I have discovered...

That the days of women as subservient property are still around. As long as you work in a gender specific role such as, say, a secretary you will always be someones property. You are no the secretary you are my, his, her secretary. The same would go for a maid or nurse. These jobs are not really careers (other than a nurse, that's a career for sure) but they are jobs that are essential to the people who are hiring them. Pretty much things would fall apart without these people who do the behind the scenes work. So do they deserve your respect or do they deserve to be referred to as property? Do they deserve you talking about them while they are less than a foot away or do they deserve you asking them your question seeing as they are quite competent, capable beings? Seriously people! Can we get over the "I'm a man, I'm the only one who knows how to do it right, I'm the only one that's competent" thing? Because when you act like that you are actually portraying yourself as the opposite of all those. Yay for equal rights now can we work on equal respect regardless of the job title?

Weekend o fun!

I have a great picture to post but i forgot my camera at home. oops.

We saw night at the museum with sukie and wudan for the boy's birthday. It was hilarious! Like literally laugh out loud hilarious! good fun movie.

We also watched WALL-E this weekend and i wasn't that impressed. It has some potential but it's just slow!

We watched Taken too. (Many movies this weekend.) It was good. A nice suspense/action movie. it really didn't have a dull moment other than Liam's 5 minute (OK not quite that long) monologue to the kidnapper. Thanks for outlining your skill but it would have been more effective to say "I'm retired CIA i will hunt you down and kill you and anyone else that stands in my way." But no we got the monologue instead.

We also had a wonderful roclette dinner and BBQ at different points this weekend. We partied it up and now i need another long weekend to recover.

PS oh and no caffeine ever again again. (well never after 3 in the afternoon again). Will i ever learn?

I am the fountain of all knowledge...

Or at least that's what many of the faculty in my department presume me to be.

I'm having a hard time not getting frustrated with a couple people that either expect me to know everything or do everything for them.

Example A: I have been asked this question multiple times and the answer is always the same. "So have they figured out what's up with my teaching for the fall." My answer. "Nope, I'll let you know when they do." This is followed by the same question the next week. I occasionally add that they (the powers that be) are discussing the options. that of course is followed up with the question of what they are discussing. Well i don't know and if you are that interested you may feel free to join the discussion with them. response to that: no i just hope they're not thinking of anything too crazy. isn't this why you would want to be involved in the discussion about your future? Whatever.

Example B (my personal favorite): I've been scheduling some rooms for a conference/symposium that this professor is heading up. Well he comes and tells me last week that the numbers have doubled, making the rooms that we have impossible to hold everyone. I tell him that it might not be possible to find anything large enough but I'll see what i can find out. His response: well it better be possible. My thought: Oh yes master I'll pull that one out of thin air for you. What am i, your genie? So i go about finding out if we can get rooms that are large enough. I get an email back explaining the options we have. Since I'm not in charge of the conference and do not feel qualified to make the final decision on the room i forward the email to the professor asking him to look over the options and to let me know what he has chosen. A week passes. I send a friendly but firm reminder email asking him to figure it out ASAP or he will not have rooms for his conference. The next day he stops by my desk to ask me if I've figured out what to do. I curtly informed him that i had sent him two emails and that he would have to look over the options and then let me know and then i would make the changes. He said: oh you emailed me? My thoughts: Yeah hello! You know email, that thing that everyone uses to contact you about important things. Please don't disregard an email sent by me. I promise it is not a ridiculous forward or junk. I would never email you expect for work related business. Seriously! Well it's been a couple of days since then and still no word. I have the feeling that he will forget to look at the email and i will not make changes (because it's not my place to do so and it's the principal of the thing) and he will show up for the conference and there will not be enough room. Of course he will come fuming to me and anyone else that will listen about how I've ruined everything. To which i will hand him the copies of the emails i sent him which i have already printed to safeguard me in this exact situation. Still it won't be fun but it will be better having the proof. yes i have learned from past similar experiences. and yes i will be sending out one more email telling him very clearly that if he does not decide i will not make changes and he will not have rooms. My work needs a little tough love.

