Excellent, DariaG! I swear, I got an endorphin rush just reading your post. I would love to be hiking again--just waiting for Thing Number 2's legs to get long enough, although we do go on little local hikes in the town forests, which are generally successful if you stop and stuff food in the kids' mouths every fifteen minutes or so.
Labral, hope your fingers feel better forthwith! That's no fun at all.
So Flamingo Fiesta was a great success, although we learned that plywood would have made a better material choice than foam core/plastic insulation board. The latter was a little too weak in the neck, and we had to bolster it with some supporting infrastructure. I'm going to attempt a link to a picture, but it's a brand new photobucket account, so I'm not sure if it will work. Just let me know.

As a collector of all things flamingo, I must say that I'm intensly jealous! My lawn flamingos now seem vastly inferior. That looks great!

Now THAT is a flamingo! Excellent work, Hildy!

And labral, I neglected to mention how bad I feel about your fingertip burns. I'm just very glad you sought medical attention; hand burns can be surprisingly dangerous if you don't. Take care of yourself, and don't drive while you're totally loopy -- but hey, enjoy the drugs otherwise! :-)

As a matter of fact, Miri, I spent some time poking around in the flamingo section of your site, looking for a good flamingo to print out for construction purposes. (My brother, who was the construction genius, took a picture, blew it up, and then created a grid, which he then mapped out on the foam board. Yes, he is an engineer. Engineers are the best.)
It was so worth the effort. Dad started cackling the minute he saw it and didn't stop the entire afternoon.

OMG, Hildy. Intense flamingo envy. That is beyond awesome. Thanks so much for the link!

Theschnauzers, what I want to know, though, is whether or not "the kids" ever grow up and mellow out. At the risk of voicing heresy, I like dogs but have never been too keen on schnauzers. This has been exacerbated by my sister's schnauzer, who is now 2. The dog gets nervous if her people aren't around at all times. If my sister and her husband want to be alone for any reason (ahem), they have to shut the dog out of the room. And then she whimpers and scratches at the door. (she must be channeling the weimaraner from Best in Show)

I guess what I'm meandering around to asking is whether or not the dog is this way _because_ schnauzers are generally smart, and my sister failed to train her correctly - ergo, she learned bad habits too well? Or is the dog atypically dumb for a schnauzer?

TheAnglican, that is really hard to answer from what you told me. I'll say first that the behavior sounds very atypical for schnauzers, at least the ones I've been directly involved with raising and having in my household.

I'm not sure what type of behavior you are describing and that's important because that dictates what your sister's household needs to do. One possibility is that the schnauzer has a severe case of separation anxiety. Another possibility is that he/she is very protective of someone in that household. (Or it can be both of these.) A third is that its part of the personality make up of that particular schnauzer. In any event, its not a question of how smart that schnauzer is, but how emotionally secure and healthy that schnauzer is. The analogy with children is really quite apt.

Is this breed behavior? No. Is it behavior they grow out of? Yes. Or at least mine have always mellowed out and showed that they had become more emotionally secure as they get older. One thing I've done for a long time (2 decades, now) is that I usually have had two schnauzers -- with several years (at least five years) difference in ages between them. The older schnauzer always takes on the parenting role, and actually does most of the puppy training and raising because the puppy learns by observing and interacting with the older one. When the older one passes on, then I adopt another schnauzer puppy for that one to raise once he/she reaches five years of age. (This works on all sorts of levels in terms of emotional health, physical health, and so forth.)

I can't tell from what you've said if what you're seeing is an separation anxiety, a socialization problem, or a schnauzer who takes his/her responsibility of protecting someone in your sister's household very, very seriously. And if this schnauzer is your sister's first, then there's a possibility that there is a learning curve going on, on both sides of the relationship.

I don't know if this helps or not but I'd quickly run afoul of the three screen length post limit just trying to write a more useful response. I hope this helps, though.

