Knitting in the Shadows

Cell Phones - The Joy and Pain

I love my cell phone.

I'm all but addicted to it.

I vaguely remember life before I had one.  And sometimes, the thought that I might be just plain un-reachable sometimes is alluring. (But then I remember the day that Kitty broke her arm.  Had I not had a cell phone, she'd have been sitting in the school office for hours, in pain and scared.)

I love what you can now do with a cell phone.  I have a smart phone, and the simplicity of keeping track of my calendar (in a way that integrates with others in my family no less), makes so many things easier!  I use many features of the phone every day.  (I also play with it, since it lets me play scrabble with my friends from anywhere!).

But.

I hate the way it dominatrices our lives.  I hate it even more when it's upgrade time.  Now, don't get me wrong, I like that they have a system whereby one CAN upgrade one's phone.  I like that they improve the technology.  But the process is unreal.

Normally, I live happily with an old phone for far longer than the two years I'm required to, because the phones are usually just fine.  But this round -- in which we joined the hyper-connected universe with cell phones -- we learned some lessons.

1) I my pockets are unreliable, and that even though I can carry my phone there with no mishaps for months on end, eventually, it will slide right out of the pocket into a wet place with no warning.

2) there is no time that is short enough for a smart phone to be in a wet place without killing it.

3) the insurance that you pay for with your phone -- through the carrier anyway -- is disappointing:

    a.  your replacement phone will not be free (yes, it will be far less expensive than an outright purchase, but far more expensive than you'd expect).

     b.  your replacement phone will not be new.  It will be a refurbished phone, and there's no guarantee that it will work right.

    c.  if your replacement phone doesn't work right, you're out of luck -- and out of chances to replace it

4)  even after one person in the house has dropped a phone into water, the other will not be wise enough to avoid simply setting his phone into a puddle on the kitchen counter.  See 2 above.

So, we've been running on one klugey smart phone that doesn't work well, and one old phone that we put back into use despite the fact that we were paying for internet access for a phone that couldn't use it.  Finally, the upgrade window opened.

Friday, Golf Pro and I went in to upgrade our phones.  We're kind of trapped into our carrier for two more years (T-Mobile is the only one who has Family Allowances.  Having that kind of control over kids' phones is worth it -- we've learned the hard way that no matter their intentions, they're not capable of ignoring texts that come into their phones during class).  But -- we're no longer trapped into sources to get new phones.

Enter Best Buy Mobile.  They have slightly different deals on the same phones, but more importantly they don't do rebates (they do straight up discounts) and their Black Tie Geek Sqaud Coverage is better than the regular insurance: no deductible, if your phone is klugey you can bring it back and they'll try again -- as many times as you need to.

But... you have to wait for them to ship the phone to you.  Oh dear. 

Alas,BestBuy doesn't actually have live phones for T-Mobile in their store, because they don't do that much T-Mobile business.  So -- we tortured the folks at the T-Mobile kiosk, then went back to Best Buy, then went back to check something, etc.  And then..once we'd make the decision (which of forty-leven phones do you want), we started what turned out to be an unbelievably long process to place the orders.  I wound up with three separate transactions -- one for my phone, one for GolfPro's phone, and one for the GeekSquad Protection. oy!  Each one took forever. We were in the mall for FOUR HOURS!  It took well over an hour to process the transactions.

Yesterday, we received our phones in the mail, and went back to get all the data transferred over.

That took over an hour and a half.  And though they promised ALL data, they just meant contacts and pictures -- which for me was not necessary -- I could have used google. They were able to move all my texts though, which was nice.

Now... download all the apps again.  And for some (since they don't save their data to the SD card, but just to phone memory) I have to re-enter data.  While this does give me the chance to choose which old data to keep, it turns out that the apps I have that don't save their data for easy transfer -- I actually want 90% of it.  Sigh.

Maybe next time they'll have figured out how to get data out of the apps too.  In the meantime, I'll be lobbying the app makers to store their data on the silly card!

The bonus: my new phone is just enough bigger than the old one that reading on it seems to work.  Kindle app here I come. (or pdf reader -- I have scads of books in pdf format!)

Almost Gardening

Today is Mother's Day.... so I'll celebrate by resting and letting my family pamper me.
Yesterday, however, I finally turned my attention to the garden.  Some of it, is doing perfectly well on its own.

Alas, the pond is growing a bit of algae, but we won't discuss that.  Instead, let's take a closer look at that archway back there.

The roses on the left are doing well.  The honeysuckle on the right are past their blooming best.  And the wysteria across the top.... needs a bit of pruning.

Back on the patio itself, we've got this.

But the planters... the planters were another story entirely.  Yesterday morning,they look like this:

And this:

The only one growing anything was this one:

The johnny jump ups are return volunteers from last year's arrangement, but the rest are weeds. 

Yesterday afternoon, I cleaned out the dead leaves and dead plants.  I weeded the planters that were still trying to grow things. And took Kitty to the plant store to help me choose the plants to fill those empty planters.

I tried to be restrained.  I did.  But in the end, my basket was full.  So full that Kitty swore that this basket had too many plants in it.

It was a small basket.  Especially for plant shopping.  But even I had to admit thath the counter looked a little full....

In the end, however, it turned out that I had just the right number of plants.  I didn't even have a single plant left -- even in the little four-packs.   And now, the planters look like this:

and this:

A little closer look?  I thought you'd never ask --

I think this one is my favorite of the plants we got -- the color is so very intense.

And the round ones look like this now:

My favorite of these, would be this one...

Ahh... gardening!

Did you notice?  There's a plant in each box that you would not expect me to buy.  Why?  Well, go back and look.  They're orange. I hate orange..... but it makes a lovely accent when it's just a little splash of color.  I broke out of my comfort zone to put that accent in this year.

Now I'm all inspired to start in on the front yard. That will be a lot more work. Weeding a flower box is easy.  Few weeds, loose soil means that the roots aren't that deep, and getting them all the way out is pretty easy.  Weeding the real garden, is no where near as easy.  The ground is packed, the roots are deep, and all tangled up with the stuff we want to keep. "Tilling" the soil in a flower box is easy.  Tilling the soil in the actual ground is another story. 

And yet.... when you work in an actual garden bed, you can put perennials in along the way, so that the work lasts for years.  That might actually keep me motivated.  But not this weekend.

My Mother's Day wish for you all: May your Mother's Day be as lovely as my patio garden  ... and may all your gardens bloom and grow as you like them.

Thankful for that Old MGB

Many years ago, I drove an adorable green MGB GT Hatchback.  There were many things about that car that I loved.  And thinking about it now, brings back all sorts of memories.  Laundry as a musical event for example.

Despite being an MG, and thus a Sports Car, it was kind of a girly car.  It was all cute, ya know?  Not macho at all.  It looked rather like this ...

 

only green.

But... there was one thing about that car that I did not love, even though it meant that I came to wield a very special power.  Because of that one thing, I became Queen of OilChecking. Because MG's do not have a good track record for retaining oil,  I wielded the Dipstick Scepter with some frequency.  It's a girly thing.

I kept an extra quart of oil in the car at all times. Because there are those who believe that MG stands for More Garage-time, I made sure that I was prepared and competent. That's a girly thing too. 

And then I gave up on all that silliness and started driving less tempermental cars.

But Monday night, it all came back to me.

I was driving my happy VW with the inevitable modern computer that monitors everything, even the tire pressure.  (I feel lucky to have a temperature gauge, and a tachometer.  An oil pressure guauge was clearly too much).  While we were heading into town, my sweet Passat binged at me.   

Loudly.

And then her screen of all information flashed a yellow oil can at me, and instructed me to stop the engine.

NOW.

