Cubicles are meant to be droneish for a reason. The less difference in one cubicle to another means the less the employees stop to chat about anything unique. It keeps things productive. But when you spend 8+ hours of your day in your office, you want to have things around you that make you happy.

Having an office that looks as awesome as This One: http://www.wired.com/culture/design/multimedia/2007/06/gallery_nemo_office  would be wonderful. However, that level of Steampunk Goodness is out of reach or impractical for most of us.

So, how do you steampunk your office into your happy place without driving your boss over the Edge?

Like all nice touches in life, the key is accessorizing.

A small industrial fan.

An Old Radio

A old library dewey decimal card cabinet for office supplies

Lightbulb with solar reactor

Venus Fly Trap

What are your ideas?

*sigh*

I could post about the fact that I did finally chop my hair off.

(Note to anyone considering it: don’t.)

I could post about a new year and new beginnings, but I do believe its been done.

I’m about as indecisive as ever. Still, after a year, wondering if I should attempt to make contact with my son’s father… who… I’m 90% positive is having a baby of his own right about…. now. (Late December? Early Jan. Based on a hunch)

And WHAT is twitter all about? Why am I the only one who doesn’t see the attraction? Seriously, what key thing am I missing about it?

Happy New Year. Don’t quit your day job. Or your Anti Depressants.

ten years healthy growth

gone one instant of impulse

chop chop went the blade

~

~

like samson i feel

that i’ve lost something vital

powerless, bereft

~

~

goodbye precious hair

make a sick child happy

sitting on her head

~

~

www.locksoflove.org

Joss,

Oh Joss! How could you do it? Why??? Why did it have to end like that?

*sniffles*

I wanted him to get the girl.

~Liza-who-thinks-it-was-good-even-if-she-didn’t-like-the-ending.

Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog in three acts is available for FREE until July 20th. See it here: www.drhorrible.com

After that… you’ll have to wait for the DVD or purchase it on Itunes. Or just purchase it now.

A few months ago, when the weather was just beginning to warm up, we went to a park with a lake and caught some massively huge bullfrog tadpoles. We have a horse-trough-turned-backyard-pond with lilies and goldfish and its own little ecosystem. We thought it could use a new inhabitant. In went seven large tadpoles the size of large egg yolks. The scurried around, dipped underwater and I didn’t see them for several weeks. I thought perhaps our crawdads ate them or they just couldn’t stay near enough to the surface to stay warm or get enough oxygen.

But lo and behold! One morning I step onto our back porch and what is looking at me but my own tiny little kermit, sitting on a lily pad just like all good frogs should! Since then, we’ve created a secondary small pond with plants and it’s own stock of live food (mosquito fish are plentiful in both bodies of water). A new frog crawled out of the water last week and this morning we have yet another new frog! Two frogs are in the large trough and one has been relocated to a less cannibalistic atmosphere. He just doesn’t know what kind of lucky frog he is!

It's not that easy being green

Tank Brothers

If I can't see you, you can't see me

http://steampunkbitz.wordpress.com/2008/07/09/steampunk_resources/

I moved this to a blog of its own! Enjoy!

Last night, looking for something in my garage, I happened upon the large stack of papers that are all my court documents from when my son was small.

I understand my son’s father’s reaction to things better now than I did. Court proceedings can get ugly. Really ugly. I wish more steps had been taken previous to filing custody papers. Such a panic, to be served with court papers. Such a panic to think a judge has 5 or 10 minutes to decide the fate of your child on a He Said She Said basis. Pray for family judges. They don’t go into that field with a desire to wreck families but to help them. Their job is a great burden.

The papers said my son would be visiting his grandparents every other weekend. A practice I had put an end to after about four or five visits when they made it clear they would not respect my wishes or give me easy access to my son (I was still nursing). They were the only people my son ever showed any intense stranger anxiety with. And with him not being able to communicate yet, I had to do what I thought was in his best interest.

That is the over simplified version, but going into the nitty gritty details is… heart wrenching to me… and not the point of my post.

