it's a fuzzy fuzzy world…

Okay, so I really suck at publicity! My band, Wild Mercy, is playing tomorrow night (Saturday!) at Logan Street Sanctuary in Noblesville for Talk Like A Pirate Day. It will be fun! There will be much “Arrrrrr”. You can bring your own grog, and wear your favorite pirate hat, and even bring your kids. $10 adults, $5 students, kids 12 and under get in free. Full info is here… https://www.facebook.com/events/1621623814777407/

Sometimes, I do things other than Ingress (I know… hard to believe, right?). Today was Patriots Day at Frankton Elementary School and we took a crew from my fire department over to join in the festivities. This was our first “event” since I changed departments and joined the crew at Richland Township Volunteer Fire Department, and I was proud to be able to go represent my new department. I could do a whole write-up about why I volunteer, but I already wrote it up once for the FD’s Facebook page, so I’ll just borrow from there… 🙂

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This morning, we had the opportunity to take Engine 48 and Ambulance 45 over to Frankton Elementary School to participate in Patriots Day or “Everyday Heroes” Day. Fire, police, EMS and military personnel with ties to the students were all welcome to participate, and there was quite a turnout.

900 students stood in the gray drizzly morning and sang “Proud To Be An American” at the top of their lungs, and then there were lots of high fives. These kids weren’t born on 9/11/01… they don’t remember that day the way the adults do. What they got out of today was an opportunity to appreciate and thank and interact with their local first responders. An opportunity to put faces with the uniforms, up close. To give a high five or a hand shake or just a quiet “Thank you.”

And for us… it was 900 little reminders of why we do this… and why we will never forget those who served before us.

I usually post the critter pix over on the Book of Face, but I’m going to post here tonight too. Smudge (the cat) does not care for dogs. He’s figured out that he can run Nick off the sofa. Petey, however, is sublimely unconcerned by Smudge’s yowls of complaint. Smudge may be deciding that the warmth of dog is worth putting up with the, well, dogness of dog. So there was a little yowling… then there was much purring…

Fastest project meeting ever… started at 10:01… finished at 10:04. I like that kind of meeting!

Trying to get Google to diagnose a problem with Google Wallet card. On the plus side, I did get a friendly and helpful tech after minimal time on hold. On the down side, he can’t figure out why a valid card with a balance is being declined when I try to use it. (Also, apparently Google’s hold music was written by a robot on crack.)

Apparently my database daemon just wanted everybody to go the f*** home. After fighting it All Damn Day, I restarted it yet again at 5:05 and it happily started to run, ingested all the built-up log files from the last five hours, and then Stayed Running. OMG. I think I’ll escape quickly before something else can go wrong…