Random Thoughts for Wild Wednesday

I don't remember when exactly I started this but so much for my attempts at Random Thoughts Manic Monday series! I had a weird brief migraine both Monday and Tuesday afternoons. So glad today I nipped that pinched neck feeling in the bud before it escalated again. I think it's work. Lord knows a steel mill in spring (with pollens everywhere) doesn't help. Or the old. musty buildings. Away from work I have been just fine.

RT 1: I love Pinterest. It inspired me to move some of my stored tidbits of "stuff" into recycled food jars rather than plastic containers. Sooo much nicer to look at when things are in glass jars! Yay.



RT 2: Raising bees is sometimes like raising children. Young children. As in, don't take your eyes away for even five seconds! Because the next thing you know, they've vanished. Sadly, this happened to one of our new queens. Mark had just uncorked her cage and looked away to get the sugar cork. He took his eyes of her for like 3.5 seconds and forgot to put his finger on the opening. Poof. She's gone. Nowhere to be found near the hive or on the ground so she must have flown off. Sad. I was sad. But then I got distracted by something else so the sadness disappeared. :)



RT 3: I love this grocery app. It lets you make your grocery list by typing in your items or scanning in a barcode. You can then add it to your Favorites if it's something you might want to buy again later. Pretty snazzy. I loaded it on Mark's phone also and we can see the same list in case one of us gets to the store without the other one. Very nice. I'd like to find an app that will do that but also have the weekly menu planner also. I found some fee based ones but I always search the freebies first.

Random Thoughts for Manic Monday

Random thought - I love Smokey. He makes me laugh more than he makes me grrr. :) And here are other random thoughts (RT) for ya today.

RT 2
I drank a creme brulee/hazelnut coffee this morning. Black. Only a touch (not even a teaspoon) of Clover honey. That is rare for me as I typically have what some people call "a little coffee with my milk." :) Anyway, like you needed to know that but there you go.

RT3
Ever since we started all the social media for GBR, I have tried to pay more attention to statistics for views/reads/likes/etc. on our pictures, blog, website, FB, and so on. I enjoy seeing what people look at on my Flickr account. I don't know why, it's just interesting. So the funny thing is this picture I took at a past ALA conference. I believe this one was in DC about five years ago. Wonder what it is that people are seeing or looking for in this shot. Makes me chuckle.



RT 4
Speaking of stats and blogs, I like to see where people are from when they visit the blogs we maintain. This is the Seguin photo blog I started back at the library, thanks to Sarybow. Every time I think about quitting this blog, someone tells me how much they like it or some other nice thing and then I keep going. Besides, I need some outlets for all the things I have on my mind, right?!

Photos Shoots Are Soothing

It's funny how my friend brings in a tray of cupcakes and the first thing I think is - oooh! I need to shoot those! I love to photograph things and her adorable little creations are fun to snap. And snapping away is a great escape for me. When I am in photography mode, my mind is focused and I could look up twenty minutes later in a blink of an eye. I love it. And I've been enjoying the iPhone 4s camera with its 8 megapixel capability. Not bad when you think it's a great camera without having to lug around the lovely but hefty Nikon D90. And I love that Laurie, my friend and officemate jumps right in on the action now. We start with an idea and then we just start shooting. So. We start with a few props in the office. And we go to this -

And then we try a plain backdrop -

And another great thing about the iPhone? The cool and fun apps that helped me enhance the pictures a little bit. What else helps soothe me? Blogging.

Next Week Will Be Tet Already

And I am not even going to be as ready as I would have been 5 years ago. There is no way I can have the house as clean and neat as I would like it to be unless I take off work and do nothing else but prepare between now and Monday. Yikes. That's not going to happen so we'll do the best we can. Tomorrow is work and then prepare ourselves for bee class Saturday morning. Then maybe a visit to the gym before they close. Saturday evening will be for taking stock of equipment to see what we need to purchase (hopefully not much) and ... hmm ... there was some other big bee biz thing we said we'd do but I can't recall. Oh yes, look at the application for submitting an Adult Continuing Education course with Comal County. We're going to write up something for GBR. This reminds me of the fun days of knitting class with Sary in SA. The teacher was horrid as a teacher but a great knitter. Somehow Sary and I got through it, as everyone else in class, and we went on to teach a LOT of other friends. And out of that, the Knit Night social gatherings were born. Seems like a long time ago right now.

