The first week

First week of the job has come and gone.  Took awhile to actually start working but I like it so far.  At the moment I'm doing massive data entry, but nothing as simple as cut and paste.  By the end of it all (guaranteed six months, should know better in a few more months) I should have used virtually everything I learned in SLIS.  So yeah. 

In contrast to shared trays of lasagna and "the magic supply closet" I encountered at one Lee High School things are much better.  They took us out to lunch the first day.  A nice place called Benjy's.  I had a dish I couldn't pronounce.  Nice huh?  Then the faculty club the next day.  Very nice.  They handed us an Office Max closet and said "order what you need."  So I got pens and staplers that will actually work.  It is the little things.  Oh and health care is cheaper and better.  Retirement is better.  I can use the rec center if I want and attend arts events (most) free.  And oh yeah... I can get overtime. 

I don't think I'll have the same antics that I did when I was teaching though.  Patent management just doesn't lend itself to it.  But if anyone can explain to me what a Buckyball is and why I care (I know it is tiny and I SHOULD care) I'd appreciate it.  Buckytubes too, though I suspect they are related to "balls" And while we're at it, why do we call them "Bucky"?

As a side effect of this whole new stage of life I hit the "my life is out of sorts and out of routine" problems that always come with new things.  Flat tire Friday morning, making that premium I paid to AAA worth it.  I also bought a new clock radio.  I'd given my classroom one away last spring so I went shopping today.  Something about a biology lab just needs background noise.  Anyway for $25 I got an automatic time-set clock with an MP3/Aux audio jack.  My office mate is going to love me but at least she's better than the narcoleptic I shared a closet with once.

Prairie Home Companion is over.  I'm going to go figure out what I'm eating for dinner.  Peace out yo. 

Gum

I usually have a couple different kinds of gum in my purse.  The favorites are Raspberry Mint and Sweet Mint, both Orbit sorts.  I like Orbitz because they kinda hook the gum into the package, not making it impossible to get out but it isn't likely that the gum will stray too far either.  I think their ads are a little annoying, so in light of the fact I've recently swayed half a dozen or so of my friends to Raspberry Mint I think they owe me a cut of that budget.  I'll write the V.P. for marketing tomorrow.

I try all their new kinds, hoping for a new exotic flavor.  Mint Mojito is different, not good or bad but it won't replace the raspberry.  Citrus Mint is fun, if you like dreamcicles.  Lemon Lime should be avoided.  I've got a new package though... Maui Melon Mint.  Haven't tried it yet, but... when I was in Hungary I bought Melon Orbit gum thinking the flavor might have failed in the U.S. before I ever saw it.  Guess not.  Budapest is apparently cutting edge in the gum market. 

Mary will be excited too. 

Oh... and Alissa... if you still read this... are you a little disappointed that "Wait Wait" has had the Linda Ronstadt episode on three times now?  Is that because of the writer's strike too?  Cause that sucks.  It's like watching Jeopardy over and over again. 

If my dad has your e-mail you already know this...

So my dad sent out an e-mail this morning.  He's proud of me which is good.  But the e-mail included his whole family, his friends at church, and half of his business partners.  So anyway... it has been an eventful week. 
Monday the 10th I turned in my last final.  Tuesday was Jeremy's birthday.  The trivia team didn't do as well as hoped, but we did spend out $40 in gift certificates.  Wednesday was uneventuful but I downloaded Photoshop Elements, a new toy to play with. Thursday I almost finished my Christmas shopping. Friday I baked lemon cookies and saw I am Legend which is much better than Will Smith just talking to himself.  Saturday I Saturday I had British food and listened to Appalachian music.  Sunday I found a child under the Christmas tree at the front of the church and made a whole bunch of stars and angels.  Monday I proposed a project to a dental lab and got a job at Rice University.  Tuesday I got my grades and went to the museum then I kinda got elected for a three year term.  I made glazed pecans and went to trivia.  Wednesday I repeated a 30+ year tradition and continued to finish my Christmas shopping.  I also met Asher, the cutest kid with porcupine hair I've seen. I also made gravy. 

So anyway... I'm done with school I have a job and I won't start for three weeks.  I'm going to be a patent manager at Rice University, at least for awhile.  Can't tell yet what the job will really look like to explain it but I'll learn a lot.  Which was really the goal of this whole librarian thing to start with. 