I was on the highway.  That wasn't happening.  But I was as gentle as I could be until I got to my destination.  Now I must admit -- the car had binged at me this way once before, but then the oil can disappeared immediatly, and the car hadn't fussed in a couple of weeks.  I figured it might have been a cranky sensor.  After all, if there was an oil pressure problem, the magic monitors should have been raising Cain (or binging loudly) every time it was detected. But having now heard the bing a second time, I pulled on my Queenly Pants, and my Competent Driver hat, and, after waiting for all the oil to return to it's resting spot, I fetched up a paper napkin from the sidewell in the door, and Checked The Oil.

ahem.

I tried a second time.

This is what I saw when I checked the oil.

That, my friends, is a dry dipstick.  Now, don't get me wrong.  I've nothing against dry dipsticks in the abstract.  After all, there is a time and place for a dry dipstick.  That time is after you've pulled it from the vehicle, and wiped it off.  That time is before you slip it back in to test the current state of the oil.

This photo, alas, was taken after the stick had been pulled, dried, and slipped back into the slot.  This photo was taken when the dipstick should have been revealing to me that, though the oil might be a little low (and certainly a little dirty, what with the oil change comign due in 200 miles), there was, in fact, enough oil.  This dipstick is clearly not showine me that there is enough oil to wait until the rest gets changed -- tomorrow.

I thanked the Universe that I own a Smart Phone, and used it to locate the nearest gas station.  I gingerly started the car, and gingerly drove to that gas station, and begged the Universe to let there be oil for sale.  I actually had to stand in line to ask the lady behind the counter whether they had any, for it was well hidden.  But they did.  All of it is "conventional" oil. 

The oil in my VW is synthetic oil.

Gleep.

Again, I thanked the Universe for my smart phone, and googled whether there was likely to be a catastrophic problem if I mixed conventional and synthetic oil.  I thanked the Universe yet again when the very first site I found assured me that it'd be okay.  I'm not testing this theory for long, but I figured it is unlikely to blow the car up between the gas station, home, my final exam in the morning, and the oil change place.  Even though I knew the oil is going to be in the car for only about 14 hours, I couldn't quite bring myself to buy the cheapest they had.

I purchased my quart of oil, strode out to the car, popped the hood again, and poured about 1/2 a quart in.  After all, I'm mixing oil types here, no need to put in more than I need. Right?

I checked the oil level.

I poured in the rest of the oil.... and checked again.

Yes, that's still a dry dipstick.  After a full quart of oil, you will note that there is no sign of any oil on that dipstick. 

This is not good. 

I went back in and bought another quart of oil.

Once again, I strode out to the car, popped the hood, and poured about 1/2 a quart in.  After all, I'm still mixing oil types here, no need to put in more than I need. Right?

I checked the oil level.

Yes, that's still a dry dip stick.

I poured in the rest of the oil.... and checked again.

Finally.  by the slimmest of margins, there is enough oil to safely drive the car.

I am glad I had my days with the MG.  It makes going back to checking the oil often easier.  It also made me feel completely comfortable with this car maintenance task.

It is good to be competent.

(I think I'll buy an extra quart of oil to carry with me....)

In Which I'm Distracted from Pathology by the Idea of Tiny Stitches

Today, while taking a break from studying for the Pathology exam that I have in about three hours, I popped over to one of my favorite blogs and read this review of The Mary Frances Sewing Book.

First off, of course, Franklin's writing is a delight.  I now crave that book.  I may have the sequel, The Knitting and Crochet Book, but I'm pretty sure I've resisted this one ... so far.

Franklin's description is wonderful, but it reminds me that these books are more than just fairy tales (even if faries do appear). They're excellent instruction books.  Franklin demonstrates what you can learn with a petticoat for his doll.  It's perfect.  It's beautiful.  It reminds me that I have a sewing machine and yards upon yards of fabric languishing in various storage places in my house. There was a time that I sewed well enough to make my own prom dress -- and a three piece suit for myself.

It reminds me that I have a daughter who would love little more than to discover that she has a full wardrobe of garb to choose from the next time someone murmers the words "Renn Faire".  I also have a daughter who will be out of school in less than a month. 

I wonder.  Could we learn to sew together this summer?  (Not that I won't be busier than ever with classes, but I already know a lot of this stuff, so for me it would be a refresher course).  Perhaps it's time to pick up that second book (which is actually the first).

Said daughter has a birthday coming up. ...  This is the point where it gets really hard to resist deciding that what she wants is a sewing kit.  I'm pretty sure what she wants is combat boots, and not a sewing kit.

I'll ponder this deliciousness a while longer, but first... Pathology awaits.   I need to be able to identify which disease it is that comes with "a progressive degeneration of the brain, leading to memory loss, personality change, and eventually death"* and indicate whether massage is okay for someone who has it. We will not discuss that today, I feel like I have memory loss, and I fear a personality change is in the offing since I'm oddly attracted to the idea of applying lace edgings to tiny linen things.  At least I know that this exam won't kill me.

 

Another one Bites the Dust

In which I win another battle, in a different war.

You may recall that I'm engaged in a long time war with the dreaded Medical Professionals' Accounting System.  I still love our docs, but their billing system is so bad that even the folks in their accounting department hate it.  

As part of this war, I've been trying to maintain a spreadsheet that will let me see the following things clearly:

1. How much the Medical Professionals charge for each service (and how much they adjust that because of the contract with the insurance company.

2. When we have paid our deductible(s) so that the insurance company will pay their share of the bill.

3. How much the Insurance Company pays the Medical Professional for each service.

4.  How much I've actually paid to the Medical Professionals and

5.  How much of, and where the Medical Professionals have allocated the payments I've made.

and thus...

6.  How much we actually owe the Medical Professionals.

I'm keeping track of this stuff myself because (as we've discussed), the bills the Medical Professionals send do not clearly identify what I've paid, and they have a history of failing to allocate all of the money that I've paid.  The bills are particularly confusing since they don't deduct from the total they claim I owe the amount that they almost acknowledge that I've paid but they haven't allocated.

This would be simpler if the Insurance Company weren't in play, of course.  On the other hand, we likely couldn't afford the care we get without the Insurance Company.  Given that we have insurance in play, the spreadsheet gets more than a little complicated:  Each person has an individual deductible to meet before the insuranc company has to start paying; and there's also a family deductible -- once that's met, even if the individual hasn't met hers (or his), the insurance company has to pay anyway.  Of course, some things don't have to meet the deductible.  And ... some things have a co-pay, but others require "co-insurance".

?  That means that if there's a specified co-pay ($20.00 or $40.00 depending), you pay that amount, if not, you pay a percentage of the covered amount and the insurance company pays the rest.

So, in order to figure out how much I owe, I have to figure out how the insurance will be applied.  And, since I've long since learned that you can't necessarily trust the insurance company and/or the medical professionals to do the math right.  That meant that I had to work out some functions that would be able to yield the right numbers, based on whether the individual and/or family deductibles had already been met.  That's easy with one person (well, once you've figured out how to do if statements in your spread sheet, but I did that ages ago), but with three people involved, the if statements got more than a little complicated.

I do not want to discuss how long it took to master that if statement. I fussed with it, then left it, then came back for more another day, rinse, repeat.  But today -- I mastered that puppy.

The spreadsheet war is over (for now), and I appear to have won! I am now fully confident in my ability to create functions with nested if statements.  My favorite was one that went pretty much like this: if family deductible not yet met, then determine which individual's deductible we're working with, then if individual deductible not yet met, then deductible for this charge = the lesser of the covered amount or the family deductible minus the covered amount or the individual deductible minus the covered amount.

Time to go back to the paper wars so I can get that desk out of the guest room.

Hail the Conquering Hero (That's Me)

Today, I marched into the corner of a multi-purpose room that houses my desk and my files and waged a little war.  A war on paper; a war on bill confusion; a war on accumulation.The war is by no means over, but I won a couple of battles.

