Amphigouri: varnished nonsense

Man, I hate dealing with vendors.

There’s a reason I dislike answering my phone at work - vendor calls. They’re the telemarketers of the business world: they usually call when it’s least convenient, they’re hard to hang up on, and sometimes harder to ignore. Ok, so they can be helpful on occasion - but I want them to be helpful on my terms only. I want to initiate the calls for information. I do not want to be harassed after the initial call. I certainly don’t want any communications to leave me feeling like I’ve been slimed with greasy salesman ectoplasmic ooze.

And there’s one vendor/sales tactic that I hate more that almost any other. I absolutely can’t STAND being cold-called. What’s even worse than a cold-call is when a vendor cold-calls not me directly, but someone else in the company (presumably the operator?) and says “I want to speak with someone who works with <insert technology here> ” . That person then forwards the vendor to my phone #, which gives the appearance that the originator of the call is another company employee rather than a sales person. Even if I am the right person to talk to about the technology they’re trying to sell, I can guarantee you I will, at best, take a name, number, and email and say “I’ll see if I can find the appropriate person to get back to you” - and it won’t be me.

Blah. Hatesss them, we do.

Sigh. I blink, and three weeks have flown by; a few blinks, and my entire summer and half of the fall are gone. As is obvious, I’ve neglected this site since May (even before?)… I’ve done a particularly horrendous job juggling school, work, and Everything Else lately. Hopefully this post marks my return to a more regular schedule of updates, and a slightly more organized schedule in general - keep your fingers crossed!

So, as mentioned, I’m back in school part-time. I’m officially an MSLIS student in Syracuse’s distance learning program, and am somewhat surprised it’s taken me this long to go back to school. While my current class in management principles (for information professionals!), one of the core requirements, is somewhat dry (and the readings smack a bit of all that managerial frou-frou stuff at which geeks tend to roll their eyes… lots of theory, and not as much - so far - illustrating actual practical implementations of said theories), I actually do enjoy being back in school and being forced to read about and think about issues I probably wouldn’t squeeze into my day under normal circumstances. My coursework this summer provided an overview of the Library & Information Science profession, and we were given glimpses into a number of avenues one with this degree might take (public librarianship, news librarianship, special/corporate librarianship, and other information-related professions that didn’t carry the label “librarian” - which is actually the topic for another post, but I digress); I found that, particularly during our talks that related most to public libraries, all my liberal (gasp!) leanings came to the fore - Free Information for All! Patriot Act is Bad! Down with Book Banning and Other Forms of Censorship!! Over the past several years, as I’ve found myself getting riled up at work over various issues (some big, most relatively minor), I’ve started to think that maybe there’s a part of my being that really needs to feel outrage at something - whether justified outrage or not - on a regular basis. I can see that this profession is going to give me *plenty* of fodder for rants and rages over the next few years (consider yourselves warned; I expect this site will serve as an outlet for at least a few of these rants).

For now, though, I’ll keep my return entry short, just so I can finally get it posted - and will leave you with a very poorly cropped picture of a black-eyed susan growing in Cushing.

Have been feeling the need to post here, as it’s been so long… but am too brain dead to produce anything even remotely resembling intelligent thought. Will leave it at this, the pic below, until later this week.

Well, maybe not quite *rapture*, exactly… but several noteworthy “events” occurred this week to make this kid near as happy as a pig in poop…… almost enough to lessen the dread of the upcoming work-week from hell (alas, that’s almost).

One: my camera has finally returned!!! Of course, timing was rather less than perfect, as it rained much of the evenings this week, and pretty much all day on Saturday. I’m hoping for some good weather next weekend so we can get out and I can fiddle with it and with the new lenses that Husband gave me for Christmas.

Two: I have discovered a ten-pin bowling center <30 minutes from the house, and it doesn't appear to be a total dive. Yay! Before moving from MA, I'd never experienced "big ball bowling" - I grew up on candlepin bowling, which seems to be the dominant version in New England (and apparrently started in Worcester, MA). When I moved to North Carolina, I knew nobody there and decided that maybe it’d be fun to join a ten-pin league (having tried the game once while in Virginia)…. despite the excruciating necessity of going solo to the bowling center the night they assigned teams, I discovered I absolutely *loved* the game (I didn’t play it as I would a sport, for those whose hackles are raised). I purchased my own shoes (something I highly recommend, even for those who don’t bowl that frequently) and my own bowling ball (it’s amazing what a difference a ball that’s drilled to fit your hand will make), and after a few months found myself in three bowling leagues (one of which was a work league that I resurrected from the dead). One of the things I miss about Greensboro is their reallyreally nice bowling center, and it looks like there’s a reasonably nice one in Lowell, MA. I can see a few Saturday mornings spent relearning how to bowl. I can’t wait!

Three: I have a new toy. My Palm Pilot finally gave up the ghost, requiring me to purchase a replacement in the form of a Sony Clié. Very happy am I.

