watch out

"Wanna arm wrestle?"

Party Girl asked me this on Friday at work. Friday mornings in testing are nearly always very busy, but then things typically quiet down by noonish. We were at noonish. She suggested the arm wrestling to see which one of us could clock out early.

I asked what made her think of arm wrestling, "We could just rochambeau", I suggested.

But then I said she could go early since I had to tutor later so wouldn't be leaving campus anyway. She then admitted she just really felt like an arm wrestle match. So fine, I granted her wish, weird as it was. I don't think I'd arm wrestled since maybe middle school?

I won by the way.

• Speaking of granting wishes, two of my PEO friends and I interviewed a woman who applied for an educational grant. Bottom line, we learned she has too much financial aid already, so is not eligible for this particular grant. I need to draft an email to inform her, so am procrastinating by blogging instead. 
  
  
• We trudged around another property-for-sale in the boonies yesterday after deciding the access road to that other one was a deal breaker. Meego has come along both times, but Wolfgang had conflicts both times, so I meant to take photos of yesterday's site for Wolfgang, but plum forgot.

These are from the listing.

Again, there is some fire damage - from a fire in 2012 - but it's not nearly as stark as the last place we visited. And there are gorgeous views. I think we might put an offer on this one after a bit more research.

• After working up an appetite, traipsing around in those woods, we stopped at nearby Vern's just outside of town. 

Vern's is very popular, known for it's hearty meals and humongo sweet rolls. We'd never been there. It's an interesting contrast to restaurants in old town Fort Collins, which are more trendy, for lack of a better term. 

from Google reviews
What is that little thing below? A wolverine??

The Vern's decor is plentiful taxidermy, dead eyes watching from every vantage point. And there was a lot of camouflage clad clientele. 

Breakfast was delicious. Mine was meatless, which seems rather contradictory upon reflection.

runneth over

 Welcome to daylight savings time Sunday - or as my step-MIL calls it, "my least favorite day of the year"

We are on a little getaway, visiting my Father-in-law and said step-MIL. As such, we've had one hour shaved from our getaway. But still, a nice time. 

The past week was quite busy with that PEO saga. Everything worked out as people stepped up to do the  required tasks, and I was relieved of presidential duties after two years, as originally planned.

In addition, they adorned me with this lovely flower arrangement. Now, I'm not particularly a flower arrangement person due to pets that will want to trash such things and my own allergies, but it's the thought that counts. So this was lovely as one of our members is an accomplished florist while her husband is a renowned glass blower - he made the vase. So I sneeze with gratitude.

With that load off my shoulders, I'll still be busy with PEO things, but it will no longer be my name as the one to contact for seemingly EVERYTHING. My email inbox is thankful.

progress

Last weekend, I had that PEO "come to Jesus" meeting to get people to fill the two officer vacancies we have for the upcoming year. The discussion went well, although no one stepped forward right away to take either office, including President. So that remains as still me.

But it was a good talk, and to my appreciation, a few other past Presidents who were at the meeting chimed in and helped throw down. I ended up contacting the state board for advice, asking what the deadline was for getting all the offices filled.

They responded back, not with a deadline, but rather a "those lazy members need to get off their asses" (I'm paraphrasing)

So I sent out an email to the chapter, quoting the state board, and reiterating that "you lazy members need to get off your asses" (again, paraphrasing). 

It seems like we're going to live for another year. The Non-Lazies are pitching in to get us through, although they already do a lot. Typical. Looks like I'll be stuck in the President's chair, but will have someone to share the load with. Another Non-Lazy has already committed to taking over in one more year, so that's a plus. Sheesh, things I gotta do.

Speaking of language, it seems I've crossed a threshold with a couple of tutees. I've mentioned how I consider it a sign that students are comfortable with me if they start comfortably swearing during our sessions, no longer overly cautious about their words. I mean, if they were elementary kids, that'd be concerning, but these are all adults.

They always start out very respectful (probably because I'm old), but the ice is soon broken. I see swearing as a breakthrough.

One guy came in grumpy, then began dropping f-bombs left and right, mad at himself for silly mistakes he'd made on a test. I agree, he knew better and should've scored higher. By the end of our session, he'd calmed down and was more optimistic. Language back to PG.

Another girl often responds with "What the heck?" when her laptop glitches or something. Yesterday, something happened, and there it was, "What the fu..?" Aha!

My words, however, are always pristine, of course

I was assigned another student this week, and I happened to notice that she'd worked with a different tutor the week before. I figured the change was due to a schedule conflict or something and mentioned that to her.

"So does this time slot work better with your schedule?", I asked

She looked a little confused and then replied, "Uh, yeah. Well, I just didn't like that other tutor". 

