Rich is watching Matt's cats. He gets the following note: "The key to my house is in your desk drawer, we left instructions for their care on the counter. Be careful when you go over, I think Worm [one of the cats] is plotting to kill you." Classic.
rant time...
There's a lot of hubbub lately about cuts at space agency to aeronautics research. You can read all about it on NASA Watch. Anyway, my personal opinion on this probably diverges a lot from the norm. But I just don't care. I mean, I do care when research funding is withdrawn prematurely and grad students can't finish their phd's. And I care when expensive, useful facilities (i.e. wind tunnels, arc jet facilities) are shut down with no thought to the future. And I hate to see people lose their jobs. But the agency helped make aeronautics a solvent, realistic idea 50 years ago. It should be supporting itself by now.
But, I just personally think the space agency doesn't need to be as involved in aeronautics as it used to be. The commercial airliners need a wider cockpit to make more money? They should fund their own research. The military worried about aerodynamic stability in a fighter jet? There budget is about 200x space agency's, they should fund their own research. Does the national airspace system need to run more efficiently? We have the FAA and the NTSB, they're the experts, they should fix it. All that's left for space agency's aeronautics should be the basic research no one else will do -- super theoretical aerodynamic shapes, high altitude stuff/high speed stuff that's useful for spaceflight, etc.
Yes, its a shame that people may have to relocate or find new jobs because of this realignment. But its ridiculous when any government agency is saddled with unnecessary work with funding that sucks money away from things they should be doing.
That said, I still remain paranoid that all this stuff is a way to quietly shut down the space agency without too many people kicking up a hissy fit. "Hey, shuttle people, help us shut it down manned spaceflight and we'll let you go to the moon... giggle, giggle... like that will ever happen... Hey aeronautics people, sorry, necessary sacrifice to go to the moon, c'est la vie, we're shutting you down... giggle giggle, who needs to reappropriate that money to space, we can just cut it from the budget... stupid engineers, they'll never know what hit them!"
So, through my lovely stat tracker, I discovered two of my old friends from high school have blogs. I added their links to the "friends" list on the sidebar: Caryn is my globe-trotting, former philosophy debating friend who randomly e-mailed me from Morocco and said "hey, I'll be in Switzerland tomorrow" and then showed up at my doorstep. Dallas was once one of the "cool kids" in my high school before she got sucked into our "trek" web of Dragonworld (a old dial-in BBS) nerdiness. Unfortunately, she moved away to North Carolina at the end of Sophomore year ...
Let's see, what have I learned (had reinforced) in 24 hours:
1. Why pay $8 to do something that you don't find quite scary and makes your arms all shakey the next day?
2. Don't talk religion unless you already precisely know how the person you are talking to reacts to the subject.
3. All you can eat sushi = good.
4. People don't really change their minds. Ever. Sometimes they humor you though.
5. 8 hours of sleep is a wonderful thing, even when your dog attempts to steal your pillow.
I left my heart in San Francisco ...
Otherwise, I would have like totally given it to you, I swear.
Happy Valentine's Day to all!
So far, I've gotten a box of candies from a person I'm angry at, and an ex- sent me one of these anti-vd cards that says "Happy unimaginative, consumerist-oriented and entirely arbirtrary, manipulative & shallow interpretation of romance day." (Take note, on that web site, I particularly like the simplicity of the card with the thorny red rose that says "prick" and the one with the crossed out baby face that says "Do not procreate").
I am wearing red today in an attempt to get into the spirit!
Simpson's has had a few good lines lately. Paraphrasing from a few weeks ago:
Marge: Hm, I wonder who's watching the kids.
[scene switches to Lisa and Bart]
Lisa: Bart, are you sure its ok with mom and dad that we entered this European balloon race?
[scene pans out to the kids in a hot air balloon over Paris]
And tonight:
[rock comes flying through and breaks the window]
Homer: Ack! A rock! Quick, Marge, call a geologist!
Along with the President of Harvard (gag) and Jen M's motherhood rant, we have the Russians saying "Men will be first to go to Mars":
"After all, women are fragile and delicate creatures; that is why men should lead the way to distant planets and carry women there in their strong hands," the head of IMBP [Director of the Institute of Medical and Biological Problems, academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, member of the Presidential Council on Sciences and Education Anatoly Grigoryev] said with a smile.
I'll show him "fragile and delicate"!!
Heavily shopping for plane tickets for my planned coming retreat to Mexico on P-day weekend. I *need* to get out of town.
Is it bad when you laugh in someone's face for suggesting they are taking a "high road" when they don't even know how low they've sunk?
I'm looking forward to a quiet weekend.
