About Bozos

Today I discovered what's a bozo. I have seen them before, I have had them in my life, but I didn't know what were they called. Normally, I just call them by the generic name of "idiot". Well, the thing is that a very,very good friend of mine - Shimmy Gin -  got a job a couple of months back at Intel. I think it was like in November-December or so, because we've met for a long overdue coffee... somewhere between Sabbaths (he's also into Paganism, like me, only more autoctonous, than me), and we promised we would never again allow a Sabbath to pass before meeting... and two have passed, so... it must have been sometime before the end of May. By that time he was head over heels with Intel and all the great things they had.

 

Shimmy Gin has always been employed in the private sector and has moved around a lot. He's a brilliant programmer who has had the chance to work with many companies, and who's reputation preceeds him. Seldom has he resigned a post for personal reasons, but usually, when he leaves a job is because he has been offered something better at another place and his current one can't equal the offer. He's that good. Then, normally he works several years at the same company, though it has happened that he has been snatched up from a company within months of having signed with it. I mean, come on, the man is a genius!

 

Well, he resigned to Intel. At first I didn't know what to think. I just got the message through facebook: "I resigned to Intel". I was worried. He's as word-profuse as I am, and such a suscint message boaded no good. "What happened, Sweetheart?" I asked him. Slowly - which shows he's deeply upset and trying to manage his anger - told me that he had no choice but to resign to his job. Not because he didn't like the company, but because he's boss was changed some 22 days after we've met and the new guy is a bozo. To explain to me what's a bozo, he showed me an article by Forbes titled Why Every Company Needs a 'No Bozos' Policy, by Eric Jackson. In short, a bozo is the kind of person (normally a boss) that has no idea about what they should be doing, but likes to pretend like they know what they are doing better than anyone else. Furthermore, since they really have no idea of the job, they ae exremely narrow minded and refure to take anyone's opinion that isn't exactly theirs. Dear Reader, whomever you are, I pray to God, the Gods and Goddesses, The Divine and the Universe that you've never, EVER have had any sort of encounter with this discusting type of... thing. I have and it isn't pretty (sadly, I must say that the public sector is sadly overpopulated with bozos. The private sector is too, but in there people tend to accept them more).

 

Shimmy Gin's run in with the bozo at Intel came in the shape of mobbing. This bozo started putting down Shimmy Gin's work, claiming that the guy that was there before did it better, and did much more in less time. Shimmy Gin had actually checked that guy's work and it turned out completely useless, so before he could even start his own job, he had to go on measuring up the damage hs predecesor did and then work from there, redoing stuff. Bozo wouldn't listen to that, but instead kept praising Guy and how Guy had made this many things and so on. All the while, Shimmy Gin's other superior would listen to their discussion and say nothing, inspite him knowing of Shimmy Gin's outstanding results before Bozo arrived. The final straw came when Bozo had Shimmy Gin's benefits removed because he deemed Shimmy Gin needs to improve his work. That was that. Shimmy Gin handed his job back to Bozo, again told him all the crap Guy made, how more than half of it was useless and the other half was incomplete and didn't stand the tests.

 

Weeks after Shimmy Gin entered Intel his old boss was still calling him back to his old job, which he loved, which sent him abroad often and where he had grown a lot. He moved to Intel because of the chance it gave him to grow in his field, and instead, it turns out that the company favours assholes who can't care less about the company, because all they want is to milk the company for their own and their friend's benefits. Nobody stopped Shimmy Gin at the door, there's no news on anyone taking a closer look at Guy's work, because as it is Bozo would have no idea what to look about in it - he sees only the number of products rolled out, not whether they work or not - and it seems Superior has no idea either about what should he be looking at it.

 

Bozos exist everywhere. They get to a place and they stay, like bubblegum on the sole of your shoe in summer. Bozos don't like smart people - really smart people - nor hardworking people. The reason for it is basic survival instinct: smart, hardworking people put them in evidence and so they can't climb up in teh company high enough so that their ignorance can be safely protected by a cohort of counselors - better known as the people that will take the fall for them. Bozos also exist in the form of counselors, and they misguide and pretend to be the bosses, and when things fail, they always have someone to place the blame on. It's never them.

