Howdy and hello, or as our governor would say, "I ain't got time to bleed".
It's been a while since I last gave the Minnesota update, and actually quite a bit has happened. In January, our department at Seagate had a pretty severe cutback, and we reduced our headcount from around 80 to 20. (The remaining 60 or so were redistributed to other departments here in the Twin Cities.) Morale around the department was pretty bad for a while, as you might imagine. I'm still employed, and I still like the work I'm doing, but I wonder how much longer my project will exist. I give it about a year before the rest of us are sent scurrying to other departments. And so it goes.
Margaret found out about all this and got scared enough to get a job! She's now manning the repairs counter at JB Hudson, the fanciest jewelry store in one of the local malls. (Not the BIG mall - that's too scary.) She dresses super-fancy for work, and I tell her that's it weird to see her dressing in drag. Her co-workers seem pretty cool, and she likes the job. The only down side is that she has to work sporadic mall hours, which includes some evenings and weekends. Not the end of the world.
"Crap From The Past" FINALLY got its own weekly time slot on my tiny radio station out here. Sundays at midnight on KFAI, Minneapolis. Not the greatest time slot, but it's weekly and it's all mine. Finally! (After almost two years of waiting for a slot to open up.) I figured that the first order of business is self-promotion, so I ordered 500 "Crap From The Past" pens. They're Bic Stics, burgundy barrel, burgundy cap, white printing. And they're due in by next week! Oh boy! A box o' pens! All toward the goal of media saturation! Woo-hoo!
"Shakespeare In Love" won the big enchilada! I'm surprised that "Saving Private Ryan" didn't win, but I thought both films were outstanding, and I'd put them in a dead heat as my favorite films of the year. Of course, one of those movies was the feel-good-hit-of-the-year, and other, well... a bit of a downer. Saw "A Simple Plan", directed by Sam Raimi ("Darkman", "Evil Dead 2"), and done very well. Also saw "Elizabeth" - pretty overrated, but not bad.
I found one tiny bright patch in the musical wasteland - Jason Falkner. He writes, produces, and plays all the instruments on his 2 albums, and his songs are catchy pop tunes, similar to Aimee Mann's solo work. I'll be wonderfully surprised if anyone outside of my office hears his single, "Author Unknown". And who let former New Kid On The Block Joey McIntyre back on the radio? I demand a recount...
Gabe Kaplan's birthday is on March 30th. (My "Crap From The Past" tribute to Mr. Kotter airs until the 28th at kfai.org.)
Winter has been lame-o out here. (Which is good.) We got practically no snow in November and December, 1000000000 inches in January, nothing in February, and nothing in March until we got 15 inches all at once about three weeks ago. It was the largest single snowfall out here since Halloween 1991 (and I was here for that, too.) The weather turned mild right after that, and now the only snow left outside is right up close to buildings, where there is no exposure to direct sunlight. You can see a sharp edge near the bottom of the building here at work, and I think it's pretty entertaining. It hit around 60 degrees today, and I think Minnesota is getting restless for spring. I can't wait to start sleeping with the windows open (a bad idea right now because 1. it gets below freezing at night, and 2. Margaret would beat me senseless.)
Hope all is well in the portion of the world that I like to call non-Minnesota. (It's my New York heritage leaking through. You're either from New York, or Who Cares?)
Stay warm,
Ron and Margaret
