Far And Wide

Hello World,

Happy Spring! Tuesday was the vernal equinox, ushering in this most rejuvenating season of the calendar, and about as welcome as, well, a breath of spring after a long cold winter. Ordinarily, the first day of spring is nothing more than a cruel hoax perpetrated on the long-suffering citizens in the northeast corridor, on a day that usually has temperatures in the single digits and three feet of snow everywhere - which I have always thought is not only cruel and unusual punishment and adding insult to injury, but kicking a man when he's down besides, and thanks so very much not. But not this time around, by golly, and not by a long shot, I can tell you that. No, indeed, this year the first day of spring was 75 degrees and sunny, with balmy breezes wafting to and fro, and a veritable thundering herd of the locals out in shorts and tank tops everywhere. This is the first day of spring for sissies, I tell you, and it's my idea of a first day of spring that I can live with, and glad of it. The way I figure it, we've already long since paid our dues as far as horrible weather over the course of time, and no doubt will again, at least if our old nemesis Comrade Mischka has anything to say about it, so we can certainly enjoy a well-deserved break once in a while, da? Probably even now, the powers-that-be are making plans to hit us with the single digit temperatures and 3-feet of snow at the autumnal equinox in September instead, and won't we all be surprised then. (NOT)

Speaking of surprises, what hasn't been going on in the local sports scene, you might be wondering, and well might you wonder. To the surprise of just about everyone, the Jets acquired veteran quarterback Tim Tebow from the Denver Broncos, which has certainly made a splash in the media, and set tongues wagging among fans and foes alike. Football camps don't even open for four months, but it already looks like it will be interesting times ahead for the gridiron faithful in this area. In other sports news, the plucky New York Rangers have somehow managed to lead their division all season, defending their position as front-runners against all comers, compared to previous seasons where they would sneak into the playoffs by the skin of their teeth at the very last moment, from way back in the standings. They've been able to do this mainly with a ragtag band of gritty nobodies, and none of the marquee players that light up teams like Pittsburgh or Washington - although if there were plans afoot to make a deal with the Jets for Tim Tebow, that might not be such a bad idea after all. Meanwhile in the national pastime, the hapless Mets are facing the prospect of an upcoming season without their superstar shortstop, as Jose Reyes left to sign with another team, and didn't bother to leave large shoes to fill, because he is essentially irreplaceable by any standard. And speaking of large shoes, what more can be said about the recent Lin-sanity of the New York Knicks, where an unheralded Ivy League youngster bursts on the scene and basically turns the town on its collective ear, giving everyone a reason to cheer, and making believers out of the most hard-boiled critics on every side. Personally, I would call that a "Lin-derella story," but I refuse to add to the gargantuan cacophony of atrocious puns of every description being foisted on a defenseless public, and which could have been entirely avoided, if only his name had been something like Hakeem Olajuwon instead.

For all the hoopla about Jeremy Lin, and deservedly so, the one thing nobody seemed to mention was what I considered the key point that made it all so remarkable, namely that he's playing professional basketball in New York, at what now would be regarded as a mere 6' 3" in height. Heck, I work with people at the hospital who are taller than that, and they probably weren't even tall enough to play basketball in high school nowadays. I can pretty much guarantee that every other team in the league has at least one player who would over-shadow him by 10 or 12 inches, which to me, makes his meteoric success even more astounding. When all is said and done, the Knicks may wind up with exactly the same record they would have had without him, but he's certainly made the season a lot more interesting than anyone could have ever expected, that's for sure. And that's not just a New York Lin-ute, believe me.

