>I am not a fashionista. I could honestly not care one way or another what people wear. If they are happy and comfy more power to them. Every once in a while I see something that strikes me as “HOLY CRAP! What were they thinking!?!” We are going to take a moment and discuss three of these things. Pants, Pants, and purses. If you are an avid reader of mass of random you know I wear coveralls to work. Nothing too exciting just your standard fire retardant coveralls.

Sometimes people who work in the administration part of the refinery wear business attire. Sure, okay…no worries. The other week I saw patterned pants. These pants caused a physical reaction in my body. The pattern, the mass of polyester, for God’s sake THE PATTERN!!! Okay, we have Heather’s fashion rule #1—no patterned pants. A light pin striping is fine…just not, well, cripes—psychedelic patterned polyester business pants. I think I would have had a seizure if they had a matching jacket. ~shudder~

Now we move on to the “other” pants problem. If you wear coveralls, wear the freaking coveralls. Sure, don’t get me wrong—if you have been working in the field all day and you are hot and sweaty it makes perfect sense to take off the top half of your coveralls and tie them around your waist on your way out. Please don’t wear a dressy button down top and then tie your coveralls around your waist. Just say no. It’s not okay. They make fire retardant pants. If you want pants, get pants. If I saw this happening once in a while—so be it. But there is one very nice lady who does it every day and it drives me insane for no good reason. My fashion-short-bus’d self has no room to make commentary but there ya have it—Heather’s fashion rule #2—wear your clothes.

Lastly, and this is probably just a personal preference. But HOLY CRAP does seeing a woman carrying a purse—a delicate girly purse, while wearing coveralls just looks wrong. Not a little wrong—a LOT wrong.
So, Heather’s stupid pointless fashion rule #3—don’t carry an annoyingly fussy purse when wearing coveralls. It looks stupid.

Okay, that’s all I have for today. Tune in later this week for more pointless observations. ~smile~

>Hello everyone. Last week was intensely long…still only 7 days but my perception was that it lasted approximately three times that. All my work tasks were focused on community outreach stuff. It was exciting, busy, and above all—wearying.
Today (Monday) I am back at my regular activities and I found it very hard to focus. It was a nice mental break to have to focus completely on different stuff. However, now that I am back to my desk looking at my “to do” pile I want to run away again. Here are a few updates from my world:

s I’m moving. Weeeeee! I am getting away from the insanity of my neighbors. Bless their alcoholic rage-filled little hearts. More power to them, they can have that place. I am very excited about my new house with its big fenced in yard walking distance from one of my favorite beaches.
s Dogs are good but WOW did they lay a guilt trip on me this morning as I left for work. They looked at me with “again?” written all over their pathetic little faces. Last week was hard on them—12 hours+ alone every day. Not a single accident those poor babies. I didn’t leave them alone over the weekend, tried to take them with me everywhere. Poor little punkins.
s Cat is still insane. I really like him. The random attacks on my feet are a little intense; but totally worth it.

That’s about all. love ya’ll!

>Just insanely busy.
Be back soon!
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I am so lucky to have someone in my life who everytime my world goes bad asks, “how can I help?”
I am so damn blessed sometimes.

>So, please understand I am very well aware that without administrative support the world would suck. I MISS the administrators we had back in Chicago. I could go on and on about how wonderful they were (are still) to me. Also, there are times when I administrate for industrial hygiene, organize, fix, review, write…whatever. In fact my current boss apologized once that many of the administration tasks for our group (of 3) fell to me. I told him I was the most recent hire and that I am damn good and damn proud of my organizational skills. So no problems there.
But why, oh why, when the safety admin is away from her desk, does every jackass wander into my office looking for help passing multiple men along the way? That my friends, that right there is sexism and it is starting to piss me off.

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>Okay, in all seriousness I am guessing at the species of gecko as the star of this little story with this “borrowed” image from the internet. But it was an odd moment in my career and felt the need to share–visual aids always help. My sarcastic co-worker has been on vacation and this has led to much more interaction with my boss. During one of our famously awkward conversations I needed to get the keys to the IH-mobile (like the bat-mobile but with way cooler toys). He reached into his pocket to pull them out and I stepped forward. A weird series of occurrences happened almost in slow motion. His hand grabbed keys, he reached keys to me, a gecko jumped off the keys onto the floor, and to my horror my shoe came damn close to squashing the little gecko. I threw myself backward and the gecko ran for cover. Boss looked at me; I looked at Boss. Boss asked, “did that just come out of my pocket?” I replied, “i think so”. It. was. weird. So about a week goes by and who do I see today? Gecko–alive and well and chillin’ in the corner of my office. Although we were insanely busy I still went and showed the boss who declared we have a mascot. So, I am aware this is an inane story–but I have a boss who has lizards in his pocket. How many people can say that? exactly.

>Well, it has happened. I wasn’t sure it would but darn it—it has. I mean nothing lasts forever and we had a good run…

I met my favorite brand of bike shorts back in 2007 from an online company that had them on clearance. I bought six pairs. Well, here we are three years later and they are all starting to die. I can’t complain, they have put in a few good years but they don’t make this kind anymore (of course).

