Feel Free To Have An Emergency Now

My first aid, CPR, and AED skills are brushed up and I feel pretty confident I can take care of you until the real medicos arrive.  Or at least not hurt you more than you already are.  I try to re-up every 2 years just to stay sharp-ish.  Since last time they've decided that you should do CPR chest compressions first and then after 2 rescue breaths do them at a rate of 100/minute.  That's fast.  I found a website that said you can sing the BeeGees' Staying Alive from Saturday Night Fever in your head to set your speed.  Pretty funny, eh?  Staying Alive, snort, get it?  It sure made for a long day, though, since I worked from 10 AM and didn't leave the store until after 10 PM.  I like my job but that's a bit much.  Next week I "get" to work every day but Wednesday and Sunday because Mr. & Mrs. Boss will be in Vegas at a diving equipment show.  There are perks to being the only employee and non-perks.  Next week is a non-perk.  (keep your paycheck in mind, Barbara, remember the paycheck)  What?  I'm old (yes I am, 61 is not young, it's not even young-ish no matter how you look at it) and I'm tired of doing what other people want me to do, I want to do what I want to do when I want to do it.  Of course, that would require an infusion of cash to fund my activities and I'm not sure where that'd come from.  The cosmos?  Some random rich person deciding to leave me his fortune?  Yeah, probably not.  We went to visit our financial advisor on Monday morning and, well, we're doing okay but not great (the economy sucks, I'm sure you've heard) and certainly not well enough that I can quit my job and go merrily off spending and charging (because I know that I would) willy-nilly.  The money that I earn pays for our groceries in addition to my manicures, fabric, book, and yarn purchases.  I can't quit, see?  Can't.  Oh, hey, I'm figuring out how to download and transfer digital media from the "new" service available from our library all on my own.  How'd that happen?  Well, I watched the tutorial video the other day at work; that helped.  And I've kept poking at it for the last few days and evidently eventually poked the right buttons in the right order.  Go, me!  The trick will be remembering how I did it the next time I find something to check out.  This is the coolest thing to me, the perfect use for digital technology.  I can borrow books from the library, audiobooks on CD that I fong onto my laptop and then transfer to my iPod, all digital ones that go straight onto the iPod without the annoying ripping files from cds, books that show up as pages on my Kindle Fire, even videos that'll show up on my Kindle or iPod (if I can figure out how to download those before they're due back; I'll get there, don't you worry).  Oh, and they can work on making them all come in the same format so I don't have to divi them up by what plays on what.  I suppose I could get all my devices in the same format... nah, they can adjust to me not the other way around.  Today's Photo a Day theme is "small" so here's a shot of the 3 tiny keyring purses lying on a hat.  I get a sort of odd satisfaction making something that small.  Weird.
 
November 9--Egypt, Mummy Mask.  Raoul smoothed his hands over the wet plaster and linen.  "So smooth," he crooned, "so cool.  You'll be glad you let me do this, you will."  Her eyes swam with tears, silently pleading with him to stop, to let her go.  Her eyes were the only part of her still visible.  He liked to keep them uncovered so that no matter how he sculpted the plaster around them their true self shone out.  He selected each one carefully, considering all of the ones that displayed themselves to him walking by his shop.  He was very particular, rejecting those not quite right.  This one had the graceful hands he was seeking so he took special care wrapping and arranging them as the plaster dried.  This one was especially good.  She had fought to stay alive much longer than most.  Her spark burned bright right up until the instant it went out forever.

I'm hungry so I'm off to maybe cook up a bowl of oatmeal with a few dried cherries in it.  You're sorry you're not here for a share, I know you are.  Have a good day.
--Barbara