Chatauqua or Bust!

Hey, Friends.

Last week I got to go to a conference for work at Chatauqua Institution.  I was very excited, as normally I don't get to go to conferences that involve a lot of traveling. Like so excited that when my guy at the Valero station (which I obviously go to way too often) asked me what was going on I told him about getting to go to the conference, and being a little worried about getting lost on the long drive.  He joked that next time he'd go with me to make sure everything went all right.  It was sweet.

It was a long drive.  There was a lot of driving.  Thankfully I wasn't making the trip alone. I had a friend (and coworker) riding shotgun with me on the way up, and she would be in charge of navigating with Google Maps.  Yes, again with the Google Maps.  If you've been following along here for a while then you might remember Google Maps and I sometimes have issues.  At least there would be another person on this adventure!

I did the math.  From the time we left last Wednesday morning until the time we returned home last Friday night we drove 820 miles.  820 miles in 61 hours....with a conference squeezed in the middle. That's a lot of time in the car.

I realize, Friends, that the vast majority of you do not give a shit about what happened at a library conference.  You just don't care, and why should you?  So I'm going to skip all of that and just tell you about the more interesting free-time parts. With pictures.  Lots and lots of pictures, cause that's how I roll.

The drive up was very pretty -- lots of green trees, hills, farms -- very picturesque.

Enjoy the trees!

There wasn't much traffic, which made driving very nice.  There also weren't any signs of life anywhere.  After a while we were noticing that there were no people outside any of the businesses or farms we could see from the road.  Not even any horses or cows out in the farm fields.  It was a bit creepy....like we thought we missed an evacuation order, or maybe the zombie apocalypse had started and we were driving right into the middle of it.

We decided to pull over at a rest area and stretch our legs.  When I think "rest area", I tend to picture the areas on the New York Thruway with gas stations, bathrooms, restaurants, etc.  At the very least some place with picnic tables and bathrooms.  I literally almost drove out of the thing before I realized we were in the rest area, not just on the entryway.

That's literally it, kids.

"Dumping household garbage prohibited".  

The garbage dumpster was the most exciting thing there.  And what other garbage would you have with you in your vehicle to throw away?  Like "household garbage" is bad, but if you randomly happen to have toxic waste with you -- go right ahead? There were also a lot of tires, which I think technically could have gone in the dumpster since they wouldn't be household garbage.

Why aren't you in the dumpster?  Are you "household garbage"?

We continued on our way, and this next picture is literally only because we drove near my BFF's home town.  

What's up, Deposit!

Iced coffee is a very important part of a long drive.  What...you didn't know that? Well, it is if you're me.  It really shouldn't surprise you either, Friends, since I have written a love letter to my coffee pot before.  We stopped at a Wendy's as I was sure I could get my iced coffee fix there and because it would have a bathroom.  I seriously wasn't going to depend on finding one at a rest area after that last experience.  Somehow, we managed to find a Wendy's that did not have iced coffee.  How is that even possible?  I thought that was like a menu staple.  It's on their website.  They have their own brand for it.  We've had it at home for years.  How can they not have iced coffee?!  I was not amused.  

We soldiered on and eventually made it to our destination about 7 hours after leaving home.  It was a long drive, with a lot of time watching trees.  We arrived with just enough time to catch the boat for the first evening's activity: dinner cruise. Like we were literally racing to the dock before we missed the boat.

We got to sit on the upper level, which was cold but had great views.  Did we want an alcoholic beverage?  Yes, yes I very much did.  

Not even sure what body of water we were sailing on at this point, but I did not care.

After the cruise we finally got registered and checked in.  As there were no other activities planned before the conference started the next morning, we decided to go out and stroll around the area.  It was a chilly evening, but there had been too much sitting all day long and we needed to stretch our legs and explore.

I hadn't paid attention the night before, but was horrified to discover that there was no coffee pot in the room.  The next morning wasn't pretty.  The only coffee I could get my hands on was at breakfast, and those were just little cups.  It was a rough day for me, Friends.

