Tales from the Shark Tank

Last night I finished reading my copy of Order of the Phoenix. It’s a fast read, even at 800-plus pages. I liked Harry’s transition into teenage angst. Rowlings could have done better characterizing the newest villian; she seems very two dimensional. She wants to stop Harry and/or make his life miserable (don’t all the villians?), but you never quite get a handle on why.

I won’t spoil who dies. I will say that when it happened I was as stunned as Our Boy Hero, but that when I thought about it, I shouldn’t have been.

All in all, I’d have to call book 5 a lot of good exposition, setting up for books 6 and 7. Ms. Rowlings, please don’t take years to finish the next 2 books.

Today is Youth Day for my employer. Anyone who wants can bring a kid (or kids) over 8 to work with them for the day. My agency is swarming with small enthusiastic bodies. In my department alone, we have 4 kids catching up our filing for us – and we are a tiny department. Anyway, I was walking down the hall a few minutes ago, and overheard the following quintessentially parental exchange.

Kid: Mom, your job is really hard!

Mom: Yes, it is. That’s why *you* need to get a good education, so you won’t have to do a job like this!

I just wish I’d heard the rest of it.

Well, 5 days and 500 miles later, I’m back in my own habitat. I’ve attended an excellent seminar, dropped in on a weekend-long reception at a campground about an hour west of that, gone on to Evansville to see an old friend (another hour and a half west, when home was by that point due north), and then taken a rather tedious 4 1/2 hour drive home. Tuesday I called in sick and proceeded to sleep the entire day, thus proving that while the spirit is 25, the body quite decidedly is not.

I came back to the pleasant news that the federal grant proposal I had done in no time flat had been accepted as complete by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. Given that I took about 8 pages to ask for rather a lot of money, I had been a little nervous; usually such proposals are much thicker than that. But when I called to check, I was thanked for keeping it short and easy to read, and told it would both speed the response time and improve the chances of subtantial approval. I keep thinking I must have missed something, because it bears no resemblance to the sample proposals the grant writing people provide as templates; I hadn’t the time for something that complex. There’s a disconnect somewhere.

Summer arrived for true this weekend. It’s been relatively comfortable up until now, with temperatures in the high 70’s. Between Friday and Sunday, though, the temperature and the humidity both shot up into the 90’s. Ick. Thank G-d for airconditioning and hotel pools.

The Ohio River Valley was genuinely lovely, though. Despite the heat, when I had time I took state roads instead of the interstate, driving between bluffs and the river with the windows rolled down so I could hear the birds. A couple of times I pulled into driveways to let people behind me pass, as I was going relatively slowly and knew they’d be annoyed if they needed to get anywhere. One old gentleman in an ancient pickup – the quintessential essence of “truck”- waved as he passed. When I pulled in behind him, it turned out he was going no faster than I had been. I was amused.

I stopped at a general store in a tiny farm town for something to drink, and ended up getting a milkshake made with homemade peach ice cream. It was incredible. Now I know what a real milkshake tastes like.

The establishment was part grocery, part local museum (with a guy happily pointing out all the things that had been collected and giving their history with names that meant nothing to me – “and that postal sorting cabinet came from Dolores Atkins’ sister’s attic, but Dolores didn’t have room for it, so she had it hauled over here because it was too interesting to throw out, don’t you think?”), part antique store and entirely fascinating. I looked around for something I needed, and finally asked in puzzlement where they kept thread. Turned out it was in a basket behind the counter, as were thimbles, both marked 29 cents each. I think they were as old as I am; they were certainly dusty enough for it!

Stayed to have dinner in Evansville, which in turn delayed me a day getting home. My friend’s 6 year old son tried to insist that he should sleep with me. (My friends had a suite, so there really was an extra bed.) So we let him fall asleep with me, and then moved him. I had to laugh, as Wick and I do that with Joseph (usually in the middle of the night) more often than not. I guess it’s in the 6 year old contract.

I should feel guilty about the delay, as it gave my husband another day of single parenting and upset my son, but I don’t really. Ok, I’m sorry the people I love were distressed, but I needed to escape from some of the stresses my husband and son create, and I did. It was a really good trip, and I’m glad I’m home.

Well, I’ll be out of touch for a while. I’m going to a CLE (continuing legal education) seminar down by the Ohio River, then to Evansville to visit a friend I haven’t seen in many too many years. Last time I saw him, his elder son was a year old. Now he’s 11. I’m leaving tomorrow morning early, and coming home on Monday.

My husband gets to play single parent while I’m gone. I can’t help thinking of the way the world has changed. When I was little, moms seldom worked, and never travelled. In my family now, the one who travels in her work is me. It’s only a couple of times a year, as a rule; it’s only been sheerest happensance that I’ve two jaunts in one week. I will admit that I’m loooking forward to relaxing in the hotel sauna, though. (Sorry, Wick.)

