Turkey Wednesday

Today's post title doesn't quite have the same ring as Turkey Day or Turkey Tuesday, does it? However, that is what it is since tomorrow is Thanksgiving. I think I heard yesterday was the day Roosevelt proclaimed the holiday. And tomorrow is also Thanksgivukkah, a confluence of Thanksgiving and Hanukkah that will not occur again for 70,000 years. I am not sticking around to check if that is true.

It looks like I will have California Quinoa Salad from Whole Foods for lunch tomorrow. I also have a kale dish called Mediterranean Crunch. I have figs, apples, pears and probably some watermelon for fruit. I have baked squash, roasted sweet potatoes and a veggie tray for vegetables. Jealous, anyone?

I did not think to load any personal photos when I got in from Chorale practice and Whole Foods shopping last night, so all I have for you today is Clarity of Vision from 2009.

In years past, we were allowed to leave early on the days before Thanksgiving and Christmas. However, we have heard no indication that will be true today. Come on, management, where's your holiday spirit? Fine, I'll finish my rant soon and get to work.

I know we need to hit Thanksgiving meals at parent's and son's houses. Friday is putting up Christmas decorations and ZooLights. Saturday is NPX. Sunday is a Chorale concert. And kicking it all off tonight is Survivor. Other than that, nothing is up over the next few days. How about you? What are your plans? Do you have traditions you will uphold like we do with ZooLights?

The commute this morning was really pleasant. That is one fun thing about these holiday weeks, right?

OK, let's get cracking. I will publish this post, then head over to refill my water bottle and grab a piece of fruit...I think pear...and settle in for a long winter's nap. Well, actually, I need to finish creating templates for project review presentations by the end of November, so that's where I will start. See you next week.

Turkey Tuesday

TV program we are watching as I type? Homeland.

Remember that college marching band video I posted a week or two ago? This new video from Ohio State is really fun.

I heard a radio announcer say that today, 11/26, is the day Roosevelt established the fourth Thursday of November as the official day of Thanksgiving. It was also a day he started rationing, although back then, it was gasoline and not how much we can eat on Thanksgiving day. There is no limit to how much we vegans can eat, but you will likely not hear me say, "Here. Take my plate away. Otherwise, I will keep nibbling on this tofurky."

I saw a story about Al Gore going vegan here. Way to go, dude. Here is Clinton talking his change with Ellen.

There/s an article on today's Yahoo page talking about Mary McDonnell's new show and she reminisces about Dances With Wolves. Personally, I think she is doing that because, if you see her on the new program, you won't recognize her at all from Dances. I cannot even see her as the same person after so much plastic surgery. Crazy, I say.

One of the places we usually hit while we are in Ouray is this ice cream/coffee shop.

And here we are ordering our little treats. Actually, I did not get one, but I enjoyed watching the family enjoy theirs.

As we walked back to our cabin after snacking, I saw the sun breaking out on the Amphitheater above town.

Four years earlier, I was not in Ouray, but I did decide to share a treat with my friend and coworkers. One of the people I sent this CoV to was a new team member whose name really was the one you see in this comic. How could I not base a comic around it?

I could not see a bad message in this license plate. In fact, I had to read the story before I understood, but it still would not occur to me. How about you?

Hey, let's finish today and then, we are only one day away from Thanksgiving and Black Friday (no, I do not participate, but some family members do). Have a great day, peoples.

Last Monday Before Thanksgiving

The photos and CoV below were loaded on Sunday night, as is this introductory paragraph. We are watching Amazing Race right now.

I just got back from an East Valley Chorale concert at an RV park east of the city. We had over 150 people attend, so that was good. This was probably our last concert before the all-Christmas-music concerts up until Christmas.

What are your plans for Thanksgiving? Grandparent's house? Parent's? Kid's? Stay home? What's Thanksgiving? We will be at my parent's place first, and then SS's house. I am not ready to jump right back into meat eating, so I will bring my own food while they all enjoy traditional turkey, dressing, etc. That's OK. It's all good. Now, missing my D-I-L's delicious desserts? Less OK.