On the home front, the unseasonable weather has got June busting out all over in March, and the yard is turning into more of a riot of color every day. The daffodils have exploded in clumps, and a cheery welter of hyacinths in every shade of the rainbow. There's sunny forsythia all over town, and Ruby Begonia, the majestic magnolia is a sight to behold. I've never seen so much blue squill, and even the dogwoods are starting to put on a show. In fact, yesterday I was outside in the middle of the day, and startled a small yellow butterfly in the driveway, which is about the earliest I can ever remember seeing anything like that in our yard. Now, lepidopterists will tell you that the mourning cloak is historically the earliest butterfly of the season, but there was nothing mournful about this golden sunbeam fluttering by, I can tell you that. We also had a visit from our hard-charging landscapers, who scoured the grounds and laid down loads of top soil, grass seed and peat moss, so with any luck, we could conceivably have something that approximates an actual lawn at some point, and for the first time in decades, I don't mind saying. At church, the property is over-run with its expanse of sunny yellow creeping buttercup to greet the Sunday morning faithful, and a more welcome sight would be hard to conjure up in this urban jungle. Of course, it would be petty and captious to complain about the beauty of nature that surrounds us at this moment, but at this rate, there won't be anything left to be busting out in June, and then where will we be, I ask you that.

Lately, the local newspaper has been over-stuffed every day with a bottomless pit of glossy circulars, as if this were the very weeks before Christmas, or some other important shopping event, which it certainly isn't, and I ought to know. A recent one caught my eye from our friends at Prisco Appliances, where they tell me, "The Satisfied Customer Comes First," which is a nice change of pace from the usual retail scene nowadays, where the customer is either benignly ignored, or actively abused. Please feel free to go right ahead and visit their web site at www.shopprisco.com and see for yourself. Items on sale among their electronic products included an array of LED and plasma TV sets, DVD and Blu-Ray players, digital photo frames, and something they described as a 7" wide-screen tablet. I'm sorry, I'm afraid that I'm simply going to have to draw the line at that, and there's just no way around it. It's bad enough that words have lost all their meaning, without getting completely ridiculous about it, and I, for one, am not going to stand for it. I don't think that someone needs to be a cantankerous nitpicking old fuddy-duddy to say that we can all agree that anything which is only seven inches across should not be described as "wide-screen" under any circumstances, no matter what it may be, at any time, for any reason, and that's all there is to it. This is right up there with "jumbo shrimp" and "instant classic," and I can tell you right now that I will have no part of it, and that's final. Why, you may as well describe the Knicks' pocket phenom as "The Lin-credible Hulk," and just stop making sense altogether. At least, that's my story and I'm sticking with it, or my name isn't -

Hakeem Olajuwon

The Bad Seed

Hello World,

Well, I don't know about where you are, but here in the metro New York area, the ridiculous winter weather has continued apace, and no end in sight, as far as the eye can see - not to mention, the Doppler weather radar, working double overtime. I wouldn't be surprised if it reached 75 degrees last Monday, and what the ski resorts and snow plow drivers are losing in seasonal income, the ice cream trucks are making up for it, believe me. I can tell you that I've seen some unseasonable winters in my time, but I don't ever remember anything like this, or even close to this - and in fact, they say that it's been setting new records every day, since they started keeping track of this stuff over a hundred years ago, and that's saying something. The crocus popped open in February, and the jonquils last week (both of which were much too early) and earlier this week, everything else in the yard was tripping over each other to see who could open up soonest. There were hyacinths by the porch and star flowers by the sidewalk. More jonquils bobbed up, and bunches of daffodils in earnest all over the yard. White anemone fringed the driveway, like tiny bright daisies, and even the wind flowers broke forth under the sycamore in lavender profusion everywhere. It certainly has been one for the record books, and while I hate to complain about great weather, I can't help but wonder what our old nemesis Comrade Mischka has up his infernal sleeve after all this, nyet?

It was my birthday on Sunday, and a lovely day for it, I don't mind saying. Bill and the cats did their usual admirable job on the gifts front, and apart from some very welcome entertainment and apparel items, there was also a very beautiful ring and some lovely earrings as well. Top that off with breakfast in bed, and frankly, I don't know any way to improve upon a day like that, by golly. As a birthday present to myself, I also took off Monday from work, and glad of it, which was another wonderful and relaxing day, and it goes without saying, way better than being at work, that's for sure. Of course, I must admit that it turned into one of those very long short weeks at work after that, but it was worth it at the time, I can tell you that.

