First Week Well, I've completed my first week at my new job, and it seems to be going well. I've had 3 people say to me that everyone says I'm doing a good job, and one of those people was the Publisher (he's the Big Cheese in the office). For the first 3 days, one guy would stop by my desk and say "wow, you came back!" like its such a surprise. My supervisor said the same thing to me yesterday and I said "yeah, and next week I may even put a picture on my desk!" *snarf*

I get a day off next week for my birthday. How cool is that? I get my birthday off as a paid holiday!

This company is pretty good, even hourly full-time employees get paid holidays on New Year's Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Labo(u)r Day (I tell ya, its hard to spell that without the dang U!), Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas Day. Plus the birthday of course. Not a lot of companies in the US do this, at least not in the south, or maybe its just this state, I dunno. Not for hourly employees that I've heard anyway.

Plus, my health benefits start on November 1st, I just don't know how much its going to cost me yet. James has only been working 1 or 2 days a week for the Domino's so that he can keep his medical insurance. If I can get him on mine for not too much money, then he can finally quit that sweatshop and maybe find something else. Or collect disability, I don't care. As long as he does the vacuuming. ;-)

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We bought a new computer the other day, just haven't got it out of the box yet. This one keeps crashing, there's a bug in it somewhere and we can't find it, its rather annoying. The new one has spyware blocker, so that'll be much betterer. Plus, its got one of those awesome new graphics cards, which is why James bought it. He plays games mostly, and this old monitor isn't all shiny like the new one. Its also got a TV chip in it, so we can watch and record TV shows on our computer. That's pretty cool! There's a few schedule changes this Fall Season, which was messing up our Thursday nights! Now we can record one and watch the other. This'll save us on having to buy a TiVo. :-) We're waiting to set it up after we move, so that it doesn't get all full of dog fur too soon. :-p

James also bought me an easel and some canvases and some sketch pads and paint brushes. Just before Christmas last year he had bought me an art set, with some paints and pastels and whatnot, but I never had any paper or canvas, or any decent brushes. The kit only came with 2 cheapo ones. Now I do. I think I will paint the dogs' portraits. I've never worked with oils before, only watercolours, so we'll see how that goes. I'll be lucky if it doesn't end up looking like a Salvador Dali or Pablo Picasso. ;-)

If I do any amazing masterpieces, I'll post 'em here.

Catch ya later.  ¶ 6:08 PM 3 Comments

  Wouldn’t ya know it! Last weekend a bunch of us had planned to go drive up above the light pollution to watch the meteor showers Of course, the weather did not play along, and it was too cloudy to bother with the hour long drive up the mountain.

Yesterday Juli stopped by to pick up her Watkins order and I asked if we should try again this weekend. Yesterday the sky was clear and beautiful. Today of course, the fates are once again opposing us, and it is completely overcast, with a forecast of thunder storms well into the night. *sigh* I just checked the weather.com forecast for Asheville, and the High Country Web cams and it doesn’t look good.

Wouldn’t ya know it, whenever we plan celestial light shows, the clouds roll in. Of course, this is the last possible weekend to view the showers, and last weekend would have been the peak. We should have gone up sometime during the week when it was clearer. Ah well, maybe next year.

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In other news, last night we watched the 200th episode of Stargate SG1 and holy cats, was it funny! This definitely was the “jumping the shark” episode, and that was IMO, confirmed in the lead-in special by one of the producers, or was it one of the writers? Anyhoo…there was something for everyone, and they poked fun at nearly ever popular Sci-Fi TV show ever made, as well as themselves. They also added in more than one nod to the fans, with O’Neill and Carter getting married, and the current SG1 team dressed in the Wizard of Oz costumes. My favourite part was the puppets; that was freakin’ hilarious! And the Furling freaking out after Sam and Daniel beam out just in time for the Furling ship to explode. *snarf*

If this was indeed the shark episode, by all accounts this is probably the last season of Stargate SG1. After 10 years, I guess they’ve run out of stories to tell. Actually, they ran out of stories a couple or 3 seasons ago, they’ve just been regurgitating, and changing the names and race of the Big Bad since. Not that that’s a bad thing necessarily, there are still story arcs that can me made, but too much of a good thing is not always good. The franchise can still grow of course, there’s the spin-off Atlantis, and I’m sure they can find another galaxy to stake a claim in for another spin-off. Look how many spawns of Star Trek there were, plus feature movies. There’s lots of life left in the Stargate universe. Just maybe not for SG1 specifically.

There is rumour of possible movie sequels, but with the movie cast and not the TV cast. I’m not sure how this would work, considering the time span since the movie (it was released in 1994), James Spader (Dr. Daniel Jackson) is now 46 years old, and I think the audience would find it hard to believe that Sha’uri has been able to feed him quite that well in the 12 years he’s been off planet. ;-) Not that I don’t like the original cast of course, I love James Spader, and Kurt Russell is ok, and I did enjoy the movie very much. But can we just totally discount the 10 years with the TV cast? And would the original movie cast even *like* to return for a couple of sequels? Plus, in the TV show, Skaara is dead and ascended. Can we just bring him back to life for the sequels? The same actor played both roles. Fans will be confused. ;-) (Alexis Cruz and Erik Avari were the only 2 cast members from the movie to cross over to the TV show).

