31 Saturday Dec 2011
Posted in 30 Posts To 30, From The Owlery, Life and Love
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Joining Farewell Stranger’s link-up, here is my year in photographs!
And yes, they’re basically all Owl photos. Because HE was my year. Work stuff isn’t worth photographing.
I’ll be posting the year-in-review meme soon, too. The long and the short of it, though?
30 Friday Dec 2011
Posted in Life and Love
One of my best Christmas presents this year was a little rolled up piece of paper, which (when unrolled) displayed this beautiful picture:
*choir of angels singing*
That’s right. Santa gave me a Terabyte drive.
I really need this.
My predilection for video editing has eaten massive amounts of space on my computer, which only had 320 Gb to begin with (that’s right, ONLY 320 Gb. Remember when 2 Gb was big??).
The hard drive is crammed full. I’ve uninstalled most of my games (which I miss desperately, but there is no time for games now. I have a BABY. It’s like having my very own sim, which functions in real time and has no pause button) but my drives are both 90% full and my computer is slowing down.
Hence Santa’s little gift.
Why a photo? You ask.
Well, because Santa ordered the drive from Future Shop on December 6th, and it still had not arrived as of our departure for Nova Scotia.
Later that day, PH, er, I mean, SANTA, checked his email and made an interesting discovery:
—
Hello Santa:
Sorry for the inconvenience but the following products are currently out of stock. We’ll do our best to reduce the wait time for this inventory.
| Item(s) currently out of stock |
| Western Digital Caviar 1TB 3.5″ Internal Hard Drive (WD10EADS) | |||||
—
So that sucked.
The odd thing is that “Western Digital Caviar 1TB 3.5″ Internal Hard Drive (WD10EADS)” seems to have disappeared entirely from Futureshop.ca.
It has been replaced by “Western Digital Caviar 1TB 3.5″ Internal Hard Drive (WD10EARS)” which is in stock! For $60 more!
ISN’T THAT GOOD NEWS?
So PH Santa gave Future Shop a little call. He wanted to know:
1. Why the product hadn’t been shipped back when he ordered it.
2. Why it took them until Christmas to notify him that his wife could expect diddly bupkiss in the mail.
3. Why the awaited product had disappeared entirely from the website, and been replaced by a virtually identical product for nearly double the price.
4. Whether we could expect to receive my gift ever.
5. Why they sucked so much.
In that order.
The guy on the other end was able to help him with none of these questions.
However, PH was able to gather that there was some kind of Greater Power at Future Shop who collectively made these decisions, whom the Help Dude referred to as “them”, much in the same way that a minor henchman would refer to “the Dark Lord”.
Q: Why wasn’t the product shipped weeks ago?
A: Actually, the odd thing was that it was ordered at all. Future Shop discontinued the product on Nov 28, 2011.
Q: Then why was it on the website, IN STOCK, and available for order on Dec 6, 2011?
A: Unsure. He would have to ask “them”.
Q: If it was discontinued in November, why did it take until Christmas Eve for them to notify him that he could not get the product he ordered?
A: Unsure. He would have to ask “them”.
Q: If the product is discontinued, why does the email give false hope that the awaited gift might still arrive in the mail?
A: Unsure, but “they” surely had “their” reasons.
Q: Why had the previously ordered hard drive been replaced with a virtually identical model, at nearly the double of the original price?
A: Well, see, this one has a better data buffer.
Q: Is that really worth nearly double the price?
A: Unsure.
Q: Could we just recieve the other hard drive as a substitute, since the one we had been promised would probably never be delivered?
A: No. It’s a different model number, you see.
Q: Could he help us in ANY WAY?
A: No. He suggested that we email “them” and ask if they would honor the original price with the newer model.
Well, he did just that, several days ago now. The Dark Lords of the Email have yet to respond.
WHY FUTURE SHOP NO LOVE US??
So, what do you think will happen next?
UPDATE: In Which The Suffering of Others Causes Me Mild Inconvenience
29 Thursday Dec 2011
Posted in From The Owlery, Life and Love
23 Friday Dec 2011
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I wrote this on my netbook and have been trying to post it ever since. PH finally managed to find me a connection with some fiddling on my netbook at my in-law’s house, thanks to an unsecured connection.
THANK HEAVENS, because I seriously need to talk to you folk about the Christmas songs I’ve been hearing on the radio. I need to find out if I’m the only person having these thoughts.
I’ve never been much of a radio person. Normally at Christmas I just have Barenaked For The Holidays on constant loop playing in the car.
Perfect Husband, though no less loyal a fan of BNL than I, has less tolerance for repetition and tends to switch to the radio.
Happily, we have found middle ground on QM FM, which plays Christmas music non-stop during December.
The only unfortunate side effect to constantly listening to radio Christmas music in the car is a tendency to walk around with songs like Six White Boomers and Mele Kalikimaka stuck in your head all the time.
But some of these songs, which I hear being played again and again, sometimes covered by a variety of artists, are starting to make me think weird thoughts… And now that I have overthought these songs, thus ruining them for myself, I feel the need to spread the weirdness.
