I wouldn't be home except I had a printer emergency and couldn't keep going - well, then I had to leave detailed instructions and put files in two locations so various people can access them What happened was this:
I started printing Tshirt transfers (always dicey), leaving the inside of the program to be printed last so I could go home and leave it printing.
A transfer wrapped around a roller. Last time that happened I was a fraction more able, and tore through the transfer, removed it with pliers, burned myself a lot, and kept on printing.
This time I called the office to see if the building manager was there - no - I said I needed a man with pliers and Denice said she'd find Skunk. I said, "What about Randy (transportation supervisor)?" He came, and it turns out he was a printer repairman for years. He got the transfer out and I started it up with the idea that if it printed I'd do the programs. I got "50.6 Fuser Error," and wondered if changing the drumkit would fix that - I couldn't get hold of Randy as there was some kind of meeting. After renaming files and making sure everything was in more than one location, I wrote notes and emails to Alex (out today due to dental things) and Brenda telling them what to do, put everything in piles on the table, etc. It's complicated to explain and they won't be happy they have to do it - but oh, well. Usually it all appears magically with no effort on anyone's part but mine. Enjah IMed while I was in Gmail, and I had to say I couldn't talk.


I actually felt cheerful and happy as I left, despite the rotten problems. I stopped and talked to Roxanna on the way out, then, as I was stopped before turning out onto the Nisqually Cut-Off I looked over at a truck that was stopped behind someone going into Conine - the driver recognised me and grinned and did a head-bob-of-recognition, and I smiled widely. A former student, without doubt. Children change a lot as they grow up and I'm not sure who it was -- however, it seemed to be a nice ending to my work-life at Wa He Lut. I've been there long enough to have children of former students. I wanted to put some old photos in the yearbook this year - alas I couldn't find them and it didn't happen, but that's life. I'm not totally finished as I need to wrap it all up for the end of year ceremony on Tuesday, then the pow wow is Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Last year was the first year I couldn't go - I love pow wows, and got lots of great photos by getting children to take pictures, taking them myself, getting a grandpa to take some, etc. The year before last was the last year I manned a booth - that was always fun.

I had a nice email from Becky L, who bought a painting - yay! She said, "With respect to the question that Lucia poses about "how does that light also suggest so much about the humans who pass through?", I have one answer. I think there is a starkness in light on your buildings that reminds me of how I have felt, back in my hiking days, when I came upon a small lake above the timberline. Those lakes- like the walls in your paintings - make me admit that they would be here whether or not I was here to behold them.
This is the classic "you're-a-speck-in-the-universe" moment, or in the case of your paintings, "you're an illumined dust mote", and it is both disquieting and comforting at the same time."

I got a nice email from Judy, in New Mexico, with whom I worked at the Lut years ago. She said, "I know, from experience, how much it means to enjoy seeing what's outside your window. It has made a real difference in my life to "have a nice view!" Right now everything in the desert is blooming; red yucca, cholla and even the pinon have sprouted tiny brown cones. We have baby squirrels running around like crazy, as well as tiny rabbits, roadrunners and tons of quail. Sometimes I just stop and think how lucky I am to be able to live amongst all of this. Mostly I'm working to keep it all going, but it's worth the effort."

Phil emailed me back -- he's in surgery tomorrow so the fact that the graphics card got delayed two weeks then cancelled meant I missed that window of opportunity. I didn't order the 7800 as I have time to poke around a bit, now, and I'm back to that "I know myself too well" thing, which is that if it's sitting here I'll put it in myself, which I shouldn't do.