So, this week is apparently TV Turnoff Week, “a program designed to promote activity in Americans that doesn’t involve a couch and a remote control.” A grand idea, IMO - Husband and I spend far more time in front of the boob tube than is healthy (though more of Husband’s time is spent more with the PS2, while I have the unfortunate tendency to get sucked into some of the the morally questionable shows one can find on Fox network [in case you were wondering, I'm not talking about the Simpsons, which embodies the highest level of family values and general ethics in comparison to these Other Shows]). I think perhaps I shall give this a shot, though the timing couldn’t be worse - new episodes of The West Wing and Law & Order are airing on Wednesday. I suppose a little transgression can be allowed… or maybe a scootch more than just the 2 hours on Wednesday, as I find that watching reruns of Seinfeld or Drew Cary while using the exercise room rather dulls the pain of the actual exercising. I wonder if the TV-Turnoff Network counts watching DVDs (our copy of the first season of Six Feet Under is calling my name) …..

Wow. And in case you were curious, Tv-Turnoff Network has a page of

In addition to spending less time sitting on the couch, I want to start cooking a little more - we were doing well for a while, particularly with recipes like Broiled Tilapia with Thai-Coconut Curry Sauce [note: about half the recommended curry paste is enough to make this dish very,very warm; those adverse to hot-n-spicy stuff, beware] and Steamed Tuna Fish (made w/o the oil… and sometimes with salmon instead of tuna - a VERY quick and tasty dinner!)… but lately we’ve succumbed to the ease of Lean Cuisine frozen dinners or pasta. Grill weather is pretty much here, too, which hopefully means lots of experimenting with Beer-Can Chicken recipes and grilled veggies. I think I need to make a quick run to the store….

I hate office politics. With a passion.

I unfortunately couldn’t bring myself to post the too-specific rant I wanted to include here, and have erased it all. Alas.
I’ll have to leave it at exaggerated hand-waving, eye-rolling, muttered cursing, and the following:

I don’t grok people who offer exceptionally lame excuses for refusing to participate in a corporate-wide endeavor, particularly when this endeavor is one that a) can greatly enhance productivity for a large target audience and is also a benefit to the company as a whole, b) would have NO negative effect on said person’s group or projects, c) could only INCREASE visibility for said person, person’s group, and person’s projects.

Ah, if only I could provide details.

On a much less stressful note:

This weekend we head to Maine to help ready the cottages for the summer season. Even though it’ll probably be pretty chilly there on the water this time of year, it’ll be enough of a taste of heaven to keep me going until Memorial Day weekend, typically the first overnight of the season. I’m hoping against all hope that my camera will be back from the shop in the next day or two so I can take it with us Friday - I think there’s no place I enjoy capturing on film more. One of these days I’ll have to gather all the Cushing pictures together in one place, and finally write up the long-ish post about the area that I’ve been tossing about in my brain for the past 6 months. ’til then…

What’s in a name? The potential for bilking people out of money, that’s what. If your name is not in harmony with your inner potential, you can fork over money ($120, to be exact) to obtain a Balanced Name Recommendation from Kabalarian Philosophy. Erm. Right.

Without knowing anything about my “inner potential,” this is what they had to say about my first name:

Heh. Actually, not that far off (how did they know about my penchant for ice cream and cheesecake and chocolate?! or my finely honed ability to procrastinate?). Slight variation if I use my nickname:

Not sure about that “supreme confidence, boundless energy, and enthusiasm” bit, but impatience is my middle name (along with procrastination and a handful of other related terms).

Despite the fact that they’re predicting all sorts of health problems for me because of my name, and that they claim changing my name “will affect [my] personality, health, personal relations, and personal and business success,” I think I’ll stick with what I have, thankyouverymuch. Makes for some interesting reading, though.

In other news…
After a month of driving new car around, I’ve seen only one other on the roads here in MA (admittedly, I haven’t been that diligent in scanning the highways for other Azteks, but I have been a little more aware of the make/model of the other cars around me). Yesterday as I pulled into a parking spot at our local grocery store, I noticed a woman staring and smiling at me while she was putting her bags into her car. I felt vaguely uncomfortable in that “damn-is-this-someone-i-know,what-the-hell’s-her-name” sort of way until I parked, exited my vehicle, and heard her say “Hey, nice car!” Upon closer inspection, I noticed that she and her husband were driving a bright red Aztek (so much for being more aware of surrounding cars, eh?). Woo! We chatted for a while, and I was informed that a group of Aztek enthusiasts gather yearly to camp, show off their cars and any custom “enhancements,” and socialize. We won’t be going this year, but it’s cool to know there’s a resource like this out there (they kinda reminded me of some of the biker folks we’ve hung around in the past - neat people).

So yeah, I jinxed it last week by saying “at least it’s not snowing” … but at the risk of a double-jinx, I’ll now point out that at least we only received 1-2″ of the 3-10″ (depending on which forecast you heard) that were predicted. To be honest, I really don’t mind the snow so much, even if it is April, and even though I know back in Greensboro the lawns are beautifully green by now, and the flowers are starting to bloom all over the place (sigh). As my soon-to-be-sister-in-law said, “New England rocks!” (or something to that effect ) - and I stand by that as well.

