Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Weird Stuff

Randomly.....

.... that Sue broke her femur while jogging and has been ordered to stay off it after walking around on it for 2 weeks (or three).

.... that my children have spent a chunk of their evening watching "Amadeus". Voluntarily. As in, Normy turned it on...but they were entranced and didn't change the channel when we left the room.

.... that someone can use "totally fair and gives equal weight to all sides" when referring to someone who subs on the radio for Rush Limbaugh. Someone who would characterize himself as a Conservative (note the capital "C"). How far up your ass do you have to have your head to think someone that Rush would allow to sit in for him would be "fair and balanced"? Oh. I think I just answered my question....

.... there are actual human beings walking around among the rest of us who think that blood transfusions are akin to practicing witchcraft and devil worship. Of course, I (and other like minded folk) think it is more that they don't want to have non-white people blood coursing through their veins. Sherilyn says that explains her atheist ways....she had transfusions at birth. I think that's a hoot and a half. I totally think she should just say "Well, I DID have blood transfused at birth" when someone questions her on why she doesn't believe in God. Then watch their heads spin... (pun intended)

.... there are other human beings who say that being fingerprinted is The Mark of The Beast. Which makes me wonder.... if God gave Adam and Eve these fingerprints.... WHO'S mark is it, exactly??? I'm easily confused. Not being a Bible Literalist and all..... Cause dang if it doesn't sound like if God gave A&E the mark, and fingerprints are the Mark of the Beast.... Well, like I said... I'm easily confused.

.... Steph (I'm POSTING!!) thinks that having multiple containers of a variety of necessities is weird. On the contrary. NOT having them is weird. I mean, really. Who wants to be running to the store at 6am for more deodorant? Weird people, that's who.

.... Me. Who thinks she's actually gonna get all this Malabrigo knit up into their proper forms before the end of the year. Along with all the OTHER projects.

Thursday, October 20, 2005

"Nancy Needs"

Stealing content from The Great and Wonderful Cowtown Stacy....again.

Try this at home. Go to Google and type in "[your name] needs"...except without the brackets. Kinda like the title of this entry, except with your own name.

Nancy needs to make sure that her Mom understands Nancy's message. Well...yea. But if Nancy's mom doesn't understand the message, Nancy's mom always asks for clarification. So that's covered.

All Nancy needs is to wolf down a three-thousand calorie dessert and bring the silver. No. Nancy does not need to wolf down a 3000 calorie anything. But I can bring the silver...

Nancy wants Susan to pass her the kettle. Now this made me laugh. Cause Sue is always trying decide if she is the pot or the kettle and has pretty much decided that she is the kettle. Which makes me ask: "What did you say to Jen NOW, Sue??"

You calculated that Nancy needs 2097 kilocalories per day. She is receiving 3060 kilocalories per day. Therefore she is getting too many calories. Yea! See... one dessert and I'm over the limit.

All Nancy needs is a peanut butter sandwich, a box of crayons, and some paper to be happy. Yea...that will do it.

Nancy needs help choosing snake to breed. No. No she doesn't. Cause if she does, Nancy will need a divorce lawyer. (Dibs on Hal!)

Nancy needs to "bite the bullet" and let her boss know that, as a supervisor, she believes it is her obligation to work with Myra. Um. Ok....

Nancy needs the exact same hardware in both machines for the servers to work together. Um. Ok... Stupid Windows.....

There is to be a cookout, and Nancy needs to prepare
the campfire, which is a multi-step process.
I'm pretty sure that Nancy shalt not prepare any sort of campfire. But she can if she has to.

Nancy needs to wake up. I'm TRYING. It's barely noon.... give me a break.

Nancy needs to allow herself to be known. You mean there is someone out there that does NOT know me? How'd that happen?

And finally....

Nancy needs saving by George Clooney and wants to listen to Schubert, too. Well.... DUH!

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

Underwear

In an odd cosmic twist, I have discussed the merits of packing twice today.

You know.... packing of clothing for a trip.

Underpack and you are totally screwed when you realize you have a key flaw in your apparel. choices.

Overpack and you are lugging half your wardrobe across a continent.

But here is a bottom line (no pun intended) non-negotiable.... There shalt be no butt funk whilst traveling.