Then I was all paranoid. Certainly it can happen, a little personality conflict or just wrong way rubbing. I know the other tutor, not that well, but wondered what's not to like? I'll admit it threw me off my game a bit. 

But she hasn't dumped ME yet.

feels like

Happy February! It's not that I necessarily love February, but nice to know we're a little closer to spring, days are getting longer, bit by bit.

Last weekend was FREEEEEEZing cold. Today, it's forecast to be in the high 50s. Magnum and I plan to bike to some coffee shop in a little while. This to say, that I am not yet caffeinated while posting this, so bare with.

• This week felt like a productive one. Tutees are starting to fill my schedule at the college. So far, I have a couple of returners from last semester, and the rest are newbs.

• I worked yesterday in testing with Kitty. A little toward the end of the shift, Work Study stopped by. She was on campus for a class and found "everything is closed on Saturday!" Well, everything but us. She'd come by to use our microwave.

She told us that last week was her final week working with us. I'll miss her, but I'm happy to see her go because (1) we don't need a work study in testing - there is not nearly enough for them to do because of limitations in what the testing world allows student workers to do, and (2) I think her new (non work-study) job is a better fit for her. So I'd felt it was a waste of funding and a waste of her talents to have her in testing, but she'll be missed.

• In entertainment news, Magnum and I recently finished watching the Netflix series [Katla]. Watched it? It's "Nordic Noir" based in Iceland, and that's all I will say. I really liked it, although it can be dark and disturbing at times. Now I want to visit Iceland. 

• The [P.E.O.] year is wrapping up. As such, I'm required to write the year-end "President's letter". I had it pretty squared away, but was having trouble with a satisfying final paragraph. Not gonna lie, I asked chatgpt for a little help, expecting it to return something bland and/or irrelevant. But damn, I liked the suggestions and went with them, paraphrased. 

And speaking of not trusting the internet, I just checked my weather app to see about our bike ride. It says it's 38 degrees and feels like 52. Uhm... what?

Whatever, coffee's calling.

food, fundraising, ferris wheel

I was originally scheduled to work today, but at the last minute, just before I left work yesterday, Blosssom asked Kitty (my scheduled coworker for today) and me if one of us would switch with her - today for next Saturday. 

Kitty had another obligation next Saturday, I had nothing, so the switcheroo was made. So I found myself with an open Saturday. I managed to arrange for a breakfast meetup this morning with Meego and Wolfgang, something we do about once a month. 

After catching up with the guys and loading up on the eats, Magnum and I - well, I dragged Magnum along with me - headed a few miles east to Windsor, CO. A locally owned gift shop is doing a fundraiser for my PEO chapter on Monday, but would honor purchases made today and Tuesday for those of us who can't do the Monday shindig.

As chapter prez, it's customary for me to present gifts to the other offficers at the end of the PEO year (March), so I figured I'd kill both those birds - contributing to the fundraiser and getting officer gifts.

It's a cute shop right downtown, and I found lots of good gift ideas. But fundraiser or no, it's too pricey considering I'm buying for seven. So I did the next best thing, I shopped for ME. I mean, I didn't want to walk outta there empty handed. It's a fundraisher!

This travel journal/ sketchbook spoke to me. 

I think it's genuine leather. Either way, it's very supple. Certian to boost my daily productivity, right? Right??

After the quaint little gift shop, we did a 180 and headed to SCHEELS sporting goods. Magnum "needed" some things, and we were in the neighborhood.

This was our third visit to SCHEELS. It's huge, and crowded. Seemingly no one goes to indoor malls anymore, but SCHEELS is always well populated.

So, consumptive day, all for good cause. Now to be productive.

Laundry, anyone?

paint, pumpkins, pedals

 I did a thing yesterday. I'd played around with painting in the past, but hadn't touched the stuff in a good long time. Yesterday, I did a Paint 'n' Sip with a few other ladies, something that had looked like fun, but I'd never done.

Seven of us plus our able instructor got together to create "a fall scene" in acryllic paint. The event was deemed a fundraiser for my PEO chapter, but was mainly an excuse to get together and goof around. Both purposes were served.

I brought my result home, and there it sits in the corner of my "office", between the dry erase markers and kleenex, for lack of any place else.

Maybe I'll touch it up and name it "Children of the Corn"

Speaking of evils, how did everyone fare with the amazon web service outage of Monday?

It's a bit concerning how dependent many of us are on our apps and cloud services, eh?

For me, it was a full-on first world problem as I had a haircut appointment on Monday, and found that my Pinterest wouldn't load. Pinterest held my hair reference photos! What to do?

Sigh of relief when the issue was corrected in time, but it was touch and go there, I tellya!

