It's like Groundhog's Day....

It's funny what packing up your crap and putting it into storage can do. People pick up and move for every kind of reason and they say goodbye to their people and their places. Or not. Cross-town moves, cross-state, cross-country, move for work, move by choice, move to escape, move for more opportunity, move to stave off boredom. Move to keep moving. Whatever the reasons, moves always involve goodbyes. With smiles, tears, and sometimes a well placed "suck it." I've known I'd be moving for a while. I've visited all the places I've wanted to, made plans to visit with friends when I should have been packing, even had an amazing mustache themed farewell party. I've said goodbye so many times I think it's starting to get old for some people.

Today is the day I'm supposed to pack up Trixie and head north to visit with the fam before I fly to England on Saturday. I even had one final goodbye this morning that involved silent tears... you know the kind. Except now I might have to stay longer. My work PC is jacked up. Thank you IT and your automatic "updates." So I find myself tied to my work computer and phone in a way that I haven't in a long time. Waiting for them to try and fix the thing remotely. Waiting for them to tell me I need to bring it in to some office. Waiting for them to tell me it will be a week before they could fix it. Whatever. I'm tied to the damn thing and I'm stuck in a place where I've said goodbye to all my friends 5 times over. It's like Groundhog's Day. But not in a funny way.

This is all a very long-winded way of saying I'm excited and ready to leave except I can't. And there is a very real plane waiting for me on Saturday that I will catch, stupid-work-computer fix in place or not. Gooo. It's not the end of the world, just a rather large annoyance. But plans change and good things come out of those changes if you look for them.

of meetings and boxes

I sit in my office drinking coffee. I used the last of the half-n-half just a few minutes ago, so tomorrow won't be quite so lovely on the coffee front. I am also surrounded by packed boxes and the detritus of crap not yet crammed into to some appropriately sized and shaped box. Finally, I sit in my office only moderately paying attention to a giant, catch-all meeting. You can see my priorities here: coffee (elixir of life), packing (big big doings), and then giant meeting*. Honestly, the giant meeting is much lower but nothing else is doing.

Let me explain the boxes: they are labeled with great detail. You see, I'm putting my riff-raff into storage for the next 6 months or so because I'm going to Europe for 5 months. Maybe a bit longer, at least for the storage of boxes. The movers come on Friday to load everything up. I will now take this opportunity to say that anyone who enjoys packing is completely insane. I've met them. I know they're out there. Except they don't look like the kind of people you wished you'd avoided by crossing the street after you spotted them.

Bottom line, this Nerd is going on a big trip. I'll have two bases of operation over the next 5 months (one in England, the other in Germany) and hope to have trips to Scotland, Ireland, France, Croatia, and Greece. There will be other things. My Easter weekend will be spent traveling through Middle Earth to Snowdonia to conquer the inimitable Mt. Snowdon. All 3,560 feet of it. It will probably rain or snow the entire way up, so I really shouldn't make fun.

Consider yourself warned, all 5 readers who gave up on this blog. The Nerd is back for the foreseeable future to apprise you of the status of the English countryside, the prevalence of tweeds, and the state of German beer. There will at least be 3 other blog posts thrown in between those topics as well. Don't want to give it all away.


* words like "synergies," "mega," "pipeline," and "drive awareness" are thrown about; you can understand why these aren't a favorite work-a-day experience of mine.

flying turkeys

Things must truly be off in the blogging world when I allow an entire OCTOBER to roll by without some Ode to October. Nothing was wrong, I just traveled for work and other things quite a bit. But have no fear! November allowed me a reprieve yesterday. Well, insofar as being stuck inside all day at work while the fall sun beckoned me can be a reprieve. Anyway, after practically losing my sanity yesterday afternoon with 2 missed appointments (one real, one not my mistake) and 2 late afternoon meetings, I managed to escape to enjoy the final bits of sun. A friend threatened bodily harm if I didn't take my camera, so I dusted that off as well.

Into the sun I went, disguised as a park, to greet the other smiling fools. I believe everyone can recognize the New Sun Smile after a week of bone chilling rain. Anyway, the day was lovely. A senior in high school had the good luck to have her senior pictures appointment scheduled, packs of respectable looking high school students grazed on the sun, and would-be photographers roamed the trails. My own internal battle raged.... sun-staring fool or poor high-school photography class impostor. It's not entirely clear to me whether there could actually be a winner in that battle. No matter!

As I left the park I stopped at one last spot because the leaves (and I mean the actual individual leaves) were so deliciously fun: green, yellow, AND red. Standing there, soaking in the smell of decomposing leaves and dirt, I heard a noise that can only be described as a helicopter in slow motion.... something streaked across the path to my left. I saw enough to know that something large was flying. Something that didn't appear as if it should be able to fly. I don't know why I always flash to pterodactyls when considering critters that fly but seam like they have no business flying. The thing was big. And made lots of noise. While my brain tried to order the sound and the trajectory of the streak, another critter made the same noise and took the same path. What the H? Was that a TURKEY? Just as I assigned "turkey" to the bits of information swirling in my head, a third bird took off from just to my right and landed up in a tree some distance away, the branch bowing under the great weight. I unknowingly flushed a flock of wild turkeys.

Welcome to November, people.

Things that are Awesome. And Rad.

