I spent four hours Friday night, nine hours Saturday, and eight hours today in a Wilderness First Aid course at the local Scout council office. A lot of practice, and all afternoon was simulated accidents. My last one was a climber with a bad ankle and a compound fracture of the right tibia and shock. Oh, and he's HIV-pos. Pity the first-aid kit didn't have gloves.

That's about the only thing I got done, and I'm ready for my weekend, but I'm out of weekend. What three-day weekend? What's a Veteran's Day holiday? You think IBM is going to waste a perfectly good Monday just so we can watch parades and put flags on graves and stuff? Think of all the wasted revenue, and how terrible it would be for America if IBM didn't make money that day! We owe it to America's veterans to pound that time-clock and keep our stockholders happy!

Eddy, the new manager, and I had a long talk on Friday. He knows I am capable of doing more than security reports, and wants to share knowledge among sites, because Jerry and I are experts in remote system management blah blah blah if I hadn't heard almost the same thing a year ago from Karen, the last manager, I'd be more confident.

Well, at least we got to go to Kathryn Mill's birthday party, which was chaotic and noisy and fun. And My Daughter comes home this week!