Dear Management 2+ (there have been many, it is turning to a running theme)

If you are going to start enforcing the towing rules suddenly you should inform people.  Oh wait, you didn't inform us yet that there has been a change in management so why would you tell us there is a change in the towing rules either?

And while you are at it you could work on getting more parking.  That would be nice.  Because there is no place to park because people just leave their cars in the lot forever.  So if you are going to tow because someone is in the wrong spot you need to make sure they have a right spot to park. 

Btw, it is actually (a lot) cheaper to get a parking ticket for kind of parking illegally than it is to get towed off private property. 

Under new management

In the continuing saga of my apartment office (packages misplaced, rent checks misplaced, delayed work orders for holes in my shower, etc.):

We have a new management company here.  This was only made news to me by the maintenance guy that eventually came to fix my shower.  He used to be my neighbor.  His name is Carlos, he won't have a job in two weeks.  Oh, and the signs that went up saying the office would be closed the entire weekend because of the new management, and we should put our rent checks in the drop box.  Which I won't do, because they will lose them. 

Anyway.  I went to get two packages yesterday.  I had two slips.  They brought out one.  I told them I had two.  I said it nicely.  The new lady (I know it is stressful the first week on the job) put her hands on her hips and told me it wasn't there.  That the postman had put it in twice cause I hadn't picked it up.  Pray tell a) when was I supposed to pick it up when you are only there 9-5 and the rest of the world is working and b) when did anyone here get that organized.  I told them I had a receipt of a package that was not the Amazon package they were giving me.  They went back and found my 16"x16"x16" box clearly marked with the number 57 all over it.  She took her hands off her hips.  I told them Thank you and that I knew it was a poorly organized system back there and left. 

So I know we are under new management.  I know I've now lived here far longer than anyone in the old office or in the new office.  I also know they didn't introduce themselves when I came in.  Or inform me what the name of the new company was in any way.  I'm also pretty sure rent is going up when my lease runs out.  In other news, I might be moving in March.

Why you care: For all of you planning on mailing me packages this holiday season I won't get it (especially not UPS, cause those guys don't even bother to leave one of those post-it notes, or actually knock on my door) unless I know it is coming.  Then I can go down with a receipt... and argue. 

Happy holidays.

December 15th

December 15th is the most popular day this year to throw a Christmas party.  I personally have been invited to four.  On no other days mind you, except for a church one on the 16th.  Four.  On one night.  I'm going to one.

Divorce and the environment... well duh

I'll point you to a study that was reported on here: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5349282.html.

Seems like this is fairly obvious and I don't think it will keep anyone from getting divorced.  I wonder if it will cause greater co-habitation and marriage.  I doubt that too.  So I wish I'd thought of this study and gotten a grant from the federal government to do it.  That would have been nice.

In other news rent is going up.  Seems the sub-prime market puts pressure on the rental market. 

Almost... finished...

I'm almost finished with grad school.  One website to finish (here you go: http://slis.jayfox.net/kaw0204/mfahomepage.html... best viewed on IE for some reason we don't know), one presentation of said website, and one final exam. 

I'm not going to my graduation.  So it will kind of just end and I'll get my diploma in the mail in eight weeks.  So I'll probably throw myself a ceremony, put on my BU gown and stand on the coffee table with my diploma. 

No gifts please.

Now soliciting suggestions

Every year I buy a Christmas gift for a child that has a parent in prison.  One year I got a boa (as in scarf), one year I got legos.  This year I have a twelve year old buy and I'm to get him a book.  Apparently his likes football.  Any ideas out there? 
Apparently Matt Christopher is for younger kids than this one.  My twelve year old girl is getting a Rascal Flats CD.  She wanted a country CD, so I asked an 11 year old girl and without a pause she said "Carrie Underwood" and "Rascal Flats."  That's a tip for any of my readers out there shopping for preteens in Texas.

Flying Saucer

It is actually four pages, but the fourth page is different combinations of beer found on the first three pages. So I guess it doesn't count.

The Engines of Our Ingenuity

http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi2294.htm

by John H. Lienhard

Click here for audio of Episode 2294.