Yesterday I didn't update because I had a sim all day. It was ok, interesting for the first 4 hours, not so much for the second 4 hours. I have one more sim to backseat before I get to touch anything. That should be in about a month (my next "backseat" is in two weeks, and I'm not scheduled the week after that, so). Amazing how much time goes on between these things.
Last night my class went out to dinner together. At first, I thought it was a kind of hokey thing for the professor to do, but it turned out to be pretty fun (the multiple bottle of red wine consumed over the course of the evening probably livened things up). My class is almost entirely non-American (seriously!): two Americans, an El Salvadorian, a Nigerian, a Greek professor, and two Indians. I felt like I was in Switzerland again. Diversity is good. I love my friends here, but international diversity is not exactly something found around our offices.
Anyway, we talked about foreign food (and doing a potluck), good Houston resteraunts (anyone want to try Nigerian?), the Ibo language (weirdly the Nigerian was from an Ibo tribe and I remembered a few words from when we read Things Fall Apart in high school, odd how these things come in handy), finding jobs, being abused by faculty advisors (I can't relate, as I am not a PhD student doing slave labor for an advidsor). And I ate gnocchi. Yum, gnocchi.
today hasn't been a great day. i've done some yelling at people and been yelled at. need to control my temper more. need to beat the crap out of some people who annoy me.
And since I'm on the subject of things that are amusing me...
As Jen M wrote yesterday my new group lead is already moving on to bigger and better things.
The amusing part is the number of occasions that someone has remarked to me "So, I guess that means you'll be in charge over there now, right? When are They moving you into the group lead's office?" (Four times: once in a group meeting, twice in the elevator, once in my office -- all people I don't work with on a regular basis, just random collegues, and all since the announcement two days ago)
Apparently there is some sort of universal amusement built deep into the human psyche that drives people to banter about office shakeups with the newest, least experienced member of the group by suggesting they are ready to run things. Obviously, my response, complete with my award-winning smile, has had a chance to evolve over time to: "Nah, I'm skipping that rung and moving right into the division office" or "Nah, I already know everything about that, I'm going straight to the FD's office."
(BTW, I told person #4, during our longer-than-usual elevator ride that he wasn't the first person who made this comment, and he found the repetition v. amusing too).
This Spoof story cracked me up:
Bush Orders Army to Shoot Down NASA’s Hubble Telescope. "Hooah!"FORT SILL, OK (STARS & STRIPES) Within moments of the Bush Administration's failure to fund repairs to the NASA Hubble Space Telescope, an order was given to the US Army 30th Field Artillery Regiment to shoot down the aging telescope from its orbit around the earth.
Bravo Battery, 2nd Battalion, 2nd Field Artillery carried out the unusual fire mission with its famous Ruben Rivers M101 Salute Howitzer. Although the M101 is normally reserved for firing military salutes in parades and funerals, Bravo Battery was proud to get a chance to show its skills in zeroing in on such a distant target. The artillery piece was named for Medal of Honor winner SSG Ruben Rivers for actions in France on 19 November, 1944. SSG Rivers was the catalyst for the first African-American soldiers to receive the Medal of Honor. SSG Rivers finally received his medal in January 1997, 52 years after the fact.
“We hit that sucker with the 2nd round. Hooah!” exclaimed a young lieutenant from Bravo Battery. “Sure beats the livin' crap out of firing blanks all day long!” Pieces of the Hubble Telescope soon began falling from orbit over a three state area. A large fragment fell on Bill Clinton’s boyhood home in Arkansas. Bush administration officials were quick to deny that this was planned. A smaller fragment hit an outhouse in Mississippi causing minor injury to a sharecropper and interrupting his morning duties.
Ha ha, I just got one of these magnetic ribbons to put on my car. What sold me? Well, you don't just get the ribbon, but you get the insert from the middle of the ribbon complete with the alien face. Don't believe me? Just look here.
Coolness: Ellen MacArthur (soon to become Dame Ellen) just broke the record for fastest solo sail around the world, coming in at just over 71 days. The previous record holder did it in 72 days (and he beat the previous record by a solid 20 days). I think that's awesome!
This cracked me up (I know this is an old e-mail forward and possibly an urban legend) -- the following ad appeared in the AJC:
SINGLE FEMALE seeks male companionship, ethnicity unimportant. I'm a very good looking girl who LOVES to play. I love long walks in the woods, riding in your pickup truck, hunting, camping and fishing trips, cozy winter nights lying by the fire. Candlelight dinners will have me eating out of your hand. I'll be at the front door when you get home from work wearing only what nature gave me. Call (404) 875-6420 and ask for Daisy, I'll be waiting...
Over 15,000 men found themselves talking to the Atlanta Humane Society about an 8-week-old black Labrador retriever.
