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Rants! & Raves! 12.28
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Got good or bad Christmas news? Here’s your chance: Rants! & Raves!
Remember the rules:
1. A Rave! is something that happened during the past week that you’re pleased about and is signified by the word “Rave!” and/or an appropriately peppy emoticon.
2 A Rant! is something that happened during the past week that you’re ticked about and is signified by the word “Rant!” and/or an appropriately grumpy emoticon.
3. You may Rant! about something a person said, did or wrote, but you may not Rant! about generally disliking a person.
Have fun!
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End of an illusion
Rant: Retail work schedules. My son works retail, and his store manager creates random and varied work schedules for her employees, which means that the rest of the family can not schedule anything. One day he might work from 8am to 5pm. The next day he might work from 2pm to 10pm. One week he might work Saturday and Sunday. The next week he might have one or both off. But the schedule is always random, always different, unpredictable, and the schedule is not published far enough in advance for us to work him into our plans as a family.
I’m putting this here because, 1. I wonder if this is a national problem? and 2. I wonder if anything can be done about it?
Rave: From Thanksgiving through Christmas (today), I’ve only gained about two pounds.
Rant: Both of them went to my pot and I can tell it in my pants size.
Rant: No matter what I do, I won’t lose them until I start doing serious work outside this spring.
Don’t we all have problems?
Rant: I am sick of commercials that always end with “Ask your doctor if —– is right for you.” If convenient, I always click away from them as soon as they come on.
Rave: Husband had six days off for Christmas.
Rant: He spent most of them sick.
Rave: He finally went to the doctor and is feeling better.
Rant: the day before he had to go back to work.
Roger, it has been a long time since I worked in retail (Rave!) But that sounds about normal, probably due to the high employee turnover.
Rant!: Paying my malpractice insurance premium.
Rave!: Accompanying a truly excellent singer on Christmas Eve. When people told me I sounded good, I told them it’s like dancing with a beautiful woman; you can’t help but look good.
Rave: I got to go to a very attentive and skilled doctor last week on very short notice, got tons of x-rays which hit his offices very shortly after, but:
Rant: He won’t be back in the office til next week.
Rave: I’m not in a lot of pain!
Rant: The septic system backed up on Christmas eve! I had to have it pumped for the third time this year!
Rave: The fellow that came on Christmas eve (bless his heart!) to pump our tank was just the nicest fellow you’d ever want to meet. He was very helpful, and I may use him (and his twin brother) to replace our system when the time comes.. but…
Rant: I had to have soil samples done and get the health dept out here again before I can do any actual repairs!
Rant: It’s gonna cost a bunch of money! I’ve got some tree clearing and grading to do in addition to putting another tank, a pump, and new fields.
Rave: I can get a loan from our bank at the drop of a hat.
Rant: I have no idea where the extra $300/month is coming from…
Rant: It’s raining! My septic system can’t handle it!
Rave: It’s raining! Rain starved GA is getting watered today!
#2
Roger,
I have a friend who has the same complaint. I invited her over for Thanksgiving and she didn’t know until that Sunday whether she’d be able to come (the store was going to be open until 2 pm, and she was expected at her mother’s house at 4 pm).
She’s only been there a few months, though, and she said it’s all the “newbies” there who get the worst schedules. In most organizations, retail or otherwise, seniority gets you better schedules (better meaning what you would like, whether that’s longer or shorter hours or no weekends or regular hours or whatever).
Rant: It’s snowing again, on top of ice from last night, and my husband said he was sliding around driving home, even with 4-wheel drive.
Rave: I don’t have to go out on the road to get to work. I can sit here at home with my computer connected to my work computer via the internet.
Rant: Instead of the relative quiet of the office (I work in an air-conditioned datacenter, where there’s a low level of white noise that I barely notice after a while), I’m sitting here listening to my husband listening to Rush Limbaugh on his computer.
Rave: Rush isn’t on the show today (it’s actually yesterday’s show, he gets it off the internet), it’s someone else filling in for him. Same ideas probably, but not the obnoxious manner of Rush.
Rave:
Random coined a new term for us on Whirled Views today.
Rant:
Those who provide this “service” make World Mag Blog worse off…
Rant!: Waiting in line to take a shower, with a poodle, a beagle, and a malti-poo in front of me.
The irony was the contrast of the pears with another gift. The pears showed no thought whatsoever–just a “check them off the list” kind of gift. Another relative sent us Elvis’ Gospel Hits CD. Although I don’t care for it, this showed thought. They know I’m a professional musician and would like music. They know we’re Christians and would like gospel music. So, I can appreciate their gift, even though I’ve returned it. (I don’t consider Elvis much of a musician and not interested in his Gospel music since he didn’t appear to even try to live what he was singing in those songs. Elvis doesn’t inspire worship, ya know?) In fact, I may have set a record at Amazon for returning a Christmas gift item at 8:30 am on Christmas morning! LOL
Rant: the dissonance of Democracy
Rave: The dissonance of Democracy
Rant: Free will. So many sins to choose from so little time.