 

The thing is, bozos are toxic, wherever they are. They are full of cheap wisdom - all of it pulled from business magazines, books from the "business" and "self help" shelves at popular bookstores (you will NEVER see a bozo digging in a used books bookstore or antique bookstore. No, they only go to the popular ones, and they go not because they like to read, but because they like to pretend they do). Recently - though then I didn't know this type of person was called a bozo - I realized that bozos also have a distorted concept of what being smart is.

 

There's this woman where I work - I won't even come up with a fake name for her, she will remain nameless - who is the ultimate bozo. Once we were having lunch with some coworkers, and she started talking about some local politicians who are very well known for their  corruption and shamelessness. It's people who have made a great damage to the country, ripped the National Treasury of lots of money and then escaped abroad, where they live in great luxury, giving conferences for huge amounts of money. This people, who have used trickery and more often than not, bullying to get their way, were being brought up by her as The Most Intelligent people of the whole country. Granted, she said, they "didn't use their smarts for good, but they were nevertheless incredibly smart". Any person with a working brain could tell you that you don't need much of a brain to come up with trickery to embezzle money from the government, specially if you have spent years in it, getting to know all the weak points. I mean, it only took me two months working as a teller at a bank to envision a perfect plan to put on an indetectable money laundry system. No, I never put it to use, but in two months I just saw through the system. Trickery isn't a matter of brains. Criminals do it all the time, everywhere, in millions and millions of levels. Being part of a pervasive political system, with agents already embedded in every level and power position, and then doing your shenanigans, paying off the right people and knowing that enough people is dirtied so that no one will talk about it, yes, that's not being smart. Then, when we talk about getting on with your way because you've used bullying... well, that's definitively not a sign of being smart.

 

The examples brought up by Bozo-lady, however, show something important about the nature of the bozo: they seek to trick and steal things, grab as much as they can from what they haven't earned, for as long as they can. I coworker of mine also told me of some acquintance of his, who used to steal from stores. This person when to stores with discounts, took something that didn't have a discount, mix it with the discounted stuff and then pick it again and go for with it to the cashier, then make a scene until the store charged him the undeserved discounted price. When my coworker asked him why he did that, the guy just said "You have to be smarter, because God don't like stupid people". So, as you can see, it's not really a matter of being smart, or a matter of using intelligence for bad, it's a matter of plotting to exploit others, to take from others, abuse the system and get away with it. Just as you wouldn't call smart people who beat their spouses because they know that if they frighten them enough they won't talk, so you wouldn't call smart someone who simply abuses the system.

 

Being intelligent doesn't mean you are good. You can be bad and be intelligent too. Being intelligent is about having the capacity to build something new - whatever it would be -, solve problems, improve things and so on. An intelligent person is reflected in the creation they are capable of. Bozos, however, can't see that, because their whole world is about abusing the system. Slow advancing, learning, hardworking is stupid for them, either because they feel uncapable of doing so, or because they "see" a way to get "results" faster, even though their mockery of results has no basis, stand no ground. You see, when someone is intelligent builds slow but over strong basis. They won't be known as corrupt, people would have nothing ill to say about their work. About them, yes, but never about their work. About bozos... the thing that gets more criticizm is their work, and that's because their either do nothing, or they do it so bad it's mindblowing, or because they stand in the way of others doing their jobs.

 

Not everyone can resign when they get to be under a bozo, so here are two of the best tips I can give you when you encounter one:

 

1. Look for another place to transfer to. Sometimes there are openings of chances to go work with other people, other bosses who might not be bozos or might be less bozos. It's worth trying.

