Level on dry erase board ~

I keep a level on my dry erase board in my office at work.

In one of the rooms that was my office in the building where I have worked for over 30 years I would sit in the room and feel like something was off. There was something wrong. And I never could really figure it out for several months.

Because my employer is not very good at providing some of the things that make office work nice I bought my own dry erase board. I brought it in and used a small level and my own tools to put it up on the wall. I made sure that I was putting it up straight because you just do that with a dry erase board or pictures or whatever.

But even though I had use the level and nature of the bubbles right in the middle and it was level it still didn't look right. I sit at my desk and look at it, that things not level! I pulled the level tool out of my drawer and put it on top of the dryer he subordinate would show that it's level. Used one of those apps on my phone to show whether it was level or not.

One night when I was in there after 10 PM I went and grabbed a stepladder and checked the level of the drop ceiling above my office. And that's when I discovered it was not level or straight.

It was off by quite a bit. The bubble went up fast and the leveling tool stayed off-center when I put it up against the bottom of the drop ceiling. I tried several different places and figured out that was what was off.

So now I have proof that things were not quite right in my office. Ironic, as always. But I needed to figure out a way to indicate that things were okay despite that.

That's when I got a piece of tape and rigged something so that the level would sit right on top of my dry erase board and show that it was straight and level. That what I had done was straight and level despite what others had done like the drop ceiling. Now I see that level on top of my dry erase board in my office or wherever I happen to have it I take a deep breath and I smile. And I reassure myself that everything is all right.

Good Ted Talk about men ~

I recently listened to an interesting TED talk. The guy went down the path of the difference between men and women and the way the hormone's work in us differently.  

He talked about how testosterone in men actually reduces stress, which I found surprising. But it interacts and apparently reduces the cortisol in our systems to help us reduce stress.

The guy talked about how as men get older excess testosterone gets converted to estrogen and that helps men become a little more emotional and empathetic as they get older. I remember my father always crying when we left my parents' house after a visit after I was an adult. It was always touching but now I understand a little bit more of what might've been going on there chemically. But the emotions were there, too.

The speaker talked about how men tend to have a cutoff switch to the brain and they sit down and start watching TV. And then he talked about how women switch on as soon as they sit down to watch TV they start thinking about all the things that they need to do people to talk to and stuff like that. I kind of disagreed with him on that one because I tend to not shut off when I watch TV. Or any kind of video. My brain is always going and it's hard to shut it down or even slow it down.

It was interesting learning a little bit more about people, hormones, and health related things. If you'd like to watch it you can check it out at

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xuM7ZS7nodk&t=5s

Enjoy!

Making the Cut ~

I watched an episode of Making The Cut recently that saddened me. No, I don't like the show for myself, I happened to be watching it so that I could spend time with my wife holding her hand and cuddling and all that in front of the TV.

The show is about a corner of the fashion industry. The winner gets $1 million and gets featured in the Amazon fashion store so that people can buy their designs.

They tell the back-stories behind the people, they show them rushing to and fro trying to make a dress or pantsuit or whatever in a crazy amount of time, and then they show the judges passing judgment over their creations and sending them on their way or moving them up to the next event.

The episode I watched was the last one of the season. I had watched two or three others of the season and watched this tall Swiss guy who wore only white clothes and had splashes of white coloring on his nose in front of his eyes and tended to wear fingernail polish work his way through to where he won. His winning design was a pants-suit sort of deal where the rear end of the model wearing his clothes was bare. A naked butt!

Some of his other clothing designs included upside down pants that were worn as a dress, a coat fashioned in such a way that it just looked wrong, and other things.

I see his winning as a symptom and not a problem. Our society is going through a time of odd things where what was unheard of and uncouth before is now pushed into the spotlight and celebrated. The further outside of the box you can go, the better it is!

My wife and I talked about it afterwards. Neither of us are going to be in a rush to go and see his store on Amazon, and I don't see is ever going to a party where his fashion designs would be purchased and worn let alone celebrated.

And that's okay.

Pens at work ~

When I was younger in college I worked at Sears. Sears was a department store that had clothing, appliances, furniture, electronics, and stuff like that. They never got into groceries but they did have some snack items on the gift shelves. Fancy!  

When I worked at Sears I worked in the Customer Convenience Center. That's where we dealt with credit card payments and applications, money exchanging with the cashiers, gift-wrapping, and general customer service. Not so much returns thank goodness, but customer service.

