A Few Updates

Today's offering, a smattering of updates:

Smoke. It's getting tougher to breathe and it's already hard to see outside. Fires burning in central Idaho are sending their smoke our way, leaving the air with that taint of barbecued pine and a fug that's blocking my view of the Big Southern butte out at work and the Iona foothills at home. We had a thunderstorm blow through late last week that cleared the smoke out for a few hours, but it's back with reinforcements. And it's nasty. I'm sitting in an air-conditioned trailer right now and I can taste the smoke on my tongue. Can't wait to go home, where the smoke is a little bit thinner.

Layoff Watch. Sounds like layoffs are coming again this October, with technical writers on the list. We'll see what happens. There are only two tech writers here at RWMC. Maybe we'll be spared. Or the subs (including me) will get the boot and a reshuffling will occur. So that means I'm back in job-applying mode. Just today applied for a tech writing job at the Space Dynamics Laboratory in Utah. Where I applied before. Where the trend is to hire new tech writers they can get for cheap and then have to replace year after year. Maybe I could help them break that trend. Maybe I'll flap my arms and fly to the moon.

Sprinkler System. The back yard was officially done, though it's looking more and more like I may have to put in another line because of some dry spots. That may have to wait until next summer, as I've still got most of the front yard to bury. Good news is I noticed the dry spots in the front yard before I buried, so I was able to put in another line and extra sprinklers before the pipes got buried.

Scouting. Michelle's only got one more week of Wood Badge to go, then she's done with her summer Scouting. I think that's a good thing. Though she is talking about doing it all over again next summer. Guess I'll be looking for another summer project. The fences do need replacing . . .  That is if the layoff thing comes out in my favor, that is.

WART!

For anyone out there who, like me, is tired of warts on their fingers and toes, just let me say this: Try some Mexican over-the-counter wart removal stuff.

Chemically -- if I'm translating my pidgin-Spanish correctly -- this stuff we've been using for the past few weeks is no different than the paint-on, salicyclic acid-based stuff we've used domestically for more than a year. But this stuff is killing off the warts like nobody's business.

Believe me, I've tried everything. First with the paint-on stuff. Then with the home-freezing kit. I even tried the duct tape technique. The only thing that seemed to work was a six-hours-long plunge into a chlorinated hot pool at Heise Hot Springs, though I didn't spread the word lest the folks there didn't want it known of the pool's curative qualities.

The pool got rid of all but four of my more than fifteen warts. This Mexican stuff is now getting rid of the final four. And it's working on the kids, too. I mean on the kids' warts. It's not making them disappear. Ha ha.

Wart Testing

Alert: For those who don't want to hear about my ongoing battle to get rid of the warts on my left hand, you may want to skip this entry.

You'll recall earlier my theory that swimming in a chlorinated pool was what helped my warts to begin dissolving. Went swimming again today, so I'm going to see now if the remaining warts shrink at an accelerated rate, or if there's no difference. It's not exactly a controlled experiment since it's a different pool and we weren't in the pool for five hours as the last time, but we'll see if maybe a smaller dose will make any difference.