How incredibly odd is it that I just hung my head out the back door and screamed “Shut Up!” at the loud crows in the backyard?
They did quiet down though.
Group Effort.
As my first semester as a college student comes to an end, today we had our last regular class in Sociology 101. I have loved this class the entire term and I have to admit that I’m a little sad to see it ending. It has really sparked my interest in conversation and debate as to what is going on the world today. The professor has kept the class interesting. I’m sure there are many taking the same course throughout The Empire State that see it as a requirement, personally I have regarded the entire experience as a delight.
Today was part two of our last exam (before finals). On Tuesday we had the standard multiple choice/true or false/scantron sheet type exam testing our knowledge on several chapters in the required textbooks and the class conversations over the past six weeks or so. I didn’t ace the exam but I feel that I did really well on it. The score from Tuesday’s task was 75% of the exam score. Today’s part made up for the other 25% of the score and it was a group effort.
The class started out with 80 or so students. Over the course of the semester it has shrunk down to around 40 or so. We broke off into groups of six and each group had a simple task: create utopia. Based on all that we had studied, debated and discussed, we were to create what we felt was a utopian society. After 30 minutes, we shared with the class what our community was like and if we gained members we earned more points towards the final, if we lost members we lost points.
Since the division of groups was left up to the students, it was interesting, although very predictable to see how the groups formed and the outcome of their efforts.
The young crowd that sat in the back row the entire semester, listening to their iPods for much of the discussion, formed a society called “Gotham” where there were no restrictions on drinking, drugs or sex.
The religious crowd that sat in the front row the entire semester (and whispered constantly until I ‘accidently’ kicked them in the back of the chair on more than one occasion) came up with a society who’s name escapes me but was focused on family values. They made a big deal about marriage being limited to between a man and a woman. No shockers there.
My group was an eclectic bunch. It was comprised of Maria, who is a mother of three and a year old than me, Sean, the student that tries hard to maintain that “C” while working a full-time job, Samantha, the cross country runner who always has fresh, wet hair, Brigide who made one of her handful of appearances this semester, Yurki, the very chatty 20 something that is not quite fluent in English and me. I was the spokesperson and note taker for the group (another shocker).
Our society was christened “Aipotu”. Given the task of making a civilization in 30 minutes or less (Domino’s couldn’t even deliver one in that amount of time), we were an all green society that home-schooled their children by rotating them through all the participating households (for cross-cultural and intergenerational benefits). The people of Aipotu believed in “live and let live”. The only crime would if you infringed on the rights of another, or if you did not prescribe to the “live and let live” principles. Punishment involved working manual labor (I proposed men had to be shirtless, which garnered smirks from my groupmates) in our planet friendly mines or building windmills.
In the end, no one moved from one community to another. Aipotu earned us all 25 points of this part of the exam. While that in itself was quite groovy, I must say that having an open and honest discussion with my classmates while formulating this backwards version of Utopia was an excellent way to bring this course to a close.
Now to get through the final next Thursday!
Listen.
This evening Earl and I attended “A Conversation with Diane Rehm”. Diane Rehm, host of the appropriately titled “The Diane Rehm Show” on NPR by way of WAMU in Washington, D.C. was in the area to speak about her experiences as a talk show host for over twenty five years from inside the beltway.
The discussion was absolutely fascinating.
Ms. Rehm opened the conversation talking about the recent Don Imus controversy and the fact that there doesn’t seem to be much listening going on anymore. World leaders are no longer listening, the American public doesn’t seem interested in listening, no one is listening anymore. She pointed out the importance of listening to all sides of an topic, even if it’s difficult to do so because of one’s vehement opposition to the other viewpoint.
That last point is something that I am going to try to better myself at.
Ms. Rehm spoke for about ten minutes before opening the forum to questions from the audience. Many people asked questions from a wide range of topics, including the war, the news sources she uses as prep for her show, her favorite interview (Mr. Rogers, the last interview before he died) and more. I wanted to ask the question but the forum came to close before I had the opportunity.
I was going to ask her for her opinion on the blogosphere.
“The Diane Rehm Show” is broadcast daily from WAMU in Washington, D.C. It is carried on most NPR stations, including WRVO-FM here in Central New York.
Customer Service.
Monday, April 30
Them: “Hello, this is Davidson’s Chevrolet in Rome (author’s note- caller ID says they’re calling from Watertown, over 80 miles away) and we’d like to let you know that the part you ordered has arrived. Could you please call and schedule a time to bring your car in?”
Me (ignoring the fact that she wants me to hang up and call back to schedule an appointment): “Uh, the car is already there. You looked at the problem, determined that you needed to order a part and so you did. Can you just go ahead and install it?”