Hey, thanks for the reply, theschnauzers. All of what you said made sense. She is their first schnauzer (and first dog, too), so all concerned are probably figuring things out still. Some of it probably is separation anxiety, and my dad the veterinarian also thinks she's unusually neurotic for a schnauzer. Glad to hear that it may not last forever, though.

And on a completely different topic, we went to the local u-pick strawberry place today, and I am happy to report that the berries this year actually taste like berries - sweet, juicy, complex. I wish I had time to do more with them than just slice them up and eat them with ice cream. The reason for the lack of time is...drum roll please...I am about 2-3 days of work away from finishing an entire draft of my dissertation to give to my advisor. All approximately 300 pages of it. So send me good and productive vibes, guys, so I can put this sucker behind me!

Just stopping by and raising a glass to -- well, I haven't been able to hang out at TWoP much, but when I realized you'd be analyzing the racers, I came to the forum just to see if anyone was "pre-hating." And you were! You are! A toast to you. Thank you. I love the pre-hating.

thanks all for the kind thoughts. My fingers feel great this am. I woke up in the middle of the night, dug my zip-lock baggie of ice out from between the bed and the wall and put it on the floor....my fingers weren't hurting at all! I've been up for 20 minutes now, and no pain! yay!!! I really didn't want to take anymore Tylenol/codine since it made me so loopy. What an adventure....which I hope to NEVER repeat!!! I went through about 1/3 of a 22lb bag of ice yesterday! the darn stuff kept melting!!! I think my main difficulty today will be to NOT use those fingers. My mom suggested I make a make-shift splint just to keep me from accidentally using that hand. Thankfully school is out and, as someone mentioned earlier, I don't have to grade papers or smack hands with rulers or anything fun like that.

re: schnauzers. In my experience, yappiness and hyperactivity are a training issue. The dogs may have a tendancy toward that, but training can contain it. Our dog club president has schnauzers and they yap their way through agility courses....but I think its because they are too quick for her. They yap to tell her to hurry up and either catch up, or tell them what to do next.

My mommy is coming to visit today! Yay!

I don't know about schnauzers, but I sure do know about living with a neurotic dog with separation anxiety. Our golden has severe, severe thunderstorm anxiety coupled with separation anxiety; we have to use a combination of daily meds and an Anxiety Wrap™ to keep him from going into blind panic attacks. (He really would do better living somewhere other than south Louisiana, too, but that's not a choice we have right now, alas!)

If it is separation anxiety, some of it may be trainable, but some of it may require other intervention. Trust me, we've tried everything in the world, but when it's severe enough training just disintegrates. He's a very good dog the rest of the time, too, so it's not from a lack of proper training; his nervous system just overwhelms what little passes for brains in that fluff between his ears.

Good luck with it, anyway!

*sigh*

After heavy rain this weekend, I came into work this morning to find out the ceiling over my desk (just my desk, of course) had leaked all over the 20+ drawings I spent all day Friday printing out for my boss to take to a meeting this morning. *siiiiggghhh* So I tried to hurry up and replot.....and the cartridges ran out of ink. Replaced the cartridges, and now the @*#$*!plotter is out of paper and we don't have any more here, so it's off to the blueprinting company to buy some more. *siiiiiiigggggghhhhhhh* Murphy's law, people. Watch out for it.

Jumping back a couple of pages (I was away this weekend, so I'm a bit behind), there's a Godiva Chocolate factory near Reading, Pennsylvania. I know this because it's within a few miles of where I live. I have a friend who works there (in the office), so I occasionally get bags of broken Godiva Chocolates for free! (They don't sell the broken ones, just sell them to employees for pennies.) Mmmmmmmmm.....broken chocolate bits. Heaven!

Your username, swimmerboy, would fit our general meteorological conditions today -- we've got endless rain boiling up from the Gulf and dripping over our heads. Those "torrential downpours" that make for delightful unexpected flooding and, safe to say, totally hideous rush hour traffic. Let's hope Murphy is done with you for the day -- but not that he's moved on down my way!

