Weird Weather!

From 53 degrees and slightly rainy to wild high winds and tornadoes on the ground.....to 16 degrees and violent snow blowing horizontally, in two hours.

In January.


That was last evening; today it's off to work in {shudder] nine degree weather.....

View from my bedroom window:


Dunno what to do with that, especially in this cold. {re-shudder} Oh, well, off to work!

New Beginnings: Employment

....got the job I'd been waiting to see if I'd get....

Is it just me, or do you never get over that initial nervousness? It's like the first day of school....not being sure how to present, how it will go, what to do.....

Not scared. Eager. Anticipation. Kind of a mental loop of "Oh wow oh shit oh wow oh shit oh wow!"

First job in my new field, and me still in school. Deep breath.

I go in tomorrow morning for the drug test scheduling, pounds of paperwork filling, and so forth......

Meanwhile, I've gone on a rampage of piecing baby quilt tops. Started out light on inspiration, then picked up speed and actually found some.

Baby Quilt Tops

They're not in the order I made them, but in the order I photographed them, more or less. You might be able to sort the poorly-inspired from the later stuff, I dunno.... :)

The Clueless in the DELL

The joys of getting a divorce, complicated by the fact that my ex has changed from a male human with a masculine name ("Guy", shall we say) to a female human with a feminine name ("Girl", for blog purposes).

Between us, we had subscriptions to six different Dell publications (puzzle magazines, mystery magazines, sf magazines). Time was, my four subscriptions were under my name ("Piggie", for our purposes); his two were under his name ("Guy").

I noticed somewhere along the way that somebody in their subscription department had decided to "tidy up" subscriptions to the same address/same surname, and all six subscriptions had started coming to "Piggie/Guy Surname", but didn't think much of it. I hope they held out for matching surnames at least when they made the decision, and didn't "consolidate" the accounts of folks in different apartments in the same building...

Fast forward to divorce/separate households. Lovely online forms; I try to change the ex's subscriptions to her new address and the name on hers to her new name.

[You would THINK someone at Dell had heard of divorce. Hell, I'd be inclined to assume someone at Dell has HAD a divorce their very own selves! But apparently not.]

Dell refuses to change the name, insists on moving ALL SIX subscriptions to the ex's new residence.

I move mine back and try to change name AGAIN; it moves all six, insists that the subscriptions MUST belong to "Piggie/Guy", will not change that. I sell house and move, change address, try to change name again.

To this day, still getting all six subscriptions at my address, all to "Piggie/Guy", cannot get that changed, cannot get them separated. Have decided the only way out of this morass is to let ALL subscriptions expire, but half suspect they will attempt to resurrect "Piggie/Guy" even as a new subscription. Attempts to contact customer service and reach a human online have accomplished precisely zip.

Having managed today (with the investment of time, patience, and a hands-free headset) to get the AARP accounts sorted out and the existence of Mr. No Such Person Not Married deleted (yes, I have physical possession of a membership card in that name), I'm contemplating tackling Dell tomorrow by phone.

If I'm brave.

Wish me luck.

New Beginnings

And a new semester has started, and a new phase in the RCIA class.....

It so happened last week that the youth group bake sale and our first week of break-out discussion were on the same week, so Kathy, who was leading our discussion, picked up a few cookies at the sale for our own sort of "community sharing", sharing some of the community-type characteristics of the Eucharist.

I thought that was pretty cool, so I made banana bread tonight to take for tomorrow's break-out discussion......

I'm having a bit of trouble getting my head in gear for the new semester. One of my classes got cancelled; another doesn't start until March. Of the other two, it's not that I'm unenthusiastic about the material---I'm not. Just having trouble getting back into the homework mentality.....

It'll come. Just feeling a half a bubble out of plumb at the moment, and very alone.

Update: Make-It!

I've been reminded by Lil Squeegles that the appliance in question is NOT called a "microwave", it's called a "make-it."

I sit corrected. :)

Job Description of a Gramma

Part of the job description of a Gramma is that they Fix Things. Making Everything Better is our specialty.....even if it's just repairing our thrift shop kitchen.

Lovely workplace, it is, except that the microwave worked a tad iffily in the absence of a door.

One Gramma, two screws, one sidewalk chalk bin lid, one cable tie and a bit of yellow duct tape later, the microwave has a door.

Better get really good at this Gramma stuff: second grandbaby on the way!

But this one will always be Gramma's Special Baby Cakes.....even when she's sixteen and would much rather not be. :)