Them: “I’ll call parts.”
Me: “Shouldn’t you call service?”
Them: “Yes. Thank you. Good-bye.”
Wednesday, May 2
Earl: “Hello, I’m calling to check the status of my car. The part has been in since Monday. Has it been installed?”
Them: “We are waiting for you to bring the car in.”
Earl: “You’ve had the car for the past week.”
Them: “We don’t know where it is.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thursday, April 26
Earl at the bank: “I’d like to apply for a home improvement loan.” (patio and landscaping)
HSBC: “No problem.”
They complete the application, Earl signs his life away.
HSBC: “We’ll have an answer for you on Friday, Monday at the latest. I’ll call your cell phone when I have an answer.”
Wednesday, May 2
Earl (after searching 45 minutes for the local branch phone number, since HSBC only wants you to call Singapore, Pakistan or India, depending on who’s cheapest today): “I’m calling for the status of my loan application. It’s been almost a week and I was told that I would have an answer by Monday at the latest.”
HSBC: “We don’t have any record of a loan application.”
This, gentle readers, is one of the many reasons that Old Glory is going right down the tubes. Lousy customer service has become commonplace and fully accepted in our society and no one gives a care.
This is just plain wrong.
Room 104.
The year was 1974. The room was numbered 104. I was in the first grade at the newly christened Lura Sharp Elementary School in Upstate New York. My teacher, Miss Kania, was a young woman that I found incredibly beautiful. She was smart and hip and pretty and had beautiful eyes. This was her first year as a first grade teacher, every year before and afterwards she taught third grade.
School officially started at 9:10. The buses started arriving around 8:45. Our bus driver, Mr. Curry, must have been a leadfoot, because bus 43 was always the first bus to arrive at school. If we had behaved during the ride, we were allowed off the bus and into the school for an informal recess before class started. If we were unruly on the bus, he’d park next to the playground and we’d just sit there, watching the other buses pass, watching our friends gather as they met each other before walking into the school, without us. He’d then let us off the bus at 9:05, leaving us just enough time to get settled before the buzzer sounded the beginning of our studies.
During the informal recess before class, Miss Kania often set up this old dinosaur of a record player. Normally used for playing records such as “Free To Be… You And Me” and instructional narration that accompanied a filmstrip, she let us bring in our favorite records to enjoy.
Scott brought in some old waltz record he’d pilfered from his parent’s collection. I don’t know why he liked those waltzes but he always did. He and Janice would try to waltz around the braided rug. He’d usually stomp on one of her feet.
Bobby (who was killed the year before we all graduated) brought in some nursery rhyme, sing-along type record. Once in a while he’d bring in something from the Mickey Mouse Club.
I always wanted to make everyone have fun dancing, so I brought in my Mom’s copy of “Rubberneckin'” by Elvis Presley. I’d get the girls to do 1st grade versions of go-go dancing and the boys would dance like monkeys all around Room 104. I cranked the music up so loud that it broke the volume knob off the old dinosaur of a record player. We ended up having to get a replacement. Miss Kania was pretty and nice, she didn’t scold me for it.
Today I stumbled upon the video for the Paul Oakenfold Remix of “Rubberneckin'” from 2003. I hope it makes you want to dance.
Bad Geek?
Earl is out of town tonight. Normally we’d just TiVo “Heroes” and watch it when he gets home. In fact, we’ll still watch it together later in the week but curiosity got the best of me so I watched it tonight.
Don’t worry, I’m not going to post any spoilers.
I did not enjoy this episode. I didn’t like it at all. In fact, I hated it. But I’m sure the remaining episodes will be excellent episodes, as we’ve come to expect from the series.
It’s obvious that this is a “throw-away” episode, designed to get the final three episodes of the season squarely into May sweeps. This is the first time that I’ve been disappointed with the show since “Heroes” debuted last fall. Maybe I’m getting old.
Oh, and I still can not stand the Nicki/Jessica character.
I hope I don’t lose geek or gay points because of this.
Electrician.
Earl and I decided that we should continue our run of home improvement projects around the house. I find it kind of funny that we are doing this sort of thing, as we sold our last house because there were just too many projects to do.
Oh well.
We started out the fun by getting rid of some of the leftover clutter from the building of the rooms in the cellar. We intended on taking it to the dumpster at Earl’s work, but they were good employees and locked up the yard gates per Earl’s orders. This was bad for us. So now we have a load of junk in the back of the Jeep that I’ll have to take to the recycling center tomorrow.
After that run of fun, I decided that the clock in our garage (which is part of my collection of school clocks) needed to have it’s wiring hidden instead of being tacked along the wall. This involved pulling wiring through insulated walls but surprisingly it didn’t go badly and I didn’t end up drilling from the garage into the adjacent laundry room.
