Author: Heather Meadows

It stopped raining, but I don’t feel like biking anymore. Going around on the verge of tears all day is pretty exhausting.

I watched the second half of Escape to Witch Mountain (1975) and all of Return from Witch Mountain (1978) on the Hallmark Channel today. Of the latter movie, I have but one question: why can’t they just drive cars like normal people? “Uncle Bene, I want to go see a movie.” “Okay, Tony, have the spaceship back by five.”

Of the former, I just want to say that every time I see Donald Pleasance, I think, “Hey, it’s Deranian!” (And not “Hey, it’s SEN 5241!”, as would theoretically be more characteristic of me. Hey, I saw Escape to Witch Mountain many many years before I ever saw THX 1138.)

I feel like I’m stranded. Sean’s asleep in bed, so I can’t be in there. It’s Saturday, so I can’t take over the living room (no one’s told me that, but it’s not my house and I wouldn’t feel right doing it). I’m in Sean’s old bedroom with my laptop sitting on the treadmill. It’s uncomfortable and I feel alone.

I’ve finished reading news and webcomics, so I’m bored. And I’m full of nervous energy, because the thing I was mad about last night hasn’t been resolved. I want to be doing something.

I’d go biking if it wasn’t raining.

Discussion’s for pansies! Just lay down the law. Your way or the highway! Actually, not even that. Your way, or your way!

I love you sweetie ;)

Gah!

SENBOKU, Akita — Two women were seriously injured and some others were slightly hurt when they were hit by an avalanche while bathing in an open-air hot spring bath here Friday morning, police said.

At around 11:20 a.m., an avalanche hit an open-air hot spring bath at the famous Tsurunoyu Onsen inn in the Nyuto hot spring district of Senboku, burying more than 10 women, prefectural police said. They later managed to free themselves.

Two of them suffered serious wounds while several others were slightly injured.

Reuters: New York mayor fires man for playing computer game

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has fired a city employee after seeing the man play solitaire on his computer at work.

“The workplace is not an appropriate place for games,” Bloomberg told reporters on Thursday when asked about firing a clerical worker in the city’s lobbying office in Albany. “I expect all city workers, including myself, to work hard.”

The man was fired last Tuesday after six years on the job with no warning or severance pay.

And that is why it sucks to have a day job!

Seriously. Did Bloomberg see this guy playing Solitaire for hours? Maybe the guy was taking one of his fifteen minute breaks, and, rather than leave his desk, was keeping himself available in case something came up! (Does New York not have fifteen minute breaks?) Maybe, like any normal person, he just needed a few minutes to rest his brain.

This sort of thing freaks me out. I would hope that Bloomberg investigated the man’s work history and productivity before making such a decision, but the article reads as if it was a snap judgment.

Update: it was a snap decision. From the AP:

Greenwood, who earned $27,000 a year and had worked in the office for six years, said in a telephone interview that he limited his play time to his one-hour lunch or during quick breaks when he needed a moment of distraction.

“It wasn’t like I spent hours and hours a day playing, because I had plenty to do,” Greenwood said. “If I had been working at something exhaustively for two hours, I might get a cup of coffee and play for a minute but then go right back to my work.”

The mayor’s office said its records show that in 2004 Greenwood reviewed the policy that prohibits “inappropriate” use of city computers.

Greenwood said he doesn’t recall doing so but probably did. He suggested that other workers in the office play solitaire and similarly stretch the rules.

“It’s not like I’m the only one that ever did this,” said the 39-year-old father of a toddler.

Greenwood said he wasn’t angry with the mayor but wished he had been warned or reprimanded for what he called a first offense.

“I admire the guy – he’s a great financial success, and he has a definite management style,” Greenwood said. “I just think he could have seen my situation and weighed the harshness of his final decision.”

Bleh!

I used all my memory cards when we were at the zoo, including an old 8 meg one and an old 16 meg one. When we went back to the room, I was unable to pull the pictures off those cards. I had to wait until I got the proper software; this only happened yesterday.

The missing pictures are now up, and they start here.

These missing pictures finish out the animals portion of the zoo and also cover the beautiful botanical gardens and the trails down to the old mill and dam on the river, of which only ruins remain.

By this time the rain had stopped and the sun had come up, providing less than optimal lighting for photography. Oh well.

…or does the Man in the Yellow Hat from the new Curious George movie look way too much like (the modern) David Seville from The Chipmunks?

Because, you know, I do.

I would like to name a child “Conrad”. However:

1) “Conrad Meadows” is kind of doofy-sounding. (“Conrad Aubrey” isn’t any better, and it’s a little difficult to pronounce!)

2) “Conrad” is too close in sound to “Connor”.

Ah well. Conrad is the only character in Kyou Kara Maou with a reasonably decent name, alas. (Imagine: Gwendal Meadows!)

Apparently our inability to buy a house isn’t entirely my fault. Hey, it’s always nice to shift blame!

Getting ahead gets harder

Straitened circumstances are becoming more familiar to those in their 20s and 30s as they try to get a foothold on the American Dream. Student loans, depressed wages, rising healthcare costs and soaring housing prices are creating new economic realities. Sixty percent of young adults between 18 and 34 are struggling for financial independence, says [Tamara] Draut, now the director of the economic opportunity program at Demos, a think tank in New York. She is also the author of a new book, “Strapped: Why America’s 20- and 30-Somethings Can’t Get Ahead.”

“What made the transition to adulthood somewhat less bumpy 30 years ago was that we had an economy that lifted all boats,” she says. “When productivity was increasing, so were wages. We don’t have that today. Wages certainly aren’t keeping up with the cost of things like healthcare and housing.”