Anyone have any tourist advice for me as I visit Anchorage, Alaska this weekend? I have two days of sight-seeing available with a marathon in between (eep!). My hotel is right downtown, but I won't have a rental car. I'm not sure what to do with myself while I'm there, and I'd appreciate your thoughts.

I'm that way, actually. I'd much rather pig out on crunchy salty things. Hershey kisses are safe, but I could easily snarf an entire bag of Doritos in one sitting.

So, I just want to thank y'all for the good karma you were sending re the adoption. Unbelievably, on Saturday, my notoriously tight-fisted (she would say thrifty) grandmother offered to front us the money for the entire thing. We'll have to pay her back when we get the tax credits and the reimbursement my employer offers, but still. Woooo! We're going to China! Saturday night Mr. Ex and I were jumping up and down in the kitchen chanting "we're having a baby!" Real mature behaviour for prospective parents, eh?

I can't stop grinning.

Congratulations, JenEx! That's wonderful news. Hey, karma does work. Any idea when you're going?

Congradulations JenEx. I think jumping up and down in the kitchen is exactly the right reaction. It showes how excited you are and any child you recieve will be lucky to have found you.

Good luck with the drawings Swimmerboy, the day can only get better?

I am so happy for you JenEx! That is wonderful news. Congratulations!

JoyWalkerEarthquake park

A big, giant Wahooooo! to Jenex. What gladsome tidings! You guys will rock as parents, I'm sure.
And swimmerboy, that sucks. Sucks, sucks, sucks. No other word for it.

I'm right there with teh salt/fat snacks in lieu of chocolate. My biggest addiction is to Mickey D's french fries. I love those things, and I don't even like fast food.

Congrats, JenEx!!!
My cousins adopted a baby girl from China about a year ago.
If I can get any info from them that could help you then send me an email.
good luck!

Oooooh, cool Jen! When do you go to China? Bring me back some egg rolls! I have a friend who brought home his baby girl from China a couple years ago and they couldn't be happier. It was worth everything they went through. (But they didn't bring me back any egg rolls. Bastards!)

swimmerboy, dude. That just plain sucks. Aren't Monday mornings great?

And now my rant for the day. (Ok, my rant for now. I can't guarantee there won't be another one coming later.) As you know, I work as a receptionist in a law firm, so most of my day is spent dealing with morons on the phone. And I've noticed that there are a lot of men who seem to have forgotten the words "thank you". They're not rude, they just substitute "thank you" with certain other messed up phrases that have no business being used in a professional conversation:

The first is "Cheers!" Instead of saying thank you, a lot of men will say "Cheers!" What the hell is that? Unless you're handing me a shot, "Cheers" makes no sense. The other phrase they use, and this one drives me NUTS, is "Right-O!" What the fucking fuck is that? That's not even a real word! Furthermore, how do I respond to that? I can't say "You're welcome". I can't say anything. What is the appropriate response to "Right-O"??? And it's always men who do this, NEVER women. Probably because women know that those two phrases sound stupid and make no fucking sense! Jesus people, just say "thank you". Is it really that fucking difficult??!

Thus endeth my rant for now.

Congradulatoins JenEx I hope everything goes smoothly from here on in.



Yeah this seems to be the sign-off on everyone's emails as well. The only people I think that can pull it off are Australians. I have no idea why, but if an Aussie (or Kiwi too I guess) ends a conversation with "Cheers Mate" I have no problem. Anyone else...kind of comes off as a wanker.

Right-O, should however only be said if the person is so British that the do in fact have the Union Jack firmly wedged up they're ass.

I don't mind 'Cheers' in place of 'Best Regards' or whatever else as an end to an email if 1) I already know the person, and 2) we have a somewhat informal working relationship. But in place of thank you? That, I cannot fathom. The two sayings have nothing to do with each other. Nothing. Not a smidgeon, jot or tittle. File under: Things that will be banned when I rule the world.

