St. Patrick and the Snake

I attended the engineering campus at Missouri for college, University of Missouri at Rolla, formerly Missouri School of Mines. The patron saint of engineers is St. Patrick, who bludgeoned to death all the snakes in Ireland, which is why there are no snakes in that island. You can only imagine the drunken festival at a mostly male university that annually occurs on this anniversary. Whatever. The point is, my cat Fritz, has found his niche in life, and that is to hunt snakes. After 3 years we have finally discovered the toy that turns him into a mewing, chirping, whirling dervish. Fritz was born to hunt snakes, notwithstanding that there are rarely snakes in this part of the San Jose foothills. We have a cotton-covered cord that in Fritz's little pea brain, must represent the most fascinating of prey, because he will beg to make the snake live, even at 4 a.m. Bless his little kitty brain, after over 3 years of trying to coax him to play, I've finally discovered his cat essence.

I should live to be 90

I found this lifestyle quiz on eons.com (OK, LivingTo100.com if you are under 50 and still have a crack at this). Now I don't do quizzes, having had quite enough of taking and giving them in my university career. However, I thought I might learn something, and so I did. If I would religiously floss my teeth daily, which I will confess doesn't happen, I would statistically gain a quarter of a year. Is it worth it? Doesn't my trusty Sonicare do a good enough job? I also completed the quiz for G, who will predecease me by 14 years, statistically speaking. Why am I not surprised?

Spring has sprung and other minutae

The trees are spectacularly beautiful again, as they always are. You will note they are not yet pruned, which is normal for this yard, as the man has to handle the pruner and we have to wait until he has been appropriately motivated. It has not been a good week although it should have been. Last weekend we went to Sonoma and drank wine. I finally bought a new serger, and took a playday mid-week to set it up, and of course, buy more fabric. My review this week was the best in years; I still have the new boss fooled that I can walk on water with only my feet getting wet. However, there is no money for raises, and I (and some 30 of my close colleagues and probably way more than that) am pissed. 300 shares of Agilent stock, which has not gone up in price and is indeed drifting down again, is not compensation for a year of knocking my socks off and not making the commission because the product line is under quota. There, I have had my public pout, I shall go finish in the lab until I have to come back tomorrow (Saturday) and I shall go home and stand in the yard and admire my trees. I just need to get my head straight again.