Bill thought it was especially egregious that the nefarious government trolls picked my birthday for this season's switch-over to Daylight Saving Time, and I couldn't agree with him more - and I don't mind saying that I am unanimous in that. We weathered the missing hour that was snatched away from us in fair shape, although it must be said that it took more than a week for all of the various clocks and other timekeepers to get reset, such as the thermostat, timers, answering machine, car stereo and the like. It's even worse at work, where beside the wall clocks, we have the date stamp, copier, fax machine and microwave that all have to be changed. Of course, I forgot the alarms in my Palm that remind me to punch in and out on time, so that didn't happen, and thanks so very much not. And adding insult to injury, it's the worst of both worlds with the Palm, because it's still programmed for the old schedule of DST, so it doesn't automatically switch-over to the new time when the rest of humanity does it, and has to be reset manually - but then, three weeks later, it very unhelpfully DOES automatically switch-over when it thinks DST used to be, so once again, the time has to be reset manually all over again. For someone who's no fan of DST to start with, having to go through this hullabaloo four times in a year with my Palm alarms is a bitter pill to swallow, and probably the best that can be said about it is that the rest of the world should be very glad that I didn't also give up chocolate for Lent, by golly.

Of course, Saturday is the feast day for Ireland's patron saint, the venerable St. Patrick his very own self, and if that's not a perfectly good excuse for green beer, well then, I just don't know what is, begorra. Things seem to have settled down on the parade front since former times, when every mention of the event brought riots, lawsuits and angry speeches at full volume from screamers of every stripe across the controversy. I guess now that they let them get married in this state, the gay people have better things to do than fight over marching in some silly parade, wearing skirts and goofy hats, and they've turned that over, back where it belongs, to the Shriners. I'm kidding of course, it's the presidential candidates in the skirts and goofy hats, because we all know that they will do anything for votes, and unfortunately, the parade organizers can't even file a lawsuit to stop them, because apparently it's not against the law to run for president in this country, regardless of how incompetent or unqualified a person might be, believe it or not. That sound you hear (above the bagpipes) is the aggrieved Founding Fathers spinning in their collective graves, and that's not just a lot of corned beef and cabbage, believe me.

Speaking of The Emerald Isle, I couldn't help but notice this arresting review in the TV Best Bets, about the NBC series "Who Do You Think You Are?" -

===================
Acclaimed actor Martin Sheen delves
into the history books to discover his
family's long-seeded history of activism
in Ireland and Spain.
===================

Obviously, the spell-checker is not going to help you with that, and for all I know, "long-seeded" might be a perfectly legitimate expression that means something appropriate to the context, but you couldn't prove it by me. I can't help but think that's not what they mean at all, and the only comparable phrase that springs to mind is "deep-seated" instead - but for heaven's sake, you have to go pretty far and wide to come up with "long-seeded" when what you really mean is "deep-seated" instead, I must say. That would be sort of like referring to someone as a "fine whether friend" rather than a "fair weather friend," or going the distance with the "hole in nine cards" instead of the "whole nine yards" as it should be. I realize there are no standards anymore, heaven knows, but when words have lost all of their meaning, well, it's no wonder that they let just anyone run for President these days, and more's the pity, I'm sure. I suppose I may as well just go out in my skirt and goofy hat and head for the parade with the rest of the carousers, because you know what they say, "If you can't bleat them, joy in them" - or at least, that's what the horoscope computer would have said, if it hadn't already shorted out from too much green beer, and that's not just the long seeds talking, believe me.

