Curtin Call

What in heaven’s name was the person that came up with the “work 5 days/get 2 off” concept thinking? 

Shhhhh.  Be vewy, vewy quiet.  Mommy and Daddy are sleeping
and I snuck on here.  I see they’ve already told you about this
cool new desk we got but, you see, they don’t want me anywhere near
it.  They say I destroy things but that’s just not true. 
Okay, so sometimes I do things that annoy them but that’s nothing more
than a test of love!  You see, I always hear them telling their
human friends how much they love me (and my sister, Sneakers, too! I’d
let her say hi but she’s sleeping, too.  She’s old.  Besides,
she’d probably just wake them up and tell them what I’m doing
anyway.  She’s like that.)   But every now and again I
just have to test them.  To see if they really love us!

So, anyway!  I’m so excited and I just had to share this with
someone.  We got some other new stuff, too!  I see they
didn’t tell you yet!  Yay!  I get to be the first! 
Yay!  (Yeesh!  I’m sooo excited!)  Ready?  Okay,
here ya go.  Check this out:

Yay!  Yay!  Yay!  I got my very own bed!  I
am soooo excited, I can hardly restrain myelf!  I’m ready to go
bounce off a wall or…  a couch or…. something!  (Oops,
gotta be careful – don’t want to wake the humans!).

Okay.  I’m calm now.  Anyway, that’s not all.  Check this out:

Yup!  Sneakers got one too!!!  Yay!  Yay!  Yay!

I was so excited!  It was all just going so well!  And then one day:

“No!”  I shrieked!.  “It can’t be!  That’s my
bed”  Just then, mommy came along and she made everything okay
again.  “You see”, she said to me, “caring is sharing!”  So,
okay.  I let Sneaky sit in my bed now.  But only sometimes.

So, aren’t we special?  Our mommy and daddy are really good to us!  I guess they really do love us!

Okay, that’s all.  I have to go climb into bed and pretend I was never here.  Don’t tell – okay???

Yup.  Elise does still work there!  I just heard back from
her.  She informs me that another Michelle that has worked there
for many, many years is leaving tomorrow.  Also, Diane and Beverly
retired last year.

I’m going to go ahead and send the link to this blog to everyone I’ve
mentioned here.  Let’s see who knows which people I’m referring to!

I had worked in the paper industry for many, many, many years before
making the smartest career change of my life by starting over and
coming to work in Academia.  In fact, I had worked for the same
paper company for 16 years!  Of course, this means getting to know
a lot of people.  Some of them came and went.  Others, I
worked with for years and formed very strong friendships.  But
like anything else, life changes and sometimes those contacts are lost.

The past several months, though, have had a wave of “reunions” with many of my old friends, in one form or another.

I would say that it was back around November or so when I had a
surprise email show up from my sweet friend Joanne (she’s still in the
paper industry although with a different company) and soon after, she
came into Cambridge and we had lunch together.  It was so great to
see her again and I look forward to staying in touch!

Then, a couple of months ago, crazy Jenny appeared in my in box! 
Jenny doesn’t work for that company anymore, either.  She’s made a
few moves since then so I’ve sort of lost track of what she’s
doing!  But she’s one funny chickadee so it’s great to be back in
communications with her!

Next, came Annmarie.  Annmarie and I have been going to the same
dentist for oh….???  15 or so years now???  Oh, at
least!  I’ve known her for 21 years!  NEVER have I run into
Annie there but my last visit (late January/early February) as I sat
and waited to see the dentist, I was reading the schedule for who was
coming in that day and, low and behold, there’s Annie’s name, along
with her two wonderful children!  She doesn’t work for that
company anymore either. 

Next, I think was Dana.  Apparently, Dana had run into Joanne (the
one from 3 paragraphs ago!) and Joanne  told her that we’d gotten
together so, yup – you guessed it – next thing I know, there’s an email
in my inbox from Dana!  Dana doesn’t work for that company anymore
either although she was still in the industry until she was laid off
recently.  That’s worked out okay, though, because it’s given her
opportunity to spend some time with her precious son as he begins
kindergarten!

Annmarie and I continue to communicate via email (the one from 2
paragraphs ago) and she sent me an email saying that, when she was at
the dentist, she’d asked about another old coworker Irene (she’s not at
that company anymore either) and that the dentist told Irene she was
asking for her so she called Annie out of the blue.  Irene told
Annie that she’d recently run into the lovely Michelle awhile back.
Michelle doesn’t work at that company anymore either, she’s staying
home and being mommy to her two sweet children!

Yikes, I can’t believe all this has happened and I’m not even done yet!!!

Last weekend, as I was out shopping for a floor lamp, I looked up from
the lamps and standing there next to me was Louise – our switchboard
operator!  Louise doesn’t work for that company anymore,
either.  She’s retired.  But nobody could handle a switchboard the way Louise did!

Then….  on Tuesday, who popped into my email but my wonderful
friend Pam!  Pam and I have known each other for close to 20
years!  We have a very special friendship – we both understand
that life is hectic which means that we don’t get to see/talk to each
other all the time.  It can go months between our communications
but every time we do catch up, it’s some of the happiest days of my
life!  Pam doesn’t work for that company anymore either.  In
fact, when she resigned, she FedEx’d her resume!!!  That’s a truly
funny story but we’ll save that for another day!  🙂

Ah…  that must be it, you say?  After all, that was Tuesday and it’s only Thursday.  Nope!  Not quite.

