I was at the dentists office yesterday for a regular checkup. While I was in the chair, I noticed that they were playing 80s Heavy Metal office wide as the background music. One example-- AC DC's Highway To Hell. It wasn't a Muzak instrumental version. It was the original version.
How did that happen? When did we decide that old Heavy Metal is now safe office music. Or maybe it's always been that way. In 25 years today's risqué music will be heard, unedited, in elevators everywhere.
The husband is taking a hard look at his career. His company has just gone through a large reorg with many job cuts. He is very uncertain about his new job and his new manager. He is pretty sure that he could earn another $30K or $40K at a different company.
He has traveled to Dallas this week for internal meetings. He is having good talks with his new manager.
C2 and I had dinner last night. Over dinner he mentioned that he had to "be on" when we have dinner together-- be a nicer person-- be a little more talkative. Sometimes he just wants to hang out with someone and not talk about things, or be nice.
Late on, I told the husband this. He laughed a little.
From that point of view, the husband is the opposite of C2. The husband is uncomfortable when he's around people and they aren't talking to each other.
Good for you! I have to admit I still have Instagram and TikTok, but I try to minimize the amount of time I spend on them.
I have uninstalled Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & Reddit.
I have started using Mastodon. I'm not sure I'm going to stick with it. It's a bit chaotic.
Getting off of social media is as much about me trying to reclaim some time in my day than it is a political statement about Musk or Zuckerberg. Thought that did help. Their recent flare ups have caused me to ask "Where am I spending my time? How can I better do so?"
I am blogging a bit more. Though those have been very matter-of-fact. I am also reading more.
Pulling up Facebook or Twitter is a very strong habit. Even a week after removing their apps, I regularly take out my phone and go to the spot where their icons once sat. Now I stare at the blank space and contemplate what to do next.
We've put up our indoor Christmas decorations-- our Christmas tree, wreaths and a nativity scene. We are traveling a bit in the next few weeks, so this weekend was as good as any.
Saturday we attended a sober, Drag Queen Bingo fundraiser. It was good. I won a gift card.
We also saw the Planter's NUTMOBILE. Somehow they got word of the fundraiser and so they showed up. We talked to the drivers for a while. It's an interesting job. They are friends with the folks who run Oscar Mayer's Weinermobile.
Sunday evening was cut short. The husband was originally going to travel for work on Monday. His flight was canceled. He ended up leaving late Sunday.
The cousins are off. They have flown back to England. Our home is back to its usual self.
The weather is thoroughly fall now. Rain. Cool. In small talk, people are commenting how rapidly it changed. One day we had summer weather. The next day it was fall.
We are discussing putting up Christmas this weekend. We are traveling to Ontario for the last two weeks of November. So next weekend will be the last weekend we can do it, unless we want to put it up late.
Christmas decorations please the husband.
Of course good news can't go unchallenged. Mom is in the hospital. She will be OK.
For sometime now, years, Mom has been prone to seizures and groggy episodes. When she has a groggy episode, she becomes quiet. She can't safely stand. It's like she's half asleep. When an episode comes on, dad will put her to bed or lay her on the sofa. Five or ten minutes later she will snap out of it, return to normal and not remember anything wrong.
This morning she had an extended groggy episode. My parents had breakfast. Everything was fine. Then she started to fade out. Dad put her to bed. That was two hour ago. She wasn't snapping out of it so dad brought her to the hospital.
Good news from my mother. The results from her latest scan look good. There is no sign of cancer in her right now.
Our fall schedule is full. The husband and I are visiting my parents for two weeks in November. Add some work travel and a few holiday parties to that, and all of a sudden it's Christmas before we have a free weekend.
The husband and I have been discussing our perennially full schedule. We'd like to have a few smaller fun events where it's just he and I. Maybe we'll take a cooking class, or glass blowing. Maybe Spanish lessons together.
I had a two day work trip to San Francisco. This time the days were packed. With the prior trip, I had one very busy day, followed by an empty day. Perhaps the company is becoming a little more open to working in person.
While I was away, Seattle had terrible air quality. For two days in a row, Seattle had the worst air quality of any place on earth. Even Pakistan had better air quality.
The husband's cousins are back at our place. For the past few weeks they have been touring the west coast. They had a good time. They were camping often. The camp grounds are shutting down, so they returned early.
Banking story... the cousins are from England. They discovered they can't pay their credit card bill while they are traveling because their bank needs to send them a text to check they haven't been hacked. Of course, they can't receive the text because they are in the U.S.
