Haiku Friday - Yippy!

Ivory satin
Covered buttons down her back
She too a princess

My thoughts on Pippa Middleton

I wrote the above haiku early this morning, as I was inspired by the beautiful pictures of the Royal Wedding and how lovely Pippa looked.

But here's my haiku using Kim Pearson's topic for this haiku Friday: Fresh

A smile fresh and bright
And a heart quite full of love
She is married now

I am still inspired by the Royal events.

Another All Nighter

This week has been busy. Lots to do for *all* the bosses in my life. Seems I have been up until 2AM every night this week (which is pretty much an all-nighter for me).

I never was one to pull all nighters. They render me useless for the following day. But with so many bosses in my life that I dare not disappoint, I seem to have mustered (hey, is the past tense of muster mustered - just like dijon or Grey Poupon?! HA!) some sort of inner umph to keep myself going through the days.

You should bet big money that by tomorrow night I won't have the energy or the inclination to so much as call for pizza - let alone ensure that the home-bosses consume it.

Yep. I am tired. But tomorrow is haiku Friday. It will be my second. I am looking forward to it. I guess its actually today, but not just yet :-) Wonder if it will be inspired by things Royal.

She Who Presents

My life has taken on a interesting activity in the last six months. It all started in October when my ever-loathed boss declared that I must prove I and learning and that I know stuff; work stuff. At the time, the only thing besides taking a test that I could think of to prove my knowledge was to make presentations and spout my wisdom. After some grumbling he agreed - truth is he had no idea how to accomplish this feat either.

Anyway, in the past 6 months I've done close to 10 presentations, if you count the two that I vastly revised.

And now, in the wee hours of the night - nearly the morn - and it will be morn before I finish everything I need to finish tonight... I am again scouring the intenet gathering data for a presentation due to tomorrow morning.

But this presentation has me wishing I could spend the rest of my life in this world... Its a presentation about my ancestral homeland. Scotland.

That's right, reader, I am of Scottish heritage. I am special. The sound of bag pipes stir my soul and take me back centuries to highland country and prickly wool tartans. Its in my blood. And I can see the country when I close my eyes. I can feel the cold wind.

Its International Week (two weeks really, but hey...) in the Pre-k world of my dear young Iron Man. He's been around the world; China, Turkey, Egypt, Cameroon, Pakistan, India, Yemen. Mostly the Middle East :-) Well, I decided I would represent an ancient "western" culture.

Truth is I am a mutt... Western European heritage. Dutch fisherman, French Huguenots, German carpenters, and Scottish coal miners. In the tradition of the Scottish, I am named after my father's grandmother - who my father adored. She was brought to this country, to Pennsylvania, right around the time of the civil war. She had one sister and 5 brothers.

Anyway... I decided the best way to show the children something outside their Middle Eastern comfort zone would be through pictures, music and food! So I am putting together a slide show of ancient castles, mountains, lochs and valleys. I hunted down some free bagpipe mp3s and the shortbread cookies are packed up. We are going to have a great time.

But even more, I am reminded of my love for this place I've never been.

I want to write. I keep saying that. And lately all the pieces are coming together. From having the energy and making the time, to finding someone who has shown me enough of the process she uses which feels like a process I could use, to the images, music and food that stirs my soul.

It should be noted that french fries and canned spinach would stir my soul - I've put myself on a super strick diet and I miss eating yummy stuff to my heart's content. But that is another post for another time.

So presentation 11 is tomorrow morning at 9 sharp, as soon as circle time starts. I am looking forward to my young audience. I hope they will be gentle in their critique. If they aren't, I'll whip out the cookies early :-) Maybe I should have been baking for the ever-loathed boss...

She who bakes... I like it. Maybe an old fashioned stone and wood fire oven in a drafting castle high on a hill overlooking the North Sea...

Quiet Days are a Blessing

Today was a quiet day. I went to my quiet office and I was alone in the building all day. I thought about stuff.

The evening was quiet too. My house is clean, dinner was easy. I took a walk after dinner. I've been working now for the last three hours. Its been quite.

I work best at home at my desk at night.

I took pictures today. Tinkerbell needs some teeth to grow in!

A Kaiku A Day - Haiku Friday

I came across a blog post today (and oh, what a fun journey it was!) that said that today is Haiku Friday. I decided to play along...

A grand place of work
Calculators and printers
Invention nurtured

I just love this idea! It made me think about words, and about how I feel. Doing the exercise made me feel happy.

And the journey there, as I mentioned above was fun, too. I have a bunch of stuff in my RSS reader feed, and from one of the posts I found a web site, and at that site I found another article that tickled me, so I linked to her website and I found Primary Sources. I clicked through to the blog section and, well... the rest is history. The site seems to be the kind of resource I love to read about - writing!

