A Mixed Bag

Thank you amazingly supportive readers!  You politely told me that I have not jumped the shark, and to stop my whining.  (I swear I was not fishing for comments!)  I will chalk my dark mood up to Pre Daylight Savings Time Blues.  Rest assured I am snapping out of it.  It is still raining in my world (I think we are on our 50^th day of rain in two months, and last night we got 2".  STOP the gutter thoughts!) it is dark when I leave for work and dark when I get home, and it currently is a mere 37 degrees. 

But I’m not going to let it get to me!

Here is a little tidbit that might make you smile:

Next Door to my office is a factory that makes musical instruments.  This factory must have at least 200 cars in its parking lot every day.  Can you believe that the musical instrument business is doing so well?  If I could afford to buy the kids an instrument and pay for lessons, they would be making my life miserable with bad notes right now.  

In the early summer the factory workers went on strike.  I do not want to get into the politics of why, but watching this strike from an on-the-other-side-of-the-fence perspective, I have to tell you it’s a strike unlike any I have ever imagined or at least seen in old 70’s movie scenes.

They have a pod.  You know those on demand storage containers.  Their pod is like home base, I am fairly certain they have made a kitchen and living room in there.  There are always at least 10 to 15 people jammed inside playing cards, doing each other’s hair and eating home cooked food.   Then they have some really nice portable tents outside.  There are usually a dozen people sitting under them continuing the party from inside.  I have seen them play catch, corn hole, hoops, and once I thing they were doing a conga line.  As it is getting colder they now have a fortress of wood stacked up – wood that would last an entire winter.  They light fires in old metal garbage cans.  This is about as authentic as they get. 

The company has had to hire security.  One guy who sits in his car all day long.  He does get out and walk around periodically to mingle with the party goers under the tent. 

The strikers don’t yell.  They don’t shake their fists; they actually don’t even look at you when you drive by or if they see you watching from your office window. They have a few signs and the only obnoxious thing they really do is park on the side of the road.  They have some nice cars, these strikers. 

I would say at least 150 parking spots have filled back up at the factory, so I’m not sure how successful this particular strike is.

Sometimes I try to rally my 6 co-workers into striking.  I think it would be fun to play corn hole and warm our hands over the garbage can.  I wonder if our neighbors would let us borrow some firewood?

And finally check this story out: http://www.kcci.com/r/29528191/detail.html

If this doesn’t either bring a tear to your eye, give you hope and inspiration, then I think you may have the blues worse than I do…..