Random Thought of the Day

My MP3 player really likes Jewel today. What's up with that? I have like 6 Jewel songs on this playlist of hundreds, and I've probably heard 4 of them.

Snakes in Mission Control

No kidding - they found a baby coral snake inside mission control this morning. It was apparently living inside a steel door. I'm not sure if this beats the aligator they caught inside a building at KSC earlier this year.

CRAZY NASA ANIMALS!

Men's Pocky

Mighty Girl posted a slideshow about Pocky sticks today. I saw this snack for the first time when I went to Japan. Someone I was with pulled a Men’s Pocky box off the shelf and asked if I’d ever had one. I immediately had to buy several boxes to take home with me. First of all, because dark-chocolate covered pretzel sticks are THE BOMB, and secondly because of how absured the “Men’s Pocky” marketing was to me. As if us delicate ladies couldn’t handle the DARK chocolate. Watch out, it’s the strong stuff!

Anyway, I totally want a box of Pocky sticks, now. I bet you can get them somewhere in Houston, but I couldn’t begin to guess where.

Bonehead

You know how you have those bonehead moments where you can’t belive you just did something? Like in 9th grade when I went to a school band concert and forgot to bring my flute. Well, I had one of those a couple days ago when I went flying.

I was chatting with my instructor while pre-flighting the airplane. One of the steps is that you get up on the wing and measure the fuel remaining by dipping a ~14" long plastic stick into the tank. I stuck the stick in upside down first, and had to pull it out and turn it over to read it correctly. Thus the part of the stick in my hand was wet with av gas when I stuck it in the second time.

Me: "Yeah, I was a little worried when I called earlier and the wind was gusting to 18... Oh, shit."

Instructor: "What?"

Me: "Um..."

Instructor: "Did you drop it in there?"

Me: "Uh, yeah." ... blushing ... "Can you get it out?"

Instructor: "I’m not sure I have anything here..."

As it turned out, we did fish it out. Or rather, he and another pilot did. My pregnant belly wouldn’t even let me get up there enough to look in the hole. It took pushing the plane up onto a little hill to get the probe to roll to the front of the tank, my instructor lying on his belly on top of the cabin, and ther other guy on a ladder holding the flashlight and one gripper. And 20 minutes. But, we got it out.

I was very careful when I measured the fuel in the other tank to hold on to the stick.

Anyway, I’m sure it wasn’t the first time it’s ever happened in the history of aviation. But, it was the first time for my instructor, and when you’ve flown as many hours and instructed as many students as he has, that’s saying something.

Snow Angels

So I haven’t had much to write about this week. I’ve gone to work, gone home, eaten dinner, watched TV, gone to bed. Not very exciting. No blog fodder. So...

BISMARCK, N.D. — Legislators waved their arms in a snow-angel salute Wednesday to celebrate North Dakota recapturing a world record for those whimsical works of winter.

Guinness World Records has confirmed that the state holds the world record for the most snow angels made simultaneously in one place, said Marilyn Snyder, the education curator for the State Historical Society of North Dakota.

That's 8,962 snow angels, created Feb. 17 by people waving their arms while lying in the snow covering the Capitol grounds.

North Dakota's snow figure turnout bested the earlier record of 3,784, set at Michigan Technological University on Feb. 10, 2006.

North Dakota set the first record in the category in 2002, with 1,791.

"If anybody wants to challenge (the snow angel record), bring 'em on." said state Sen. Dick Dever, who sponsored a resolution celebrating the achievement that the Senate approved Wednesday. It now goes to the state House.

At Dever's request, senators waved their arms in snow-angel fashion as they approved the resolution. The Senate's presiding officer, Lt. Gov. Jack Dalrymple, called the display "a bizarre thing to see."

It’s nice to see something fun in the news every once in a while.

Gripes and Goods

Today's Gripes

1) Work has started blocking access to Blogger. This is understandable, but annoying. Maybe I'll install movable type after all.

2) Apparently, BBQ doesn't go so well with a pregnant stomach. This sucks because I like BBQ.


Today's Good

1) The teddy bear my co-worker got for Valentine's Day. There's a picture in my photostream. It not only looks that cool, but it sings "I want to be loved by you... Boo-boo-bee-doo". Good for hours of amusement

2) Trading casual e-mails with an astronaut. How cool is my job?

What's New?

So, I'd like for you to try to guess what's different about this page today. Anyone? Anyone? Look around; try guessing...

Neurotic

You know how some people can't stand the sound of nails on a chalkboard? Well, for me it's the sound of someone handling tape. You know, the sticky sound when it peels off your fingers. It gives me the chills. Literally, I get goosebumps. It's a strange neuroticism, and I'm rather shy about telling people about it. I think Gavin and I were actually married before I fessed up.

