Points & counterpoints
I get excited when: I see a newspaper in the men's room.
I get sad when: I see it's the business section.
I get excited when: It's warm enough to wear shorts & flip-flops.
I get sad when: The next day, it's so cold that a sweater's insufficient.
I get excited when: I wake up early without an alarm.
I get sad when: I still don't make it to work at a reasonable hour. (Not as true today)
I get excited when: I eat healthily.
I get sad when: That plan backfires.
I get excited when: I expect a free lunch.
I get sad when: I find out after coming to the office that I will not get one.
I get excited when: I (re?)find a new place/route to drive.
I get sad when: I think about how the way I drive there is rather unsafe and definitely dangerous to anybody who could be biking along there, e.g. me.
I get excited when: I think about the work I have to do.
I get sad when: I think about the work I have to do.
The world continued to be weird last week. Lots of changes in the social world. On Tuesday after a much-needed haircut, I helped a stranger in need. The scenario's almost too complicated to explain, but maybe this is sufficient: I was stuck in traffic along that bit of E Henrietta betw. Mt Hope & South. There was a traffic jam because of an accident or something up at Westfall. In the right lane there was a minivan (late 80s Chrysler) parked. Parked, I say. No blinkers, no drivers, not on. Parked. At first I didn't know of the situation ahead because I couldn't see that far. But I saw a Brighton cop coming down South Ave (at the crawling speed of the traffic) and I FIGURED he was going to deal with this minivan. But no! We, the traffic, poked ahead, ignoring the light and a variety of laws. It was a nice day, so I rolled my back windows down & cranked the Savage Love podcast. At that moment, the driver of the van happened to be getting into her vehicle. I gave her a slight nod, the nod you give strangers to let them know that you just happened to be looking at them, you're not being creepy. She nodded back, then I heard a voice from my rear passenger window. "Excuse me, do you have jumper cables?" "I think so." I had done a massive trunk clean-out for recruitment weekend's Thai purchasing, but I was pretty sure I'd left them there. I maneuvered in front of her without much trouble: everybody was in the left lane, even though they eventually ended up in the right to be funneled away from the troubled intersection. From there, it was evident that a guy in a late model 2-door Honda had pulled up onto the sidewalk/curb to help her out. He asked how I was doing today, fine fine. Friendly, but I often get a little weirded out when strangers ask that. (Oh, Baltimore!) My trunk did indeed contain jumper cables, as when I'd cleaned it, I considered removing them, then thought better. Good thing, eh?? I was surprised that neither he nor the minivan lady carried them. It was unclear whether they knew each other. I told Mr. Honda "I hope you know how to do this, because I never remember what to do." He took the cables & confidently started attaching them. I questioned, mostly silently but also out loud sometimes, every step he did, because in my head the schema is something like:
Car1 is running, Car2 is dead.
Attach both clips to Car1
Attach red clip? to Car2's battery
Attach black clip? to Car2's frame/"engine block"
Turn key on Car2, hope it starts.
If it doesn't, keep Car1 running, give it some gas
Repeat "Turn key" step
etc.
He attached both clips to both batteries, and I don't remember if there was an order to it. I asked about attaching it to the frame, and he replied "You only do that if you can't find a ground." Uh, what? Aren't the red & black positive & negative? (God, I don't even remember which is which. I hate myself.) The worst case scenario I kept envisioning was jumper cables, well, jumping off the batteries and hitting me in the face. Not my precious face! It all turned out fine, but ehow agrees with me that this guy was doing some wonky stuff. Then I went to the Chinese grocery store, which had some delightful/terrifying possible health code violations. And great great deals.
I've been having fun with Google Documents recently. Sometimes starting a document natively is a little frustrating with the automatic line spacing after header styles, but I'm finding it quite useful.
re: Regina Spektor "I never knew there were so many syllables in the word heart before." - Scott Regan, WRUR
In my head recently:
"On The Radio" by RS
"Mambo Italiano" - Don't even ask.
"Daydream Believer" by the Monkees - I've been replacing the words Daydream Believer with Black Bean Burrito).
This weekend: Amerks game, Home Depot (It's been too long, my love!), some spring cleaning, some spring fun. Pictures will be up on flickr soon of recent compost fun & last night's late night project in my kitchen which will be fully revealed tomorrow, as long as it doesn't suck bad. It involves my small motor skills.
