w  w  w  .  s  c  h  u  m  i  n  w  e  b  .  c  o  m

< 1 minute read

March 14, 2005, 5:31 PM

Tomorrow begins that transition back into real life again. I have a follow-up appointment with the doctor, I have to swing by Wal-Mart to pick up and drop off some stuff, and lastly, I have to go to the bank.

What I can’t believe is that it’s officially been two weeks now that I’ve been at home. And with one short exception when Katie came to visit and I stepped outside, the whole time has been spent inside the house. Scary? Yeah. So it will definitely be nice to get out for a bit.

I also can’t believe that this time off of work is nearly over. Believe it or not, I have, overall, enjoyed my time off of work because of the operation. I got a lot accomplished in these last two weeks. I did a big Transit Center update, I put up a new photography set, and discontinued the quote, which necessitated a redesign of the main page. Plus I’ve finally gotten a chance to work on the total redesign and overhaul of the Today’s Special site that I have, and it’s getting close to being finished.

Of course, there were the unpleasant moments, like in changing the dressing on the wound, since it was still quite tender (and therefore painful) during the first week. After that, though, as things continued to heal, that dressing change got a lot easier.

Still, I’m just glad to be getting out of the house again. But at least things will be getting somewhat back to normal, which will be nice. I’m even thinking about going to Washington DC again later on this month. Hopefully that will be a go.

All in all, things are looking up!

Categories: Personal health, Schumin Web meta

< 1 minute read

March 10, 2005, 8:23 PM

No one’s more surprised than me. The last time I had any caffeine was a Coke at AMC right after the procedure. And it wasn’t intentional, either. It just happened that way that I haven’t had any caffeine in ten days. All I have to say is that when I do have a soda again, probably after I go back to Wal-Mart, I’ll probably be bouncing off the walls.

Meanwhile, I’m itching to go somewhere. I haven’t been out since the surgery on the 28th. Considering that I’ve been working on various Washington DC photos lately, both in an “Urban Demolition” photo set that I’ve been working on (coming soon!), and all those Transit Center photos I put up last week, I’m really itching to go to Washington again. Depending on how well I’ve healed up, I want to go at the end of this month or the beginning of next month.

Otherwise, Sis comes back from Europe tomorrow! I’ll be so glad to see her again. Especially since when she came back from VT, I only saw her for 20 minutes at most. Plus I’ll be interested to see how she did with her new digital camera.

Categories: Family, Food and drink, Myself

2 minute read

March 5, 2005, 6:34 PM

Yes, this is day #6… Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and now Saturday. I have been at home recovering from this procedure. And according to Mom, it’s slowly but surely healing up. I have to ask, because the wound is not somewhere that I can see myself.

Meanwhile, it’s Spring Break at Virginia Tech, and my sister is in Europe! Her boyfriend Chris is doing a study abroad program this semester, and so Sis is going to visit him. Of course, the trip nearly didn’t happen, as there was a small snafu with the passport, as we didn’t realize that since she was under a certain age that it expired sooner than the rest of ours did. But with some scrambling, a phone call to the office of our Congressman, Bob Goodlatte, and an unexpected trip to Washington DC (vs. just Dulles Airport, where the flight was), my father managed to get the whole situation straightened out, and she’s over in Europe now. So I hope she has fun.

Meanwhile, the TV is showing nothing but wall-to-wall Martha Stewart. My exact thought is, who cares? She just happens to be a celebrity that went to jail, instead of someone less-known.

Continue reading…

Categories: CFW, Dreams, Family, Personal health, Walmart

2 minute read

March 3, 2005, 10:11 AM

Since I had the procedure on Monday, it’s nice to get support from the people who care about you. I’ve gotten many kind words of support over the computer from many people, and also two cards from people from church! This one was particularly cute:

Continue reading…

Categories: Family, Friends, Myself

6 minute read

February 28, 2005, 7:10 PM

Today I had a small surgical procedure done at Augusta Medical Center. Let me tell you… they’ve got quite an operation going in there for outpatient surgery. But it was quick and relatively painless. So that was good. And I arrived at AMC at 6:30 and was out before noon. So that was really good. And now I’m at home once again.

It’s interesting… it’s like a television studio to an extent. They have all kinds of furniture that they change out in your little cubbyhole throughout the time you’re there. We got to AMC and they called me and took me into the outpatient center, and we went to one of many of those cubbyholes. It was fitted with two chairs. There, they wheeled a little computer over and verified all of my information.

Then I went to a second little cubbyhole. This had a stretcher in it, and a chair. They gave me the hospital gown, and it was time to change into it. They closed the curtain and I changed. I did pretty well for the most part, but had quite a time with the sleeves, mainly because I had no idea what I was doing with them. As it turns out, the sleeves snapped up the sides. I don’t know what I was thinking when I was trying to put that thing on. Of course, I also had to figure out which end was up in the first place on that thing. But I managed to get it on, tie the string in the back, and then screw up the sleeves. If you can imagine this, I had my arms sticking out the sides of the sleeves. I thought maybe this thing was supposed to look like a Roman tunic. I had no idea. Then, figuring that didn’t look right, I unsnapped the upper snap and put my arm through the two snaps (vs. the top of the sleeve and the first snap). I was satisfied that it was right. Or so I thought.