Also this week, I took in another bicycle. These things are wrecking my minimalist image. I have the lovely Violet, which I mainly take for relatively long joyrides, like this morning's beautiful fall ride. Then there's Daisy, my trusty single speed commuter. I also have Lily, the buxom mountain bike. 

Well, now I have the yet-to-be-named newbie-to-me. We bought her 10 plus years ago for Meego. He rode it through high school and then college, but hasn't ridden it much in recent years. 

With the temperatures getting cooler and days getting shorter, I was thinking it would be nice to have a little softer ride on the cooler, darker commutes. Violet and Daisy both have skinny tires and zero suspension. I rattle with every bump and crack. For grins, I asked Meego if he used that old bike much, and if not, could I buy it from him. 

Well, he brought it over, free of charge he says. I gave it a little spa treatment and have been enjoying her cushiness this past week.

That's her in her yet-to-be-named orangeness, parked alongside the zippy Daisy who takes a well deserved respite. And no, I won't name it Donald or Trump. 

Or will I?

shooting star and a limp biscuit

Lately, I've been contemplating how much longer I wish to stay on working at the testing center. I've been slowly increasing my tuting while simultaneously decreasing the testing. They are two distinct positions at the college - two different bosses, two different pay buckets. 

I'm now down to two short shifts per week in testing plus the Saturday rotations. I enjoy tutoring more, which does coincidentally pay a little better. I'm coming up on four years at the testing center. It was the job that got me in the door at the college, and I picked up the math tutoring later, after getting to know some of the "math people". 

I'm actually a bit surprised at how many students sign up for in-person tutoring with all the other resources at their disposal. But there seems to be no shortage of requests, and I can seemingly add more hours at any time.

Test administration is fine, but truth be told, there is little to no creativity in that job. I do enjoy my coworkers. All of us part timers are similar in that we have other things going on, and don't wish to work in testing full time. All of us except for Star.

Star, as I've mentioned before, is young, intelligent, hard-working, without many obligations outside of work. It was a mystery to me as to why she was languishing at this part-time job, and now I get it. I get it, because she's announced she's leaving to accept a full time admin offer from a nearby medical research center. I realize she was building up her administrative experience to enable her to move on to bigger and better things.

So, good for her! Her last day working with us was yesterday, and it was certainly bittersweet. I'll miss her but I'm super happy for her. 

Thursday morning, I arrived for my short shift to find Sarge running around, still getting things set up while testers were starting to show up.

"You opened by yourself?", I asked

"Yeah, Boss texted", he explained, "Biscuit (Boss's cat) lost the use of his back legs. Boss is taking him to the kitty ER"

Well, that didn't sound good. Sure enough, Boss texted us a short time later. Biscuit had a big ol' stroke, so Boss had him put down and sent for aquamation, a process I was unfamiliar with before Biscuit.

Bottom line, it's probably not the best time to tell Boss I'm gonna leave.

In other news, the PEO year came to a close and the new year has begun. I agreed to stay on as Prez for one more year. ONE more. Magnum and I visited the big greenhouse down the road last weekend, and I picked up these little plants of appreciation for the other officers from the past year.

They are drought resistant, we'll see how long we can keep them alive.

New slate of officers heading back to the philanthropy trenches:

trending

 Just finished cleaning out my email inboxes. Aaah, so satisfying. Last night, my [PEO] chapter had an "offical visit" - an audit of sorts. Health checkup of sorts. Happens about every 4 years.

Since I'm currently the chapter prez, I feel I was in the hot seat the most. I think it went well - a few glitches that were out of my control - but we survived. I mean, what're they gonna do? Fire us? Anyway, the "test" had been looming on my calendar for a while, and now I'm glad it's in the rear view.

I am a bit concerned about one of our officers. She seems a bit spacey in recent months. I don't know her all that well outside of meetings, so maybe that's just how she is, but I'm seriously wondering if her mind is going. 

So that's behind me, now back to mediocrity.

I've noticed a return of the men's mullet. All the rage in the late 80's - early 90's, it seems to be making a comeback.  Can't say that I'm a fan, but people can do what they want with their own hair.

And like any other fashion, it looks good on some, not on others.

A year or so ago, at the testing center, we had a man come in somewhat regularly, testing for water professional certifications. He had a glorious mullet that actually looked good on him (really, we all agreed).

We proctored him better than average, if y'know what I'm saying.  Proctored the sh*t out of him, admiring his luscious hairdo, whenever he came in for various levels of certification. Plus, he was just a nice guy.

And okay, we nicknamed him "Water Treatment Fabio"

He came in again last week for another certification after his ~yearlong absence. He'd shaved the mullet. Very short on top now, fading to nothing in the back and sides.  It was Party Girl who first realized it was Water Treatment Fabio. She remembered his real name, and when his face seemed vaguely familiar, she put it together. 