You know, there is one restaurant in Telluride that we always hit when we are in town. It is Baked in Telluride. They even had a couple of choice for vegan types. And check out the lovely ski slopes back behind the building.

I thought the golden of these aspen looked really cool against the white and red of the cliffs behind them.

Here is a shot of the San Miguel River near Placerville, CO, where we stopped for a picnic a few years ago. You can probably find the photos if you search back through the October photos from 2011 or 2010 or 2009. [Monday musings: I looked, but did not see the photos in previous postings. Maybe I put it in a photo book, but never shared it with y'all. Sorry]

Why have I kept writing Clarity of Vision comics for these past four years? Actually, I wondered that myself, back in 2009.

I am sitting at my new desk. Remember that they moved a whole bunch of people on Monday? Anyway, I am one cubicle over from the first cube I occupied when I was hired here. It has come full circle, my friends. Full circle, I say.

Well, since it is Thanksgiving week, it is a short workweek. That's cool. I can dig it. What it means, though, is I need to wrap this up and start working on the Powerpoint-based status slides for my projects. I need to publish them before 8am, so go do your Monday stuff. I'll be back on Turkey Tuesday.

Check Out the Farkling Snow

Let's start today with the power outage in Ouray back in October. We left the restaurant and went back to our cabin. Dad and I decided to play a little Farkle.

Speaking of the power outage, it did not stop the snow. Check out how heavily it was coming down.

The next morning, all was right with the world. Check out how the snow brings out the colors.

Speaking of color, check out how colorful the CoV was back in April of 2009. Well, by colorful, I mean lovely blues and grays and no faces.

Speaking of colorful, check out this cool concept motorcycle from Kawasaki. It is like a Transformer come to life. It kind of makes me miss the old motorcycling days of my youth.

Speaking of days of my youth, today is the 50th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. I remember that (a) one of my buddies was at the airport to see him arrive, (b) a luau we had planned for that afternoon at school got cancelled, and (c) they let us out of school soon after the announcement that the President was dead. Was his death part of some conspiracy? I think that is likely, but as I heard on a news program last night, it does seem that some evidence would have leaked out at some point since then if there were. We'll never know.

Speaking of conspiracy, there must be some collusion between our company and the firm hired to move people between cubicles and buildings. I have heard it costs $300 for each move and I know that several hundred are being moved today and this weekend. I am scheduled to move today at noon.

It is a rainy, gloomy day outside. I wonder if that is why it is still quiet in the office. Probably that plus the fact that it is Friday. I still have to pack my boxes for the move, so I need to drop y'all off here at the curb. Have a great weekend and check back in on Monday.

Different than Back Home

Back when it was snowing in Ouray, Mom enjoyed watching the falling flakes...probably because it is so unlike anything she sees back home in the desert.

Speaking of things that are different from back home, what is this weird thing running down the road with a bulldozer blade on the front?

Do you remember that I told you the power went out while we were eating at Buen Tiempo? Here is a shot of that while we were waiting for it to be restored. We ended up leaving before it was restored (some 2-3 hours later). Unfortunately for Dad, he had already paid for the meal just a few minutes earlier. True, power can go out back home, too, but at least we are usually in our own home when that happens during the monsoon season.

Continuing with the old CoVs, we find one that looks Like I must have gotten a new boss around the time I wrote this comic. Right now, I do not have a new boss, and that is OK with me.

Did you miss me Wednesday? I was at the Mayo Clinic for my annual physical. This year, though, I wanted to see what difference the vegan diet is making in my numbers. Everything looked very good except for cholesterol. According to the doctor, there are six factors affecting a person's cholesterol numbers: diet, weight, exercise, age/gender, diabetes, heredity. I was very good on five of them, but heredity is a very strong indicator. He said that all the other numbers look good, so I can stay vegan if I choose, but I need to restart my statin pills on Thursday. With the family history, and how high the cholesterol numbers are, even though all the other blood and urine chemistry numbers are very good, we cannot take the risk of plaque buildup. So, here comes the sore muscles after workout again. Now, what to do about my diet?