Because I was writing things all day I carried pens with me. Sears had these skinny black pins with white tops and no clip for your pocket. Being a cool teenager I didn't want to put it in my shirt pocket anyways because that would look goofy and nerdy. So I would carry two or three of these pens in the back pocket of my pants. That way I could reach around with my right hand and pull out what I needed to make a mark on a sheet of paper, application, or whatever.

When I would get off of work I would take the pens out of my pocket and leave them at work. The next day I would pick up a couple more and put them back there. So throughout the workday I had the pens in the back pocket of my pants but after or before work I did not.

I had a friend who bought a fancy older car. He was a manager at K-mart and earned enough money to where he bought a Satellite Sebring that was bright green with a white vinyl top, white leather seats and interior, fat mag wheels, and booming sound system. Very cool for the early to mid 1980s!

After he bought that car he wanted to show it off to me so I went over to Kmart on a lunch break. He came running out because he had a car alarm and shut off how he could turn the car along on and off. Then we got in and the went for a ride. We went through the parking lot in a road and went back. We didn't get any lunch because he didn't want to eat in the car and mess up the white leather interior.

We had a lot of fun and when I got out we were about to close the doors and he went all man! What did you do?

The black pens in my back pocket had scribbled black ink on the passenger side white leather seat. Luckily it didn't poke a hole in the leather but there were several butt scribbles on the seat.

My friend got really upset, and then he said no big deal and that he would clean it off.

But I always felt bad about that incident. And now whenever I go to sit in somebody's car I double check my back pockets to make sure I don't have anything poking out.

And I carry my pens in my shirt pocket when I have a shirt pocket. Otherwise I try not to carry a pen with me except for my wallet pen hat I keep on me.

Fun memory!

What I learned from Job ~

As I get older the book of Job comes to me more and more to me. It's not a fun thing to read. It's actually scary as the father of four children to read that, especially since I've had a vasectomy. So it would be a real miracle to need to produce more children!

But as I get older I think about Job being dedicated to God. Job was a member of God's kingdom living in a fallen world, living in another kingdom. So Satan had to ask permission to do anything to Job. Even though Job lived in the fallen world that God had created but a world that had turned away from God, Job was still a member of God's kingdom.

When I listen to it and I read it I see that God is proud of his people that live in this other kingdom. He takes pride in us and our dedication to him. He brags about us!

God also gives permission for things to happen to us. That's not the same as us being tempted or damaged by God, it's God saying I will allow others to do something to one of mine. Kind of scary to think about because we don't think that that should never happen but it does.

I see sadness and anger in Job. He worked hard and was dedicated to what he did and it hurt to have his family killed and his property destroyed. But he did not sin. He put on sackcloth, sat in ashes, and questioned why things were happening.

I see those questions. Why, God? It's okay to ask those questions.

I learned that even your wife will question your dedication to certain things. Job's wife told him to curse God and die. But Job did not do that.

I see Job's friends come and sit with him. Commiserate with him. Question his dedication to such a losing proposition. And Job hung on and stuck with his dedication to God. With questions, but stuck with it.

I see God answering questions. So often we don't think God ever answers us but he does. Not always in the way that we want, not always with the answer that we want to hear. If I'm asking why did my children die and his answer to me is who are you to question me the creator of the universe? I'm gonna be shocked and speechless.

I also see Job make it through all of that and coming out on the other side better. Not the same, but better. Still dedicated to God.

It almost would make a great sitcom but it would be sad and scary.

That's what I've learned from Job. I think I'll listen to it again and see what else I can get.

Aspiring to be disabled ~

Is there any other country on the face of the earth other than the United States of America where people aspire to be considered disabled?

I ask because I have run into people that try really hard to be considered disabled. They claim medical issues when they don't really have issues. They apply for handicapped stickers for their vehicles when they just barely meet the need and can motivate and move around without any problem at all but because they qualify for it they want the "better" parking spaces.

I've even known veterans who apply for disability payments from the government because they don't want to have to work to earn their money. They just want to scrimp by and that's it. They usually take work on boats and get paid in cash so that they can keep their income from being "disabled".

I even have friends who look forward to getting their Social Security payments because that's going to be their retirement. Personally I plan to work hard to reach a point where I don't even care if I ever get Social Security.

But I just think an illness has infected so many people that are part of the greatest country on the planet. The United States of America is so great that even the people that hate it stay and even the people that stream in illegally to siphon off money to send back to their families or countries they came from.

The other thing that scares me is how some people want to be considered a "victim" so that they can get the benefits of being victimized. But that's a different subject.

I hope I never aspire to be disabled.