Look behind you!!!

Okay, since I have a 1.58333 year old, I have the wonderful pleasure of watching young children's programming. If the show is not some acid trippy frolic through a primary color infused post apocalyptic world (think Teletubbies and Boo-Bah), there is one situation that inevitably arises... especially in a show with an ensemble cast. One of the characters is trying to find one of the other characters.

For example, on the Disney Channel's Playhouse Disney it was a JoJo's Circus weekend. This means that the scheduling wizards in the Magic Kingdom decided that instead of showing their normal variety of shows, they would instead only show JoJo's Circus. It is a cute show, but it is also the worst offender in the search for another character shows. Every episode starts out with JoJo introducing herself and her pet lion, Goliath. Her pet lion always "hides" from her when she tries to introduce him to the viewing public. It sounds something like, "Hi, I'm JoJo, and this is my pet lion, Goliath." She points to an empty area next to her feet. "Now where is that silly lion?" Invariably, the lion is hiding behind her, and not well, I might add. If he were well hidden I would not be able to see his oddly shaped mane of hair or his twitching tail. He is hiding behind a drum smaller than his head, a small sapling, a piece of lint, something else entirely not large enough to hide behind, etc... If this were the plains of the Serengheti, JoJo would be Goliath's breakfast, and Goliath would be out of dim enough prey when the clown was gone. Back to the topic at hand... If JoJo would turn around she would see her ill-hidden big cat, every single flippin' time. Her thought should be, "Where is that silly lion? Maybe I should look behind me."

I understand that the kid's shows want to engage the viewing children and have them scream out at the tv, "JOJO!! HE'S BEHIND THE PIC-NIC BASKET!!!" And have the character react to the children yelling at the screen. It is just soooooo tired. Every episode of that show, and eventually at least 4 or 5 episodes of other shows. It is getting to be a bit old and uninspired. Dora, your monkey is behind you. If I had a nickel for every time I had to tell someone that the monkey was behind them.... Captain Feathersword, look behind you, Wags is drenching you with water, it is not raining, and you are an idiot.

Oh well, back to the grind.

I am just phoning it in today

Today is the culmination of an 11 day marathon workweek for myself and my 2 cartographers. We seem to just be going through the motions, and deservedly so. I will try to post something relatively witty and semi-cogent on Monday.

Elvis has left the building.

It is already a looooong day tomorrow

So, this has been one of those days where all I have had enough time to do is breath, maybe.

It has been an insane rat race the past few days. My "crew" and I have had to edit poster sized public involvement boards for out client multiple times. Currently, we are starting to run up against some physical time constraints that will prohibit any further edits, so at least we got that going for us. Of the 25 poster sized graphics associated with this public involvement meeting he has determined that 9 of the already printed graphics need to be scrapped and editted. This is sooooooo tiresome, but it is what I get paid for.

I have to get back to the grindstone, so maybe I will be able to write more tomorrow, but it is already going to be a looooong day tomorrow.

Da Da Da De Da... I'm Lovin' It

So on the way into work today, I decided that I was really really hungry. This condition of hunger was a direct result of having soup for lunch and for dinner. Soup is a good foodstuff, but it is typically fairly thin and easily digestible. In other words, it leaves the eater of soup un-satisfied fairly quickly. Last night I went to bed prior to the onset of he un-satisfaction, so when I awoke this morning, my stomach was eating itself.

Anyway... I was hungry on the way into work today, so I decided that McDonald's would be a fine, if not healthy, breakfast for me this wonderful Tuesday morning. I ordered my usual number 1 extra value meal, threw in a sausage biscuit, and got a large coke for good measure. The total, as always, for my un-healthy yet filling breakfast is an even 5 smackers. I am cashless, so I will pay with my handy dandy little debit card (whoever came up with the idea of a debit card is a genius). I pull up to the first window to pay and hand the nice English-is-a-second-language worker my card so that I might be able to obtain my food. There were some issues communicating between the woman working the drive through and myself. She seems to be a very nice lady, but English is clearly not the strongest language that she knows. Makes me wonder how little English the other workers knew to put her on the drive through. She had to ask me my order a few times over the speaker, and I had to give my order a few times as well. It all worked out in the end, so it was no skin off my back. She apologized profusely for the communication "breakdown" (as it were), but she really did not have to. She was polite the entire time, and I think both of us were laughing a bit when everything was said and done.

