has an oven that requires wood or coal. Yes, I could fumble my way through the experience, but give me modern appliances any day of the week.

Then, 1 of my staunch supporters here at work sent me this joke.

Subject: 1st GRADE!! 3rd grade test A first-grade teacher, Ms. Brooks, was having trouble with one of her students. The teacher asked, "Harry, what's your problem?" Harry answered, "I'm too smart for the 1st grade. My sister is in the 3rd grade and I'm smarter than she is! I think I should be in the 3rd grade too!" Ms. Brooks had had enough. She took Harry to the principal's office. While Harry waited in the outer office, the teacher explained to the principal what the situation was. The principal told Ms. Brooks he would give the boy a test. If he failed to answer any of his questions he was to go back to the 1st grade and behave. She agreed. Harry was brought in and the conditions were explained to him and he agreed to take the test. Principal: "What is 3 x 3?" Harry: "9." Principal: "What is 6 x 6?" Harry: "36." And so it went with every question the principal thought a 3rd grader should know. The principal looks at Ms. Brooks and tells her, "I think Harry can go to the 3rd grade." Ms. Brooks says to the principal, "Let me ask him some questions." The principal and Harry both agreed. Ms. Brooks asks, "What does a cow have four of that I have only two of?" Harry, after a moment: "Legs." Ms. Brooks: "What is in your pants that you have but I do not have?" The principal wondered why she would ask such a question! Harry replied: "Pockets." Ms. Brooks: "What does a dog do that a man steps into?" Harry: "Pants." Ms. Brooks: What starts with a C, ends with a T, is hairy, oval, delicious, and contains thin, whitish liquid?" Harry: "Coconut." The principal sat forward with his mouth hanging open. Ms. Brooks: "What goes in hard and pink then comes out soft and sticky?" The principal's eyes opened really wide and before he could stop the answer, Harry replied, "Bubble gum." Ms. Brooks: "What does a man do standing up, a woman does sitting down and a dog does on three legs?" Harry: "Shake hands." The principal was trembling. Ms. Brooks: "What word starts with an 'F' and ends in 'K' that means a lot of heat and excitement?" Harry: "Fire truck." The principal breathed a sigh of relief and told the teacher, "Put Harry in the fifth-grade, I got the last seven questions wrong...... "

Changing subjects again, but this is a bit of personal trivia that is bugging me. Due to a death, I contacted my ex-fiancé via his grandfather so that he would know and could send his condolences. I figured it was the right thing to do because the person who had just died mattered in his personal world. Mattered in mine as well, but I could not get off work to attend the funeral so all I can do is send a card & flowers. But anyway, the point is that instead of hearing back from the ex, I got an email telling me how he & his wife had separated and he had disappeared.

This blew me away completely because his mother is the sun his world revolves around, with his father & grandfather being the moons. They were incredibly close and, when I knew them well, they adored one another. So now my curiosity streak is itching madly because I want to know what happened to change the situation. I will be the 1st to agree that he is/was an arrogant, pompous, chauvinistic, control freak, but those adjectives can easily apply to me as well, though I hope no one has ever thought of me as chauvinistic. But I did live with him for more years than I care to recall & he was exactly what I needed when we met. So I guess I still care about how he is doing. Not enough to go track him down or anything insane like that, but I want to know that he is at least content.
From the letters he sent up till his marriage, I think he was desperately unhappy, but when he met his now ex-wife, he was happy again & it was SUCH a relief. I had been feeling guilty because I had broken up with him & since we had been in the middle of wedding plans, I know it was a definite shock. He actually joined the military once he finally accepted my decision, though in his letters he made it clear he did it partially because he could not find a job, partially to help keep his mind occupied, and partially to become more of the man he thought I wanted & needed.

Does guilt trip sound about right to anyone else? Thank God I have the circle of friends I do because it almost worked.

But, he met someone & amazingly enough my life became vastly easier, though the letter that came with his wedding invitation was rather odd. I hope to NEVER get a letter like that again. She informed me that she appreciated all the experiences the 2 of us had together because it helped make him the man she fell in love with, and how she hoped that we could become friends because I obviously meant so much to him & she just knew we were destined to be friends.