 

2. If the first option isn't an option, then follow the protocol and BACKUP everything you do. And hold your ground. It can be a very taxing thing to do, but you must develop a thick skin for this. Do the job as you know it's well done. Refuse doing things you know you can't do. Like what? Well, if you are a lawyer in a building company, refuse to supervise and sign the job of the architects, because you evidently have no idea whether those are good or not. It's important to always hold your ground, and to do so, borrow some bozo-tools, such as not listening. You are asked something unreasonable, so you smile, say "sure" and repeat the task as you know it should be done. It might require several repeats, until the bozo understands that you won't do it any way other than the way you said you would. Then, as part of the back up, get all the commands of the bozo in written. If something is said verbally, you go to your computer and write it down in an e-mail, make your comments on it, all your observations and send it to the bozo. If the bozo calls you again, and again verbally go over their flawed view, you get back to the computer and put it in writing the same way. Your out of this is if they put it in written, then you have evidence against them. Proceed to save and print out the e-mail. in several copies.

 

Bozos normaly don't stay long in the same position, they need to move before their idiocy sinks the floor beneath them, and then they leave the mess for someone else to patch up. This is good in the sense that, if you can't escape the bozo, but you make their life hard enough for them to choose to ignore you, all you'll have to do is keep your head low and in a while they will be replaced with someone less of a bozo. It's mathematic, they'll actually need someone who can somewhat solve the crap. The bad thing is that enough bozos in the company can sink it.

 

Yeah, don't but that stupid liberal crap about how companies only keep their best workers in order to be the bests in the market and do profit. Please! That only exists in Economics and Business textbooks. In real life corruptions, lobbying and under-the-table contracts, often seasoned with gifts and bonuses are what keep companies seemingly making money. And companies seem to make money thanks to creative accounting based on a heap of estimations, that not necessarily need any basis on real life unless the company suddenly bankrupts or gets an auditing. Or what do you think? If successful companies were really that good by the service or the products they make, why would they need accounts for "representation"? Why would they need to assign their top salespeople with money for lavish dinners for clients? Why pay for trips, dinners, stays at fancy hotels, gifts and so on? I assure you, none of those play any role in those textbooks I told you about. Lobbying is excluded from any economical theory I know of (granted, I don't know that many of them, but still, none of those came up in any I was taught about in the five years I spent to get my degree).

 

Sometimes it can get really bad, sometimes you might be tempted to become like them, be a bozo yourself too. Hey, if it works for you and it helps you, well, who am I to stop you? But if you are like me, the sheer thought would make you vomit. To live knowing you have betrayed yourself? That you've sold your  integrity so you can get by? Unthinkable. Use tools like hypocrisy if you must - often it's the onl way to sail through the social surface of a sea full of bozos - but never, ever gve up what makes you you: the integrity of your work. And you must leave in the end, do it like my friend Dragonfly did, with your head up high, knowing people may call you bitch and unssuferable, but no one will ever have a bad word about the quality of your work.

About Love and Self Love

A friend of mine has a horrible family, with a particularly horrible mother. Well, maybe there are mothers who are worse than this, but this one has my and Carrie's blood boiling.

 

My friend - whom we will call Ellie - is the sweetest person you would ever meet. I met her through Carrie, basically (or maybe I met Carrie through Ellie, I don't remember), and ever since then she has been in this terrible situation. She was working (and still is) at this company where she was being exploited like, really, out of the pages of Das Kapital or something. They had he training people who then they promoted over her, ignored her for promotion, but always moved her from one problem area to another, basically because she's good at solving problems. She hates doing so, specially after she had finally managed to get in good terms with her team, and yet, she still keeps with the company, submitting to their moving her from one area to the other and never recognizing her efforts, and even standing in the path of her studies. From what she has told her, the company makes her cover for her coworkers who attend to college, but refuse her the time to do so. Also make her cover for others' vacations but pull her out of her own whenever needed.

 

She complains to us, her friends, but doesn't actually does anything to improve her situation. She remains in a situation of evident abuse, taking it and never speaking up. It can be nerve wracking, so we have tried to understand why is this happening to her. Is it that she needs the money? Well, we all need the money, but being that this job hasn't really let her finish her college degree - she has been struggling through a 4 year block for over fourtheen years now - so it's not really taking her anywhere. One could also say that she already got used to it, but if it were som why is she still complaining for the treatment she gets?

