1 – Yesterday, as I was pulling out of the parking lot of my office building, I noticed that the car in front of me had a vanity license plate. It said “Sweti” which I think was supposed to mean “Sweetie” but really ends up looking like “Sweaty.” Methinks the driver of said car didn’t necessarily think that idea through quite enough.
2 – My knee makes this really gross crinkle crackle noise when I bend it. It’s done that for a really long time, like over a year, but is only just now starting to hurt. Everyone that’s heard it seems to think I need to go to the doctor. I think I’ll take some flaxseed oil and glucosamine and see what’s what. I probably shouldn’t start training for that half marathon I want to run either. It’s only one little knee, right? I have another one!
3 – Violet is quickly becoming the most argumentative member of our household. I swear, I could say “The sky is blue” and she would argue with me about how wrong I am. This is very annoying to someone like me who clearly knows everything about everything. She’s also starting to act all angsty all the time, which is also fun. I do not really like this age, I must say. Nope, not at all.
4 – I am now annoyed because Mr. Chick just called me and is going to be working late tonight executing a search warrant, when we are supposed to be out buying a grill. This might not seem like a big deal, but we are hosting a cookout tomorrow and I threw our old grill away yesterday. Stupid criminals are cramping my style. Quit stealing and get a job, jeez.
5 – I got an email from Lily’s teacher today. Apparently, there is a head lice outbreak in the 3rd grade. A head lice check is an excellent way to start the weekend. I’m looking forward to it immensely. I’m choosing to look on the bright side and be happy that at least there's no soccer tournament this weekend.
Lovely weekend wishes to all!
Friday, January 29, 2010
Thursday, January 28, 2010
It's All Fun and Games Until Mother Chick Rips Your Head Off
Seriously, what is with kids today? Violet called me at work today and was in tears at the after school program. A boy was hitting and pushing her AND calling her a bitch. WTF?
After I popped a vein in my eyeball from the rage, I tore ass out of work and was at school in less than 1o minutes. Luckily, I was wearing my chunky heeled bitch boots, so the counselors could hear me marching up to the school from at least a mile away. It was quite the entrance. I actually felt a little sorry for the counselor when I walked in because she looked pretty scared. Not sorry enough to spare her my wrath though, because there were several problems with today's incident:
1 - Violet called us from her cell phone to report what was going on. In my opinion, a counselor or program director should have called to speak to me. They never did and that's not cool.
2 - Apparently this boy had been pushing and hitting not just Violet but several other kids, several times over the course of several hours. When I asked Violet where the counselors were, she said they were busy playing football. I get that part of their job is to play with the kids, but they are also supposed to supervise them to make sure these kinds of things don't happen, or to stop them quickly when they do.
3 - When I questioned the counselors on what happened, they had no idea that he had actually hit and pushed Violet. Because they didn't realize that he had actual put his hands on my child (because he clearly wants me to remove his eyeballs through his nostrils), they didn't suspend him from the program and send him home. So, they didn't see what happened because they weren't watching, then they didn't research thoroughly enough to get a clear understanding of what actually occurred. As a result, I had to take my kid home to remove her from the situation. What's wrong with that picture?
I definitely have some follow up work to do here, and I will. Part of me wonders if I did the right thing by taking Violet home, because she needs to learn to deal with some of this stuff on her own. I really don't think this was one of those times, though. I wanted her to feel supported and safe and to know that if she is in a situation where she feels threatened, I will do everything in my power to help her. And that it is never okay for someone to treat her like that.
Violet did tell me later that she said to the boy when he hit her "Are your parents proud of you when you act like that?" To which I said, "That was a really good thing to say." while thinking "Next time though, punch him in the mouth."
After I popped a vein in my eyeball from the rage, I tore ass out of work and was at school in less than 1o minutes. Luckily, I was wearing my chunky heeled bitch boots, so the counselors could hear me marching up to the school from at least a mile away. It was quite the entrance. I actually felt a little sorry for the counselor when I walked in because she looked pretty scared. Not sorry enough to spare her my wrath though, because there were several problems with today's incident:
1 - Violet called us from her cell phone to report what was going on. In my opinion, a counselor or program director should have called to speak to me. They never did and that's not cool.
2 - Apparently this boy had been pushing and hitting not just Violet but several other kids, several times over the course of several hours. When I asked Violet where the counselors were, she said they were busy playing football. I get that part of their job is to play with the kids, but they are also supposed to supervise them to make sure these kinds of things don't happen, or to stop them quickly when they do.
3 - When I questioned the counselors on what happened, they had no idea that he had actually hit and pushed Violet. Because they didn't realize that he had actual put his hands on my child (because he clearly wants me to remove his eyeballs through his nostrils), they didn't suspend him from the program and send him home. So, they didn't see what happened because they weren't watching, then they didn't research thoroughly enough to get a clear understanding of what actually occurred. As a result, I had to take my kid home to remove her from the situation. What's wrong with that picture?