Why now, you may ask? 

Well, this room is being partially re-purposed so that when we have guests, it can serve as a guest room. (The former guest room has already been repurposed to serve as my Massage Room - and there are rumors afoot that my parents will be coming to visit in the not so distant future)  This room is also being adapted so that the large television can actualy be used to watch, well, television.  And possibly even movies. 

To this end, I must remove some of the furniture that has lived in the room for a long time.  One desk was moved into the "new" massage room, so that I would have a place to write SOAP notes, and put the books and records and oils and such that I need to use there.  This left one computer desk that houses the last desk top in the house (used intermittenlty by the kids, and serving double duty as a storage place for random stuff), one little corner computer desk that houses the very computer upon which I'm writing this blog, and the big desk that seems to serve as much as a repository for all the paper I don't know what to do with as it does a place to do work.

The big desk has to go.  Sure, I could wait until the next guest's arrival is imminent -- but I've just learned that the first four weeks of my summer classes are going to be HARD and intense, and leave me no time for whole days spent flailing at my "office" stuff.  The time is now.

Alas, the big desk also serves(d) as the filing cabinet for all those files I use (or file things into) every month when I pay the bills.  Thus - the first battle - ShadowDancer vs. the Paper Monster.

In my office corner, I have what amounts to six mini-file drawers full of files.  In the closet, I had another two mini-file drawers full of files. Two of these drawers are in the pedestal legs of the Big Desk.  My task -- empty those drawers so that the desk can be removed.

One solution, of course, is to siimply stuff the papers more tightly into the other drawers.  While that seems easy at first, I quickly realized that this would only make my job harder the next time I paid the bills.

Instead, I actually tackled the paper itself.  First, I pulled the wee filing cabinet out of the closet, and went through the files.  With fierce determination, and an empty paper bag, I mercilessly eliminated file after file.  Anything more than ten years old clearly had to have a VERY GOOD REASON to be allowed to stay in the house.  The folder full of cards from my wedding -- gets to stay. 

I then went through the other six drawers, purging all sorts of paper, and rearranging the way the files were organized until all the stuff I touch often fit into the little two-drawer guy, and the other cabinet got a full organizational over-haul.  Finding things will be easier.

With my full bag of useless formerly-filed paper waiting by the door to head down to the recycling bin, I survey a room that looks little different to the casual viewer - but I know that I've won the first battle against the paper monster.  I've won the first battle in the war to reclaim this space for a useful purpose.

 

"All on an April Fool's Day Sunday"

'Tis the day to listen to this song by S.J.Tucker:

 

It's one of my favorites. (okay, I confess, she is one of my favorites). It's from her album Blessings.

And not only does it acknowledge April Fool's Day -- the day in question is a Sunday!

I've not done much with my Sunday.  Every time I tried to face the bill-paying chore, I came up against something that was just too frustrating.  The medical bills continue to baffle me.  They don't bother to show you what you've paid.  At least I know I've paid for Kitty's clarinet lessons through the end of March.

I've been knitting away on Dwarrowdelf, but now that it's very wide, you can't really see the progress.  I'll wait until I can actually show you something.

When I'm not listening to S.J.Tucker ... I'm listening to the frogs, who have arrived at our backyard pond.  They're singing away out there, calling for their mates.  I wonder if we'll have tadpoles this year?  I wonder what the weather is going to do to their normal cycle.  If it's this warm this early, what will it be like in a month? 

 

 

 

Passing it on: Subject for Debate: Are Women People?

There's a trend -- and I'm joining in.

Several of the blogs I read have shared this article (by sharing the first two paragraphs).  I'm doing the same.

"All my adult life, I’ve been pretty sure I’m a sentient, even semi-competent human being. I have a job and an apartment; I know how to read and vote; I make regular, mostly autonomous decisions about what to eat for lunch and which cat videos I will watch whilst eating my lunch. But in the past couple of months, certain powerful figures in media and politics have cracked open that certitude.

"You see, like most women, I was born with the chromosome abnormality known as “XX,” a deviation of the normative “XY” pattern. Symptoms of XX, which affects slightly more than half of the American population, include breasts, ovaries, a uterus, a menstrual cycle, and the potential to bear and nurse children. Now, many would argue even today that the lack of a Y chromosome should not affect my ability to make informed choices about what health care options and lunchtime cat videos are right for me. But others have posited, with increasing volume and intensity, that XX is a disability, even a roadblock on the evolutionary highway. This debate has reached critical mass, and leaves me uncertain of my legal and moral status. Am I a person? An object? A ward of the state? A “prostitute”? (And if I’m the last of these, where do I drop off my W-2?)."

Read more: http://ideas.time.com/2012/03/07/subject-for-debate-are-women-people/#ixzz1qesCiQ4L

There are so many things going on in politics today --  And so very few of them seem good -- especially if you're a woman.

In various states, they're working on repealing the Equal Pay Act.   Even though women still earn only 77 cents for every dollar men earn.

In various states, they're setting things up so that a woman who wants an abortion -- regardless of why she wants it -- has to under go a transvaginal ultrasound first.  Even if the woman is seeking to abort a child she already knows has died.   Heck, Georgia had a go at requiring a woman whose fetus is more than 20 weeks to carry that fetus to term -- even if it has died.

But there's all this inconsistency -- if we have to have babies, whether we want to carry them to term or not, shouldn't we then be able to take care of them? Shouldn't we be able to provide the best food for them, even if we have to work to keep food on the table for the rest of the family?  Evidently not, since in Texas  women can be fired for bringing breast pumps to work. And the judges are upholding that nonsense.

It's blowing my mind. 

I wonder... can we all claim benefits under the ADA?  After all, they're clearly acting as though having that XX chromosome means we're functionally disabled?

100!

I have the coolest homework assignments.

Every week, I have to give at least two massages.

Every week, I have to use my skills, and the love in my hands, to give two (or more) people relief from pain, a sense of peace, ease from stress.

Darn.

I think that's so cool!  (and when I graduate, and get my license, I'll be able to do that every day).

I think it's so cool, that I almost always give more than two of these home-work massages each week.

Today, I gave my 100th homework massage since I started the massage program.

I have learned so many wonderful things -- in class, following up on lessons by watching videos on the same modality, and by paying very close attention every time I get a massage from someone new (especially a new professional).

Today, my "client" came to me with pain in her low back, and her feet, and her neck, and her chest muscles.  She left, with happy, happy feet, a soothed low back, and an open feeling in her chest muscles. And it was my hands that made that happen!  I still find that pretty amazing.

and yet -- find it as natural as rainwater.

 

In Which My House Feels Like A Day Spa

When I got up Sunday morning, my plan included studying for Monday's Pathology exam, possibly paying bills, reading, and giving one homework massage.

Instead, I took Bookworm to the store to get supplies to repair a hair disaster, and spent the next couple of hours carefully re-bleaching her hair, in preparation for re-coloring her hair. 

Bookworm is very grateful that my camera when on strike today.  Otherwise, you'd see photos of the hair disaster (in which her hair color ranged from the dark mahogany/burgundy brown she'd last died it, through various shades of fox, dark strawberry blond, butterscotch, platinum blonde, wheat, apricot, ....

While it could have been VERY COOL, the color ranges weren't in interesting natural looking streaks.... they were more.... spotted.  Like someone took the fur colors of a red fox or red panda, and used the patterns of, say an ocelot.  In short... NOT good.

There would also be pictures of the process, with her hair mostly pinned up, and some foil wrapped, to show you just how small the sections were that I worked with, so that I'd bleach the brown parts, and lighten the darker foxy colors, without over bleaching the honey and platinum.....

Of course, there are also no pictures of the almost finished results -- the bleaching is done, and her hair looks pretty good -- sort of strawberry blond.  But we're going to even it out a little better with a round of blonde dye after it's had a chance to breathe from two days in a row of bleaching.

