Just something kinda funny from work.

I don't remember if I blogged about this or not, but basically, at work my boss had me switch and do something else every day. I process rush loan requests from other libraries. There's a specific website that tells us what we have to supply, and we keep track of it all on the site.

Yesterday, right before I left work I had like 10 more articles that I needed to update on the website, to say that the requests had been filled. My computer didn't still have me signed into the website, though, and I had to re-enter our library's username and password.

Just to kind of illustrate, our username is something like JOE, and the password is something like JO22library. Except that our username isn't JOE, and the password isn't that one.

Anyway, I was kind of thinking about the 22 in the middle of the password, and I realized I probably knew where they got it from. And it seemed like a standard way to assign passwords. So I tried signing in with another library which had a username similar to ours and it worked. Ha. And then I tried signing in with one that had a totally different username, and it worked too.


I thought it was kind of funny. I showed Tasha, since she was the only one still working.

"TASHA! Look! I figured out how they do the passwords, and I can sign in as other schools!"

Tasha was unimpressed.

"Isn't that cool?!" I asked her.

"Well. I don't know what good it would do us."

"Oh! None!" I told her. I don't plan on secretly signing in as BYU or some other school and printing their requests they've received and filling them instead of doing ours, and then secretly marking them as done. It is absolutely not useful to us at all.

But it is kind of awesome. That's all.

Donate to the Food Drive!

This weekend I attended the Utah BYU football game, and it was great. Instead of giving a play by play for that though, I want to mention something else. During Rivalry Week, we had a bunch of contests on campus, and one of them was a food drive. We're supposed to try and collect more food and more money for the Food Bank than BYU people do. (Historically BYU always collects more food and the University of Utah always collects more money.)

Outside the stadium, a group of people were collecting money for the food drive, and I just thought they were fantastic. As tons of people walked to the game, they called for donations from the crowds.

I had about an hour and a half of extra time between the tailgate party and the game, so I spent most of an hour sitting on a hill right by them, listening and laughing, and typing stuff they were saying (on my phone). I wish you could hear the main guy's voice.


Donate to the food drive! All donations might be tax deductible. And we don't feed Cougar fans either. Yes, be like this guy! Donate to the food drive. All donations might be tax deductible. Everybody! We need your money. For the food drive. Any spare change. Nobody likes it. Donate to the food drive, it's all against BYU. Some of you have spare change, I know it. Fore go that hot dog and or soda and donate to the food drive instead. All donations might be tax deductible. He's going for it, he's goin' for it. yes! Everybody donate, everyone is doing it. Donate to the food drive. We know you have money! You all can hear me! She just donated twice. If you donate the Utes will win! Donate to the food drive! All donations might be tax deductible. Yes! Thank you sir. Yes! Be like this kid. He probably doesn't even have a job and he's donating! Couch cushions! Donate to the food drive! Yes! She donated lots of money! Thank you ma'am! All donations very well could be tax deductible. Awesome! Awesome! Go Utes! Buy this ticket and donate to the food drive with the proceeds to the food drive. Donate to the food drive! Everybody! Go Utes! Food drive! Nobody likes spare change and nobody likes the Cougars. Don't avoid eye contact donate to the food drive. I'm pretty sure some of you have cash and or coins! Thank you for your generosity sir! All donations might be tax deductible! It's going to the food drive! We need to beat BYU; nobody likes them anyway! We're going to beat BYU /but we need YOU! I'm pretty sure most of you have cash and or coins! Starving families! Starving families need your money! They just donated and they're in their car! Your quarters, your dimes we don't care! We just want to beat BYU! I'm confident most of you have spare change. Utah fans, this is not enough money! It's all going to the food bank! Ladies with purses I know you have change! Donate money! Even if it's just a couple quarters. All right! Wooo! Go Utes! All donations might be tax deductible! Feel really good about yourself today! Donate to the food drive! Yeah! Whatever ya got! Be like this guy, he just donated!

(I gave them all of my change, which was about 17 cents. But I don't feel too bad; I already donated to the food drive this week.)

Another FAKE website

I'm catching up on episodes of TV shows that I watch but don't watch (since my TV isn't plugged in).

In the most recent episode of How I Met Your Mother, Barney starts Not A Father's Day.

And he shows products that people can buy on the website, which actually exists.

It's http://www.notafathersday.com

I don't know if it's quite as good as the Ted Mosby is a Jerk site that I mentioned in my other post about this, but fake websites are pretty much always awesome.

That is all.

ASK HER [WHAT?!]

