How do you feel today? v. 3.0

[I'm Murrin]

New strategy for Twitter starting today. If I see just one interesting tweet from a person, I'll follow, then review and remove at a later date if their feed's not interesting.

I tend to fail at the first hurdle on social media stuff: the whole having real life contacts who also use the site part, leaving me with a collection of follows/followers that's too small to grow itself.

[aliantha]

I dunno where my Twitter followers are coming from, to be honest. I signed up to participate in a contest last month in which people could get a contest entry by liking my FB page or following me on Twitter (and the FB pages, etc., of a bunch of other indie authors, too); a bunch of them might be from there. But I'm under no illusions that I'll ever see most of those people on my FB page ever again.

[sgt.null]

Quartermaster Null.

i'm stealing that.

[Iolanthe]

Quartermaster Null.

i'm stealing that.

There was Sarge, Sarge, eating all the marge
In the Stores, In the Stores
There was Sarge, Sarge, eating all the marge
In the Quartermasters Stores

My eyes are dim I cannot see
I have not brought my specs with me
I have not brought my specs with me

(Alternative words)

My eyes are dim I cannot see
I left my specs in the WC
I left my specs in the WC

We used to sing that at school camp (the alternative words of course). I think it's a 2nd World War song, or even 1st World War?

BTW, marge = margarine

[Phantasm]

Good luck with that Sarge.

I got told my new post today - manager of the admissions wing - start a week on Monday.

Can't wait - sadly, it means going back onto a shift pattern, gladly, the money's a lot better (with money comes responsibility though)

[sgt.null]

Iolanthe -

phantasm - thanks. i should know more in two weeks when i attend inservice.

[Avatar]

Quite day on the Watch huh?

--A

"Quiet" Avatar - the word you're looking for is "quiet"!

Yes I was.

Me, I feel like not enough people have Voted In The Watchies.

Voting closes on the 14th, so if you haven't, go vote.

--A

[Damelon]

Quartermaster Null.

i'm stealing that.

Please do so.

I once had a quartermaster type job, though it was for office supplies.

[deer of the dawn]

Iolanthe, we sing that song in the US only here it's "in the corner grocery store". And there were beans, beans, trying on some jeans, in the store, in the store...

Tomorrow is a No Movement Day. I.e. no one is supposed to drive any motor vehicles anywhere, so they can conduct a vote to replace a State Senator who was killed when militants attacked a mass funeral for some other people who had been massacred.

Only in Nigeria. (I hope.)

[aliantha]

I guess I'm firmly entrenched in US car culture, because the first question that comes to mind about No Movement day is: if people can't drive, how can they get to the polls?

Damelon, when you were a quartermaster, did they issue you a quarterstaff? I think that would be cool.

As if I don't have enough social media going on already , I joined Pinterest last night. I have no illusions that my board(s) will be visually stunning, but another group I'm in is doing a Pinterest like-fest tomorrow and so I figured I ought to have something for people to like. Duchess says she uses hers for keeping track of recipes she'd like to try. Hmm.

[Savor Dam]

Quartermaster song is a Scouting standard, using Iolanthe's first set of chorus lyrics.

Guess that stands to reason, since Scouts tend to consider the WC to be fields.

[Iolanthe]

I don't think we sang that in Guides.

Did you sing "Oh, Sir Jaspar do not touch me"? The Headmaster always stopped it when we got to the penultimate line "Oh, Sir!!".

[Lefdmae Deemalr Effaeldm]

My first association for quartermaster is Long John Silver Sarge, good luck to you, may this turn out well)

Io, that was a Watch-related song rewrite

[sgt.null]

this is happening in our town tomorrow...


Angleton Centennial Celebration

Wednesday, August 15, 2012 at 3:47PM

Join us Saturday, October 6, for the momentous occasion marking the 100th birthday of the City of Angleton. Festivities will include: Car and Truck Show, Historic Pictorial Display, Centennial Themed Cake Decorating Contest, Childrens' performer Tom's Fun Band, Carnival, Games, Great Food, Fireworks, Street Dance featuring Traylor Trash and Dog Town Blues. All events will be located around the Courthouse from noon to midnight.

[sgt.null]

i wanted to expand on the idea of applying for the prison warehouse jobs.

i hate change. always did, even as a kid. likely being part of a broken home. so i tend to find something i like and stick with it. it is a comfort.

after two failures at establishing long term relationships i met julie. we have now been married 18 years. hell, i am still friends with my first girlfriend of some 22 years ago. (facebook is awesome)

we have lived in the same house for some ten years now. since we have lived in texas it is only the third place we have had. one apartment and one house preceded this.

i have been part of this board since july 13th of 2004. 8 mostly great years.

i am still friends with my best friend from highschool. (facebook is awesome)

my best friend in texas is someone i first met here some 14 (?) years ago while working at Kroger, my first job here.

and I have worked in food service for tdcj for the last 12 years. 10 years at Ramsey I and the last two here at Wayne Scott.

so it terrifies and excites me to be going after this. i have 12 years to go before i can retire. and who knows what will happen when i reach that/

[Iolanthe]

I'm with you there, Sarge, don't like change either.

