Yesterday my sister’s family hosted a birthday party for me and I got to wear this:
Today’s my actual 40th birthday and I got one of these for my birthday from the better-half…
I think my schoolwork/housework/yardwork productivity has just been shot.
As the end of the semester approaches (thank heavens), I have several papers/projects to wrap up. One of the requirements for my program is we have to write reflective essays after completing certain classes. Actually we must turn essays in for most of the classes we take. I’ve been a little out of practice since I had to take so many of the no essay required courses in quick succession. This semester I’m taking two classes and both require the essay. In fact from now until I’m finished with the program, I’ll be writing these essays. Before I can graduate I have to write a long essay wherein I reflect on my entire journey through the program–that one should be interesting since it will come due at the end of what is predicted to be a very grueling semester.
I decided to go ahead and write both of my essays this weekend so I can focus on the last paper in one class and the finishing touches on a group presentation in the other. When I started writing the essays, I really thought I would have a hard time making distinctions between the two. As it turns out the tone of the two essays are completely different. Both are highly personal and show how much I’ve been thinking about lessons learned, but they diverge after this point. One is brighter and sunnier (if that makes any sense in relationship to academia) and the other is darker and more somber. The more somber of the two is for my Groups and Teams class. I have an odd relationship with that professor–in one breath she’ll tell me how much she values my contributions and in the next she’s stone-cold to me. I don’t know if this is just how her personality is or if when she’s being stone-cold she’s telling me to step it up. At any rate, I do believe she’s an excellent facilitator and even when you don’t feel like learning she manages to get you thinking and engaged.
As part of our learning process in Groups and Teams, we formed a team and had to work on three projects together. I have come to believe we were never really a team. This disappoints me. We have some of the characteristics of a team (task focused, goal setting, structured work assignments) but we fell way down in the team identity dimension. There’s another team in the class that I believe to be a good example of a team and we’re nowhere close to their level of cohesion. I touched on these feelings in my reflective essay and will explore them further in the long paper I have due in eight days. Eight days…crap, I need to get busy.
I moseyed over to Amazon today to add a CD to my wishlist and found out Ellen Gilchrist has a new book coming out in May. I pre-ordered it after spinning around in my chair, whoo-hooing and stomping my feet in joy.
I just went down the hall to pick up a large print out and yes; I use the way-far-away printer because I hate having to walk ten feet into the production room because that means interacting with the training center support staff. I know how elitist that sounds. When you figure one of them was wearing an electronic ankle bracelet when she was hired and can’t under any circumstance find her “inside†voice, you can understand why I may want to avoid her and her incomprehensible loud mumbling. And then there’s her co-worker who speaks at an appropriate volume but speaks in non sequiturs so I always feel like I’ve missed the first part of the conversation.
I walked into the copier/printer/mail room to pick up my print out and realized little Miss Non Sequitur was standing at the copier trying to figure out how to print one sheet a couple of times. Damn. She asked me which tray to use. I said I had no idea (because I was not interested in any tray other than the preset default), just press Start. I grabbed my print out and began my retreat. She said she got it and the copier started up. Like it would when you press Start.
I was once an administrative assistant for a mid-sized company and there were several things that I had to know how to do. As long as I completed the following things, I could spend the rest of my time plotting to take over the world (still working on that):
Making copies is pretty easy once you’ve used one copier in your life. Even if that copier was the cheapest portable copier your dead-beat boss could find at a yard sale. We may not be quite at the ideal of Star Trek where people walk up to computer panels and even if they don’t speak Klingon can figure out how to fire the photon torpedo but we’re at the point where you can walk up to a copier and get a single sheet of paper to come out on the other side as two copies. Except where I work.
The better-half and I were in the middle of making Mexican chorizo (from scratch) when the sky got all weird and the sound of the wind and rain wigged us out. The temperature dropped and I located the cat. We were about to run into our downstairs bathroom (the only room downstairs without windows) when suddenly the big scary weather was gone. Just like that.
About 10 minutes later our weather radio (yes, we have one of those) blared out a Tornado Warning. I checked an online weather site and a tornado was spotted just northeast of us.