Anyway... she informs me that they do not have a card machine that is currently working and asked if I had cash. I am not a proud man, but if I had $5, I would not use a card for $5. When I have cash on hand, I try to use the cash. I let her know that I did not indeed have the $5 in question as cash, and she said," Go on to second window, I give it to you."

BOOOOO-FRIKKIN'-Yah!! BABAY!!!! Free food in the morning! Woooooo-hooooooo!

(I did mention that I was not a proud man, didn't I?)

I am still having soup for lunch though.

I promised myself

I promised myself that I would add to this blog for everyday that I went into work, but I have to tell you folk out there that sometimes it is not the easiest of tasks to accomplish. I do not have that exciting of a life. The material is just plain lacking. It is difficult to come up with topics every day of the week, so many of my topics and posts end up being rather weak. I guess I could start limiting the posts to days when I have something interesting to say, but I am really not that interesting, so the posts would become very few and far between. Then I would start to lose the few people that actually read this thing, and then I would no longer have any reason to continue adding to this.

So I continue to try and come up with witty posts that typically are about nothing. It is a difficult task, to say the least.

Anyway... onto today's topic....

I got nothing. Absolutely nothing. Well, that is not entirely true. I have things that are going on right now, that I am not going to write about. I have made the conscious decision to not talk about anything private, anything concerning my pathetic past-time, and most things political. These are promises that I made to my friends and family so that they could be comfortable with the existence of this blog. Just like the fact that I never use anyone's name when I am talking about events that have occurred. Keeping things anonymous can sometimes be tricky.

Anyway... back to the topic at hand... I have things that have occurred that would be good fodder for the blogging environment, but they are voluntarily taboo, so you are not going to hear about them. So instead, I hope I have something interesting to post about tomorrow.

Wednesday

The word "Wednesday" is derived from Nordic words meaning "Wodan's Day" or the day named after the King of the Norse gods. In the Germanic and Nordic cultures prior to the introduction of Christianity into those cultures, Wednesday was the beginning of the week. "Thursday" was named for Thor, Wodan's son, and "Friday" for Frigga the goddess of married love (interesting that the Norse had married love and un-married love have their own goddesses. "Tuesday" was named for the Norse god of war, Tyr. "Sunday" and "Monday" were named after the celestial bodies the Sun and the Moon, but what I do not understand is "Saturday." Looking it up online "Saturday" is derived from Saturn's day (referring to the planet, not to the Greek father of the gods). All the days of the week are associated with Germanic and Nordic histories except for Saturday. Why is that? I am fairly sure that the Norse did not call Saturn by that name. That is a Greek name; all the planets have Greek names. Should "Saturday" be something else? I think so. Discuss...

Useless knowledge. When one a font of Useless Knowledge, one must spout Useless Knowledge. If I have taught anyone anything, then I have accomplished something. Something useless? Yes, something useless.

Anyway...

Currently, I am making this blog entry to keep myself from focusing on the huge pile of work that is waiting on me and my 2 intrepid cartographers. It is a big pile of work and it seems to be staying at a steady state. It is neither growing nor is it getting smaller, no matter how much work I accomplish. So, currently we are getting new tasks at the same rate that we can accomplish old tasks. I am sure there is a differential equation in there somewhere that I could come up with, but I am choosing not to. The newest thing that I have to do is my employee reviews. This being a boss thing really is a pain in the butt. I now have to rate my "2 intrepid cartographers" as realistically and as fairly as possible. It is an odd rating process that we have in the first place, so it will be an odd exercise for me to accomplish anyway. How do you give an ordinal ranking to the concept of someone having "Integrity?" By the purely physical definition both of them have quite a lot of integrity. If someone places them on a vibrating plate they do not shake apart, and if I put them in the sun (sun shine you literal reading bastards, If I had the power to place people inside the Sun, let's just say there is a running mental list, and they are not near the top of it) they will not melt. That shows a whole bunch of Integrity right there.

Our company has this new ridiculous notion that we need to rate employees by their adherence to our 6 "core values." These are Integrity, Respect, Client-Focus, Teamwork, Excellence, and Innovation. So how does one rate Excellence? Just an odd concept to say the least.