I had visions of arsenic in my dinner. I sent a gift along with my decision not to attend.
Seemed the smart thing to do.

Subject change –

I realized this morning when I stepped outside & it had gone from the mid-80’s to lower 50’s that I need different shoes. I did a mental tally of what I own shoe wise & realized that I have my heels that go with various formal wear, I have sandals ranging from plastic flip flops to the Dr. Scholl’s slip-ons, tennis shoes not fit for public viewing (which is why I wear them only at 6 am to take the dogs walking) & a pair of knee high moccasins. That is it. I have nothing remotely resembling casual work shoes that I can wear with skirts or slacks when it gets chilly.

This is terrifying because it means I have to brave shoe departments. I wear a 6 ½ with an extremely high arch, which means that I need shoes with laces or low in front so that I can get them on. Wearing a 6 ½ shoe means I have to go questing because that is not a common size. To further complicate matters, the only time I wear brown is if it is a leather bomber jacket. Otherwise, I have NOTHING brown, unless you count greenish khaki slacks as brown. So that cuts ½ the remaining selection down. And then there is the comfort aspect which means anything remotely attractive has to be tried on because there is a fairly strong chance they will not fit, even if they do match all the necessary superficial criteria.

I can find an entire outfit from the skin out, including purse & jewelry, faster than I can find 1 pair of shoes. This is terrifying.

I also need my hair trimmed, which is just annoying.

Ooops. Just checked my work email & had a nasty gram. Nothing like petty annoyances to make life just grand and show what people are really like. But I have checked out several cookbooks & have left them with various friends. Problem is that they are past due & I can’t renew them because there are holds. Normally not a big deal, except that the next person waiting for these cookbooks is my uber boss & she is a general pain. Not a bad person, but generally the sort I would rather go to the dentist for a root canal than sit through another meeting she chairs. Oh well. Guess I get to be demanding & gather up books this weekend.

I just found this at cnn.com –
'Literary' texts no more?
Project reduces classic works to text messages
Thursday, November 17, 2005; Posted: 2:32 p.m. EST (19:32 GMT)
Bottom of Form
LONDON, England (AP) -- "Romeo, Romeo -- wher4 Rt thou Romeo?"
It could be the future of Shakespeare.
Dot mobile, a British mobile phone service aimed at students, says it plans to condense classic works of literature into SMS text messages. The company claims the service will be a valuable resource for studying for exams.
Academic purists will be horrified. Hamlet's famous query, "To be or not to be, that is the question," becomes "2b? Nt2b? ???"
John Milton's epic poem "Paradise Lost" begins "devl kikd outa hevn coz jelus of jesus&strts war." ("The devil is kicked out of heaven because he is jealous of Jesus and starts a war.")
Some may dismiss the summaries as cheat notes for the attention-deficit generation, but John Sutherland, a University College London English professor who consulted on the project, said they could act as a useful memory aid.
"The educational opportunities it offers are immense," said Sutherland, who chaired the judging panel for this year's Booker Prize for fiction.
Sutherland said the compressed nature of text messages allowed them to "fillet out the important elements in a plot."
"Take for example the ending to Jane Eyre -- 'MadwyfSetsFyr2Haus.' (Mad wife sets fire to house.) Was ever a climax better compressed?"
But political commentator and author Oliver Kamm said the terse texts were "more than a travesty."
"What you lose with text messaging in literature is what makes literature what it is -- the imagery, the irony, the nuance," he told British Broadcasting Corp. radio.
"What I fear will happen with text versions of Shakespeare is that students will be encouraged not to read the books but to settle for something else, and people don't need excuses not to read books. They don't read enough as it is."
Books planned for the service include Charles Dickens' "Bleak House," whose tale of the interminable legal suit of Jarndyce and Jarndyce is reduced to a few snappy lines, and Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice," which describes hunky Mr. Darcy as "fit&loadd" (handsome and wealthy).
Dot mobile said it planned to launch the service in January, with Shakespeare's complete works available by April. The texts will be free to subscribers to the company's phone service.
Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Talk about a farce!