Rain

I just had some really good thunderstorm luck. I went grocery shopping even though the sky looked like it was going to fall. I made it into the store, through all of my shopping, and back out to the car before it rained. I loaded up the car, put the cart away, and got in the car and at the exact moment I closed the door the first rain drop hit my windshield. Perfect timing.

As I drove home, the rain was so heavy I really couldn’t see. It sucked. I made it home in one piece though and I sat in the driveway for a few minutes waiting for the rain to calm down. Magically, it stopped all together! Nice! I needed three trips from the car to the kitchen and back and it wasn’t until I was on the third trip that the rain started again. I was only in it for a couple of seconds. A small price to pay given the risks involved. I’ll take it.

Suck it, thunderstorm. Of course it’s down pouring again now, but that’s okay. I’m in for the rest of the day.

Earlier today we drove to Boston for a few minutes. Enjoy the obligatory stuck-in-traffic-getting-on-to-Storrow-Drive-looking-at-the-Zakim-bridge pics.

245/365

And in closing, two cat pics:

That Was a Day

I’m down to the last few minutes of the work day on this screwy Thursday. I was out the last two days and figured I’d spend the first hour or so today sifting through the hundreds of emails in my inbox. It didn’t take long for that plan to go down the crapper. One customer with a critical issue lead to three of us from my group spending the day on the phone along with a bunch of other co-workers. We hashed it out and fixed it but woah was that a grind.

I actually feel pretty good about the state of the universe from a work perspective. From every other perspective? Yeah, right.

I am too tired and fried to think of anything else to write. I’m hoping for an easy commute tonight but yeah, right. What else? I don’t know. It’s May 1st. Happy May. This month will see my birthday, mother’s day, my step son’s college graduation, my step daughter’s birthday, Memorial Day, and our wedding anniversary. That’s what I call busy. May is a good month. Here’s hoping we get spectacular weather and not dreary, rainy gloom like we’ve been getting the last few months. The sun only comes out during the work week now. Weekends are gross, weather wise. I need that trend to stop and do a full 180.

Okay. It is now 5:30pm and I am clear to punch out and go home. Wish me luck on my commute.

Friday at Last

Work has been good this week. No disasters, no scary moments. I did get a call from a customer (service programmers, like me, are not supposed to get calls directly from customers) but I was able to help the guy and it actually felt pretty good. Nope, this past week was a good week at work.

It was the rest of civilization that blew chunks. My wife and I agreed when we discussed it last night that this week has been the longest six months of our lives.

I need to do something creative this weekend. I NEED TO. Photography. Let’s go out and snap some pictures! Let’s play with the new long lens I bought a few months ago. Let’s play with the 120 film camera I bought a few months ago. Let’s go to the ocean and watch the sunrise and shoot all sorts of good stuff. Of course we should check the weather first… snow and rain today and tomorrow and rain on Sunday. Well you can just bite me, mother nature.

Music it is then! Guitar! I will play guitar this weekend if it kills me! I don’t know if we’re going to have a band practice or not. I’ll post something to our messenger thread later today (when it’s not pre-8:00am so that the other three guys don’t think I am weird and obsessed or anything) and see what’s up. If not then I need to find something else to do.

I do not want this weekend to be spent doom scrolling news sites and reading stories about the collapse of american democracy that will build up inside of me until I have a stroke. No. That would be bad, even if it is more or less inevitable. I must play guitar! I! Must! Play! Guitar!

Winter Never Ends

Yesterday was April 9, 2025. It was 7:30am or so and I was packing up to leave for work. I asked Siri how the weather was and she told me it was 26 degrees out. 26… in the second week of April. I looked out the window at the car and said out loud, “at least there’s no ice on the car.”

Fast forward to this morning, April 10, 2025. I don’t have to drive to work today but when I got up at a little after 6:00am I did happen to look out the window at the driveway. Sure enough, this time there was ice on the car. It was 29 degrees out though so it’s practically a heatwave.

Winter never ends around these parts. It starts around the last week of August and it hangs on for dear life until sometime in late May or early June.

