The Blog With No Name

What to do…

mary — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 05:24:40 +0000

…with my sad little blog? It’s been so neglected. And here I am, writing the clichéd “oh my poor neglected blog” post too.

I could track my goals for this year – lose some more weight, feed the troops better, reduce clutter. How to measure is the question – the more quantifiable the goal, the better chance of success.

So:

I want to lose 18 pounds. This will, I hope, be accomplished by doing a new exercise routine, and continuing to improve my diet.
I want to make one “new” meal per week. It’s an extra win if it’s in the crock pot.
I want to clear 25% of my file cabinets out and scan/shred the contents (that is one half of a lateral drawer).

We Shall See…

Paleolithic Tech

mary — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 23:33:59 +0000

I am a prisoner of my favorite toys, like a fly stuck in amber in a bad SF movie. I lovelovelove my Palm Centro, but Palm doesn’t make it any more, no one writes software for it any more, and none of the new groovy calendar- and contact-syncing web sites work with PalmOS any more. I love MS Money on my computer and Ultrasoft Money on my Palm (they talk to each other! perfectly!) but Microsoft has discontinued Money and won’t be supporting it after the end of the year. Eventually my Centro will die (noooooo……….) or my computer will totally crash, and then how will I track my finances as perfectly and easily as I do now? I am whining. I still don’t trust Mint or Wesabe or those totally-online “solutions.” Maybe I’m wrong. But I’m going to take really good care of my phone!

School!

mary — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 01:59:08 +0000

School is back in session. The daughter is is eighth grade, and will, I hope, soon be in the jazz band. The jazz band rehearses at 7:00 a.m. Getting her there on time is going to be, um, interesting. The boy has a new teacher, who looks like she’s 14 (everybody looks like he or she is 14 to me now), but who seems to be on the ball and has placed him so that she can keep an evil eye on his desk. She does not allow messy desks! Yay!

The booster group at his school seems to have attracted a few new and potentially-really-active people, so we are trying to think of ways to give them some meaningful work but not so much that they run away in terror. Ideas?

The paper budget at her junior high school has been cut by 2/3. PAPER. As in, NO PAPER. So in addition to lunch money, it seems I might be buying cases of paper to donate to the school as well. WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS COUNTRY.

Hey, other than that, it’s been a great day. Weather finally turned warm, we went to the pool, had lunch with some friends, every day should be this way.

Arg, Summer

mary — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 17:52:34 +0000

I have a baaaaad attitude these days at work. No one tells me anything, I haven’t had any sort of a review in over a year, I have no direction, and I’m just bored. More interesting things to do at home. Like, right now, I’m about to go make some bread (yes, it’s July 1st, and it’s 65F outside. WTF?). Then back to the library. Honestly, staring at a wall is more interesting than work these days.

Paradigm Shifts

mary — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 21:53:35 +0000

The financial world is in turmoil. Newspapers are going out of business all over the country. And now, get-out-the-vote phone banks are not working any more, as people switch to cell phones (or use caller ID to screen their calls!).

Hello!

mary — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 18:40:45 +0000

I’ve started using Google Reader to follow my gadget/tech/personal finance blogs. Wow, has it cut down on the time it takes me to see what’s interesting! More time for Facebook (arg). This is just a crazy month so far, thankfully it’s almost over! I still have these things to do:

Junior High School PTA Bylaw Revision
Breadbaking Demonstration
Jenny Lind Chapel Budget for 2009
Arrange a certain social event for March
(too too embarrassing) put away the blankety-blank Christmas decorations!

Today is the day I get the by-laws done, if I have to stay up to midnight!!! Wish me luck!

Shopping – It’s Your Civic Duty!

mary — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 19:40:15 +0000

I admit it – I am bad with money. Bad with budgets, bad with controlling impulse spending, and so on. I will focus on fixing this in 2009. In light of that, I was greatly amused at the small print in the middle of the packaging for a small stocking-stuffer gift I got for Christmas. I bet you can figure out what I’m talking about…

Poor Little Blog…

mary — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 02:26:23 +0000

I’ve been assimilated into the Borg, I mean Facebook. Yeah, that’s it. Pretty amazing how people you haven’t seen in umpty years pop out of the woodwork at you. Sort of like, um, here too.

I also have a new cell phone. A Centro. Free from Verizon after I get their little debit card dealie. I LOVE MY NEW PHONE. This convergence stuff is beginning to seem cooler and cooler. My phone, my checkbook register, my shopping list, my to-dos, all on one small (really small!) so-far very sturdy, device. LOVELOVELOVE.

I mean, come on!

mary — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 20:53:51 +0000

My boss occasionally indicates that she is amused at the idea that I’m stressing out about something, usually a machine that is not doing what I think it should be doing at that exact minute, or something that has to be done fastfastfast (usually because she hasn’t mentioned it until the last minute), like today – there was a funeral at my work church which I decided to attend, and we needed more bulletins. So the funeral director was standing there taking them as they came out of the printer. I was annoyed because I’m not used to printing them that way; I usually run them off on this really neat-o high speed offset printer thingie we have. The laser printer is sllllllooooooooowwwwwwwwwwww by comparison. So there is my boss out in the hallway saying, “Mary looks like she’s on the edge, I’ll just stay out of her way, etc etc.” What the fuck is it to her? Is it amusing? Does she get points? She seems so smug when this happens. I wasn’t even stressed until I heard her gloating, and then I just got PISSED OFF. It reminds me of the USSR, that very Soviet attitude – “I’m unhappy so you have no right to be happy, no matter how much harder you are willing to work than I am – we’ll all be equally miserable.” My boss is disorganized and thrives on chaos, so she feels she must bring it to everyone else’s work life? FUCK THAT. *This* is what will drive me to hunt for a new job.

Grumble grumble

mary — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 22:53:03 +0000

A ladder just fell on my face. My glasses are bent, and I imagine that tomorrow morning I will have a truly spectacular bruise on my left temple. Not to mention a really fun headache. I will post a photograph.

(Charles was trying to climb up on the roof. The ladder wasn’t quite tall enough to reach, but it was tall enough to be unmanageable. I’m sure we looked like a Keystone Kops routine in action trying to get the stupid thing down on to the ground.)