Like a month ago, ALL over campus, someone wrote ASK HER in big, like painted chalk letters.

As I walked under the tunnel from the stadium to campus ASK HER, ASK HER facing both directions, and HUGE. And I walked up past the gym towards my classes. In big letters and in a couple different places in front of the gym, ASK HER ASK HER. And then when I got up to the building where my classes were ASK HER was in huge letters there too. And by the student center. ASK HER was written all over the place.

I was so so curious. ASK HER what? Did he? Was someone proposing? What did she say? Or if it wasn't that, what did he ask? WHO thought someone should ASK HER? A few days went by, and there was nothing about it. So I was just curious. I took a picture with my phone so that I could blog about it. I talked to a couple people about it.


And after Fall Break, the letters were gone and I was still curious. I thought about obtaining chalk and writing a follow up question. WHAT DID SHE SAY? seemed long though.

And I don't know why I didn't blog about it before.


BUT THEN! This last weekend, I asked my coworker what he was doing for the weekend, and he said he was joining a fraternity, and I asked which one, and he told me and he said "the one who did the ask her thing." WHAT. I stopped everything. "OH!! You know about it! It was a fraternity thing? What was it? Who is she? Did someone ask? What did they ask?"

And he explained, that basically, they need some certain number of people to restart the fraternity on campus. People from the fraternity wrote ASK HER all over campus, and then some day afterward, a whole bunch of girls wore shirts that said ASK ME. And then you were supposed to ask them, and they passed out info about the fraternity.

AWESOME.


He told me there had also been an article about it in our school paper. I found it. It's here. And here. I guess fraternities at a couple other schools have done it before too. And they were fined for violating campus posting rules. BEST $25 EVER. Except that I guess there are going to be vandalism charges of like $3000, too, which I don't understand why because it all seemed to wash off. It seemed like it was that street spray paint like they use for surveyors and big races, etc. Whatever.

And then there's another article about a guy who was inspired by the ASK HERs and actually did propose. Supposedly. And my coworker said that when he first saw them all, he was thinking about asking some girl out, and he thought maybe his roommate had done it because he had been talking about it and then his roommate was gone the night before. And he asked the girl out.

I'm just happy to know what it was all about.

Brown Bag Lunches

I've decided (for like the 7th time) that I want to be one of those people who actually uses their inbox for incoming email. Right now I have like 4000 messages in my inbox, some from July 2004. Most people haven't even had gmail since then. Anyway, I started by deleting Facebook alerts, and Geocaching.com alerts, and Williams-Sonoma emails, and that kind of stuff. I'm finding lots of treasures, and I'll probably post a few things on here.

Right now I'm going through newsletters that I got from eHealthCompete, which used to be our fitness website for the first year that I worked at Ancestry.


I thought this was kind of a fun email. I'm cutting out the good part to post here. It's a list of tips for brown-bagging awesomely.





Here are some tips for better brown bag:


Splurge: If you are brown-bagging to work, you are automatically saving money by not eating out. So by all means, make your food more enticing than the local fast-food chain's. Make prosciutto, tomato and basil sandwiches, or pick up a roasted chicken in the deli and pack a portion for lunch.


Grilled Thrills: Nothing adds more flavor than grilled foods. Add grilled veggies (onions, zucchini, and eggplant) to your lunch kits. You can bag them separately then add them to a normal sandwich to make it extraordinary. Especially good with goat cheese.


Lunch-Pooling: Form a lunch-pool at work with 4 other persons. On one day of the week, one person makes lunch for all. It's easier to make 5 of the same lunches at once than to make 5 different ones every morning. Plus, it adds variety (just make sure you all share the same tastes in food).


Zip Those Chips: Instead of costly pre-made single serving packs, use sealable plastic bags and even mix up your favorites. Some of them, like those tasty bean chips, vegetable chips and garlic bagel chips, don't come in single server packs.


Stop the Sog: If you are using moist vegetables or condiments, bag them separately then add them to a sandwich at lunch. No more yucky bread.


Fast Food Packets: Next time you eat fast-food (and we know you do), pick up extra packets of ketchup, mustard, salt, pepper, salsa, etc. They are handy for adding flavor to your meal. Condiments can make a sandwich soggy, so adding them fresh from the packet will make your meal tastier.


Condiment Heaven: Explore new condiments on your sandwich. Sun-dried tomato spread, horseradish, Chinese mustard, spreadable goat cheese and Caesar salad dressing are unique alternatives.


If your only problem with taking a brown bag with you is that you forget your lunch then drop your car keys in the bag. You'll never get to work without them

An awesome work story.

