Last Saturday, Andy and I went out to lunch while his truck was being worked on. He had to get new tires and shocks, but the truck is over eight years old so that is to be expected. Anyway, we were at lunch and Andy asked me what I wanted for my birthday. It just dawned on me earlier that day that my birthday is this coming Sunday. Birthdays just aren't the same when you get old. There is nothing to look forward to. I remember counting down the days for weeks until my birthday when I was a kid, and now it totally sneaks up on me.

I told Andy that nothing could top last year's birthday present, and of course I had to remind him what that was, or actually who that was, because it was for my birthday last year that I got Virgil the tortoise. I said he could get me a friend for Virgil, and he was actually okay with that. I looked around and found that they have some Hermann's tortoise hatchlings (that is what Virgil is, a Hermann's tortoise) at a turtle farm in our area. Yes, we have turtle farm here, isn't that cool?

Visits to the turtle farm are by appointment only, so I made an appointment for three o'clock on Saturday afternoon. I am excited to see if we will bring home a buddy for Virgil! Andy did make a point of mentioning that if I get another tortoise for my birthday this year, it doesn't mean that I can get another one EVERY year. I said, "Why not? Think of how great it will be when I am eighty years old and fully surrounded by tortoises. That would be wonderful!" I am not sure Andy sees it that way, though :)

You might remember that I posted some time ago about a certain group of "represented" employees that went on strike. If you can believe it, it has now been 138 days that they have been sitting out by the side of the road, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And life at the space center has gone on without them. I am not going to go into the politics of unions or even what I think about this particular strike as it is immaterial.

There were negotiations between the union and the company yesterday, and they continued today, but no information has come out. Everyone is still in the dark about what is going on. I am going to point you toward a forum run by the major newspaper in this area, and a particular thread that is now 89 pages long so that you can see what a strike can do to people. There is a lot of back and forth banter between strikers and non-represented employees and the general public. Some of it is downright viscious, but it is interesting how strikes have moved from being just about the picket line to having a presence on the internet. There is a blog for the union strikers and all of this discussion on the forums. It is definitely a different world.

Anyway, it seems that a strike only tears people apart. Even if there is a contract agreement made, I don't know how anyone can expect that a die hard union person can work alongside a so-called scab ever again. It just won't work; there are too many hurt feelings on both sides.

If you are interested, you can follow a lot of the banter here. There are several other threads like this one, but this one has stuck around the longest. Be forewarned, you may get sucked in to the story and there is a lot to read. You could lose some serious time following the saga.

I have been somewhat absent from this blog for the last few days. Chalk it up to schoolwork- I got two more quizzes and another writing assignment completed for my class. I have a section exam to take and then I will be halfway complete with my first real class since I returned to school only a couple of weeks ago.

Today I had to take some time out of my studying schedule to address our household shame. You know those desirable architectural features known as plant shelves? Well, I do not desire them, but I have them. You should not desire them either, unless you live in a very non-dusty area or you have a sick compulsion to climb ladders regularly to dust. Neither of these apply to us, yet we have plant shelves. Mostly, we ignore the piling up of world class dust bunnies up there, even though it can be viewed easily from our upstairs hallway that is like a loft looking down over the plant shelves. We choose not to look, because we don't want to deal with it. We have put off the chore of dusting up there for centuries.

Finally I decided we had to do it. I think it was because last night we started having snow flurries from the globs of dust that were liberating from the ceiling fan. Keep in mind that in most senses I am a total neat freak, I have just chosen to ignore this rapidly worsening condition by not looking up there. When we finally started working on the piles of dust, it wasn't pretty. The silk plants that were taken down from the shelves had intricate patterns of dust on them, almost like delicate snowflakes or spiderwebs, but as soon as they were moved, chunks of dust started flying everywhere. I took each one outside and thoroughly beat all of the dust out of it while Andy vacuumed the shelves and ceiling fan atop a ladder. After it was all over, I had to dust everything below and clean the florrs of all of the dust that had fallen on them. Yuck.

So that is how I spent my Sunday, dealing with our household shame. What about you?

Here are another two photos that Andy happened to appear in on the NASA site from astronaut training a couple of weeks ago. He is only in the background and very blurry on the right in the second one, but I still think it is kind of funny that he ended up in so many of these photos because he tried diligently to keep out of the way and/or spotlight as much as possible. He is just like that. You can see the photos in their full huge glory by clicking on them. The credits for these photos belong to NASA and they can be found at this gallery.