Back to Tet. At least I have door decorations and sweets this year! Hooray for trips to and through Houston. I love that 99 Market - so conveniently located along IH-10. :) Now, gotta get to bed. I need an early start tomorrow. The other job requires some data pulled together for a 2p meeting. I feel like I'm in college a bit. At least I have until 2p to finish my data gathering assignment. Nighty night.

Thoughts from a Stuck China

Here are some thoughts on my mind first thing (well, maybe not first since I've been awake since 4:45am) this morning:

1. It is hard to warm up hands and feet once they get REALLY cold. I got here Sunday. By Thursday, for some reason, I got really cold and couldn't get my feet and hands warm unless I had them on the vents in the car. Or take a super, duper HOT shower. I hope I'm not getting sick.
2. Training room setup is important and takes some thought. The way the classroom is configured, I am in the farthest corner away from the door and I can't get out without making two other people get up, which would be disruptive. I also can't move around to help students unless they are in the seats in front of me or beside me.
3. Women make things complicated sometimes. I have traveled quite a bit for work and have been involved on many different project teams. Overall, traveling with a group of men is a lot less complicated than with a group of women. Man, the logistics can get so frustrating. This is why I often try to get my own wheels. After a trip or two having to rely on others for a ride, I've learned my lesson for sure.

I like this picture because it reminds me of a less busy, less stressful time in my life. A time when I made time to sit quietly to knit and little Smokey was just a little bitty thing. He's so adorable.

Earl says...

...talk to the hand because I am outta here! Sadly, my little cubemate is no more. At least I haven't seen him in a while so I'm not sure what has happened to him. My neighbor found a "fried" lizard outside our building and he says THAT was Earl and I thought it was too but then last week I did see a green lizard so maybe that chicken-fried-Earl wasn't Earl! lol - we'll never know for sure. Looks like Ronnie and I should caught Earl for tagging sooner like we had talked about doing.

Okay, so moving on...been BUSY! Very busy. But here I am sitting in Irving, all packed and ready to go home. woo hoo! Being away a full week up here hasn't happened in a while so I am ready for home. That's for sure. People are so interesting - we're going through a lot of changes with a new CIO and you should see how people's attitudes have changed. Not all bad - working later, follow-through on projects, talking to their customers. Good stuff. I'm hopeful that things will really turn around here.

Okay, I need to go post to GBR blog before bed. Me tired.

Whaaat? It's August?

My top 10 thoughts for the week:

1. I am going to try baking these butternut squash for a light dessert this weekend.
2. We are hitting the Marion Sausage Supper/Trade Days event this Saturday - tent, honey, mingling. Should be fun!
3. I am hitting Dallas the rest of the week.
4. We have been to A Dong at the Forum like 3 times in the past week and a half. That's how much we like it. :-)
5. I have a new office and a new office mate. We survived our first day together. That's good.
6. Our bees have multiplied! Mark's up to about 44 hives I believe.
7. We're going to get a Food Manufacturer's license soon! That means we're able to get into retail outlets legally.
8. It's HOT.
9. It's AUGUST. WHAT???? Where did the year go? I am still pondering that. Amazing.
10. I am in love with the D90. I love the feel of snapping shots with it.

Blogger It Is

I think I will stay put on Blogger. I'm not feeling Wordpress at the moment and I've been too busy to play around and learn. So let's stay put for now. :-) Thanks for your patience!

I have been in Chicora, PA the past two weeks and I think it's so beautiful here! I was really surprised by how much I enjoyed myself because the first week I was so lonely and a bit homesick. I have not traveled for non-Corporate visits in over a year so it took a little adjustment. The second week was a lot better and I drove around as I used to and snapped lots of pictures of things that appealed to me. Like this house. I love the greenness of the landscape, the rolling hills, the super-low humidity. It was awesome. You know what else was great? The PEOPLE. They were all soooo nice to me and they really reminded me of the folks I met in places like Fallon (NV) and Iowa Falls. Just normal, nice, funny people. Very cool.

I'm back home and straightening up my desk a bit. I may have a friend over this weekend to show her how to set herself up on a blog service. She's a baker and I think she may be wanting to start a blog to showcase her work. We'll see. She hasn't even told me yet what she wants to do. lol

Ahhh....and now to play with all my cool Mary Kay stuff I just got. I love the discount for products I love using. Plus other people put some orders in as well so I need to sort through it all and price stuff. Fun! I like the ability to try a lot of new colors (esp. for eyes) that I would not otherwise try. I always stayed pretty neutral but this summer, I am experimenting with lighter shades and adding a lot of color. I love it! I think I am making up for being such a tomboy growing up. :-\

Aren't my lashes just the ultimate?? lol, that's the name of it. Really, I do like the products a lot and have been using them for several years now. I had to start moisturizing and firming up this 40-something face! Pearl Cream will not cut it.