 

Then we've got it: it's her family. Ellie lives with her two older brothers and their mom. Both her brothers are professionals and have college degrees, and yet she's the one stuck with paying the bills at home. Her mother demands it so. Her mother has a pension, which is enough for her to travel to places like Peru, Dubai, Chile and whatever strikes her fancy. Clearly, money isn't an issue at home. The mother don't defend her against he brothers, but she actually makes her feel bad if Ellie as much as dares to complain. The abuse have been taking quite a few interesting shapes. For instance, Ellie's mother raids her daughter's closet and simply appropiates for herself whatever she finds pleasing. As result, Ellie has no formal clothing, only her work clothes and whatever geeky clothes she can find. At one point, Ellie's mother took all of Ellie's sweaters and hats, leaving her with nothing, and not bothering with giving them back to her.

 

As part of this behavior, her mother also has no qualms when it comes to giving away Ellie's things without asking her, and again, when she has complained about it, her mother has replied that she shouldn't be so selfish, and besides, Ellie has money, so she can buy the stuff again. On top of all of that, Ellie tells us as a funny thing how her mother puts down her skills constantly. She can's cook, she can't clean, she's useless, she can't do any sort of art or craft, and so on.

 

For a while now, her mother has been particularly demanding when it comes to gifts. Ellie keeps spending quite large sums on gifts for her birthday, Mother's Day and Christmas on her, taking her out for dinner wherever she wants to go and whenever she wants to go, but in return she has been getting pretty much nothing for her birthday and Christmas. Among her siblings, it seems they don't give each other anything, but the mother demands gifts and treats, and then - at least in the case of Ellie - she can't care enough to reciprocate. For her last birthday, the only thing Ellie got was a cake. Ellie doesn't eat anything sweet.

 

In the light of this, suddenly I understood what was going on with Ellie: she's already accostumed to abuse. For her, taking abuse at her workplace is natural - inspite of the fact that it hurts her - because that's what she's used to at home. She doubts her own feeling because they have been systematically invalidated by her mother, thus, when something hurts her, Ellie tends to believe that she's the problem, that if others do things to her it's because that's alright, and her feeling bad about it, instead of grateful, is wrong. Ellie, even though she's such a sweet girl, can't really appreciate love because she has been denied of it so much, she doesn't love herself either. She knows Carrie and I love her, but I wonder how she matches that knowledge with what surrounds her everyday.

 

After Ellie's last birthday - the first time ever Carrie and I spied the begining of tears in Ellie's eyes as she told us about how off handedly, carelessly, her family dealt about her birthday - Carrie and I were furious. Long after the birthday, the knowledge that her only semblance of a celebration came from our silly gifts and us taking her out for dinner wherever she wanted to go, the knowledge of how her family abuse her burned us. It is hurting her, maybe it's finally getting to the surface. Carrie wishes we could do something, and I wish too, but after much thinking, I realized that this is now our battle. Trying to distract her, take her out as often as we could isn't a solution because her mother could (rightfully) think we are trying to take her away from her family, and forbid Ellie to ever talk to us (inspite the fact that Ellie is already well in ther 30's), with which we would accomplish nothing. This is Ellie's fight and Ellie must fight it in her own terms, at her own time. Even if we could "solve" this for her, Carrie and I would only perpetuate a vicious cycle, making her feel useless and in need to be saved by others.

 

No matter how much we wish to help others, there are battles people have to fight themselves, with their own weapons, their own skills. The conquering of self love is one of them. You can't love someone into loving themselves, and it's dangerous to let them take your love in replacement of their own self-esteem. Dependance of other's love to feel worthy is nothing but masking the problem of low self esteem. So as a friend, what can you do? Support. Be there, listen, hold hands, reassure the person and remind them that they can count on you, but don't fight their battles, those must be wielded by themselves.

