entering the sublime

Haven't posted much about this (because, heh, too much time thinking about it at work), but Congress/the White House has officially hit the 'pause button'  on one of my Big News projects. You may have even had a blurb about it in your local papers... (no, you'll never see MY name on this one.....I'm just handling the bureaucratic red tape for the Cemetery)

From the Washington Post:

The Army spokesman quoted at the end got blasted for his quote, btw....it's not "been resolved"....he has no idea what he's talking about and made a presumption.  He issued a retraction, but it will never get printed....

~*~

The thing that drives me nuts about this is that only PART of the story has been pushed around by the National Trust.  Yes, the thing can be repaired BUT, the repair only lasts about 10 years.  And then all of the old grout must come out (along with a little of the marble, inevitably) and the crack is wider.  AND the cracks keep growing...and the 'leading edge' of the cracks is too small to grout.  Eventually we will  as one blogger put it, "eternally grout these edifices until they consist of more spackle than spectacle."

The other thing that no one mentions is that the marble, from Marble, Colorado, is a limited resource.  We need to act now to get a replacement block....and need to carve it, because what if in the transport from Colorado to Vermont (where its carved) to Arlington, a problem develops and *oops* no more marble! 

But we're just doing what Congress (and the sneaky National Trust) has ordered us to do.....hopefully our report to them will open their eyes a bit more.

The REAL fun has been getting google news alerts for anything on this.  Blogs and wacky right wing messageboards are convinced that the replacement will strike the word "God"  heh...not quite. 

if anything, its been fun to see how this project is perceived in different parts of the country, and its fascinating to see how much misinformation gets spread.

I googled 'employee appreciation letters' to get a few phrases for inscribing in a book that I'm giving to a few people on my project team. I'm HORRIBLE at coming up with something concise, personal, and meaningful, but anything would be better than this sample:

Dear Employee:

Your enthusiasm and your ability to motivate your employees
has resulted in a significant increase in productivity and
profitability.

If we had an award to give, you would be the prime candidate.

Please accept my sincerest appreciation for the fine job you
are doing in our sales department.

~Brought Ben into work for the afternoon yesterday (it was bring you kid to work day, after all!) I brought him in the stroller and carried him in the sling on my hip, which is something that I haven't done in ages.  He fit perfectly in there, and the bright green sling looked nice with my shirt(:P) He was awesome - we visited a few coworkers for a little while, then I plopped him down on a blanket with a bucket of cheerios, cup of water and some toys. He entertained himself for about 90 minutes.    I miss my little coworker today :(

~Judd has his wisdom teeth out on Wed.  He's doing about a billion times better than I did 15 years ago, but all of mine we impacted and none of his were.  Last night, Ben at more 'solid' food than Judd did.  ha!

~I don't usually get sentimental or happy about the news these days, but the story about Stephen Hawking riding the vomit comet is a great story.  Why hadn't he done this before??

~there was a story on the news (yesterday's Today show?) about the reemergence of Wet Nurses.  Some women pay $1k a week for someone else to nurse their kid!  I'm super pro-bf, but if I couldn't for some reason, my kid would be getting formula. I MIGHT investigate a milk bank, and could maybe fathom having a trusted friend/family who was currently BF feed him on an emergency basis, but regularly?  uh no.

~in a similar vein, was watching Planet Earth / Shallow Seas and learned that a 1 year old Blue Whale drinks 137 gallons of milk a day.  WOAH!

~I finally got my work desktop computer converted to a laptop/workstation.  I've got a Dell Latitude D260, which works just fine, but the screen sucks.  I've been REALLY spoiled with my Mac....   It IS nice to be able to connect wirelessly at home, though, but the whole touchpad/eraser curser thing sucks.  Again, Apple's seems so much easier to use.

My office had supply cutbacks when I was out. That meant xerox paper was under lock and key, only 'budget' post it notes and pen refills as opposed to real pens, cause a refill cost 50 cents each versus a $1 pen. I think they spent about 1000 pens arguing about it.

Well, the boss who insisted on Pen Refills had a problem yesterday.

He lost his pen.
He went to the supply cabinent, and, yup, no pens, just refills.



He then asked the secretary to order pens, because "Who can write with a refill?!?"

Shrimp, or any product containing shrimp (hell, lets expand that to ALL seafood) should NEVER go in the micro.

I'm about to barf from someone's Shimp Linguini Lean Cuisine dinner.  

blech.

I didn't take this pic, but think its gorgeous and captures the stillness of ANC.
Luckily, I'm not usually down there at daybreak!!!

Arlington Cemetery on a Foggy Morning

My boss, white, middle age engineer w/ no kids,  found a new-ish 30G I pod on the side of the road this past weekend.  The road is a 3 lane road (1 each direction plus 'suicide' turn lane in middle), and there's no stores or anything around which would indicate that someone would be walking.  The pod is in good condition, with only a little scrape on the bottom edge, but it also has a bunch of velcro on the back to, presumably, attach it to something.

There's nothing engraved on the back, and when you click on the 'about' in the settings, it reads "fun-Kay1" instead of a name. 

He was going to email Apple with the serial # to get an owners name....I said forget it....I'm sure that the funKay 1 isn't a registration kind of person.

The funniest thing is how horrified my boss was while reading the song titles....there's a fair amount of 50 Cent, but also a bunch of Train, Weezer, Black Eyes Peas, Adam Sandler routines, etc.  He didn't believe me when I said that songs with titles like "Fuck you Ho" were pretty commonplace these days, esp on rap/hip hop albums. 

I set him up with what he needs to use it (USB -> ipod cord) and he bought his own charger already.  


I think all of his REO Speedwagon and Dire Straights will be populating the pod now and 50 cent will see the trash can.

I'm (sorta) working from home today - I have our on-line 'defensive driving' required 6 hr annual training running in the background. No way to speed (ha) through it, and you have to keep clicking buttons to 'prove' you've completed it.

Had a meeting at Arlington today, and for the first time in AGES went by myself. Left directly from home & stopped in my old neighborhood of Takoma Park for lunch and shopping. Picked up the cutest t-shirt for Liam and a few ten-cent babies and twenty-cent rubber chickens. (lj user="afterknowledge" one guess where these came from!) Both are smaller than a pistachio. I will have fun hiding them on Judd.

I miss Takoma Park - it has a nice Berkley vibe (but, duh, way smaller). Lots of cute bungalows and hybrid cars and yoga studios.


urg. back to finishing up this stoopid course