Fragmented Friday - PAC Man Fever

Got the following IM from Zinger yesterday afternoon: "You made a mistake with your blog. Unless you start posting more often, we're all going to have to see that pic of PigPen until you decide to blog again. Hopefully it will not be long." I assured him that I had a Fragmented Friday post in the works.

The other day I was checking my site statistics and saw that CoIM got a hit as a result of the following Google search: destroying shack fu. So, watch out, bubba, apparently someone in New York has it out for you.

I'm slowly adjusting to a PigPen-less household; you know, it's the little things that get ya. Like, how when the new season of Deadliest Catch comes on, who's going to sing along with the theme song with me? And when I watch Wipeout, who's going to laugh so hard at people face-planting that I have to rewind the tape so he can take a hit of his inhaler and get his breath back? And what the heck am I going to do with the vast array of rubber bands, paper wads, and other projectiles I unconsciously accumulate with an eye towards hurling them in PigPen's general direction?

After my Ham of Dogpatch, USA post I was eagerly awaiting some sort of response from PigPen, and was disappointed when none was forthcoming; after all, now that we no longer room together, I have to find other, long distance ways to pick fights with him. Turns out that he did try to post a comment on the MySpace version of the blog, but for some reason it didn't take. From what he said, the comment was pretty much what I expected it would be, first responding to my hairline crack with a "like you have room to talk" comeback, followed by an assurance that if I had hollered that out he would have come off the stage and into the audience to find me, just like I had told Li'l Random and Trouble he would. He also said that the girl trying to get him to take the picture wasn't embarrassed, since he was embarrassed enough for the both of them. Think that was about it.

Along with my lack of drive to write anything for the past month or two, I've also had a lack of drive to attend my judo classes. The first few I missed were because Shack-Fu had just gotten back into town after deployment and PigPen's work schedule changed so he was actually home from work before 9 or 10, and I chose trying to maximize my quality time with two of my Best Friends before they moved on over going to class, rationalizing that I could go back to judo at any time, but who knew how many more chances I'd have to work out with Shack or pick a fight with PigPen? Of course, the longer I went without going to judo, the harder it became to get motivated to return; ironically, the two people who were my initial reason for slacking off were the two voices raised loudest in disappointment over my lack of attendance. This all came to a bit of a head on Sunday when I was at lunch with the Singles and I saw one of the black belts from class coming in with his family. Shack-Fu noticed him too, and remarked that he was one of Shack-Fu's co-workers. I, silly little man that I am, mentioned that he was one of my senseis. Not too long after that, Shack-Fu got up to get a refill on his drink, but was gone for quite a while; the mystery of his extended absence was solved when I suddenly heard his voice uttering my name loudly from across the restaurant. I turned my head and saw him and my sensei both staring at me with manic grins on their faces. Yup, nothing like knowing that I've now been singled out for special humiliation and attention to get me back to class; Shack-Fu knows me so well!

For the record, while I razzed PigPen about hamming it up in Li'l Abner, the fact is that the whole cast was pretty hammy -- at one scene a character literally vocalized a "Yuk yuk yuk!" type of laugh as he skipped off stage -- so he was just going along with the tone of the production. Plus, he made us laugh (on purpose, even), which is what he was there for, so I'd say it was a successful role for him.

Oh, and Shack-Fu's machinations did work, and I did finally make it back to judo on Tuesday; so far out of shape that I thought at one point I was going to keel over and die. All that, and the FEMA sensei wasn't even there. *sigh*

It's the time of year at work where all the librarians have to turn in their Personnel Affairs Committee binders which are filled with documentation of all the work we've performed throughout the year, both in our primary assignments and in our professional development. Since the documentation in these PAC binders are what are used to determine raises, promotions, and extension of contracts, it's a pretty stressful time of year. My joy has been that this is my third PAC binder to prepare, and it's also my third job title, as every year since I've become a librarian my job description has changed drastically. I'm hoping that now that I've become Head of the Serials and Electronic Resources Unit these drastic changes will die down, and I can actually start focusing on that whole "professional development" thing I've heard about. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go write up my personal essay for the binder explaining why the heck I did what I did this year.