So I’ll get back with y’all after my foray into the Northern edge of the old Confederacy. And don’t worry; I’ll be careful.

Yesterday I drove through beautiful Southern Indiana down to the booming metropolis of French Lick. (It’s a blink town; if you blink, you’ll miss it.) On the way back, I was forced onto a detour due to an accident on the state highway somewhere north of me. Thus did I come upon a prosperous and truly unique farm.

Its prosperity I infer from the farmhouse, which is large, lovely, and fairly modern, and the collection of 8 (yes, I counted) barns, all in excellent repair with gleaming paint. The paint gave the farm its distinctiveness.

Each barn was a different jewel tone, with contrasting trim. There was the amethyst purple barn with yellow trim. The next one was deep golden yellow with green trim. There were also barns in emerald green and white, turquoise and white, crimson and pale blue, sapphire blue and pale yellow, silvery grey with pink, and white with royal blue.

I can just see someone giving instructions like “make sure the horses in the purple barn have fresh hay”. It’s certainly a more interesting way to distinguish between barns than numbers. Who says farmers are conservative and tradition-bound!

I am through two of my five major projects, and my supervisor, bless her, has taken another one to do herself. Tomorrow I get to drive half-way down the state (To French Lick, for those who are familiar with Indiana geography) and give my lecture to the judges. I wonder how many will be there, and how many will be on the golf course or out by the pool. Then Thursday I will be able to come back in and tune the federal grant proposal, instead of babysitting a nervous supervisor in an unemployment compensation hearing.

My supervisor is wonderful. She really is.

I have a number of critical projects with deadlines that all hit this week, only one of which I knew about before last Friday. The first of them is done now. I have written the summary of changes is law and administrative procedure for this year’s judicial conference. But since the department secretary is on vacation, it also falls upon me to get the copies made so they can be distributed. And so do I come to praise 21st Century technology. A few buttons pushed, a check to make certain that there is sufficient paper in the bin, and lo, the copier is providing me with 70 two sided, collated, book-stapled copies without requiring any babysitting on my part. Woo-hoo!

Last night I decided to cut out a split skirt. I need to upgrade my wardrobe to match my new position, as I am no longer the lawyer who hides in the office and writes. Now that I have a fancy title (Deputy Chief Counsel), I have to go to meetings with people who will take me more seriously if I look like I take myself seriously. Since by preference I dress somewhere distinctly on the casual side of business, that means new clothes. And since my body type does not match the expectations of women’s clothing manufacturers (women of my girth are supposed to be bulgy and short and very buxom, and I am none of those things), that means getting into the vast stash of fabrics and making new clothes.

So I got out a length of khaki silk-linen blend fabric. According to pattern envelope information, I should have been about a quarter yard short of the amount needed just for the skirt.

I played with it. I looked at the jigsaw puzzle and shifted things around. And when I was done, I had not only cut out my skirt, I had cut a matching vest. So when I get done with it, I’ll have a suit I can wear spring, summer or fall that will fit perfectly. Woo hoo!

Each day this week, Li has tried to call me on her cell phone as she was leaving her place of employment. Each time, I have had the bad fortune to get another call at just to strategic moment to send her into voicemail limbo.

So today, I made a point of making very sure my line stayed clear, so that I would get the call. And, of course, having struck out three times running, today is the day she didn’t call.

Sigh. Life is just like that sometimes.

My home town is undergoing the Interstate Construction Project from Hell (mundanely known as the Hyperfix project) this summer. The area most dependent on that collection of interstates to get anywhere is the northeast suburbs. Of course, that’s where I live.

In order to ease the commute, the city public transit authority has established temporary park-and-ride locations from that part of the metropolis into downtown. The idea is that rather than fight the traffic and the orange cone zones and the closed access routes, you can park your car and let the bus driver worry about it. Save stress, save time, reduce traffic, what could be bad?

Two of the three sites chosen for pick-up points and the schedule, that’s what! One is off an exit for one of the busiest access routes into town, which has a traffic jam at all hours when it doesn’t have an accident or two. Having hundreds (and yes, that’s what they’re drawing) more people converge on that interchange is just a recipe for disaster – and has been a source of chaos since it opened. I’m sorry, anyone with half a brain could have predicted that.

The other is in the middle of the other massive construction project, with the end result that there’s no way to get to the bus stop without detours and cone-zones — which the bus must then contend with heading out. Hello! Was anyone looking at traffic patterns when they chose where to have the bus stop? I know, because I spoke to transit agency’s attorney before the contracts were signed, that they had other options.

The last straw, though, is the schedule. If I arrange to leave my house at 8:30 instead of 7:30 (which is my preference anyway) I can get downtown by the most direct route in 30 minutes. The bus, however, starting from a point somewhat closer than my house and making no stops until it arrives downtown, takes an hour and a quarter. This is supposed to save time exactly how?

I liked the idea on paper. Execution, however, needs work. It does not appear I shall be taking the bus to avoid the Hyperfix this summer.