Today, I'll contaminate the Internet. The University of Houston's College of Engineering presents this series about the machines that make our civilization run, and the people whose ingenuity created them.

The other day, a friend showed me his program for the Tom Stoppard play, Arcadia, which he'd just seen. The play has a lot in it about early 19th-century science and technology. It's hailed as a kind of meeting ground for C. P. Snow's two cultures, the sciences and the humanities. The program notes made much of that and said that the play incorporates Newton's second law of thermodynamics. So I Googled Newton's second law of thermodynamics and got 3270 hits. Now, when I post this script, there'll be even more.

In any case, my friend was rightly appalled. For this is right up there with the flat earth and denials of evolution. When Newton wrote his second law of motion, he completely altered the way we deal with our world. But the subject of thermodynamics would not arise for another century and a half.

Newton's second law says that to accelerate any body we have to apply a force equal to its mass times the rate of acceleration. The much later second law of thermodynamics says that the potential of energy for doing useful work is constantly degraded by irreversible events. That knowledge was also destined to radically alter our world view.

The two laws are completely unrelated. Irreversibility is unknown in the world of Newton's laws. Stoppard's actors recognize that fact. One character says, flat out, that the newly formulated laws of heat flow threaten Newton's determinism.

So a blunder was made in the program notes. No big deal by itself; we all make mistakes. But this one was so quotable that it echoes down through the Internet's corridors. The Internet leaves an indelible record, and too few people know enough to question it.

Just this morning, a newspaper feature on scientific illiteracy listed ten things we should all know and gave a brief explanation of each -- stuff like DNA, evolution, relativity, the big bang, quantum mechanics. It was all good stuff, but it did not include the older -- and still essential -- laws of physics.

It did include statistics, where so many of us trip, but what about handling simple numbers? I just went to the web and typed in "Joan of Arc, Noah's wife." I got fifteen thousand hits. Article after article reported the fraction of Americans who thought that Joan of Arc was Noah's wife. Some said six percent, others ten, twelve, twenty -- I even saw sixty percent.

That shows pretty low respect for numerical accuracy from the very people concerned with illiteracy. It also gives me pause. As I do my dance in favor of technological literacy, how much mischief do I sow among people listening with half an ear? Well, I've really done it this time -- by posting this script, I've created one more citation to Newton's non-existent second law of thermodynamics on that un-erasable mirror that we call the Internet.

I'm John Lienhard, at the University of Houston, where we're interested in the way inventive minds work.

(Theme music)

---

T. Stoppard, Arcadia. (Faber & Faber, 1994.)

C. Cookson, Numbers + Symbols = Confusion. Life & Arts, Financial Times, Sunday, Nov. 25, 2007, pp. 1-2

I am grateful to Charlie Dalton, UH Mechanical Engineering Dept. for showing me the "Newton's second law of thermodynamics" blunder.

Thanksgiving at the grocery

I never thought I would want to promote families going to Luby's, Boston Market, or to a steakhouse for Thanksgiving dinner.  Today I do.  I went to the store today to pick up three items (Sam had graciously gone last night at 11PM, but I forgot to ask for, didn't think about, and he couldn't find these three things).  I left the museum early even to avoid any rush.  Still there were couples blindly wondering the baking aisle looking for stuffing.  There were parents piloting their grown children.  There was even a couple with a bag of pecans and a pie shell arguing over what else was in a pecan pie.


Everything you need is in the front of the store folks.  Everything you could possibly need... unless you were me, looking for instant flour and parchment paper. 



In other news I have a second interview next Tuesday.  If you are the praying type pray, if you are another type think happy thoughts... one way or another, that I'll discern and fall my way to where I'm supposed to be. 

Pocket doors

A pocket door is a door that slides between the two sides of a wall.  I think sometimes they are called "recessed" but in any case there are two slits on either side of the door that papers and whatnot could be shoved in.  No G.I. Joes though. 

Huntsville

Yesterday I went to Huntsville to take my old students to visit some more of my old students.

I told my mom this before I left.  I got a blank stare before she started to as "what did they do?"

Oh... their at Sam Houston State, not prison. 

Fair enough, Mom, fair enough...

The little thief

I haven't lived in the house on Rosefield since I was a freshman in high school. 