It's one thing to be a slug and pull on yesterdays clothing when you are alone at home. It is an all together different issue when you are out in some serious public. With strangers. With collegues. With friends. EVEN with family. Because no matter WHO you are with, you are in close quarters when you are traveling.

On an airplane. In a car. In a hotel room. In a cruise ship cubbyhole. In a meeting room. In someone ELSE'S living room.

Please people. Clean underwear out there, will ya?

Monday, October 17, 2005

That Was Fun

"That was fun."

"She was nice. I like her."

"And she's pretty!"

That would be Emma's summary of dinner with Steph. Maybe it is because Steph gave Emma a sign language name. Maybe it's because it WAS fun, she IS nice, we DO like her...and yes, she is pretty.

Emma and I just had plain ol' fun driving up Hwy 50.... until there was an accident that was going to have the highway closed for 2-3 hours right at Echo Summit. We were able to take an old road and get around it, thank goodness. Cause otherwise it would have been faster to go back to Sacramento and go up I-80!

We stopped for a potty break and snacks at the Raley's at the Y and stopped periodically as we drove around the lake for photos and lake looking at-ing.

Squaw Valley in fall colors was spectacular.

I told Steph that I've been to Tahoe maybe a handful of times in the winter. But I've spent many SUMMERS there. The Tahoe I know is a summer lake, summer foliage.

The only questions that remain are these....

Why do we stay away? Why are we not up there several times a year? Why do we let the jewel of the Sierras just 'be there' without us?

Oh. And Emma is now very impressed with herself. She now knows someone, other than Gramma, who lives in another state.

And she's pretty.....

Thursday, October 13, 2005

Mother In Law

My Mother In Law has a job. I would tell you what it is, but I may have to kill you if I do. I'm not sure. So.... I won't, just in case.

But this job takes her to exotic locations on occasion. San Francisco. Washington D.C. Mare Island. (might've heard about Mare Island today. Big fire there last night. Wine warehouse. Rare and expensive wines up in smoke....)

The Phillapines. Guam. Hawaii.

RARELY do we know of her leavings until perhaps a postcard arrives for a granddaughter. A small gift.... Or just "when I was in Guam last month..." We knew she was in Hawaii recently because when called on her birthday and asked "what are you going to do for your birthday" she said something about walking on the beach.

Ok. NOT in Reno.... check.

But evidence of a trip to Hawaii has been arriving. Yesterday it was a necklace for Emma.

Today, it was six cans of Mauna Loa Macadamia nuts.

Judy loves us.

Chocolate cookies with chopped macadamia nuts.....hmmmm.....

Evil Mother

That would be me. I am the Evil Mother.

I torture my poor child.

Made her (read= paid actual cash money) take a knitting lesson.

I did this evil thing because, well.... she wanted to learn to knit. And I'm sure not gonna teach her. Nor did she WANT me to "teach" her.

Do you want me to have Mrs. Bowen give you a lesson?

Yes.

So the Evil Mother arranged for said lesson and paid for said lesson.

Good thing Mrs. Bowen has a good sense of humor and four children of her own. Sulking through a lesson is poor form.

I had to FINALLY knock on the door and say "HEY! I'm PAYING for you to sit in there and pee!". The child came out, properly contrite.... and gunned another glass of water.

The irony here is she has NO OBJECTION to knitting. She does have an objection to purling....but I totally understand that. But she WANTS to create knitted objects. She just doesn't want to LEARN how to make that happen.

And I KNOW that if and when she ever gets that felted purse done and felted... she's gonna be so dang proud of herself and just love it.......

Monday, October 10, 2005

Opportunity Lost

Today, due to the fact that she is off track, Emma went with me to Tax Class. The promise of fast food for a mid-morning snack AND for lunch was too good to pass up. Yea. She won't be making THAT mistake again.....

Which is too bad. Because it didn't occur to me until too late, to put HER on the computers.

Today we took them SCREEN by SCREEN.

OMFSM..... if this one woman, who I will call "Jen", because that is her name, doesn't get behind EVEN WITH screen by screen instructions.

Enter zip code is the screen. The instruction given is: "enter in a zip code, doesn't matter for this". "What do I put here?" she asks. So I tell her "95624". "9.....5....6....2....4....?....?....?....?"