Now, if I don't get back to the doldrums of my work-list, I won't be too happy much longer :-)

Well Done

So many things have turned out differently than I could have ever imagined. R. often reminds me of a time, nearly 20 years ago when I was concerned that if I married him I'd never go on a vacation or travel. Needless to say, we've traveled the globe together and savored every minute of it.

But that's not where I was going with this post when I started it...

Tea. Chai. I never gave a hoot about it until I met R. And boy did he give a hoot. Still does. And I have learned... According to R. there's no one in the world, not even his mother or his aunt, who can make a cup of tea as satisfying as mine.

And I give a hoot now. A very serious hoot. I seek out the best tea, boil the water and let it rest. I haven't made tea with a tea bag in at least 18 years. I know exactly how much half and half to add to his tea. Its always the perfect dark caramel colour. And its always hot.

I make good tea because it makes him happy. A good cup of tea usually settles any differences we may have.

It all comes down to tea.

I Had it All Ready to Go

But then I fell asleep. The night sorta soured around 8:30 anyway, so...

I am hoping for better tonight :-)

Quak'n

And shaking this afternoon up here on the SF bay!

Remind me to tell you about the melt down last Friday... Suffice to say, I was anything but a hack'n goddess... But having fought my way out of fibre madness I again feel goddess-like. All's well that ends well and maybe that's all I need to say. I can leave out the part where my head exploded and I wound up on the floor in a heap of frustrated tears. Not one of my finer moments.

But when I got home my kids still loved me.

Was It Lunch or a Vacation

Today we lunched with the mother of one of S.'s friends from her swimming class. The daughter, actually, is also an S.

That reminds me...

Yesterday evening at Trader Joe's we ended up in the line of a new checker-girl. And man was she pretty. I mean, the word gorgeous doesn't do her justice. Tall, slender, long black hair, plump happy lips and and easy, happy smile. And crystal blue eyes. And she was sincerely sweet.

Anyway, Mr. 20-something ahead of us in line gave it his best shot. Turns out he's new in town - been here just three weeks. Came from Maryland. He's in IT. I thought he said he was working for Johnson and Johnson, but I must have heard wrong - around these parts it must have been Johnson controls.

He was a cutie. Not too tall, in great shape, well cut blond hair. I had this feeling he was fresh out of the military. Clean cut. Looked great in his red t-shirt. No visible ink.

Yep, he gave it his best shot, but I think Gorgeous is spoken-for. Too bad. They would have made beautiful babies...

But I digress...

We had lunch today with the Mom. Turns out she and I and R. all work for the same super-huge high tech conglomerate - made muchly more huge because her conglomerate ate up ours about a year ago. She was so much fun to talk to. She was comfortable to be around. And we had great food for lunch, too. Left me feeling so high, I thought I'd just spent a week on a tropical island somewhere.

I love to feel like that.

I'm not usually that comfortable with people.

Loved her story about how she met and married her husband. Met him at a trade show in Nice, Fr. Then again 6 months later at a trade show in Chicago. One year and one very serious re-location later and they walked down the aisle. Their first date included dinner in an aquarium - how romantic would that be?!?!?

I am thankful for how good I feel today.

I Reached The Summit

Only to see that there's more ahead. But truly the heat is from the shining sun.

So we did what we do best - we celebrated with ice cream!

This was a remarkable day.

Baffled... Completely

S. will be 7 this year. Seven. S.E.V.E.N. Granted its 8 months away, but still. How can this be?

I spent the weekend holed-up writing technical presentations and editing R's IETF trip report. The trip report took me forever because it was fascinating - all this future of networking and the internet. Editing that report was more a private geek-fest for me. My own technical reports/presentations are much more challenging for me mostly because they are so boring. And they are boring because they are about storage. I hate storage. Its dull. Its complicated in a way where my tiny mind looses track of stuff fast. Networking, on the other hand, is all just a path from one place to another - anywhere, anyhow. Also, its what I got my degree in. How I ended up in storage is beyond me, but I digress... I literally didn't leave my property all weekend. I was up until the wee hours geeking (just like I am tonight! HA!)

The point is, S. came and stood by me for a while and I looked over at her and I just could not believe I have children. I could not believe that she is mine. I can't believe how she has grown. I sat in this same chair, at this same desk (my grandmother's actually) and held her as a tiny baby.

I still can't believe I have kids. I am still a child myself. Sometimes I wonder what people see when they look at me. What do I look like? Does anyone look twice?

