full weekend

Busy busy busy. classics_cat came over Sat night, to dye some stuff, and By & I kept her company with our projects. Stayed up way too late, but I did get pages folded for 5 or 6 books, thick books, which is an accomplishment.

Went out to Robyn's property Sunday, to mark trees she wants removed. The firetending crew are going to haul them off for Heartland bonfires. Lovely place....only place I've ever seen literally acres of wild dog-tooth violets growing. Robyn said I could have a few--I was thinking of rescuing the ones growing in the roadbed that's going to get gravelled soon, since they're a protected species. Also saw lots of Dutchman's breeches down by the creek. And violets, and wild ginger......we got a full tour. Spent some time after the tour sitting by the cars, talking about her plans for the place, which gave us an idea for Robyn's birthday present....a pair of forsythia bushes, to start the hedge she wants. I'll pick those up today.

Spent Monday gardening....I've got all of the front flower beds but one completely cleaned out, and that last one is mostly done, just too dusty to finish Monday. I hope to start on the back beds this week or weekend. Made a stitching cradle, which holds the signatures open so the holes get punched exactly in the fold. Very helpful gadget, just cardboard and glue and a bit of old canvas. Finished a couple of books Monday night, nothing fancy, simple 4-signature Coptic bound.

Spent Tuesday tidying, and making covers for the pages I folded on Sat. Finished two more books, and got the leather ready to do another leather-bound Coptic. Albert the Salvage God wants me to make a bunch, that he can take to the Civil War get-togethers and sell, so I need to get busy folding pages, if I want to have enough to send with him and some to take to Heartland.

And, By's working this week, which is always good news. Robyn's meeting with people from Tivol this afternoon; wish her luck.

Update on job application (mine, and other people's)

Called the City's HR department this morning. The nice lady there told me that the "applicants chosen for interview" had already been contacted, which means no dice there. Ah, well. It didn't cost me anything to try.

Learned quite a bit about the Arboretum, and city politics this morning. I'd forgotten that one of the administrative assistants in the Maint office was on the city's Tree Board....she had all kinds of interesting things to say about how the city, and the Arboretum worked. So did the extension agent, who's also on the City Tree Board. The summary of what I learned: city politics is even more convoluted than college politics, there's 4 or 5 groups with their fingers in that pie and they don't talk to each other, and the supervisor for that position is a son-of-a-bitch. Gee, sounds like where I work now.


Grounds Foreman had a long talk with JCCC's HR yesterday, and is, while still quite pissed about the whole deal, feeling better. He will get paid for the time he spent as "acting supervisor", which is great news. And I guess HR was very curious about Maintenance Director, and how he handled the interview process. I guess Maintenance Director is on their "doesn't play by our rules and must be watched list".

Still no official word on the status of the Grounds Supervisor, and whether or not Applicant will get the job. I'm half hoping that Grounds Foreman's talks with HR might spark a deeper look at the guy, and more thorough investigation of his reference. Either way, Grounds Foreman is leaving, probably in mid-May. We'll miss him.