2018 Summer July 19 Thursday

76 degrees this morning, walk 34:47 Humidity is 69%

Decided to start tracking the humidity since it has such an impact on my coughing etc.  Or it least it appears to.  

Overall good walk this morning, humidity a little higher than I expected.  

No moon tonight, “dark sky” still prevailed. 

SKUNK! 

The “Scare of my life” this morning when I finished my walk and almost walked over a skunk as I started to the front door.  It was literally right in front of the door as I started to unlock the front door.  

I moved FAST.  I wish our camera had been on that part, I doubt if I have moved faster in years.  I was back on the street in a second!

For a minute or two I debated how to get into the house, but finally, on the theory the skunk is as scared of me as I am of it (which would be almost impossible), I went through the front door.  (Very quickly).

I will need to do some quick research on skunks and how to discourage them from our front (and back and side) doors as will as keep it out of the house! I know skunks can crawl through almost anything.  

I walked very timidly into the garage this morning!  

If I remember correctly moth balls discourage skunks, as well as ammonia.  I’ll see.  

Probably I will call the pest control people, I don’t really have the courage to trap a skunk and take it in.  I think the city will provide the trap, but I think I will forgo that experience.  

I had my Apple Watch on and you can see right at the end, where my heartbeat literally doubled at the last few moments!  I’m not sure which is worst, having  a heart attack of getting sprayed by a skunk.  

I was a little wary about sitting out on the patio this morning, but decided to go ahead.  Both areas are well lit and I think skunks are nocturnal animals and really don’t like light.  (Unless they are rabid, which is another story.)

Today I have one of the few tasks of my job I really don’t care for, but it is part of the job and necessary.  I won’t go into more detail than that.

It is funny how organizations operate.  A few months ago there was a survey, a very honest effort by the organization to find ways to improve the work environment (other than salary increases of course).  

One of the key concerns I had, and I believe many others, was that we (the workers who actually deal with the forms, the people and regulations etc.) were never consulted before actions were taken where we were directly involved.  

Lo and behold, we were just force fed a form which we weren’t consulted about, had no input into and which doesn’t make any sense and is basically unusable.   It seems that there would have been at least a small attempt to have us (the people who will be working with it daily) to test it and have some input into it.  

Of course, the very first day, there was a major bug of the new software program because there hadn’t been any testing of the program before it was rolled out!

Such is life, I’ll just roll with it.  

That’s it for now, Thursday, July 19, 2018