Charli and Her Book

Here is Charli, my African brown-headed parrot, chewing up my copy of Will Shortz' Little Black Book of Suduko. Don't worry -- I'd already worked all the puzzles, and she doesn't ingest any of the paper. Sometimes she gets so involved in chewing that her little feet actually come up off the surface.

This is her favorite toy (after me, of course).

Little Flash and Nicholas showcased tonight!

Let's see -- Sugar Franklin acted ever so slightly distressed on Saturday; tail bobbing just a tiny bit, sleeping a lot. She'd laid an egg on Tuesday, so I knew there was another one on the way despite my very best lectures to her. The vet's office closes at noon on Saturday so I rushed her in, whereupon she perked up enough to make a liar out of me. She was about 5 grams heavier than usual, and the vet felt the mass without a shell. That one only cost me $55, but I'm made of money, you know.

She laid a perfect egg on Sunday morning, whereupon she's been her usual feisty aggravating self.

Work has been quiet this week; my supervisor is on vacation. Thank you, God.

The weather is typical for us this time of year. Seventy degrees one day, snow the next. It rained most of last weekend and was warm this week, but they're warning us of snow for the weekend,

I've been having all kinds of epiphanies (I don't think that's spelled right) related to my piano lessons. My self-talk is not good, and I'm way too hard on myself and get frustrated because I can't "do it right," which leads to more negative self-talk, which leads to more frustration and the growth of nine extra fingers, none of which will strike the right key.

O is going to Europe for three weeks, and she gave me three weeks' worth of homework. Mostly scales, which I hate, but these are supposed to help me learn to play with hands in one position and then lift my hands to move to another position. This sounds so easy I imagine my two readers are lifting their eyebrows, but believe me it is incredibly difficult to move and get your fingers all arranged in a completely different position within the space of a quarter note. Even though she always insists I go as slow as I need to, but still.

Last week's lesson included a song in which I was to play stacco (short, clipped notes) with my left hand while playing legato (smooth and connected) with my right. At the same time. I simply could not and still can't do it. O and I had a really bad lesson this week because of it, but we worked it out.

I bought a metronome a couple of weeks ago. I'd never seen one other than on TV before. It's a little electronic, digital thing that will beep from 40 beats a minute to over 200 beats a minute. I tend to stay around 64 to 68. It will do all manner of other things but I have no clue what they are or what good they'd do me. Anyway, it sort of made me feel like a real musician. Or at least a reasonable facsimile of one.

I'm taking tonight off from piano practice, laundry, writing, cooking, and anything else I'm supposed to do.

I took some pictures of my beloved Sugar Franklin, and I'm going to try to upload a little video. This may be the video that ends with me tilting the camera up to the ceiling, but I don't know yet how to deal with the software to fix that.

Keep your fingers crossed!

Wednesday Blues

Been raining all day. Spring rain but still rain.

I'm seeing someone at the credit union Monday about refinancing my house. He said on the phone he didn't think rates would go down much more so I guess I may as well do it and get it over with. I seriously doubt I'll ever get this house paid for.

I applied for an online instructor position with a local community college, and got hired on the condition I went through the Blackboard training. I kept having technical problems -- their system wouldn't accept my password -- so the woman who "hired" me said since I was having problems I should take more time to learn more technical stuff as well as Blackboard. Their system won't let me in and she says it's my problem.

OK. Suddenly the system is now working so I finish my online Blackboard training and take the certification test, and miss one question over the limit. Then I disappear from the system. I ask what happened and now get told they couldn't let me teach now even if I had passed the test because I have no online experience teaching (this is not quite true, but they decide to ignore that) nor enough training. I asked how exactly I'm supposed to get this experience and this extra training, and she tells me "You're an intelligent woman, you know what to do."

Yep. I am an intelligent woman and I know when I'm getting jerked around. So I've wasted a ton of time and the cost of having transcripts mailed to them -- for nothing.

But there are other community and business colleges that offer online classes, so I'll apply to them, too.

Meanwhile, things are quiet at work. For awhile anyway. Tomorrow is my mid-year review, and I dare my supervisor to say one damn word to me about that awful situation with that awful woman. My supervisor told me months ago it wouldn't be reflected on my evaluation, but my supervisor is not exactly what you'd call trustworthy about that kind of stuff. We'll see.

The administration has sent around a survey to measure employee satisfaction. What a joke -- we've done this several times before and nothing changes. They get up there and announce how happy we all are then everything goes back to what passes for normal. This time they're offering door prizes. And still the response rate is dismally low. The survey gave us three small lines to include our suggestions or comments -- I added three single-spaced pages, which probably hit the trash right off.

Hmmm, writing all this it's suddenly obvious I'm pretty angry, which I didn't realize. Good idea to get out in print.

On the birdie front, Sugar Franklin laid an egg yesterday, despite my very exact instructions not to.

I gave all the birds a soaking bath today, partly to avoid practicing piano. But I finally did sit down at the keyboard and try to do this impossible thing O wants me to do. But I can't seem to make my fingers work right.

sigh . . .

Neighbors' Mysteries Revealed!

Busy, busy, busy, which is not really an excuse (except that it is) for not making an entry sooner.

Had a really good piano lesson tonight with O. I actually managed to do a decent job of a murderously difficult (for me) piece.

I made up my mind about what I would be willing to pay to have a water line installed so I could have ice and cold water from my new frig. When I got a quote from my plumber it was exactly what I was willing to pay (no, I hadn't given my plumber a hint). Now I can say it's worth two or three times what I paid to have it hooked up; I love it.

I finally bought a digital camera! It takes great pictures and videos, though I'm finding the videos hard to upload because they're so big. But I plan to do more when I get a chance. I really enjoy taking pictures of my babies with the 12X optical zoom.

Now -- about the neighbors! Continuing line of different cars and trucks coming and going. One day I noticed that one of my fence planks was nearly rotted and broken, and the neighbors had put their trash containers in front of it to help keep their dog in. So the next time I saw the man I told him I would get a new plank and replace the broken one. He said he'd be glad to nail it up if I'd lend him a hammer and some nails.

So last Saturday I went beside his house with the plank (I was going to do it myself), and called nicely to the dog tied up in the backyard. When he started barking the young black woman came out and warned me off until she got the dog inside. The man came out and offered to nail up the plank. I ain't no fool about work -- so I let him.

Turns out his name is Milton and he's got 8 children. When I asked him if he ever found out what was causing it he burst out laughing. I asked where he worked, and he said he was on disability. Turns out he'd been shot something like 9 or 10 times during a home invasion crime wave we'd had a year or so ago. "I drove into my garage and there they were," he said. "I gave 'em my wallet, thinking that's all they wanted." It was then I realized all the scars on his body (he was wearing a sleeveless tee-shirt) were healed-over bullet holes. He said he'd been in the hospital for 11 months. That's why he has two dogs now (I thought he only had one); to warn him if there are any prowlers. There is no garage with his house next door.

He has a son in Florida who was due to visit the next day (and a car with Florida plates did arrive the next day). There were two cute little boys hanging out in the yard, who turned out be his sons and evidently were visiting that weekend. Plus there's a baby (or two?). I didn't ask how many mothers were involved in this extended family.

He kept calling me "ma'am," which I encouraged him not to do, but he said it was a habit. I like polite people.