More Updates on my Week

It's been over a month now with Björn and I'm still not 100% used to it's keyboard. Spanish keyboard... damned, I miss the Hungarian keyboard so much!! I guess I'm still quite at odds with my new laptop (or is it a netbook? I think it's a netbook), but we are working quite ok with one another.

Well, this week - series-wise - I've got completely hooked on this Netflix series called Sense8. This series is about eight people from around the world, whose conciousness suddenly get connected among them after the death of a woman - Angelica - who is a sensate who, by her death, gives them a second birth as sensates. What's a sensate? It's like a kind of person who can connect, communicate and share skills with a given group of people, who are called their "cluster". At first they can't control their connection, and seem to be sharing in this open-sensory-channel of theirs all sorts of stuff that only confuses them the more. By the end of the first season (they have 12 episodes for the first season), you are not entirely convinced that they have managed to control their connection, but it seems like they are making progress. The story pushes boundaries, touches many sensitive topics, regarding sexuality and some old-story social topics as well. In my opinion, it pushes hard the sexuality topic, which is nice and sells well in today's occidental society, but it carefully skims over social topics, minding how much it delves into things that - taken with much more seriousness - could really become a political topic and a serious proposal interesting to watch. The second season has been authorized, from what it's heard down the grapewine, so yeah, can's wait to see what will be next!!

This week I've also been a little bit more... "girly", to call it somehow. I've been keeping my facial care regime, which isn't always easy, as I'd rather sleep or read rather than lock myself in the bathroom to wash my face and put on a facial, but truth to be told, once I get to do it, I kind of like it. I'm being quite careful to always do the whole clean-wash-tone-eyecream-facecream-sunblock ritual in the morning - due to which I think I'll have to start waking up even earlier than already - and then the matching clean-wash-tone-eyecream-nightcream ritual in the evening, and that can prove to be rather tiresome, but oh well. We shall see if 1. I can keep doing it, and 2. what effects may it yield in the long run. It's a tad of pampering, and my skin feels a bit better, but then again, I'm noticing a bit of oilier skin, though I suspect that's due to my CC cream. Oh dear, yes, I've a CC cream.

A CC cream is like a BB cream, only with more pigmentation. A CC cream is a moisturizing cream with a sunblocking and just a dab of color. Like a very-very light foundation you can use on its own to even out your skin tone. I'm basically using it like a sort of "trainer foundation", since I'm still not very fond of make up. Actually, the other day I put on make up to go to a forum, and the whole day I felt like I had his mask glued to my face, and I wanted nothing but to scratch it off. My coworkers commented on it, said it looked nice and very natural, bu I didn't feel comfortable in the least with it. I guess I have no practice still wih make up, and maybe I should try and practice more, but damned, it feels stiff on my face and it looks so... I don't know, weird. I guess I just don't know how to blend the color properly make the base look well, but still... Well, one day, maybe. Who knows?

Along with the make up, I've been also wearing more dresses, ad pulled out some of my shorter dresses, which I combined with my opaque thighs and legwarmers. I love legwarmers! It's absolutely not a thing here, and I haven't seen anyone else in hear wear them, and everbody around me goes "Flashdance" when they see them - and really, I don't like much being compared to Jennifer Beal - but I've been taking the chance to be feminine on my own terms. I do my best not to wear them in front of my boss, since he has this ideas about how we should look, and I guess my legwarmers go against his idea of Armani-suit-clad-money-talking-professionals, but I still try to wear them as often as I can. And that's not very often, considering that I only have three of them. Naturally, as you can guess, my next trip to Hungary will include a mandatory stop at some of my favorite stocking stores to stock up on opaque thighs and legwarmers. And of course, a couple of stops at my favorite clothing stores to get the kind of short skirts and dresses that can showcase my latest love for opaque thighs and legwarmers.