I am also getting ready to go and pick up a prescription for my little one. We ran out of his rescue inhaler medicine this morning, and that is something that we really should keep around. Currently he has a bit of a cold, and again we are attempting to keep that cold from developing into anything asthmatic. So far so good, but it is too early to tell if we are out of the woods yet.

Boy, this one is rather disjointed today. I guess that is because I started writing it at 9:30 this morning, and I have not been able to devote any sustained amount of time to finishing it up. Oh well 30 minutes till I make my pilgramige to the paharmacy, I guess I could try to work for a bit again.

Everybody feels better making fun of someone

Everybody feels better when they are making fun of someone. It is a tautology that is completely irrefutable, like "space takes up space" or "you'll shoot your eye out." Luckily everyone has someone to make fun of. In the US most people can make fun of Alabamians, Alabamians can make fun of Mississippians, Mississippians can make fun of Arkansans (Arkansawers?), Arkansans make fun of Louisianans, Louisianans can make fun of West Virginians, and West Virginians either don't get it or they make fun of their neighbors or Alabamians. The point is, no matter how bad we have it, there is always someone worse off than we are, and we should make fun of them (I am lookin' your way 'Bama).

Anyway.... I have a shit-ton of work that has to get done, in a relatively short amount of time, and my list seems to get longer and longer. This list keeps lengthening because of incidents like the one I had happen to me yesterday. One of the Board of Directors dropped by my office yesterday with a retired employee in tow. I have had the displeasure of working with this old coot before, and it was not pretty. One cannot in any good measure say "no" to one of the Board and expect not to do the work eventually.* So anyway the geezerly gentleman with no life other than his past employer** needs us to add his pointless busy work tasks to our already bloated checklist of activities. Whence I have had the displeasure of working with this particular relic of engineering's past, it has always taken much much longer and much more work than was initially described. So far we have just finished his initial request, but I am waiting with baited breath for the old codger to come back and ask for the impossible. It will come tomorrow around 10 AM, if my "Old Coot Schedule" is correct. Oh well, this mountain of work will not complete itself, no matter how long I ignore it.


*I could have said, "No, we really do not have the time to make this dotery old fool some maps pro bono. So, if you would please, shove off." but the Board guy would have gone to my boss or my boss's boss and said make him do this. This way I cut out the middle man and look like I am a happy team player. We are, after all "All one Team.

** When I retire, there is literally no chance anyone will ever see me again at the office from which I will retire. Work is an unfortunate necessity in my life that I would easily forego if I had the means to.***

*** I need my wife to make us independently wealthy. She is our only hope seeing as how much brighter than I am she is and all. Maybe my child will pull us into a life of leisure...

A boot on your head

Lately, there just have not been the "opportunities" to spout out tons of vitriolic prose due to a single occurrence. In other words, there have not been any singular specific incidents for me to blog about with tons of caustic remarks. The stuff that has been going on lately is more of the moderate systemic stuff that just grinds on one until they are a weeping puddle of melted Jell-o brand pudding pops. Unfortunately for you reader folk, that does not make for the most interesting of blog entries. I am sure you were all touched and awed by the "Silly things I do not like" but that post lacked a certain bit of magic in it, a certain "je ne sais quoi." Please do not mistake this as complaining on my part. I am rather happy that nothing particularly untoward has occurred that has been directed at me or those around me. It makes for a much more pleasant existence, but it also make it a bit difficult to write sarcasm. This, of course, leads me into today's entry...

Nothing in the world says "Do not touch," "Does not play well with others," or "Bat-shit crazy" like someone wearing a boot on their head. If you see someone who has footwear atop their skull, give them a wide berth, for they are indeed bat-shit crazy. I am sure you are saying to yourselves, "I am of above average intelligence, I know things, I do not think that someone wearing a boot on their head is the strongest indicator of someone's break with reality." Well let me make my case for you.

Firstly, 75% of Americans think they are "above average intelligence," so we cannot all be correct in that assumption, you pompous jerks. Personally, I would be happy if I am above median intelligence. There are some nasty statistical outliers pulling the "average" IQ to a rather low number. For example, someone wearing a boot on their head will pull the average IQ down more than a newly minted PhD physicist can bring it up. In truth, someone with a boot on their head will actually draw people's IQ's down as they get closer to the boot-headed individual. This decrease of IQ in proximity to someone with footwear on their noggin is due to the increasing puzzlement of why someone has a boot on their head. The progression looks something like...