I am posting these photos because I really have to get some homework done tonight. I took my first quiz in my Legal Aspects of Safety and Health class and I got another 100%. I love how you can fill out your test/quiz and hit submit and get your grade instantly. At least it works that way for multiple choice, when you have essay questions you have to wait for the professor to grade them, but it is nice to get some of your scores instantly.

Today at 11:38 am Discovery lifted off on its way to the International Space Station. I have seen quite a few launches now, the last seven plus years worth, but they are always special. I can't see a launch ever seeming routine.

There is always excitement in the air on launch days. Even those workers that have spent their entire careers in the various space programs get excited about launches. You won't find anyone inside during a launch except those who have to be, for the most part.

I remember when I first started working at the space center, there was a guy in my shop who didn't care in the least about launches. He couldn't even be bothered to go outside or even stand in a doorway to watch. He said he'd seen launches and didn't need to see another one. That is sad. But he is the only person with that attitude that I have ever encountered out there and he's a little wacked in the head. Personally I think that a person like that shouldn't be permitted to work on the space program, because there are so many people out there who would jump at the chance and really appreciate it.

I have included Andy's video of the launch. It isn't perfect, but it is better than my video, which was really sucky. The durned thing is just so bright it overwhelms the equipment and makes those white lines on the screen. My video did the same thing, and it would probably have made you dizzy because I shook the camera so much.

I can't believe this is the same place I woke up in this morning. The nasty rainy weather has completely moved out and it was beautiful this afternoon. That is one of the nice things about Florida- we don't generally get days on end of icky weather, it just comes in spurts. And hopefully the weather will stay fair, because we have a launch scheduled for tomorrow at 11:38 am Eastern time.

There are lots of interesting things about the upcoming launch of Discovery for STS-120. One of the most interesting to me is the roles that women fill in this mission. The Associated Press explains it like this:

It will be the first time in the 50-year history of spaceflight that two women are in charge of two spacecraft at the same time.

This is no public relations gimmick cooked up by NASA. It's coincidence, which pleases shuttle commander Pamela Melroy and station commander Peggy Whitson.

"To me, that's one of the best parts about it," said Melroy, a retired Air Force colonel who will be only the second woman to command a space shuttle flight. "This is not something that was planned or orchestrated in any way."

"This is a really special event for us," Melroy said. "... There are enough women in the program that coincidentally this can happen, and that is a wonderful thing. It says a lot about the first 50 years of spaceflight that this is where we're at."

Whitson, the first woman to be in charge of a space station, arrived at the orbital outpost on a Russian Soyuz spacecraft on Oct. 12. She flew there with two men, one a Russian cosmonaut who will spend the entire six months with her.

Before the launch, an official presented her with a traditional Kazakh whip to take with her. It's a symbol of power, Whitson explained, because of all the horseback and camel riding in Kazakhstan.

Smiling, she said she took the gift as a compliment and added: "I did think it was interesting though, that they talked a lot about the fact that they don't typically let women have these."

At least it wasn't a mop. The whip stayed behind on Earth.

Eleven years ago, just before Shannon Lucid rocketed to the Russian space station Mir, a Russian space official said during a live prime-time news conference that he was pleased she was going up because "we know that women love to clean."

"I really haven't heard very much like that at all from the Russian perspective," Whitson said in an interview with The Associated Press last week. "Russian cosmonauts are very professional and having worked and trained with them for years before we get to this point, I think makes it better because then it doesn't seem unusual to them either."

In other mission news, those of you who are big fans of Star Wars will be excited to know that the original lightsaber used by Mark Hamill in Return of the Jedi will be flown to the International Space Station and then will return to earth in celebration of the 30th anniversary of the Star Wars franchise. Whoopee.

Anyway, we are hoping for good weather tomorrow to see this bird off. I will post photos, video or whatever I get from work at the time if she goes.

Ugh. It is not even five in the morning and it is already pouring outside for the nine millionth time this year. What's that thing about rainy days and Mondays? Yuck. I hope it isn't raining where you are- unless you like for it to, that is.

Today I finally made the decision to change my main email address. I have had the same email since 2001, but it was a dot msn address, lorded over by Microshaft. If you aren't already aware, they have been making a big move over to the "Windoze Live" format and everything is being upgraded. The upgrades mean that I can no longer view my email using my browser of choice, Apple's Safari browser. So buh bye to MSN email. I will let the address hang around for a little while, but I am officially moving over to Gmail. Nice move, Microshaft!

It may be a small victory, but I finished my orientation class for school tonight by scoring 100% on the second exam. I have now earned one credit hour and am ready to start my real classes. My first class starts today and I have ten weeks to finish it. It is Legal Aspects of Safety and Health and I find it very interesting. My textbook was delivered to the house yesterday; I can't wait to see how I will do in it.