I heard the most excellent story at work yesterday.

Okay, so basically, I have one lady who is in charge of my department (who has an office), and then there are two full-timers who kind of supervise the main parts of our work, and they each have their own desks right next to each other, and the rest of us move around. One of the full-timers is training me (I'll call her H).

SO! I was sitting at the one girl's desk with her, and she was showing me how to do something when one of our department's phone lines rang. "It's her again," H said. The phone rang again, and H looked at the other full time lady (that I'll call Tasha), she was like "Tasha, don't answer it, it's her again." H stood up and loudly announced to everyone in our department, "NOBODY ANSWER THAT. IT'S HER AGAIN."

Not knowing anything about it, I was of course curious. "Who?" I asked H. "It's a crazy lady," she said. "She's called three times already today." H pointed at a little paper pinned up to her bulletin board that said:

do not answer calls from

LADY'S NAME

lady's phone number

"Does she call every day?" I asked. "No. Just sometimes." I guess sometimes she'll go months without calling, and other times she calls a bunch. One time Tasha threatened to call the police if the lady called again, and she didn't call for months after that. Until yesterday.

And H told me a little bit about it, and then she had to go do something and while I was waiting for her, Tasha told me more about it.

I guess they had answered her calls before, and the reason she was calling was to tell us that Tasha is crazy and we should do something about it. (She's not; she's not new here, and she's great.) And when she asks for Tasha and someone tells her that Tasha doesn't want to take her call (Tasha has told her not to call that number many times before), the lady gets all mad. The lady called H crazy and a drunk. And she said similar things to one of my other coworkers when they answered.

SO what happened was, before Tasha started working with us, she worked at another library. And this lady was a patron there. And that was how they knew each other. Tasha says she doesn't know, she thinks she may have given the lady her home number back a long time ago, but definitely not her work one--the lady figured it out on her own.

Tasha said that the lady is an artist. And her stuff was on exhibition at Trolley Square. So Tasha went, to be nice and show support, because the lady had invited her. And while she was there, she saw some other artist's prints that she was already familiar with, and she really liked the guy's stuff, and you could get a little framed one for like $5, so she bought one as a little gift for some relative who was coming to visit soon. AND THEN! This lady was all offended that Tasha didn't buy one of her paintings. But hers are like those massive canvases, and they're all very expensive. And Tasha can't afford a huge huge canvas painting for hundreds of dollars or whatever.

And so this lady got mad and started sending her all these letters. And one time she sent a stack of like, printouts? with pictures of her work, or something like that. And Tasha was like "..." [what am I supposed to do with these?]. And Tasha asked her when the crazy lady called her again, and after half an hour of prying it out of her, the lady was like, "Well, you're still in touch with your in-laws, right?" and Tasha's like [surprised] "No..." Because her husband died years ago. And I think the lady knew that. But she wanted Tasha to like, get in touch with her relatives, so that she could give them advertisements for the lady's paintings. ... Ummmm no.

And another time, the lady was dating some guy and wanted Tasha to meet him. So she was like "You should have us over to dinner sometime!" EXCEPT! She had told Tasha before that the guy was a criminal! And Tasha didn't want him, like, in her house, knowing where she lived. And Tasha was like "You can come for dinner if you want, but I don't want you to bring him"...

And now I'll finish with the best part of the story.

About the criminal knowing where she lived, or whatever, Tasha told me it's a locked apartment building, where you need to have a key to get in at all. She said though, even though she can't get in, sometimes this lady will come to her house. She said one time the lady came, and it was like midnight, and the lady stood outside and was like "TASHA!!! TASHA!!!!" from down at the street. And she opened her window and was like "What?" And I don't remember why, but she invited the lady in. And the lady came in, etc, but she stopped and knocked on the door of one of Tasha's neighbors. And Tasha said she knew a single guy lived there. And Tasha was like "What are you doing?!"

So she knocked, and remember it's midnight. And the guy comes to the door and from inside says, "Who is it?" And the lady says, "Me," in a singsongy voice. And the guy is like "What do you want?" to which she responds, "Just one passionate kiss." [!!!] And Tasha is embarrassed, obviously, and she doesn't want the neighbor to associate this lady with her, so she goes inside her apartment and leaves the lady. The lady said she was just doing it as a joke. But how crazy is that?!

True story.

Cool quote

I heard a neat quote last night at my Pistol Marksmanship class, which I thought was worth writing down (and apparently also worth sharing).