In 1983, when I was two, before I could talk I used to play with my mom and my dad's wallet.  For some reason they let me take out all the credit cards and bang them together.  I guess for the same reason people two year olds are now playing with cell phones.  Whatever that is.  One day the credit cards went missing and I, being the only mobile child was the usual suspect. 

"Kate, where are Mommy's credit cards?"

To which I promptly walked to the pocket door in the kitchen and pointed. 

My parents tried in vain to fish them all out, failing to retrieve all but a few they reordered the credit cards, the loyalty cards, and anything else I hid and considered them all lost.  They expired and life moved on.  I don't know if I was allowed to play with the wallets anymore. 

Earlier this week the hardwood flooring company that worked on the house on Rosefield, the one that my dad works with, got a call.  They gave out my mom's number and she got a call.  The pocket door has been remodeled out of existence and the credit cards were found.  The woman that bought the house offered to return them, an offer my parents declined, though I wish they had accepted.  It is the only story of two year old Kate I know. 

She also still has the door frame that marks off our heights, completely unpainted.  Which is kinda weird. 

Web 2.0

Ok...
So I went to this continuing ed (ah, continuing ed when you're still in school!) thing on Saturday and they were talking about all that Web 2.0 stuff.  So I've resolved to go at it more systematically than just playing with the Internet every now and then.  Ill consider it a fourth class to take.  I've already done a lot of this stuff, but I figured I'd share this (the links here haven't been updated, it is still in progress cause it is actually a "class" people are taking... but you can work on it with the blog posts to the right)....

http://ihcpl2.blogspot.com/2007/08/23-things.html
and here is another that isn't in progress, but is slightly different...  http://plcmcl2-things.blogspot.com/

I'll even give Second Life another try...

Peace.

Request

So I've asked some of you to "be on this one" but I figured I'd share more generally.  I'm entering the "I'm looking for a job" stage of my little hiatus from the working world.  Grad school is almost over (I'm going to make a paper chain to count down the days tomorrow) and I feel like I should be able to turn that into a job.  Since that was one of the goals of grad school.  So pray for me please.  Think happy thoughts for me if you aren't the praying type.  I'll take it all. 

The First Annual Bake Off

Hirsch Library had its first annual bake off yesterday. It was quite a treat.

1st for taste - Kerri's cupcakes
1st for creativity - Sarah's lamb for the slaughter
1st for presentation - Kate's hayride

Pictures...

Ok fine, picture have been (kind of) edited and are now here:


http://flickr.com/send?photostream=76105532@N00


Large chunks didn't get photographed, or couldn't be anyway... and the obsession with accommodations was more of an exercise in compare and contrast.  All of the beds were singles shoved together with separate duvets.  Which is just about the best idea ever. 
On to work on my census homework. 

I may never know what the devil is going on...

While away I glanced at CNN.com on occasion.  Not much, and really just enough to know a rapper had been busted with machine guns.  And I knew something was up with Turkey when I looked at the State Department website to figure out the visa situation. 

I returned Tuesday.  I woke up to NPR on Wednesday... and then this morning I woke up to a pledge drive.  Since it started on a Thursday I can only presume it will go until next Friday.

Even if I cut them a check right now they would still go blathering on about the value of such cultural institutions in a community.  Then I'd resent that I was paying for them to ask me for money.

Alternative Holidays

In Vienna there were already some shops set up to sell Christmas wares.  While it isn't yet Halloween I thought I'd share some Alternative Holidays resources and ideas and ask ya'll to share any you have.  Cause we're blessed. 

Heifer Project
International Justice Mission
M.D. Anderson Children's Art Project
Friends of Houston Public Library
Thanksgiving Dinner for the Homeless
Brookwood: Pottery by the functionally disabled
The Hunger Site Store
Fair Trade Coffee, Tea, and Chocolate
Ten Thousand Villages

Oh Yukio! Or things to consider when staying in a hostel

Good idea to confine your things to a corner of the room.  Bad idea to put your dirty laundry in various cabinets around the dorm.

Good idea to clean the dishes after you use them, not before.  Especially if you burned the rice.

You really don't need to buy vodka for yourself, there will be plenty left around from previous guests.

Good idea say hello to your roommates.  Or at least look at them and smile.

