Category: To Occupy my Time

I’m all for rules and regulations, but can’t this be done electronically?

In the past few months rules in the health care and mortgage industry have kicked in and now we get a monthly statement from HomeStreet Bank telling us about our mortgage which is auto deducted.  Plus, after every appointment at Kaiser (I go once weekly for UV therapy for psoriasis) I receive a mailing telling me how much UV therapy supposedly costs.
I have an entire electronic thing set up at Kaiser so I don’t have to get these types of things, so why don’t they come via that?  And HomeStreet, it would be great to opt in to something like that for the mortgage notification.

Kid thank you

So sweet.  This is from one of the K/1 classes.  My favorite is “she has her own style” which is a comment that another co-worker also got.  I laughed because the other co-worker has a very fun sense of style, while mine involves wearing the same thing every day of the week.  But to a K/1, I guess that counts as “own sense of style.”

Ah, the illusion of control

It’s summer!  And that means I have things to do at work.  So I’ve put things in order and have goals for all the weeks I’ve worked.  Nicole, from First Unitarian introduced me to this planning method. It’s great for when you have specific tasks to do over a set amount of time, not all of which are date specific. My summer tasks mostly just need to get done, and some can’t start before I finish others, so this system works fabulously for me.  Whatever doesn’t get done in a given week gets moved down to the next week.  The trick is to keep July 21-25 from getting to full of too many un-done post-it notes.
Another way to do this is to use index cards instead of post-its.  Then you can save the index cards, make notes on the backs, and throw them in a folder to retrieve for the next summer.

Another stunning generalization that takes my breath away.

“Jared Padgett’s extended family knew him as a happy, chatty person who was quick to hug, full of love and had a goal in life, unlike many teenagers.”
Um.  Most all of the teenagers I’ve encountered have goals.  I myself had goals for my life when I was a teenager.  Most of them weren’t really realistic and didn’t come to pass, but that doesn’t meant I didn’t have them.  How about giving the upcoming adults some credit?

This is not a member of the marching band!

Text under the picture says, “The Union High School Marching Band takes part in Saturday’s Rose Festival Grand Floral Parade.”
Huh.  I remember band as looking more like people in unisex uniforms carrying instruments and playing and stuff, but I guess things have changed since my day.
(There is half of a flute pictured, on the right side of the picture. Also, picture caption writer, you might tell us from whence the Union High School came.  Because I have no idea.)

Just because.

This was a commentary about a program in Portland called Girls on the Run, where girls in third through eighth grades learn life skills and run, completing a 5k at the end of the program. It’s a great program and many girls at school have participated.
Predictably, came this editorial.  I’m not going to be diligent and actually look up statistics, but I’m willing to bet that participation in youth sports is not equal between genders.  And while sports are expected for boys, they still aren’t universally accepted for girls, even forty years after Title IX.  
So that’s why girls get more encouragement.  Lets even things out first.