I still hate chocolate candy.

Yes, even if it's really good chocolate.

It always (even milk chocolate) tastes unbelievably bitter to me. I think it might have something to do with me though, because there's a variety of food that I have this reaction to, which no one else seems to think tastes funny.

TheAnglican, I meant to add in my last post in response to your schnauzer question, to feel free to send me an email to follow up on the topic of your sister's schnauzer.

Ok, in e-mails, I have no problem with either of those expressions (although I would prefer "thank you"), but I'm talking about actual verbal conversations I have with people. Those expressions just don't work when you're actually speaking to someone.

Normal conversation:

Me - I'll make sure he gets the message.
Woman - Thank you.
Me- You're welcome.

These idiots:

Me - I'll make sure he gets the message.
Idiot - Right-O!
Me - <silence until I finally give up trying to figure out what to say and just hang up>

Mega-congrats, JenEx, on your upcoming little one! And don't forget, when the day arrives, we want to see pictures!

I'm guilty of signing emails with "cheers", but I'd never say it in real life.

Thanks for the good wishes, guys. Proof that TWoP karma rocks. We are sending in the initial paperwork this week, and since we're applying to the waiting child program (we want to adopt a toddler) it goes a bit faster; if all goes smoothly we should be matched with a child by late fall and will probably go to China sometime after the new year. So it will be a while before I have pictures, MamaTiger, but don't worry, I'm sure when the time comes we'll have an entire website devoted to her. Rachel, I'm not sure how well egg rolls travel, but I'll see what I can do!

You know the irony of all this? I really don't like Chinese food. Not a clue what I'll eat while I'm there.

Congrats, JenEx!!!! You and the Mr. definitely deserve to jump up and down and chant : ). Your little one will have a great life with parents that excited!

RachelRSL, I'm with you on people forgetting the words "thank you." I don't get too much of the "let's substitute a nonsense phrase" problem, but more of people forgetting to say thanks at all. That irks me. I know that I'm only a lowly receptionist (though hopefully not for too much longer - I just got accepted to grad school and I'm looking for a job in my field of study), but would it kill people not to be completely rude? I'm in this job because the market is crappy, not because I'm an imbecile. And even if I was, that's not an excuse to be a shithead.

RachelRSL, I often have the same problem; I work with a lot of politicians, and manners are completely unknown to most of them! I say You're welcome first, and then they say thank you and sometimes get a bit embarrassed, which I enjoy.

JenEx, congratulations! I hope everything goes smoothly, and you keep us all updated on the process!

well, everything worked out. The client was pretty reasonable and agreed to push the meeting back till this afternoon. We all got a good chuckle out of it, actually. That kind of stuff is always happening to us.

Congratulations, JenEx! I can just imagine how excited you and Mr. JenEx must be!

ETA...while we're kind of on the subject of odd conversation ettiquette, does it bother anybody else when you answer the phone "Hello?", and the person on the other end also says "Hello", and then doesn't say anything else? I hate that so much. I will just keep repeating "Hello" until the person on the other end decides to tell me what they want or who they're calling for.

Ugh. Things guaranteed to make an employee ticked off (speaking of the lack of "thank you's" these days). The head of my international uber corp is being knighted by the Queen for "services to information and publishing." Nice. He's only been involved in information and publishing for a paltry 5 years and only at the CEO level. I always had a feeling my company viewed us more in the line of serfs who owe them fealty. Now that I'm answering to someone with "Sir" in his name, it all becomes clear.

Legis, I've seen the same thing in working with politicians. "Thank you's" are almost as plentiful as "I'm sorry's" with them.

And let me add my congrats to you and Mr. Ex, JenEx! How exciting and wonderful. Hope that it all goes smoothly.

