February 1, 1996
Dear Everyone:
Happy Birthday,
“Alice”!!!
Got to work Monday
morning to discover that it was 58o in my office.
I like it a little cooler than most people, but this was
ridiculous. It turns out
that the new furnace that CREMCO (Company Real Estate Management
Company) installed last October turns itself off Friday afternoon, but
nobody seems to have figured out how to program it to come back on
Monday morning.
Each Monday morning,
“Ford” has to call CREMCO and report the “problem”.
Then they send an engineer to turn the furnace back on.
Around 2:00 Monday afternoon, I noticed that it seemed to be
warming up. Of course, it
was warm in my office all
day. I took one look at the
thermometer on the wall (“Yes, it’s definitely below 60”) and turned the
little space heater on. By
the time I got back from Safety Stretching (visualize a half-dozen, or
more, people watching a
Johnny Carson
video and doing stretching exercises in jackets, parkas, and sweatshirts
-- it’s hard to link your fingers together when you’re wearing mittens),
it was already noticeably warmer in there.
Unfortunately, it meant that I froze half to death every time I
had to leave the office.
I got the little
heater (it’s smaller than a shoe box, but puts out plenty of heat) last
October when CREMCO decided to replace the old furnace with a new one
and shut the heat off for a few weeks.
Why did CREMCO decide the old furnace needed replacing?
Because last winter,
it got so cold inside that I loaned “Nelly” a different little heater,
and she blew out the entire electrical system in her work area with it.
If you want to get CREMCO’s attention, almost setting the
building on fire is a pretty good way of doing it.
Hopefully, CREMCO
will get its act together with the new furnace soon.
In the meantime, Mondays are definitely Sweater Days.
As for the weather
outside, on Monday everyone (papers, radio,
CNN, the
Weather Channel)
was telling us that a big storm was on its way in to Northern
California. Big storm, heavy
rain, thundershowers, winds up to 70 mph.
Batten down the hatches, it’s going to hit tonight.
If you’re driving into the
City, you may
have problems getting back over the bridges.
So when I got home
Monday night, I checked the flashlights and oil lamps.
Plenty of candles.
Fresh backup batteries in the clock radio.
I even went out on the patio and put a rubber band around the
wind chimes so they wouldn’t ring all night long and disturb the
neighbors.
Tuesday morning
came, mildly overcast, very little breeze.
Where was the storm?
Don’t worry, the Weather Channel advised, it’s still coming.
It finally arrived late Tuesday night.
By Wednesday, it was gone.
All those dire predictions of meteorological mayhem came to
naught. Mother Nature was
only kidding. This time.
In other news...
“Jeannie” took one
look at her neighbors bringing in truckloads of beer and junk food last
Sunday and immediately decided to accept my invitation to come over to
my place for the
Silly Bowl and to learn how to make chicken soup.
She’s currently in a cost-cutting phase and wants to make soup to
save money.
We turned the TV on
for “the game” and went to work in the kitchen.
Whenever we heard a commercial break come on, we’d leave the
kitchen, watch the commercials, then go back to fixing soup, or doing
the laundry. We were rooting
for the
Pittsburgh Steelers because Mom hates the
Dallas Cowboys
because of that obnoxious
coach of theirs. Of
course, the coach hasn’t worked for Dallas in about 10 years; but in
this family, by God, we know how to hold a grudge.
I typed up the
recipe for chicken soup and printed it out for “Jeannie”, then proceeded
to show her how to simmer the stock, prepare and add ingredients, etc.
Once the soup was done (about 4 hours, just like the Stupid
Bowl), we ladled it into small freezer bags.
“Jeannie” took four bags home with her...and left the recipe
behind.
Movies...
Finally saw
The American
President, without “Jeannie” who has developed an antipathy for
Michael Douglas.
It’s not the comedy that I was led to expect.
Rather, it’s a very pleasant romance about two people whose jobs,
not to mention political ideals, keep getting in the way of their
feelings for each other.
There is a cute running gag throughout about how the President of the
United States can’t just run out and order a bouquet of flowers for his
lady friend. Worth the
matinee price. Or wait for
it to come out on tape. It’s
just the thing for a cold, wet afternoon some weekend.
Love, as always,
Pete
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