Look what I found today- a freshly hatched softshell turtle with a funny little pointy nose. I found him in the middle of the sidewalk this morning after I almost stepped on him, and then I transported him to a nice safe pond where he would have a much better chance of survival and released him. He was darn cute, though.

I just started my first class yesterday, and I took my first exam today. Granted, the first class is an orientation class, so it is no biggie, but at least I am moving in the right direction. I got 100% on the exam and have only one more orientation exam to take and then I will be ready to move on into the interesting stuff. Actually my first class is on Legal Aspects of Safety and Health and I start Friday. Moving right along!

This could be the wave of the future for me- blogging while on the go. I just got a new phone that has everything but the kitchen sink (Wi-fi, querty keyboard, GPS, 3 MP digital camera) so I am well equipped for it if I can find the time. You may start seeing more posts due to my new mobile capabilities.

That is what I call Virgil sometimes, my little tortellini. I think he likes it. Virgil and I went to see a reptilian veterinarian this afternoon about his toenails. On two of his feet, two adjacent toenails have fused together, and it worried me. So I went to a vet in Cocoa that sees all types of exotic animals to get him checked out.

It is funny taking a tortoise to the vet. Everyone at the vet wanted to see him and ask questions about him. He is very handsome, of course, and everyone liked him. When we saw the doctor, she tried to pry the toenails apart, but they were good and fused. She said that while they don't know what causes it to happen, it is not an uncommon thing for tortoises and that it shouldn't affect him much. It may correct itself when his toenails shed their outer surface next time. In any case, she examined him and said that he looked like he was in excellent health and we are doing all the right things. His shell didn't show signs of pyramiding- which is when the individual scutes, or sections of the shell start to grow in a pyramid shape due to nutritional deficiencies, resulting in a very sharply bumped shell. It is hard to tell in the early stages, and I wasn't sure if he had some pyramiding, but she said no, he looks fine. And of course he peed on her just for good measure, but she didn't mind a bit.

I made a neat transporter for Virgil out of a plastic container that was meant to be a photo organizer. I bought it at Target for $5.99 and drilled half inch holes in the sides of it for ventilation, then added a dirt substrate for him to crawl around on. Here is a photo of it, but it isn't Virgil inside- I put a little figure of a tortoise in there to illustrate, but it is pretty close to the same size as Virge- he is just teeny bit bigger.

Andy spent some time this week supporting the astronaut training at the launch pads on the slide wire baskets, which are an emergency escape mechanism for the astronauts to escape from the launch pad if something were to go wrong. He was captured on the edge of this NASA photo- that is him in the grey shirt and jeans- that appears on the NASA website here.

I was just thinking about careers today, and something occurred to me. I think there are certain careers that almost require some sort of personal "passion" or drive for them for a person to truly be successful in the job. I know there are many jobs out there that are just a living but that people don't care about. I am sure that a lot of people hate their jobs or just get through them without any real care about the outcome of their work beyond how it affects their paycheck. But certain jobs seem to call for more than that. I mean, do you really want a nurse caring for you in the hospital that really hates his job and doesn't care, or do you want one that is driven to give the best care possible? We've all had different teachers in school, and isn't there a world of difference between those that just get by and those that make it their life's work to inspire their students to learn and achieve? Would you want a firefighter that doesn't really care about his job to be the one on call when your house is on fire?

You know you have the right people on the job when you hear reports like those from Dawn about her job working as a nurse. She is just cut out for it perfectly, and is the kind of nurse I would want looking after me if I was in the hospital. This is what I mean about having the drive necessary for a certain job. The problems I have seen lately are with many of the people in Safety careers. I just have found that most of them that I have encountered are in it for the money or some other reason, but very few are actually in the field because they care about safety of employees. That is truly sad. That is why I want to pursue occupational safety further in school, because I don't feel that those in charge of safety and safety policies when working in hazardous environments care in the least about my safety. They seem to be concerned more with the "appearance of safety" or how it looks on paper and that is of little use to me or others working where we are exposed to enormous hazards on the job. I think the Safety profession needs more people that have come from working in these areas and can take the dangers seriously rather than just book trained office types that have never had to worry about whether they will make it home from work in one piece. I wish that these safety policy makers would be forsed to go out in the field and be subject to their own screwed up policies a few times until they could understand where they have gone wrong, but unfortunately it never happens. Oh well. When I get my Safety degree things are going to change. I hope.

Okay, so this is weird. I wrote my post from yesterday and hit publish last night, but somehow there was a sentence at the end of the post that I didn't write. I removed it a little while ago, but I think it is kind of freaky.