ETA, swimmerboy, while the "hello" thing does bug me, the lack of "goodbye" or "talk to you later" at the end of a phone conversation irks me more. People who have basically decided the conversation is over and just hang up. Definite pet peeve.

That sucks about the water damage swimmerboy. I totally empathize because a few months ago I had a similar thing happen to me. The roof in our new office building developed a leak that just happened to be over my office. I didn’t have any work stuff damaged so I totally feel for you on that part.

Glad you’re feeling better labral.

Congrats on the great news JenEx!!!! I can’t remember if you mentioned this before but what part of china are you and the hubbie going to/getting the toddler from?

Bwaaahaa! and Word! on the diminishing use of "thank you". Also, in my office it seems that a few people have also stopped using appropriate responses to Thank You.
When I say "Thanks" or "Thank you" I'll get, "Uh huh" or "Yep" or just nothing as a response. How about "You're welcome" or "No problem" or "Glad I could help" etc.

I must say, I'm tired y'all. This flying back and worth between Seattle and Spokane and staying in hotels etc. is bringing the killer fatigue.

Congratulations, JenEx! That is wonderful news.

Just checking back in - haven't been around much. I've been a woman of leisure for a week, and I actually wish I had more free time. I've been busy with work for my upcoming summer program and with a freelance assignment. It is lovely, though, to go the gym in the morning when no one is there. I leave for New York on saturday, and I still have to pack (though I'm not taking much) and get rid of my car (which I'm happy about, because while you always love your first car, mine is getting on in years and losing reliability. My next car, I'm buying one I can put gas in, change the oil every so often, and forget about).

I don't like it when people just end phone conversations, either. Very annoying and rude. I'm the kind of person who will call people back if they hang up on me, accidentally or on purpose, and tell them I wasn't finished.

Oooh, people who don't say "goodbye." Count Papa Tiger in that bunch. He'll say, "Thank you," and then I keep talking, and next thing I know, I realize I'm talking to dead air. I simply cannot persuade him that the occasional indicator that the conversation is actually concluded is in order.

ETA: Way cool! I just made Fanatic! Does this mean I now really need to get a life?

I was on the phone today, and the person on the other end started to say "You're welcome" and then stopped halfway through. That's when I realized I am one of those people who don't always say "Thank you". I had said "Great" instead. I feel so ashamed! I do say "Thank you" and "Excuse me" a lot - I am Canadian after all.

Heh. I get annoying variations of that all day long and, yes, it *is* annoying. The most common one is, after I've answered the phone, they say something like: "Hi, it's Joe Blow from Royal Bank. <silence> Hello?" I have to bite my tongue to keep from saying: "You didn't say anything that required me to respond. Just tell me who you want to speak to, fuckwad!"

Congrats, JenEx!

What irks me even more is when callers just state the name of the person for whom they're calling and that's it, like:

Me: Good afternoon, Soulless Corporate Entity!
Caller: (tersely) John Doe.

As opposed to, say:
Me: Good afternoon, Soulless Corporate Entity!
Caller: Hi, may I speak to Rachel Roe, please?

I always have to bite my tongue to avoid saying, "Yes? What about him/her?" Plus, it makes me feel like a trained seal somehow.

In more positive job news, Ms. I DON'T HAVE AN INDOOR VOICE! is indeed on vacation this week, so as my last day is Friday, I never have to hear her again! (I start my new job as an apartment leasing agent on Monday. Quick Reader's Digest condensed version: last Friday, within the space of about 3-4 hours, I found out I wasn't hired by this one real estate company [the same one I posted in here about a month ago that I was hired by; that person, turns out, didn't have the authority to directly hire and I'd been in the interview process with them ever since], laid off from my current job effective this coming Friday, and hired by my second choice real estate agency. Believe me, I went out and got plastered that night!)


My weird chocolate thing is, it has to have some sort of crunch to it, like, say, Kit Kat, Twix, or Crunch. The texture of just plain chocolate with nothing in it creeps me out.