Continue reading…

Categories: Fire alarms, Personal health

< 1 minute read

February 7, 2005, 12:42 AM

Ever done that, where you burn the roof of your mouth eating food that’s a little too hot? I did that last night. We had pizza, and it was just a little too piping hot to eat, but I ate anyway. The first bite was just like, “WOW!” on the heat index.

So it was pretty evident that I’d burned my mouth on that hot pizza. And as expected, it was numb afterwards, as the heat from the pizza probably burned off all the nerve endings over there.

The next day is when the fun begins, though. By the day after, all the nerve endings and such related to sensation have healed, and so now you can feel the burned area again. And it’s still sensitive from the burn. And it’s not even a “pain” kind of feeling. It’s more of a tingly feeling, if you know what I mean. It’s weird.

I highly do not recommend trying to find out for yourself. Trust me on this one. Plus, in the course of life, you, too, will eat something that’s too hot and burn your mouth.

And also, this is a distinctly different feeling from when I’ve burned my tongue in the past, usually on hot soup or hot coffee. Burning the roof of your mouth is a different, more intense feeling. But it’s still quite similar as well. And still a weird feeling nonetheless.

Categories: Food and drink, Myself

2 minute read

January 14, 2005, 5:25 PM

It’s nice to go out on the town a bit. That’s what I did today. I had some errands to run, and went to both Staunton and Waynesboro in the process.

Note I say “local town”. You may recall that I go to Washington DC a lot, and spend a lot of time in that town, which hopefully will be my local town before too long. So I draw that distinction.

But anyway, I went out and about, which was fun. Went to Staunton Mall. I had lunch at “Hot Wok”, a Chinese restaurant in the mall. I’d never eaten a meal at Hot Wok before. It was good.

Continue reading…

Categories: Personal health, Staunton, Staunton Mall

2 minute read

January 13, 2005, 7:22 PM

That line of Blanche’s from The Golden Girls just cracks me up. Since, you see, I am originally from New Jersey, and still consider myself northern, even though I’ve lived in Virginia for more than half my life.

This is why I love it when people say that I sound northern, like one person told me today. Shows I haven’t lost it. And let me tell you – the word “y’all” is not in my vocabulary. And if ever you hear me say “y’all”, slap me.

Meanwhile, I’m going to the doctor’s office tomorrow for pain. Where? Wrists! Over Christmas, I managed to get a repetitive stress injury in both wrists from scanning items for customers. Now it’s painful to scan stuff. I had this happen in 2003 in my right wrist only, and then it went away after a while on the Service Desk. This time it’s both wrists, and I am so done with the Service Desk, so that’s not an escape again. I’m hoping to get some “feel-good medicine” to make me feel good (thus “feel-good medicine”) and make the pain go away. Usually I do so well, and nothing ever ails me. Then within the last month or so, I got two colds in a row in December, and then this. Yuck.

Continue reading…

Categories: Activism, Fire drills, Personal health, Television

2 minute read

January 5, 2005, 11:37 PM

A coworker at Wal-Mart, in looking at my Web site, noticed that I have a lot of pictures of my own feet on there. Specifically, she noticed this one on the way home from my 2000 beach trip, this one from where I was waiting for a bus at JMU, this one at Rosslyn while I was waiting for the train in 2001, and this one at my 2004 beach trip.

Now I will be the first to tell you – the first three feet shots, all of my own feet, were “bored” shots. They’re shots I ended up with because I had nothing better to do while waiting for something – in the car, at the bus shelter, and in the train station. The last one, of my sandy feet, was intended to show just how much sand I’d collected while out on the beach.

My coworker came to a different conclusion. She thought that I had a thing for feet, and thus why I have these four photos of my feet on my site. Not quite, I said. My feet, as I said, just happen to be something I always know the whereabouts of, and are also convenient to photograph when there’s nothing else to do.

Still, I ought to see if I can do something artistic with my feet. Or not. Who knows.

Continue reading…

Categories: Myself

2 minute read

December 11, 2004, 8:04 PM

You know, I’d expect it in a college dorm, where everyone lives in close proximity to each other and shares community facilities. But I didn’t expect to see it like this in the workplace.

What is “it”? A cold. Seriously, there’s a cold making its rounds through the associates at Wal-Mart in Waynesboro. I just think it’s interesting that so many people have it. But with having meetings and sharing phones, tills, podiums, and registers, it’s bound to happen, I guess.

I caught it myself, too. It’s not all that bad of a cold, manifesting it mostly as congestion. At its worst, I was congested all the way from the nose right on down the throat. Now I’m on what I’d consider the upswing – things are starting to get back to normal in my body. Now I only have a little throat congestion. So I feel a lot better, but I still haven’t gotten my whole voice back, and that seems to go in and out as it pleases.

It just bothers me that for right now, I can’t do all that I usually can do vocally. It will be back soon, I’m sure. Still, when I have to get on the squawk box, everyone in the store can tell that I’m trying, but still haven’t gotten my whole voice back yet.