The relocation of the clock looks spiffy.
Now I’m currently taking a break of installing new lights in a remote area of the cellar. Earl was impressed with the fact that I was wearing safety glasses, so he snapped a photo.
Tuesday night the landscaping people come to tell us how much it’s going to cost to relocate our dirt.
Fun times in the JPnEarl household.
Retro Time.
I love “Never Can Say Goodbye” as performed by The Communards in 1987. I *always* play this track when I’m spinning (usually the last fast song of the night). Today’s dance music doesn’t come close to the energy of songs like this. Plus, it brings back so many fond memories from my first spin at college and “Doc’s”, the classy(?) bar in Jamestown, N.Y.
Enjoy the video.
Oh Alec.
I’m trying to decide if I like Alec Baldwin these days. This picture of him from years ago helps me sway my decision a little bit, but just a little.
Of course Alec has been part of the latest breaking headlines from Hollywood, after he left a very ridiculous, sad and unbelievably angry and hostile voicemail for his young daughter, Ireland. Yesterday he appeared on “The View”, in a double segment no less, where he joined Barbara Walters and Rosie O’Donnell to give his side of the story of what actually happened and the aftermath of it all.
Alec is now heading up the cause of “Parental Alienation”. He is trying to bring awareness of this to the masses. He has also written a book which will be released in September. Per his appearance on “The View”, Alec wanted out of his contract with NBC for “30 Rock” so he could focus on this instead. Sources say NBC responded with a “no”.
O.k., he said some hateful things to his daughter on that voicemail message. Let’s face it, you really shouldn’t call anyone a pig and especially not your family. Alec knows that. He lost his cool. He took out frustrations with his ex-wife on his daughter. I think that’s readily apparent. It doesn’t make what he did acceptable by any means, but people lose their cool and they need to learn and move on from the experience. But you know what, that message should have never been made public in the first place. Years ago I went on a rant that rivaled Alec’s voicemail performance. I sure as hell wouldn’t have wanted that rant to be seen by anyone in the general public. It’s amazing that I can interact with the target of my venom once in a while and have it be an amicable experience. So in a way, I feel for Alec in that regard.
But what kind of creeped me out was the whole interview itself. Barbara Walters desperately tried to go into 20/20 mode, but Alec wasn’t having any of it and pretty much steered the direction and tempo of the interview. Barbara was visibly uncomfortable with this. Rosie looked like she was a little uncomfortable as well but for different reasons. This style of interview is not her forté and she certainly gets an “E” for effort.
I guess I felt that Alec was trying too hard to do damage control. To me it felt like it was too soon for this sort of thing. He looked like he hadn’t gotten much sleep, he stammered and stuttered a little bit and while I appreciate the scruffy face, he really should have shaved if he wanted to put his best face forward so to speak. People notice that sort of thing.
So do I like Alec Baldwin? I guess time will tell. I’ll download “30 Rock” and catch up on it this summer. I’ll see how he behaves in the future.
For now I’ll keep enjoying his scruff in the proper situations as well.
Telstar.
Today has been one of them days where you think you’re accomplishing things but then you look around and it seems like nothing has been done.
We started the morning fairly early. At 8 a.m. on the dot, a contractor arrived to give us the quote for the new patio we’re having put in. The back deck is gone and we’ve opted for a stamped concrete patio; the contractor gave us two bits of good news: 1. It will be done within two weeks, 2: the price is very reasonable.
Yay! Where do we sign on the dotted line?
With that accomplished, we had hoped to clean up what was left of the deck but April showers prevailed. So I suggested “Plan B”. In an effort to save money, Earl and I have been talking about dropping DirecTV and going with a traditional antenna instead. Several of the stations in the area are now broadcasting HDTV digitally over-the-air, so I figured between these feeds and the AppleTV, we’d be fine with our entertainment fill. Off to Radio Shack we went, where we picked out a moderately priced antenna that could be mounted on the side of the house without looking like we were trying to pick up secret conversations from Telstar.
Just for kicks I installed the antenna in a makeshift arrangement in an effort to confirm that we’d be getting a decent signal. I figured it’s better to be safe than sorry before calling DirecTV and telling them to pull our plug.
That’s when Earl realized that we weren’t going to get ESPN, Discovery, Lifetime, Logo, et. al. anymore.
I think he paled.
So the antenna went back in the box and is destined to be returned and DirecTV will continue to tap our wallets for something that was free back in the day.
After our little Telstar drama, Earl and I made supper together, which was an enjoyable experience. After our delicious meal, he said he’d help with loading the dishwasher, where I was presented with this (images are clickable in this new blog format):
He’s such a kidder.