At lunch we were given time to explore the institution grounds.  It really is a gorgeous place.  It kind of creeped me out a bit because it was almost too perfect, if that makes sense. It was totally ridiculous, but the whole thing was giving me a Stepford Wives kind of vibe: everything looked so perfect, everyone we met was just so happy and helpful.  It's not normal for every single person to be in a good mood.  The majority of the residents weren't there yet, as it wasn't "the season".  All of the homes and businesses looked immaculate though, and the gardens were all beautiful.  They are like their own little community behind closed gates -- their own post office, library, movie theater, dance hall, churches.

Little garden area

There were a lot of pillars

View from the second floor of the library

Paintings in the post office

Another view inside the library

Also in the library

In the gift shop.  I found it amusing.

Fish fountain

That evening we got to go to the Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz Museum, and have dinner in the Tropicana room. That was actually really interesting and a lovely time.

Tropicana Room

Outside the museum

 Original Movieola.  Description below.

The "Three-Headed Monster" and tribute to Dann Cahn

Just a few Emmy Awards

After dinner we had been given a map, and we set out to find Lucy's childhood home.  I think we did...at least we found the address that was listed.  We were expecting a plaque of some kind to be there marking the place, but it wasn't so. The only hint we had the right place was a small poster on the door and large signs that the property was under video surveillance.

That's it, folks.

We had also heard that there was a scary Lucille Ball statue in existence, and it was due to be removed and replaced with a more accurate version in the near future.  It had upset people greatly since its unveiling.  That was not labeled on our little map, but the people at the museum had pointed out the general location.  We made it our mission to find the controversial Lucy statue.  Let the adventure begin!

And find it we did.  We also found Ribfest going on in the same park, and got some pretty sunset views.

The Lucille Ball statue.  Won't be there much longer.

 Sunset views from the park

We also found a Tim Horton's, which might have been an equally great moment for me.  Lesson learned -- I was not equipped to go through another coffee-deprived morning.  I was buying coffee now.  I didn't care that it would be cold by the morning.  There would be coffee in my room when I woke up, and I fully intended to refill that cup at breakfast and have coffee during my morning conference sessions.

No lie, I kind of loved Tim Hortons at this point

After the conference the next morning, we were back on the road headed home.  We had another travel buddy for the ride home, which just made it more fun. It made the miles and miles of trees much more bearable.

View from my window the last morning in Chatauqua

Flowers outside of our building on our last morning.

Mural we saw in Jamestown the previous evening.  Thought the message was appropriate.

We stopped for lunch on the way back in Olean.  I'm not sure why, but they had these giant squirrel statues all over the place, and each one was different.

Hi there, new friend!

Lunch was delicious!  If I'm ever in Olean again, I'm going back here.

I'd like to say that it was due to my super-awesome planning skills that we ended up going over the Shawangunks just about at sunset, but that would be a lie.  We were nearing the end of our fantastic journey, but had to take a break to take in the sights.

Finally, blessedly, we returned home around 10pm.  Our magical voyage across New York State had come to its end.  61 hours, a conference, and 820 miles after it had begun.  Other than the serious lack of coffee, it was fun.  I enjoyed it and learned some things at the conference.  

It only took me until 2 pm the next day to convince myself that I was eventually going to have to get back in the car, if only to acquire an iced coffee.  And when I saw my Valero guy a couple days later? He totally asked how the trip had gone.

Of Book Groups and Pinterest Fails

Hey, Friends.

So, last week at work I got to run my book discussion group.  Since it was May -- the month of Free Comic Book Day and the first ever Hudson Valley Comic Con -- I decided that we would do a graphic novel this month.  I chose Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes by Neil Gaiman.  If I was going to do this then I was going to pick one that I love.

It was a hard sell.  Two ladies flat-out told me the month before that they wouldn't be coming because it wasn't their thing. Fair enough.  There were a few other people I mentally took out of attendance because I already was pretty sure that it wasn't something they would like.