I wanted my son to have a relationship with his father. I trusted his father. Even when he was angry at me and had filed custody proceedings to restore his parents visits with my son, I still trusted *him*. I did not trust his parents. These were the people that had offered to pay for my abortion. I was younger and more reactionary. Being taken to court and being told by a judge I had to leave my child with someone I didn’t trust… Dear God, the level of panic…

I fought, as hard as I could. I still think the judge errored and the law clearly stated I could, as my son’s custodial parent, choose to deny the grandparents visitation. I spent hours researching. I had law and precedent on my side. But still, the visits were ordered. My son came home with a bruise on his back. Still the visits were ordered… I would have to take pictures after my son was injured, something that hadn’t occurred to me in time.

I did something desperate. I have mixed feelings about it now. I had run across a journal page his father had given me. It talked about his father hitting him when he was younger. I brought it into court. They couldn’t take it as evidence, she said.

But the grandparents stopped exercising their right to visitation. Too busy, something came up they said. Next court date, they withdrew their case. Did not want to face false accusations of child abuse, they said.

By bringing in that journal entry… such mixed feelings right now. I betrayed what small amount of trust that was left between my son’s father and I. I entered into court documents the fact that he had admitted, outside his family, that his father hit him as a kid. I’m sure his parents weren’t pleased with him about that. I betrayed the trust he had shown me by giving me the journal to begin with.  Personal, private thoughts, aired publicly and against him.

My only defense is, my son was small, unable to communicate. It was my job to protect him. Not being able to determine for myself what went on behind their doors… I could only go on the evidence presented to me. My son’s intense anxiety at being left with them, their disregard for my wishes, putting me down in front of family and friends, the history I knew existed, the bruise on his back.

Very mixed feelings. Regret. But feeling forced into a corner, my tiny son behind my legs, feeling like he was going to be snatched away from me, possibly hurt, needing to protect him. I lashed out with the only feeble claw I had. Still, deep regret. I know his father wanted a relationship with his son. I never wanted to interfere with that. By breaking that trust, I did. Disgusted and betrayed by me, he has not seen his son since. I understand my part in that. I wish things had gone differently, many steps of the way. I wish that, even if he is still justifiably angry at me, that he understood…  just a little…  I did what I did out of a deep desire to protect our son. I wish he knew too, how much I regret it. I wish I could go back now and use my older level headed self to tell my younger stupider skittish self that there are other ways to handle situations.

My son is at an age now where he can communicate. He’s ten. He’s articulate, he has a large vocabulary and I am blessed that he speaks his mind rather than misbehaves to act out what is frustrating him. He tells us, point blank, if something is bothering him. At this point, my son could say, “I don’t want to go there. I don’t feel comfortable.” or “Yes! Grandma’s house!” He has the ability to call me on his own if something is wrong. He knows my rules and he respects them, even when I am not present.

I would feel comfortable, now, sending him to visit. But that is not likely to ever happen. I regret that too. I’m sorry.

Come visit Sunny and Smoke Filled California! Home of the Unseasonally Early Harvest Moon!

I took these today, July 11th, with my Canon Rebel Xti. Cropped them a bit, but no other editing has been done to them.

Everyone else seems bothered by the air quality. I just think it makes things look pretty.

I also think that if you took a napsack of smores, grahams and some chocolate and a stick… you’d be able to make yourself a snack right quick as soon as you came across the nearest fire.

You’ll have to forgive me for taking so long to write my own self assigned assignment. I was working on an essay about my driving anxieties and got majorly sidetracked by life. My teenage daughter, normally a mild mannered, high achieving, organized and all around well balanced daughter was discovered drinking and making out with some boys recently. Dissapointed, angry, scared for her… those do not begin to describe the feelings that went through us.

Scared for her is the overwhelming emotion. Anger and occasional disspointment are a given when it comes to parenting. Scared for your child is an emotion that you try to put into the background. Worried for your child as they learn to walk and occasionally fall down, but you stuff your fear back and let them take those steps. Your heart races as they learn (and think its funny) to run away from you. You heart stops when that direction is a busy street. Excitement, sadness and a little bit of fear accompany you, like a uninvited third party, down the hall on the way to the first day of school. Your Kindgartener’s tiny hand in yours, both of you gripping tightly to each other.