I recently had a friend lament that the original meaning of the word "awesome" was so, well, awesome that the current slang usage just wasn't up to snuff. Or not cool enough. Or not something enough. Anyway, got me to thinking about my current usage of the term "awesome" and other such phrases from my childhood. One word that never really left me, besides the awesome, is "rad" ..... yes, rad. Many people would be embarrassed by this. I am not. I've also been mentally compiling a list of awesome and rad things to share with y'all, with supporting evidence:

David Gray live in concert.

• I have a good decade under my belt of love for Mr. Gray.
• He unintentionally moves his head like a bobblehead when singing.
• When excited and dancing on stage he looks like a muppet. Imagine Kermit the Frog leaving the stage after introducing an act.
• Hello, he's rad. I'm not sure if you're aware or not, but he's a fantastic songwriter.

My parents text messaging me.

• They send me pictures of the cat.
• They tell me they're watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (the movie).
• They use emoticons.

Left-over dessert for breakfast.

• Pie and/or cake have a proven history with coffee, which is, after all, the breakfast of champions.
• You're not all full from dinner and trying to enjoy delicious dessert.
• What a way to start your day, right? Full of sweet wishes.

Seeing Beetlegirl Design stuff in a store in Seattle.

• She's fantastically creative. I'd say ridiculously so.
• She thinks them up and builds them.
• The creations are ridiculously cute!
  

There are, of course, loads of other awesome things (in all senses of the word). But these oneses* have been on my mind of late.

Yes, I did that on purpose. It's quite obviously the plural of "ones"

epic epicness

A few weeks ago I filled in for a friend's softball team. Softball is fun enough, I suppose, but not necessarily something I seek out. Anyway, amid the boringness that is a softball league with no strikes or balls (for real), I saw the most epic epicness EVER.

Standing in center outfield, pondering my dinner, the grass, World Cup viewing schedules, waiting for the hitter to hit, I heard a din back and to my right. Focusing, the noise turned out to be crows. A lot of them. I looked in the direction of the noise and saw nothing but trees and houses placed neatly up the hill. Nothing, but oh! the hitter hit and it went over by first base with nothing for me to do but cheer and stand and contemplate grass and the movie Looking for Eric and shoes and .... I heard it again. The crows. They really were going batshit crazy.

I looked again, the noise too much to ignore. Out of the trees burst a bald eagle, lazily flying about 150 feet off the ground. Holy Crap! One doesn't see a bald eagle flying that low in the city. Holy Crap! One doesn't see a MURDER OF CROWS chasing said eagle flying low in the city EVER. I didn't even bother to pretend to pay attention to the game. In fact, I distracted my fellow outfielders by pointing out the epic epicness unfolding above our heads. Those crows chased that eagle who knows where. It was the most metal thing I've seen in years. Those crows deserved to be on some album cover art.

Epic Epicness is a murder of crows chasing a bald eagle.

a celebration of sorts, I guess, and actual celebrations

Huzzah! It's my 500th post! Or so the Bogger Dashboard, in its infinite wisdom, tells me. I'm feeling, at the mo, like I don't deserve the 500th post celebration because my blog has been nothing but weak sauce lately. An explanation: I've been hunkered down for the past month in the morning and at lunch time watching soccer, all standard times of blogging for me. We're finally down to the final match this Sunday and I have my mornings back. Please don't view that as a complaint. It's an entertaining way to start your day, particularly when your friends show up at 6:45AM to watch the match with you. Luckily this event only rolls around every four years.

Also of note, the red head graduated, skated, defended, rodeo(ed), and visited the Yak (in that order) this month. So, between soccer and fun, I didn't sit in front of the computer much when not at work. I've got some things filed away in my brain, but for now I'll leave you with this lovely bathroom picture from last weekend. It reminded me of that fantastic fake commercial from SNL in the 90s, the "love toilet," except this was just the Women's restroom. So, I'm calling it the "Hers and Hers".

Blues and Whites

Alas, four years passed since we last had a proxy world war, where the tiniest nations have a chance to upset the world powerhouses. It's all very neat and clean with rules of law if not etiquette. Think what the world would be like if that's how wars were fought. Imagine, if you will, one of those charming announcers with British or Scottish accents they bring in to call soccer games in America to give them a particular gravitas* (unattainable by American announcers): Oh! There's a whistle on the American Colonial side. I have to tell you, he was just blatantly shooting the British player from the safety of the trees and I expect to see a... ah yes, here comes the referee to talk to him. As I was saying, I wouldn't be surprised with a red card for that little trick. And there it is! Red card for the Americans. They're going to really regret later on. They need every man on the field to even have a chance and that will certainly cost them a great deal. If that's how things went down, we'd all be British. Ah yes. So, the World Cup starts at the end of the week with the US taking the pitch in their first game on Saturday against England. Believe it or not, the Americans have a chance to move onto the next round at the top of their group. Don't call during the match please as I'll be too busy watching and fielding my Mom's phone calls about particular plays or calls. You think I'm kidding, but I'm not.

As a small soccer fashion side-note, I stumbled across the Girl's Soccer image the other and found yet another reason to thank my lucky stars that I was born when I was. Who wants to wear some Victorian bordella boot type thingy to run around in? Though I must admit, the bloomers on the girls to the left would probably be comfortable after a match.

One final bit, the above images came from the Library of Congress Flickr site. Go there. Explore. It's fun.

* Invariably the Scottish announcers, though not so much the British, are the equivalent of good ol' boys. It's like saying NASCAR announcers have gravitas.