your dog is a true philosopher

update
Well, I'm sitting next to Mama in her hospital room at Mayo's (actually Methodist Hospital, if you want to be exact and precise).

Unfortunately, she has one positive lymph node, so it'll be chemo for her. She'll start chemo in a month. Don't know much about how it's done or how long it'll be. The good side is that for colon cancer, the survival stats are really good compared to other cancers.

After she gets through this, she has an excellent chance of getting back to her ornery ole self. In the meantime, her three siblings, her three children and many other people are volunteering to help out. She's popular!

Mayo
I'm at the Mayo clinic with Mama. She's going to have surgery tomorrow. If everything goes OK, they said she'll be good to fly home (or my house, or elsewhere) 10 days post-op.

If lymph nodes are positive, she has to do chemo. If they are negative, most likely she won't.

This sux
My mom just called to say she has colon cancer. Don't know the staging or type of cancer yet. Sounds like it is not metastatic. Thank goodness for small mercies.

Current Mood: cussin'

Good stuff
No job yet, but good things. I have a job interview on Tuesday, and it also looks like the WIA (Workforce Investment Act) people will give me a retraining grant to take some classes. I think I'd like to get Official DBA Certification and improve my web skills.

They also gave me a CTA pass. Apparently I'm entitled to one.

Soda tax
Both

lhn and

ratatosk have made intelligent comments about whether taxing sugary beverages is a good idea. You could make arguments about "sin taxes" in general, how to distinguish real food from junk food, and other good points.

So I was feeling ambivalent about the idea until I saw this ad:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxIwwrO2JYg

My reaction "you call filling your children full of sugar water FEEDING them? Give me a break! You deserve to be TAXED TO THE MAX!"

The ad turns about to be by an industry lobbying group, called Americans Against Food Taxes. The New York Times business page discusses them here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/17/business/17soda.html?_r=1&ref=business

What I learned today.
Not long ago, in fact 2008, the Chicago Reader played one of the best April Fool's pranks on us.

Yesterday's excitement
I went down to the Experimental Station yesterday morning. I belong to a bulk buying club and I went to help unload the truck and pick up my order. The truck was late, and I spent some time talking to C and D about whatever and discovered they had chickens!

Four extremely good-looking hens. I think Chicago is like other cities where it's ok to have hens but not roosters (crowing at 4:30am doesn't make you popular with neighbors). C released the hens from their night-time coop and they scooted all over the grounds.

Later on, the big black hen had the silvery little tail of a lizard or snake hanging out of her beak. She wolfed the critter down with greed and pleasure. I didn't know that chickens had a taste for reptiles.

estudio español
I'm trying to get serious about learning Spanish. I took it as a kid in Junior High, where I actually had a very good teacher. But my high school teacher was not so good and I stalled out.

So, looking at the MIT online course, they use Destinos which is a telenovela for beginners. So far, don Fernando has received a mysterious letter ...

Michelle
Michelle Obama actually has me mildly interested in fashion. I figure if she can get away with wearing it, so can I. I won't look age-inappropriate since I'm only 5 years older, and generally wouldn't look workplace inappropriate either, since she's off doing workety things. (We won't mention that I'm 7 inches shorter...etc.)

It's not that I love absolutely everything she wears, but that she generally looks very good in a way that I think I can emulate. She isn't Carla Bruni (professional fashion model) or even Jackie O. (way super-upper class and out of my league), but a normal person. At least that's how I see it when I buy a sleeveless sheath dress like the ones she has.

Thanks, Michelle.

new assignment
This one is to list dates when important things happened in Chicago to put together an "on this day, X" calendar.

It's easy to find exact dates for the disasters (the Fire, the Loop flood, etc.), but I am finding the other stuff challenging and often find only a year. For example, Daniel Burnham published his plan for Chicago in 1909, but what day did it hit the press?

Anyway, I did find the exact date of the Curse of the Billy Goat, and I am proud of that.