I hope we didn't make him too self conscious when we all registered our surprise at his new appearance. But certainly, we couldn't have been the only ones. The mullet was really that glorious. 

I asked if he missed his mullet at all.

"Yeah, sometimes", he replied, while rubbing the stubble on the back of his head.

I kinda miss it too.

bricks and mud

[Brickies (don't call it Lego™ even though it's all actual Legos™) Creation Fest] happened once again in downtown Fort Collins this weekend. Once again, my PEO chapter volunteered to run various activity booths and will receive a nice donation from the organizers. 

Sure beats a bake sale, I say!

I rather enjoy this particular volunteer duty. Fun activities, cute families, downtown Fort Collins... What's not to like? Well, the heat, for one thing. But, what doesn't kill ya makes ya stronger.

My duty featured a *Lego* horse race, but I won't bore with the rules. Suffice to say it was enjoyed by many a fest goer, and I somehow managed to make about a 0.4 second appearance in the [instagram promo video] enticing people to come on down.

As with the previous two years I've volunteered, it featured much wholesomeness - attentive parents, cute kids, friendly teens. I particularly liked seeing older kids actually trying to lose the horse race with their younger siblings/ cousins/ friends. One older brother actually confessed, "I'm sorry, I wanted you to win", to his little sis. But it all hinged on the roll of the dice, no real skill involved. He won, fair and square. 

Good times.

Later, last evening, we were absolutely DELUGED  by an aggressive unpredicted thunderstorm. Oh sure, after the thing already moved through, we got alerts for severe weather warnings. 

This morning I went for an absolutely lovely bike ride, and there was a lot of post-storm trash - limbs, mud, guck - around town. Many an underpass was still under a good amount of water along with heaps of "flood mud". 

I confess to actually getting off the bicycle and gingerly making my way through one particularly muddy underpass because it was too spooky to attempt with my skinny tires. That stuff is slippery!

But it's been so hot and dry lately, and this was a nice break from the heat bringing much needed moisture. Everyone I encountered while on my ride seemed to be in a good mood - cheerful greetings all around! Let's not think about politics for a minute!

And all this creation happening reminded me that I've not felt/been very creative lately. 

Feeling heroic from my nearly three whole hours of volunteering, I pulled out the sketchbook.

a Friday five

• Because of Memorial Day Monday, I only worked two days this week. I normally have Wednesdays and Fridays off and there is no tutoring happening until next week. Not complaining as I got caught up on a few housekeepery things and enjoyed some nice weather time.

• In the meantime, [PEO]'s keeping me pretty busy. State convention is coming up. I'm not a delegate but got talked into helping out on one of the days since convention is nearby.

• We ended up taking our pooch Merlin to the vet as his symptoms from last week weren't really improving. Vet "gave" him (sold us) some special food that has helped and ran some tests. His bloodwork came back, and Vet says, "this could likely be from an infection or a type of cancer".

Sheesh, talk about two ends of a spectrum. For now, we're treating it as an infection and will watch and wait. Merlin seems like his old self, and hopefully that holds.

• I don't like wearing sunscreen, yet I live in a place with lots of sun and lots of cases of melanoma. As such, I often wear these moisture wicking long-sleeved tops when I'm outdoors on hot days. 

I got a couple from yamazon that include these thumbholes. 

Made for short-armed people, I suppose. Thumbholes miles away from my thumbs. Oh well, I don't usually use thumbholes anyway.

• I kind of want to see [Furiosa] in the theater. The movie  didn't do so well in the box office for opening weekend, however. We saw the last Mad Max movie, [Fury Road], in the theater. 

I went in expecting some macho testosterone shoot-em-up, but I found it surprisingly good - wonderfully artistic, with an epic soundtrack, not to mention... Tom Hardy.

water babies

I think I've become somewhat acclimated to the heat of summer. I looked up some tips for doing so, and bottom line, you just have to go outside and be uncomfortably hot for a while. At the same time, however, go too far outside your comfort zone and set yourself up for being heat sensitive forever. It's a fine line.

Apparently, there are scientific physiological processes at work other than just tricking our brains to "get used to it". As one article I perused puts it:

"Heat training has been shown to increase your standard rate of sweat, which in turn helps you regulate your body temperature. Further still, the body naturally will increase its volume of blood plasma (An adaptation similar to how altitude training increases your red blood cells)"

In short, your body learns to sweat more - bathing you in evaporative cooling. I took part in an impromptu study of such on Saturday.

Saturday was our town's annual Brickies™ (don't-call-it-LegoⓇ ) Creation Festival. The women of my P.E.O. chapter work the various booths, and, in turn, the downtown association gives us a pile of money. This was my second year volunteering. 

