It's freezonious in the MMP

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
181

Evenin’ all. We had glorious autumnal weather here today; clear blue skies, chilly morning where I could just see my breath, but no risk of ice. Lovely. So, of course, I was inside at irk most of the day, and that looks to be the best weather all week.

I’m trying to be all good and get on with skool irk, but citing stuff is booooring.

I’m also having some issues 'cos I’ve got a marked group project in Ecology, which isn’t much fun at the best of times. I’ve been grouped with someone who wants to do everything slowly and carefully, researching everything before doing it (and I mean everything, she reads up on every lecture beforehand and gets upset if they change them around), and has real trouble with things not being clear cut and definite. Ecology research ain’t gonna be clear cut and definite. It’s all fuzzy edges and estimates.

If I do stuff, she’s freaking out because she has no clue what I’m doing and then gets annoyed that I’m taking over; if she does it, she has to stop constantly to ask the course leader what to do, and carefully work out everything before we do it, and we’re not even half finished by the end of class and have to try arrange to come in on a day off once she’s gone home and researched to finish off, even when all the info is right there, was something we did last year, or is just high school level science, and I really don’t have time to come back and do it later.

The odds of this ending with a decent project and us still being at all friends are seeming pretty low. This project is 50% of the module, about 8% of the overall year, it’s not something I can just write off. I mean, I know it’s not her fault that she prefers to do things slowly, and I know she’s not getting anything out of it if she doesn’t understand, but if we have 2 hours to do some field work, I do resent spending 20 minutes of it trying to explain how percentages work to someone who then gets annoyed at me for being bossy and trying to rush her, then goes and asks the lecturer anyway. I’m not getting anything out of it either if we don’t have time to do anything. I’m not really sure how to deal with it…

182

Well Bumba, if you never get in the water your chances of a shark bite drop to almost 0%. So are they talking only people who get in the water are 80 times more likely to get bitten or are they talking the overall population’s chance of getting bit?
Are they talking the entire world population, or just the population in the lottery playing area, or the population who both plays the lottery and gets in the water? Are my chances of winning the lottery lesser or greater if I do get in the water, and how deep does the water have to be?

When you think about it it is a pretty stupid comparison, probably written by somebody who wants to discourage other people from buying tickets so they have a better chance of winning. Which really doesn’t work, because the winning numbers are the winning numbers no matter how many tickets are sold. It’s not like your odds go up if fewer people by tickets.
It’s a lottery, not a raffle.

The way I look at it is somebody has to win (eventually) and it may as well be me. :smiley:

183

**sari **- no doubt the worry is that 2 or more people will hold winning tickets, so one person won’t get the whole $1.6 billion… How can you expect someone to live on a measly $800 million or $500 million? I mean really… :stuck_out_tongue:

Poke roast and 2 sweet N.O.T.s in the oven - I’ll make tots or smashed N.O.T.s for the guys. I’ve also got fresh broccoli to steam and I may open a can of pineapple chunks. Supper will be healthy and yummy!

Laundry is done and I swept most of the leaves off the back deck. Higgs and Cozmo were tracking too many in when we let then thru the dining room door. Which reminds me - I need to vacuum.

It’s been a good day. And the sun is now out - with luck, it’ll dry a bit overnight and I can mulch/vac the leaves.

184

Lotteries are a tax on people who are bad at mathematics.
Besides, you will piss off Mom!
Speaking of Mothers, whoever wins, please remember that Mama Plant needs that expensive operation!

I have a seneye device that monitors various parameters of the large salt water aquarium. It phones home via a PC and the web, and I can see these parameters on my cell phone. I get an email if Bad Things Happen. I bought the least expensive laptop Amazon had, $165 so that I could run the seneye device all the time. I had to buy 2 Gigs of memory, a mere $18 and replace the hard drive cover. I’m considering using my HP laptop for the seneye. I just found out how to turn off the key board back light on the Dell, making this action more attractive.

