[Magdalen] Safe?

[cady soukup]

Enjoying hearing from everyone,

Chicago - what a flash point for weather and emotional turmoil (the
sparking of riots and consequences thereof). We are at such a series
of spark points, at every possible level.

Chicago / Illinois weather: I remember a spring summer on the
quadrangle at U. Illinois in Champaign-Urbana (or "Shampoo-Ipana" as
my father called it - he & my mother met there in chemistry graduate
school) when a massive (hail?) storm rolled in and changed the
temperature from around the 90's to much lower (40's?). There were
towels and suntan lotion abandoned on the grass while scantily clad
students scampered into  the various buildings for shelter! Let's see,
it could have been around 1969 or 1970?

We now have son #2 living with us after a misdirected life adventure
in Florida. He is working as a manager for several pizza places in
northern Virginia (Gainesville-Warrenton area), but he has been good
about wearing a mask and maintaining his distance. Every-other
weekend, we have his son, our grandson, visiting us as well. Their
summer project has been to resurrect the "ancient" video game systems
we managed to keep (we had resident teenagers from 1991 to 2014,
having failed at family planning).

My spousal unit mostly works from home but is in the office today (he
goes in almost once a week for planning meetings).

I work entirely from home and am waiting for my job either to end or
to be transformed into something unrecognizable. It is difficult to
maintain any kind of enthusiasm either way.

In my area of IT, employment & promotion now heavily depends on
certifications. IT / tech management classes are now all online, and
are paced at a rate (overdubbing sentences so as not to waste a
portion of a second) that can only be understood by reading along with
the transcript, even by a native English speaker. It would be a really
good idea for me to get official certifications but my ability to get
excited about online classes is ... a sign of my general lack of
enthusiasm for technology at the moment? Bad me.

At least we have live hummingbirds to entertain us, along with our
usual native visitors (deer, turkeys, bears, etc.), our cats and
parrots, way too many books to read, and a relatively stable internet
connection. Lots of weather, few riots.

hugs - blessings - Cady
in flyover country, Virginia