For the record -- I'm actually opposed to my high school aged daughter dyeing her hair.  I'm even more opposed to her doing it in ways that require bleaching.  But -- the whole thing started months and months ago when she slipped out to Walgreens and spent her own money on hair dye.  She surprised me with the new color - fait accompli.  And luckily, it actually looked quite good.  I decided that this was a battle I was not going to win.

However, after this weekend's mishap, she and I had a chat about intense color changed (especially ones invovling bleach. Next time, she's going to buy the product from the beauty supply shop, not Walgreen's, and she's going to have ME help her for things more complex than simple coloring.  Kitty meant well, but she's never had it done, much less watched it being done, and thus didn't quite know how to tackle the job.

By the time stage one of hair repair was done, it was time for me to give a massage.  (Day spa time... get your hair colored (or trimmed), and a massage.  I can even paint your tonails, though I'm no pro at the whole pedicure thing. (snicker).

I closed the day giving a massage to Golf Pro, who was long overdue.

I finally got to the pathology book at about 11:30 p.m.  Color me grateful that the exam wasn't until 2:00 p.m.

I'm hoping that the camera and I get back on good terms so I can show you the new BookWorm.  It looks great, even if I do keep having to do double takes.  (It's a pretty drastic change).

The Return of Lace

Once upon a time, I seemed to knit nothing but lace. Lace lace lace.

I loved lace so much, I talked my dear friend into helping me start a Giant Repeating Lace KAL. We called it Seasons of Lace.  And I knit lace and ran the KAL for several years, and it was good.

And there was lots of lace.

  And then there was life. And massage school.

And suddenly, I was buried in way too much to do! It got so bad that lace all but disappeared from my needles.

It's been socks, and the lovely shadow-knitting afghan that I was commissioned to design and knit.

And the current lace project languished, pining for my attention.

As you may recall (well, likely not, since it's been so long .... ) I've gone on a tear, and am adapting Susan Pandorf's Dwarrowdelf Stole pattern for use as curtains. This means I needed to make them a lot WIDER to fit my windows.

So, being the oh-so-professional planner and detail person that I am... I hauled off and knit a top edge, vastly increasing the number of repeats called for by the stole pattern.

And then I looked to see what the ratio of repeats on top edge piece would be to the repeats on the body, and my brain fried a little.

In many ways, it has been simple (ish) math that was getting between me and my lace knitting.

I knew that the repeats on the top edge were 14 rows "wide". I knew that the ends of the top edge included a five row edge. (I spaced for the longest time on the three rows of set up at one end and the four rows of ... well... set down at the other).

I knew that I was getting approximately 7 rows to the inch. I knew that the repeats on the body would be 24 stitches wide. I knew that the ends included a 9 stitch edge on one side and an 18 stitch edge on the other.And... I knew that I was getting approximately 6 stitches to the inch.

Clearly, forgetting those 7 extra rows bollixed me up for a while.

But suddenly, after my brief escape to Oak Park, I made the math work! And here, we see the winding up of the skinny top edge:

It's pushing 44 inches long here. This aftenoon, I knit that five row edge, and bound off.

I'm now in the throes of picking up three hundred and some odd stitches along the edge that runs along the left side in that picture. So much for something to work on where the rows are short and I can feel like real progress happens when I knit for a few minutes.

I'm Handy!

Every now and then, I remind myself that I'm competent at more than knitting and massage.

Last week, I proved myself on plumbing!

I got cranky with my shower head.  It was dripping in ways that it's not supposed to be dripping.  Ordinarily, I would probably ignore a little dripping from my shower head that only drips when the shower is on.  I mean, really, I'm a little lazy.  But...as it got worse, it was having a negative impact on the water pressure in my shower.

Here's what I found when I took the shower head down:

Yes, cracks...  It gets uglier...

Well, no WONDER it leaked!  Sheesh!

I took my handy wrench, and took that puppy right off the pipe in my shower.  Then, I cleaned the pipe, applied pipe thread tape, and attached my fancy new shower head:

W00t!

I'm feelin' so womanly!

Whining...

I've been pretty good about posting positive things lately.  Heck, I've had posts that are nothing but telling the world I'm grateful for things.  But today... I'm cranky.

Sure, I'm still very grateful for lovely moments with Bookworm (she woke me with coffee!  And then, later in the day, she bought me more coffee.)

And yes, I'm also grateful for a generally good life. 

But, I'm really cranky about the amount of time I've spent today working on medical bills.  While I'm not happy with the size of the bills (who is?), that's not what's making me cranky.

We are a family of four mostly healthy people.  All of our doctors (including some, but not all of the dental professionals) work at the same organization.  That ought to make things pretty simple, right? 

Wrong.

Some of the complexity comes to use courtesy of  HIPAA, which requires the clinic to create a separate billing account for any mental health care charges one might have, so that no one seeing a regular medical bill can tell that you've ever seen a mental health care professional.  But that ought to mean we have two accounts to deal with.

Nope.  We've got ten, or is it fourteen?  I can't even TELL how many separate accounts we four have with our health care providers.  I get upwards of six bills at a time.  All of them from the same folks -- but with different account numbers. 

I'm not kidding.  I get two separate bills from the C**** Physician Group.  Golf Pro gets three separate bills from teh C**** Physician Group.  Bookworm has one of her own from the C**** Physician Group.  And, even though one has labs done right there at the same clinic where the doctors' offices are, they get billed through the C**** Foundation Hospital -- so I have one account with them; and for some reason Golf Pro has somewhere between one and three, but they show up on one bill.  Of course if you are actually in the hospital and see a doctor, the Hospital doesn't bill you -- C**** Physician SERVICES bills you.  But wait... if you see one of the dental surgeons, they have their own separate account numbers (still under the C**** Physician Group name... ).  I'm lost before I even look at the bills.

But you know, one can slow down, and take one step at a time, right?  Look at each bill as just another bill.  How bad can that be? I mean, I can (and do) put all the little payment slips for the same billing entity in one envelope and mail them together (yes, I've put five different slips in one envelope going to C**** Physician Group, each with a separate payment via a credit card).  So why does it take hours?

Here's why:

When they bill you, they don't tell you which doctor you saw.  And, they don't necessarily allocate your co-pay to the charge you thought it applied to.  And though they swear that they allocate any payment not designated as a co-pay to the oldest outstanding charge, they don't actually do that.  Heck, sometimes they split payments between accounts! (If they can do that, why can't they just send one freakin' bill???)

And they usually divide up any given payment between several charges.

And.... if you've actually paid a charge off with a payment, that whole thing disappears from your next statement, so you can't SEE that the payment was allocated to a given charge.  We were actually all caught up for several months -- our co-pays kept us fully paid.  So, we didn't get statements at all.  That meant that I never got confirmation from them that they'd received and allocated the whole payment for any payment we made.

This has meant that I have to call the patient accounts office monthly to request detailed statements that actually reveal most of the information you might need.  Those statements take weeks for them to produce.  And today, I found one in which they'd allocated part of one of my payments to a charge that had been fully paid for by insurance.

Of course one of today's bills included two co-payments, but didn't actually include the charges for which those co-payments were made!

This complex slight of hand with the payments sometimes means that they don't, in fact, allocate the whole payment -- which leaves a few dollars here and a few more there just... hanging out there.  Of course, if a payment hasn't been allocated to a charge -- they don't count it as having actually been made when they tell you the total amount you should send in.  It'll count on the next statement (maybe),once they 've allocated it.  And sometimes... they change the allocations -- so that something you were sure was paid off, isn't anymore, and something else has some or all of that payment as a credit.