Their bank has a branch nearby. The tellers at the bank couldn't fix the problem.
However, they discovered that if they are on the bank's wifi, then they can use their banking app without the extra check. All good, sort of. The cousins now go to the bank once a week. Hang out in the lobby to do their banking. Explain to security what they are doing, and then get on with their lives.
Wednesday, my CEO was in town. We had a large all-hands meeting at the office. Afterwards about twenty randomly chosen people, including me, went out for dinner with him. It was an interesting experience.
My first takeaway is that I would hate to be a CEO. It would be exhausting. Half the crowd was angling to talk to him-- share their ideas, ask him difficult questions, complain. The other half went out of the way to keep their distance. Thought out it all, the CEO kept a smile on his face and had pleasant conversation with everyone. He drew the quiet out. He listened to the same trivial complaint half a dozen times and took it calmly and seriously.
Thursday, the Husband and I had a date night. Dinner at "The Fog Room." It has nice views of the Puget Sound. The weather is warm and we sat outside. Air quality is still low. Smoke is pervasive. Everywhere smells like a campfire. None-the-less, we enjoyed our dinner on the patio.
Towards the end of dinner, the Husband suggested we meet up with his brother for dessert. The brother-in-law lives nearby. So we switched restaurants and spent an hour chatting with him. It was good to catch up. He seems to be doing well.
Saturday we attended Salmon Day's with Allen & Even. Salmon Day's are is the local, annual street fair. We celebrate the return of the salmon to the city. We eat street fair food-- corn dogs, deep fried spiral cut potatoes, mini-donuts. We check out the artists.
This was the first Salmon Day's since the pandemic.
The fried food stands had huge lines. The husband and I joked that if we ever wanted to quit our jobs and become street fair vendors, then mini-donuts and elephant ears are the way to go.
Sunday we walked up the stairs of the Space Needle. This was a charity fundraiser. The Space Needle has 832 steps.
We did it in 17 minutes and 58 seconds.
The fastest stair climbers did it in five minutes. In an interview the fastest man said he does stair climbing all the time. Friday he did the Columbia Center for practice. Today he is flying off to Tampa for another climb.
Things are quiet this week. The husband is away for leadership training (at Westpoint!) our roommate is dog sitting. No-one at home but me and my dog.
I try to play fetch with the dog. It's good exercise for her. She has her own rules to fetch. She has trained us as much as we have trained her.
1. The dog decides where the ball is thrown and returned. If I throw the ball from an unacceptable spot, she will return the ball to the correct spot. It's then my obligation to walk to that spot and start throwing from there.
2. The dog decides the direction and the distance for the ball to be thrown. As I start to throw the ball, she'll start running. If I don't throw the ball a bit ahead of her, she'll give up on chasing the ball, then turn around and glare.
3. The dog decides how often the ball is to be thrown. At some point, she'll stop returning the ball. She'll just lay down and chew on the ball. She will show no interest if I walk over and take the ball away from her.
I understand what happened with the cousin's plan. In England, they purchased a U.S. package for their cell phone. Once in America, they discovered that their phone won't actually work on a U.S. network. The cell company can't fix this.
To get full access to their bank account, they need to receive a code from the bank by text message... and that phone can't work here.
The cousins traveled to the US with a very limited credit card and a very flakey cell phone. They do have tablets that can connect to wifi.
Their bank has a branch near us. They are traveling to it this afternoon to see what they can do about accessing more of their money.
Yesterday they took the mother-in-law on a nice roadtrip to Leavenworth, WA. A little tourist destination that's about two hours away from us.
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The mother-in-law has started her radiation treatment. She should be done with it within a month.
The cousins are still here. The husband and I have been discussing their rather open ended travel plans. They will probably stay till Monday. They think they will come back at the end of October for a week, or maybe two.
Now, the cousins are clean and quiet people. It's easy to have interesting conversation with them. They are still strangers in our house. They bring small impositions. Who buys the food? Do we cook for them each night? Who gets to choose what we watch on TV? When we have company over, do we invite the cousins as well? Do we shoo them away? Small impositions, none the less, they are impositions.
Of course, we want to spend time at their place when we travel to England. And of course, they are good people, so we still want to have a strong relationship with them.
The husband is going to talk to them about their travel plans. Maybe if they bought food and cooked it would be better. We shall see.