As with last year, this year's was a cute, wholesome, fun time. I mean, really. If you're feeling down about hearing of bad parents or thinking that kids are just a bunch of little hell-raisers, go spend some time at a Lego Fest. The contrast is rejuvenating!

I showed up at my assigned time of around 2pm. We had shade canopies, but it was still hot hot. The shade helped somewhat, but there was very little breeze. In fact, I looked down at the sweaty P.E.O. sister whom I was relieving of duty (she's very short), and she told me how her companion had to bug out early to barely avoid succumbing to heat exhaustion.

No sooner had I set down my bag that I could feel the sweat rolling down my face. This continued to be the case for the remainder of the afternoon a la...

this guy from Airplane.

And certainly not just my face. I periodically checked my shirt for noticeable signs of the great drenching. Thankfully, nothing seemed to break through the surface while I knew all too well what was happening underneath. 

As far as I can tell, I didn't frighten any children away from my station with my "increased standard rate of sweat and volume of blood plasma" as the line to take part was relentless until closing ceremonies were announced. 

More importantly, we all survived.

lingering boss, veep, and fresh starts

Is this the day where we all b*tch about the time change?

I, for one, didn't realize it was spring forward weekend until Magnum mentioned it last night at bedtime. Welp, too late to plan accordingly at that point. Here we are in MDT.

Another good week in the books. Spring break for the college is this coming week, and it's been a  bit busier than usual. I'm looking forward to a more mellow week ahead? Hopefully? 

Boss told us that his move-out date has been moved to summer semester, so June. Ha! At this point, I'll believe it when I see it and am not holding my breath. I have heard through the grapevine that someone or two at another campus aren't happy with Boss's new position and don't particularly like some of the changes he wants to make. I say, "Just wait 'til they have to spend a whole shift with him!"

But that's the way it is. Not surprisingly, Boss was the only one who applied for the position.

Speaking of bossing, I was installed as VP of my P.E.O. chapter this week. As I stood up there saying my "I will", "I do", etc. I was thinking how I am still struggling to learn names of most of the members of this new chapter.  But they asked, so I said, "uhm, okay?"

I have a year as veep, so guess I'd better start learning some names and stuff. I figure this will be good for me to feel more committed after covid lockdowns took a lot of the fun out of P.E.O., and it took more of a back burner for me. 

Speaking of fresh starts, I have a tutor student who was struggling with an annoying cold/flu virus for a couple of weeks. He texted me on one of the days we were scheduled to meet:

"I'm at urgent care, and I doubt I will make it..."

And I was all, "WHAAAAT?!"

"...in time for tutoring", he continued.

Oh sheesh.

So we rescheduled once "the antibiotics kicked in!". He showed up, still a bit sniffly, but in a fresh new collegiate t-shirt and stylish haircut. Said, after the virus kicked his ass for two weeks, he was ready for a fresh start after feeling a bit better from the meds.

I thought, good idea. Periodic fresh starts are good things. So this week, I purged a few things from my closet, retired a pair of running shoes well past their prime, organized some computer files, and made an appointment at the hair salon 'cause I'm due. *satisfying exhale*. No annoying virus necessary.

Today, I'm on dog duty as Chaco dropped of his pooch, Ella, and he and Magnum went out to do some guy things. I might take the dogs for walks, I might not.
Schrödinger's dogs.

let that one go

We're enjoying spring-like weather around here this weekend. Whoop it up because it won't last, so I'll try to live in the moment.  

On that note, Winter Bike-to-Work Day was Friday morning. It was sunny, no real wind to speak of, icy in patches. 

It was 15 degrees. We noped out. That was too cold to be spending that long outdoors and bicycling around town. The coffee and sweet rolls are only so warm.

For the record, I did bike to work later in the day when the temps made it into the 30s. So, I biked to work,  I just didn't bike-to-work. 

Other weekly reflect-upons:

It's changing of the guard time in PEO. My new chapter asked me to be Vice Prez. This means they've unspokenly asked me to be Prez this time next year. I said, "yeah okay, why not..." We'll see what the year brings.

My coworker, Party Girl, confided to me that she's cut off her bff. Bff is a friend that Party Girl grew up with and has been texting with regularly since they reconnected a couple of years ago.  We'll call him "Mo". Party Girl would give us little anecdotes about what Mo's been up to as he's a bit of a character.

So I went into work on Thursday and Party Girl quietly told me she'd cut him off and told him to not contact her anymore, she was clearly upset. She realized there were some red flags with his personality. Then, in their last conversation, Mo mentioned to PG that he'd witnessed a "sexual assault" (I don't know the details) on a girl from a boy in a high school classroom in which he was working as a substitute teacher. Instead of reporting the incident, he just made the kid do a few pushups in the hall. No other reprimand, no reporting it to school officials.