Elle

Sign Of The Times

Hello World,

These are heady days indeed in the local area, as the weather continues to be more spring-like than what usually passes for actual spring in these parts, and which technically doesn't arrive for another two weeks yet. But you can't tell by our yard, where the jaunty crocus have been putting on a show since last month, and now even the perky jonquils have popped open, and don't bother to tell them it's way too early. Down south, fans of the national pastime know that spring training games have started in earnest, and it goes without saying that seeing young men in sunny climes tossing around the old horsehide is a tonic for what ails you, although it must be said that this is much more therapeutic a remedy when the temperatures up here are in single digits all week, and everything is covered with snow, believe me. On an even more local level, Bill and I celebrated 29 years of wedded bliss last week, with all the presents anyone could hope for, besides a candlelit dinner - which is not usually how we enjoy our pizza, I can tell you that. Rounding out the week is the dreaded return of the confounded horologic tomfoolery of Daylight Saving Time, where the plan is to Spring Ahead, or show up late everywhere on Sunday. The very idea of taking away an hour from chocolate-deprived grouchy Christians getting to church at the wrong time, well, that's what I call a recipe for disaster on an epic scale. I'll have mine with chocolate, if you please.

At the hospital where I work, for ages upon ages, there was a large sign on the top of the main building that one of the employees had fabricated out of metal pipes which had been bent into shape to spell NOEL in bright lights for the holiday season, and could be seen for miles in every direction. Then a few years ago, this timeless message was deemed too politically incorrect to display to the wide world, so they sent the crack Engineering team up to the roof to perform the necessary remediation, and make the public safe from such a blatantly partisan greeting emanating from the hospital's peak. In a manner that would tax my spatial geometry challenged brain cells (both of them, which I have renamed Pythagoras and Euclid for the occasion) they re-configured the pipes in such a way, so that what used to be NOEL was transformed into PEACE instead, and I think we can all agree, long may it wave. Now, I'm not usually out driving at night, but yesterday I was going to a meeting at church after dinner, and couldn't help but notice that the sign atop the hospital was still lit up, even though it's a lot closer to Easter than to Christmas at this point. It seems that the censors had the last laugh after all, because as I drove past, it became apparent that what the sign says now is EACE, which I'm thinking, must really make people wonder far and wide, and I can't say that I blame them one bit. Not to mention Pythagoras and Euclid, who cannot be relied on for any ponderous cogitation, and are all too easily confused. And if The Wise Men of lore and legend had been looking for a sign to follow, and it was this one, they certainly never would have found their way to Bethlehem in the first place, and we'd all still be Druids to this day, by golly.

Speaking of work, for years we kept a file cabinet of maintenance files, for our service agreements and contracts, separate from all of the one-time orders in our regular files. People would call and ask for something, and we would promptly go right to it and pick it up instantly with no trouble at all. Then the consultants came, and brought along their own contract specialist, which you would think would make things better - or at least you would think that if you had no experience with consultants previously. I should point out that in our department, we've been there over 150 years between the four of us, and the consultants have been there for 6 months, and yet they decided to chuck our filing system and replace it with one of their own making, like that would be any kind of improvement. To the surprise of no one, what actually happened was that they managed to totally mess up all of our files, so that now it takes 2 people 20 minutes to look through 6 file cabinets in 4 different offices, and you still can't find what you're looking for, and thanks ever so much not. When this happened once again earlier in the week, the contract specialist came back to me later with the errant paperwork, and apologized because he said he had put it in a drawer, but the files were not in alphabetic order, which is why he hadn't found it the first time he looked. Of course, everyone knows that I'm too polite to laugh, or to criticize, and I ruthlessly bit back the retort that sprang to my lips, which was to ask him: "And what order were you thinking of filing them, if not alphabetically - putting them in order by size?" I'm telling you, you just can't make this stuff up.