1. Just catches sight of the boot headed individual. "Does that guy have a boot on his head?"
2. Confirms that the person indeed has a boot on their head. "Oh my gosh, that guy really has a boot on his head."
3. Puzzlement. "Why on earth would he choose to wear a boot on his head?"
4. Study. "Is that a new boot or an old one? How is it staying on that man's head? Does it shade his eyes like a hat?..." etc...
5. Obsession. "If I got a boot, could I figure out how to wear it on my head? Do I tie the shoelaces around my chin to hold it in place..." etc...
6. Trial and error. A new person is now wearing a boot on their head.

...and point 6 brings me to my second point, so without further ado...

Secondly, one does not simply place a boot on one's head and have it stay there. One must figure out how to affix the footwear to one's head, indicating forethought and dementia. The boot must be big enough to fit on one's head. So a search must be conducted to find footwear to fill that bill. There has to be a cause to wear a boot on one's head as well. A boot instead of, say, a tin-foil hat that keeps the government's controlling rays out. In short there is trial and error associated with wearing a boot on one's head. I have yet to see any behavior that indicates "Do not touch," "Does not play well with others," or "Bat-shit crazy" better than the person wearing a boot on their head.

In summary... Boot on the head = bat-shit crazy

Silly things I do not like

I cannot stand the word "ointment" written or spoken, but especially spoken. Something about its existence is abhorrent to me. I am fine with the concept of (and this is difficult for me to write due my loathing of it) ointment, just don't refer to it in that horrid way. Poultice, salve, cream, rub, balm, emollient, or lotion, just not "ointment." Puts shivers down my spine just typing the accursed word.

I also am averse to the word "packet." Mostly when it is spoken. I always hate going to informational seminars and conferences because they invariably give you a packet of information. It is usually in a cheap folder, so I think that is how it should be referred. "If you could look at the yellow sheet of paper located in the right pocket of your cheap folder of information." Just call it what it is. The only true packets are data packets being sent and received by computers with this thing that some call the Internet. Everything else is a bag, folder, or some such thing. "Packet" is just that kind of word for me.

I do not like eating cold lunches. Cold cut sandwiches, veggie tray etc... I need my food warmed up, like it has been freshly killed cause that is the kind of badass I am. I do not have a problem eating cold stuff for lunch as long as it is accompanied by something warm. Cold cut sandwich is fine if there is some soup with it. Carrot sticks are perfectly acceptable when associated with a warm sandwich.

I do not like waking up before 9 am. I do it everyday because I am an adult and I have responsibilities that need to be attended to, but I do not like it one iota. I am always tired if I wake up prior to 9. Even if I went to bed at 7 pm the night before, I am tired when I wake up before 9. Oddly enough, I usually do not feel tired when I am fortunate enough to wake up after 9 am even when I did not go to bed until 4 am.

I do not like to get into conversation with people I do not know. At supermarkets, bank lines, stores, etc... I do not know you, don't talk to me. I will be civil (barely if you ask my wife) to the talky stranger, but rarely nice and engaging.

If I continue to outline these dislikes of mine, I am sure all of you who actually know me will start to consider me one boot on my head away from the nut-house, because nothing says crazy like wearing a boot on your head.

I thought of a topic yesterday afternoon

I thought of a topic yesterday afternoon, and then promptly forgot it. It was a killer topic too. The kind which makes all bloggers salivate at its sheer awesomeness. It was a topic that I am sure would be captured in one of those 5 minute CNN Headline News human interest pieces that they do at the end of their 30 minute loops. I would have been on Late Night with Conan O'Brian chatting about how I came up with such an incredibly poigniant and witty post. The post would have gotten me recognized in Google's most viewed websites list for today. It would have crushed Blogger.com's bandwidth, reducing their servers to smoldering ash piles of network equipment. Researchers would have been enlightened to the cure cancer due to this topic. Israelis and Palestinians would eat dinner together (all of them at one gigantic table that ran from Turkey to somewhere in the Nile basin). Our military presence would no longer be necessary in Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, etc... because World Peace would ensue whence world leaders were given copies of my post to read during their daily briefings. Dog and cats would sit down and play poker. It would have been translated into at least 137 different languages (including Elvish and Klingon, because geeks would hail me as their hero). The planets would have aligned. A harmonic convergence of heavenly forces would have ushered forth from the firmament to push humanity forward evolutionarily. We, as a species would have transcended our mere physical forms to become part of a spiritual universe of calm and peacefulness. There would indeed be doughnuts for all. All of this due to my most magnificent post ever. Alas and alack, the topic was promptly forgotten. So, instead you got this.

