Odds and Ends, 8/31/09

Before I forget, I would like to acknowledge and thank my former mother-in-law, my friends Mark, Gillian, Ken, Barb and Elizabeth for their moral support while I was dealing with my breakup. I have probably forgotten someone, and my apologies if I have. In times like these you become aware of who your friends really are. I also wish to thank my family.

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The monsoon season in Arizona will be winding down soon. The season typically starts around June 30th, and lasts until early September. We get, if we're lucky, lots of thunderstorms. And I mean the word lucky, as that I enjoy thunderstorms, and we need the rain.

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Corporate politics can be very interesting at times. I need to devote a whole entry to what's going on at work right now. Suffice it to say that I'm in a very good position with my employer. I can't identify them; I have to be careful what I make public here, and I'm not going to divulge any trade secrets or proprietary information. I can however, write anecdotes about what's happening, and what I'm learning.

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From the Unforgettable Lyrics Department: a quote from the old Kansas song, "Two Cents Worth", penned by Kerry Livgren: "There's too much craziness here. In twenty-five years I have used all the tears in my eyes." I thought of that song yesterday, or maybe it was the day before, when I was in pain. I remember first hearing this song back in 1977, when a good friend of mine named Hal Liming was sharing it with me. I found those lyrics interesting then, and I still do now. They seem to have some intensity behind them. I probably ought to see if there's a way to email Mr. Livgren to see if he will tell me what he was thinking of when he wrote that song. That answer may also be in his autobiography, which I have, but haven't read in years. Maybe I'll look there first.

Unfortunately, Hal Liming is no longer with us. He introduced me to a lot of interesting music, some of which I still listen to today. We lost him in August of 1981 due to an accidental death.

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In addition to enduring the end of a relationship, my refrigerator suffered from the effects of a lightning storm two weekends ago, but I didn't become aware of the problem until last Wednesday. A power surge took out the compressor and a few other parts. The new compressor gets put in tomorrow. Meantime, I am fighting some nasty food odor problems created when the food spoiled. I've got a pan of bleach in both the freezer and cold storage compartments. I also sprayed the insides with Formula 409. The stench was really bad.....you don't want to know how bad. I'll follow up with baking soda next. In a few days I hope to start re-stocking it.

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And finally, I'm thinking of giving eHarmony a try. I've been in and out of match.com for the past several years. Although match.com will result in dates, the reality of that site is that 98% of the women you meet aren't matches, even if they tell you it's a 100% match. I saw one of the old girlfriends on there get rated at that score.

eHarmony will run you thru quite the battery of questions, and they charge more. I think though that they're much more diligent in their matching process, and I don't mind paying more if the quality of matches rises commensurately. With match.com as a starting point, that probably won't be too hard for them to do.

I'll probably go ahead and pay the fees, but it will be a few weeks before I'm ready to meet someone. There was still some residual sadness today but at least I didn't break down in uncontrollable sobbing.