Speaking of which, check out this article. I have not done it to help with global warming. The article also includes a quote by the doctor that wrote the book that got me started on this journey.

BTW, Survivor is on as I write this. And earlier, we caught up on CSI.

Here is an interesting little video about what started Paul McCartney and John Lennon writing their own songs.

Today is one of those days like previous positions required. I have meetings at 9:30am, 10am, 11am, 1pm and 2pm. I am leading the meetings at 9:30 and 2, so I need to be sure I have identified clear agendas and capture meeting minutes. Plus, I need to have all my weekly reporting information updated today. So, I'll get some preparatory work done this morning before everyone gets here. I also need to pack up my desk so they can move me 50 yds to another desk in the same building. As always, thanks for noticing my blog.

What About the Elephant in the Room?

As I type, we are watching a pre-recorded Shark Tank and the people are trying to pitch an elephant doll in a clear glass box that they are calling "Elephant in a room". They want to price this thing at $59. Did any of the sharks bite? Would you have?

Hmm, how upset was JV at Santa? Did you see his photo yesterday?

I guess the girls wanted to practice their weaponry, also.

Looks like someone is trying to bring in a partner with their own weapon.

I may or may not post tomorrow. I don't have to be at the Mayo until 9:15, so maybe I will sleep in. Or maybe not since TD will use up all the hot water if I wait. So, if I am up, I will probably post. If not, then I will either not post or post later while waiting at the Mayo.

Well, I don't have any Yahoo! links to share today, so you get off with a warning. Just don't try to speed through this blog again.

[Oops. Tuesday update] I forgot to add in my throwback CoV from 2009.

Tickling the Ivories

What's on while I write this? Well, it is Sunday night and we just watched Revolution, CSI is on now, and our final show of the night will be Amazing Race. Sounds like a pleasant evening, doesn't it? Sometimes, it is nice to relax and veg out in front of the boob tube. Plus, I am allowed to 'veg' out on this vegan diet. Ha ha.

Speaking of ivory tickling, this past Friday, it was not me or MBH playing the piano. I was the two granddaughters at their first recital. They did a great job, but they were much more at ease after their turn passed. I know SS got video of them, and the photos are on LMH's camera, so I'll need to share them another day. I watched from the hallway babysitting JV, but we did stand in the door while each of them played.

Here, though, is my behind-the-scenes shot of visiting Santa the next morning at Bass Pro Shop.

And when they rode the merry-go-round, it seems they rode at breakneck speed, although JV had stopped crying by then. Well, it seems that way when I tried to catch a shot without the flash.

I was apparently clever a few years ago. As proof, I offer another Clarity of Vision from 2009.

[Monday mumblings] I am moving between cubicles this coming Friday (which happens to be the 50th anniversary of the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated. I do not think the two events are related, although I do think all this cubicle shifting is the result of a conspiracy). Anyway, I will land one cubicle away from my first cube when I joined the company. Coincidence? I think not. OK, actually, I think so.

I scanned through my normal daily websites and did not see any links that I thought would captivate and and/or titillate you, so I am done for the day. Please resume your normal habits until we get together again on the morrow. Thanks for being a loyal reader, though.

Heigh Ho, Heigh Ho, It's Off Twerk We Go

I am writing this while watching Glee on Thursday night. Apparently, the glee club is learning to twerk, so that is what the title of today's post means. You could also consider it sort of a hidden Mickey.

We also watched Walking Dead. It seems that, during every season, episode 4 has something major happen. Was it true again this season? I'll never tell. Well, I won't tell in this post.

Speaking of the number 4, we are still walking through April, 2009 comics. We have made it to 4/13, so enjoy.

Remember that I said we went up north over the weekend. Well, here is the resort where we stayed. You can see the girls playing on a little locomotive at the entrance.