I can include politics, disasters, arts, architecture, business, sports, just about anything. What interesting dates do you recommend that this calendar have? (Hey,

princeofcairo, if you are out there reading ...)

Ad block
Is there a way to block diet and teeth-whitening ads from Firefox? I don't care about the other ones, since Flashblock is doing a great job of sparing me the horrible dancing men of the sub-prime mortgage mess.

These ads are really gross, kinda like ugly pictures in a medical textbook, and if I wanted to look at that stuff, I'd go get a medical textbook.

Is there some bot that thinks I'm the target demographic? Can I change those settings and see, say, computer ads instead?

Governor Sanford scandal
This scandal seems different, since the poor fellow fell in love and believes he found his "soul mate". Now I'm wondering, if this were your partner (for values of 'you' both poly and not), what would you do if they found a "soul mate" and that "soul mate" were not you?

(I don't literally believe in "soul mates", but if somebody uses that language, I think it means "strongly in romantic love").

public service announcement
I had two job interviews this week, and I feel good about both places. We'll see if I get a job.

But my purpose here isn't to talk about jobs, but to talk about pantyhose. In this interview process, I have discovered that you should always have a spare pair in your briefcase in case the one you have on explodes, snags or runs. When buying pantyhose, you determine the size you need by adding 35 pounds to your weight and 4 inches to your height. That should do the trick.

I was told many years ago that there are pantyhose in France that don't run, but I haven't checked Google to find out if this is indeed the case.

PS -- take Metra instead of Bus #6 during Taste of Chicago.

Job interviews!
I have an interview on Monday and another one the following Monday.

Things are moving. I feel good.

Social networking and looking for jobs
One of the workshops I went to at Laid Off Camp was about social networking sites on the internet and the job hunt. At the outplacement talks I've been to, people mostly liked Linked In, but not so much Facebook or MySpace, but here, there were mentions of Facebook and Twitter as good places to look for jobs. (And MySpace for music people).

I am wondering whether to put my picture on my Linked In profile. I've been hesitant to do so, since I worry that I'd open myself up to even more prejudice and discrimination than may be heading my way already. However, people at the workshop seemed to think it was a good idea -- even older folks and minority folks said so. One middle-aged guy said that you should use the same picture for all your social networking sites (this is a kind of personal brand, I suppose). A young man said that the web has changed from "being about anonymity to being about transparency". A young woman said that people are even offended if you don't put your picture, because that indicates you don't trust them.

What do you all think? Picture on Linked In or no picture?

Laid Off Camp
On Wednesday, I went to Laid Off Camp. This even was at the Water Tower branch of Loyola University and was organized by people who have been laid off in the recent recession. There were workshops on job hunting, social networking and starting your own business.

ABC news even showed up. Here is a video. The guy explaining that it's a good idea to put your picture on your Linked In profile is answering my question.

I met lots of people in marketing and advertising, so if you are starting a business and need some marketing and advertising people, there will be some good ones who need jobs out there. I met a sports writer, laid off because of the terrible hit newspapers are taking, finance/accounting people -- even a CPA, computer folks like me, and people from non-profits.

I had a great time, and it was definitely a mood-booster and would recommend it to everybody laid off, or trying to start a business.

Shy
Now that I'm middle-aged, I find myself attracted to doing things that I was too shy to do at the appropriate age. I never went to summer camp, for instance, because it sounded too scary. My bolder younger sister gamely trouped off, but I never did. Now it sounds like it would be a blast swimming in lakes and doing arts and crafts and roasting (sweet potatoes, I hope) in the campfire.

I never did Junior Year Abroad because I was too shy. Now it sounds like fun. I had never mastered any language other than English because the shyness was a huge conversational block. Now I'm ready to try, although the middle-aged brain won't be as good as the child brain.

What's the story? Where did the shyness come from and why is it abating? It sure isn't all gone, a school dance would be beyond me, for instance, but it isn't in the way of life the way it was before.

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