Sassy Black Friend

Bridal laziness

That’s my new diagnosis for Little Sister. She’s suffering from a serious case of bridal laziness. Well, she’s not actually suffering, but everyone else is. J is coordinating pretty much everything from Philly. Little Sister’s mother is doing the hard stuff, compiling addresses for guests and such. And in a prime example of this disease I just made up, Little Sister has tasked me with picking out the bridesmaid gifts.

Now, on one hand – hooray! I get to pick out my own gift. Gotta love that. But it does kind of spoil the surprise. I told her to just buy us new cars, but she refused. Some people. I think I’ll probably choose a nice bottle of wine or a reasonably priced set of earrings we can wear for the wedding. J was telling me that she got a gift certificate for a store she hates for an ex-friend’s wedding. No mystery why that friendship is ex, right?

And in local news

A high school in my area is in the news today because the teachers have been in a labor dispute with the school board for a year. The talks basically stopped in January, with no resolution. So, the teachers decided to only participate in events specified in their contracts, avoiding optional activities.

Which, since the whole issue is pay, makes sense, right? Well, one of the activities they teachers decided not to attend is the graduation ceremony -held today. Last month when the decision was announced, some of the students in the school protested, saying:

“The teachers are being immature,” said Colando, who participated in the late morning protest. “It’s not right. They’re taking their frustration out on students. It’s not our fault the teachers have a conflict with the board. What they’re doing is only going to get people angry.”

Whatever, kid. Talk to me when you’re working your ass off teaching for peanuts. I understand wanting teachers you had relationships with to see your graduate. But after graduation these students are gone, moving on with their lives. The teachers are still there, still fighting to get fair treatment and pay. Sometimes you have to take a stand, even if you don’t like it.

On the local news today the headline of the three pieces I saw about this stared something like, “What if you were graduating from high school and your teachers didn’t bother to show up.” Uh huh. As usual, anti-union bullshit. It’s not like the teachers all decided to have a kegger instead of going to the ceremony. And I’m sure they all did their best to convey how proud they are of their now former students.

And how ridiculous is the derisive tone towards the teachers when the news admits they are doing their jobs as required:

The community has been in turmoil since the teachers’ union decided to follow its contract to the tee.

After working without a contract for two years, the teachers decided to work to contract and do nothing else.

The action means teachers are not staying late for students to make up tests, they are not chaperoning events and they will be not be working graduation. [Emphasis mine]

The nerve of these people, doing their jobs.

And now, a personal note from me to the students complaining:

Stop being such babies. Welcome to adulthood. Sometimes things don’t go the way you want them – because some things are more important than your evening of celebration. In a few years when you have union jobs you’ll pray to have a membership looking a the big picture rather than their personal feelings about a ceremony.

Besides, if you’re so close to your teachers that not having them at graduation ruins it, get some coffee over the summer before you go to college and forget all about them anyway.

Song of the Day – Bum bum bedum bum bum bedum bum

Boring boring

The boyfriend and I decided we’re the most boring people in the world – between 11pm and midnight. Like all good progressives, we watch the Daily Show and the Colbert report. I’m usually still trying to catch up on the day’s emails, and he tends to be folding and ironing laundry that we inevitably leave in the dryer for days.

During commercials we talk about exciting things like grocery shopping, testosterone creams that work, what brand of toothpaste to try next (it’s a longstanding obsession that keeps us together – neither of us has ever found a toothpaste we really like), and other assorted domestic issues.

At midnight we either go to sleep or watch something else on TiVo. ZZzzzzzzzzzzz. Riveting!

Uh, if you say so NYT

According to the New York Times, I have great focus.

Accompanying an article about what impact multitasking has on our brains is a quiz that tests how well you can focus among distractions. By any measure I am certainly a multitasker, but not a jerk face about it like the people in the article.

So I was pleasantly surprised to see my results were really good. I wouldn’t say I have the ability to focus well, but maybe I just don’t realize that it’s not something people are worse at than me.

Take the quiz to see how well you do, my results are below.

Brain freeze

Not the kind caused by margarita slurping (assuming you engage in that kind of shameless behavior). I mean where your brain just stops working. It could be in the middle of a sentence, or as you’re sitting at a traffic light.

For me, it happened this morning in the grocery store. I was thinking about the stuff I needed to rewrite about a new thermogenic fat burner, what results I wanted to include and which medical sources to check. Then, suddenly, when it was my time to check out, I checked out.

I’d lost my discount card a couple of weeks ago and keep forgetting to grab the boyfriend’s when I shop. The guy asked for my phone number to use instead, and I had no idea what it was. I just stared at him for a good 20 seconds.

He clearly thought I was stupid or high, and just used a different card for my discounts.

For the record, I do know what my phone number is, but now I have to find a new grocery store to shop at.