Party girl was livid, disgusted - she wouldn't detail the assault when she told me - and decided to immediately cut Mo off. She said she'd been up late the night before ruminating on her and Mo's relationship by writing writing writing.

Now, I know this is something PG does. Last spring? When we had that issue with Nurse Ratchet and ended up reporting her to HR? Party Girl went to a back room and ranted with pen and much paper while working things out in her mind. It's an effective coping strategy for her.

Anyway, I told her I was proud of her for realizing the relationship was toxic and cutting Mo off, regardless of their long friendship history. 

I give Party Girl a hard time sometimes (in my head) because of her drinking problem that she seems to take a sort of college girl pride in. But on the other hand, she is strangely observant, thoughtful, and  responsible. 

Who knows what she'd be like without the booze?

playing catch up

Hello, December!

Another busy week down. Finals begin this week at the college. High anxiety time. These days, there are all these stressbusters in place: puppies, free treats, free yoga, etc. Sheesh, when I was in college, we tempered stress by studying and abusing substances on our own dime.

In other work related news, my boss is up for a promotion.  Similar role, but bigger crown. I hope he gets the job because (1) I think he'd be highly effective at it, and (2) if selected, his office would be at another campus.

I would still work for him, and as I've said here before - I like working FOR my boss, but I don't necessarily like working WITH him a lot of the time. He talks SO much about himself and his special interests (which aren't very interesting). So if he is the chosen one, it's the best of both worlds for me, and his maybe-promotion is all about me.

The selection process will take a while, but I'm over here rooting for him. He actually asked me to go over his cover letter and tighten it up a bit. You know I did my best!

The weekend was good. I had a PEO meeting on Saturday and then another Tortoise and Hare race on Sunday. This one was a 6k, so about 3.7 miles. 

The nature of these T&H races is such that "the fastest person doesn't always win". In fact, the fastest person rarely wins.

Likely winners are those who improve over their previous race. Last year, the one who took the grand prize at the end of the season was a 7-year-old kid.

But it's still a race, so naturally, everyone wants to know who's the fastest. Sorting the results always pulls up the same bunch.

Always those whipper snapper high school cross country kids. Oh, to be young again.

for the moment

And so... the holiday week comes to a close. We woke to grey skies and a fresh dusting of wet snow/slush. Maybe Mother Nature herself is reluctant to rush back to the rat race.

It makes for nice running weather, though, and I enjoyed a quiet morning slog along the creek once again. I thought I'd give some blog homage to the ducks since the geese typically hog the glory, but this pair didn't seem too willing.

A nice week it was, what with Thanksgiving and all. Sadly, Meego missed the festivities here as he is dealing with the annoying-virus-but-not-COVID that is currently worming its way through the community. He decided to keep his contagion to himself, while we four remainders did our thing.

Additionally, Magnum and I had birthdays this week. No fanfare to be had, just acknowledgement that we each survived yet another year.

Speaking of aging, race results eventually came in for that Thanksgiving day run. I learned that the mayor is the same age as me, and we both made decent showings for our old lady age division. Until next year, Mrs. Mayor!

And speaking of birthdays, I must give a shout out to my friend and PEO sis, Maxine, who turned 101 this week! Still going strong! She's been on the earth a long time and has seen some stuff!


Her family appropriately threw a 101 Dalmatians birthday party for her, but know that she is no Cruella!

Personally, I have no real desire to live to be 101. What year is appropriate for Hello Kitty?

ain't seen nothing yet until you're downtown

Another week down, let's reflect.

At last check in, I hadn't lost my car, was reunited with my water bottle, and acquired a free scab calculator. Not a bad week by my standards.

Yesterday, I pulled a volunteer shift at the annual Lego Creation Festival downtown. This new PEO chapter I transferred into had agreed to fill certain volunteer spots, and in return, we'd get a nice donation for our philanthropies. One of the women in my group is married to someone who has something to do with planning and running the festival, so there we were. 

one of the views from my
Lego Fest office

There were still a couple of slots open, so I blindly put my name in one. I pulled duty at the "art tent".

It was quite an easy assignment. There were Lego themed pages to color along with an assortment of markers, crayons, and scissors.

Once we got the little artists set up with their supplies, they were in the zone and not wanting to be bothered. Can't say as I blame them.

It was a very good turnout, lots of families getting their Lego on. Kinda put my faith back into humanity for a while to be around all these nice, well-behaved kids with doting parents. Neglectful, abusive parents and their traumatized kids don't attend Lego Festivals, so my view was skewed toward wholesomeness.