I definitely have some follow up work to do here, and I will. Part of me wonders if I did the right thing by taking Violet home, because she needs to learn to deal with some of this stuff on her own. I really don't think this was one of those times, though. I wanted her to feel supported and safe and to know that if she is in a situation where she feels threatened, I will do everything in my power to help her. And that it is never okay for someone to treat her like that.
Violet did tell me later that she said to the boy when he hit her "Are your parents proud of you when you act like that?" To which I said, "That was a really good thing to say." while thinking "Next time though, punch him in the mouth."
Tuesday, January 26, 2010
Doing My Part for Global Diplomacy
The company that I work for is actually pretty big. As in global. In my office alone, we have a fairly large contingent of Ukrainian computer programmers and let me tell you, you have not lived until you've listened to two Ukrainian men argue in Slavic over who forgot to refill the coffeepot after pouring the last cup. Those Ukrainians, they love their coffee fiercely.
Anyway, we sometimes have visitors to our office from our other locations around the world. Today a visitor from one of our Chinese offices, whom we'll call Lisa (did you know that the Chinese all adopt American sounding names for business purposes because they are easier to pronounce? I think this is kind of sad, actually), arrived for a month-long project. Having been pre-selected as the office ambassador prior to Lisa's arrival, the tasks of showing her around the office and taking her out to dinner after work fell to me.
Early in the day, I did some last minute research on Chinese culture to ensure that I didn't do anything to inadvertently offend her. Number one on the list of "Don't Do This To A Chinese Person" was touching. Apparently, the Chinese dislike being touched by strangers. Chinese people and I have that in common, actually. Interestingly enough, when Lisa arrived, the first thing she did was hug me.
My research also said the Chinese don't like to use the word no. If you ask a question they will respond with "Maybe" even if the answer is really no. My research instructed me to do the same, so as not to appear rude. At one point, Lisa asked me if the bathroom was "that way" and pointed in the wrong direction. When I said "Maybe" and pointed the other way, she looked at me like I was maybe smoking a little of the crack.
At dinner, Lisa asked me what I like to do for fun. When I mentioned my daughters and their various extracurricular activities, she said "Oh, you don't look old enough to have a baby, even if you have at age twenty. I am twenty six and have no babies." This is when I remembered that my research also said that I should be prepared to answer personal questions that I might think are inappropriate, and to be vague but polite.
When Lisa asked, "You will have more babies, yes?" I thought to myself "Hell to the no" but instead just laughed and and answered "I don't know...maybe?"
Anyway, we sometimes have visitors to our office from our other locations around the world. Today a visitor from one of our Chinese offices, whom we'll call Lisa (did you know that the Chinese all adopt American sounding names for business purposes because they are easier to pronounce? I think this is kind of sad, actually), arrived for a month-long project. Having been pre-selected as the office ambassador prior to Lisa's arrival, the tasks of showing her around the office and taking her out to dinner after work fell to me.
Early in the day, I did some last minute research on Chinese culture to ensure that I didn't do anything to inadvertently offend her. Number one on the list of "Don't Do This To A Chinese Person" was touching. Apparently, the Chinese dislike being touched by strangers. Chinese people and I have that in common, actually. Interestingly enough, when Lisa arrived, the first thing she did was hug me.
My research also said the Chinese don't like to use the word no. If you ask a question they will respond with "Maybe" even if the answer is really no. My research instructed me to do the same, so as not to appear rude. At one point, Lisa asked me if the bathroom was "that way" and pointed in the wrong direction. When I said "Maybe" and pointed the other way, she looked at me like I was maybe smoking a little of the crack.
At dinner, Lisa asked me what I like to do for fun. When I mentioned my daughters and their various extracurricular activities, she said "Oh, you don't look old enough to have a baby, even if you have at age twenty. I am twenty six and have no babies." This is when I remembered that my research also said that I should be prepared to answer personal questions that I might think are inappropriate, and to be vague but polite.
When Lisa asked, "You will have more babies, yes?" I thought to myself "Hell to the no" but instead just laughed and and answered "I don't know...maybe?"
Monday, January 25, 2010
On Comments
There was an interesting discussion on Studio Thirty Plus the other day on blog comments. The question posed was about whether or not you, as a blogger, respond to comments and if so, how? Do you reply back in the comment thread? Email back? Something else?
I found it interesting that some people said they respond to comments within the actual comment thread itself. I've never thought to do this. I guess it's because of how I visit and comment on blogs. I leave comments but don't actually go back to check and see if they were responded to. I suppose I automatically assumed others operated this same way. Now I'm wondering if I've been doing it wrong.