This "newfound" passion for clothes and skincare is kind of a product of the changes going in me body-wise. I'm closer to my ideal weight (the one that gives me a body-mass index of 22.5), and I'm already thinking in pushing that a little more, go for an index of 20. I'm getting more and more Narcissistic, which  love, and want to do stuff like, I don't know, be naked for as much time as possible. I'm just so pleased and so in love with my body! For over a year I've been careful of my diet, and getting some exercise, and then some daily exercise. I can't tell you that I'm hitting the gym regularly, but I've some rutines, and I try to do something more than my daily 35 minutes each morning every week, even if it happens only once a week. Today I actually found something I might be able to add to my weekly program: The "90 Minutos Powerade" or "Powerade 90 Minutes". It's a program of two 45-minute free exercise classes that's held every Sunday at the Capital city's Metropolitan Park, which is better known as La Sabana, right in front of my workplace. The first class - at least today - is a kickboxing class, which was quite demanding and I didn't like so much. The second one I liked better and it was a zumba class. I actually thought it was all about zumba, so the kickboxing came as a surprise for me, but I still did it.

I had decided to go with a friend of mine, who has been asisting for a while now, though she only goes for the zumba class.

This activity, I believe, is part of a municipal initiative - or maybe a Health Ministry - to incentivate people to be healthier. In several communities now you can find exercise machines at the parks for people to go there and exercise at no cost, and now this sort of fitness activities are also held, so that people who want to be healthy and fit don't feel constrained for economical matters. The success of the program was evident in the fact that, thought it was a cloudy day and it stared rainig at some point, the area for the program was filled to capacity and people weren't leaving even in spite of the rain.

Every week I plan to go to the gym at least two times, and end up going one or none, but with the discovery of the 90 Minutes, I think I could make sure to add a little more of fitness into my week, and so help myself reach my goal. Who knows? Maybe in a year I'll be posting pictures of my hard abs. ^_^

My Week

I don'thave a specific topic for today to talk to you about, so I'll simply go on rambling about my week. Is that ok? Well, I hope so, because that's what you are going to get.

This week I had my monthly appointment with my nutritionist, and my results were rather good. I'm not entirely trusting those numbers, since last week was hell week, and I tend to gain back some weight after hell week, ut I guess we shall see about that next month. As I stand right now, I'm only 2 kg (about 4 pounds) from my ideal weight. I'm already in the good zone, mind you, with a good body mass index and healthy percentage of fat on my frame, but he nutritionist says it's better to bring it to this ideal weight, so I can keep it easier. I've been thinking about it, and told her that once I get to this ideal weight, I'd like to consider to push it a little lower, since the hormonal change at 40 is coming close, and I'd like to have room for changes. I told her about my goal and she found it reasonable. However, we shall see how I do n getting to the ideal weight first and then we'll talk about bringing my body mass index to 20.

This month I don't have any crazy plans to adhere to. No hell weeks, no shake-days, just regular diet. And should work a little bit more on my exercise. I've been taking a little bit more seriously my beauty regime, keeping up the facial program I made for myself, and doing that annoying rutine of facial care in the morning and in at night, which has me considering rescheduling my waking hours, so maybe I can get to the office in time to get a good spot at the parking lot. Hell, it's taking me up to 20 more minutes to get ready just because I need to do my face! And I'm not even wearing make up! It's so much time. Yes,of  course there are results, like a much rested look, softer skin, more even tone, but still, I have to get used to the time it demands to do so much for your face. And well, I must admit that I like those minutes of pampering, they feel good. :-) So yes, I bitch about it now, but it's not so bad, just a matter of readjusting my schedule to fit all my new activities in.

The plan also has the advantage that it pushes me to keep up my gym appointments, since I only have two days open to go to the gym - either way, at the gym I go, you can only schedule two appointments a week - so I make my best to take them and use them. Also came recently to flirt with the idea of joining a free zumba classes at our Metropolitan Park.

To be honest, I do see the changes on my body, and I do feel them as well. I guess this is what's pushing me to do more. Hey, I gave up weight, I'm being more active, why not see if I can improve other areas as well?