While the girls were outside, JV was playing with a hippo singing "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas". The stuffed animal was singing that, not JV. We listened to that song A LOT over the weekend.

And here's the whole family, together for a nice shot.

[Friday Fun Fact] Today, I am back in that fancy building for all-day training. I don't remember when I placed a photo in a previous blog, but since I was here for three months, I still have access to the room up on the ninth floor where I can work until time for class, and then come back up here to eat my lunch. Nice, huh?

With the two additional projects assigned to me, I am staying plenty busy, so I need to finish some stuff before the weekend, and since I have class starting in 1-1/2 hours, I've gotta go. Thanks for spending some time with me.

New Projects Assigned, So No Time to Waste

I met with Boss Man (No, I am not going to shorten that to BM) yesterday. He assigned me two new projects, one of which is high priority, short timeline, and involves a contractor. So, I have my first meeting with the team at 9am. I think my key challenge on that will be monitoring the budget so that the work is complete before the contract runs our of funds.

I am noticing some dismal news about people signing up (or not) for Obamacare. I have never even looked at the site. Have any of you?

I'm not even going to explain it anymore. You can tell by the date in the lower left of each CoV when it was first written, and yes, we are still back in time in 2009.

Let's go back in time all the way to October of this year. You can tell in this photo how much it was snowing while we were visiting Ironton Township near Ouray, CO.

But it is nice and warm inside. Except, of course, that there are no doors and no glass in the windows.

And on the road home, here is the end of a flume or some sort of mine-related chute down the mountain. What would y'all call this?

One thing I am certainly not going to do is acknowledge that, before this vegan diet, I looked forward to the McRib coming back each year. And this article says I shouldn't eat them, even if I stop being vegan.

Time waits for no man, and I am a man, and time is not waiting for me, so I need to catch up to it. That, and I did not see anything else I wanted to share today. Have a good one and I'll go catch up with time.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Black Friday

I am sure that many of you were in some type of choir when you were younger. Between church and school and now, multi-church, I have been in a bunch of them. In order to have the group ready for the Christmas season, a choir has to begin learning the songs back in August or September. Finally, as of last night's practice, we are working solely on Christmas music. The all-Christmas concerts don't begin until early December, but we pretty much know our non-seasonal songs, so we can focus on Christmas. Still, it is weird to be singing those songs four months before 12/25.

You know what else is weird. That bitstrips is not available yet. And I searched, but did not find a good replacement for it. So, let's go back 1679 days and again check out an old CoV from 2009.

We really should go back 4-5 days to see photos from the weekend in Pinetop, but I have not uploaded them yet. Yeah, my bad. And we will probably have some more shots of the GRANDS this coming weekend when they spend Saturday night with us. Then, I will be even MORE behind.

When I say GRANDS, you are interpreting that to mean our grandchildren, right? I think that is obvious, but not all slang is so easily understood. Check out this slang from the Victorian era.

Have you ever heard of Ancapa Island? I hadn't, but it looks really interesting after seeing this dude's portfolio. This is actually part of an ad campaign for Exposure, and it does automatically generate a pretty cool looking site, but I am intrigued by the locale.

I cannot believe I didn't share info about this new bicycle helmet with you. I showed it to TD and we had a good laugh, but now, I see it on yahoo.com. It is a weird invention.

I just read that it is 1,093 days until the 2016 election. Why are they measuring survey numbers already? There is still a LOT of time for everybody to screw up and lose their chance before then. And as of right now, who thinks the Republican challenger has a chance anyway? Not because of them, but because of the messed up state of the party itself. Sorry, I forgot to tell you that Clinton would beat Christie by 10 points.

I thought this bit was kind of funny. It is from the Jimmy Fallon show.

OK, time to to some project-related stuff. Don't forget it is Survivor night. Who do YOU think will be voted off? I'll be back with more of this type of useless drivel tomorrow. I promise.

Where is My Daily UncleRW Post?

