Alpaca, And Camel, And Musk Ox, And Yak, And Algae! Oh My! – A Fibrous MMP

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
161

Dottie - Altruism aside, I think (if I may throw my 2¢ on the pile) that it’s a bad idea. It’s one thing to help out here and there, with errands and babysitting, but to become a full time nanny when you aren’t even sure about your own maternal instincts, is a headache waiting to happen. It will surely cause a rift between you and your friend, maybe not right away, but it will. I foresee her sumping the child with you while she goes off to do whatever. You don’t ned to sacrefice your life at your age. She has to take responsibilty for her indescretion and if her parents aren’t willig to help her, there are agencies that will.

Also, you probably told us a while ago, but I’ve forgotten; why are you living in a corner of an unfinished basement in your own house? That does not sound good.

162

Surely you jest!

My childhood’s worse memories include these horrible 30’ sessions where we’d sit in the dining room: Dad and Mom in their armchairs, me in this old chair that creaked if I moved and which for the latest years would be likely to come apart. The only light was the lamp shining on Mom’s knitting… clickyclickyclicky the knitting would grow, while Dad thoroughly demolished my grades and denied me any and all defenses.

And while the session itself was bad, the work up was even worse. If I’d gotten my grades on a Monday, Dad would say “we need to talk” but we wouldn’t have the fourth degree session until Friday or Saturday night. It’s a wonder I still have nerves left.

Even if I’d had any kind of natural talent for needlework of any kind (which I don’t), those sessions would have been enough to drive me away from trying it.

163

For Og’s sake, no Afghans…

164

Au Contraire, Fireio, it takes just minutes for my natural manly beauty to shine through. :smiley:

Now it’s a tornado watch. The sun is also sorta shining. Hmmm… I just know it’s waiting until I get to the NAS and then all hell will break loose. :eek:

In other news, I’m having all kinds of trouble keyboarding (is that a word?) on this here laptop. When I’m typing away it looks like ervey other wird is mipslled. Weird ani’t it?

OK, off I go into the wild blue Naval Air Station.

165

G’mornin’ people!

I can’t believe what just happened. I pushed back in my rolling desk chair, and it started to tip over. Then it did! I even yelled. Stoopid chair. And there were witnesses! I feel stupid. I’m ok though.

I have to go down to the medical center to get a blood test at 10:00 today. So I’ll have a long lunch (which I already made up the time for baecause of yesterday’s luncheon.) And I’m off tomorrow! Should be an easy day, thank Og.

166

Another day today like yesterday, and my next post will be from the hoosegow, because I’ll have murdered someone.

People are stupid. That is all.

Today though, is going to have a rocky start, I have a 9:30 meeting with a driver who has the silliest beef ever, and even the union reps coming in the room with her don’t back her up. But, of course, she’ll have her back against the wall, and the more…grating aspects of her gentle, sweet personality will be standing on the table shouting at me.

At which point, I kill her and go to jail.

Later today is a quarterly leadership team meeting. All of us admin people (the ones that aren’t being arraigned) have a 2 hour meeting. These are often followed by beerverages at some local establishment, so yay.

167

Busboy, do let us know if you become a murderer. :wink:

Thanks to everyone for the nice anniversary wishes! The Actual Day isn’t until Saturday, which makes it nice for going-out purposes. As some of you know, I had a miserable, unhappy marriage, got divorced, was a complete mess for like .32 nanosecords, until my darling husband and I found one another. Now I exist on a delirously happy plane that I thought simply did not exist. I, like, had no idea that people could be so happy. I thought everyone who was, was faking it. Ha! Anyway, it’s been three years and The Love is more wonderful every day.

[/sappy part]

I too eagerly await the gory details of mamatig’s surgery.

Oh and dot, think carefully about moving in with your friend. I think you’re way too young to take on such responsibility.

168

I have to agree with rosie, Dots. As much as you love your friend, this is her responsibility to deal with. However, I support the idea of you moving out, if you can find some other way to do it.

Today I get to run the sniff last lab of the term. It really has been a joy to TA for these kids. I heard such horror stories about the pre-med students, that they would be vicious grade-grabbing stuck up monsters. All lies. They’ve been eager to learn, and almost obseqious when it comes to asking me for help.

Good luck with killing people, MBG.