Yesterday we had our second class at the Graduation Accounting Seminar, and honestly, I'm quite pleased with the teacher. This time around our team has been slacking a tad, but I'm sure we will soon pick up the pace and make things work. We had to take in another member, which our coordinator, Adry, didn't want, but we were told that we either brought up our team members to 4 or we wouldn't graduate. A team was dismembered, since they didn't have a company to work with, so I was quick to pick the one of them that seemed to be the best, a girl named Aracelly. I don't care if I came out looking rude to the other guy, we had a bad experience already in the last Seminar, so I rather pick the strongest of the lot. We met today via Skype and organized our work, decided on internal deadlines, and are now off to do our part. I'm dealing with the Methodology chapter. I picked that one, since I did it for the past Seminar and did a darn good job out of it. :-)  Personally, I consider this chapter to be stupid. I don't get why a thesis (in the end we make a thesis) must devote a chapter to explaining the research approach one uses to dothe job. Fuck, that should be selfexplanatory, doesn't it? What matters is the processing of the information, not all the academic crap about whether we are going qualitative or quantitative, exploratory or explanatory... but I'll do it, since I have those terms and stuff fresher in my head, and I'm organized enough to see the whole concept through. And I'm good at it, mind you.

I'm reading currently the last book of the Millenium trilogy, by Stieg Larsson. I liked the first book, but not so much the second. This third one is getting on my good graces. We shall see how it ends, though. Great books can be completely fucked up with a bad ending.

I'm also working on my smashbook for Carrie, which is taking quite some time. I don't get it, I was able to work on two within a year and send them to my friends, but then I can't seem to be able to finish one in over a year and a half. It's amazing. And it's not like such a big production either! Well, I do go changing layouts, and have printed out and cut out far more pictures that what I'll use at all, but still, that's not the point. The point is that it's taking me a freaking lot of time, and I'm about to ask for another deadline to get it done. Have I tackled more for this that what I can handle; Nah, I refuse to believe that. I've to complete ten more spreads, all of them already planned out, though I'm considering - again - to change some, replace them for other topics I like better currently, and then add some special stuff... if I can pull that. It's going to be cool, and I hope Carrie will like it, specially because I'm busting my ass here doing them for her.

Work is going on as usual. I'm disappointed by a lot of the stuff that's going on, and would even say that I'm heartbroken about it. It's really bad when someone you admired let's you down and shows you they are no better than the incompetent, slime, corrupt bastards you despise so much. It's tiresome to go around, looking ahead of you.

Blessed Lughnasadh!

Source: meetup.com

The time of the year has come, when we celebrate the first results of our work. Yes, it's the first harvest, a celebration of bread and grain, when we first start to see the yields of our many efforts. Before we even break under the high Sun, before we get disheartened for working so much and maybe not seeing anything "of use", Mother Nature sends forth the first results, and we can see, that yes, what we have put out has returned to us.

This celebration, for me, is about the first yieldings of our work, be it a suficient work or not. It gives us a peak of what's to come in the next two harvests. It's kind of interesting how this coincides in time with the first and second semesters. As August comes, you already know how good your work was in the first semester and whether you need to improve in the second. Schoolwise, in those places where school years start in September, as August starts, students have settled in already about the end of the previous year and now they can start seeing the results of ther efforts. Not only for the grades that they already know but now, but it's a great moment to make balance of how have we studied, how have we worked and what could be improved. I mean here not only to study harder, but maybe also, not to obsess so much about school and learn to have the needed down time to have a happy life, a life into which the results of school are well welcomed.

I'm midway through my graduation seminars, and I indeed learned a few things. I could be moe organized about my time, I could study more efficiently, and when I make a program and stick to it, things come out wonderfully. I've been a little chaotic lately about my finances, but I'm dealing with it already. It sets me back  some on my very tightly knit plans, but yes, the lesson here is: "Hey girl! Live a little! It's OK!". Know your measure, because if you have plans, you shouldn't be the one stone in your own road towards getting to them, but it's ok to loose your corset too. So it will take a little bit more of time, so what? There's more time than life, anyways, right?