Hey, did you miss me yesterday? Between a whirlwind trip up to Pinetop this weekend and some sniffling and sneezing, I just didn't even think of a post yesterday. And even today, I forgot about talking to y'all until now, which is about 1.5 hours later than usual.

I forgot to upload photos from Pinetop, but we went to this resort last year and had a great time. We enjoyed it again this past weekend. And if you are a regular reader, you already know that we took our own kids up thee twenty years ago or so and loved it back then. You have not lived until you try to play anything that looks like racquetball with a five- and seven-year-old.

Before we went, though, we had an Australian Bee Gees concert to attend. It was a lot of fun, but we found out how few songs out of their catalog we knew. Compared to past concerts of tribute groups for The Beatles, Queen and the Eagles, it came in last for me. That is not to say it was very enjoyable. It was. Just more songs that we didn't already know.

As always happens when you leave the desert for cooler climes, it is a shock when you return. We reached 90F yesterday and are heading towards 91F today. Yeah, that's kind of gross for two weeks before Thanksgiving.

BTW, THANK YOU to all veterans out there for serving and protecting our country and our way of life.

And, to no one's surprise, I still do not have access to bitstrips to create a new comic, so back to the Wayback machine we go.

Everything should be back to normal by tomorrow. Well, except for maybe stupid bitstrips. See you then.

Did He Say Frizz or Fritz?

Have you seen any of those Ron Burgundy commercials for Dodge Ram? You know Ron, the "Anchorman"? Anyway, since he started those commercials, sales have gone up 59%. You can read the details (and watch one of the ads) here.

My Sis and Dad were talking about this video at Wednesday night's Survivor Celebration. I saw it on Tuesday and sent the link to myself so I could share it with you, and then forgot to use it. If you have not seen it, watch it now. You'll be impressed.

CoV, anyone? Nope, it is still not new. Bitstrips is still on the fritz. You know, fritz is not a word you don't hear much anymore, and it is a name you hear even less.



I have an idea to look at some photos from this trip and compare them to previous trips. Here is Colorado Boy mine on that now-famous snowy day in Ouray, CO.

Here is a similar shot on a more traditional fall day.

Let's do that again. Here is a shot of an old suspension bridge in the snow.

And the same bridge on a slightly less snowy day.

When you read email, either at work or at home, do you immediately handle it and do something with it so that it doesn't just sit there in your Inbox? Efficiency experts say you should do that. I am not that disciplined. If it is something I may want to add to the blog, or I want to remember, or will act on sometime in the future, or just don't have time to read it right now, I leave it there. What happens then? At work, I have 1800 in my Inbox, of which 377 are unread. I have 6000 in my personal email Inbox and 3500 of them are unread. I really ought to clean it up, but guess what? Yup, I don't have time right now.

As the countdown to my physical comes up, let's see how I am doing on my diet. My calorie counts starting last Sunday are 1901, 1733, 1937, 2157, and 1961. I slipped a bit since I had 4 days over 2000 calories last week. I do still have today and tomorrow to up my 2000+ counts. With so much veggies and fruit, though, I get full quicker.

And I imagine you are full of information after reading today's blog post, so let's allow it to settle before you jump into the workday (I think you are supposed to wait an hour). See you Monday.

Snow Way It Is That Cold Here

We had our regular Survivor party over at the folks' place tonight. My Sis correctly predicted who would be voted off tonight and is one point ahead of the others she competes with at work. Congrats.

It is so cold outside. We just got in from shopping and I think it is, maybe, 65F outside. So, while I had on shorts, it made me think of the snow on our vacation.

And see how these old buildings looked right there beside the highway. Purty cool.

You can see there is no traffic behind us. Check out how much snow has accumulated on the road.

There is something else that is cool. This CoV from 2009.