For those souls brave enough to attend I wanted to make it awesome!  Well...as awesome as a program room in the library can be.  I always try to decorate to match the feel of the book.  I also try to serve refreshments that go with it -- be it food that was mentioned in the book, or something that kind of goes with it.  If you have been hanging around here long enough, you may recall when I made little sinking Titanics out of Twinkies when we read A Night to Remember by Walter Lord.  There have also been some rather interesting choices around Christmas time.

So, this is what I came up with for our discussion of Sandman:

Our table, complete with coloring options.  Shout-out to Chris for his help in finding said coloring options.

Cupcake display!  Conveniently received the holder as a birthday gift.

Chocolate cupcakes with cherry pie filling, chocolate icing, and complete with little skull sprinkles on top. (Death is a character in the books, for those who haven't read them.)

Display of other related works for further reading

I even wore a Carpe Noctem shirt.  Thought it was appropriate.

One of my favorite quotes from the book, hanging on the door.

Candy to represent the more squiggly dream-essence, and unicorn poop cookies.

About that last bit, Friends...

Yeah.  Unicorn Poop Cookies had zero relevance to the book.  And there is a story about how they got to be included.

A couple of weeks prior to book group I was still trying to figure out what I was going to do to try and bring the Awesome to it.  I was working at the circulation desk when this cookbook came through: Nerdy Nummies by Rosanna Pansino.  I flipped through it to take a look, and that's when I saw it -- Unicorn Poop Cookies.  OMG I have to find a reason to make these at some point!  I thought nothing more about it. Didn't read the recipe, didn't make a copy of it.  Simply checked it in and put it on the shelf for the patron that had requested it.

Jump ahead to about a week before book group.  Other than the cupcakes I still didn't know what I was going to make.  The idea of the Unicorn Poop Cookies was still lingering in my brain.  I mean, they totally had nothing to do with the book.  On the other hand, if there was ever a group of people who might appreciate being served such a thing this was probably my best bet.  The swirly colors of the cookies kind of reminded me of Delirium from The Endless, which is a stretch since she isn't even mentioned in the book, but it would make sense if people had read the rest of the series....and I could print out a rendition of The Endless to try to explain.  Yeah.  This could work!  I can totally rationalize why there are Unicorn Poop Cookies being served.

That's when the drama of our little tale really begins, Friends.  I didn't have the cookbook or the recipe, hadn't even really read it.  I decide to just Google "Unicorn Poop Cookies Recipe" and that should get me a result.

It got me a shit-ton of results (technical term, I know).  Most of them were links through Pinterest, which always gives me a little trepidation.  You hear about Pinterest Fails all the time, but they hadn't steered me wrong with the Twinkie Titanics.  So I browsed through a few options, found one that seemed pretty clear-cut, and printed it out.  And before you ask: No, I cannot pinpoint exactly which recipe I used.  I found it, printed it out, didn't save it, and moved on with my life.  I didn't save the print-out either, and you'll soon see why.

Let's start with a picture of what the magical Unicorn Poop Cookies are supposed to look like:

Cute, right?  You won't be seeing this later.

We're going to skip the boring part about making the dough.  You don't need to read that.  We're jumping straight to the action where I try and make it look like the above picture.

The recipe has helpful tips/steps included on how to get the best results.  Fantastic! I'm probably going to need those.  To paraphrase, these include things like the following:

--Remember to use more food coloring than you think you will need!  As the dough bakes, the colors will fade.

Use an obscene amount of food coloring.  Got it.

--Divide the dough into sections, and place on separate sheets of plastic wrap.

Okay, that makes sense since we are going to be making different colors.  I'm with you so far.

--Take a section of dough on the plastic wrap and shape it into a circle.  Make a well in the middle. Drop the food coloring in to the well.  Wrap it in plastic wrap and knead in the color.  This will keep the food coloring from getting all over your hands!

And that would be the step that made me leery, and I kind of started talking to myself.

"Wouldn't it be easier to just wear gloves?"

Yes, brain of mine, it probably would.  Where the hell were you earlier?  The color was going to have to be put into the dough at some point.  Why did I not consider this before?