In the same house since 1980.

Married to the same man for almost 40 years.

Still in touch with several old school friends (left school in 1970, and this in spite of the fact that in 1973 we moved to a completely different part of the country!)

Still in touch with the three girls I shared a room with at college.

But, I still think we were very brave as newly weds moving to a part of the country where we knew no-one at all, and knowing we would only see our parents and old friends at long intervals. You probably laugh at the distances, but to us 4 hours and 5 hours away for our parents seemed a big obstacle. Thanks to good neighbours here we survived.

[sgt.null]

Iolanthe - our big risk was moving to Texas so Julie could reconnect with her family. I had to give up my home, my family, my few friends. but I have never regretted it or wanted to change the fact that we moved.

no matter how much pain it caused us in the long run (due to seperations), Julie's son fathered two wonderful children. one here in Texas that we still get to see and one in Las Vegas that we had for a brief, glorious time.

of course we ended up with the greatest dog ever. Sonny has gotten us through some very rough times. even killing two possums. (and a duck, a rooster, some frogs, one squirrel, many roaches...)

he has been by us through Julie's two major operations and my two major operations. and during the hurricane when Julie had to find shelter near Dallas at a pastor's house (his porch in fact) the pastor told Julie that whenever they would check on her, Sonny would get up and protect her, placing himself in front of her - ready to do whatever was necessary. and on the way back home he took a big poo on the grounds of a Jaguar dealership. he gets his anti-capitalist ways from his dad.

and we met Tom Jones at the art car museum in Houston. he was the curator and on our first trip there I mentioned that I wanted to do art. he said that I had to and that they had an open call coming up. he gave us the theme, Calacas (Bones in Spanish) so we went home and cobbled together the Four Stickmen of the Apocalypse. a board game based on the war in Iraq.

the night of the opening I was down looking at all the fantastic art, believing it was all so much better than my poor attempt. Tom sensing my mood gathered me and Julie and introduced to Hunter Roth (and amazing artist who was teaching at LSU at the time). he explained to Hunter who we were and showed our art to him.

Tom saved my art career there and then. Hunter gave an impromptu glowing review of our piece! I was so shocked and happy that I decided maybe I had something.

the next year Tom allowed us to ignore the size requirement for our piece, in fact he allowed us two pieces! it was an anti-war piece for the War show.

the next year Julie took Zeke to the art car parade, running into Tom. he asked her to take a friend of his from out of state on a tour of the city. she happily did so. after dropping the friend off she returned home.

tragically Tom was killed that night in front of the museum by a drunk driver. it was such a blow. our friend, our art father (Julie's great term) was taken from us.

that year I made what we both feel is our greatest work. a tribute to Tom as an artist and musician. I took and old red, white & blue acoustic guitar. we nailed, screwed and glued various pieces to that guitar. electronics from work that the maintanence department kept form the scrap heap for me. also other various eclectic pieces. I wanted a picture of me and Tom together, but found no such picture existed. but we had a picture of Julie and Tom that I proudly glued on. I also built an effects pedal board.

I called it Chinese Democracy (Owed to Tom Jones) to find it the week after we dropped it off that Guns N Roses finally released the album after some ten years. I laughed at the joke, believing that Tom would have laughed as well.

everyone loved the piece. and a few years later we were at the museum, when one of the curators introduced to a new staff member. I shook his hand and wandered off. Julie says after I left the curator turned to the new guy and said... "he made the guitar." the new guy said, "oh yeah, I loved that piece." well that made me so proud that my work could touch people that way.

and of course I started taking my writing seriously here on the board while living here. and after some very rough re-beginings I think I have created some fine pieces that need to find a wider audience.

I need to thank Julie for all her help with my art. we also put work in every year at the local fair - winning best of catagory one year and a bunch of first, second and show ribbons. I enjoy the recognition very much.

and of course I have to thank Lucimay for her tireless support of my writing. and everyone else here who has enjoyed and/or commented on my writing.

must be the meds, why I feel so much like sharing thses past couple of days.

[Iolanthe]

That's a wonderful tale Sarge. I must admit to not being at all "arty", in the visual sense.

Perhaps in a way we are similar. You expose your true self through your art, I through the piano keys. It's a way of showing strangers how we feel without words. Although I will talk to anyone about many things (the hind legs of a donkey don't come into it) I find it very difficult to talk about feelings and aspects of my personal life. Maybe that is a result of being brought up in the 50s and 60s when "we don't talk about things like that".

[Iolanthe]

Well, here I am again. The Watch is deserted!

I've been gardening, trying to get rid of ground elder. I don't know if you are acquainted with ground elder? It is Lord Foul personified. It can be diminished but it always comes back again. And the roots! I have a garden bin full from a 1 foot by 4 foot patch of garden. To make matters worse, it is entangled with a large patch of montbretia (see image) which grows from small bulbs. Consequently I have to sit or lie on the concrete gradually scraping away soil to remove the bulbs (which I want to replant) so that I can get at the ground elder roots.



Should finish it this afternoon, but by tonight my old bones will be aching like mad.

Oh, I should have taken before and after pictures but didn't think of it.

[aliantha]

Very pretty flowers.