Therefore, I bring you:
20 Tuesday Dec 2011
Posted in Life and Love
It’s amazing how cut-off I feel without internet. It couldn’t have happened at a worse time. Stocking stuffers that I meant to order online never got ordered. Blog posts have been piling up in my head/on my netbook in Open Office files. I launched the website of my dog training biz and haven’t been able to moderate it since.
Do you know how much you need internet FOR these days? Without Facebook/email, my primary means of communicating with friends and family in inconvenient time zones has been eradicated.
Now I’m at McDonalds, eating food I don’t even feel like eating, because they turned their play-place into more seating, and added wifi (apparently children don’t play anymore?)
So, here is the brief rundown on my life:
We leave to go home for Christmas tomorrow (and internet stalkers, beware: I have a house sitter, an attack-cat, and murderous robots, not to mention very nosy neighbours who know we’re away).
Today I have to:
Deliver a bottle of over-the-counter pet nutriceuticals to a friend, which I got at cost at work and for which I am being traded a used Xbox (I have a vague notion of picking up a Kinect at some point in the future and putting an active two year old in front of it, saying “run. jump. be merry”.)
Buy stocking stuffers
Clean like a mofo, because of afore-mentioned cat sitter (and you know that I’ll still apologize for the messiness of the house in my note to here, to give the impression that my just-been-scrubbed-house is actually usually even cleaner)
Write instructions for my dog sitter so she knows how to operate said dog (a lot of his commands are uncommon ones)
Deliver my poor dog and abandon him for Christmas
Pick up Owl from daycare
It doesn’t help that I’m not feeling 100%. PH’s ghastly illness, not doubt caught from Owl, has not visited me, but I think my intestines are waging war against it. I have the vaguely unsettled stomach feeling that was my constant state of being in the first three months of my pregnancy, and frighteningly GEOLOGICAL sounds seem to rumbling ominously from my abdomen.
And NO, I’m not pregnant. I can’t be, right? IUD? Also, just had a period… I dunno, a couple of weeks ago.
ANYWAY, I’M NOT PREGNANT I’VE JUST BEEN SURROUNDED BY DIARRHEA FOR THREE WEEKS SO IT’S A MIRACLE I’M NOT SICKER.
PH lost, like, 20 lbs from this foul disease and poor Owl has reverted to his rib-showing, spine-showing state of yore.
…MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Every time I get access to the internet, I’m going to try and post some of brewing backlog that I’ve been building.
Wish me luck…
14 Wednesday Dec 2011
Posted in Life and Love, My Blag is on the Interwebs
I’m huddled outside the Safeway at ten o clock with my netbook, folks. If that isn’t dedication to my blog, I dunno what is. Thankfully, World Moms Blog has just published one of my posts, entitled My Job Is Eating My Life, so if you’re feeling starved for a life update, head on over there!
My life is pretty much the same as when I wrote that post, except now I have NO INTERWEBS until next week. I’m living like a cave person.
PH is still out of commission, but looking less like a Victor Hugo character.
I got an email from an animal magazine agreeing to publish an article written by me! I just need to write the thing. Here’s hoping internet is achieved before the deadline.
My dog training business is technically up and running! Unfortunately, we have no clients. If you want the link to my website so you can spread the word for me, drop me an email and I’ll give it to you.
I should be able to check my email before next year.
Hopefully.
11 Sunday Dec 2011
Posted in Life and Love
our interwobs died. We need a new modem, accordiNg tto ourr sooon to be ex service provider. rI’m trying owrIte this from ps blackberry. tis idiculous. half the ts type dn’t show u. wtf wronG with this hing?? how errious usiness people wrrIte portant mails wIth tese things? how ds ph mnage w hs ssive m pws? can’task him he’s got owl’s vrus. seVere mach pains and pink eyE. lks likE quasimodo. ospitAal says it adenovirus.
09 Friday Dec 2011
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Remember the good old days, when spam used to mindlessly flatter you in order to flog the links and products that it was trying to disseminate?
My spam all used to be stuff like this:
You understand therefore considerably in terms of this matter, made me individually consider it from a lot of various angles. Its like men and women are not interested until it’s one thing to accomplish with Girl gaga! Your individual stuffs great. All the time take care of it up!
And I’d be like “Well, that has absolutely nothing to do with my family history, which is what this post was about, but thanks, random spammer!”
DELETE.
But lately it’s started to change.
Some of the posts were just… more neutral. Like this one:
I found this quote very fitting “Don’t fear failure so much that you refuse to try new things. The saddest summary of a life contains three descriptions: could have, might have, and should have.” — Louis E. Boone
Um… thanks? Are you calling me a coward? HOW SHOULD I INTERPRET THIS, MISTER ENLARGE-YOUR-PENIS?
Some would contain random ass-vice.
I suggest adding a facebook like button for the blog!
Thanks, Miss Elliptical Machine Reviewer, I use what wordpress gives me, but whatever.
Then my spam took a definite downward turn. On PH’s rant on the misogyny of the 1930s, someone replied
Seriously? This post is mediocre in my opinion, just like carrot cake. I know you can do better
And yes, it came complete with the passive aggressive smiley face. I was like “WTF? Carrot cake is awesome and so is PH’s rare but wonderful writing.”