I don't want to write today

I do not want to write today, but I decided in October that I was going to write everyday that I was at work. So I will write, but I will not like it.

One of the main reasons I do not want to write is an utter lack of material. You see, even in the most beneficial light, I lead a boring life. What did I have for dinner last night? Spaghetti. Ooh, look how exciting my life is. Spaghetti, I bet you wish you could live that exciting of a life. What did I do last night after eating spaghetti? Cleaned the dining room. Does it get any more exciting than that? I think not. Well at least for me it does not. Spaghetti and cleaning, whoooo-weeee I do know how to live it up. I got up early this morning so I can go with my little one to his allergist appointment. Again, excitement abounds. We are hoping that the Dr. tells us that he is no longer allergic to anything. Then we can get him some more varied dietary choices.

I have 3 active projects that I am working on at work right now. One of those projects just hit me with the insane amounts of work bat yesterday. But that is to be expected with this particular project. The PM on the client side has a problem saying "No" to anyone other than us. He consistently promises things that are nigh impossible to deliver. Somehow we do, but it usually involves just plain wrong levels of work. So I have tons of work to do whilst at the job. Tons of work really cuts into the interesting distractions aspect of work life. Oh well.

I am sure that I will have a rip-snorting good time this evening cleaning the living room. Envious? I thought so. Sorry about the whininess of this post, but I truly have nothing interesting going on for me at the moment. Maybe I will be inspired later on today, or hopefully, at the very least, I will be more inspired tomorrow.

Bad naming convention

So, in a conversation that I had with a friend earlier this morning, He came up with one of the worst names I have ever heard. Luckily it is a fictitious name, so no harm, no foul. The name he came up with was "Percival VonBeatme." Other than some laws on the books, this is the reason that I think he is not allowed to reproduce. His is a genetic line that should die with him, but he has brothers with kids, so it won't. I am holding out that eventually Darwin will end that line or dilute it to the point of obscurity. Thank you Darwin. The existence of his brothers' children is irrefutable evidence that Intelligent Design is not a valid theory. It has to be just dumb luck that has gotten that gene pool mistake this far. If I did not know better his family probably has webbed feet or some such. Mutant. And I say all of that with love and kindness.

This does make me wonder about how bad names could be. My doctor's last name is Butcher. I am glad she never went into surgery. "Paging Dr. Butcher to the O.R. Dr. Butcher to the O.R."
Sounds almost like a crappy super villain. But my docs name does not really enter in to what I am talking about. What I am talking about is just plain bad made up names such as Percival VonBeatme. Just plain horrid names. Not the ones that Bart pranks Moe with, a la "Amanda Hugginkiss." Or those faux authors who wrote faux books, a la "Yellow Snow by I.P. Freely." I'm talking about just plain crappy fictitious names. Everybody comes up with them to talk about people either that we know or people we have encountered that we did not know their names. It’s human nature to make fun of those we know, and especially those we do not.

For example when someone I know does something inherently clumsy, I would call them "Trippy McFallsalot." If someone I do not know does something rather clumsy I refer to them as something like Edna Fumblefoot or Mike Kersplatsky. Absurdly naming those we know and do not know is fun and, typically, funny. Percival VonBeatme would be the kid you did not know who always got their lunch money taken. As a side note, any name with Floyd or Wayne in it is typically comedy gold.

On another note: Little one is on Orapred again. Ergo, he is a cranky little boy now. Oh well, today is his last day of that medicine.

Cleaning up just doesn't mean as much as it used to

Cleaning up just doesn't mean as much as it used to. i am tidying my workspace up today, but I am fairly sure that by tomorrow it will be a mess again. And I don't even work on Friday’s. Heck, it is questionable if I worked at all this week. With the little one being sick and my general malaise, I think the effort I have been able to muster has been a bit below par. Did I mention the little one was sick again? Yep, he has a cold. We are hoping that said cold does not progress into something asthmatic, but that would be a first since in 6 months. We are not terribly hopeful.