It's 9 pm.  Not going out to try and find gloves at this point.  Let's do this thing, Pinterest!

I decide to start with green, to kick it off with one of the darker colors.  Go big or go home.

It took all of about 10 seconds for it to start going wrong.  Two squeezes in the plastic wrap to start working in the color, and that shit was leaking out all over my hands.

I look like I'm morphing into the Hulk.  And that's after trying to wash it off.

I fucking hate you so much right now, Pinterest recipe.  Liar, liar pants on fire! Things were only going to get worse, as I had three other colors to make as well.

--Chill the colored dough sections for a couple of hours.  This will make it easier to handle later.

Sure thing.  I'll use that time that to scrub the rainbow off of my hands after your last little step failed spectacularly.  Maybe I will find a quasi-normal skin color once again.

--Twist each section into a thin strand.  Take each strand and twist it together, and then form them into cookies.

That sounds a lot simpler than it really was.  

Fun fact: chilling the dough doesn't keep the food coloring from once again getting all over your hands as soon as it meets up with the warm temperature of your body. Also, the dough gets stickier the warmer it gets and the more it is handled.

Could I have put it back in the fridge to chill again?  Yes. Should I have done so? Probably.  Did I? No, no I did not.  It was already almost 11:30 pm and I just wanted this ordeal over and done. It wasn't pretty, Friends.

Looks appetizing, right?

So I rolled, and twisted, and made cookie-type shapes.  I baked them.

Those suckers did not fade into pretty pastel shades.  No.  I had some seriously dark colors going on. We're talking primary colors, like they could decorate a kindergarten classroom's walls to help teach the kids their colors.  "Colors will fade"?  Bullshit.

--After letting your cookies cool, add fun sprinkles, or icing, or edible glitter to make them prettier!

Are you kidding me?!  Sprinkles and glitter won't stick to cookies after they are baked without some sort of icing or frosting.  That shit needed to be added BEFORE you told me to bake them, when the whole cookie universe was a sticky mess! I wish I had realized earlier that you were kind of talking out your ass, Pinterest recipe.

This, Friends, was the point where the recipe and I parted ways and I decided to just make the rest up on my own.  How was I going to get the decorations to stick to these things?  The original picture didn't seem to show any frosting or icing involved.

I decided to make a glaze, of sorts.  A little confectioners sugar and vanilla ought to do the trick.  It should be relatively clear and shiny when it dried.  If I basted it on the cookies, then threw the decorations on really fast before it hardened, they should stick.  It was literally the middle of the night by this point.  My brain was not coming up with a lot of other options.


I did it, and it worked.  It didn't really help to make the cookies look more like the cute original picture, but the damn things were finally finished.

Here they are, in all their glory!

Feel free to scroll back up the page to look at the model version...and then look at my handiwork.  Not a total fail, but not a raging success either.

They still tasted pretty darn good, and people were amused.  Mission accomplished!

But I will probably think long and hard for before blindly placing my trust in a recipe found on Pinterest again.

Please Read Me, James Maslow

(Hey, Friends.  This post is really only meant for one person, which is why I didn't post the link any of the usual spots.  If you still managed to find your way here, then I admire and thank you for your dedication.  Buy yourself a prize -- something nice.  You can totally still read this if you want.  Hell, I'm not even sure the person it is directed to will actually read it, so if you do read it then at least it will be seen.  We good?  Fabulous.)

Dear James and/or his people,

Hi there.  You're a busy guy and I don't want to waste your time, so let me give you the tl;dr version first.

I backed you on Patreon recently.  Yay!  I love your music, love the videos and am happy to support them.  It's a win-win situation.  I noticed that it says I get a Twitter follow out of it.  Totally wasn't expecting that...and then I noticed that nowhere on there does it ask for my Twitter handle.  How in the world are you supposed to find me then?  It's @tammyshampoo  (long story that we don't have time for.  Trust me.)

So give me a follow when you have a chance.  I realize that this is just a kind gesture.  You don't have time to sit around reading my inane tweets that would most likely be of zero interest to you. Think of it as a random act of kindness that will warm the cockles of my heart when it happens.