And while we're on the subject of making things up, it reminds me of when I went to the dentist recently with my bum tooth, although I am not using that affliction as an excuse by any means. When I first went in for my appointment, I was given a clipboard full of forms to fill out, and I had gotten there nice and early for just this purpose, because there's always paperwork beforehand, and I didn't want it to slow things down, especially since I was in so much pain. I filled out the personal and medical information that it asked for, and the questionnaire about allergies and other health concerns that were unrelated to my current complaint. The last page was a Consent form, that I needed to check off and initial each section, saying that the procedure had been explained to me and I understood it, including the surgical options, details about anesthesia, post-operative care, and medications that might be used. As I said, I was given this clipboard full of forms to fill out, and nobody said to fill out some of them and leave the last one blank, so in the interests of speed, I just went ahead and checked and initialed each section of the Consent form, even though I hadn't seen the dentist yet, and nothing had been explained to me so far. When I got into the treatment room with the dentist, he reviewed all of the forms, and he made a sort of rueful chuckle when he pointed out that I had already completed the last form, when the two of us had never set eyes on each other until that very moment - which he pointed out, entirely defeated the purpose of calling it an Informed Consent form in the first place. "Oh," I replied breezily, "I work at the hospital, and we're always signing forms that we don't understand. We call that 'UN-Informed Consent'." He laughed.

Also at work last week, even though it was before the semi-annual chronological donnybrook of Daylight Saving Time, there were apparently other time challenges that turned out to be too much for the staff to handle. I sent an email to the Laboratory Director, only to receive back this startling Away notice in return -

========================
I will be out of the office on Tuesday February 21st
and Wednesday February 22nd
========================

I'm sorry, please step out of the booth, and thank you for playing our game. No, you most certainly "WILL" not be anything on those two dates in February, which had long since passed by March 6, when this message was sent to me - unless once again, either you were planning to take your Way-Back Machine there, or perhaps the intended target dates were supposed to be in 2013 instead, which makes even less sense. Going in the opposite direction in Accounts Payable, they forwarded to me an invoice that needed to be straightened out, but frankly, I found its biggest problem was their own time-and-date stamp at the top:

====================
RECEIVED
South Shore Med Ctr
FINANCE DEPT
2012 MAY - 5 10:44 AM
=====================

Now it was MY turn in the Way-Back Machine, since I received this invoice on March 5, or two whole months before it ever reached Finance in the first place. It certainly was some confusing times at the employer of last resort lately, and they can't all be laid at my doorstep, not by a long shot. One can only hope that things will improve once we Spring Ahead to the other side of this nefarious vernal time warp, although if that actually worked, you can believe me when I say that I personally would eat my hat, and devil take the hind-most. But now in the spirit of brotherhood and good will to all, I have asked Pythagoras and Euclid to leave you with this immortal benediction that passeth understanding -

EACE

Can Can

Hello World,

Happy March! We certainly got our money's worth out of February, that's for sure, and not cheated out of anything by a long shot, including an extra day thrown in for good measure. Only the snowboarders and ski resorts complained about the weather, which set a new standard for the warmest February on record,
averaging over 40 degrees for the month, and seemed a lot warmer, I can tell you that. Which I don't mind saying was just as well, at least for one very unexpected reason, namely that there was what seemed like a lengthy period of no heat at work. This is especially unexpected because my office is in a derelict old building that is so unendurably hot all winter that everyone leaves their windows open and air conditioners running full-time. It was not that long ago, in fact it was in my note from November 11 of last year (you can go right ahead and look it up - I'll wait ..... dum-de-dum-de-dum-de-de-dum ..... ) where we found ourselves in exactly the same situation, although back then, it managed to be even worse:

======================
So it was totally unexpected when the boiler developed a valve problem, and there was literally no heat in the whole building for an entire week, for the first time since I've been there, and to say that it was uncharacteristic for this building would be an understatement of epic proportion. Meanwhile, alert readers may remember that this was the exact same week that the asbestos team dismantled our furnace at home, while the plumbers didn't install the new furnace until the following week, so guess what - there was also no heat at home, during the very same long cold week, and I'm sure it goes without saying, thanks oh so very much not. I said to Bill that you know things are completely upside-down when the warmest place I go all week is church, which has always been so chilly that everyone routinely wears their coats through the whole service, and people cluster around the coffee urn downstairs for warmth.
======================