[Thursday Thoughts] OK, I didn't finish the post last night, so I am working on it on Thursday morning. There is a rhyming episode coming up on How I Met Your Mother that sounds pretty fun. The description reminds me of the singing episode of Scrubs. Did you see it? If not, you should watch it right now. Go ahead. I can wait. Wasn't that worth it? This Yahoo article list some other crazy TV stunt episodes.

Which reminds me. Do any of you remember Cop Rock? You should watch some of the scenes, or maybe even this whole episode, which I do remember from when it was broadcast.

Yesterday morning, I stopped by the other building to help a teammate from the other project. She brought me a gift to thank me. There is no way you could guess what it was. Two Morningstar Mediterranean veggie burgers. Nice, huh?

Well, I guess we sped through today's post fairly quickly. So, to end, I will give you one more link. This one is for an article on how to avoid speeding tickets. Until Friday, my friend.

Is It November Already?

How is it that the days seem to go on forever, but the months go by so quickly? Well? I'm waiting for an answer? Anyone? Bueller?

Oh, I met with my boss yesterday, and we are going to resume three of my old projects until we see what level of effort they will take. Then we can evaluate how much bandwidth I still have available. I am also redesigning some Powerpoint slides we use for project evaluation, and looking into redesigning the project website.

Here is a scene I see all too often on our trips. Everyone else sitting in the car while I walk around and take "just a few more" photos.

We don't always stop at designated lookout points, but when we do, I run around taking photos from all sorts of angles while I have the opportunity. I liked this angle because you could see the colors behind it.

I saw this car pulled off and a dude putting away his tripod (you can see it there beside the car). So, we whipped in because he had a nice camera and this nice tripod. He must be a pro and I will find some gorgeous shot where he was pointed.

And here is what he was photographing. Maybe he had some lens that zoomed in on something more photogenic, but I didn't see it. At least, you can see the snow falling, so the shot is not a total loss.

OK, we are slowly, but surely working our way through the oldest Clarity of Vision comics. Today, we remember the strip from 4/3/09.

Did I mention that the Mayo Clinic called me yesterday? "Hey, I said, 'Hold the Mayo!'" Anyway, the blood test that I need are covered inside the annual physical, so no out of pocket. Whoo to the Hoo.

I am at the office of the University Strategy project and am helping out my supervisor with Microsoft Project before heading over to my real job in another building. You remember when I said I moved from this nice, nine-story building to the one-story computer center. So, I need to get busy helping her.

We Hit the Gym On Monday

My employer provides a once-a-year physical at the Mayo Clinic. So my date is November 20, as I mentioned in a previous post. This includes blood tests, checking body fat, colonoscopy (if needed), prostate or mammogram, and a regular physical. It is very thorough. Unfortunately, they do not do a full blood chemistry, and my regular physician would like me to get that because I am currently eating vegan. So, I have to pay $375 to get the additional tests, but I want to make sure I am getting healthier, so that is a small price to pay (that's not really that small right now, but will give us valuable info). I am also going to go to the gym as often as I can to help improve my numbers and overall health. So, we restarted on Monday night.

You will soon see that I started this post on Monday night. How can you tell? You will see some Ouray photos from our Fall trip. As I type this, we are watching The Walking Dead. We are recording Sleepy Hollow and Blacklist.

When we posted this shot of MBH (My Better Half) on Facebook, we called it "Morning coffee on a rainy day."

Here a view looking up towards Mt. Abrams on the day it snowed (looking south from our rental).

And so then, we drove up to where the cloud line was in the last shot and I turned north, back towards town.

Oh, bitstrips finally gave us an update. Here is what you see if you try to get on the site.

And so, we continue our march through the history of this legendary strip. Let's move to 4/2/09.

I have a 1:1 with my boss at 10am, so I will find out what my new assignments are. I already know that I will resume two projects that I had before I moved to that special project in August. I expect to get 2-3 more. That's good. I don't like it if there is not enough work to keep me busy. What about you? What work style do you prefer?

You already know what I am going to say next. Our time is up. Please get up from the couch and we will continue where we left off next visit. You can pay the receptionist on your way out.