Have a great day!

Tammy

Okay, so that's all you really have to read.  Now, if you have time to kill....say, you're sitting in an airport, waiting for a plane with all of its parts functional....allow me to try and explain how I got to the point of writing this post.

Like I said, backed you on Patreon, surprised that I would get a Twitter follow for it.  I should probably also mention that I was doing this through the app on my phone.  I didn't realize until very recently (like 15 minutes ago) how important that fact would be.

I go on with my life, not thinking about it at all. A couple days later, at like 11:30 at night, the thought crosses my mind that I don't think it actually asked me for my Twitter handle on Patreon anywhere. Huh.  Maybe I filled it in and I just don't remember.  So I pull up the app and dig all through that thing. Nowhere on the profile does it ask for that information.

How the hell is this supposed to work then?  You're a very talented guy, but I'm guessing that psychic abilities are not included in the mix.  I could be wrong, but I feel pretty confident in that assumption.

Can you Google someone's email address and find their Twitter account?  Apparently not, at least not in my case.  It might work for someone with a much bigger following, but I wasn't even a blip on the radar.  Googling my name and twitter brought up way more results than I ever would have expected, and it still would not help you to figure out which of those accounts was actually mine.  

Google, you disappoint me.  Moving on.

Back to the Patreon app. Shouldn't there be a way to send you a message on there?  I've got to be overlooking some pretty obvious shit.  I am, obviously, not the greatest with social media.  This seems like a pretty basic feature that should exist.  Eventually I figure out that I could leave a comment on something you posted recently, but I don't want to go that route.  That's out there for the whole world to see.

Twitter.  Duh!  I could just go over to Twitter and send you a direct message.....

except then I realized that feature won't be available since you don't follow me, and now I'm just following poor logic around in circles back to the issue I was trying to solve to begin with.  I could just tweet to you, but then again it's out there for the entire universe to see.  I refuse to be one of those people going around begging people to follow them.  That irks me to no end.  Plus, you probably get inundated with messages 24/7 and it would just get lost in the maelstrom.

Did you ever have one of those moments where the most ridiculous shit is just stuck in your head and you kind of fixate on it?  There were so many other things I could and probably should have been doing - like sleeping since it was after midnight at this point.  There had to be a shockingly simple solution to this, and it was just going to annoy me until I got it resolved.

I wanted a subtle way of dealing with this.  The entire world did not need to know that I had backed you or that I was so clueless that I had to post my Twitter handle in a comment. So I decided that writing a blog post and then commenting with a link to it would be the best I could do.

I know.  You're probably thinking, "And writing an entire blog post about it is subtle?"  Yes.  Sort of. If I don't post a link to this on Twitter or Facebook?  There are maybe a handful of people who will actually find it, and probably very few who will bother to read it.  To my overtired brain it was an excellent idea.  I typed this whole mess up and figured I would go back and edit it later when I was more awake.  It solved the problem enough in my mind that I could get some sleep.

Which brings us to now, when I am trying to go through this thing so that it makes some sort of sense.  Only now did it occur to me that I should bring up the Patreon website on my laptop and see if it was any different from the app version.

Yes, yes it is.  Very different.

Like you can add your Twitter handle right to your freaking profile.  Spectacular.  And look over there -- a f$%king link to send you a message.  Why did I not think of going to the actual website before this?!

So I updated my profile.  And yeah, I probably should just leave it at that.  Delete this whole post, send you a little message, and be done with it.  I don't really need to have your first impression of me be that I am a fool who should be avoided at all costs kept at a safe distance in case the clueless-ness is contagious.

But I already typed this whole thing up.  It would be such a wasted effort to just delete it all. So I'm going to post it and send you the link.

Maybe you'll read it, maybe you won't.  Maybe you will be slightly amused; maybe you will ask me never to darken your digital doorstep ever again.  It could go either way.

If you actually did read this whole thing?  Thanks.  And I kind of feel like I should apologize for wasting your time....and probably for swearing so much.

Lost In Translation

Hey there, Friends.