About an hour into our 2-hour shift, dark clouds moved in - nice to cool things down a bit. Then the rain came, another welcome guest. Then lightning, not so welcome. We were all directed to clear out until the storm moved out, and the delay was about 45 minutes. Activities resumed afterward, but the agenda had fallen behind, and my 2-hour shift turned into 3. Quite a long time to be in a Lego Fest art tent, but not horrible.

When my co-volunteer and I returned to the tent after the delay, we found an adult passing through on an e-bike had used the art tent as his shelter from the storm and was happily coloring a Lego man rendition. He eventually was overtaken by little humans and motored off into the sunset. 

seven old days

It's been a week already since I last posted. Juneteenth is now a federal holiday, and since I work at a state college, it's a long weekend for me. I recently passed one year working at my current job, making it the longest duration of employment - other than my tutoring biz - in quite a while.

Not that I haven't enjoyed and/or gained from my various paid stints in recent years. Each has been a stepping stone to something better in the difficult waters of finding rewarding employment beyond 50. I'm thankful for the tuting that's carried me for several years, and I'm thankful that I can be picky - an offshoot of being thankful that Magnum is the stable one.

Also, last week, I officially transferred to a local PEO chapter after the two year+ holding pattern. I've mentioned that PEO has chapters all over the US and that covid shut down in-person PEO meetings right after we moved here. So I held off visiting local chapters until things opened up again, then hit up a few local chapter meetings with a vengeance. One group eventually took me in - a lovely assemblage of ladies, for certain. 

Speaking of work, covid, and shutdowns, I occasionally deal with technical issues at work and have to contact tech support agents.  This past month, I made two calls to different tech support sites.  I'm pretty sure that most tech support agents we deal with are working from home these days.

Both of the unrelated agents I dealt with were prompt and helpful. And, in each case, I almost got the impression that they were... lonely? Wanting to keep me on the line after my issues were resolved, they offered more (deemed unnecessary) assistance or wanted to chat more about the cause of the original issues, etc. I wonder if they miss going in to an office where they have face-to-face interactions with coworkers?

I know of others who love working from home and don't want to ever go back to the rat race commutes. One of my coworkers dealt with a tech support call where the coworker said he heard multiple cats in the background. Ideal work for crazy cat ladies?

I mostly like getting out of the house, but my job is an easy bicycling or walking commute away, and it's not full-time. It's not a "dream job", but it'll do for now, while I figure out the color of my parachute.

it's how you use it

I've been working some extra shifts these last two weeks.  A couple of weeks ago featured spring semester finals for the college students. Then this past week, one of my coworkers took a vacation week to Mexico, so I covered one of her long shifts.   I'm looking forward to "normalcy" working hours.

And I'm looking forward to continued spring thaw.  Many signs shout it out, mainly return of allergy sneezing and puffiness and little puffball goose babies around every corner.

I enjoyed a run along the burbling creek this morning. Geese on the water, but I didn't spot any babies.  Childless geese?  Parents getting out for "me time" before the babies are up?

I received an invitation to transfer to a local PEO chapter this week.  I recently blogged about visiting some meetings after being on hold from the 2-year covid lockdown.  This first chapter to invite me to transfer is the one I'd set my sights on and was stalking the hardest. It's all pretty casual, but there are procedures to follow - in that, to transfer, I need to be invited - so we're playing the game.  I'll accept and be done with playing the field, I suppose.

Also at work this week, each of us in my department was given a little "thank you" gift for  making it to the end of another school year and gearing up for the next.  We each received a polo shirt with the college logo and a similarly logoed coffee cup. 

We were told a few weeks ago that this was coming, and in fact, we were to select a size and style for the polo shirt from a box of samples.  I selected the Ladies medium, but when push came to shove, alas, the Ladies medium was unavailable.  

It was no biggie to me, I mean, where would I even wear the thing other than to work?  And we're not required to wear it - it's not a uniform.  

Anyway, the gift bags were bestowed upon us, and I found that the powers-that-be got me a shirt anyway - a Men's small shirt, substituted for the Ladies medium. Putting it on, I look like  a small woman in a man's shirt.  Like a middle school kid wearing his dad's golf shirt for the school dance.

They tried, and I appreciate it. I'm not scrutinizing the mouth of this gift horse. Seriously, though, I will never wear that shirt. 

But it got me thinking.  What if, say, a male coworker selected a Men's medium and it wasn't available.  Would he be given a Ladies large as substitution?  I think not.  But what would they do?

I like the coffee cup.  It will get much use, it's quite the right size.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Loosely linking up with Mama Kat for the prompt:

1. Write about something you are looking forward to.

sisters

With my sis, Running Sue, at P.E.O.
2016 Colorado State Convention

This week, I've been taking steps to get back into the P.E.O. groove.  