Happy April

Hi everyone, time for an update! Sometimes I forget what I've posted, where I posted it and when. :-) I love technology and gadgets - do you? We have so many (too many perhaps) ways to stay in touch - text messages, chats and messengers, 4 or 5 blogs, Facebook, Twitter, work email, personal email and on and on. I've been trying to make more time for the more personal phone calls and in-person time. I'd rather have a real hug than a virtual one from family and friends!

Having said all that, La China and Ta-Ravel still should get updated so here we go. Work is going better. I still miss the team a lot but at least I have friends around me here in Seguin and I'm not traveling up to Irving much. When I do, I actually enjoy it b/c I love seeing Jess and reconnecting with her. I feel more in tune with the "new" work when we can do face-to-face sessions. I'm currently learning how to creat e-Learning, which is new and pretty neat to me. It just means rethinking how to teach some things I've always taught in person. Learning a lot so that's a good thing.

Home is super - nothing but great things going on there. Mark and I enjoy our time together whether we're tending bees or hanging out and talking about what we want to do in the near future. We're ready for adventures elsewhere so you never know when or where that'll take us. We'll keep you posted.

Time to end, folks. Mark's taking this China off to SA for some Vietnamese food. Woo hoo! Y'all have a great week. Mark's got the Tx Library Assoc. Annual Conference in town this week so very little to no beekeeping going on for a while. TTYL.

That Stings!

This is how I felt work did me today. Bad stinger. :-( I miss my peeps. I miss training and helping people. It stinks to go through them at the library and then again here. I know I should appreciate having a job and I DO. I just wish I could do something that brings me joy; something that touches me.

Oh yes, the stinger. Cool, huh? Good thing I had gloves on! Mark saved me! I had forgotten mine like a bad beekeeper. lol. The little bee wouldn't leave me alone even after I walked away quite a distance and for quite some time. I got tired of her and to be honest, the thought did cross my mind that I could kill two birds with one stone - get rid of her so I could get closer to the hives AND take a picture of a stinger, which I had been wanting to catch (though not on ME). As soon as she landed on my hand again, I smacked and she stung. And then she DIED!!!! Poor thing.

Ok, now I need to do some work. But as a treat, I let myself update three blogs. Woohoo! lol. To all my special peeps...I MISS YOU VERY MUCH.

March Happenings

Check out that stinger from a bee at the Gonzales yard. :-) Thank goodness for LONG, THICK gloves! I have been thinking it'd be cool to catch a shot of a bee sting in action but it's hard to think of subjecting anyone to holding still while I catch the perfect shot. Mark got stung four times or so on his right wrist and it got sort of swollen but not bad. He's tough. I would have been a mess for sure. Since I am now officially allergic to them (another something to my allergy list, it keeps growing), I have my Epipen ready to go. I appreciate the full protection of the suit, veil and gloves, but it does make photographing all the action a challenge. Sometimes it is too sunny to see my screen well through the veil. Maybe someone will invent something to help with that. Speaking of the bees, they are doing really well so we are super excited about the harvest in June!

Depending on one another

This week started off really, really, really, really, really rough. I am normally a positive, upbeat person but sometimes even I need help. Sometimes I just want to rest quietly and let others help me. And I'm lucky, because I am surrounded by family and friends who love me and provide me with all the help I need. Near or far, it's a good feeling to know you can call on people just to talk if you need to do so.

I felt like this yellow fungus for some reason. You know, I'm resting on others. Relying on others to carry me when I am a little down and out. I pull from their strength. They lend me support; nurture me for a while. Melancholy. I felt melancholy. Usually I feel bubbly.

Anyway, I don't dwell on the bad or the negative for long usually. But I did want to say that I am a very lucky person to have a really good life filled with awesome people. And when I think I am having a hard time, reminders are sent my way that show me I'm not the only one going through difficult times. Hopefully I can be as great a support to them as others have been for me lately.

