Upson Downs

Welcome to Upson Downs, the least known horse racing facility in the State of Bob. I've been up and down lately. Thanks to all of you who sent kind words. I think I had a few sky-is-falling sort of moments and I have helpfully decided that that is decidedly unhelpful so I'm just not going there anymore. If I accidentally get there again I'm turning right back around thank you.

SO Gilligan's Island is going pretty well. We staged one production number tonight. We sang the song about a jillion times. The people who can actually dance were taught the dance that goes with it. I valiantly tried to follow. Suffice to say my dancing won't be the highlight of anything but I'm going to give it my best. We are at the confluence-of-everything stage where it seems that all of the work that you did before was about 80% good and the cumulative effect of this is that when you put three things together you get 0.8 X 0.8 X 0.8 or exactly 51.2% of what you were trying to achieve. It is a wonder that the director can sit there and not throw things at you. I'm sure it will all come together in the end. It always does.

Oh yeah, the dates are on the flier. Yes there is a Halloween show.

No lucky company has stepped forward to claim their new prize employee, so I continue my job search. If you know people who know people who may have a job for me now's their chance to talk to me. I'll do them a favor and call them if you give me their contact information. I have lots of leads to run down already but I could always use 46 more.

That's Faire

I wrote a pretty personal and critical post this morning. I decided that I didn't want it up any more.

Suffice to say that I went to Faire and I didn't have the good time that I had hoped to. I really enjoyed being with my friends, and performing a play, but the rest I could have done without.

Nuff said.

Here kitty kitty

Our friend Lucy called us the other day. "Are you interested in a kitten. I can't keep her." or something like that. You get the idea. Since this is a blog, not USA TUDAY, I'll tell you the whole story.

Her daughter picked up the kitten after seeing/hearing her several days in a row. The little dear was hungry and shedding alot but otherwise OK. She was pretty frightened. Lucy calmed her down and started looking around for a better home since her old cat was distinctly negative on the "new kitten" thing.

So we said, "Why don't you just bring her over and we'll see how she reacts to the dogs." This is code for, "We would love a new kitten no matter what." So Lucy brought the kitty round to the casa.

What a nice kitten! Full bred Siamese, blue eyes, dark points. She was very mellow with the dogs. She hissed at them to ensure they knew who was boss, then settled down and didn't mind getting her ears licked by the big doggie. Well, not too much anyway.

We mused, "Is she chipped?" (RFID chip so the animal can be uniquely identified) Sure enough she was. You can feel the capsule under the skin near the shoulder. It feels like an oversized grain of rice made out of glass. So this morning Sharon took her to the vet to get her chip scanned so we could find the person associated with the chip.

Sharon called the lady. She had got two kittens from the same litter from the shelter one male one female. They had been spayed/neutered, had their first round of shots, and got chipped. She took them home and realized in a few days that she was really allergic to cats. Oops. Hello craigslist. She listed them online and gave them to what she thought was a worthy home in Redwood City.

She contacted the new owners about a month later and they said everything was OK. Then she was contacted by someone who had found the male and had his chip scanned just like we did. Then she contacted the people again, and they said everything was OK. She told them about the found male and they then admitted that they had actually "lost" (read dumped) both of the kittens.

So the nice allergic lady said we could keep her, and that she had named her Coco. Nice name except that the dog's name so we'll have to come up with something else, as if the cat really cares.

Cute huh?

My pirate name is:

Black Roger Cash

Like anyone confronted with the harshness of robbery on the high seas, you can be pessimistic at times. You're musical, and you've got a certain style if not flair. You'll do just fine. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

Tis actually work

Who knew just doing research on prospective employers was difficult. Oy!

I can do a lot of things but the thing I like best is figuring out how to do things better, and the area I like to work in is business processes, not specifically manufacturing. The manufacturing part has a big focus on hardware and I like there to be more focus on the people part.

The jobs I have been looking into seem to scream "turn this crank just like this". I want to be the fellow that guides the decision as to whether a crank is needed, where it should go, and exactly how the crank should be turned, and maybe builds the crank, or at least designs it.

Alas, there are very few job desciptions that go: "must do what Bob especially likes to do".

Soon I will find my niche, perhaps it is on my radar and I just don't see it yet.

The Internets

I decided that I wanted a new domain for the career search email and possible consulting marketing. Plus I can use it for manifesto posting.

Upsides: Separation between personal stuff and professional stuff, non-goofy email address, a chance to try out the hosting and email service with GoDaddy. They say that the email service has sophisticated spam filtering and since collierfam.com gets about 60 spam messages every fricken day I think that would be worth $20 a year to get rid of.
Downsides: Another domain to manage. $55 bucks for the year.

The new schtick is: colliersystems.com

It is in the "Coming Soon" mode now. It'll be live in a day or so. Just don't expect to find any boob references there.

Happy September 11th

I suggest that we create a national holiday of sorts out of September 11th, wherein we thumb our noses at the puritanical fanatics that would have the whole world submit to their view of things. I'll have it my way thank you very much. If you want to have it your way (for you) please go right ahead. In my usual fashion I'm certain that I am oversimplifying but what else is new.

