Category: Random

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Kids/Parenting Random

Reclaiming (or at least remembering) my childhood

I can’t believe I’ve forgotten so many kids’ songs. I was swinging with Hayden in our backyard yesterday and couldn’t remember children’s song lyrics. I got a few lines or a chorus of

  • “Polly Wolly Doodle”
  • “Buffalo Gal”
  • “Oh Susannah”
  • “On top of Old Smokey” (the real words; I can remember “On top of Spaghetti”)
  • And I completely forgot the title verse of “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad.” All I could get was the part about Dinah.
  • And I tried really hard, but can only remember the title of “Camptown Races.” And the part about the bay.

And then Ryan was singing Hayden a Cub Scout camp song he calls “Patsy Odie Odie Ay”—and he forgot half the words.

We’re going to have to remember all these. Can’t let the rich American folk song heritage die with this generation!

Let’s get these lyrics. I don’t want to Google them—restore my faith in our collective memory. Who knows these songs?

Categories
Kids/Parenting Random

Oo-de-lally, a crown! How exciting!

Things that I am excited about today:

  • Jasmine’s birthday today!!
  • It’s I <3 Lennie month on TNT (Looking for the I love L&O mug?)
  • Our roses are blooming again (3rd time this year!)
  • My beautiful yarn arrived! I love it, even though the color doesn’t seem quite the same as on the website.
  • Hayden’s new adorable crib sheet.
  • A letter and CD of photos from Kim!
  • A knitting kick: looking at even more fun yarns and thinking about designing my first pattern, even!

Things that I’m not excited about:

  • Hayden’s amazing six night streak of resisting any and all attempts to help him sleep through the night.
  • Nursing Hayden at 3 AM for the rest of . . . the year? Forever?
  • Hayden’s new separation anxiety.
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Random

Ev’ryone makes mistakes so why can’t you?

I just got an e-mail from tech support after I e-mailed because I made a dumb mistake. My favorite part of the e-mail was the line:

“Jordan, everybody make mistakes but don’t worry, I’ll help you.”

Yes. Yes, everyone does. I now rest assured.

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Random

The quest continues: TNT L&O commercial mug

Update: FOUND ONE!

Looking for the TNT L&O commerical mug? I <3 L&O too, and the quest for the mug continues. Here’s what I’ve found so far:

  • My mom located the offical NBC L&O store. They have a black ceramic mug with the show logo (and one with the SVU logo).
  • TNT does not currently have a store, but they do have an entire I<3L&O subsite. There’s a lot of fun stuff there. After e-mailing them corrections & new questions for “Stump the L&O experts” and my own “I <3 L&O so much…” stories, I also asked them if they were planning on selling the I<3L&O mug. I informed them that people are searching for the mug (I’ve gotten three or four visitors from search engines looking for “TNT L&O mug”—I’m #1 for that keyword, oddly enough). I’ll let you know if I get a response.
  • If you don’t want to wait for a response, I have a do-it-yourself solution.
    • Locate a site like CafePress. CafePress has a limited selection of ceramic mugs to put a custom design on. Use the images in this post at your own risk if you want them; they may require resizing, touchup, etc.
  • A fourth alternative: there are several professional mug printing companies that offer batch orders. If enough people contact me (by leaving comments), I’d be willing to spearhead an order. I’ve seen a few mugs with a minimum order of 12 (several to choose from, but I like this one best) or 25 mugs. I’d charge even cost, including shipping to you. The end cost would be a minimum of $12.50+shipping to you, and that’s based on a one-color quote. A 2 color quote might be $3-4 dollars extra.
    • Still interested? Leave a comment about the design & cup you’d prefer!

PS. I heart L ‘n’ O, in case you haven’t noticed.

Categories
Random Work

How to lie with statistics

This Slate article shows how the medical profession lies with statistics by using qualifiers that virtually no one understands, like “relative risk.” How big of a difference is it? Read to find out.

I also like eMarketer Daily‘s usual habit of overinterpreting differences. I still remember nearly a year ago they published a report on how different ethnicities use cell phone technologies differently. The “findings” talked about how 28% one group (African Americans or Hispanics, I forget which) used text messaging or the Internet on their cell phones as if it were a big difference from the second group, wherein “only” 26% did. There was no mention of the margin of error for the study.

I especially liked eMarketer Daily’s report a few months later that ClickZ lies with statistics. As I e-mailed to a coworker, that’s really the pot calling the kettle black.

Don’t worry, I promise to post about Hayden later today. I know it’s what you really want to see. AND I promise to post about the quest for the I<3L&O mug tomorrow.

Categories
Random

Planned obsolence?

So it’s been one year since we bought our newest computer. We got a printer free with rebate, a Canon Pixma iP3000—and yes I have to name names. For the last 6 weeks, the printer has started printing white streaks in documents. It’s gotten worse over time—now it can’t even print a single legible line in three pages of text. I’ve been through the entire troubleshooting process on the Canon website twice, including cleaning and deep cleaning the print heads.

Now it says that I have to take it to Salt Lake to get it serviced (a 40 min drive, which is quite a chore with a baby!) or mail it to their service center—and I’ll need proof of purchase, which I sent to them as part of the rebate and no longer have a copy of.

Sigh. At least the rebate means we got the printer for free . . . I think.

Except we bought $75 of print cartridges last week (after the salesguy assured us that these print cartridges cost less than the printer, unlike my old Compaq/Lexmark) to see if that was the problem. It wasn’t.

…Now what?

On the plus side, I found an awesome pattern to knit a wrap cardigan and some inexpensive, high quality (and gorgeous) yarn.

Well, back to work. Got to make hay while Hayden sleeps.