We were talking about how, I guess it used to be that you were supposed to aim at the center of the target when you shoot. Which makes sense, because that's what you want to hit. Except, when people (especially beginners) aim at something so tiny, it's hard to actually hit it. Because peoples' bodies naturally move a tiny bit, etc. So instead, they teach people to aim below the target. And then it's easier to focus on the front sight (instead of the target), because you can see it better, and you're not so distracted with trying to hit a tiny specific spot. And then you adjust the sight so that by aiming a little below the target, and then you're more likely to hit the center than if you're actually aiming at the center.

And the instructor mentioned a quote that he'd heard recently, which I thought was good. He didn't cite it though, and Google attributes it to "unknown" sooo, here you go:

"Don't let perfection get in the way of excellence."

Good stuff, huh?

Just staying busy.

Well, I haven't really blogged all that much lately.

I've been busy.

Here are the main things that have been happening in my life:

I attended concerts! I saw Weezer live, which was excellent, and then the next week I went to the Rock Band Live! concert, which was also very good. It converted me to liking Dashboard Confessional, which I never really cared for before the concert. I also really enjoyed seeing Panic! at the Disco, and thought they did a great job. (I went because they were playing.) Plain White T's was less impressive. For both concerts I had tickets that were down on the floor, and I invited a guy from my Institute up here in Salt Lake. We were super close--so close that we didn't watch the big screens because we could actually see the people singing and the expressions on their faces, etc, without needing to look at the big screen. (PS, the concert pictures are from my camera phone.)

I visited New England with my friends. We went to a Shaker village in New Hampshire, visited Dartmouth, and then we went to Sharon, Vermont, to see Joseph Smith's birthplace. We also went to Lexington and Concord (and saw the spot where "the shot heard 'round the world" was fired, and also saw a live reenactment of redcoat stuff), and we had a tour of Harvard Law school. And went to church in Boston, which was basically the same as church in Utah or church in California. The trip was my favorite thing I've done in a long time. I've decided that traveling with my friends is my favorite thing to do. Of everything.

I ran a 5K last Saturday, which was part of Wellness week on campus. The actual title of the race is "Run Like Health", but nobody actually pronounced the "th" on "Health" and I'm pretty sure that was intentional. I got a cool shirt from it, which I plan to really wear, unlike my other race shirts. Also, on the same topic, I've started running most days. And I like it. (I always wanted to like running!)

I had the kitties, which obviously I already blogged about. It's kind of weird now that they're gone, because I come home and I don't have to make sure the kitties don't run out as I'm coming in the door. And then I go take my shoes off, and I don't have to put them up high, because the kitties aren't going to snag them or chew on them. And I take my earrings out, and I don't have to put them up high either, because the kitties won't play with them or eat them. And my house doesn't smell like kitties or waste, even though I empty the litter box zero times per day. And I sleep well basically every night now. So. Sort of I miss them, and really I'm secretly relieved to have my house smell normal and all that. Even though they were cute.

I watched season one of Heroes, and I liked it. And now I'm watching season two. Claire is my favorite of all the characters. I also like Hiro. I've been kind of slow about watching my other shows. I'm just busy enough with everything else that like, The Office and HIMYM are not as important as they were. I also watched season one of Pushing Daisies and I love it. Actually, though, I still haven't bothered to plug in my TV yet, sooo, my TV viewing is basically all online or while I'm running.

I don't have any fancy hobbies right now, really. I had this great idea that I wanted to knit washcloths for all of my married friends (because I think they make a house a home), but Jess thought it was a stupid idea, because everyone uses sponges nowadays. And I guess she's right, so now I'm not excited about spending lots of time making something that nobody wants. Jess said I should knit hot pads instead. Meh. We'll see. So I knitted one washcloth to try out one of the patterns, but that's all of the knitting I've done lately. (Although now that it's cold, maybe I'll want to knit more scarves and hats and socks.) I haven't been spinning either.

Hobby updates: remember how I was all into gardening this summer? And I turned out to have not a green thumb at all, but like a thumb of death instead? I was at my old apartment a couple weeks ago and turns out, my tomato plants grew a tomato! One. That was green in the middle of October, so probably would never be red. Too bad, but still kind of neat, since I started the tomatoes as tiny seeds. My other hobby update is about CERT-- this week I finally got my card that shows that I did it.

OH! AND I have been shooting! I signed up for a Pistol Marksmanship class, and I've had three classes of it so far. LOVE IT! I've always wanted to try, and frankly, I'm not very good (yet!), but it sounded like a fun idea, and I'm enjoying it tremendously. I like just doing things instead of thinking and thinking about them forever. So this was one of those things.