Well, it seems that two weeks ago, the ancient wheezing boiler blew another valve in a different part of the system, and we were once again, the unhappy denizens of an old drafty building with no heat to be found for love or money, and don't think that we didn't try plenty of both, believe me. From one end to the other, everyone was wearing jackets, and breaking out their illicit space heaters from under their desks, behind the furniture or secreted in closets. One of the thundering herd of consultants brought in his own heater from home, and promptly blew the fuse along the whole hallway on our floor, plunging us all into darkness besides being cold, and snuffing out all of our clattering office equipment at a stroke. (In fact, I was using the network multi-function device down the hall when it happened, so it was just as well that I wasn't making copies of my butt or boobs at the time, like they do in the movies - or it would have been highly embarrassing when the electrician trotted over to set things right, I can tell you that.) Luckily for us, it was so unseasonably warm in the month, so it wasn't like November when it was frigid inside and out, and that did help a bit. In fact, one day was 60 degrees and sunny - although 60 degrees in your office is still pretty darned chilly if you're sitting at your desk doing payroll reports - and outside we could all hear the unmistakable sounds of the ice cream truck, which I thought was just adding insult to injury, and thanks so very much not.

Speaking of treats, it was during this week that the Accounting manager celebrated her birthday, and we were all invited to shuffle down the hallway in our long-johns and wool scarves, and gather in one of their offices to sing around the birthday cake while she blew out the candles - although I don't mind saying, there was a very vocal contingent in favor of leaving them burning for the heat, and it was hard to vote against their unassailable logic. Ironically, this turned out to be an ice cream cake, which I'm sure seemed like a good idea when they first came up with this plan, but was a decidedly unappealing choice at the time of the occasion, I can tell you that, and even among the dessert's staunchest adherents - of which I am one of the very staunchest - it was a hard sell to the shivering staff huddled in their winter coats and fuzzy boots. In the end, it was a long ten days of "the big chill," only this time, the return of the heat was greeted with a more muted mixture of relief and foreboding of when this very same thing might happen all over again. I can tell you that someone showing up and selling Snuggies door-to-door would do a land-office business in the place at this point.

On a related retail topic, I am reminded of some bulky holiday presents that I had ordered, and stayed home from work at the end of last year to get deliveries of them, on the chance that their outer boxes would reveal the contents for all the world to see, and thus ruin the surprise for the giftee on Christmas morning. One of the items I was expecting was a very large metal trash can (you know you've been married a long time when this type of thing is considered not only a perfectly reasonable gift, but in fact, a rather desirable one) and I kept checking the windows for any trucks showing up that might be likely to drop it off. At one point, a delivery truck did pull into the driveway, and the peppy young driver hopped out and ran up the steps two at a time, then handed me a tiny box, which I signed for without enthusiasm, as I explained what I was really waiting for. "You have to get up pretty early in the morning to put anything over on me," I told him flatly, "I could tell right away that was no trash can, by golly." He accepted this rebuke with good grace, and assured me he would have brought the trash can if he had it. I suppose the good news was that the trash can surprise was not spoiled after all, since it wasn't actually delivered for more than a week after the ho-ho-holiday, long after the element of surprise had been forged into the alloy of indifference, and I ought to know.

Speaking of surprises, one of our cats was having problems with his teeth, and a trip to the veterinarian was in order, which he endured with a sense of stoic resignation that is his trademark. As part of his treatment plan, they gave us an anti-biotic liquid for RaggMopp, with instructions to squirt it into his mouth twice a day, to help clear up some of the infection that had sprung up. We thanked them and went on our way, with our medicine in hand, and planned to fight the good fight against marauding germs on the home front. I don't know what we paid for that small bottle of drugs, but I do know that I ended up getting more of it on me than in him, that's for sure. I have the feeling this war on germs would only have worked if the germs had jumped out of his mouth and onto my hands, which is where most of the anti-biotic liquid ended up, twice a day on a regular basis. Of course, if I could have gotten the germs to jump out of his mouth, I wouldn't have needed the anti-biotic in the first place, and frankly, this is a direction that I think modern medicine should pursue with greater diligence. In fact, I already have a giant trash can that they could jump right into, and that's not just the frostbite talking, believe me.

Elle