So, I'm going to need a little help.  I'm going to describe a little scenario for you, and then I need you to help me figure out what the hell was going on.  This has been bugging me all day.  All the reasonable explanations I have come up with make no sense in this situation.

You game?  Fantastic!

Allow me to start by sharing my artistic rendering of the scene.  I made it special just for you, Friends. (If local people can figure out where this is then I will be super proud of myself!)

I didn't say it was good -- I said it was an artistic rendering.

As you can clearly see (or maybe not), this is a traffic intersection. Most important points being:

A) Guy in Truck

B) Me

You are looking at the two little rectangles in the intersection with the circles near them, not the big labels I wrote near the bottom of the page. I was trying to clarify the drawing, but that might have made it more confusing.  My bad.

The scene:

It's the middle of a sunny day. Guy in Truck and I are both stopped at red lights.  He is waiting to go straight across.  I have my blinker on and am waiting to make the left turn.  The two sides of the intersection that we are on do not get green lights at the same time.  Ever.  It just doesn't work that way.  This is also a rather lengthy light to sit through, as the main road (going North-South) gets most of the traffic and time.

There is no one behind me as I just missed getting through the light.  There is no one in the lane to my right.  There are a couple of cars next to Guy in Truck.  Oddly, is there very little traffic going up the main drag.  This is rather unusual, but it also means there is a clear view across the intersection most of the time.

Guy in Truck flashes his headlights a few times, and starts waving to me.  His side gets the green light first and he proceeds to stare at me as he drives by, not watching the road where he is driving.

Everybody on the same page, Friends?  Do we all understand the scene? Excellent. Now we are going to play a little game called....

WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED?

(Title could use a little work, I admit.)

Theory 1: I Must Know This Guy

No.

If I knew this guy we wouldn't be playing this game in the first place.  Really, Friends.  That was a lame thought.  I did not recognize him, and I did not recognize his vehicle.  I didn't even vaguely recall him as a library patron from work.

Theory 2: He Is Trying To Warn Me About A Fire Truck Behind Me

Still no.

There was no one behind me.  I'm not completely oblivious to my surroundings when driving. Nothing was coming into or out of the fire station.  Also, if something where to happen there would be sirens.  Lots and lots of sirens.  At this particular intersection a blue flashing light also goes off to warn drivers of impending emergency vehicles, and my side would have immediately gotten a green light so they could exit faster.

Theory 3: He's Warning Me There Is A Police Car Ahead

Maybe?  But still pretty inapplicable.

I know people will sometimes flash their headlights at oncoming traffic as a warning that police are shooting radar ahead.  I had a pretty clear view of the intersection, and there were no police cars in sight.  Also, I was not heading in the direction he was coming from.  I had my turn signal on, so it would be pointless to warn me about something in a direction I was not going to be traveling.

Theory 4: He's Trying To Tell You There Is Something Wrong With Your Car, Dumbass!

Possible, but still wrong.

I will admit this was my immediate assumption.  I thought maybe my tire was going flat or the like and he was trying to let me know.  I had no indicator about a problem on my dash, and everything was fine when I checked it out at home.  It was also the middle of a sunny day, so I did not need to have my headlights on, or my high beams for that matter, so he couldn't have been telling me to turn them down/off.  It wasn't raining, so he wasn't trying to tell me to turn them on either.  This theory proved to be wrong.

Theory 5: He's Being Carjacked And Is Trying To Signal For Help

Yeah.  We've gone to a dark place on this one, Friends. 

I freaking hope that was not the case.  Message obviously did not get through.  The fact that I haven't seen or heard anything about anyone being carjacked today (or lately at all) is keeping me from feeling like I maybe failed the dude in a very important way.

Theory 6: He's Trying To Flirt With You, You Clueless Wonder

Is this even a thing?  Tell me this is not a thing.  

As we have previously established, I fail at noticing when someone is flirting with me when they do it face to face.  The chance that I would ever figure it out via Interpretive Intersection Communication is zero.