Then this one appeared on my Daycare-makes-my-baby-wear-a-hat-inside post:
In this grand design of things you secure a B- with regard to hard work. Exactly where you actually confused me ended up being on all the specifics….For right now I will subscribe to your point but wish in the foreseeable future you link the dots much better.
What is this, English class?
I give this spam comment a D- in the grand design of things, for general failure at making coherent sentences. The point where he confused me ended up being ALL THE SPECIFICS.
And then, AND THEN, this one arrived in my spam box:
This is pointless, why am I even reading it and not enjoying gulrotkake appelsin? I should learn to spend my time better.
Well.
You can’t argue with logic like that.
08 Thursday Dec 2011
Posted in Life and Love, My Blag is on the Interwebs, Pointless Posts
When I was a girl I wrote you a lot
with wish lists that I would compile great thought
believing and trusting that you would come through
with some of the stuff I requested from you.
I don’t think that readers will be shocked to hear
that some gifts were notably absent each year.
The ponies and power-wheels for which I would nag
clearly could not be tucked into your bag!
And no one could blame you, not even me
for failing to leave me a horse by the tree.
But now I am older and feeling more wise
So I will consider the issue of size!
My requests should cause you no trouble at all
for all of them are quite reasonably small:
I’m sure, as you know, I am only a tech,
so maybe you could please consider a check?
For the mortgage, assessment, vacations and such
a million or so would be fine: not too much.
And then, because, as you know, I do blog
but working and sleeping and the baby can hog
a lot of my time so more time would be great.
Or maybe just take some things off of my plate,
like some of the time that I spend on my whelp:
A baby who slept through the night would sure help.
If you can’t manage that, and you wish to atone,
I’d take wifi, a new hard drive, and a data plan for my phone.
Just one more thing I would ask for myself:
Perhaps you could spare me a single good elf?
He needn’t be burly, or much of a hunk
To tidy my house and to purge it of junk
That should be enough for Christmas this year
to fill my poor soul with the old Christmas cheer!
06 Tuesday Dec 2011
Posted in From The Owlery
Owl is sick.
“With what?“ you ask.
NO IDEA.
On the first day, Daycare Lady called me in the afternoon because Owl was having green diarrhea. I picked him up and he was fine for the rest of the day, so she took him back the next day. I got another call. Now he had green diarrhea and a fever.
I took him to the pediatrician.
The verdict: A miscellaneous viral intestinal infection which could last up to 14 DAYS. Prescription: Banana, rice, applesauce and toast.
Because, you know, Owl is nearly 15 months old and only 20 lbs, so a low fat diet is just what he needs.
Obviously he couldn’t go to daycare with an infection and diarrhea, so I had to keep him home Thursday and Friday.
Thursday I worked the morning because it was just babysitting an otherwise empty clinic. I dumped baby toys on the floor and spent the morning trying to prevent Owl from destroying anything.
Friday I stayed home entirely.
That’s a three half-days of work. We’s going to be PO’.
OH, and I didn’t tell you the best part. The pediatrician said Owl is “trying” to have an ear infection in his left ear. Apparently there’s some fluid and redness. But she didn’t want to give antibiotics because it isn’t an infection YET.
“If he wakes up in the middle of the night screaming with a high fever and vomiting, it’s the ear infection kicking in,” she told me cheerfully.
OH GOOD.
Such things to look forward to, being a parent.
By Saturday he had been diarrhea free for 36 hours, and was cheerful and happy. We were all like “yay! He can go back to daycare and we can get paid again!”
Cue the fever of 39.4 and the screaming. Oh my gawd, the screaming. All night, the screaming. It was like an evil sequel to his colic days.
Monday he was whiny, but the fever was down, so Daycare Lady agreed to take him. She had spoken with her brother, the pediatrician, and he had assurred her that Owl’s most contagious period had already passed, and the daycare kids were as exposed as they were going to get, anyway.
I was only scheduled for a half day, anyway.
So she took him.
When I picked him up, the fever was back, his ears were bright red, and he was NOT a happy camper.
So we spent the evening at the pediatrician’s office.
AGAIN.
Presenting complaint: fever since Sunday, red ears, no diarrhea, generally being a complete pill.
Verdict:
No idea what’s wrong.
His ears look the same. No worse.
Yes his nose is stuffy, but his throat is ok and his lungs are clear.
No, they still didn’t want to put him on antibiotics because his throat and lungs were clear.
Maybe it’s a urinary tract infection. Here, have a bag to stick over your baby’s junk. Take the pee to a lab and we’ll see.
Other than that, um… bring him back in 2 or 3 days if he still has a fever.
He had a fever this morning. His whining is so constant that it’s like a little motor of misery. He chases the cat across the room going “Mmmmmm Mmmmm Mmmmmm Mmmmmmm” in the most pathetic way.
PH is staying home from work.
WHAT IS WRONG WITH THIS KID?
Someone needs to fix this baby before we die of sleep deprivation, or before his whining liquefies our brains to the point where we start leaking from our ears.
If By Yes 