The only story I can liken to what I am experiencing today is a horror my husband and I experienced while camping. We all sat around chatting and laughing and enjoying the company of those around us. One lovely large gentleman was wearing leggings and not much else. At one point the seam of said legging started giving way in the “crotchular” region. It wasn’t as if they just gave way altogether, it was more of a Playdo Fun Factory pressing effect as more and more of his “crotchular” area fun factory’d its way out. My husband gurglecoughsnorted and said in an incredulous and horrified manner, “the structural integrity of your pants has been compromised!!!!” before closing his eyes and trying to forget the image…the horrible horrible image.

Needless to say for a few years all of our friends used my husband’s overly complicated version of “dude, your junk is squeezing out your pants” for anything we could. Often heard around our home was, “the structural integrity of has been compromised!!” ahhh…good times.

So, thankfully my bike shorts are safely covered by coveralls and there is minimal danger of any visually horrifying playdo fun factory events—needless to say it may be time to buy some new “under coverall” shorts.

>Hello. Please note—I am not in any way experienced with hurricanes. Almost every single person who lives on the island has more experience than me and I am certain that they all have hints and tricks better and perhaps more applicable than mine. That said I am going to keep ya’ll updated on what I have been doing to make my world a little more pleasant during inclement weather.

Flush Water
There is nothing as decadent as indoor plumbing. During hurricane season I keep an old cat litter bucket (cleaned and approx. 5 gallons) filled with water (and a little bleach). The cat litter bucket has a lid which I keep closed to prevent mosquitoes from enjoying a breeding ground. Then, when a flush is needed, I have that ability. It’s awesome.

Face Wipes
Okay, I know most of you have heard of the whole baby wipe thing. Those are fine but if you really want to “treat” yourself buy some fancy no water needed face washing towelettes. I have some Olay ones and I love them. They actually made me feel clean before bed. I can’t recommend anything more.

Wash Yer Dang Dishes
Very little is as gross as icky dishwater. Now, if you have it and don’t have electricity or water for a few days it gets really manky. So, when you know a storm is coming make sure to wash all your dishes and put them away before the storm. Then use environmentally unfriendly disposable products during the storm. Water is way too precious to do anything else.

Soapy Water & Rinse Bucket
I use my empty dish washing sink bucket thing and half fill it with sudsy water. This allows me to wash my hands during the storm and after by dunking and swishing. I rinse my hands in a bucket with clean water before drying. This may sound stupid, but it is amazing how often I needed this.

Oil Candles & Lantern
Light is amazing. Sure, I need a headlamp to read and all that but just by illuminating an area it can make you feel less alone. There is a reason everyone gathers at campfires…it feels homey. Just remember all your basic fire safety skills.

Buckets, Buckets, and more Buckets
You may have noticed that I use a lot of buckets—get more of them. Somewhere in your house is going to leak. You may need to soak something in bleach, you may need to dip water out of your cistern, just get lots of buckets. Trust me. I think I have 8 bucket-type objects, and yes, I have used them all.

Drinking Water
A lot of potable water is essential. Seriously. The estimate is 1 gallon per person per day. Pets are a minimum of ½ gallon per pet a day. Those estimates are NOT for people like me and my pets. My big dogs need a gallon per day as well. So, I have about 30 gallons before any hurricane. So far so good.

Insect Repellant/Raid/Boric Acid
The little buggers EXPLODE after a storm. I had an ant infestation on my stove within 1 day following inclement weather. A sprinkling of Borax and they were gone. J Also, mosquitoes are just evil—they will eat you alive after a storm. I keep a can of Off by the bed and in the kitchen. I rarely use Raid—but it isn’t bad to keep on hand.

Cash
If there is no power or phone service after a hurricane, there is no way to get money and you can’t pay with a credit card/debit card. So, yeah, take out as much cash as you can prior to a storm. One person I know puts all ones and fives he gets in change in a jar starting June 1st and uses that as his Hurricane Fund. It’s a pretty good idea.

Battery Operated Fan
I don’t have one; but I sure have wished for one for the last few days with no power! I have great hopes of getting one someday. 🙂

Rubbermaid Roughneck Containers
These things are great. Keep a few changes of clothes in one of them so that you have some dry clean clothes to wear. Sometimes everything gets wet.

>

>Is there anything in this world less motivating than motivational posters? I didn’t think so either. I’ve never been a fan of such dripping obvious schlock. However, I’d never really been subjected to them either. The other day something horrible happened. The local admin brought in a framed copy of some motivational poster for us to put in our office. *blink* really? Us? Me and the officemate (aka Sarcasmo) who go out of our way to write buzzwords in a mocking manner on the whiteboard in our office (synergy, cooperation, paradigm shift, strategery…wait, that ain’t one—you get the idea)?
The dark horror was prevalent in our office. We didn’t want it.
It sat on a chair…looking at us.
Okay, I’m being a wee bit melodramatic; but it was annoying. So we zipped down the hallway and crowded into our boss’ office doorway and said “do we have to?” to which he said, “Nope”. The offending poster was taken away…they still haunt the hallways though. If a poster was wall I needed to become motivated…

Should anyone wish to giggle you can Google “demotivators” and see what I wish was all over my walls.

Muah!-H.