Am I taking anything for it? Nope. Not a thing, aside from some nasal spray on a couple of occasions where I didn’t want to mess with my nose. See, cold medicine doesn’t seem to do anything for me anyway, so there you go. I save my money.

And of course this kind of thing has to hit right around Christmas, when everyone is already frazzled due to it being our big season.

Speaking of which, I finished my Christmas shopping. Did you?

Categories: Myself

3 minute read

October 26, 2004, 9:57 PM

As of right now, most of my search results are bad. Specifically, at this time, it affects all pages in the Life and Times, Major Areas, Odds and Ends, and Photography sections. That’s because all my pages now end in .asp and not .htm, since the new menus require the new extension. And the aforementioned sections are the ones where the redesign has been completed. Journal, being a new section, is different because there are no old results. It just needs to be crawled for the first time.

So as a result, I can expect to see some of my site traffic dip until Google finds me again. I’ve done my part, though, and resubmitted the home pages for the changed sections, where all the links live.

Otherwise, I got out of the house for a little bit today. I actually went to Staunton Mall to get my glasses adjusted, and then went to the Staunton Wal-Mart to do a little shopping. In this case, Staunton Wal-Mart is crucial here. I don’t shop in the Waynesboro Wal-Mart on my off-days. Feels too much like going to work. So I went to Staunton. I hadn’t seen them in a while, and so that was nice. Staunton has now turned their Garden Center patio into a full-scale greenhouse like we have in Waynesboro, which I thought was cool. It definitely beats the heck out of the open-air patio that it used to be.

Continue reading…

Categories: Family, Myself, Retail, Schumin Web meta

2 minute read

October 26, 2004, 9:01 AM

I really hope I’m not coming down with something, because this would be a heck of a time to come down with something. Though it would serve me right, since I’ve overextended myself lately, going eight days without a break on a number of occasions recently. Most recently, I had the Million Worker March followed by seven straight days at the Service Desk. That’s a recipe for fatigue.

And so today and yesterday, my nose has been stuffed up. I don’t know what to tell you on that one. I hope I’m not getting sick. Since that would just be unpleasant. The last time I was truly sick, as in feeling bad enough that I actually had to miss something was back in 2002. Usually when I catch something, it manifests itself as a sore throat and then goes away on its own. No big deal.

So we’ll see.

Continue reading…

Categories: Myself, Schumin Web meta

< 1 minute read

October 7, 2004, 12:14 AM

Finally I found out what ß means! It’s only found in German, a language which I have not studied seriously. I studied Spanish and Latin in high school, and in college had no formal foreign language study (the benefit of a Bachelor of Science degree), but I did become quite proficient in Foul while at JMU.

Of course, “Foul” only consists of about seven words, and you’re not allowed to say it on the air.

But anyway, ß. For years, I referred to it as “that funky-looking B that they have in German”. And that got me some very confused looks from just about everyone. But think about it. ß does look like a B. See? ß. B. So my description is understandable.

Turns out, though, that ß is not related to B at all. It’s actually related to S. And like most language elements, it has a very long history, and a big description of how it’s used in the German language.

Still, at least now I know what ß really means, and how it’s only a lowercase letter. It has no uppercase equivalent.

I am very pleased with myself for finding out about ß, a letter which has puzzled me for years.

Categories: Myself

< 1 minute read

August 27, 2004, 10:02 PM

How refreshing a little shuteye can be! After working 9-6 and getting maybe eight hours sleep total over the last few days, a little sleep can be great. And I’m going to get a little more momentarily.

Because let me tell you… all this work on the stairs turned into where my butt was really dragging by the end of the day at work. And that’s not fun. I think if I had stayed any longer, I would have fallen down, I was so tired. But we don’t show that to the customers. Based on what I let on to the customers, I was fresh as a daisy. But still, after work I went home and got sleep. Ah, sleep.

And so now, nearing midnight, I’ve slept for some hours, and now I’m going to brush my teeth and then get some more sleep. And then tomorrow…

Doors closing! (ding-dong)

Washington DC. And not “Warshington DC” as some people like to say it. I’ve never seen an “r” in Washington. But anyway, though, I’m excited, especially since last time my first train of the day was not a Breda, as I usually have first thing out of Vienna. I had a CAF! (Ooooooooooooh!)

Anyway, back to sleep. Zzzzzzzzzzzzz…

Categories: Myself

< 1 minute read

August 27, 2004, 6:24 AM

Seriously, after doing two LONG days due to the stairs (days I otherwise would have slept longer), I have a third get-up-early-for-the-stairs day here.

However, at least I have work at 9 AM today, instead of 2 PM. This is a good thing. I get off at 6 PM, and can thus go home and snooze (provided the stairs are ready) so that I can be fresh as a daisy for my planned trip to Washington DC tomorrow. I need to be fresh as a daisy for these trips, but this whole thing with the stairs has just been running me into the ground, because of the guy’s schedule (bright and early before even 8:00), and my schedule (work at 2:00). So that’s the problem we have.

Still, soon this floor work will all be over, and I’ll get my life back again…

Categories: Myself, New porch and floors