Rave: Free will. Two slices of pumpkin pie instead of just one.
Rant: My shirts don’t fit at the neck because of the exercise of free will (see above)
Rave: Neck size extenders (only 1$ a pop)
Rant: The same old song and dance from certain WOW contributors
Rave: The new creative ways of singing and dancing
Rant: Finishing a really good book.
Rave: Finishing a really good book and having another one waiting to be read.
Rant: I don’t have as much time to hand out at the blog like some of the others
Rave: While they’re commenting, I am actually doing something productive.
Rant: Lynn always has a movie quote
OOPs! I hit the submit button by mistake.
Rant: Lynn always has a movie quote from an ethereal world I hardly every visit.
Rave: I’ve actually rented a few of them and enjoyed them.
Hmmmm I love pears.
But maybe you could make a deal with your kids Litoralise?
A pear for a gift card?
Maybe Elvis didn’t live the gosepl in a noticeable obvious way, but
I’ve heard/read so many stories of so many things he did for others that
I believe he did live the gospel.
I’ve loved Elvis’ music all of my life but that’s me!
Metanoia - Thanks for the chuckles.
Rave: We had a nice, relatively relaxed Christmas enjoying my daughter and family. We will have another one this weekend with our other daughter and her family.
Rant: We have to drive four hours and it looks like the weather will not be the best. Still it isn’t as bad as what my daughter drove up in last week.
Rave: In spite of all the cars in the ditch and having to drive very slowly, my daughter and family made it safely here for the holidays.
Rave: I have a wonderful family and husband. I don’t have to wake up in fear from anyone or be worried about a bomb or soldiers in my neighborhood. I am more well fed then I should be! :)I am free to worship as I please. God has provided for my salvation and gives me all I need to grow in grace and the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. I am blessed.
metanoia–that was great!
VS–My kids are WAY too smart for that! LOL I’m glad Elvis did some good things. His heart lays bare before the Lord, not me. It’s my own personal cognitive dissonance of putting his (public) life together with worship of our amazing God that accounts for the lack of desire to listen to his gospel music. It’s the a similar feeling I get when seeing a Santa display next to a nativity set in someone’s yard this time of year. Many may think it strange for me to think that, but I think it strange not to. (Each to his own! Thankfully, we have the spiritual and constitutional liberty to do so!) Hmmm…that concept might make a good thread…
Rave: My brother, his wife, and their almost-arrived daughter are moving back home this weekend.
Rant: They’re doing it a week before my sister-in-law gives birth. Really.
Rave: Juno may be my favorite movie to come out this year apart from Ratatouille. Sweet, funny, and surprisingly unpreachy.
Rave: That I got to see it with the macaroni to my cheese.
Rave
A nice Christmas.
Rave
Relative peace in the family.
Rave
Learning more about my faith and growing in it.
Having some great social times with my husband.
Rave
Rant
Where’s “preview”?
Anlir…So sorry to hear about your situation. Understandably frustrating. Peace to you, friend, while you wait.
BTW, Litoralise, one of my favorite Christmas displays had Santa in a nativity scene–kneeling in prayer before the manger. Beautiful!
Roger - I did a brief stint in retail while between jobs a while back; the place I was at had that same schedule issue (it was a small 3 store operation, and the individual managers had carte blanche - they varied widely in their ability to schedule sensibly/predictably).
Rave: My sister with cancer had a wonderful time on Christmas Eve and for the last few days. One of her best friends in all the world came to see her on the night of the 26th. She and my mother are very pleased with the hospice arrangements, which I helped persuade them to make.
Rave: My wife’s parents agreed to go with us to visit her sister’s family, which means that my wife and I got to see almost every person on both sides of the family (one nephew excepted).
Rant: My raves more than make up for anything I have to rant about.
What are your plans for NYE Hamachi?
Rave: We had a partly white Christmas and the snow was gone in time to drive my sister-in-law’s (is sister’s-in-law?) house for Christmas dinner.
Rant: The snow turned to (more) rain and it keeps raining. If I skied, I guess I’d be happy, since it means more snow in the mountains - but I don’t.
Rant: I still have a cold that started the Friday before Christmas.
Rave: Our adoption dossier is on its way to Ethiopia so we can begin waiting for a referral!
MIM-
NYE we will spend the evening with my wife’s brother’s family. Lots of low-key fun. The cousins will be in their pajamas running free-range all over the house. Us dads will crack a bottle of good rum and start a fire in the fireplace while the moms sip bubbly and make appetizers and dinner. Around 10pm, if this is one is anything like years past, we will finally sit down to dinner. As midnight approaches, any kids that are still awake will be wrapped in blankets and carried out on the deck to watch the Spaceneedle elevator drop and the fireworks show begin! It’s a simple night really, but we enjoy it.
Do you have plans, MIM?