It's so confusing that I've taken to making up my own spread sheets.  They show the charges, the insurance allocations, and my payment allocations on one worksheet -- and the payment I've made and their allocations on a second worksheet (just to verify that they line up, which they don't always do).  So, in paying their bill, I seem to have two worksheets for each of those nine, er, ten, um, fourteen?? accounts.  It's a pain in the *ss.  But it saved me over $500.00 one year (they'd actually failed to fully allocate that much).

This doesn't stop them from threatening collection.  There was a $12.78 charge for something to do with the lab (I think it was the charge for the phlebotomist doing the stick (the tests get billed by someone else).  I'd paid it, by sending in the statement with a credit card number etc.  Then I got another bill, and paid that.  But they'd hauled off and allocated both payments to a different account anyway.  So then, I got a call warning me that the account in question was about to go to collection. 

And forget about making things work out if you're using Quicken to keep track of things.  "Reconciling" a statement is just plain impossible.

This makes me very cranky.

I don't mind paying my bills (much).  I have even almost gotten over the gross injustice that is our mental health care coverage.  But I really resent having to put in a full days work each month just trying to figure out the bill.  If I thought for an instant that I could trust them to really allocate the whole payment every time, I might just write the checks -- but I've learned over and over again that I can't trust them to do that. 

I wish I could bill them for my time.

If continuity of care weren't so darned important to me, I swear I'd drop them and go in search of medical professionals whose business office has any respect for their patients at all.

It makes me wonder -- is this standard for the medical industry? or just the special behavior of our local medical professionals' business office?

 

 

Here we go again

I have not fallen off the earth.

I have changed, life has changed, but things are good and getting better.

We had a bit of a challenge over the past few months; one that I'm not going to blog about, but we're over the hump and back in the swing.

The following has NOT changed:

I still knit -- a lot.  I still take the sock in progress everywhere (okay, I've got two: one is complicated, one is plain). 

I still design stuff - I'm working on an afghan design in Shadow Knitting (finally).

I still have two lovely daughters who surprise, delight, frustrate, and inspire me daily.

Golf Pro still plays golf  (duh).

I'm still in the Massage Program, learning things at an insane rate. Last semester, it was Anatomy, and Physiology, and more Anatomy.    Learning about the human body and the way it works was so awesome.  That knowing about these things enables me to heal someone's pain is just plain magic. 

This semester it's Pathology.  Now I'm learning about the many ways the human body can break down or be sick.  It was overwhelming at first... and now it just makes me grateful... oh so very grateful that we have so much health in our house and family.  Sure, we have health challenges, but some of the diseases and conditions I'm reading about are more than a little overwhelming.  I'm so grateful that I'm learning things that will let me help people who have them, and I'm equally grateful that we don't right now.

So, I'm charging up my camera battery, and getting ready to take some more pictures of pretty yarn being turned into pretty socks and other things....

Gratitude - Acts of Kindness

The organizers of these 15 days of gratitude pegged day four as a day to celebrate acts of kindness.

We're going to start with an act of kindness that let me have coffee this morning ... my dear friend Colleen came over for Knit Night last night, and graciously stopped by the store to bring me milk for my coffee.  That meant I did not have to go out on a night when I was just too darned tired.

And then, my dear friend Mary agreed to pick up Kitty from her performance and bring her home (Mary was actually pretty close to the performance place, and was coming to visit...but still).  Again, I was saved from trekking out into the world on an evening when I just wanted to stay home.

Little things.

But such a difference they made to me!

I am so grateful to HAVE knit night, and to have such wonderful friends who are so good to me.

 

Resurrection -

December was an extraordinarily challenging month here in Shadowland.  I hunkered down, and just worked through it.  There were few days when I thought I had anything positive to blog about, and on those days, frankly, I hadn't the energy to write the posts.

It did have a few high points. 

I was able to start the month by making and giving a few knitted gifts that were "just because" gifts. (I even deluded myself that I'd pull it off weekly).

1. A pair of socks for Bookworm: - here's the in progress picture.

 I KNOW I took pictures of the finished socks... but can't find them right now.

2. A pair of wrist warmers for a fellow student in my Massage Program who loves to wear them, and who had been sad lately.

 Again, I know I took pics, but they're hiding...

3. A hat for a newborn baby - of which I got no pictures.  I gave the hat to my Anatomy prof, whose wife had a baby boy right after Thanksgiving.  He was so touched - which made it more than worth the time spent away from studying for his class.

I also managed to pull out a 4.0 GPA for the semester, despite a very ugly final two weeks of the semester.  I was very grateful to have racked up enough bonus points here and there to cover me on the Anatomy final, which I took while Golf Pro was in the hospital.

Yes, I did say hospital.  I took him to the E.R. at 2:00 am on the last Wednesday of the semester.  They admitted him later that morning.

There were a couple of scary days.  His blood pressure, which had never been a problem, went through the roof WHILE he was there.  That meant he had to stay in the hospital itself until they got it under control.  He's still recovering, but each day is a little better.  There's a lot I could say about the whole thing, but since it's not MY illness, I won't. 

Since then, I had the blessing of visits from both my parents.  My mother came during that last week of school and took care of feeding us while I focused on finishing the semester and helping Golf Pro. 

Alas, she came down with an evil virus while here; I was two days behind her.  For me, it developed into bronchitis.  I finally caved and went to the doctor a week later.  I got magic antibiotics just in time to welcome my father, his lovely wife, and my wonderful cousin Gail.  They took care of me until I was ready to face the holiday cooking -- and then cleaned up the kitchen for me while I sat and rested.

I loved having them here, but I'm glad to be just us.  Now that we're back to the local contingent, we've been cleaning madly.  After a brief war with a mouse who would not leave (and who managed to lick peanut butter off the standartd traps), we caved and got poison.  Now that he (they?) is  (are) gone, I've been deep cleaning.  Mom helped some while she was here, but I've now finised washing all the stuff in the kitchen drawers (and the drawers) and under the cabinets etc.  We've also stepped up and thoroughly cleaned the rest of the house - I'm down to the last bits of my desk.

Later today, we should be picking up a new member of the family.  We're adopting a lovely black cat whose owners took him to the humane society because he'd been moody and forsaking his litter box.  Rahter than take him to the vet (who would have treated his urinary tract infection), they abandoned him.  :-(  He's very sweet -- and likes both other cats and dogs.  I think he'll be very happy here.

Not my usual Friday. ...

I keep making these plans about what's going to come up on this blog next.

Lately they've included knitting, and traveling and such.

But today clearly had other things in mind.  Today was so not normal, I kind of want to have a record.  And... most of what wasn't normal is likely to pop up again before the year's over, so I may as well share.

Friday mornings are supposed to look like this:

I get up at 7:00, and make sure my daughters have already gotten up too.  We load up the car by 7:30, I drive them to school, where they shamble off without having said much, and I drive to school myself to learn about anatomy.

Today, my day started at 5:30 a.m. when Golf Pro informed me that he was finally ready to take me up on my offer to drive him to Convenient Care.  (Tuesday night, he fell somehow, and hurt his back so that he woke up in pain Wednesday. I'd been urging a doctor visit since Wednesday evening).

I persuaded him that if he'd been willing to wait two whole days, two and a half more hours to take the cost from a $175.00 ER visit to a $20.00 Convenient Care visit might be okay.

So, I got up shortly before 7:00, went to roust Kitty (who is usually up before that) only to find an immovable lump in her bed.  She opened one eye and outlined some symptoms that sounded unpleasant, and I let her sleep.  I rousted Bookworm, who wasn't terribly happy about it, then got dressed, and helped Golf Pro down the stairs.

I made coffee, drank coffee while writing up all I could about Golf Pro's last couple of days and the various symptoms I'd been keeping track of, and then loaded Golf Pro into the car.  Bookworm loaded herself, and I drove 7.5 miles to the school, then back 7 miles to the Convenient Care.  Checked Golf Pro in, and abandoned him to the medical folk while I drove 8 or so miles to school.