169

Yeesh. Busy, busy week. Not so much in the pleasant way either, but all things considered not too bad. Haven’t gotten caught up here yet, but hopefully I’ll get the time to get there.

Big-butted storm coming this way later on – snow, sleet, freezing rain, high winds. “The worst storm of the season” the weathermen have been calling it. In like a lion, indeed. As long as it can wait 'til, say, 6:30 this evening, I’ll be home then and it can howl and whine all it wants. Until 7am Friday, anyway.

Anyway, off to get caught up 'n stuff (assuming the phones will let me).

170

I cannot tell you how much the fact that it’s already March freaks me out!

SDorothy, how close are you with this friend? I was trying to imagine what I’d do in your shoes, and I realized that there are less than a handful of people I’d be willing to do this for. Of course, all of us have graduated from college and are working or in grad school - I think age makes a big difference. I was barely mature enough to take care of myself in high school, let alone anyone else.

If you’re seriously considering this, maybe you should talk your concerns over with your friend and her parents.

Off to do some work, then scamper off to school. Have a lovely day, everyone! Muah!

171

Happy Anniversary to the Cherrys.:slight_smile:

**SurrenderDorothy ** I really think it would be a mistake to move in with your friend’s parents. At worst you could end up as an unpaid servant with a baby you don’t like and no time to continue with your studies. I can’t tell you how much this idea concerns me.

**Swampbear ** will you please try the turtle cheesecake if you happen across it again? I have this fascinated horror of Southern Mericish cooking which you satisfy nicely with your posts.

My spacebar is still broken so it’s taken me ages to type this.

172

Happy Anniversary, Cherries!

It’s so cool to hear how happy you are.

Dotster, I agree with what others have said. I know you’re not happy at home, but living with other people, even your best friend, is really really really hard. I’ve known too many friendships that have ended when friends tried to become roommates. And that’s without adding the stress of a baby.

So I’d say offer to babysit whenever you can and help out in whatever other way is useful - maybe bring her homework/books to her on days when she’s out with a sick baby. But I think living together would be a big mistake.

It’s snowing like CRAZY here. I think we were lulled into a false sense of security when the snow that was predicted overnight didn’t amount to much (~2" over night). Now I think we may have gotten another 2" in the last 2 hours! I’m so glad I have a really short commute. And that I have a garage waiting for me when I get home!

KeithT’s working from home today. He’s got a > 1 hour commute on a good day. Even though the roads were ok this a.m., they’re going to be bad by the evening commute so I think he made a good decision. We’re going to try to go out for lunch together but given the current weather, I don’t know if that’s going to happen! But then again, I didn’t bring lunch with me so I’ll either have to go somewhere or order in. I always feel bad for delivery drivers at times like this. That’s got to be a sucky job.

Oh and someone hit a snow plow this morning. Car (or in this case truck) vs. snow plow just doesn’t go well for the car. Not many vehicles come out of that one well. They had warnings on the radio the other day of “Do not follow snow plows too closely. Leave 5 car lengths. Do not pass snow plows.” Um… duh. C’mon people. It’s like 5 times your size, has blades on it, and is made a hell of a lot more solidly than your Honda. Don’t be an idiot. Sheesh.

173

Good barely morning all. And a happy pre-anniversary to the CHERRIES!

Horses don’t do too good against snowplows either. Saw that out in Wyoming. :frowning:

No snow signs still up here till I get around to putting them in the attic. Imma thinking about a trip for some new spring duds maybe tomorrow. Need to find out what’s on the schedule here.

Din-din tonite, or as taters says chop-chop, will be Teriaki chicki boobs on the grill and some rahce. Nummy.

Back to work.

Tupug

174

Good morning my friends!

We had snow, but the very worst of it hit further up north and has screwed up commutes and school for those unlucky folks. We had a 40-50 car pile up on I-90 yesterday which jacked up the pass for over five hours. Some people were injured and one guy is lucky to be alive. He walked out with a goose egg on his head after his car went underneath a semi-trailer.

SD, I gotta say I think moving in with your friend may be a bad idea. Most of the reasons have already been listed.

Happy Anniversary to the Cherries!

Work is still nutso-crazy.

Nothing much else exciting going on. My life is the definition of mundanity.