Just This Close

Today I devote the entire day, (and yes, that would be a complete 24 hours!) to completing the least two purgatory projects I have been tasked with at work. They will be completed by this weekend and then my life will change. The chains will fall away and I will be free.

Yes, there are always more things, but after six months of working my tushy off I will turn a corner on Wednesday with these projects.

And in my heart, as unhappy as I have been, God has sustained hope for a better situation. He has held my heart when I thought I'd rip it from my own chest. And although I have much work to do, I will complete these two tasks with a joyous heart and start anew.

Faith sustains like nothing else. Without it you are lost and alone.

I want this for my children. I want it for my marriage. I want it for.

So today, as I begin the last push, I can feel the Almighty's hands on my back, holding me up to see the top of the world just ahead. His hands are large and strong and cover my entire back. His palms at my should blades, solid and unwavering.

I am blessed by Him and this day he has given me.

Thank you.

Reading and The Library

This most certainly has been library week. We went on Monday, got a load of books and have been reading them like crazy ever since. S. reads to us as I comb out her hair. Then I read something from among Z.'s selections.

We completed the Iron Man history book last night. Seems the movies simplified stuff, and took some serious liberties, too. Turns out Pepper and Happy are married in comic-book life, but in the movie Pepper and Tony quite obviously are destined for each other from the very start of the first movie.

And the plot twists! These people seriously took their cues from the soap opera world. Alliances form, crumble and re-form... Its soap opera on steroids!

Went on the quickie field trip with pre-k to the library today. We had a great time. Stories were read, shelves were disheveled. Pure bliss...

Pure Bliss...

Library Nights

Off we went to the library last night after dinner. We chose a huge bag load of books and brought them home to read. We didn't get too far last night, so we'll pick up where we left off tonight after karate.

Life is good.

From Frankfurt to Pride

They canceled R.'s flight. Saturday night in Frankfurt instead of home. The little ones took the news pretty well, though.

S. read Greg Mortenson's Listen To The Wind out loud to me while I ate my dinner this evening. She can read anything! Anything! Its amazing and wonderful. Z. hung out and listened, too.

Z. put together the Batman Trio structure thingy that Munnoo had me buy for him. The kit came with all the pieces and Ikea-like instructions as to how to put the thing together. Homeboy, like his beloved and cherished mother, appears to have been born to assemble massive creations simply by interpreting wordless pictures. This Trio stuff must be Swedish. Amen.

Truly, though, he carefully considered each picture, chose the pieces required and referred back as he put each piece in its place. The pieces don't always fit nicely, so once he knew where he wanted them he'd ask me to help secure things.

47 Instructions and 1.25 hours later and the fortress was assembled and ready for play time. Awesome. Awesome! AWESOME.

I am one proud Mama.

I gotta Crow

So my kids do the karate thing. We are pretty serious about it actually.

Z. does a good job, especially when you consider he's younger than everyone else by at least 1.5 years, and he started about 2 years younger than kids normally start. He's pretty good, actually.

Today he was amazing. Koncho, his teacher, believes that push-ups are the best exercise ever. And you should see Koncho do push-ups. He's got one foot crossed over the other, the foot on the floor is up high on his big toe. He's got his index and middle fingers on the floor holding him up. He only bends at the elbows, touches his nose - and only his nose - to the ground. He does them fast. He talks while he does them. Each and every push-up is perfect each and every time. Truly, it is a sight to behold.

Z.'s push-ups aren't quite as impressive as Koncho's - yet. But you oughtta see him! he gets his little body down there and only bends his elbows - no Mount Everest Butt!

Well, this evening during the advanced class Koncho was not too happy with one of the kids. The young man really wasn't doing well. Koncho told the kid to give him 20 push-ups. The kid got down and his efforts were, at best, weak.

Koncho saw Z. in the back of the room and called for him to come forward. He asked Z. to get down and do some push-ups. Z. did as he was asked. And he performed flawlessly!

Then Koncho asked the kid and Z. to come to the front of the room, face each other and go head to head doing push-ups.

Z. smoked that kid right out of the water! Everyone clapped. It was really cute because Z. was pleased with himself, but he didn't get the subtlety of the situation and how he'd effectively humiliated the kid. He simply looked pleased with himself in a genuine, innocent way.

As his mother I beamed. Everyone else in the room was proud of Z. Koncho has the older students mentor the younger ones and many of the students have worked with Z. Its kinda got a family atmosphere.

I do feel sad for the other kid, though. He must have been hurting. The other kid is 7 years older than Z.

I called R. in Prague to tell him this story. He was pleased.

I Broke A Nail Today

But it was worth it. I got the information I needed and I am ready to start working on a big new thing that I gotta do fast.

Sacrificing a nail was soooo worth it!