Once upon a time, I had a different blog for two plus years, and received my fair share of comments on it. At the time, I read a lot of blogs and commented on a few fairly regularly. This was before blogging became hugely ridiculously popular, so there really wasn't a Comment Code of Ethics. Also, I was probably just a selfish whorebag who thought everything I had to say was beyond interesting, so of course the masses would read and respond.
These days, if someone is kind enough to visit and leave a comment here, I return the favor by visiting and commenting on their blog. I actually like this method, because I find a lot of great blogs this way. Of course, I also comment on other blogs too, if I have something to say. If I read a blog and don't comment, most likely I have nothing interesting to say that day. But if it's a blog I read regularly, I'll most likely comment at some point.
Others still said they reply to comments directly via email. I've actually experienced this recently. I've read Cecily at Uppercase Woman for years, but also hadn't commented in many years. Cecily has what I consider to be a huge audience and yet, I've commented on her blog twice in the last couple of weeks and both times, she responded back to me directly, via email. It was almost like getting an email from the President. Or maybe the First Lady. Or Whitney Houston. Oh wait, that bitch never writes anyone back (Check out my 100 things list if you are dying to figure out what I mean by that, #79 to be exact).
Anyway, I thought it was pretty classy for someone with such a wide readership to take the time to respond individually. Nonetheless, I'll probably keep on keeping on just as I have been, but I'm interested in the thoughts of others on this subject (all 9 of you who read this thing, anyway).
So, if you have a blog, how do you handle comments? Do you appreciate reciprocal comments or individual responses to the comments you leave? Along the same lines, if you read blogs and don't comment, why is that?
I found it interesting that some people said they respond to comments within the actual comment thread itself. I've never thought to do this. I guess it's because of how I visit and comment on blogs. I leave comments but don't actually go back to check and see if they were responded to. I suppose I automatically assumed others operated this same way. Now I'm wondering if I've been doing it wrong.
Once upon a time, I had a different blog for two plus years, and received my fair share of comments on it. At the time, I read a lot of blogs and commented on a few fairly regularly. This was before blogging became hugely ridiculously popular, so there really wasn't a Comment Code of Ethics. Also, I was probably just a selfish whorebag who thought everything I had to say was beyond interesting, so of course the masses would read and respond.
These days, if someone is kind enough to visit and leave a comment here, I return the favor by visiting and commenting on their blog. I actually like this method, because I find a lot of great blogs this way. Of course, I also comment on other blogs too, if I have something to say. If I read a blog and don't comment, most likely I have nothing interesting to say that day. But if it's a blog I read regularly, I'll most likely comment at some point.
Others still said they reply to comments directly via email. I've actually experienced this recently. I've read Cecily at Uppercase Woman for years, but also hadn't commented in many years. Cecily has what I consider to be a huge audience and yet, I've commented on her blog twice in the last couple of weeks and both times, she responded back to me directly, via email. It was almost like getting an email from the President. Or maybe the First Lady. Or Whitney Houston. Oh wait, that bitch never writes anyone back (Check out my 100 things list if you are dying to figure out what I mean by that, #79 to be exact).
Anyway, I thought it was pretty classy for someone with such a wide readership to take the time to respond individually. Nonetheless, I'll probably keep on keeping on just as I have been, but I'm interested in the thoughts of others on this subject (all 9 of you who read this thing, anyway).
So, if you have a blog, how do you handle comments? Do you appreciate reciprocal comments or individual responses to the comments you leave? Along the same lines, if you read blogs and don't comment, why is that?
Friday, January 22, 2010
Random Friday Thoughts
1. People constantly amaze me with their aptitude for laziness. Example: The elevators in my office building break ALL. THE. TIME. The last time one broke down, it actually fell a couple of floors with someone inside. Luckily they weren't hurt, but the fire department had to come, there was a crowd gathered, it was all very dramatic. The elevators were out of commission completely for several days after that and I decided that since I rather like being an able-bodied individual, I'd be just fine taking the stairs every day. Our building is only five floors, so this it totally doable. I've heard tell that since the "incident" the elevators make a terrible clicking noise and shudder and hesitate when reaching a floor. I find it fascinating that some people still voluntarily board the Elevators 'O Certain Death on a daily basis. When I walked past the elevator bank this morning, some guy was holding the door for me. 'You sure?' he asked, when I said I was taking the stairs. Yep, I'm sure.
2. I've felt all day like I have a sneeze stuck that won't come out. Except, I've sneezed about a thousand times and I still have the stuck sneezeness going on. Is annoying, in case you were wondering.
3. Violet is going out of town with a friend tonight, for the first time ever, for THREE WHOLE NIGHTS. I'm a little freaked out. May need to drink heavily this weekend. Not that that's out of the ordinary or anything.
4. Serioulsy, what is with people? One of my employees resigned and today was her last day. So of course, she left at lunch time to get a sandwich and never came back. It must have been a really good sandwich. Loser.