Rant:I logged onto my daughter’s computor and my gravator is very dark and it is hard to discern what it is. On mine at home it is a very pretty red heart on pink background! No wonder someone had asked me what it was!
Rave: Our trip down was safe and fairly good.
Rave! I got all my Christmas decorations put away this week.
Rave! Before doing so, I hit an after-Christmas sale and bought a new-but-old-fashioned-looking $40 tree skirt for $12. (Our old one was shot through with holes.)
Rave! Over the past two weeks, I have driven 800 miles in the new Prius for a grand total of $62 in gas. (It would’ve cost me $173 before) Woo-hoo!
Rave! Had a great time this morning going back through my Bible journal, distilling thoughts and lessons from 2007 for action in 2008. I thought 2008 might be a good year not to, as James says, walk away from the mirror and forget what I look like!
Rave! Numba One son bought all his own Christmas gifts this year with money he earned working crazy hours in retail (I think that’s normal.) Numba Two son also did all his own shopping, using money earned working around the house. He only needed a little $$ help from Mom and Dad.
Rave: Living in an area where someone leaves 10 million dollars to the Shriners to built a burn unit on the Gulf Coast.
Rave: Living in an area where everyone is upset that a really wonderful local business man died from complications from a robbery earlier in the year.
Rave: Talking to a nice older gentleman in Winn Dixie today.
Rant: He was going home to take a nap since it was raining.
KI-
What you describe sounds like a monitor calibration issue. I calibrate my display about every two weeks, it’s spot on, and your gravatar appears colorful to me. I see a deep magenta “V” shape over a violet/pink section, over a greyish herringbone or tweed pattern. I suspect your daughter may have made some adjustments to her monitor–and she shouldn’t have (except for brightness, of course).
I may be able to help you get it back within normal range it’s a Mac/Apple. Sorry, but I haven’t used Windows since 1995
H20,
I have the same problem with our monitor. The one I use at work is brighter, and while KI’s gravatar isn’t as pink for me as it probably is for her, it’s better than on this one. Kim’s gravatar is just a dark shadow on here, while at work I can make out the kitten’s head.
I have tried and tried to adjust this one (the controls are built into the monitor, and aren’t adjustable by Windows so far as I know), because in one adventure game we couldn’t see the objects we were supposed to find. (We finally realized that when my son played it on his computer.) But it’s set all the way up on brightness and isn’t going any further.
H2: I hope I haven’t been griping so much that you really are thankful I am raving instead of ranting.
This week has been good.
Pauline,
I wish I could help, but I know absolutely nothing about windows OS. I’m sure there is a way to choose different color profiles for the monitor, but I wouldn’t even know where to tell you to look. For instance, on mine I click System Preferences>Display>then choose the latest calibrated profile. There must be a way to do something similar under Windows, where you can choose a better canned profile. If I get some time later tonight I will see if I can find some info for you guys and post it here.
KIM-
Not at all!! I enjoy you and your posts. I was feeling bad for you last week and am happy you’re feeling better–and feeling like Raving! Excellente!
Rant-The Patriots are 15-0, and will go for the perfect season against my Giants.
Rave-I will be there in the Meadowlands to watch. It will be history in the making, or one heck of an upset. Either way, I’m looking forward to it.
And another Rave-That my wife bought my ticket from a season ticket holder 9 weeks ago. The same section was goin’ on stubhub yesterday for $360 a seat, my wife paid $80. She’s such a good little shopper, always gettin’ the best deal.
And still one more Rave-My wife Cheryl. For getting me quite possibly the best present EVER in my life.
Rant:
Andy Rooney’s column in today’s paper where he says cars are no better today than they were 50 years ago.
Those of us who own a car for more than two years know otherwise.
Ampipolis, I once had a 1950 Chevrolet that I got 100,000 miles on. I was real proud of that, but it was a piece of junk when I finished. I sold it for $50. Now, my son gave his college daughter their ‘92 Camrey with over 190000 miles on it. My Merc had 120k last speing when I tataled it on black ice. I expect to get over 100k on my new one. It may last me forever.
#2 Roger
I worked for a now out-of-biz grocery chain in the Dallas area in the 80s. The schedule was not quite as flexible as you describe. It was also a unionized chain.
I dont know anyone who works only 40 hours/wk in our modern era. Young soldiers earn so little hourly but you have to attach a dollar figure to their 100% health insu for themselves and their families.
As for as retail work goes.. I suspect since so many in retail work are in-between “real jobs” and in financial dire straits, these managers know they have kids over a barrel. If someone doesnt show up you fire them and someone else gets a bigger check from the extra hours.
After I got my RN I was at least able to mark the days I would and would not work. Self-scheduling can often work well; and if you can get someone to switch out with you it is golden.
I would often work Fri Sat and Monday just to be off from the hospital on Sunday. My dept was always very slow on the weekends and paradoxicly you were paid more for working Sundays even though the work load and stress was way way low!!