Waiting for the morning round of stimulation to hit me. Yawn. No dice.
LOST tonight at my house, anyone? It's oh-so-quiet around here, except for Vik's typing.
I will spend my afternoon deciding on conference funding for UR students. Uh, I have power? WTF?
Last week, I got a phone call from an Unrestricted number. This is usually one of my parents from the office. It was Verizon, offering me my 2-year new phone & contract renewal. I'll renew gladly, but didn't want to choose a phone OVER the phone without any research. I asked if I could do it in stores, and the telemarketer/staffer/what'stheterm told me that if I did this in a store, I would have to pay for the phone. Huh? Has anybody else dealt with this? I told her to give me a call at 3 PM on Friday. I had my phone off then in a meeting, but nobody left a voice mail and nobody's called since. Now I've narrowed my phone down to 3 choices and I can't decide if I should call Verizon back to deal with this, or go to a store to ask. Ahh, pressure! (I figure that 2 years from now, I'll still be in Rochester & Verizon'll still be the best carrier to choose. And by that, I mean a lot like the CowboyNeal option.) Do I want Bluetooth? Will I use it for anything? Are either of my computers already Bluetooth-equipped, or would I have to drop a little more bank into making them so? Why isn't mobile web included in these too-expensive-already plans? Why isn't everything free?
In other growing-up news, I want to find a decent, convenient dry cleaner. Preferably an organic one. Challenges: It's Rochester, I'm lazy, and I don't know what are reasonable prices. Would that there was like a gasbuddy for dry cleaning. RocWiki has very little on dry cleaning. I did a quick web search yesterday with null results, except that I might want a CO2 cleaner and I don't know how to find one. I hate the web these days. suomifrikki, any leads?
New/refound comic love: Dinosaur Comics on Qwantz. Today's hits hard, and I feel T-Rex's pain, except that I don't let typos get out from my fingers. That said, I want to replace both of the keyboards in my life. My iMac keyboard is mostly gacked up with my own filth, but might just be aging. I could buy a new Apple kb, I could use one of the 3ish spares I see lying around in my rooms, or I could do a little legwork & find a replacement I like. Shrug. My laptop's keyboard is doing god only knows what again/still/farther, and I just know that it'll cost an arm and a leg to get it even looked at.
I get sad when: I see it's the business section.
I get excited when: It's warm enough to wear shorts & flip-flops.
I get sad when: The next day, it's so cold that a sweater's insufficient.
I get excited when: I wake up early without an alarm.
I get sad when: I still don't make it to work at a reasonable hour. (Not as true today)
I get excited when: I eat healthily.
I get sad when: That plan backfires.
I get excited when: I expect a free lunch.
I get sad when: I find out after coming to the office that I will not get one.
I get excited when: I (re?)find a new place/route to drive.
I get sad when: I think about how the way I drive there is rather unsafe and definitely dangerous to anybody who could be biking along there, e.g. me.
I get excited when: I think about the work I have to do.
I get sad when: I think about the work I have to do.
The world continued to be weird last week. Lots of changes in the social world. On Tuesday after a much-needed haircut, I helped a stranger in need. The scenario's almost too complicated to explain, but maybe this is sufficient: I was stuck in traffic along that bit of E Henrietta betw. Mt Hope & South. There was a traffic jam because of an accident or something up at Westfall. In the right lane there was a minivan (late 80s Chrysler) parked. Parked, I say. No blinkers, no drivers, not on. Parked. At first I didn't know of the situation ahead because I couldn't see that far. But I saw a Brighton cop coming down South Ave (at the crawling speed of the traffic) and I FIGURED he was going to deal with this minivan. But no! We, the traffic, poked ahead, ignoring the light and a variety of laws. It was a nice day, so I rolled my back windows down & cranked the Savage Love podcast. At that moment, the driver of the van happened to be getting into her vehicle. I gave her a slight nod, the nod you give strangers to let them know that you just happened to be looking at them, you're not being creepy. She nodded back, then I heard a voice from my rear passenger window. "Excuse me, do you have jumper cables?" "I think so." I had done a massive trunk clean-out for recruitment weekend's Thai purchasing, but I was pretty sure I'd left them there. I maneuvered in front of her without much trouble: everybody was in the left lane, even though they eventually ended up in the right to be funneled away from the troubled intersection. From there, it was evident that a guy in a late model 2-door Honda had pulled up onto the sidewalk/curb to help her out. He asked how I was doing today, fine fine. Friendly, but I often get a little weirded out when strangers ask that. (Oh, Baltimore!) My trunk did indeed contain jumper cables, as when I'd cleaned it, I considered removing them, then thought better. Good thing, eh?? I was surprised that neither he nor the minivan lady carried them. It was unclear whether they knew each other. I told Mr. Honda "I hope you know how to do this, because I never remember what to do." He took the cables & confidently started attaching them. I questioned, mostly silently but also out loud sometimes, every step he did, because in my head the schema is something like:
Car1 is running, Car2 is dead.