I’ve never been one to name my cars. However, I think we’ve inadvertently come up with a nickname for the new one: TROG. I’m still not quite clear on how this name came about, but I suspect it was a segue between a conversation Husband and I were having about the current administration (in which the unfortunate label of “troglodyte” was used [along with some equally unflattering descriptive phrases]) and another conversation we had on the “aesthetically challenged” nature of the Aztek. I rather like the name, and think it suits the vehicle even more than our previous nickname, Ugly Duckling, which came about when trying to come up with amusing vanity plate options.

Speaking of Mr. Trog.. er… President:

Right. Um. I’m really curious to know the demographics behind this poll, particularly since I and nearly all of the people I interact with on a daily (or mostly-daily) basis fall into the lower percentiles, as do many of the authors of many(most?) of the weblogs I read (ok, so one can argue that I don’t vary my reading enough; this is true, but let’s ignore that point for the moment, shall we?). It was just yesterday that I was bemoaning the fact that I don’t have nearly the trust and confidence in our gov’t that I’d like and that is appropriate (actually, I think this may have been the theme of discussion w/ Husband referenced above). To be fair, there were times during the previous administration when I was thoroughly disgusted, more than a little cynical, and rather discouraged… but I don’t recall feeling the utter dismay at the general direction our country and our policies were headed, and I don’t remember anxiously awaiting the next election with the hopes that a new administration would be installed and would turn things around nearly 180° . I suppose this is yet another sign that with age my liberal leanings are tilting even more to the left (and to think that Husband thought I was a Strict Conservative when we first met!!).

I guess I shouldn’t really complain about the weather, as at least it’s not snowing AGAIN.
However, the constant gray skies and drizzle/rain makes me want to just stay home and curl up in bed with a book. Motivation at work is a little more elusive than usual, but this is also typical of the days shortly after the pseudo-end of a project; much of last month was spent gearing up for events of this past Tuesday, and over the last couple of days I’ve been mostly monitoring our server, web pages, & database in anticipation of a huge fallout (which, fortunately, hasn’t happened). The rest of this month will be somewhat chaotic as well, as our group prepares for our small role at the annual engineering conference our company holds. I’m hoping that after the conference I’ll be able to once again focus most of my work-energies onto my largest project, which has pretty much been on hold since early December. Little other projects keep rearing their heads, though, so the reality will probably be that my work schedule will be crazy as ever, up until, through, and beyond July, which is when I’ll be starting my grad school program.

Oh, right. That’s my latest news: verbal acceptance from Syracuse last week! Yippee! I’m still waiting (impatiently, as usual) for the official paperwork/acceptance letter, however. Once that arrives, I start planning my arguments to present to my Boss in order to avoid being forced to use precious vacation time for the week-long stay at Syracuse this summer. It’s something I really don’t understand; the program I’m taking (the (mostly) distance learning version of Master of Science in Library and Information Science) is directly related to my current job, and it’s been suggested to me that one of the requirements for future promotion may be evidence of furthering my education. In my mind, this means that my 5-day intro to the program should be treated like any other week-long training class, but based on past conversations I’ve had with people here at work, this is often not common thinking (”your degree is something that can never be taken from you; vacations come and go” sort of thing). ?!? I suspect the compromise will be that I offer to work longer hours/weekends in order to offset at least part of the week I’ll be in NY, which, while not optimal, is still better than using up vacation time (we were forced to use a handful of days around Christmas for a company-wide shutdown; while nice to have an extended break around the holidays, it tends to cause me some difficulties when trying to schedule time off later in the year).

Have spent part of this day outlining documentation I need to write, while listening to our Wedding Dinner playlist on my iPod. I’d forgotten how cheesy some of the music we chose is. Rather than hire a band or a D.J., we had one of Husband’s friends preside over my iPod, which was connected to the banquet room’s speaker system. We created two separate playlists - one for dinner, one for after dinner - and I remember seriously stressing over the selections and ordering for both lists. As it turned out, on The Day I really couldn’t have cared much less about whether other people liked our selections or not (yeah, L, I know most of what we had wasn’t very conducive to dancing, but once we got the two or three “necessary” dances out of the way, we didn’t much care any more  ). One band represented on the dinner playlist was one I had the great fortune of hearing live while I was on a business trip in Ireland: Dervish. Great Irish music, and watching them in person was really a treat. [crap! I just saw that they played in NH 3 weeks ago! ] This reminds me, I really need to have my passport updated and Husband needs to get a passport so he can come with me next time I go to Ireland (or maybe we’ll just take vacation sometime in the next few years and go on our own).

I recently obtained a copy of Adobe Photoshop Elements (thank you, Hubby!), which I like better than the software that came with my Coolpix. A bonus: the sw can be installed on both my Mac and my win2k laptop(yay!). While I’ve been awaiting the return of my camera from the factory, I’ve been poking around our folders of old pictures (some from the digital cameras, some scanned from my Pentax k1000), and have been fiddling a bit with Husband’s Ricoh. A few random results are below.