Guys, if this is a thing -- don't do it. The whole staring thing just creeped me out.  I'm not advising you to follow someone in traffic and stalk them to get their number either.  Just consider it a missed moment and go on with your life.  Maybe you'll bump into each other again at some point.

Maybe other people would find the staring flattering.  It was so fixed that I find it a bit creepy.  Like I'm wondering if this dude was memorizing my license plate number in an attempt to track me down later.  

That's sounds crazy, I realize.  

Real talk: I'm like flypaper for freaks.  I don't know what it is about me that makes me so attractive to the more eccentric personalities out there, but it's true.  It happens a lot.  

For example: My admirer who stalked me at work, wrote me bad love poems on the internet, and was trying to sell his personal belongings to my coworkers.  

You want another one?  How about the guy who wrote me a note saying he'd been watching me at work for several years, and wanted to take me out.  I should look him up on Facebook under a certain name, not his "government name" (because, as it turns out, he had a criminal record).  And what was on his Facebook?  Many pictures documenting the healing process of his huge scab (cause of said injury unknown), and really bad homemade videos of him trying to rap. 

A third, just to round it out nicely?  Sure thing, Friends -- I've got tons to choose from! Let's go for a non-work related deal. How about the guy I met in the grocery store who asked me out for coffee, then spent the entire time talking about his ex-girlfriends.  And there were several -- complete with pictures of each one!  They were all blonde, and rather short. I was very obviously not his type, and the whole thing felt more like I was his therapist. Did I mention that he ordered decaf because, after we arrived, he thought that maybe he wasn't supposed to mix caffeine with his medication?  Yeah. But I did get free coffee out of it, so not a total loss.

Back to the point:  I have a bad track record with attracting the odder parts of the male population. Guy in Truck was being weird.  He might be a totally nice, normal dude -- but that was kind of creepy and my track record makes me leery.

Here's Your Time To Shine, Friends!

What the hell was Guy in Truck trying to accomplish earlier today? Let me know what you think.  I turned this over in my head a lot, as you can probably tell, and I've got nothing.  Can you come up with any other logical explanations for his behavior? 

*At the very least you could reassure me that the guy wasn't being carjacked.* 

Sunday Funday...Sort Of

Hey Friends.

So, this past Sunday I decided to take my breakfast and go down to Quiet Cove Park.  It was my own little baby version of having Sunday Funday as I still had to go to work later that day.  It's better than nothing -- no judging.

As I was the only person in the entire park, I decided to take some pictures.  It's what I do for fun, folks.  Also, consider this fair warning that this post is going to include a bunch of pictures.  If you're on a slow connection or this is going to massively drain your battery by trying to load it all -- you have been warned.

Path by the parking area.  Didn't have time to explore it.

The entrance can seem a bit creepy, but it's fine.

In the tunnel.  This is why we can't have nice things.

Nautical-theme flag...and some construction

Well, it is the Hudson River.  I wouldn't try eating anything, personally.

And that's why.  Didn't capture well, but there was a lovely film of some sort on the surface of the water.  

There is a little beach access.

Beautiful spot for breakfast, and I had it all to myself!

Walkway Over the Hudson and the Mid-Hudson Bridge to the South

View to the North, complete with train on the other side.

Somebody put in a lot of work on the graffiti on that train car to have it visible from the other side of the river.  And I kind of want that house.

An old silo, maybe?  I'm not really sure what it is.

Driftwood along the shore.

Does black & white make it look more artsy?

My breakfast buddy

There are some pretty flowers.

More flowers.

It's a nice little spot to wander around and relax before heading to work.  I don't know about you, but sometimes I just need to get out and breathe the fresh air. Clear your head and recharge before going back to the usual business of life.  Just unplug from everything and enjoy the little things.  Helps to put things in perspective.

And now that I sound like some kind of life coach, I think I'll stop my rambling.  

You'll Be Amazed What You Can Find!

Hey, Friends.