Ugh! Yes, I HATE those people! Common courtesy people...look into it.

I also hate those people who think that voice mail is a life altering decision. I can't even begin to tell you how many times I inform a caller that someone is not in and when I ask them if they'd like their voice mail, I get a distressed: "Oh, um, gee...oh, I don't know...uh..." It's not Sophie's Choice, do you want their voice mail or not?!

Oooh, here's another reception desk pet peeve. I hate it when callers give me shit about their inability to reach someone in my office. "But I've called three times and I have to talk to him right now and wahwahwah me-cakes!" Dude, I'm not the office mom. I don't get to withhold dessert if someone doesn't return phone calls. In other words, you are whining to the WRONG person, so shut it. Thanks.

And then there's the rant that's particular to my office and my office alone I'm fairly sure. Our hours are 8:30am to 5:00pm. One would assume that that means that phones are manned between those hours. However, you'd be wrong. Instead, phones are manned from 8:15am to 5:15pm, because other people may have their clocks set wrong and expect someone to be there. Except that there is no one here except for me, the receptionist, so even if someone were to call (which is rare), there's no one here to help them anyway. Fantastic.

Can you tell I hate my job? Anyone know of any library positions suitable for an MLS student open in Chicago? Because I'm ready to pitch a Florinka fit right now.

Heh. I can sympathize. I work 9:00 until 6:00, yet everyone else in my office only works until 5:00. So from 5:00 to 6:00 I sit here and tell clients I can't help them. Very professional.

yay!!!! JenEx congratualtions!!!!

and re: thank you, one of my new rules in my classroom next year will be "if I give you something gift-like (piece of candy, loan of a pencil, etc) and you don't say 'thank you' within 10 seconds, I'm taking it back.

Oooh, yes. I forgot about that one. We used to have this one particularly snobby client who had major attitude problems and everytime he called and I answered, he'd say very abruptly "Ted Cattle." After I got fed up with it, I did pull the "Yes, what about him?" several times. A couple times, (and I used to crack myself up when I did this), I'd respond, "No sir, my name is Joseph." After a while he got the hint. I hated that guy.

JoyWalker, My sis lives in Anchorage. She says the two tourist sites not to miss are the native heritage center and the downtown museum. Also best place to buy native crafts is the gift shop of the Alaska Native Medical Center. Since they buy directly from native villages and don't mark up much, you get a good price/quality ratio.

Just popping in to say I love that Flamingo, please feel better Labral and Congrats to JenEx. Cheers! (just kidding).

How about another example of telephone jerks? I hate it when I answer the phone and say something like, "Good morning. Widget department. May I help you?," and the person at the other end snaps, "Who's this?" I always want to say, "I'm the person who's going to decide whether or not your call goes through. So unless you want to disappear into communications limbo forever, show a little courtesy."

First, congrats to JenEx.

Second, word on the phone ettiqute hate. About 80% of my job is answering the phones and I hate it when people get so huffy about us not having voicemail. We are a company of 17 people, 2 of which are the owners and have offices. I can write down a message on a piece of paper and walk the 60 feet to their desk a hell of a lot easier than I can convince people to install a new phone system. It's not like the caller is calling to give codes to nuclear bombs or anything, the message is usually like "I got the fax you sent and I'll reply in an e-mail today", ooh big mystery what that's about.

I also hate when I have to give directions which is a lot and I'll start giving them and then they don't listen. "We're on the southeast corner of Main and..." Caller: "What's that near? Which streets?" If they had just let me finish they would know that information now wouldn't they?

Ohh I HATE it when I don't get directions the way I want em. I want street names and building numbers, not landmarks r us. My dads friends are bad at this. They're all, "There's this street and he's gonna go past this tree and then theres a dip in the road." I'm like, SHUT UP. You can't see trees and dips in the road on maps.