Yes. Dear FSM... YES.

"Is he blind?" He's a mechanic....what do you think?

"This W-2 doesn't have any allocated tips." Do you tip your mechanic? "No." Then that's probably why he doesn't have any allocated tips. (time passes) You need to press "enter" to go to the next question.

What you can't tell from this exchange, is that I had to tell her EVERY SINGLE TIME to "press enter" after EACH AND EVERY QUESTION.

Oh. And she had to hunt down that "Enter" key to boot.

It scares me to think she is a nurse.

Taxes ARE complicated.

Entering information into a database is not. And that's really what this is. ESPECIALLY at this stage of class.

Personal info: Name, SSN, Address
Income statements: W-2's, 1099-INT etc. It's just transfering the info from one place to the other. Fill in the blank.

And still...... DO NOT ENTER YOUR OWN SSN WHEN DOING SOMEONE'S TAX RETURN! They have one. Use that one.

I swear.... I could get Emma up to speed on doing basic returns in a week.

Schedule C? (self employment)

Schedule D? (capital gains and losses)

Schedule E? (If'n you have rental property)

I shudder to think.......

I think that even a Schedule A is gonna do some of them in.

If not them....me.

Everything Old is New Again

My grandmother and all her sisters (except Barbara and Elsie) are looking down from heaven (Barbara and Elsie are still of this Earth... not that they went someplace "not heaven....just wanted to be clear) and just shaking their heads.

They watched The Today Show Today with the rest of us.

You see.... They started potty training their babies at 6 months plus or minus. They were 12 of them. Four boys, Eight girls. I think. Dang if I can remember all the time.... (ask my cousin Lori, she knows). But when you have THAT MANY CHILDREN back in the day? You didn't have Huggies and you didn't have those fancy schmancy "nappy covers". You didn't even have rubber pants. Back in the day, if there WAS a diaper service, they didn't go out to the ranch. Or you called the diaper service "the big girls". So babies didn't walk around in diapers for three or four years.

My grandmother and her sisters had their babies pottied trained by the time they could walk.

Those babies, for the most part, did the same with their babies. Our generation totally failed our grandmothers.

But I would venture that most of us had our babies pottied trained before the national average.

Yes. This is PARENT LED potty training. Shocking, I know. It requires the PARENT to decide that "now is time". It's a good idea, really. Sets up your authority for the future. "It is time to go to school". Emma would still be in Miss Rose's preschool if her parents didn't lead her away and off to kindergarten.

No. No one goes to college still in diapers. But that doesn't mean the kid has to wear them until three days before kindergarten either.

It's a simple principle really. Start them as soon as they can sit up on their own (because toppling over isn't good for anyone) but before they can get up and walk away. Captive audience. It won't happen overnight. It won't happen in a week. It will take a year to get the child to the point that they can use the potty on his or her own and be pretty much accident free.

I had one child announce that she wanted to start using the potty. And from that point on, she did. She was barely two. Verbal little cuss she was too.... It was up to me to let the other child know it was time. And even tho' she was the ornery sort at the time, she complied. It took longer with her, several months (not the diapers yesterday, no diapers today or ever again day and night like her sister) but she was fully potty trained by 2 and a half.

It just slays me to see three year olds say "I need a new diaper". If they can know they need a new diaper, they can know they need to get to the potty. But the parents say "He doesn't want to". WTF? He's not gonna want to take out the trash or do his homework EITHER. Step up and be a parent.

The Denny sisters are looking down and just shaking their heads. Probably squabbling about who had to change or wash the most sibling diapers too. They were a great bunch of women. For so many reasons. Grammy died when I was 6. I wish I knew her when my own was 6. But my sister and I were adopted by the rest as their own granddaughters. My girls may have been in diapers WAY too long... but I hope I make them proud.

Tuesday, October 04, 2005

Randomness

A series of random thoughts....


Ok. So people DO read this thing.