5. Why am I again not looking forward to this weekend? Oh, that's right. Another all weekend soccer tournament. For the second weekend in a row. Excellent.
Lovely weekend wishes to all!
2. I've felt all day like I have a sneeze stuck that won't come out. Except, I've sneezed about a thousand times and I still have the stuck sneezeness going on. Is annoying, in case you were wondering.
3. Violet is going out of town with a friend tonight, for the first time ever, for THREE WHOLE NIGHTS. I'm a little freaked out. May need to drink heavily this weekend. Not that that's out of the ordinary or anything.
4. Serioulsy, what is with people? One of my employees resigned and today was her last day. So of course, she left at lunch time to get a sandwich and never came back. It must have been a really good sandwich. Loser.
5. Why am I again not looking forward to this weekend? Oh, that's right. Another all weekend soccer tournament. For the second weekend in a row. Excellent.
Lovely weekend wishes to all!
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
She Is Definitely Her Mother's Daughter
Oh, Lily. That kid kills me. She has such a spirit and I love that but man, she tries me sometimes.
Example:
Scene: Lily has just done something mean to Violet for the 100th time.
Mother Chick: "Hey! Go to your room."
Lily: "I wanted to go there anyway, see you later." Happily skips off to bedroom.
(END SCENE)
OR
Scene: Lily has just done something mean to Violet for the 1000th time.
Mother Chick: "Hey! Give me your DS for that."
Lily: "Here, I was done playing anyway." Hands over DS without batting an eye.
(END SCENE)
See what I mean?
What's that saying? What doesn't kill me makes me stronger? I think it's more like "What doesn't kill me still makes we want to drink a lot of wine."
Yep, that's definitely it.
Example:
Scene: Lily has just done something mean to Violet for the 100th time.
Mother Chick: "Hey! Go to your room."
Lily: "I wanted to go there anyway, see you later." Happily skips off to bedroom.
(END SCENE)
OR
Scene: Lily has just done something mean to Violet for the 1000th time.
Mother Chick: "Hey! Give me your DS for that."
Lily: "Here, I was done playing anyway." Hands over DS without batting an eye.
(END SCENE)
See what I mean?
What's that saying? What doesn't kill me makes me stronger? I think it's more like "What doesn't kill me still makes we want to drink a lot of wine."
Yep, that's definitely it.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Random Friday Thoughts
1. Does it make me a bad person because I’m secretly (well, maybe not that secretly) happy that Violet made first cuts for the school soccer team and Ringleader from the infamous Mean Girl Incident did not? Granted, I don’t really care if it makes me a bad person as it’s simple, really. Mess with my kid, and I will want to rip your face off. I won’t actually rip your face off, but I will be happy that karma is in fact, a beyotch (like Ringleader!), and you got what you deserve. Which in this case, I am. Happy, that is.
2. Why is Smart Food White Cheddar popcorn so darn tasty? Mmm, popcorn…nom nom nom.
3. Why do my dog’s feet always smell like Fritos? Not that I sniff her feet on a regular basis, but she’s jabbed a paw in my face a time or two when she would like some attention (yes, she’s a spoiled brat) and it never fails, Eau de Frito-Lay.
4. I wonder if it’s a bad thing that on January 15th, I’m drinking a can of Diet Coke that’s advertising Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios. Stupid vending machine guy and his stupid old soda. Can you get old soda poisoning? I guess we’ll find out, because I didn’t notice until the can was empty. If you don’t hear from me after this, it’s because I died of old soda poisoning. At least there is now record of it on the internets, so my family can file a big lawsuit. I feel faint…
5. How is it possible to not be that glad that it’s the weekend? Oh, right, an all weekend soccer tournament will do it every time. Games start at 6:00 PM tonight all the way through Sunday. Good times.
Lovely weekend wishes to all!
2. Why is Smart Food White Cheddar popcorn so darn tasty? Mmm, popcorn…nom nom nom.
3. Why do my dog’s feet always smell like Fritos? Not that I sniff her feet on a regular basis, but she’s jabbed a paw in my face a time or two when she would like some attention (yes, she’s a spoiled brat) and it never fails, Eau de Frito-Lay.
4. I wonder if it’s a bad thing that on January 15th, I’m drinking a can of Diet Coke that’s advertising Halloween Horror Nights at Universal Studios. Stupid vending machine guy and his stupid old soda. Can you get old soda poisoning? I guess we’ll find out, because I didn’t notice until the can was empty. If you don’t hear from me after this, it’s because I died of old soda poisoning. At least there is now record of it on the internets, so my family can file a big lawsuit. I feel faint…
5. How is it possible to not be that glad that it’s the weekend? Oh, right, an all weekend soccer tournament will do it every time. Games start at 6:00 PM tonight all the way through Sunday. Good times.
Lovely weekend wishes to all!
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