Attach both clips to Car1
Attach red clip? to Car2's battery
Attach black clip? to Car2's frame/"engine block"
Turn key on Car2, hope it starts.
If it doesn't, keep Car1 running, give it some gas
Repeat "Turn key" step
etc.
He attached both clips to both batteries, and I don't remember if there was an order to it. I asked about attaching it to the frame, and he replied "You only do that if you can't find a ground." Uh, what? Aren't the red & black positive & negative? (God, I don't even remember which is which. I hate myself.) The worst case scenario I kept envisioning was jumper cables, well, jumping off the batteries and hitting me in the face. Not my precious face! It all turned out fine, but ehow agrees with me that this guy was doing some wonky stuff. Then I went to the Chinese grocery store, which had some delightful/terrifying possible health code violations. And great great deals.
I've been having fun with Google Documents recently. Sometimes starting a document natively is a little frustrating with the automatic line spacing after header styles, but I'm finding it quite useful.
re: Regina Spektor "I never knew there were so many syllables in the word heart before." - Scott Regan, WRUR
In my head recently:
"On The Radio" by RS
"Mambo Italiano" - Don't even ask.
"Daydream Believer" by the Monkees - I've been replacing the words Daydream Believer with Black Bean Burrito).
This weekend: Amerks game, Home Depot (It's been too long, my love!), some spring cleaning, some spring fun. Pictures will be up on flickr soon of recent compost fun & last night's late night project in my kitchen which will be fully revealed tomorrow, as long as it doesn't suck bad. It involves my small motor skills.
Waiting for the morning round of stimulation to hit me. Yawn. No dice.
LOST tonight at my house, anyone? It's oh-so-quiet around here, except for Vik's typing.
I will spend my afternoon deciding on conference funding for UR students. Uh, I have power? WTF?
Last week, I got a phone call from an Unrestricted number. This is usually one of my parents from the office. It was Verizon, offering me my 2-year new phone & contract renewal. I'll renew gladly, but didn't want to choose a phone OVER the phone without any research. I asked if I could do it in stores, and the telemarketer/staffer/what'stheterm told me that if I did this in a store, I would have to pay for the phone. Huh? Has anybody else dealt with this? I told her to give me a call at 3 PM on Friday. I had my phone off then in a meeting, but nobody left a voice mail and nobody's called since. Now I've narrowed my phone down to 3 choices and I can't decide if I should call Verizon back to deal with this, or go to a store to ask. Ahh, pressure! (I figure that 2 years from now, I'll still be in Rochester & Verizon'll still be the best carrier to choose. And by that, I mean a lot like the CowboyNeal option.) Do I want Bluetooth? Will I use it for anything? Are either of my computers already Bluetooth-equipped, or would I have to drop a little more bank into making them so? Why isn't mobile web included in these too-expensive-already plans? Why isn't everything free?
In other growing-up news, I want to find a decent, convenient dry cleaner. Preferably an organic one. Challenges: It's Rochester, I'm lazy, and I don't know what are reasonable prices. Would that there was like a gasbuddy for dry cleaning. RocWiki has very little on dry cleaning. I did a quick web search yesterday with null results, except that I might want a CO2 cleaner and I don't know how to find one. I hate the web these days. suomifrikki, any leads?
New/refound comic love: Dinosaur Comics on Qwantz. Today's hits hard, and I feel T-Rex's pain, except that I don't let typos get out from my fingers. That said, I want to replace both of the keyboards in my life. My iMac keyboard is mostly gacked up with my own filth, but might just be aging. I could buy a new Apple kb, I could use one of the 3ish spares I see lying around in my rooms, or I could do a little legwork & find a replacement I like. Shrug. My laptop's keyboard is doing god only knows what again/still/farther, and I just know that it'll cost an arm and a leg to get it even looked at.