Example C (this is just for giggles): Same professor from example a came up to me today and asked me for a Kleenex. i offered her a box to keep in her office since we do that here. She declined and just took one. Somehow i think this scenario will be played out again.

So yes i am the fountain of all knowledge. One who knows all, has all, and does all for whoever is asking.

Back on the wagon...

"If you love to walk or run but are looking for a low-impact workout that is good on your joints and tendons, the elliptical trainer may be just the piece of exercise equipment you are looking for. Elliptical trainers provide a similar workout to walking or running, but with much less bounce and impact. " - quote from www.ellipticaltrainers.us/about.htm

We bought sukie and wudan's elliptical because they never use it and wanted to unload it and because I'm an old woman and it's one of the only things my poor hip can handle. The picture proves that the elliptical is good for even an old broke down woman like me.

We got it home Saturday night and i used it for the first time yesterday. I like it. I get a pretty good workout and it's really nice to just be doing something again. (To be honest that's the first time I've really worked our since the surgery and it went surprisingly well.) I'm just the tiniest bit sore today but my hip isn't any more sore than the rest of my body and that is fantastic! I did a half mile last night and this morning. It's nice to be back on the wagon again :)

Oh David and I also bought bikes. We are going to start saving the earth, money and our bodies tomorrow. We're going to ride to work instead of drive from now on. We're pretty excited about doing the healthy thing. We always walked to school/work before but now we live a little bit far for walking. So biking is the perfect solution!

Yay for being healthy again!!! (And not becoming a fatty fat fat, a serious concern after eating out for 2 weeks straight while state hopping for wedding, reception and honeymoon stuff.)

Angels and Demons

We went to see angels and demons on Saturday. It was well done but disappointing if you have read the book. There were several big things changed unnecessarily. Overall it was an entertaining and well done but not quite what we were expecting. Still a fun outing though.

After that we did BBQ at sukie and wudan's. Best kabobs ever! We had a grand time and then watched seven pounds. One of my favorite movies. It's pretty heavy but still good.

So overall a great weekend.

Honeymoon Part 3: Chicago

Fun with curious George fruit snacks in the car.

We ate at the cheesecake factory and David love the ceiling because it looked like cheesecake.

View from the women's bathroom o the 96th floor of the Hancock building. you wouldn't think that the best view would be from the bathroom but it was. (if you go don't go to the observatory go to the restaurant and get appetizers or dessert. it's cheaper than the observation deck.) when we went up they were actually in between lunch and dinner and no one seated us so we just enjoyed the view.

Swiss chocolate! Yum!

Water fountain that had faces. Kind of random, kind of cool.

The reflecting pond was even with the ground so you could walk right across it or stand on water. David thought it was really cool.

Crazy Chinese art.

Cook architecture.

The inside of the bean in Millennium park. There's this really shiny bean shaped sculpture and it reflects the city and you can find yourself in it. It sounds kind of weird but it was actually really cool.

Our reflection in the bean.

Full size view of the bean.

Chicago deep dish pizza a la "Gino's East". It was so good. After 2 pieces we were both full. Don't order a medium if it's just 2 people. And yes, we did eat it with a knife and fork.

Chicago was the perfect relaxing end to all of our busy reception traveling. We went where we wanted, woke up when we wanted and went to bed when we wanted (me around 10 :) It was great.

Everything was great except for the airline. Delta/northwest = no good. Horrible customer service. One of our flights was canceled. They charged us for luggage even though they shouldn't have. (really i looked this one up online before we left and they shouldn't have charged us.) It was just a kind of ridiculous flying situation.

Honeymoon Part 2: Lake Michigan and Dutch Village

Ok Nothing to do with the honeymoon but it was my favorite billboard of the trip. Affordable Bankruptcy? Really? I kind of thought that wasn't possible. Oh well

David was talking to his mom because it was mother's day.

There were tons of ladybugs everywhere.

Sinking our feet in the sand.

Huge wooden shoes.

Right size wooden shoes.

There is a town in Michigan called Holland. We have a lot of dutch people in Michigan so they have this little dutch village amusement park and shops. We stopped by because David wanted to see the wooden shoes. It's a fun place to look through. Holland also has an annual tulip festival. We were there the day after it ended but the tulips were still beautiful.