*****

There is really nothing new in tax class. There is still a stunning number of people (defined as >0) who do not know how to operate a computer when the instruction is "put in the social security number and then hit "enter" "

It is still true that NO MATTER how many times you say "The Social Security Number is the single most important piece of information you must enter." there is still a stunning number of people (see above definition) who will wonder why they can't get past the "enter SSN" screen and argue with you when you say "because you didn't enter it in correctly". Damn if it ain't the case EVERY DAMN TIME. No. It is not the program. The program is FINE. It is keyboard to chair interface error.

It is still true that every class will have someone with two brain cells and that person will rub them together, generate some heat and get what you are saying in 1.3 seconds. You will know them by the bruise on the forehead from pounding their head against said keyboard while waiting for you to say "NO. You have to LOOK at the social security number in and enter EXACTLY THE SAME WAY both times the program asks for it" for the 12th time to the same person.

Yes. It must be entered the SAME both times.

Really.

NO LIE.

Why would I lie about that??? What would be my motive???

******

Dye lots matter.

******

Unless it's a "design element".

******

I should care that my workroom is a disaster. But I don't. I think that means I don't care about the business that is supposed to be conducted out of that room. But I knew THAT. C'est la vie.....

*****

I don't care about baseball playoff. I won't care until the CALIFORNIA ANGELS (and in a pinch, Anaheim Angels) win the pennant. Then I MIGHT.

*****

Basketball starts soon. I REALLY don't care about that. Again...until the Kings are in the hunt, I won't.

*****

Sir Paul puts on a fine show. Counting down to November....

*****

I don't watch Presidential Press Conferences. They make my brain hurt. Unfortunately, I miss out on all the good quotes that way too.....

*****

The shoes are gone. Both locations.

*****

Sometime this week, probably tomorrow, DHL will deliver very large feed bags of yarn from Uruguay to Knitique. We have 8 more in our order still due to arrive. I both dread and look forward to this occurance. It's Malabrigo and it is 215 yards of the most wonderfully soft wool yarn. It is kettle dyed and so the variations in each skein make for wonderful patterns in your work. It is fabulous felted. Just gorgeous. I think we have 40? 50? different colors coming in. That's the dread part.... I gotta find a place for all of it!

*****

I had my "annual"..or semi-annual..or has it been three? ... dermatalogical examination. Doc decided four spots needed closer examination. Which means I have been wildly itchy on the four small spots that got scraped off. Two she thought looked 'funny' cause of where they were (right where my collar rubs) but took 'em off anyway. All were funny. But only one needs more attention. That happens Dec. 6. Once again... only in the 'blast zone'. Oh well..... small price to pay, all in all. My moles still make Doc crazed. But they don't change so she leaves them be.

*****

Being grounded sucks. My children are just starting to REALLY embrace that idea. And if they don't.... I'm tougher than they are. And I care WAY less about their social lives than they do.

*****

It is October. Again. REALLY starting to not like that month. Not only for the above mentioned tax class, but because Halloween is at the end. This year, we are invited to a COSTUME party. Ugh. I have an aversion to spending mega bucks (that I really don't have to begin with) on something that will be worn for a couple of hours. Emma has expressed an interest in being a "Dead Cheerleader". Kaitlyn was a "Dead Prom Queen" last year? Year before? My children are freaks. Normy and I have to come up with a "couple's costume". Hmph. Then I have to spend a bunch of scratch on candy. Pumpkin carving.

Ugh.

Halloween is definitely the most not looked forward to holiday.

*****

Thanksgiving will be next. Excellent. I make a GREAT turkey and stuffing.

*****

It really sucks to be several states away when your friends are hurting and are in need. I hate that. I need to learn to fly and buy myself a Cessna. Then I could just GO and take someone out to coffee (and make her get dressed) or take another's kidlets to the park for a few hours to get them out of the house (so she can nap in peace).

*****

Customer service in my world is a given. I give it. I get it. MOST places I go and all places I work, give great customer service. The customer isn't always right, but the customer can always be made happy. Unless they are hopeless cases and then it doesn't matter. So it is always a shock to the system when we encounter BAD customer service. Hint: If you order equipment from DISH Network...ASK what cables are needed, KNOW what you HAVE and make sure you'll get what you need and not what you HAVE.

*****

Finally.... in case you were wondering.... the "enter" key? It's the big one on the right that says "enter". In addition, there is NO key that says "Any" so quit looking for it and just hit the "G".