I've mentioned it before, but, in short, P.E.O. is a women's charitable organization.  I've been a "sister" since almost forever.  Anyways, we provide scholarships, grants, loans, and  friendship in support of women's post secondary education.  It's pretty much the only volunteer thing I do these days.

My mom was a P.E.O. and that's how I got involved.  I didn't know much about it back when I was 20, but it seemed rude to decline their invitation to join, so here I am. 

One nice thing about P.E.O. is that there are chapters all over the United States and Canada.  Move?  Hitch onto another one!  

So when we moved from Colorado Springs to Fort Collins a couple years ago, I knew I'd have sisters here to connect with.  There are 10 chapters in Fort Collins alone, and about 20 chapters if I include surrounding towns.  

Except... COVID.

Everything P.E.O. went to hell Zoom when COVID hit.  We still raised and gave away lots of money for education, but the social side of things  naturally dropped.  Typically, I would've started visiting other chapters shortly after moving here, but I got held in COVID limbo - Zooming with my CoSprings chapter until things eased up... which is now.

My phone and email have been lighting up with invites from local chapters to come visit.  This week, I visited two whose schedules meshed around my work schedule, and I'm on tap to visit another next week.  

Meanwhile, P.E.O.'s been working toward modernizing its image in recent years.  When I was a kid, this was pretty much what I imagined a typical P.E.O. meeting was...

peointernational.org

And this is what the propaganda circulating around P.E.O. looks like these days.

I'd say the current representation is somewhere in between the two images.  And it is still VERY much straight, white, Christian women.  Some are working to further change that up, while others offer strong resistance regarding changes to the Christian part. 

I will note that all of the women in this graphic are bona fide recipients of P.E.O. funds.

Meanwhile, no way will I visit all ten, let alone twenty local chapters.  I'll say five tops, then pick a spot to settle down.  Well... pending them liking me too. 😊

Until then, it's nice to be a sought after, wined and dined guest.  

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Linking up this week with Mama Kat for the prompt:

5. Share something that you worked on this week.

I don't have tuberculosis, but I do have an ample chest

Yes, there's a pandemic and all that brings with it.  It seems like half the country's on fire while the other half is hit by a hurricane.  The list goes on.

But what's good about it?  Let's find stuff.  In my little corner of the world anyway...

We had this Douglas Fir in our front yard.  Ever have a Douglas Fir?  They're pretty enough, but GEEEZ, they generate a lot of garbage in the form of needles and pesky little pine cones.  Plus, this tree was much too close to the house.  Whose idea to plant it there?  

Nevermind, it's gone now.  We'd scheduled it's removal for last week, but strangely, it snowed on the scheduled removal day.  The crew was able to squeeze us in this week, and I came home one afternoon to the tune of much mulch making.  Good-bye Doug.

Speaking of wood...

Long story short, we inherited a piece of furniture from Magnum's sister who'd inherited it from their mother.  To clarify, my MIL is alive and well, but she and her husband moved from a largish home to a smaller home a couple of years ago, and furniture spilled over into SIL's.  

Once the dust settled, SIL was dealing with a good sized chest they didn't really have room for.  So she sent out an email looking for a good home.  We took her up on it, and Magnum had a work trip this week back to Colo. Spgs and brought the item back.

It's larger than it looked in SIL's photo, but we found a spot for it and will put it to good use.

Speaking of useful things...

I completed the first of two orientations at the new job.  It was four hours of one person reading Power Point slides to us.  *YAWN*.  Good information, but they could use some variety in their media approach.  

Round two is next week and I'm REalLy LoOKinG FOrwArD tO iT.  And I once again confirmed that I do not have tuberculosis.

Speaking of orientating...

I got together with a local P.E.O. sister as the ladies here have gotten word of my arrival.  There are no in-person meetings happening now because of COVID-19, but it was nice to get together with someone and learn a bit about the local P.E.O. scene.  

I've blogged a few times about P.E.O. since I've been a member for many years.  My mom was a P.E.O., so that was my in.  What is it?  I'll be lazy and cut and paste from the website. In a nutshell, 

P.E.O. is a philanthropic organization where women CELEBRATE the advancement of women; EDUCATE women through scholarships, grants, awards, loans, and stewardship of Cottey College and MOTIVATE women to achieve their highest aspirations.

But seriously, hit me up if you or a woman you know could use some money for school... or if you're interested in membership.
Even though you've probably never heard of it, there are chapters ALL over the US and Canada. Each chapter has around 40 members or so.  There are ten chapters in Fort Collins, so I'm getting some phone calls and emails.  

Another P.E.O. invited me to a Zoom social next week.  Her email included, 

"You are more than welcome to have an adult beverage on hand when you join the meeting."

I like that chapter already.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Linking up this week with Mama Kat for the prompt:
6. Write about something good that happened this week