In case you missed it, follow this link to my favorite Super Bowl commercial. Click "Surprise Date."
I just participated in a very funny office conversation (originally posted by Sarah):
Nick: "Why do people say 'throw down the gauntlet' when you duel? If I want to duel, do I have to run out and get a gauntlet?"
Becca: "No, you can just say 'let's duel.'"
Nick: "Where did that phrase come from?"
Becca: "Well, I think it's a throw-back from a time when people wore gaunlets."
Nick: "You wear them? Wait, what's a gauntlet?"
Becca: "It's a glove."
Sarah: "Yeah, and the part that goes on your forearm. We had fake ones to wear with our marching band uniforms in high school."
Nick: "What?? I thought it was, like, a glass."
Sarah & Becca: "No, that's a goblet."
Ok, admittedly I'm not much of a sports fan. But there is an exception -- when a hometown team makes it to a Big Game. And I remember all the Super Bowls of years passed asking Dad "Why aren't the Eagles playing this year?" I love how Phildelphia lights up its skyscrapers with green lights when the Eagles are playing important games. I like how Phillhy fans beat the crap out of anyone that comes to their town and cheers for an out-of-town team.
And for the (many) naysayers, here are 10 reasons the Eagles could win this game. They just want it more. Hell, even I want it for them!
This announcement is really cool. More at boldlygo.com. Have I mentioned recently that Richard Branson is my favorite billionaire?
Postscript: Thanks to Caryn for pointing out the obvious: I'm a terrible speller. Caryn, is that you reading my blog from Germany? I've noticed an increase hit count from Germany, especially considering I don't have any other friends living there. I never know where in the world you are -- Florida, Japan, Germany, back to Florida, on to Austria, la da di. Any leads on a job for someone with a German degree in Houston? I have a friend who's looking...
First, introducing my friend Melanie's new blog. I also updated some of the links on the sidebar.
I forgot to tell a story yesterday that cracked me up.
Picture a call from a school nurse regarding my cousin (very removed - the grandson of my great aunt):
"Hello? Mrs W [my great aunt]? How are you today? This is the nurse at St. John's. We're calling because we couldn't reach little D's parents. Um, yes, well, we're going to need you to come pick up little D. from school. How do I put this? C*tri children have done a lot of odd things at this school over the years, but this one tops the cake. You're going to need to take little D. to see a doctor right away. You see he has a pencil stuck in his head..."
A pencil! Stuck in his forehead! Apparently his mother was quite distraught for at least a little while - but it seems the rest of our family has a pretty good sense of humor about the whole thing. Oh, how I hope they got a picture! I can only imagine how this wound was inflicted. How do you get a pencil stuck in you forehead so that it has to be removed by a trained physician? I welcome comments...
I took this quiz to see what Supreme Court Justice I was most aligned with. Here are the results:
1. O'Conner
2. Breyer
3. Souter
4. Stevens
5. Ginsburg
6. Kennedy
7. Rehnquist
8. Scalia
9. Thomas
Oh my gosh, Chris B metioned a gay water polo team called the "Rainbow Trout"!!! That is possibly the most hillarious/creative team name EVER!
Chalk this up to one more entry that's going to make some elderly (over 25) relative of mine who reads this blog shake their head in dismay. I'm on a roll!
Oh, what a good title for an entry. Last night, Mom and I talked (openly, what a great relationship!) about two sensitive subjects: the gynecologist and drugs. I'll leave off talking about the gynecologist as a subject that may cause some of my male friends who read this blog to squirm (at least just a little, because most of them are pretty cool about "girl stuff"). And go onto drugs.
My mom really enjoyed reading this entry in "Bad Mother", which lead her to wonder about if she "raised us right." Of course, she didn't know what to say, because I don't think she ever actually asked my brother or I about drug use (statistics say that at least one of us would have tried some form of recreational drug).
She and I have talked off and on about the difficulty some government agencies have about hiring lawyers -- she specifically mentioned one county in Florida that requires drug testing for its attorneys end up with all the C- and D- students who have to take the Bar twice, because so many of the good students decide its not worth the hassle of subjecting themselves to random drug tests -- let alone background checks required in major agencies. She said that getting admitted to the Bar and going through all THEIR background checks should be sufficient for any hiring agencies. She said something like "Only JAGs would put up with any more of that crap." Whereas other counties in Florida that don't require drug testing seem to have no problem recruiting good students.