On edit:

Oh yeah, I am getting robocalls on my work cell phone in an Asian language. :dubious:

185

I hate working in groups. I had an undergraduate course where one guy in the group did absolutely nothing until the day the project was due. He also accosted a squirrel outside the class room, threatening, upon seeing a nut buried, “I’m gonna get your nut!” We spoke sharply to him. Another group project in graduate school, programming a measuring device I had previously worked on, was a disaster and we didn’t finish the programming. The undergraduate instructor explained that it was getting us ready to work in a job. At work, I generally don’t trust other people to do work. Not that they are dishonest, but they are dumb.
Can you speak to the instructor?

186

I shoulda put in a smilie to indicate I was being wryly sarcastic

Like I said, I consider it cheap entertainment. The most I’ve ever won was $42.
Wifey’s ex won $100,000 a few years ago though. I dont know hich game he won it on. It wasn’t megabucks. 5 outta 6 only gets you about $700 on that game.
I was in a state once, (it may have been Michigan) where the top prize was somewhat smaller but 5 out of 6 would net you something like $50k to $75k. I think that would be better.

187

Bumba I knew that…

I was just being difficult…

FCM I can live a whole lot better on 1.6 billion than 800 million.
So can my friends.
Flytrap - so am I.

188

I could complain if I was working with someone who was just slacking off, the lecturer’s been pretty accommodating for those stuck grouped with those who don’t do anything. Problem is, this is someone who is always there and trying really hard, they just don’t seem to be able to adjust to there not being a fixed way to do things and everything not having one clear right answer, also doesn’t like the short deadlines, and is reacting to issues by stopping and trying to get everyone else to stop too, which obviously makes the deadline issues worse… She’s not doing anything wrong exactly, just not someone you want to do stuff on a time limit with.
I’m not the most diplomatic of people either… I think someone’s being a twit, I’m not very good at hiding it.

There’s 2 other people as well in the group, both of them are going ‘OK, someone else decide what we’re doing’ the just going along with it. It winds up meaning that either I try come up with a plan or we get bogged down immediately. Be a bossy cow or don’t get it done, and get bitched at either way. Joy.

189

Nut, I feel for you, I often was the one in a group that had to come up with the ideas because nobody else wanted to be hanging out there with the responsibility. Just take it as a life lesson (that you are one of those people that is willing to fish instead of cut bait and make a choice/decision) and do the best you can. It might be a learning disability on her part (or maybe that’s the way she lives here life), but I doubt you’re going to change things.

Guess I’m going to have to go up to Tennessee this Sunday for some Mega Millions stuff, since Ali-bama doesn’t condone such sinful things as gambling (albeit most of the license plates tomorrow will be from Bama…). Haven’t won a dime, but might hazard a $20.

To fix your quote flytrap, I hate working [del]in groups.[/del]. And you spent nearly $200 so you could watch water…hmmmmmm

Sari, hope the dog park/doggie hotel (as I call them) work out well; I’m still worried about the biting reflex your puppeh has.

wetone, where are you, the Northern coast of Scotland? Nasty weather.

FCM, hope daughter and the Roxster get to feeling better (whom am I kidding, everybody going to catch cold there).

It was 55F and rainy this morning, so of course I went out to coach and referee soccer. Reffereed first, helping out a 12 year old doing his second-ever center, kid did OK. Then coached, girls were 4 v 4 (most were on Fall break vacations) and then the boys played the best team in the league and we were down a player (7 vs 8), but the kids played them close until there were 10 minutes left, then got worn down and gave up 3 late goals (final 1-5). Was proud of them nevertheless and told them so. We’ll have the 6 year olds play on Wednesday during practice.

So home about 3pm and have pretty much done nothing but remove my wet clothes. It made it all the way to 63F today. Supposed to go to 36F this evening. I’m missing summer already.

Need to go forage for some food here in a minute.

190

I came home from irk and took a long nap. Now up but feel as though I may be coming down with something. Got the chills and it is not at all chilly here. I can’t/don’t want to be sick.

