Nothing Wrong With Shooting...

...As long as the right people get shot.

Got an invite last Friday afternoon for a mandatory, all-staff meeting first thing Monday morning. Last minute... mandatory... all staff... those are never good.

It wasn't about layoffs, but it was a re-org, though the re-org doesn't make much sense. They've all but dismantled the UE group and no one's telling us why.

It seems like no one really thought through all the details. When our (now unhappy) ID's asked about the new structure, they were told it was done to make their lives better, yet no one asked them for input.

What's really behind the re-org? Why can't we hear the whole story? Are we not adults?

CHiP Roulette

On the way home yesterday I felt like I was driving through a mine field and at any moment a CHP would blow up on my ass.

Starting out in Oregon it was mellow in the morning - no one was out except a few truckers here & there. It was a fast drive from Bend to Dorris. But shortly after reaching the border, it felt like cops were everywhere

I had my radar detector fired up, but if they're not shooting at you it does no good. When you whiz past them at close to the speed of sound, they don't really need a radar gun to tell them shapes and colors are converging into a blurry speeding glob.

All I could do was watch for air patrol and hope for the best. As I was leaning into the turns around Lake Shasta I saw a helicopter go right over my head.

Nooo! What to do... what to do... Was it even a cop? Maybe it was a rescue helicopter? There's no way to know! It's usually a plane, but maybe they got more money from Homeland Security and bought a Blackhawk.

I pulled off the road and waited - driving leisurely around the lake area. After a little while I got back onto 5 and went with the speed of traffic.

There was no way they could prove it was my car slotting around the turns. I was now a good 10 minutes behind where they would have expected me to be, and I'm in a station wagon? Who speeds in a station wagon?

But it didn't end there. All through Redding down to Dunnigan and on the 505 they kept appearing from nowhere, totally messing with my head. It was brutal.

With three stops along the way, I made it home in 7.5 hours. Not my land speed record of 6.5/7 hours, but good enough. I wasn't trying to break any records - I just wanted to get home.

I'm a Dumbass

Not this little guy - me - I'm the dumbass.

I'm in Oregon at the moment and just after arriving, looked through my bag for a pair of sweatpants and other warm layers and found none.

I must have been sleep-packing, because I packed t-shirts but no sweaters, no fleece, nothing warmer than a sweatshirt, and nothing to lounge around the house in.

Clearly, my vitamins aren't working or they can't stop my brain from dissolving and running out my nose with every sneeze.

On a positive note, the opening at the museum was a big success and that night I was commissioned to get more wildlife shots. I spent some time there yesterday watching a lively river otter swim all around his pond - otters have the coolest paws - and getting new shots of the lynx and bobcat. It was hard not to get in there and snuggle with them.

Lethargic

I've been in a physical/mental funk lately - feeling lethargic and run down and this past week I've had trouble finding the right words and three times over the course of the week forgot what day it was.

What I need is my own lab - how much does it cost to set up your own lab to run blood tests? Can't be that expensive. Have you seen some of the "labs" out there? Not so fancy. A centrifuge would be handy for separating the fat from roasting juices.