I managed to get myself into the first group for our first Practical in the Cadaver lab.  (I feel quite confident about this test, since I'd been fretting about remembering "popliteal" (the area behind your knee), but then was able to remember it for the question that happened to ask us to identify the popliteal area!  Go me.)

Golf Pro texted me that he was ready, and I got the text right after finishing my test.  So I drove back to Convenient Care to fetch him, and pick up the meds they ordered.  He'd been given a pain shot and an anti-nausea shot (evidently, when you're in serious pain and they poke at the injured place, it can make you nauseated -- duh), so he wasn't too clear on stuff.  I took him home, and he went up to bed.

Normally, Friday noons involve me eating lunch and studying a bit.  Or maybe giving a homework massage.

Today, it involved me having a long chat with Golf Pro's doc (I am SO glad he signed that form that says they can talk to me).  I got the low down on his four fractured ribs.  I learned that he needed to come back today to have his pulse-ox taken since thy discovered a "pneumo" on his x-ray (translated, that means that there was air in the pleural cavity that was OUTSIDE his lungs, which is not where it's supposed to be, and a wee hole in his lungs from which it had come.  They weren't terribly worried though, since it HAD been two days, and his lung showed no sign of collapsing).  I took good notes, and made his follow up appointment for Monday.

We did go back, his O2 was fine.  But the pain meds weren't doing diddly. The doc and I worked out a new plan, and she gave me a scrip for something more exciting just in case we really need it.  (As it turns out, we've not needed it yet.  Fingers crossed it stays that way).

Normally, I'd go to class in the afternoon, and then fetch a child or two, and come home.

Today, I went to class, and then went in to write a big check to the Band Boosters -- out of nowhere, Golf Pro decided that based on a long overdue payment that we'll be getting this fall, Bookworm gets to go to Disney with the Marching Band.  And so do the rest of us.  We'll be having Thanksgiving there -- with the band -- after watching them do their marchy goodness that afternoon.

Bookworm is pleased.  Kitty doesn't really know yet.  Heck, I only found out that it would be feasible 22 hours ago, and only learned that it was actually possible 9 hours ago (when the band director confirmed that she could sneak us in despite yesterday having been the cut-off).

Normally, I'd spend the evening at home, hanging with my kids, and watching TV or movies.  Instead, I'm about to get in my car, and (voluntarily mind you), drive to a place where people will be playing (and watching) football.  Then I'm going to park my car, and go PAY some one to let me into the area where I can SEE them play football.  ???

What?

Who am I?  What have I done with myself???

Oh yeah. 

I"m a mom.  And I have a daughter in marching band.  And she's quit telling me that they "suck" and is now willing to have me come watch their half-time show. 

Even though it's cool, and threatening to drizzle a bit, I know that this weather is WAY better than boiling hot, or freezing cold.  And my experience wtih football is that you're far more likely to encounter one of those two than a brisk but otherwise pleasant evening.  So..

My lace and I are going to the football game.

Life on the Student Track

Suddenly, I find that every minute is packed.  Mostly that's a good thing.

Yes, it's playing havoc with my ability to keep up with all the TV shows I like to watch, but I think I can survive if I've not seen this week's Closer.

Yes, it is slowing down the knitting and designing process a tad, but it's not keeping me from edging ever closer to binding off Fairy Stars over Diamonds (I'm so close!!).

But -- it's filling my brain with all sorts of wonderful new stuff! I have so much to think about (and talk about), that I'm sort of overflowing with it all.  Best of all,  I'm meeting new people, some of whom are truly delightful, with whom I can discuss this stuff so that I'm not driving my family mad.

Better still, it's not ALL brain work.  True, I'm learning physiology and anatomy and psychology.  And I do have to memorize muscles (among this week's pets: the Levator Scapulae.  They're among the culprits for headaches and are the reason you can't turn your head when you get a stiff neck.)  For each muscle, I need to know it's origin (where it attaches to the bone(s)), and its insertion point (the other bone(s) to which it attaches, and which it moves when flexed), and what it does -- exactly what it does.  It's both pure memorization and useful for the hands on work.

Learning all the muscles means that I understand what I'm massaging. And learning the origins and insertion points helps you remember which way is best to work the muscle (from origin to insertion).

The other part of my week is learning a new sequence of massage.  We started with the back, learning what will become about a 25 minute sequence (when we've learned it well enough to do it without lots of filler strokes to figure out what's next) that pretty much addresses all the back muscles.  Once we learn the sequence, we have to practice it. Each week we have to give a certain number of practice massages, and record what we noticed and/or learned in the process.  My local friends are lapping this up  :-)

At first, I thought this would be awkward.  I also feared I'd find it tiring to wedge in the massages.  Now, I'm thinking I'll be doing far more than the required number.  I mean -- I've fulfilled my obligation for this week, but I've got DAYS until the new week starts.  Surely I can give another one ??? maybe two???  It turns out, the hard part is scheduling them in ways that work for both me and the ... recipient.

Alas, all this fun and studying means that I'm woefully behind in reporting on the Scotland trip.  As I get used to the studying and the memorizing, I'll find more time to do that.  Perhaps tomorrow morning.

For now, I'm off to take another quiz.  I got 18/20 on this morning's quiz. I'm a tad irked that I didn't get them all right, and am dithering over taking advantage of the re-take option. On the other hand, it's hard to complain about an A when I know others are struggling for their C's.

So What's Taking So Long?

Some of you may be wondering what's taking me so very long to finish up the Scotland posts.

Well, the day after we got home, I started school!

After years of being unable to get a job because I'm either over- or under-qualified (and most often some bizarre combination of the two) for everything, I decided to just start over and get certified in something new so that I become employable again.

I've started the Massage Therapy Program in our local college.  This week that has meant studying chemistry (in particular body chemistry) in my Physiology & Anatomy course, memorizing the basic skeletal bones and about 50 muscles in my Musculo-Skeletal Anatomy course, and learning the structure of the brain in the psychology class.  My brain is numb.

And, I seem to stay up later than I'd like studying every night.   Luckily, I seem not to have a ton of homework on Wednesday nights, so I can still have knit night  :-)

But, it means that I seem not to have the hours I usually spend tweaking pictures and posts.  I'll try to get back in gear now that I've gotten all the administrative kinks worked out.

Dithering ....

I'm almost finished with two projects --

Catkin is in its final rows....and too scrunched on the needles to show off well.

And while Fairy Stars (which I've been working on for what seems like ages), is still on the needles, it's too close to the end to be appropriate for travel knitting, which is what I must plan now.  In fact, it is within the realm of possibility that it will be finished before I leave. (I'd show you, but it's really squished on the needles right now).

So.... I've been poring over my queue trying to decide what to take on my upcoming trip to Scotland.  When I leave home, I'll be gone for two weeks. Think of all that knitting time as I sit forever in airports waiting for my next flight... and then on the plane....  I could finish something on the way! (By the time I get home, I'll have sat through five layovers, and been in the air for about 28 hours).

On the other hand, one wants something that weighs very little, and takes up not much room, but affords hours and hours of knitting time.  Worsted weight takes up tons of room in the suitcase, making it not a good candidate for a carry-on bag.  And now that the airlines want to charge big bucks to let you put baggage in the baggage compartment, one does not want to carry more than one bag under the plane.  I'm pretty sure DH would be unhappy with me if I tried to use up all the space in our one checked bag with yarn.

So, I've been thinking of doing something with one of these yarns(all but one of which are a good thousand yards or more, so I can make a nice big shawl, and thus will not run out of knitting while I'm gone):

Some yummy yarn dyed for me by Alyse.  I really should figure out how many yards are in this 225 g of light fingering weight yarn...

Briar Rose Angel Face - 2500 yards of luscious alpaca (the largest skein in consideration).