175

I KNOW. What the hell, March!? You’re not due for another two weeks yet, so if you could just step back behind the I SAID BEHIND THE YELLOW LINE, MARCH. Thank you.[sub]someone is taking that “lion” thing a little too seriously[/sub]

176

Don’t bother me none. VunderKind was born during an ice storm, and I was stranded in the hospital for 36 hours.

Tornadoes are as sure a sign of spring as flowers, birds, croaking frogs, buds on the trees, and bouncing halter tops.

177

It’s not the March weather[sub]lousy Smarch weather[/sub] that gets me. What leaves my cheese out in the wind is looking at the date and feeling like I’ve lost a whole month. “March? What the hell happened to February?” This is compounded by the fact that the winter trimester is the shortest of all, so two weeks ago I had midterms, and a week from now classes are over.

178

SD, I have to go with the “don’t do it” on this one. There isn’t any need to turn yourself into an unpaid nanny for someone else’s baby. Babysitting on occasion and bringing books is fine, and of course general moral support, but don’t give up your own space. "Tis very risky.

Happy upcoming anniversary to the Cherries!

I have an executive board meeting for the booster club tonight, and I have a feeling it is going to be very tense. The current President told us he wasn’t going to run again, so the 1st Vice President decided to run. Now Pres. has decided to run again, and didn’t even have the balls to come to us and tell us he had changed his mind. I am running (so far unchallenged) for my Corresponding Secretary post, and I hope he is not re-elected. I don’t want to work with him again. I would resign if he gets elected, but I talked a friend of mine into running for treasurer and she has promised to kill me if I quit.

It is pouring rain here, which makes me very sleepy. The cats are all better (I know you have been worried) and I am actually feeling a bit better myself.

179

Hi, all. Im back, and to be honest am not going to be around for too long right now – I am TAHRED for some strange reason. I think I’m going to go crawl in bed now that Palebunny picked up my drugs and I can stop the pain that’s starting to kick in in my knee again, for some strange reason.

And yes, I could indeed hear what was going on in parts of my surgery. Not enough, alas; it was fascinating! I was under a local with a sedative and the anesthesiologist warned me I might wake up, which as long as I was cool with it didn’t bother him, and sure enough partway through I kind of came to and heard all kinds of sawing and drilling. Unfortunately, I couldn’t see anything because they’d hung a sheet up, but I still picked my head up to see if I could, at which point the anesthesiologist put me out again. :frowning: Everyone thought that was weird of me, but hey, I like to know what they’re doing to me!

Anyway, you’ll have to wait for the rest of the gory details, including gory photos, till next week’s MMP; I don’t want to spoil ALL the fun! It’s good to be back, though. I’ll read the rest of what I’ve missed in the next day or so when I’m a little more awake; right now I can hardly hold my eyes open, so I’m going to take a NAP. (Which the hospital wouldn’t let me do – all that money I pay for a bed, and they wouldn’t let me even lie on it except at night!)

180

I’m too nice. And I’m getting tired of being nice!

Last night, we went out for dinner as it’s DH’s birthday. All went splendidly. The note I passed to the hostess when we were seated worked out - a slice of cake arrives discreetly without any singing or hoopla and dinner was tasty.

The snag was with the bill. I got the right one, but when they ran the charge, they punched the wrong table number into the terminal, so what comes back to me is a charge slip for far less than it should have been. How much less? Well, it was pretty close to what I was planning to leave as a tip. Quandrary. Do I say nothing, write down my original tip amount and scoot?

If this was the last time I’d been at Denny’s, the answer would have been “Hell, YES!” after they goofed one order and another in our party watched their dinner take a tour of the restaurant as they didn’t know what table it was for, and they seemed to be literally walking around with a plate of food asking every table if they recognized it. That night was so bad, they wound up comping the whole table and we’ve not been back since.

But, this wasn’t Denny’s, the service had been very good, and DH’s steak was at just the right level of mooing rare so I didn’t want to stiff anyone and leave them to be docked more than a day’s worth of minimum wage. (I’m hoping the servers at this place are making better than minimum!)

Only problem is that once they bring the charge slip, that’s the usual end of their involvement with you, so we had to wait for them to come back around. Once they did, I explained and they were quite happy and went off to fix things.

Now, this morning, I’m in the coffee room here, and it looks like someone threw a used coffee filter at the trash can and missed as there were dark spots all over the wall. Everyone else has been ignoring the mess, but what do I do? Grab some paper towels, get them wet and wash off the wall.

Why am I being so nice?