December 18, 2002
Dear Everyone:
Last Letter of the year, and a short one at that. Things suddenly got very busy both at work and in the evenings.
Last night, it was picking “Marshall” and “Jeannie”
up at the airport. The weary
travelers are returned from two weeks in
Tonight is the bi-monthly (third Wednesday of every even-numbered month) Homeowners’ Association Board of Directors meeting. And I especially want to attend this meeting because it looks like our property manager has lined up a towing service to deal with those scofflaws who park on the sidewalk rather than walk a few feet from the street.
Tomorrow night is the monthly ARMA (Association of Records Managers and Administrators) dinner meeting. I actually have to get there early so that I’m ready to take checks and cash and make change if necessary.
As for work, by the end of last week I had completed the data formatting project and had completed assigning retention categories to a project in a part of Africa known as the PNZ (Partitioned Neutral Zone, which has a scary feel to it). Just when it looked like I would have nothing to do but poke around in a document management system just for the fun of it (and to try and figure it out), BOOM!
Yesterday, I received a listing of 563 document “types” that need retention categories assigned. By tomorrow. On the plus side: It gives me something worthwhile to do and it is scheduled to be finished before I start my vacation, which is Friday. On the delta side: It has to be completed by tomorrow. And I can’t work late on it because of all these other obligations.
Nevertheless, I think I can get it done on time, as long as nothing else gets in the way. I may not have time to get to the post office until Friday, but there’s only one package still waiting to be mailed. And if it’s a little late, it won’t matter. Christmas isn’t really over until January 6th (Twelfth Night).
Ditto for the holiday greeting cards. I managed to complete the “office” cards in time to send them out via interoffice mail on Tuesday. The rest will have to wait for Friday.
Movies…
I know what you’re thinking: Why go to the movies when you have all this work to accomplish? Because I went to the movies on Sunday, before everything got so suddenly busy.
While “Jeannie” was discovering the culinary
delights of
When United Artists (now a subsidiary of MGM) bought the film rights from Ian Fleming, they stipulated that they could use the film rights even after they ran out of Fleming’s books. Fleming wisely took the money and ran.
So the studio kept right on making Bond movies long after the books ran out and are, in fact, using Bond version 5 (there have been four other actors in the role before Brosnan) these days. Brosnan makes a fine Bond, although I always felt he’d make a better Simon Templar, because The Saint was famous for his elegant dress, and Brosnan wears clothes well.
As for the movie itself, like most Bond fare, there are lots of flashy stunts and fancy gizmos, and beautiful women. And the plot is typically difficult to follow. The villains are (thankfully!) not of Middle Eastern persuasion. There’s an ice castle. Madonna sings the title song, which has no bearing on the film whatsoever.
Who cares? There are worse ways to spend 2½ hours on a cold winter afternoon.
Love, as always,
Pete
| Previous | Next |