 

BB Knits Divinity Lace -- 1320 yards of cashmere, alpaca, silk (possibly for Kamile?)

 
Tanis Fibers Pink Label Lace-weight - 1000 yards of merino

Fleece Artist Suri Blue 1320 total yards of alpaca/wool (in two skeins).

Miss Babs Mulberry Silk - 1250 yards of SILK.

There's also a lovely kit using Just Our Yarns Almaza that I can't seem to find a picture for -- but that one has beads.... and I'm pretty sure that the airlines will not be happy with that sharp little beading hook.

Dither Dither...  Recommendations?  Suggestions....

I will, of course, be taking a pair of socks, and a pair of fingerless mitts (that out of Malabrigo Sock, yumm).  I'm also contemplating something out of a heavier yarn, just to give my wrists a break.

 

 

Trying to test products

As you know, I work with BlogHer on a bunch of things, not the least of which is supporting my blogging habit.  Recently they've expanded the options for me to work with them, and I've decided to take them up on some of these options.

Among these is a chance to test products and blog about them.  I thought it might be fun, and when the chance to sample some Mary Kay products came along, I signed up.  That was quite a while ago.  On Friday, I finally received my little box of Mary Kay products: a Compact Mini (which one loads up with blush and eye-shadow); a Mineral Cheek Color; and  Mineral Eye Color Bundle (three shades that are supposed to work together to make your eyes look marvelous).  They look like fun, except for one minor detail - my eyes are blue.  They sent the bundle for brown eyed folk.

No biggie, I think, I'll just contact a local Mary Kay consultant and switch.

Not so much.  I called the local "National Sales Director," figuring she'd be in a better position to work out this product testing thing.  She wasn't in, so I left a message.  I had hoped to get started over the weekend, but she was out for the holiday.  No biggie.

The National Sales Director handed me off to her daughter, another Mary Kay rep.  Fine.  When I explained my dilemma, she was so confused by the blog part that she couldn't wrap her mind around the fact that all I needed to do was swap the Mineral Eye Color Bundle whose "expert shade choices were customized for" brown eyes for one "customized for" blue eyes.  She told me that I had to call corporate -- and gave me the phone number that Mary Kay consultants use (which puts you into a phone message system loop that's wholly useless for customers). I'm not impressed with her customer service skills, but I get that she might be saving them for her actual customers.

I went to the website, and after looking harder than I should have had to, found the number to contact Mary Kay.  Then, after enduring a long automated phone system set up, I finlaly talked to a person.  She got hung up on my inability to give her the name of the consultant I am allegedly working with, but eventually passed me off to someone else.  I think that person is going to do something, but I'm not entirely sure about that. In the mean time, I'm letting my Mary Kay products sit, untouched, until they can figure out how to give me the customized experience that I'm supposed to be blogging about.

Meanwhile -- because timing is everything -- I expect I'll be receiving a box from Bare Minerals any day now.  I opted to try their products after getting rave reviews from a close friend.  The radio had an ad that offered a 30 day trial period of the whole set up for $10.00.  I'm guessing I'll have it in hand before I get the Mary Kay stuff in hand....

ETA:  Mary Kay is coming through.  The delightful Pam at headquarters called to tell me that my BLUE eyed shadows are in the mail!

I got nothin'

Not sure why this didn't go on it's due date... but ...

Okay, that's not entirely true.

I've been a busy beaver over here, but there's nothing really exciting to post about.

What have I been doing?

Well, over at Seasons of Lace, we're ramping up for the Summer Season, so I've been contacting potential prize donors and potential sponsors groveling for prizes and discounts.  When I'm successful, I've been updating the Prize Page and the Sponsor Page.  I've been taking registrations for the summer season, logging them into my magic spreadsheet, and updating them on the Blog so that they'll have access to the discount codes from our sponsors. (And I just got help with that last bit -- yay).  And I've been setting up polls for folks to vote on which pattern(s) we're going to do for this Summer's KAL.  It sounds like so little, but MAN does that eat time.

And around here, I've been doing various cleaning things.  Like cleaning out the hot tub.  A bigger challenge this year becasue sometime in April or so, our lid failed.  I mean really failed -- and it leaked little flakes of blue plastic .... stuff ... into the tub.  So we've had to drain the tub, and then let the flakes dry out just enough that the shop vac could suck them up without a lot of water (so we could, you know, throw them away), but not so much that they'd glue themselves to the side of the tub.  That took a few rounds.  And, now that we've got the brand-shiny-new lid in place, we've gone back to do the full bore cleaning (which was somehow much worse than usual because mud got in there too -- and no, I've no clue how that happened).

I also went on a glass cleaning binge.  Every piece of stemware we own (which is, in fact, far more than any sane household needs in this century), is not shiny and clean.  Ditto all crystal golf trophies, Baccarat crystal statue thingies we were given for our wedding, all cool glass paperweights, salt cellars, dessert bowls, decanters, water pitchers, geodes, and stem-less wine goblets.  Regular glassware remains the same, but that gets used all the time, and thus sees the dishwasher regularly.  I even got so nuts as to clean the glass parts of the dining room "chandelier".  (And yes, once I did that... I couldn't resist a little Monk moment - I did in fact, clean the light bulbs - as it turns out, that can increase their efficiency by 20%!).

So far, I've resisted the urge to wash windows.

I spent a LOT of time in water over the past several days.  My phone hung out happily in my pocket until I was done, then slipped out of my pocket ..... into the toilet.

Sigh.

Cool phones with touch screens do not like water.

I'm incredibly grateful that I decided to pony up for insurance on this one.  Never done it before.  Will totally do it again.  Those Android phones?  scary expensive when you just straight out buy one!  This morning, I sit poised, eagerly awaiting the U.P.S. driver who will be bringing my replacement phone.  (DId I mention how glad I am to have insured it??)

Playing with Lightning

This past weekend, I took Kitty to DucKon - a ScienceFiction/Fantasy convention held in DuPage County Illinois.  I took her as a life preservation measure -- saving my own skin.

Why would taking her to a con be a life saving measure?  Good question.  Most folks would consider it more dangerous to take her than to stay home.  After all, taking her means exposing her to all sorts of tempting delights in the Dealers Room and the Art Show... and introducing her to all sorts of costuming ideas (and skills).  THAT could be expensive!

But her favorite author in the world was the Guest of Honor.  And she spoke on all sorts of panels.  And she autographed books.  And... best of all, she happily chatted with her fans for two whole days.  Kitty spent a lot of time with her.  Kitty's claws would have come out all over me had I deprived her of that.  It just wasn't worth it.

Besides.  I kind of LIKE going to cons.

In addition to all the fun panels, and fun people, there was GREAT entertainment and fun playing with lightning on Saturday night the Masters of Lightning brought out their

TESLA COILS

Tesla coils make -- well... lighting.   Among the fun things about Tesla Coils is that they can also be modulated to make music...

From the side, in action, they look like this:

 

Yes, that's electricity barely controlled there. (Okay, the guys doing it know exactly what they're doing, but it sure looks like they're making lightning in the parking lot).

Once you're all happy with them making lightning, they start playing with it....

The dude is luring the lightning to meet in the middle and light up the lightbulbs on that bar...

And just to prove it's no fluke, he demonstrates that he doesn't really need both streams..

And here is he just plain showing off:

My second favorite trick was the one with the propane torch.  For this one, they had the coils play the theme song from a familar movie ....

Who ya gonna call? eh?  (Bill Murray, eat your heart out).  That sounded rather like this (though the video for this part has him playing with the lightbulbs, not the propane torch)

My favorite part -- was the cage...

It looks moderately cool from the outside.... but very cool from the INSIDE

Kitty thought it was fun too.