Southern California is calling me. Hell, at this point maybe it’s Mexico calling me. Should I start learning Spanish? You know, just in case?

Not Again

I posted something yesterday about how there was a little bit of snow during my morning commute and how snow in April sucks the big one.

I have been in meetings all morning today. Back to back to back, one after the other. Woah, that’s a lot of meetings. At a few minutes after noon I was listening in to the third meeting in the string and something caught my eye outside of the window. I was on a video conference so I didn’t want to stare at the goings on outside so I took the briefest of glances.

It was snowing like a freakin’ blizzard. Oh, fer cryin’ out loud. What the hell, mother nature?

It didn’t last long. I took a second side-eye glance about 20 minutes later and there was still some snow falling but it was much lighter. 15 minutes after that the meeting ended and the snow had slowed down to a few random flakes.

All in all this past winter was not that bad. It was very cold, and February had a ton of snow. Outside of that, it could have been much worse. Why then are we having to deal with snow falling on both the seventh and eighth of April. It is most definitely not winter any longer. At least it isn’t sticking but still… come on. Enough is enough. I want my spring to look and feel like spring.

Winter, go home. Your mother nature is calling you. Jerk.

Weather is a Jerk

It is April so if there is one thing we can count on it is rain in New England. Today is at least the forth consecutive day with rain in my town. Forth or fifth? Something like that. It’s raining again.

Or is it? Is it more than that?

Yeah… I was driving in to the office and sure enough there was snow falling. Not a lot. Just the occasional snow flake mixed in with the drizzle. Today is April 7th and there is snow falling. Well honk my hooter, April snow. Ugh.

I tried to take a picture of Robin the Cat before I left the house. I needed to do the photo a day thing. I pointed my phone at her as she was exploring the laundry basket that I failed to put away yesterday. Just as I was about to click the shutter button she saw me and ran away and this is the photo I got…

219/365

Happy Monday, folks. It’s going to be a tough one, I think. All the signs are pointing that way.

Spring Feels

It’s not quite Spring yet, but it kinda feels like it today. I honored the pleasant weather with this:

I’ve also opened some windows. The cats haven’t connected the two events yet, but they will.

Windy

It is so windy out right now that one of our big metal patio chairs was just blown over. I didn’t think that was possible. One of the bird feeders blew away as well. I don’t see it anywhere. I’m going to have to go outside and see if I can find it along the tree line. I hope the wind doesn’t blow me away, though it might be fun to feel like I’m flying for a few seconds.

The cats are disturbed by the noise of the wind. Just wait until the second contractor of the day shows up and see how much more disturbing that will be to your little feline brains.

188/365

Late

I had a million things to do before work this morning, then a million things to do during work, then a million things to do after work… so obviously I was going to oversleep, right?

Frustrated sigh.

Oh well. The big question for Friday mornings these days is do I watch the new episode of Severance while I do my morning exercise, or do I watch the new episode of Yellowjackets. Today I went with Yellowjackets. No spoilers for season three episode five, but if there is one thing that show needs (a lot) more of, it is PJ Harvey music. I started watching Severance (season two episode eight, I think) but I haven’t the faintest clue what’s going on. I’ll finish it before I sleep tonight. Promise.

We had a contractor at the house yesterday. We have another one coming this morning, any minute now, and we have another one coming this afternoon. Things are getting weird around here.

What else was I going to mention this morning? Oh yeah, I woke up at about 4:00am this morning. I think it was the wind that woke me. It was blowing around like a hurricane out there. It was bad enough that it knocked over the bird feeder. I have to fix it, but the ground is still frozen so it might have to wait a little while. It’s March so the thaw out is coming, but it’s not coming soon enough for me.

Today is also the NHL trade deadline. I expect it’s going to be a sad day for Boston Bruins fans as we’re far enough out of the playoff picture that we will be sellers. Here’s hoping for a lot of high draft picks while also hoping that none of my favorite Bruins get dealt away. Fingers crossed.

Apple Music just let me know that there’s a new Bob Mould album released today. I’ll give that a listen while stressing about everything under the sun. Sounds good to me.

The first contractor has arrived. I’d best let him in…………