But then, it's time to get back on track, and you should learn to do it too, before it's too late. As part of this, for instance, I've got back on track with my personal accounting, and yes, though in debts still, it feels good to know I've gone through all my bills, all my vouchers and set it all. I'm ready to continue my year with a firmer grasp on my wallet.

Source: www.vogue.in

One thing that this harvest brought to me - through some videos I've been watching - is a renewed interest in skin care and hair care. I decided to be more involved with my skin, get back to my morning and evening regimes and start making use of the many facials I've bought. I have a Brightening Moisturizing Mask by L'Occitane, which I've purchased a while back and never got to use! Hell, and that thing wasn't cheap either!! So I decided to make a routine for myself, a weekly plan for facials, including this one twice a week (I need to use it up before it expires), and then one day for a wonderful grape facial by Oriflame, and another for an aloe vera facial, also from Oriflame. I've also decided to start making a closing up towards make up again, which makes sense not so much because I'm 40, but because I've a make up bag full of it and eventually I'd like to use it... before I end up again, throwing out forty pieces of lipstick because they are too old and I didn't even used them. So here I am, googling and learning about the differences between BB and CC creams, and deciding that, for a no-make-up person like me, starting out with a little of BB or CC cream would be just perfect. Lets build up from there on, though I don't think I'll ever end up like a make up diva, with full on make up and a plastic face so different from my own, butI guess this could be a nice start.

Hair care used to be a huge part of my life, back when I had waist long locks, but in the last years my only hair care was brush it and use shampoo. Yes, that was it. No conditioner, no hairdrying, no creams, no nothing. just that. Though I still avoid any heat source around my hair, and conditioner, I'm getting close again to regenerating, moisturizing and anti-frizz products, I'm also trying to wear it undone as often as possible, so it doesn't break as much, but I'm also thinking about investing in a couple of wigs, so I can give my hair a break from now and then, and go to work while protecting it from the elements. But that's a little further ahead.

Finally, a sad piece of news: my beloved cat, Hyperion, passed away this Wednesday. It seems he was poisoned. Well, you sure can guess how deeply sad this makes me. Strangely, though I cry every time I watch a Disney or a Pixar movie, or any time I see someone else cry, when facing loss, I only cry when I'm alone, and it disturbs me to cry my pain in front of others. So I've cried for my friend, my familiar, my dear Hyperion, and did it alone. He was the greatest, most beautiful and gentle cat I have ever had the honor to meet. A true sweetheart, always so tender and friendly, and loved to be taken care of. He could stay in your lap receiving loads of petting like no other cat I had ever known. He had a way of looking at you and conveying what he felt, what he wished to say. His eyes could make you feel loved, and the way in which he sometimes leaned into ou, particularly when you were carrying him, made you feel like it was only the two of you in the world. Hyperion was a real charmer. His death was not only undeserved, but an act of cowardice and unworthy of any living being. An innocent cat, loved and admired by many, whom at least had three different human households (I like to think we were his primary humans), all of which will sourly miss him. His death has brought mourning, for he wasn't an animal, like many like to think, he was a family member, someone who had earned his place in the life of many, humans and other felines alike, and who can't be replaced. I guess I've told you before that Hyperion had a cat-wife of sorts, Cirmi, who was the mother of his kittens in 2011. Those kittens died and she got terribly disturbed, living now with serious traumas that make her to become nearly obssessively attached to cats she lives with. Well, with Hyperion's death, Cirmi has been showing again the same restless, desperate behavior she displayed with the loss of Tsuki and Nini, her children.

We buried Hippie (Hyperion's nickname) in the backyard, exactly at the spot he loved the most. He leaves behind a life that touched many lives with love. The harvest those who have taken his life will be one of sour grapes, for I believe that the pain he has caused to others will seep into his days and turn to ash the food in his mouth. As for me, memories of Hippie plague my mind, I remember him hopping on my bed and demanding attention while I tried to blog or study in a way that commanded undivided attention in the most lovely and irresistible of way. I'll get over it, learn to live with Cirmi and Mûzli, loving them for who they are instead of spending every second sad because they are nothing like Hyperion was.