If you'd like to watch the first ten minutes or so of the show (and hear the coils play more music), watch this:

On Customer Service and Unemployment

Every now and then, one gets the urge to blog about something that ... well... maybe one ought not.  Today is one of those days. (Well, actually, I had this day a couple of days ago, drafted a blog entry, and have let it stew.  This post is what happens when you get that urge, let it stew, and edit it a bit before hitting "publish", but don't let it stew long enough to do the smart thing and keep your mouth shut).

As you may or may not know, I'm quietly job-hunting.  Among the upheavals the past year has brought to ShadowLand has been an abrupt and unintended, and therefore premature, retirement.  This means that we're not as financially comfortable as we would most like to be.  Thus, I'm trying to return to the real-time job market.  This is relevant only because it explains why I had the following experience:

Taking full advantage of the joys of the internet, I've applied for a few jobs using sites like Monster.com.  A few weeks ago, I received a phone call from a search firm, evidently related to one of those applications.  I had a lovely, long telephone interview with a fellow who was trying to place someone in a Customer Service Supervisory position here in town.  We discussed my customer service experience, my experience in training/teaching, my supervisory experience, etc. etc.  I felt pretty good about the whole thing. 

At the end of our call, he told me that he'd like to keep in touch with me over the next two weeks as he would be setting up interviews at the employer's site in that time frame.   I felt even better about the whole thing.  I hung up having been given the impression that he thought I would be a good fit for the position, and that barring a flood of folks who were a much better fit, the likelihood was high that I'd be one of the folks he called to interview with his client (to whom, of course, he only sends his best candidates).

I tried not to be impatient.  I placed other calls, applied to other places, but held out hopes of hearing from this person. After all, he had said that he wanted to stay in touch over the next couple of weeks. 

Last Monday, I had the pleasure of interviewing for a different job -- one that feels very like I will love it, working for a fellow whose philosophy I admire and share.  I'm trying very hard not to build my hopes up for that position too much, because I know that he still has a swack of folks to talk to before he reaches a decision.  I have no doubt that he will get back to me, one way or the other, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I'll be joining his team. 

In the mean time, since I am trying to be a responsible job-seeker, I followed up and the end of last week with the first fellow.  As you may recall, this was for a customer service related job.  Our phone call went something like this:

Me:  Hi, I'm calling to follow up on the customer service supervisor position that you had talked to me about two weeks ago.  You had indicated that you wanted to stay in touch over these two weeks, and since that time is running out, I thought I'd call to see how that search was coming.

Him:  Oh yes... we had two folks interview for that and.... let me see... yes, that was filled on the 19th.

Me: Oh.

Him: So what is it you wanted?

(We will ignore, for the moment, that I had already answered that question. We will assume that since that job was filled, and thus no longer important to him, he skipped right past the part of my initial statement that indicated curiosity about a position he'd already filled.)

Me:  Well, I guess I'm kind of surprised not to have heard from you about that position, since you'd told me that you wanted to stay in touch over those two weeks as you set up the interviews.  I guess I thought you'd have told me that you were no longer considering me.

                .......

Him: So, you were looking at customer service work, right?  is this phone call really demonstrating that you'd be a good fit for that?  Is this really how you want to handle a conversation with someone who might be a good resource for you in finding a job?

Me: (pause)  For a customer service supervisor? Yes.  because it demonstrates that I would make sure that the customer service personnell working under me would not leave our customers hanging; I'd be sure they followed up on every situation where they'd created an expectation of hearing back.

Him:  But you aren't my customer.  Job seekers arent' my customers; the employers are.

 

[CUSTOMER SERVICE FAIL]

I guess I was trained differently.  It's my understanding that everyone with whom you interact is your customer: your boss, your co-worker, your subordinate, your clients, the people with whom you interact on behalf of your client, even the UPS guy.  My bad.

Clearly, I have higher expectations for customer service than many folks do. I worry about this country and this time because of what I see in folks' perceptions of what it means to be in a job where customer service is part of the equation.  The first issue that bugs me is the fact that people seem to have lost track of whether their jobs involve customer service at all. A lot of that comes from how one defines "customer", but some comes from what seems like a dwindling of the concept of service.  And that's the second issue: We all seem to want to be served, but no one seems to want to serve.  Oddly, if we all worked more on serving, and less on demanding good service, we'd probably all receive better service.

Alas, I have this pro-active tendency to follow up when I feel that a person who should have been doing at least a little service in his job has utterly failed to do so.  I find the supervisor, and talk to them abou the issue. (Note, my goal is never to get the person in question in trouble, but to find out where my expectations were wrong, and to help the supervisor help his or her staff do a better job, which in turn helps other customers.) 

I'm sure you're not suprised to learn that I followed up on my disappointing phone call by calling and asking to speak to a supervisor.  I explained what happened, and asked for clarifications on what my expectations should have been. As it turns out, they try to get interviewees to the employers within two day thus, my expectation that the two week contact time would be related to the particular job about which he called me was unrealistic.  Alas, all I had to go on was what he told me; and what he told me led me to believe that I was actually in the running for the job I'd applied for.  Additionally, since they never send people to their clients without having had an in-person interview, the fact that he didn't set up such an interview with me for the next day was a clear indication that he'd not actually be considering me for THAT job.  Alas, again, I only had his statement to go on, and his statememt was grossly misleading given the two to three day turnaround time he'd forgotten to mention.

She apologized that the lad had given me unrealistic expectations.  I shared with her my philosophy of who one defines as "customer", and she seemed to agree with me.  I told her that when I was in supervisory positions, I appreciated when I learned about situations in which people walked away from an encounter with my staff that left a bad taste in their mouths - it let me review stuff with the staff so that it didn't happen again.  The fellow's supervisor seemed to agree with me on that front as well.  Evidently, my expectations for customer service aren't THAT much higher than hers -- just his.

 So, I may have burned a bridge with respect to finding gainful employment.  I'm okay with that as long as somehow, his supervisor can help him work on creating realistic expectations when he talks to people, and maybe even following up on the expectations he creates.  At least then no one else will feel as let down by their company as I was.

 

 

 

Update on Education (keeping the record as straight as I can)

Last week I posted about some bills coming up to "improve" Educaiton around here.  I thought I'd share with you their repsonse to my queries and concerns about tying teacher salaries and jobs to their performance, and how one assesses performance (in particular my concerns that it would just mean more standardized tests which don't actually test teacher performance.)

 "Thank you for your passionate response, we are actually in agreement with you and happy to report that the Performance Evaluation measures will be based on Student Academic Growth overall (with test scores as one of many measures). Our bill is based on the work that began last year with the Performance Evaluation Reform Act of 2010. PERA will create a statewide model for evaluations based on student academic growth. School Districts will be required to add this model to their evaluation plans, unless they already have one in place that calculates growth over multiple measures (this could include teacher/classroom observation, student performance on internal classroom weekly tests – those given by teachers, performance on homework over the course of the year, tracking attendance rates, and even classroom behavior as a measure for student growth over a school year) School districts and teachers unions will be required to work together to determine what “student academic growth” measures should be put in place in addition to the ISAT. The law only requires that 50% of a teachers eval be based on student academic growth, unless a district and a union cannot come to an agreement, then it would be only 35% and the state model (which will likely be Charlotte Danielson) will become the default evaluation plan.

 The Performance Evaluation Advisory Council meets monthly to discuss the changes, ..., these meetings are open to the public so we encourage people to attend and give input to the model as it’s being developed. http://www.isbe.net/PEAC/meetings/meetings.htm

 Most of our bill will not go into effect until PERA is implemented (2013 for 300 Chicago schools). We appreciate your support and would love for you to contact your local State Rep to share with them how you feel about SB 7, we also have volunteer opportunities available if you are interested in getting involved!

 Thank you,
Etoy Ridgnal
Stand for Children

It's not perfect, but I feel better knowing that the plan is something OTHER than just more standardized tests.