Yesterday, as I sat at work, my phone rang.  I could tell by the
way it came through that someone had called into the name recognition
system.  Hmmm….  I wondered.  Who could this be? 
Well, next thing I get is “Hi, Mary.  It’s Lori”.  “Hi, Lori”, I
say.  “I used to work with you”, I hear.  “Oh, geez, which
Lori is this?”  I don’t even recall her response but as soon as I
heard it, I knew exactly which Lori it was!  Last time I saw Lori,
her adorable little girl was probably 6 or so.  Well, now she’s
16!  Ugh…. we’re all getting old!  Lori doesn’t work for
that company anymore either.  She does, though, live about 5
minutes from me now so a lunch date is definitely in order there! 
Yay.

Phew.  That’s it now.  What can all this mean?  I don’t
know.  I do know, though, that I am thrilled to have heard from
these old friends.  I also know that I’ve been very fortunate to
have each and every one of them in my life and I’m looking forward to
staying in contact with all of them!

This also makes me think, though, who the heck does work at that old
paper company???  I just took the opportunity to try to rekindle
one more old friendship.  I sent an email to another old friend –
Elise – at her paper company email address.  Let’s see if this
works, or if she’s moved on, too!

Yes, I do agree that this is nothing more than just another “Hallmark
Holiday” however, Hallmark is not making one darn cent by my coming
here and wishing my friends a Happy Valentine’s Day!  Spend it
with the ones you love!

The past couple days, it’s been all about snow (as most of my dedicated
readers know!).  I realized yesterday that it had been well over a
year since I’ve lifted a shovel as I was down from surgery at this time
last year and boy, did it catch up with me!!!  Where we are, I’d
say we got a good 15″ or so.  On Sunday, we made two rounds each
at our own house and at my mother in laws house.  Of course, the
plows waited until we were all tucked in Sunday evening to come by so
it meant round three at each house yesterday.  I usually make
every effort to get into work when it snows on the weekend but
yesterday, I just didn’t have it in me!

I didn’t realize just how wiped out I was until I logged off the
computer at around 12:30 yesterday afternoon, rolled over next to
Sneakers and fell asleep – for 2-1/2 hours!!!  Yes, when I woke up and looked at the clock, it was 3:00!!!   And
if that weren’t enough sleep, I went to bed at my usual 9:30 or so last
night and the first time I woke up, I was certain it was 2:00 or
3:00 in the morning however, when I looked at the clock, it was only 11:20!!! 
Oh, the joy of thinking that you are just a few hours away from the
alarm clock only to learn that you still have many, many hours to go!

So, with that, I have absolutely no excuse not to be full of energy
today and to not complete all of these silly tasks that I’ve been
procrastinating over!  So, here I go! 

Again, a Happy Valentine’s Day to you and your loved ones!

I must admit that I never knew there was such a thing as “Fairy Blog
Mother Day” however, I have been enlightened to the fact that yes, in
fact there is such a day and yes, in fact “Fairy Blog Mother Day 2006”
happens to be today, February 6th!  So to my Fairy Blog mother, I
say a happy day to you and thanks so much for introducing me to this
fun technology and also for helping me over the bumps in the road that
I’ve come across now and then!  Of course, my half dozen or so
readers thank you also!  (Click on the title to learn who my Fair
Blog Mother is!)

On another note, has anyone else noticed how quickly weekends seem to
pass these days?  I barely blink and it’s back to work!  I
had a wonderful weekend – both hubby and I found the motivation that
we’d been lacking through these winter months.  Maybe it’s the
fact that it felt more like April than February out there.  I
actually started my spring cleaning and the paint/paint brush found
their way out of the storage room as well!  We hung some pictures
that had been put aside in storage whilst the painting was going on –
my house is really looking like a good old fashioned, lived-in house
again!

And…  I LOVE MY DESK!  Did I tell you that I LOVE MY NEW DESK? 
I found a lamp online that I think I’m going to like and yesterday I
went to the store so I could actually SEE it  but they did not
have it on the floor.  However, I did buy two new frames (I’ve
gotten a couple cute kitty shots that I’ll post here soon) for the
desk, which match the drawer handles nicely and I bought file
folders!  Course, the folders are hanging in the drawer and what
needs to be put in them still sits in a heap in the other drawer but,
come on!  One step at a time here!

And….  I ALMOST think I’m ready to make the jump to joining the
rest of the world in shopping online!  Yes, I am one of the few
that have held back from doing so (please see side bar!)  I’ve
refrained from doing so all this time mostly because I am absolutely,
positively petrified of identity theft!  However, with recent
“errors” (I won’t say names) that you hear on the news of people having
their credit information found out WITHOUT the involvement of internet
shopping, I guess that maybe, just maybe, I’m ready to make that jump!

Of course, the other reason I’ve refrained from doing so is that it is just to darn convenient. 
You see, I’m not a big shopper.  I have no patience for shopping
and I enter stores only when I absolutely, positively have to! 
So, can you just envision my credit card balance going up and my
checking account balance going down?

I don’t know.  I just don’t know if I’m ready for that yet.  Time will tell….