Quo Vado?

This morning started with the discovery of ants in the kitchen - coming out of the wall plug. We don’t like spraying the bugs in non-confined areas, but this morning I couldn’t resist. So we sprayed. Then we sealed to reduce the level of fumigation required. Wee, what fun.

The day was brought to me by the number ten.

Every couple of months, I go into battle with the ant population living in our building. The skirmish is usually brief. I awake to find ants swarming at some part of my bathroom, kill them with window cleaner, Raid the room and go to work. After thirty minutes or so of cleanup that evening, we’re good and life is bug-free once again.

Today, however, is Day Eight of The Great Ant Battle. They desecrated the bedroom door last Saturday, stole cat food on Sunday, and covered my bathroom on Monday. Half a tube of tub caulk^[1] later, and I thought I was done. Tuesday was peaceful. Only to come home Wednesday to a covered vanity and wake up Thursday to a moving bathroom floor. Kill. Spray^[2]. Caulk. Repeat.

Today is Saturday. I’m almost out of caulk. The phantom ants crawling on me are making me paranoid. I never should have watched McGyver.

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[1] Yeah, I don’t want to meet the guy who’ll get to refinish this place the next time around. I’ve caulked everything - tub fixtures, the space at the tub and the wall, and even the wood trim - in an effort to seal away the ants.
[2] I can only spray the part of the bathroom I can close up - the stuff makes me ill.

Here’s one of the things I don’t get today. Why do band-aid packagers put band aids in the box with the sleeves stuck together? When they do that you have to find the end of the band aid series and tear one off before you get to fuss with removing the band aid from the sleeve, hope to not accidentally touch the sticky to anything but the target. I’m bleeding here and you added two more steps to the process.

Dude, you’re supposed to help stop the bleeding not make it last longer.

Don’t knock the weather. If it didn’t change once in a while, nine out of ten people couldn’t start a conversation.
- Kin Hubbard

The actual close of my most recent email to Mom:

I’m not dead yet.
I’ve not yet be arrested for homicide.
I’ve not yet be arrested for assault with a deadly weapon.
I’ve not yet be arrested for assault and battery.
And I haven’t quit.
So, I guess all is reasonable here.
LLP -kel

With so much rage, I wonder why Bossman doesn’t believe that I can’t talk to him about the problem without being fired.

I am a two hundred pound woman. You are a two thousand pound car. If you were to hit me as you move from second to third during your left turn, you might end up with a bumper dent at knee level. I would be squished. So, please don’t look at me with disdain when I pull up while crossing the street you’re trying to turn onto at the same time.

It’s only self-preservation. I expect you to be an idiot.

Why is it that I’ve suddenly come to need an extra layer between me an the world? I was out yesterday grabbing steak and yeast rolls when I realized that I felt naked. As if something was missing. Fully dressed, I wondered about this feeling as I ripped into a roll. Then I realized I wasn’t wearing an undershirt. It only took two months but the undershirt has become part of my public armor. My attempt to stay warm at work produces yet another consequence.

The deepest definition of youth is life as yet untouched by tragedy.
- Alfred North Whitehead

The Subtle Neurotic You scored 52 anxiety, 76 awkwardness, and 43 neuroticism!

You have all the makings of neuroticism without any of the amusing trappings—you are The Subtle Neurotic! Plagued by doubt, fears, and worries, you are much more likely to have a quiet existential crisis off on your own than to bite your fingernails. You worry a lot over social situations, but take heart—chances are, you’re not nearly as awkward as you feel you are. The best advice I can give you? Confide your worries in someone—no matter how irrational they seem. You’re far too likely to keep everything bottled up. Your high anxiety score implies that you are unable to relax, worry about the future often, and probably are plagued by irrational fears and self-doubt. Your high awkwardness score implies that you are socially nervous, probably have difficulty with conversation, and perhaps feel uncomfortable in large groups of people, such as at parties. Your low neuroticism score implies that you don’t exhibit subtle neurotic behaviors—your nails are probably an acceptable length, your pencils aren’t covered with bite marks, and your bookcase isn’t arranged alphabetically by genre. Congrats!

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Link: The Neurotic Test. I forget where I first saw it, sorry!

We cross our bridges when we come to them and burn them behind us, with nothing to show for our progress except a memory of the smell of smoke, and a presumption that once our eyes watered.
- Tom Stoppard

As I stood on the third floor balcony of the beach houses facing the cloudy Florida bay I finally understood why you would want to build at the salt water face. The slightly salty wind refreshed me. Just a minute standing in the breeze wiped relieved the flying pains and eased my annoyance at having to be in Florida just three days after returning from vacation. I still don’t understand why you’d spend as much as the people buying the units in question will spend for such a place. Yesterday MyPBT suggested that the monetary difference between taking a job that pays more and one you’d love would be spent to keep you sane - it’s what you’d put into alcohol, drugs, gas or (in my case) books. The project in question probably falls into the category of a sanity purchase for someone with a crappier better paying job than I.

Today’s foggy weather reminded me how much I love walking through clouds - when it’s warm. It feels like nature reaches out and gives a moving hug. Ok, the hug’s a bit damp, but I love it anyway. Fog forces the world to slow down, as everyone waiting on a plane with me will attest.

The airport I’m flying out of has a limited number of public use electrical outlets, today I’ve tucked myself on the floor between two chair rows to recharge hawkins. Today’s photo is a badly lit image taken from a horribly low position. The only bad thing about this particular location is that my gate is downstairs. I’ve never boarded from the lower level of this airport, I hope that doesn’t mean I have to do yucky plane stairs. Speaking of plane stairs, they’ve started to use long ramps in Atlanta on some of the smaller planes so that you don’t have to climb the too steep stairs.

I suppose I should put on my boots and head downstairs so that I’m not here if these people loose their minds if the plane can’t land due to fog.

Speaking of fog, my plane didn’t land either so there’s a story, but I don’t know what yet.

There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is in having lots to do and not doing it.
- Mary Wilson Little

A couple of days ago I saw a video of Al Hirschfeld working on drawing of Paul Newman in the Broadway production of “Our Town”. Hirschfeld used quick pencil movement to roughly sketch out the basic line work - placing multiple lines in the areas of interest, as if trying each one for fit. Using ink on vellum (I’m guessing) he drew the final piece over the sketches of many lines. While watching, the strokes felt short.Hirschfeld used long strokes flowing strokes for specific elements of the image, but the short specific strokes prevailed.

Having never spent time hanging around with artists, the “randomness” of the first pencil marks startled me. I knew that by the age of ninety-nine Hirschfeld knew what he was doing and long experience guided his marks. The contradiction between the actual impreciseness of the actual process and the initial perfection of my mental image startled me. Somewhere along the way I bought into the notion that for artists the first line is always the perfect line, as if art was pure genius. Where did I pick up that idea? When did I move the concept of “perfect the first time” from the problem set to the blank page? Just how far has this mindset invaded my daily life? How does it limit me? Does it unnecessarily prevent me from trying or continuing things?

Do I need to give up the pen?

Bring on the eraser.