The interesting thing is there’s not one stick or branch in our front yard, but our back yard is littered with them. The storm evidently just looped around the back side of us and headed on.
UPDATE:
There’s now news coverage of the storm and the storm really did loop around the back side of us. The property that our land abuts was hit hard. Those folks have a long dirt road and when I drove past it this morning I saw the destruction. The local newspaper and radio station are both reporting that a four mile path was hit by the storm yesterday. Some people lost roofs and others had their barns and other property destroyed. The radio station reported that crews will be out to look at the damage and try to determine if it was a tornado or just a very severe thunderstorm.
UPDATE #2:
It was a tornado.
In a perfect world, this video by Micro$oft would have people switching to Linux or Leopard in no time. How could have this Bruce Springsteen rip-off ever been made?
At work and am very tired, hoping I don’t fall asleep in the training room today. Spent evening at Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo concert. They were loud and rocking. I’m too old to have two nights in a row out late. But, they rocked and since I was way too young to enjoy Benatar concerts when she lived in town, I was really glad to see her.
The National is a great venue–they have a ginormous Ladies bathroom on the first floor and pretty architectural details. The seats, however, suck. Seriously suck. Unless you are the size of a pygmy. And, we’re not talking about how fat everyone is and they can’t fit into seats. We’re talking about anyone more than four feet tall being able to fold themselves into a seat. I can’t tell you how many people we watched sit down, give each other the WTF look and then wander off to find another seat but finding all the seats really crappy except in nosebleed which is where we were. Nosebleed wasn’t even all that great but at least your knees were actually able to go in front of your body.
Beginning today I’ll be in the classroom for most of this week, observing and assisting with training. It’s been a long time since I was in the classroom in an instructor role. I won’t actually be leading any training this week, but I have a feeling I will have to come to the lead trainer’s rescue–she hasn’t taught one of the major points of this session in over a year. That’s why she wanted my help. It’s been even longer for me but I’ve done this training so many times I could do it in my sleep.
The thing that bothers me and is a fundamental problem with the way things go around here is why hasn’t she taught that particular section of training in over a year? How can you team teach something and always let the other person do a section you don’t like or a section that scares you a little bit? Isn’t the point of being the instructor is to stretch and do things outside of your comfort zone? We ask trainees to do that all the time because a certain level of risk brings learning. Seriously, look it up. If you are never challenged then what’s the fun of doing your job?
Back in the day when I traveled all the time to deliver training there was a section of training in which I wasn’t particularly strong and my partner loved training it. I finally had to get her to agree that I had to train that section every other week so that I could become comfortable with it and so she could be comfortable in the part I normally led. It turns out we both benefited from changing things up. It also stops the tedium and boredom that sets in after you’ve delivered the same message a hundred times.
So, it will be interesting to see how the lead trainer handles things this week. I’ll be making notes on portions of training that need to be updated. I’ll also be looking at her floor skills in an unofficial capacity. I’m always interested in how other people deliver training. You never know what clever idea you can steal and use later.
Been ruminating and ranting lately and even though I have a General Spleen Venting category that I use to tag entries, I couldn’t muster putting the complete and total vent on here. So, off to other subjects.
Ages ago I heard about an old and out of print book called The Gentleman’s Companion Volume II, by Charles Baker. I added the title to my Amazon wish list with a note not to spend over $50 for the book. I just checked my wish list and I added the book April 18, 2005. In the intervening three years, I’ve periodically checked on the availability of this book on various used book websites and the price has always soared to over $100. I really wanted that book, but I couldn’t see parting with $100+ dollars just to get a copy.
A week ago I decided to check on the book again and found it for $20. I emailed the seller and she did in fact still have the book in stock and could ship it for a small fee as soon as I made a payment. The money flew out of my paypal account and the book arrived yesterday.
I’ve only read the first few pages but I’m already hooked. The writing is witty and filled with words and turns of phrases you don’t see anymore (unless you read Susanna Clarke who writes in that late 18th/early 19th century style).The book also smells so good. It has that musty smell that reminds me of old shop fronts with wide wood floors, dusty stacks of books and other oddities stuffed in amongst the stacks.