Colin Powell

A couple of weeks ago, a big group of us had the opportunity to attend an event called Get Motivated. It was an interesting opportunity to hear several great speakers though some of them didn't speak as long as I would have liked. For example, I really enjoyed Colin Powell. He was hilarious and he just commands respect. Even when he's joking about himself adjusting to retirement after serving his country for thirty-five years. He's cool.

We also got to hear folks like Tony Parker, President Bush (younger), Terry Bradshaw, Zig Ziglar and Dr. Robert Schuller. If you ever get a chance to attend, I'd recommend it. Sure there are some parts that aren't as great but you take away the good stuff and leave the other parts behind. I enjoyed it and I'm really glad our company let us go.

Last week we also went back to Mississippi to pick up the last of our twenty hives we bought from J.N. Russell of Russell Apiaries. Nice man, beautiful countryside there. Seriously, how can this landscape below not touch you. It was so beautiful there!



Work is great and getting better. :-) Enjoying getting to know my new manager and enjoying spending more time with my three trainers here in Seguin. Haven't been to Corporate a few weeks though I'll go back after Christmas and then again in January. At least it's not every week! Hopefully things will settle down more and more with each passing week. What is truly wonderful is the level of stress has decreased significantly for me AND I'm now able to take a day off here and there and truly enjoy the time off. No worries about what's happening at work and who's doing what to handle things. Nice. Very nice. It's a great end of the year gift! Speaking of gift, if you check out Seguin blog, you'll see the gift I got from work. :-) Well, gift PLUS door prize. Again...nice.

We're girls and we rock!

Here's a shot of my team at work. We finally filled the two vacancies, including my replacement - that's Jess on my right (facing the picture) and I have really enjoyed getting to know her so far. We are on the same page on lots and that is a good feeling. I think there are a lot of things she can teach me about e-learning and IT standards training so I'm really looking forward to working with her. And you know what??? NO PLANNED TRIPS TO IRVING ON THE HORIZON. Wow! It's a nice feeling and how wonderful to put away the overnight bag for a while. :-)

Last week we had the ENTIRE team in Seguin. Half of us are in Irving and there's a total of 26 of us. Many had not been on plant tour before so we really wanted them to have a chance to see who makes all our money for us. And I got to wear my pink hat. That made me happy. lol

Work & Bee Update

I use to feel like this when I came up to Corporate. Too many meetings, demands, stresses, craziness. And now I feel like this...



Why? Because my new boss started today so I am up here in Irving, transitioning out of the Manager role I have held since January 1! And now I get to do what I really enjoy - trainer development and training delivery. I'll still sit on projects but I can really focus my energy on areas in which I'm really interested. I hope to anyway. Heck, just having one job is WAY better than three! So it's already a huge improvement!

Bee update as it pertains to me: I am officially allergic to stings. :-( But the good news is that I totally suited up this past weekend and took EXTRA care with Mark's help and guidance and I worked on clearing brush near the bees without a single sting! Woo hoo! Enough visits to ER already. LOL. BTW, that's what we ended up doing. I had to get another steroid shot in the booty AND pills. Earlier I wrote it didn't seem as bad as the 2nd sting. But I wrote too soon b/c it became worse. The swelling and itching was crazy! Anyway, I really need to watch myself when I take pictures. I get so caught up and excited that I always seem to FORGET to look at the ground. And then I step in things. Like ant mounds. He he, that was Saturday when I shot the wind mills. Three or four ant bites but luckily not fire ants so I didn't react badly to them. Phew.

November is here

Where did the year go for crying out loud? LOL, here we are already into November and then Christmas is here and then 2010. Wow.

This is a shot I snapped while visiting our Elm Creek bee yard with Mark a couple of weekends ago. I love going out with him to do bee stuff because it's so relaxing and really takes my mind off everything else. The weather has been so perfect for enjoying the outdoors - 70s and low humidity, can't ask for more in Texas. The allergens are still bad so I just know to crank up on medicine and to do two nasal rinses on Saturdays. :-)

The butterflies seem to be enjoying some sugar water that Mark dumped out from the hives. It's funny to watch them since they are EVERYWHERE these past several weeks. You know what else has been everywhere out in the country...caterpillars! Today I spotted a HUGE green one that fascinated me so I snapped a bunch of pictures. I appreciate their unique beauty. My aversion really has to do with not wanting them ON me. Ugh. All those little feet, or whatever caterpillars call their feet. :-) Speaking of today, I also got stung. My third sting. So far not as bad as sting #2 which required the ER but it is pretty swollen and quite achy. If it's not better tomorrow, then I'll go get a shot again. It was my fault. I sensed they were tiring of me in front of their hive, taking pics, but I just wanted a couple more shot. That was pushing it. Anyway, at least I have a sweet, non-stinging honey bee at home to care for me.

