Who Really Cares, Anyway?: July 2010

More Fun Fotos

The Daddy-free vacation continues! On Sunday, Michelle & Mariel visited with my friends the Guercios of Tonawanda, NY.

Contemplating the koi pond in the Guercios' lush back yard. (Note to Mariel: No, you can't take one home with you.)

Mariel is "hip" to the latest in musical technology. Was that "The Third Man Theme" I wonder?

Dancing to the peppy sounds of Bill's Victrola. Hotcha.

Big bonus: It was the last day of the Canalfest on the Erie Canal! You know - the "mule named Sal" one!

Mariel Meets the new cats in their playpen.

Space Cadet Mariel! (Good thing its wasn't their litter box.)

Well It Looks Like They're Having Fun

The family (sans Papa) are in the middle of a two week visit to Buffalo, NY and environs.

Daddy didn't have any paid vacation time accrued, so he stayed behind to work in the dishrack factory.

Upon stopping at a motel for the night, the following exchange occurred:

Mommy: Mariel, what would you like for dinner?

Mariel: I want Cheerios - for GO power!

That's my daughter!

An Anniversary

It was Friday, July 24th, 2009 that I was laid off from my job at the dish rack factory.

I was hired back as an "hourly" at the end of April, 2010.

Tomorrow is Friday, July 23, 2010. To commemorate this anniversary, I have been told to stay home (without pay) because the customer has changed their shipping schedule.

I've come a long way in one year, wouldn't you say?.

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO ME!

UPDATE: I actually ended up working on some "special projects" on Friday, so I actually got a full paycheck.

Whoot!

Wishy-Washy Words of Wisdom

I've been reading "Schulz and Peanuts - A Biography" by David Michaelis.

As you might guess it is about cartoonist Charles Schulz.

There is a passage about an early job he had at a printing company that had some resonance for me, and I thought I'd share it here.

But [at] his next job... he noticed something powerful among the people who worked at the hardest jobs in the plant:

"At noon they would all gather down at the end of this room, and they would play pinochle, and eat their lunch. And you could hear them laughing, and having a wonderful time. When one o'clock came, they would go back to working again. These were the people who held everything together. It wasn't the boss and the other partners. It was the workers, with their common sense, who just seemed somehow to know what is right and what is wrong. I think it's what we call the great middle class. There are radicals on both sides, left and right, and the people that do strange things. But there are still people with the common sense that hold everything together." (emphasis added)

Isn't it the "people with the common sense that hold everything together" that we still count on?

Now, what constitutes "common sense" is open to debate, but shouldn't each and every one of us support and strive to be one of those people?

Now, excuse me, but I gotta go see a tree about a kite.

(A post for my brother who was asking recently asking about my world view.)