When I got to work it was 58 inside our office, as someone had left the thermostat in A/C mode over the weekend. I'm drinking tea and wearing three shirts, so I'm OK.

Do not want to be awake and working. I probably shouldn't have been reading until 1am this morning. But books!

Had a busy but good weekend. Got my tush out of the house both days, trying to break my hermit/depression tendencies. The depression has been building again lately and I'm trying hard to not let it paralyze me.

Wow, Maria. Yeah. good choice.

My plans tonight involve leftovers, my couch, and TV.

That sounds great! I am torn between spending some post-work daylight hours working in the yard while I can (ie, while it's not scorching hot and also not dark and/or raining) and catching up on my TV watching. We'll see how the day goes.

Glad your weekend was good, Suzi!

Jackson is a perfect bedroom cat—quiet, relatively still, basically he's just a furry purring lump on the bed until I actually get up, at which point meowing for food begins. If Molly could behave like that instead of racing around clawing at things throughout the night I'd just leave my bedroom door open and let both of them sleep in my room.

We now let the cats and the dog sleep in the bedroom, and it is working out okay because now we really only have one floor, except for the finished basement, but the critters don't like to go down there because, you know, where the people are is where they want to be.

The cats sleep with us, but Arthur isn't allowed on furniture; he sleeps on the dog bed.

ION, M's bar mitzvah went absolutely wonderfully. He did such a wonderful job, and we are so proud of him, and everything went well as far as M's mother's family being cordial was concerned; everyone was polite and friendly, and it was actually a much more pleasant experience than I expected.

Also (in shallow news) I was the best dressed person there, so with regards about my freaking out about my outfits, I didn't need to worry about it, because people looked much more casual than i expected, especially several women -- including M's mom. It was not my idea of dressy at all, so I felt really good about looking appropriately dressed and nice.

So thanks for the advice guys, I really appreciate it and it made me feel very confident.

Also, I've never been in a synagogue before or witnessed Jewish services, & I thought they were just lovely and I enjoyed myself immensely. It was a wonderful experience all around.

Mr Peabody wakes up with a leisurely stretch at about 11 a.m. However, with some frequency he barks his head off to go out at 3 a.m. I usually let him out, but there has been some concern about coyotes and small dogs here. A small beagle was killed in his fenced yard about two blocks away. The only witness was a person newly arrived from Russia, who described the attacker as a large yellow dog. Having seen a large dog kill a small dog, I do wonder if coyotes are villains or scapegoats. There's no question that there are coyotes. There's also no question that some people are totally irrational about them. In my yard, I figure the three large dogs next door would be barking at coyotes.

I've spent my morning trying to track the paperwork that was supposed to go from hospital to insurer to doctor to medical supply place. As part of that, I was writing an e-mail to my doctor, only to find that the Kaiser system had logged me out while I was typing.

Oh, ugh, Ginger, that is one of my fears with all systems that automatically log you out for "inactivity".

I'm a little afraid of a coyote eating the cats, which is why I theoretically bring them inside at night - luring them in with canned food and closing their window - but since I have been leaving the back door open for Walter's late night peeing needs (see his aforementioned inability to wake me up) it's all just kind of absurd, really. But my fence is at least 8 feet high with no gaps and, topped with iron spikes along the front (house was formerly owned by an iron worker, there is iron EVERYWHERE, fairies would so not like it), my yard is probably pretty safe.

Ah, I love catching up on email to find escalations where people were repeatedly asking me to follow up on things when I clearly indicated in my out of office message and calendar that I was unavailable.

As part of that, I was writing an e-mail to my doctor, only to find that the Kaiser system had logged me out while I was typing.

That's so infuriating.

Ah, I love catching up on email to find escalations where people were repeatedly asking me to follow up on things when I clearly indicated in my out of office message and calendar that I was unavailable.

I love asking clients to quit bitching at me over the phone and send the email detailing your complaints (that I've asked for 3 times now), so I can escalate this properly. I also love sending the email, cc'ing my boss and the head of CST, as to why things weren't done when they said they would be done, and why the hell is no one communicating delays or issues to me so I don't sound like a fucking idiot when the client calls me all pissed off. Oh Monday....

Ginger, what shrift said. I've taken to highlighting and copying every so often when I know I'm in one of those systems. Of course, you have to *know* in order to be proactive. We shall not discuss those systems that don't give you any warning that you're about to be logged out.