Picture Book “Readers”

Several weeks ago one of my coworkers surprised me—in a good way.  That surprise came as I answered his question on what my plans were for that weekend.  They revolved around visiting Jason.  The purpose of the visit was to update the design of JuicyK, fix a few glitches, and watch some World Cup action in between.  He then asked, semi-stated, “You haven’t written on there in a while, huh?”

“Ha, wow.  No, I haven’t.  Thanks for noticing, man.”  Normally our exchanges vary between degrees of immaturity most always including a variation of “fart-face”, “shut-up”, or “bite me”, but that conversation was different.  He actually noticed something very important to me, and it made me smile.

A few weeks later you could find us in the same spot as our initial conversation, sitting side by side at the computers staring at our respective mitochondrial tests.  Because I knew he took the time to at least visit my site, I made it a point to let him know that I had posted something the day before.  He took a break from analyzing genetic sequences to check it out.  He finished reading about my exchange with The Malaysian and said, “Ha.  That’s funny, but you need to make the posts longer.”

“Well, Crappery (another nickname for The Malaysian) doesn’t like to read.  He says I should make them shorter, and I told him I would try to put up a picture.”

To keep everyone happy (myself included) I’m going to make an attempt to assuage preferences for both, visual and verbal, types of posts.  So, this is me keeping my word to Zachary (The Malaysian’s American name) with a picture I took of a ladybug near Brays Bayou.

On that day the grass was crawling with variations of fire-colored bodies but was too dense for a clear macro shot.  Instead of digging through the grass I picked up this stick for a better angle right before she prepared to fly away.  It ended up being one of my favorites out of about 500 shots taken throughout the afternoon.  Hope you like it, Poopery Shmoopery (alternative nickname for The Malaysian derived from “Crappery”).

For those that would rather read than look, a more verbally focused post should be up within the next few days.  Get excited!

As long as there’s a little grass, it’s still a good day

It’s been a really interesting past month to say the least, maybe more like “interesting”, not always in the best way.  To combat days (or months) like that I try to focus on anything remotely positive no matter how insignificant it is.

The mood improving game I’ve been playing lately involves the Kia, a little grass, and a driveway full of concrete with the goal being to salvage as much grass as possible while pulling into the driveway.  For some reason I have not been able to consistently park without taking a chunk of the landscape along underneath my rear passenger tire.

I was intently focused on accomplishing this small task while my niece was riding with me.  She asked what I was doing and I explained.

“Oh, Juicy, that’s easy.  Drive like it’s an ‘L’, not a ‘J’.  Duh.”

“Nooney, I’m trying.”

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Sorry, Lady, wrong house.

Short commutes are awesome.  I occasionally take advantage of my 2-minute drive from work to come back to the house mid-day, sit in front of the TV, possibly eat something, and watch cheesy action flicks from the early 80′s and 90′s.  Little things like that make the work day go by much faster.  The opportunity to take a siesta in my own bed rather than the “Lactation Room” is also much appreciated.  (The Malaysian wasn’t aware of what lactation referred to and would regularly take lunch break naps in any of the empty rooms designated for milking.  He now only eats on his lunch break after a fellow employee  informed him about the intended purpose of those rooms.  Still makes me laugh.)

Yesterday my thirst was out of control, so for lunch all I could dream about was a tall glass of watered down juice.  Around noon I headed back to the house.  At 12:02 pm I pulled into the driveway.  Sunbathing lizards scattered across the walkway as I opened the door, headed into the kitchen, and turned on the sink to wash my hands.  I screamed.  At the bottom of the empty sink was a large lizard (compared to others outside) peering up at me with a look that said, “Alright, lady.  So how we gonna play this?  Your move.”

The running water didn’t seem to startle it at all.  It just waited for me to decide what I was gonna do.  No way I was going to leave it there to have free reign of the kitchen, dining room, and especially not my bedroom.  No-freaking-way in the world.  Somehow I would have to get it outside with the rest of its buddies.  I don’t really have any problems with lizards, but I prefer for them to stay outside.  There is even a black one that hangs out in the decorative shutters on the front of the house.  It peers out from the shade when I pull up and goes back to cooling down after seeing it’s only me, not some stranger, or at least that’s the story I tell myself.

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