I don’t feel redundant. I feel slightly too needed. All of you have just volunteered to borrow Nat for the rest of the week! 
Made it through work, everybody’s walked and fed.
Cute pups, Vbob.
Hope you feel better tomorrow, Taters.
I’m glad you have a good boss, FCM.
Can I bring him to work with me, LiLi? I’m sure he could be a big help.
Some people here are silly. 
Good on you for bringing that rumor report to your boss right away, FCM! I can never understand why anyone would think that making stuff up like that will help them in any way (except maybe out the door).
Those puppies are very very cute, Bobbio!
Sorry about the headache, Taters.
I finished another scarf and am starting on some little hand warmers. We’ll see if they turn out. Also watched a couple of episodes of Better Off Ted on hulu. Mildly entertaining.
Off to beddie bye. Hoping not to wake up too much before the alarm tomorrow.
GT
Awwwwwww
Puppehs!
FCM, I hate it when that happens. And what kills me is that every time something similar happened, my crystal ball knew exactly who had said it, when, to whom and why… and the person telling me “the bad news” was surprised. Let’s see: if I interact with about 100 people, 90 treat me like I’m the second coming (or at least the coming-and-a-half), 9 others don’t but I’m still their “go to” person (they just happen to be as allergic to grovelling as I am), and 1 looks at me like I stink… gee, wonder who complained about my 'tude!
LiLi, I’ll be happy to take him for the next two weeks minus flight time.
I’m moving to the dorm on the 5th. The crystal ball says there’s going to be storage boxes under my bed in the near future, as I’m staying there for 9 months and that means things like a lot of clothing; it’s not like I can dash home to get the fat boots when the weatherman says they’ll be needed. They’re “the fat boots” because they make my feet look as if I don’t shop in the children’s section (which I often need to, being a size 3).
They provide bedclothes (ours to keep) and the kitchen is semi-furnished, it has white goods but no microwave (then again, lots of food that would be “1 min in the microwave” elsewhere are “add boiling water” or “15 min in the oven” here) and no tableware or pots (I think I already have some of that, as The Hordie doesn’t seem to be using most of what I left). The price includes internet, the license for the TV in the living room (if anybody places one in his room, he needs to pay the license for that one), cleaning service and all that other stuff which normally falls under “expenses” (electricity, gas, heating, water, trash removal).
A new Magic Armchair has been mail-ordered and should be here Monday at the latest. The UK has some sweeeeeet mail order shopping, so long as you don’t happen to need to import. Like when MS Access was being sold stand-alone in the US only, in all of Europe you had to buy the whole kit but if you tried to order from amazon.com they refused to sell you to Europe because “that product is not available there”… I know, that’s why I’m ordering from Over There! Funny happenstance there (or not): MS broke up the kit in Europe shortly after I’d mentioned that problem in the Dope.
Or, alternatively, I hope to fall asleep before the alarm goes off.
Finally getting sleepy. I’ve been up knitting because I was so awake. Already set the alarm for a bit later. On the plus side, one hand warmer is knit. Just need to weave in some ends.
OK…now I’m going to sleep. Really.
GT
I hear ya, gt. I finally felt sleepy enough around 12:30 (3 hours ago), and now I am wide awake after a mutha of a coughing fit.
Greetings from sunny Budapest, mumpers! I’m having a fantastic time over here, spent our first week at the Sziget festival, met some great people and saw some excellent bands. Far too much beer has been consumed, far too much lardy food has been scoffed but we’re having too much fun to care.
After the festival we had a day off to laze around then we went on a train-based adventure to make the 170km journey from Budapest to Kunhyges to visit our friends who moved over here about 18 months ago. They have a house with a plot of land and are slowly learning to be relatively self-sufficient. It was definitely an adventure as we had to get the train from Budapest and change at a station in the middle of nowhere that had no proper platforms, just a white-bordered walk-way across the tracks. It was unstaffed too, so I was wondering how we’d work out which train to catch for the second part of the journey but it was ok 'cos there was only one train in the station at the time we expected to catch one, and it turned out to be the right one. Otherwise, we probably would have ended up in Ukraine or somewhere like that!
Today we’re heading off to the beautiful Szecheyni thermal spa to laze around in pools of warm water. Actually I might go and look for a cooler pool 'cos it’s about 34degrees outside. I am not built for sun, that’s for sure! Anyway, got to get a move on, got to play tourist for the rest of the day and then tomorrow we are flying home and kind of looking forward to it as we’ll be able to rescue the fuzzbutts from the moggery.
Have fun!
Boofae must have run everyone off.