Anyway, my opinion about which (and whether) recreational drugs should be legal is beside the point. The point is, they aren't legal. At least in Florida, small uses of pot is considered the criminal equivilent of petit theft. Now, if a private citizen practices civil disobedience and "responsibly" uses, well, that's his life. But, I guess I have no problem with drug tests on government employees. There's a different standard. I mean, do you want a state attorney who regularly breaks the law? I mean, what if that attorney would "recreationally" steal CD's from the music store? Criminally its the same thing, and its more about respect for the law in this case, then it is about what "should" or "shouldn't" be legal.
Anyway, apparently this makes me "too establishment." That makes me laugh.
Today I stupidly scheduled a training class right in the middle of lunch. Friday lunch! How could I be so silly? Traditionally, a group of us basically spend all Friday morning arguing about where to go and then end up going to one of the same 5 places that we can all agree on to eat lunch out. But its nice, and social, and everyone goes. Even M. goes and he's a machine about packing his lunch the other 4 days of the week (we like to tease him for being way too predictible). But it should be a cool class, some button pushing and item entries into a mockup of the space shuttle computers and maybe I'll get a better idea of how everything works....
[ok, diverging on a tangent now]
That's one thing the simulator I flew out in California didn't have -- it had all the flight controls, but no simulated computers, since they really aren't needed for approach and land. Its amazing the level of functionality that was programmed into these 128 kb computers back in the 70s! And they still work! Its more amazing to me what we could do with modern computers -- think about all the vehicle health monitoring, and guidance algorithms, and self-testing... With robots, neural networks for abort logic, and better (more-automated) programs -- we could really reduce the army of people involved with operating a space plane (both in flight and during turnaround) to a mere handful - more like an air traffic control tower than anything else. What a cool future that would be! And then the space program's resources could be turned to exploring the solar system. Ok, apparently my college internship experiences with the "Vision SP" people has rubbed off. The only thing I would personally do differently than their proposals is keep a pilot in the loop -- all those algorithms do not replace the ability of a person to deal with the unexpected.
[off tangent]
I guess this means my coworkers will get to go to a steakhouse or something today :) (here's to hoping I can talk them into bringing me something back since I'm boycotting the cafeteria...)
Cari and I went to the Hobbit Hole Cafe for dinner last night. Yum yum! I love any sandwich that has an entire avacado on it!
I think my dentist is a quack. I left without getting my teeth cleaned because he wanted me to make a "special" appointment, for a "special" teeth cleaning that will cost 8x as much as a normal cleaning (yes, that's $800 for a tooth cleaning!) I'm going for a second opinion before I give him one more penny. Another hour and a half of my life that I will never get back. Quack quack.
I want to go lie on the beach for a weekend, so I'm thinking of making a jaunt to Mexico over P'day weekend - Sarah may come with me. Beach, sand, Aztec ruins, blue water, swim up bars. That's exactly what I want. And I want to go skiing -- really really badly. This Whistler trip is turning out harder to coordinate then usual - but this trip is "special", next year, we'll go somewhere closer/easier/cheaper again, no doubt...
Today, I am wearing one of my most comfortable sweaters. Probably The Most Comfortable Sweater I have ever owned. I bought it in Switzerland, from H&M, probably for dirt cheap (and, yes, probably mass produced by sweatshop labor, but I'm not going to speculate too much about that). Anyway, I hardly ever wear it, because H&M clothes are more "throwaway" than anything else, they get worn out pretty fast.
Today is the third day of wet, cold, unpleasantness, and by gosh, I was going to wear my comfortable warm sweater. Anyway, its green, and has a huge, HUGE turtle neck that consumes my entire neck. That's probably one of the reasons I like it so much, because most turtle neck sweaters are so tight, they practically choke you. This one gives you room to breath.
But, apparently, it also makes me look like a turtle. Therefore the subject of much in-office teasing. Sigh. There's no mercy around here.
I also received the same level of no mercy is why I didn't get a full cup of coffee this morning. I've been told that I'm never at my desk anymore and "don't really work here" and therefore don't "deserve" my morning coffee. Its true, I have been in and out a lot and I'm not really officially an analyst anymore. But I'm still physically here, and figure I deserve my darned coffee!! (Take note George and Sarah!) Now, if they could just get me the darned desk that has been several weeks coming...
Anyway, last night, I contemplated how many times I mentioned my new job title and my employer etc. in my blog, and began to worry about people searching for it on the Internet (why, I don't know...) and me ending up dooced. So, I googled "fdo." I found this kind of dated web page which I thought might be of some interest to my co-workers. Scan down to "What is a FDO?" and you can learn more about hte job that I'm basically just starting...
As a point of reference, this web page was the 5th item in the google search. The tenth was the "Finnish Dart Organization." No kidding.
Orlando Bloom is single again!. I expect he will be knocking at my door any day now. Ah, the man of my daydreams...