I also shot a little video of the butterflies in case you want to check it out. It's on my YouTube page, along with our beekeeping videos. If you search for tgretchen, you'll find my stuff.

Crafty Goodness

Wow, the entire month of September passed and I didn't even post here! I am sure tired of being tired of things. Mainly it's just work. We are still short two positions being filled, including my manager role, but I think if we can get some good people hired, my life is bound to be less busy and stressful. Right?? Since I never know who might stumble across my posts, I won't say much here besides, pray hard for some help soon. Then I can return to the happier me I like to be.

Last Friday, I sat through a pilot training of Covey's Focus Workshop adn it really helped me to get back to what was important to me. What are my values? What do I hope to accomplish? How should my values drive my decision making process? My reaction to people's demands, requests, dramas, etc.? It was really good. No, it was a really great day. And wouldn't you know it...as I was leaving for the day, I answered one last call and it ended up being a loaded, long call. LOL, can't win sometimes. I did not, however, let it ruin my weekend. Instead, I did a few emails when I got home and then banished work from my mind for the weekend.

I helped Mark work on a label/tag for the honey and had a such a GREAT time! IT was so fun and relaxing to focus on something creative. I even made a trip to Hobby Lobby in New Braunfels to pick up some tags to try out. There's not a big selection at that location but they did have one size to try (medium) so we'll see what the big HL of SA has to offer. A color other than white might be nice. Okay, so tags made and attached. Now to sell the honey...

Sheesh....I am bad!

Obviously I am having a hard time keeping up with my online life. :) Hoping things will get better once I can leave my current position and fill the Trainer Lead. I'll be able to focus on trainer development and actual training delivery, which are both very fulfilling to me. Also, it'll mean I won't have to travel to Corporate so much. I think I am actually getting tired of flying. Yes. The last two times I have become sort of woozy right when we're about to land. Ugh. Not fun. Luckily no hurling. :)

Mark's doing very well. I sent an email update I hope to everyone. If not, I'm sorry if I missed you. He is recovering well and decided not to complete his contract with SAPL. Instead, he's been busy on his second book, keeping bees and building his workshed. Very happy to be home and I'm very happy to see him so.

Here's are a few friends of ours at work. Jessica, Sonia, Tod and me. I really enjoy being in Seguin all of this week and probably all of next week too! No Big D until August 17.

I so enjoy our vegetables from the garden! It's so fun to see them growing and it's even greater to put them in my belly! :) The green beans were delicious tonight with the chicken. We also had yellow squash with dinner. The picture above is of longbeans that Mark's sister gave us. None harvested yet so I'll let you know what that's like. I like the interesting look they have as they are growing.

And here's a shot of our bell pepper plant. Our peppers appear to grow upward, which is funny apparently since other people told me theirs grown "normal," pointing downward. Hee, we have funny peppers.



I am home all week this week! I am so happy about that! I feel like I'm reconnecting with home, with my Seguin office buds and with myself. It's good to be where you feel good. Dallas is a different world and the past two weeks have been a real challenge and though I know I learned a lot (about others, about myself and about business), and I certainly hope I helped some of my peeps up there, I am sure glad it's over with for now. We made our hiring decisions and soon, I hope to have a formal announcement sent out about the new IT Training Team. We will have ten people on the team! Should be interesting.

Mark's Book Signing

Last Thursday, Mark had his first official book signing at the Library and I was happy to at least catch the last 5 or 10 minutes of the presentation. Then I helped him by sitting at the "book sales table" for a while. He sold 18 copies -- good job, honey!



I was late due to delayed flights out of Dallas because of the severe storms up there. Thanks Penny, for getting me back to the house in time to make the talk! :) Work has been pretty trying lately and I'd venture to say the last two week have been my toughest there but I have seriously learned a lot and I am still happy to be here. I can't tell you how much I've learned in my two years here - May 28 was my two year annivesary! With the integration of the SAP Training Team, my peeps grew from 3 to something like 23, so it made traveling to Dallas every week a necessity. The stress of managing people going through a transition took its toll on me so I'm glad it's done with for now. Interviews, phone calls (to decline people), meetings, meetings, meetings...I just want to train. And train others how to train. I'm ready to get back to it. So here's to better weeks ahead.