The Life and Times of Alann

So first off i want to thank Craig for reading my blog and then when he saw a camcorder on sale at http://www.woot.com/ letting me know, and while i found out i can get a newer one for cheaper elsewhere, i appreciate the effort.

My arms are all better now and can hang at my side with no problem, though if i stretch them i still feel a little soreness at the elbows. Whether you like Obama or not one of his web pages announced that he is going to make a new position and field of higher level federal jobs dealing with urban design and policy to help the US become better connected, efficient and energy sustainable. This of course means a much brighter, steady, opportunistic and lucrative job field for myself. Because for every 1 gov job that appears 10 more in the private sector are made to support or compete with it. So that is exciting for planners and others who are in a similar job field.

My topic today is about bathrooms and some of what goes on in them. Now i don't know how it is for the girls in the bathroom, but for guys there are a couple of etiquette rules about where to stand and where to look and so on and so forth. Now i don't know if this is an etiquette thing or just a peeve of mine, but i can't stand it when someone is in the public bathroom in the stall and they are doing something other than using the facilities. At every job I've been at, there is some person who thinks the stall is their own little bathroom like at home. Regardless of why i am in the bathroom, i don't want to hear your cellphone conversation with your buddy while your in the stall. Also why are you texting, shouldn't you be trying to get something done so you can go back to the office where work and other conversations are supposed to be?

One that i really couldn't take was a guy at Lowe's who would take the public break room newspaper in to the bathroom with him, read it, lay the read sections on the floor when he was done with them and then return it to the break room table. Eeewwww! Regardless of how the person doing these things feels about others hearing them, they should be considerate of how it makes others feel when they are in the bathroom. Some people refuse to use public bathrooms in the first place, lets not make it anymore uncomfortable for them by making their bodily functions part of the background noise of your phone call. Can't people just say goodbye or hang up their phone for a coupe minutes to get things done. Besides think of what might happen if the phone slipped out of your hand.

For those of you who read my last blog you know that i had some big study and construction plans for this weekend and for those of you who didn't read the last blog, shame on you! Well i never got to do all my plans last weekend in fact i barely did any of it. Why, you ask. Because i spent the entire time with my arms bent at a 90 degree angle trying to keep them from cramping, Becca spent the weekend calling me T-Rex. Thursday of last week we had a sub-teacher for my weight lifting class and he made up do some killer bicep exercises which completely destroyed my ability to use of stretch out my arms. I tried everything from pain killers to muscle relaxants, ointments, hot pads, and supplements. Nothing has worked except for time. Which is no good for me because now i have a 5 page paper to write tonight as well as a a midterm to study for which is also happening tomorrow. My arms still hurt today, but they have dropped to a less funny looking 160 degree angle and almost look normal. I still have to stop and rub/stretch them, but it is now where near as bad. Sufficed to say i am not very happy with the instructor and if he subs again i will ignore his recommendations and do my own lighter version of the workout.

I don't know if Becca will address it in her blog, but here car is in the shop for a leaking water pump and was taken away from us for the whole weekend and cost us more than we were really wanting to pay. The problem with trying to fix anything on her car is that the engine compartment is so small and the engine in sideways and it is way low to the ground. So if we want anything fixed it either has to go to the shop or i have to find a way to spend an entire day on something that would normally take 2 hours to do on another car. Which means it usually goes to the shop.

Today i got a letter from my sister asking what we wanted to do about buying Christmas gifts for each other and i of course said that i would take my normal 5 presents from everyone, thank you very much! No, i think the agreement is to do couples gifts this year, which makes sense, but for those of you who still need to know what to get me, i have one thing in mind now and if you refuse to do it i will post one or two other ideas in a day or two. For this year, i want to buy a camcorder so we can start making videos of our family to send to people or post on the blog and i thought the best way to do this would be to just ask for money from people so i can pool it all together and buy one. Of course if you want to just buy me/us one that is also fine with me, but that is my general plan for getting a camcorder.