Blurf. I’d be excited that my kid is somewhere between Indiannoplace and Etlanner at the moment, but I’m too sleepy.
Hugs, yays, boos, wet trout ant chitlins, gropes, and No Doze as needed. Take what you will and pass along the rest.
waaaah! I wan’ my mommie!
koffkokokokokokoff
I am now officially on Short Term Disability leave. 
ContagiousRosie, whatever it is you have, I had for a week before I went to Beantown, and it was in Beantown that it was the worst. I prescribe Popsicles, Cloraseptic, and OTC cold medicine. Since you’re Jewish, chicken soup, too.
To run the complete course was 2 weeks, but the apex of the worst was about 3 days.
I’m already on a Z-Pak - and with a non functioning a/c, chicken soup is out of the question - But I am drinking a lot of water
Feel better soon, Rosie! Poor thing.
Purty puppies, Bobbio.
I hope your headache’s gone, Taters.
Sounds like a blast, BooFae!
Work beckons…
SQUEEEEEEE!!!
They are Teh Keeee-UTE! I want the white one. 
fcm, good on you for going to the boss. I always figure if somebody has enough time to study what I’m doing all day, then THEY don’t have enough to do.
soapy, I think the Myth Busters busted the 5 second rule so not counting on it at the gas pump was a good thing.
Well, had the head MRI thing this morning. Not horrible but not pleasant either. I won’t know anything till my doc calls me next week.
Come oooooooon, Firday!!
Tupug
I can lend you mine, she’s now bereft of anybody to mother and that makes her mad as hell…
ask her to bring some paella (sp?) and you’ve got a deal.
I haven’t quite caught up yet, but I did see those cuuuuuuuute itty bitty puppies! Awwwwwwww!
We’ve got an all employee meeting in 10 min. Yippee. Nothing more of a time waster than an all employee meeting. Just leave me alone and let me get my work done. If you really want to tell me how we’re doing, send out a report that I can look at when I have time. Ugh.
Anyway, a friend made an amazing beet pasta dish a couple weeks ago. KT took a camera phone pic of the recipe, but it was all fuzzy so this is a close approximation of the recipe. Amounts are approximate too.
Beet pasta
1 lb cooked beets
1 lb bow tie pasta (the texture of the bow ties really is perfect for this)
1 large onion
1 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil
~3 tbsp heavy cream (or half and half)
Salt and pepper
Boil the pasta just to al dente.
Dice the onions finely and sauté in the butter and olive oil. Season with salt and pepper.
Finely chop the already-cooked beets. (I used my mandolin; I think the person who made it for us a couple weeks ago must have used a food processor. The mandolin or hand chopping will make it more “rustic” where a food processor will make a finer, more even texture. Use whatever you want to get the consistency you want.)
Add the beets to the onions. Stir in the cream. Add the pasta when it’s ready and toss to coat. Check the seasoning and add salt as necessary. It should be just slightly salty to give it a nice salty-sweet flavor.
Soooooo goooooooooooood!
Afternoon/evening all.
{{{FCM}}} I’m glad you got things straightened out with your boss - wonder who’s been spreading rumours?
{{{rosie}} I hate Teh Sick[sup]TM[/sup]!
VBob, cute pups!!!
Puggie, fingers crossed for the right result on your MRI. I’m praying for you.
Today was another sh*tty hot day - heat index of 54C/129F! Enough already!!! I can haz Autumn pleez???
There was just a big argument in Boss’s cube. Well, as big an argument as polite Midwesterners can muster. The biggest argument that I’ve seen (well, overheard) at work in my >3 years here. Boss and Guy from Neighboring Dept were disagreeing with IT guy over The Plan. IT guy feels that the most important thing is to stick to The Plan while Boss and Guy from Neighboring Dept want to do What’s Best for the Business, even if it deviates from The Plan. Fun times.
We’re having a Salads & Sweets pot luck for lunch today. Gotta go assemble my spinach salad.
This well and truly sucks.
One of our Faire friends suffered a stroke last week. Completely out of the blue - one day he’s healthy as ever and gearing up to start building the Faire site on Friday, then something lets go and he’s out. Initial reports were decent - stable but serious condition. Over the weekend, things went worse, and a CT scan apparently showed a big empty space.
His family decided to have him removed from life support. Original plan was for this to be done today. Kaiser denied the “extra” day, so he was taken off the ventilator last night. I understand that patients in ICU beds tend to be train wrecks and big money pits, but for an HMO to come right out and essentially say “We think he’s already dead and we’re not going to pay any more” is horrible.
Our friend has been gone since last week. I just hope his body figures this out quickly and doesn’t linger.