If you are going to eat cereal out of the common bowl use the ladle.  Not your hands.

Slurping is gross.

You can ask a stranger to "pass the bread" or to point.  You don't have to get up and walk around the table to avoid them.

Packing your things in 50 plastic bags is weird.  It is also weird to rustle with them until midnight and wake up to do it again in the morning.

We know it doesn't take two and a half hours to cook rice.  We know you are avoiding us. 

Even if you think everyone in the room is asleep... don't walk around in your briefs.

Get a bit of a mental map of the room so you don't slam into the other guests beds at top speed in the dark.

If you do trip on someone's stuff, it isn't necessary to hold your wound for ten minutes.  You don't need sound effects.  Get over it.

Taking a nap in the morning when you've kept your roommates up most of the night with your rustling of plastic bags will invite contempt.

If you are a competent member of Japan's PSIA you fooled us.  We think you're borderline autistic. 

Homophones

Westbahnhof

We thought there was a train leaving Vienna everz hour.  Turns out thatäs reallz on the weekdazs... and it is Sundaz.  Forgot about that.  So weäve got toms time to kill before leaving the Mecca of great coffee. 

 

To sum up.  Been to the small, medium, and large of teastern European cities... a good summarz of what the Hapsburg Empire has become.  And what communism did... even fifteen zears and more later.  All of these cities are beautiful in their own waz, and invite varzing reflections on the state of the world todaz.  Still chewing.  In some cases fast food is a blight, in other places it is simplz the most comforting thing zou can find in a foreign train station at 5AM. 

 

Iäve been talking to Bethanz for almost eight dazs straight too.  Which will also invite all kinds of varzing reflections.  Still chewing. 

 

On the state of being content... it isnät verz comforting to be far from home and not know where zou )or how far awaz it is) are going to sleep that night, to not know if the ticket home is actuallz a ticket... or some sort os reservation that looks like a ticket.  It also makes me crankz. 

 

Back to Budapest...

 

 

 

Did zou know...

Bucharest is one big parking lot with a bunch of straz dogs.  Thez also donät have manz hotel rooms.

Vienna has plentz and has sidewalks to walk on.

 

 

Read Bethanzäs Blog

In the interest of time Iäll ignore the changes in the German kezboard.  It is just enough to be reallz annozing. 

In anz case we are in Wein now, planning on spending the night and then heading back to Budapest.  We had a bit of a run in with the police, though reallz I slept through most of it... we still have our passports though and are hoping to file for refugee status as an underwater hockey team.  Hez the Moldovanäs did it.  Twice.

 

Oh... the communists trzing to look like Paris is more than a little interesting. 

 

If zou can afford it... alwazs get the sleeper car.  Always.

 

German operas with Hungarian subtitles are great... and ÄMexicanÄ hotels in the heart of Budapest are also lovelz.  Coffee is good.. weäre getting lots of it. 

 

And Iäm going to have a craving for polenta, sour cream, and goat cheese when I get back.  Start looking up Romanian food. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dear Sam

Hey Sam,

Tell Mőm were going to Istanbul... for more details I will refer you to Bethanys blog. 

Peace out,

Kate

 

P.S. Tonight we will be at the Yellow Submarine Lotus Youth Hostel.

Referal

Two hours till my ride gets here.  I have a lunch to eat and a bunch of stuff to shove into a rucksack.  I finished my homework though... so with the exception of my 1.5 hour midterm that will so rudely interrupt my vacation (it is still the best 12 days we could have picked)... I'm done for awhile.  Grad school is a piece of cake, if you aren't trying to work a 55 hour a week job at the same time. 

When I get back I'll start looking for jobs to apply for.  I'm considering this week a space for a bit of soul searching... I can't talk to Bethany consecutively for THAT many hours.

So I'm not actually planning on writing much while I'm gone.  I'm just not.  In an case I'll refer you to the partner in crime over at Fair Trade Certified in case she writes any.  Or you want to compare our stories.  There's a great moth story in there... she's a better writer than I am anyway.

This Day in History

For all you Yankees and Texans that weren't here in 4th grade I'll offer up this link... on The Texas Revolution.

But they should have learned it in high school...

Just for fun from Mr. Wyman. 
Civic Liberties Quiz