You can find amazing things left in the library.  Yeah, there are the usual suspects:  articles of clothing, more car keys than you can possibly imagine, sunglasses, umbrellas, food, phones...and that is keeping the list to the more popular, non-gross, list of items.  Those are the things that you would think that people would miss and come back to claim. It never ceases to amaze me that people never come back for this stuff.  Hell, I wouldn't be able to leave the library if I left my car key there.  It would definitely be something I missed and needed.

Sometimes, through whatever cosmic forces you want to imagine are behind it, the collection of flotsam accumulated over the course of an afternoon just needs to be documented.

Friends, this afternoon the stars aligned and it was magical.  It was as if the patrons collectively were trying to send us a message.

The message I interpreted from the artifacts collected?  PIRATE

Yeah.  I know that sounds ridiculous, but just go with it.  (And you should probably also know that I've worked the last 16 days in a row and have 5 more to go before I get a day off.  I'm not above making my own fun to get through the day at this point.)  It was so bizarre, yet kind of awesome, that I felt the need to document it in photos.

Let me break it down for you....

It was a slow afternoon in Library Land. Pretty peaceful, not a lot of problems. It was finally sunny and nice out after a week of rain, and it was Mother's Day, so most people had an elsewhere to be.

My mad theory began with a discovery by our student page.

ARTIFACT #1

He was diligently working away, shelving the new books that had been returned.  As he was working he discovered a couple of items hidden away behind the books.

Happy Hour at the library!

Two of these, both empty, tucked away behind the books.  The odd part of it isn't finding bottles hidden behind books.  Weirder shit than that gets discovered all of the time.  To be fair, kicking back a couple of drinks while hiding in the stacks is on the more tame end of behavior that happens on a fairly regular basis.  

Why hide the empties?  I could understand hiding your stash for later, but the empties?  It would be so much less conspicuous to chuck them in a trash can somewhere.  It was a little disturbing that we might be someone's new watering hole, but not unexpected in the grand scheme of things.

ARTIFACT #2

A short while later I discovered the next item left on the circulation desk.  I didn't see the bearer of such a gift, nor did I know when they deposited it.  Again -- nothing out of the norm.  Patrons are always finding things that they think are lost, or weird, or broken, and they bring them to the circulation desk.  Sometimes -- especially if it is something they think might be valuable (or dangerous) -- they will wait to tell us where they found it. Many times they just drop it and go with the assumption that we will eventually find it and deal with it.  The item I found was small, and tucked almost around the edge of the desk.  I only noticed because there was suddenly something shiny that hadn't been there earlier.

OMG it's a tiny pirate hook!

Sure, it could be just a broken clasp, or part of a broken clip.  The eye sees what it wants to see.

Plus, that's so boring.  

Use your imagination, Friends!  Don't disappoint me and take the "boring" route.

I mean, we just discovered two empty bottles of rum.  How could this be anything other than a tiny pirate hook to go with the rum?  

This was awesome!  It needed to be documented because....well...how often do you find 2 bottles of rum and a tiny pirate hook just hanging out in the library?

I thought it was appropriate

But then, Friends, as impossible as it may seem, it got even better!

ARTIFACT #3

You might be wondering how this could possibly get better.  I had already told our page that if he found seashells, or beach sand, a ship in a bottle -- anything else weird and pirate-related -- he needed to let me know ASAP.  No lie.  I had everyone on board with my antics at this point.

And then my lovely coworker pointed out artifact #3.  

There, sitting unassumingly atop a library book mark that had been left in a book when it was returned, was item number three.  It was perfect!  

We had reached The Trifecta of Pirate.  The Holy Trinity of Swashbuckler Paraphernalia.

Enjoy the new background I set on that computer, kids!

Empty rum bottles.

A tiny pirate hook.

A skull.

I think it's pretty clear what the universe was trying to tell us:  Pirates!

There obviously must be pirates around.  Or nefarious behavior of some sort. 

At the very least someone who might be inebriated, and may or may not have broken jewelry, and was forgetful when it comes to keeping track of their bookmarks.

Or maybe it is just a sign that we were bored this afternoon, and I really need a day away from Library Land.  

(But I'm sticking with the pirates.)