In that spirit, let me direct you to a celebration of the frankly irreverant. It IS NOT safe for work my friends and you have never seen anything like it I assure you, (otherwise you would have showed it to me).

PS I didn't find this, a friend of mine did.

Holy crap it's funny.

Fairly tired

Wow. Faire was pretty fun. Tiring but fun. I saw loads of people I knew and met boatloads more;
more names than I can remember, not surprising since I can hardly remember my name.

Our friends Danielle and Kurt had a handfasting ceremony today which was really sweet. There was a whole section of ladies there that were crying. Yes, a handfasting is like a country wedding without the legal meaning, and is infused with symbolism. I am led to believe that the ceremony was traditionally performed when no official was on hand to make a recognized marriage. Suffice to say they pledged their love and devotion to each other before a whole crowd of friends, and asked their friends to support them in their life together.

Aparrently standing onstage in the full sun in a head to toe black woolen costume with black hat and black gloves makes you REALLY HOT. I needed to drink lots of water and sit down in the shade after all that.

Once I get my bluetooth act in gear I'll post some pictures.

Tomorrow I get out the resume polish and see if I can make something of use out of all the nifty things I did at GMI.

Not a creature was stirring

It's 1:18 in the morning on Friday night before the Casa Faire opens. I like to call the night before any fair(e) opens, "Sewing Night". Yup, even I did a little sewing.

I also did some laundry, sewed up the loose bit on my pants, got all my stuff together and put it in the car, went to buy gas, made shortbread, and cleaned the kitchen. Mind you I did all of this after I finally finished building the gates in the front yard. Now they have bamboo as planned. They look fabulous if I do say so myself... see...










The ladies plus Amy sewed all manner of stuff starting with a new bum roll and ending with sewing lots of pearls on dresses. Whee!

Oh yeah, I also had lunch with my good friend Walter who is finally blogging. I also picked up some junk I forgot at work and told everyone that I'll come back periodically and give them all hugs. I also talked with my friend Pat who just happens to be a VP at the agency that GMI hires to help terminated (great way to put it) employees get back into the job market. I get started there on Tuesday. I also found out how much unemployment insurance benefits I'll be getting(!). It will really help.

See you all at faire!

What I did on my vacation

Slept in
Goofed off
Surfed for jobs
Organized some stuff
Looked at my sadly out of date resume
Talked to my recently ex boss who is also laid off
Called GMI and arranged to pick up some stuff I forgot
Called a bunch of friends (one even knew of three possible jobs!)
Off to rehearsal, sang the whole show and then drove home and practiced

A pretty good day overall.

Time for a movie and a martini. (. )( .)

But Just Remember This

Today I noticed that the president of my company was in his office, which is really weird because he hasn't been to the Sunnyvale office in months. Then the HR manager told me that I needed to speak with him. At that point it was pretty clear to me that I would soon be seeking a new position. I was right.

I had been at GMI for 19 years and my little footprints are all over the place (Like, I'm the voice on the voicemail). But times are hard in the capital printing equipment industry and with sales down a great deal from budgeted projections something had to give. I can't fault management, they are doing what is necessary to preserve core investments. My boss had to go as well. As it was, I was an expensive overhead position. Very helpful to the organization, but pure overhead. I hope the company does well. I still have some great friends there.

So now I have a chance to find a new place to make a cup of tea in the morning. If you know of some place that needs someone who can make difficult problems get better don't hesitate to drop me a note.

Looks like I don't have to take Friday afternoon off. It seems I'm free already.

butterscotch

I really like butterscotch pudding. I like it better than coffee ice cream, which I like a lot. I'm just pudding that fact out there for your consumption.

Over the weekend I was assigned a character for Casa Faire. Tonight I found enough dope on the fellow that I might be able to pretend to be Baron North.

I'm making slow but steady progress on the gates in the front yard, which as I'm sure you remember, are supposed to be filled in with bamboo. We got the bamboo, I cut the pieces to length, and filled in the ends. Sharon came up with a clever way to mount the bamboo, and of course I have overengineered the implementation making it take a lot longer to execute. Of course if I didn't it would keep me up nights.

I've been trying to learn my 13 lines for the Alien part. That's hard enough. I worked on it for an hour and a half and learned about five lines, most of which are short responses. Jeez, how do people learn all those dang lines for real parts! ... like I said, all the fun, half the work. Plus I get to sing harmony with the rest of the cast, all seven of them!

Short week then the opening of Faire... Maybe I'll take off early on Friday.

trio

just there by my toe
inside my shoe
a tiny rock

aged mineral lump
is this your last act
(to distract me)

once a mighty stone
formed in the crucible
beaten down by your creator
mother earth

just there by my side
in my bed
a partner

fully grown woman
is this your life's work
(to complete me)

once a tiny speck
formed in the womb
nurtured by your creator
mama

just there facing out
at the door
my child

barely grown up
is this your destiny
(to leave me)

once a twinkle
formed in love
nurtured by your creators
us

we rejoice in your honor
one purpose fulfilled
with beauty and grace