[…]

Very often, social observers say, young adults living on the financial edge view their situation as simply their own fault.

“We’re so individualistic,” says Deborah Thorne, a sociologist at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. “We see this as an individual problem, and then we look to the individual for the solution. The fact is, these are national problems and they require a national solution. But this is just not on the radar of politicians. It’s not an issue with which they concern themselves. But it’s the issue the American family is concerned with.”

Young people, Draut says, feel that many Americans are doing very well. “You see Hummers on the highway, McMansions being built. It’s extremely frustrating and confusing for young adults who are living paycheck to paycheck and with five- figure student-loan debts to see young families living in million-dollar houses.”

Parents are also confused. “A lot of parents don’t understand why their kids haven’t accomplished the traditional markers of adulthood that they did — buying a home, starting a family, living without debt,” Draut says. “I don’t think there’s an awareness of how much the economic context has changed.”

We don’t have any debt at the moment, but we sure can’t seem to progress very far either…

I don’t know if I would say that everything was great 30 years ago, though. It’s not like my parents were driving new cars and living in a huge house.

When I saw this headline, ‘Maid in Japan’ cafes treat geeks like lords, I thought, “That’s old news to people who’ve seen Densha Otoko.” I went on to read the piece, thinking it would be a neat culture explanation to link to, and to my surprise came across the following:

Patronage is also on the rise among young women, some hoping to snag a geek and turn him into Prince Charming in a real-life imitation of last year’s hit movie “Train Boy”, a love story set in Akihabara that also became a popular TV series.

Hahaha! (Although they should have mentioned that “Train Boy” [“Train Boy”?!] was based on a true story.)

The article also mentions some things I didn’t know, like the following:

Hair salons in Akihabara are also cashing in on the trend.

At one such establishment called “Moesham”, stylists dressed as maids give shampoos and cuts to a mainly male clientele not intimidated by the salon’s decor, which resembles the bedroom of a young girl besotted by hearts and lace.

A few customers even come three or four times a week for a shampoo, said Yuki Todo, stylist-manager at the shop.

Too bad they don’t explain “moe“. From Jim Breen’s WWWJDIC:

萌え 【もえ】 (n) (1) sprouting; budding; (2) crush (anime, manga term); fascination; infatuation.

Obviously the “sham” is short for “shampoo”.

I’d like to go to a maid cafe at least once. I’m afraid, however, that I’d feel the same way I felt at the hostess bar: awkward and somewhat irritated.

Well, this is interesting.

Wikinews: New South Wales to introduce ‘parenting contracts’

Parents would be forced to sign the contracts by the children’s court. They could require parents to attend parenting classes, undergo counselling, stop drug use or stop consuming excessive amounts of alcohol depending on the situation. The NSW Deparment of Community Services would be allowed to apply to the court for the contracts to be drawn up.

If parents failed to comply with the contracts their children would be removed by authorities.

I want to know how this turns out.

They’re questionnaires, dammit.

Amy at Blue Lotus asked for volunteers, and I hastily responded, as is my wont.

I think “Too Much Information” is sort of a misnomer, because as I understand it, I am to list 10 “revealing/odd/interesting/random facts about me”. It’s really only TMI if I make it TMI, don’t you think?

The trick will be to write things that I haven’t mentioned before! Hmmmmm.

1. One time when I was mad at AJ for borrowing something of mine without permission, I decided to trash his room. Except I barely got started when I started to feel guilty. I was going to throw a CD, but I knew that might scratch and damage it, so instead I hung it from the wall by a tack, with the scratchable side out so it wouldn’t rub against the wall. Vengeance was mine!

2. I like prunes.

3. I love dishes. Very often when I’m out shopping, I will fall in love with a bowl or cup and want to buy it immediately. Occasionally I succumb.

4. Yesterday I changed the greeting message on my cell phone from “Hi Heather!” to “Kyou Kara Maou!”, and wished my phone supported Japanese text.

5. Speaking of Kyou Kara Maou…over the weekend Sean noticed that I changed my Windows XP user account pictures to pictures of Yuuri, and said, “You want to leave me for Yuuri, don’t you?” I responded, “No…it’s more like I want to be Yuuri.” “Oh,” Sean said, “you want to leave me for Conrad, then.”

6. I can’t breathe through my nose right now.

7. I believe that I could make an awesome webcomic if I committed myself to it. Including the art. Yes, I’m that egotistical!

8. I absolutely adore the Super Mario Bros. remix of Nine Inch Nails’ “Closer”. It’s really the only way I’ll listen to the song ;>

9. My first memory of sneaking food is from when I was really young and we lived in the trailer. I stole cookies out of the cookie jar and hid them behind something on a shelf. Later when I went back to eat them, they were covered with ants.

10. I’m thinking of going into business for myself as a page and Web designer.

Okay, I really can’t breathe out of my nose, and it’s driving me nuts. So I’m going to post this and find some decongestant!

[Edit 9:05 pm:] I forgot to tag people. Hyper, Roderick, Jered, Charles, Ross. Go! (Can you guess the theme involved in that list of people?)

So I’m thinking that I don’t want my house to be arctic. While I’d love to replicate the design of an old Japanese house, I also like things like central heating and air, and insulation. So! I propose a compromise: a large sunroom–maybe stretching the length of the back of my house–with tatami floors, dividers, vents, an honest-to-goodness kerosene heater, a kotatsu, a closet full of futon…and the rice paper doors slide open to the Japanese garden, complete with koi pond.

Oh yeah.