The fear is pushed back, though worry for your kids is a constant background presence. Let it overwhelm and you live a life of anxiety and create unhealthy children. You have to let them take those steps, learn how to use a sharp knife, how to wash dishes without breaking them. You have to learn, eventually, how to let them out of your sight… how to trust them.

My daughter, in the middle of this hullabaloo, accused us of driving her to it by not ever truely trusting her. A child’s view of the world. We have the gall to ask where she is going, what she is doing and when she is coming back. Even roommates generally let each other know such things. I explained that we have not checked up on her in person. We don’t track her through various GPS devices you can purchase. As an A student, when she says she’s done her homework I don’t demand to see it. She’s earned that trust. I don’t nag her in her chores, because she does them on her own. She couldn’t really give me any other examples of why she doesn’t feel trusted.

Up until this point, my dear, it was not you that I didn’t trust. It was the rest of the world. Up until this point, you have made good choices, you have earned our trust and the privledges that go along with it. You’ve had it, until you blew it, then lied about it. It was the rest of the world I did not trust to treat you well. And you, with only 15 short years of experience with people who love you, cannot understand that the rest of the world will not be as kind with you. Our questions, precautions, concerns were because we love you. We stifled our fears, knowing you would have to grow up and break away, and let you out… because you had earned that trust. Just like we stayed silent that first day of school. Just like we didn’t cry out, “Just let me cut it for you,” while taking over the knife. We let you.

We find out she was drinking and making out with a boy on a dare. A boy that she did not want to be making out with.  It was like watching the two year old run onto the freeway and not be able to stop them. By some miracle, she was not hurt… this time. Laughing on the other side of four lanes, she felt she had got away with something. But she hadn’t. She’s busted. Grounding is useless, a punishment that is helpful for backtalking… at this point would only have her ticking off days till it was done. And truely, I know that if she is determined to make bad choices, I cannot stop her. I cannot lock her up day and night, dragging her from class to class. She will have ample opportunity between now and moving out to make choices for herself, good or bad.

And so, her punishment is primarily education. Research and reports on alcohol, blood alcohol levels (a cup of rum in a 98lb body and she thinks she was in control of her faculties), the risk of alcoholism in young drinkers. Another report on date rape drugs, gang rape and mob mentality or “How things go from good to terrible in a group of people and why no one steps in to stop it.” She will also be experiencing observed random drug testing between now and exiting high school. “I cannot stop you from making bad choices. But I will catch you.”

In three anxious days between knowing she was busted and receiving her punishment from her Four Parent Unit (dad, stepmom, mom and stepdad) she was quite despondent. I’m sure she felt like her life was going to be over. And so we return full circle to the Fear. The graphics were drawn on her whiteboard before we went to meet with her mom and stepdad. Before she heard the Punishment. From her mom’s house, she left for grandmas for two weeks. She was actually in a very good mood post-sentencing. She had a number of Ah-Ha moments of understanding that evening. From how we actually had trusted her (past tense), to how much we love her and were scared for her, to finding out that we do have boundaries and we will enforce them… she seemed to feel a lot better.

Unhappy times

But I walked back into her room and I find these horrible notes. Good bye forever, bullet to the heart, life is over, suicide=totally…    and the panic strikes me. The Fear. The Fear above all Fears.

I’ve been assured by the Other Half of our parental unit that no such notes or indications were made at the Other house. But no chances… she’ll be getting professional help shortly. If it was an attempt at pity to get us to lighten the sentence… well, that’s not going to work since we see the sentence as light to begin with. (No bedroom door, no internet access, and standard grounding for one month. Three months of friends at our house only. Random drug testing. And most importantly, the reports.) It could be a real cry for help, and a professional can help with that.

There are some fears you can push back, swallow, hold your breath. This isn’t one of them.