I've also kind of become a football fan, which is way new for me. I'm in the student section at school, and I've been to a few of the games. This week we're playing against TCU, and we're having a blackout game, which is, get this, where everyone wears black. Even the players. It's supposed to look intimidating. I think it will. Except if tomorrow is anything like today, we'll be snowy black, which I think it more picturesque and not so intimidating, but whatever. Yesterday I picked up my MUSS BLACKOUT sweatshirt. I think the game will be fun. And more fun if we win. [Not my car; just one I saw.]

In other sports news, I'm ref'ing (sp?) volleyball games for the next couple weekends. RANDOM! I don't know anything about volleyball. But it's cool. I'll figure it out.

My classes are going pretty well. EXCEPT, turns out I love love Accounting, and really hate English [literature], which is unfortunate becuase the English major here isn't English. It's English [literature]. And if I switch to Accounting, I'm basically starting from square one (3 1/2 years of classes, for just my bachelors, because I have to go through the whole business school thing). But if I keep going with English, I have 1 1/2 years left instead. SO, not sure what I'm going to do about that.

And then I guess my last item of news is just about my new job. I started working there this Monday, and so far things are fine. I don't love it. It's okay, though. And there are some things that I do like about it. Like, yesterday, I got to check in a bunch of books we had lent out to other libraries, and a bunch of places put these little thank you notes in the books, and that made me happy. I also do a bunch of scanning, and that is less interesting. I'm happy to be working somewhere, though.

So that's good.

No more cats.

Well, I just took the cats back.

This time, I tried calling ahead (nobody answered), I found a way to put a luggage strap on the Pet Taxi, and I got off at the correct train stop, so that made things a little easier. Okay, a lot.

But when I told them the kitties hadn't had their second shots or been spayed/neutered yet, they got mad at me. "We never take foster kittens back before they've been spayed." WELL. And I kind of mumbled something about the Humane Society being far, and I have to carry the cats, and they're destroying my house, and it sounded like a lame excuse.

And I don't think the lady understood that when I bought a pumpkin yesterday, I couldn't carry it because my forearms are still bruised, and so are my hips. And she obviously didn't understand that last night I had to put sweats on top of my pajamas and then sleep with a heating pad, because I was out of clean blankets and even my comforter needs to be washed, and so does my couch. And she couldn't have understood that I can't put my bathmat in the bathroom, my shoes on the floor, or my books on the couch. And she definitely didn't understand that my new-to-me couch which had zero snag marks when I got it is now covered in snag marks. Even though I say "no" whenever kitties start to bother it.

Obviously she didn't understand that kitties bite me awake, or just mew and mew, or run around and I haven't slept well since I got back from Boston. And I don't think she understood that I've tried and tried to make my house smell livable, but that I can't open my windows really, because they have no screens and I can't let the cats out. She didn't understand that I gave each of the kitties individual attention at least a couple times every day so that they would feel loved, and grow up to be nice cats, for other people. She didn't understand that I was trying to help and did my best.

She didn't thank me for keeping six cats in my apartment for six weeks.

She was annoyed. She said, "They're not spayed. What am I supposed to do with them?" and I thought maybe it was a rhetorical question, because she's in charge of foster animals with the Humane Society. And like, all week long doesn't she get not-spayed cats that she's not expecting? (That's the whole idea of having a Humane Society, right?) And these ones weren't even mine. But she just looked at me, because it wasn't a rhetorical question, so I said, "Spay them?" And she said they'd have to find someone else to foster them. It was an extremely awkward conversation.

And I know I read on the fostering agreement that if I didn't take them for their shots, or if I refused to give them back, I wouldn't be allowed to foster animals and maybe not even adopt from the Humane Society ever again. So I think I may be blacklisted from the Humane Society.

Which is awful. That's like being blacklisted from volunteering at the library or at an elementary school.

So now I'm home in my catless house. And feeling awful about my best not being enough.

OOh, glimmer of hope! Just now, as I was typing this, another lady from the fostering at the Humane Society called to find out what happened. And I explained that I couldn't take them back for shots, etc, during the week because I have a new job, and the Humane Society is way far without a car, etc, and she was like, "Ohh." And she told me the kitties were "nice and fat"! And we talked about some of the mom's issues (like wishing she were an outside cat and not using the litter box), and some of the personality traits of the kitties (one of them was hissy when they tried to give it shots), etc, and it was the conversation that I had expected to have when I dropped them off.

Sigh.