A couple nights ago, the trainee on my shift spent most of the last hour we were there peeling a sticker off his notebook. Piece by little piece. I'm getting shivers just thinking about it now. But I didn't want to ask him to stop, because then the sticker would be half peeled off, and that offends my sense of neatness. So I waited, shuddering from time to time, while he peeled every little piece off. I internally celebrated when the last piece came off and went into the garbage.

And then he started picking at the sticky stuff that's left after you peel a sticker off. Eew eew eew eew eew eew eew!

Accent

Hmmm… Well, I’m definitely from the West. But, I have relatives that live in Fargo and I don’t talk like them. “About” does not rhyme with “boat”. But, they probably don’t have a category for a Wyoming accent.

What American accent do you have? Your Result: North Central   "North Central" is what professional linguists call the Minnesota accent. If you saw "Fargo" you probably didn't think the characters sounded very out of the ordinary. Outsiders probably mistake you for a Canadian a lot.
The West
The Midland
Boston
The Inland North
The South
Philadelphia
The Northeast
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Weighty Letter

I love poorly written spam. Here's a few excerpts from one I got today at work...


Weighty letter. You require to read.

Please read it. Today is the exact day to buy that stock.
Read that note attentively. Here you will find the intimate news about GDKI. Please Read this news.

In an violent attempt to stay ahead of the game, the Corporation moved fast in
taking on the already triumphant and rising famous person. Sean "P.Diddy" Combs tells that it is pleasantly to deal with these guys. They as anybody else know entertainment industriousness and exactly know what is required for the American spectators. He also emphasizes individuality of his fresh album Press Play and tells that the appearance of this album on october 17 will make an effect of the blasted bomb.

Overheard

Overheard at work today:

"I know this woman who was attacked by three hens..."

God Bless Texas

That said, though, I have some sympathy for that woman. I've been attacked by birds a couple times in my life, and it always leaves you feeling vulnerable. Like the universal order is out of wack.

Damn geese.

Universal Truth

You know what's annoying? Meetings around lunchtime. But, it's so easy to schedule meetings then because everyone hates meetings around lunchtime. So nobody schedules meetings between 10:30 and 1:00 until all the other slots are full and they have no choice. So it's usually last-minute meetings that end up there.

Which just means that you get blindsided by the noon meeting. Suprises are not always good.

Texas Proud

Texas is so strange.

Apparently, there is a state law called the "Sportsman's Rights Act" which makes it illegal "to intentionally interfere with another person lawfully engaged in the process of hunting or catching wildlife."

OK, so Texas is big on guns and hunting and places where they release birds from traps so that the hunter doesn't even have to bother to look for the game. So, I can understand that the law exists. Probably at some time in the past there was an animal rights group that went out with cowbells and whistles and tried to scare all the game away from a group of hunters. And so the state legislature passed a law to make that illegal, because nothing is more un-American or un-Texan than interfering with a person's basic right to shoot things.

But in the particular case that was in the paper this morning, the Sportsman's Rights Act is being used to fine a man who's kids "play loud music and ride ATVs" on HIS OWN PROPERTY before 12AM and after 4PM during hunting season. The ranch next door apparently complained that the noise was scaring off the deer.

' "I kind of got mixed feelings out of it," Morris said. "Basically what they're saying is, during deer season you got to keep your kids indoors. You could sneeze and scare a deer off." '

It's completely absurd. Of course, I shouldn't make too much fun of Texas, because this easily could have happened in Wyoming as well. Except that I think people in Wyoming basically take it for granted that you just go somewhere further from people to hunt so that there's no noise.


P.S. In case anyone is about to send me a nasty comment about hating hunters, I just want to state for the record that I have no problem with hunting. I don't see the appeal myself. I particualrly don't see the appeal in going to one of those places that releases game right in front of your face to shoot at. But as long as people use the meat, I don't see any problem without people going out and killing their dinner themselves. It's probably more humane than how the beef in the grocery store is produced.

Weakness

I've been talked into working a shift on Saturday so that one of my co-workers can take a day off. And, incindentally, go to the UT/Rice football game. :) It won't be too bad, but I will have to get up at 6:00AM or so - much earlier than my Saturday norm!

I have a weakness for shoes. A while back I bought a pair of shoes on a whim, which Becca calls my "Jackie-O shoes". The impulse part is that I normally have a very strict rule about all my shoes being at least somewhat comfortable. I have to be able to walk in them. My Jackie-O shoes, though, not so much. I see them in the closet and put them on because they're cute. I then spend all day wishing I was wearing steel traps on my feet because they'd hurt less.

Oh well, nobody's perfectly rational.