Either my body was overtaken by aliens that typed in that sentence last night, or maybe my blog is haunted. In any case I think I'll change my password!

Eeek. It rained again today. And I spent most of the day with dog hair in my eye.

Yesterday I groomed four of the sweet hounds. During one of the groomings, while I was using the dust buster to suck the hair up, a little bit of short cut fur flew up into my eye. My eye has been red and irritated ever since.

Luckily this afternoon while I was at work, I think the little piece of cut dog hair worked its way out of my eyeball. The white of my eye started turning back from nasty irritated pink to normal eye color. Thank God- that little piece of hair was quite uncomfortable.

So, I haven't posted in a few days- that is very unlike me. Nothing special has been going on, it was just a rough week. There was a lot I had to get done, plus I got back my evaluation form the University I have been planning to go to. They accepted the majority of my credits, but the one credit they didn't take from Florida State was my math credit. That was kind of a big deal. I refuse to take a math class, especially a basically remedial one just because they don't want to accept the one I have. Long story. Anyway, the solution I finally came up with is that I am going to take a CLEP test to get the credit I need.

The rest of the classes are all toward my major and are things I am interested in and I should be ready to graduate in about a year or so. But it took me a while to figure out what I was going to do.

Last week was just rotten all around. It rained hard almost every day, we had some setbacks with the whole house building thing, the big issue that I brought up at work that was ignored, etc. I am hoping this coming week will be better.

Being involved with company awards programs for the past five years, I have picked up a thing or two about thhe art of writing a compelling award nomination. If I do say so myself, I have almost a talent for composing winning nominations when I can extract all the information I need from the nominator. I handle everything for the managers. When theirnominations come in, I research and rewrite them, asking questions where I need info to fill in the blanks. Most or all of them like for me to take care of everything, because it is such a pain for them otherwise.

From the things I have learned while serving on the various awards boards I am on, I have written extensive "how to" material. I have written tons on how to write a successful award nomination and given examples, and why it is important to explain things a certain way or phrase things in a specific manner. The PR department in charge of the entire awards program has recently begun teaching classes on award nomination writing for managers. The people in charge of this asked for input from members of the top level awards board months ago, and I submitted all of the documents I had written to help the managers within my group. It turned out that I was one of few (or maybe the only one) to submit anything and a huge portion of the course material they are teaching in the classes now is my work, down to the exact words and phrases I used. I am fine with that and feel it is flattering to me.

The thing that bugs me a little is that I have been working hard for over five years now to get top awards for hundreds of people in my directorate. The PR people have said to mangement over and over how important it is to show employees that their contributions are valued through the awards program. How recognition is a key thing even more so than pay and benefits in a lot of cases. And they nod in agreement. And they nominate employees for awards. Except me. And yes, I am still eligible, although my achievement has to be greater than the average award winner for me to win since I am on the board. Typically they have the other members vote in secret when a board member is nominated so it remains a surprise if the nomination is selected. It happens regularly and is no big deal.

But lately, my achievements have been of a large magnitude. I can't go into any kind of detail because of the nature of my work, unfortunately. But it is significant and is in several areas. I have been killing myself to overachieve to an enormous extent. But there is nothing. It is like they just forget all about me when it comes to recognition. I am forever having to fight for awards for people that did little or nothing beyond the scope of their jobs, and it is beginning to wear on me. Especially when I see nominations for individuals that I could only describe as idiotic horse's asses. I am not supposed to care, I guess, but I can't help wishing someone would recognize how hard I am working and the sacrifices I have made. I have made it a priority to do everything in my power to get nominations from the managers in my group to emerge as winners, but I think the appreciation for that and the much larger more significant things I do is non-existent and my hard work is taken completely for granted. Why do these people think that when "employees" value recognition for the work that they have done, that it excludes certain people?

Do I have to save the planet to be worthy of recognition while everyone else can just show up and maybe be mildly productive and have awards shooting out of their asses?

Could it be near? Could it actually be around the corner?

This weekend, especially on Sunday the weather was, for a change, almost bearable. The temperatures were below the upper nineties and the humidity was reasonable as well. It was downright comfortable almost.

There was no way it could last, but incredibly this morning there was more of the same. The weather was mild and very breezy. Was it a dream? Nope. This afternoon the reverie was interrupted by the sound of nothing less than a monsoon of pouring rain. There goes our low humidity. Kiss those mild temperatures goodbye. Boo hoo. I guess we'll have to wait a little longer to get anything more than our very first glimpse of fall weather or even a tiny preview of less summery weather than what we've had. Ugh.