Juicy Rainbow Rocks, Big People Words & Probably Whining

Holy sheep shit batman, it's been a long week. To be honest, it felt a lot more like a month. Everyone is getting used to working at home which while working at home always had it perks like wearing slippers, it's not as much fun without the right accounts, right equipment and a system to communicate. Our conference call system we use at work is enough to drive one batty as everyone is using it and the quality is horrible. For someone who wears hearing aids, nothing pisses me off more than not being able to understand someone. So, despite every other day check ins, it feels lonely.

To amuse myself, one night I painted some rainbow rocks. I outlined them the next day in between things. Turns out outlining is like fussy cutting something. You have to pay attention and you can't think about horrible things like what's happening everywhere with the virus. I follow at lot of rock groups on Facebook and this lady in Maine uses these super awesome pens for outlining so I got some months ago. I finally got to try them out for outlining on rocks and they do work awesome! The trick is multiple coats of Modge Podge to make it easy to glide over the words. I used glitter.

So, rock groups aren't the same as Rock Groups, fyi. People paint rocks, especially in arty little towns like ours & hide them for the kids to find. Well, and adults. I've found some myself and had private little happy dances. That heart one up there is a keeper. I found it on my anniversary back in February when you could go to stores. So, anyhow those rainbow rocks are hidden around a local park for the kids to find. I scooted out to grab some take out food yesterday afternoon and the park was on the way so "hid" them in plain sight. Speaking of arty little towns, our town has this ginormous glass building.

Corning Inc. just rehabbed B Building this past summer. For years they spelled out "NOEL" during the Christmas season by an elaborate system of leaving lights on in some offices and not in others. Since they went with glass windows that adjust to the light outside, the building itself has programmable glass and now can spell out whatever they can fit on the building. It was all over Bookface last night that they had switched it up. A local took this photo! Shout out to Carmen J. Narde for the great photo! We love our little town & it's shout out of hope.

Anyhow, it's time to get this rainy Saturday started. I can and will continue to use any words that have to do with bats in an effort to be funny and less bitchy. Let's hope it works. Stay safe friends!

Everything is Fine

Dear Lord that escalated quickly. By virtue of having New York City in our state, we're watching our numbers climb of infected people and county by county have cases. It's not looking good elsewhere either in the US either. What that means for me is that I've got two college kids home full time for the foreseeable future, I'm "working at home" without a work at home account on my personal pc but making it work transferring emails from my cell to my home email and trying to keep the grant I'm working on going. At some point things will eventually roll along to where we're actually administering it so I want it ready. I'm actually also really thankful to have this distraction of work and that we're all calling in a couple of days a week to stay connected.

THE MAN is holed up in the camper atm on a Saturday am conference call. He's been late getting home all week and due to the critical nature of what his plant makes, they are business as usual. Well, if you call screening people before entering the building for sickness, fever, etc. and a whole slew of prevention measures to keep people healthy at work normal. In the couple of times I've ventured out for critical type stuff, it appears we're not taking it seriously here. Aside from seeing parking spots on Market Street during the day, parking lots and streets appeared full. Freaking stay home already people!

I've already jumped up on a soap box here at home about that, yelled at my Mom who went out for a meeting, and I woke up at 4 am thinking of ways to decontaminate THE MAN before he comes in the house after work. Lexi says I need to chill out and rolled her eyes. I'm trying kid. I'm chill for big chunks of time. And then I'm not.

During one of those not good times yesterday I fussy cut a fairy. I cannot freak out during a fussy cutting fairy session and the brain calmed. So, today I thought, let's dust off the blog since I'm home talking to the dogs and holding down the fort. What, you thought I'd be talking to the kids? They only emerge for our new normal, afternoon tea. It's at 4:30 and involves actual tea and usually cookies. We watch the birds from the kitchen window because for some reason they are super active then. We've witnessed epic battles between chipmunks and our two doves that hang out. It's early spring, so the woodpeckers have temporarily converted to seed eaters and it's always exciting when one shows up and perches precariously on one of the little pegs. They are skittish so you have to be careful to not move around too much. We've even had a little "action" outside as it is springtime, which is also love time and make baby time. We've told the cardinal to "get a room" but he's still proceeding to fluff around to the point where he can't actually stand up. Typical man though, he's still trying to stuff his beak as he shows off. The lady cardinal isn't even sparing him a glance as she stuffs her beak. Some things never change.

So, anyhow back to art making and fairies. We had a quick play this last Sunday. It was a crafternoon because most of the guys were bowling and the girls needed something to do. We knew we were on the hairy edge of full blown staying at home and it might be one of the last times we could hang for quite some time. Teri provided the canvases and paint, I bought mac and cheese and we had a crumbly apple pie with ice cream. Comfort food and company.

We have been saying "everything is fine" a lot in our house lately. We've gone from a kid with two weeks of spring break who was supposed to go back to campus for lab at the end to a complete shut down. The other one had the same thing happen only his was overnight. On-line everything. One minute we're reduced down to a 50% work force, then 75% work force, then 100%, and then only essential business. It's rapidly evolving by the day, minute by minute, and one press release at a time.

I'll be hanging here for the foreseeable future and probably ramble on blogger every now and again. Don't hesitate to leave me a comment...it's a little quiet and it's nice to have a shout out now and again from a friend.