Hubby is cooking and neighbor just offered up some homemade chicken noodle soup which is timely so I said heck yeah I’ll take some. It’s been at least a year since I had a cold. Maybe it is just allergies which are usually bad this time of the year. That does not explain the chills though.

I have not yet but will spring for a lottery ticket or two. I can’t even imagine that much money. It would be fun to try to spend some of it though.

Happy Saturday night all!

191

bumba, before Indiana had a lottery, one of my dad’s cousins hit five in the Michigan lotto and won enough to purchase a house with her winnings. Mind you, this was forty years ago when you could buy a nice one for $50K in the area, but it was enough to have no mortgage.

I farted around in the studio this morning and took Nelson to the dog park this afternoon. There were no small dogs on the small dog side, so I took him to the big dog area. He’s usually pretty good over there, but there were three rambunctous big pups (sweet, but rambunctous) that scared him, so I took him to the littles side. It wasn’t long before there were some of teh small guys there to play with, so he had a good time. .

I just talked to my SIL and the planned bike ride may well become a car ramble with her and the two dogs. It’s cool enough now to take them with us without worrying about leaving them in a hot car if we stop somewhere.

192

I may buy a Mega Millions ticket. I know it’s just a cheap way to dream, but dreaming can be fun. I learned the formulas for figuring the odds when I was in a statistics class in college.

193

Good busy day. Scored a great deal on 4 Bell helmets to go with the bikes we have for this years toy drive, had a great Mexican dinner, had a good time at Castle Blood. And tomorrow we freeze out bits off being ride ops at Kennywood. There are times when life is good.

194

Me too, on my cell. :mad: I have about 4 numbers blocked now. Why? Why are they doing this?

Akiko had a busy day running around with my nieces, who came over to help me unpack my kitchen. Most of the work is done (yay!). Puppeh is exhausted. She is sleeping with her head in her food bowl. Every now and then she wakes up and eats and few bites and then she goes back to sleep.

Tomorrow Comcast comes and hopefully we’ll get phone and cable set up. We’re almost human!

195

Good Mornin’ Y’all! Up and caffeinatin’. YAWN 'Tis 54 Amurrkin (BRR!) out and clear (well, dark) with a predicted high of <snerk> 69! <snerk> and mostly N.O.S. for the day. We shall, of course, deheathenate today. Both of us are awake (went to bed around nine last night) so we may go deheathenate with the Luteruns. That is provided we motivate.

Maybe we shall purchase lottery tickets whilst out and about. Couldn’t hurt I reckon.

Now I need more caffeine and to feed rumbly tummy. Purtification for deheathenization must also commence. Come on motivation! Or not.

Happy Sunday Y’all!

196

The day starts at 47° hereabouts and it’s quite windy. Higgs has been tended to. Taz is investigation the boxes from FCD’s new shoes. I had a terrible time falling asleep and I woke at least twice during the night. I hate being on this weird sleep cycle.

Today’s only plan is to tend to the leaves on the ground. I’m hoping the mulcher/vac starts up without issue. I’ll do the front and back yards for sure, but I’ll probably not bother with the side, unless I just ride the mower over those leaves. We shall see.

Happy Sunday!!

197

I’m going to be going over to the church early to bake cookies and sausage balls. I signed up for refreshments after the second service. I get in good with the clergy because before the service starts I take them a sampler plate in the sacristy. They get mobbed after the service and sometimes don’t have a chance to get to the snacks before the ravening hords have eaten most of the stuff.

198

Morning. Up and caffeinatin’. Today’s plan is WalMart, tidying up, and going to the barn. Dinner will be Swedish meatballs, green beans, an a baked tatie.

199

Up, caffeinated, and sheveled. Did a double yesterday. Going to a Canes season ticket event this morning ,then back to work.

It is a non zero chance. And if I win, I can fulfill my dream of shipping 200,000 howler monkeys to Arkansas.:smiley:

200

There are some at the zoo. You should those sum bitches at noon on Wednesdays when the tornado sirens are tested.