Back to the topic at hand.... I remember when I first started working at this wondrous company, when I cleaned my desk, it stayed clean for like a month. Now, with all this crap filtering through to me, I am lucky if I see desktop for more than a day. That saying about cluttered desk: cluttered mind... well, it is appropriate to a point. The mind has been going this way and that for a while now. It has been somewhat difficult to focus on one task at a time recently, but I think a lot of that has to do with the amazing number of tasks that I have coming at me regularly.

Speaking of regular, the little boy is now eating oatmeal. Eat your heart out Wilfred Brimley. He also has been only eating things that has been closely associated with vast amounts of tomatoes during the cooking process. That amazing consumption of the fruity vegetable has caused a bit of a reaction to the citric acid found in the tomatoes. He still only wants tomato based stuff. I guess he will be rashy for a while then.

And to the topic at hand.... More tasks seem to have exponentially increased the amount of physical crap I have to deal with in my deskish area. That and supervising two people seems to have increased the clutter in my head. Maybe a clean desk will help the old noggin as well.

Speaking of Noggin, the little one loves to watch Blues Clues. I find it to be an odd show to say the least, but if he likes it, then it is a great odd show.

Back to topic... Clean is good. Ummm... I think that is it for the day.

For some reason...

For some reason the little man wanted to be shirtless the other day. (See attached picture below) Far be it from us to deny him that right. So, shirtless he went. At least he was shirtless for a bit, then it went to complete naked time. He loves him some naked time. It usually causes him to dance a bit. I guess if he had bongo drums he could have a scandal, a la Mathew McConaughey. Well, I guess he would need some weed and another naked guy dancing with him as well... oh, and to be famous. It is not really a scandal if one is not famous. It is only a news item from the local police blotter if someone is not famous.

And now for something completely different... ( I really dated myself with that reference)

I cannot believe that it is already February. And that happened yesterday. Speaking of which, I really feel bad for the month of February. It is the tiniest month of the year. I am sure that is why it is black history month, but that is a different story all together, and I will not get into it in this particular forum. I do try to be a-political in this venue. Honestly. No really. Anyways... February is pretty much the left over month of the year.

February is the month that was stolen from by July and August. Everybody remembers Julius Caesar and Augustus Caesar, but Julius's step nephew once removed, Februarius, is not so well renowned. He did good things. He is known for his many and varied inappropriate uses of gravel. I guess that is why his month only has 28 days (typically).

Abercrombie & Fitch ain't got nothin' 

I hate getting to work early

So, one might ask, "Other than just the fact that you are early, why do you hate getting to work early?"

Well, let me tell you. It is the little things really. I have to turn on the lights, printers are not warmed up, the ambient noise that is associated with an office is missing (it's quiet), there is nothing to distract me from accomplishing work (except for a certain blog), and when people who are usually here earlier than you get in, they always ask you why you are in so early.

Other than that, it is great. No, really. It is like having to come in on the weekend, without losing your weekend.

Nextly, one might ask, "Those reasons for disliking coming to work early are all well and good, but why exactly did you have to come in early this morning?"

Good question. The woman who watches my darling little boy is sick, so my wife and I are doing some creative scheduling to get through this time of caregiver illness. It really is unsurprising that this woman is sick. Number 1: (ah, my favorite method of emphasis, the numbering of things) she watches a little kid who gets sick and then sicker. Lots of germs around the little one. Number 2: She had her hip replaced in late November, so her immune system is not quite up to snuff. And Number 3: She has Lupus, so her immune system is really and truly never quite up to snuff. I imagine that she will be sick for the rest of the week. Especially when she is describing an illness that seemed to knock my relatively healthy self down for 3 days. She can watch the little man next week; we will smurf something out for this week. We are bright folk, we can figure it out.

So I will be getting out of the office for about 4 hours this afternoon. My PTO schedule is going to Hell in a hand basket. Not quite sure as to why "Going to Hell in a hand basket" is a saying at all. Why would someone carry a "hand basket" to Hell? And what am I doing in said hand basket (other than going to Hell)? How large is the person carrying a hand basket that can fit a 6'2", 215 lbs man. At that point, doesn't every basket become a "hand basket" because the person is a giant? I have so many questions, and no one to answer them, I am in early after all.