From one article I read, they’d like to make the sequels as completely stand-alone from the TV show, but continue the movie story-line. Ok, sure, I’m not a Hollywood script writer, but I just don’t see how it can be done believably. Or at least as believably as a Hollywood SciFi movie can be. There’s too much history already, I’m not sure how it can be ignored. Or even if it should be. But, what do I know?...

Well, I think I will go into town and see about getting me some appropriate office wear type clothes. I don’t have many anymore.  ¶ 1:53 PM 0 Comments

  Up early again I had to get up early again this morning to go to the newspaper office to fill out all the new employee forms. Yep, I got the job! Woo Hoo!

I forgot to ask if the health benefits include the hubby, so I will have to remember to do that on Monday when I start, but all in all, it sounds like a pretty decent place to work. The job itself is just data entry, which can be tedious, but they guy who interviewed me said its necessary to take lots of breaks so its not too tedious. I can live with that. ;-)

Plus, its only about 5 minutes from home, so I can come home for lunch.

This means that I will have a "normal" job, Monday to Friday, 8 to 5, no weekends, no weird shifts. I may be able to have some sort of life even. Which is difficult to have a social life when you work opposite shifts of everyone you know, like I was when I was at Domino's. And, I'll even have money to be able to go out now and again!

Well, that's all for now I s'pose.  ¶ 10:43 AM 4 Comments

  Job interview I had to get up this morning at the un-godly hour of 7:30. I'm not used to such civility, I've been working second shift and been unemployed so long! :-p

Anyhow, the interview was at the local newspaper, for an Ad order entry position. Full time, pay's not bad, with pretty good benefits it sounds like, and 2 weeks paid vacation. Odd for this area I must say!

They didn't ask me about any of my previous work experience at all, just told me what the job is about, gave me a typing test, sent me for a drug test and that was it. I expect to hear from them probably tomorrow.

This may be something I can tolerate for a while until we figure out if we're going to move away from Morganton. At least it'll be some money coming in, and medical benefits so I won't be afraid of getting sick anymore. Which in itself can make someone sick...if you follow!

Well, that's about it. I think I need a snooze. I'm really not used to being up so early! Might have to get used to it tho eh?  ¶ 3:45 PM 3 Comments

  What if I want to go to school? Or to be more specific, college.

I was just looking at a couple of the local community college curriculums, and wondering about registering for a few classes. I gotta say, it’s a whole lot different here than in Canada! In Canada if you want to take a few college classes, you show up during registration time, fill out a form, pay the money and there ya go. Not here! Nope nope nope…Back home, most of the classes that are available to full time students during the week days are also available to “continuing education” students on evenings and weekends. Not here! I don’t recall when I went to college night school classes in Toronto that I had to write entrance exams and give them my high school records.

According to what I’ve read on the CVCC and WPCC websites, you must write an admissions test, have your high school and any other college transcripts sent to them, and only Then can you attend classes. You can register, but you can’t attend until you get these things. I find this rather restrictive, and quite honestly, discriminatory.

There doesn’t seem to be any “mature student” allowances. I don’t get it. Why bother having “higher education” if it is so restricted? I can’t imagine how high school students feel when they’re contemplating post secondary schools. Maybe that’s why there’s so many American students in foreign schools, its easier to get in!

Now I know that Canadian universities require a pre-registration entrance exam or something, but not community colleges. This seems excessive.

I was thinking of taking some writing courses. English literature, journalism, stuff like that. CVCC even has some anthropology courses that look really interesting. I could be an anthropologist right? If I could just get in the damn door! Sheesh!

*sigh* I dunno…maybe I’ll email them and find out if they do have mature student allowances and they just don’t advertise it. I think I’m too late for the Fall Semester though, classes start next week.  ¶ 3:26 PM 3 Comments

  Six Degrees Have you ever played the Kevin Bacon game? If you have, you know how frustrating it can be, and if you haven’t, well, it’s a six degrees type of game. Every actor on the planet can be connected to Kevin Bacon within 6 degrees. But it also works for just everybody, not just actors. For instance…I passed Keifer Sutherland on the street one time in Toronto; we exchanged glances, Keifer worked with Kevin Bacon in a couple of movies. Ergo, I can be connected to Kevin Bacon in just 2 degrees.

Well, I’ve been thinking that this can work for just about anyone, not just Kevin Bacon. But then even if you don’t use Kevin Bacon as the central figure, you can still likely connect everyone to him within 6 degrees anyway. I’m not sure how this game started, but Wikipedia says it was invented in 1994. However, I recall it first featured in an episode of Mad About You, but I can’t remember what season it was.

…btw, I wouldn’t recommend using this as a mode of trying to tire the brain if you are suffering insomnia. It has kept me awake more than once, rather than put me to sleep!

Anyhoo…recently I’ve been getting addicted to the TV show Stargate SG-1 . It has been on for 10 seasons, and I’ve watched it now and again since I moved here because James watches it, but I did not watch it since the beginning. It started in 1997, and I was otherwise engaged with other shows I think. If you miss the first few seasons, you’re pretty much lost, however I was familiar with the premise, as I had seen the movie it spawned from and quite enjoyed it.

So, after James went and bought seasons 1 & 2 on DVD a couple of weeks ago, we sat and watched, and I was hooked. We’ve since obtained seasons 3, 4 & 5, and finished watching season 5 last night. *boo hoo sniff sniff* Now we need seasons 6 thru 9, and of course 10 is still on TV this season.

Well, I went looking on imdb.com for some background information about the show and cast, and discovered that Michael Shanks who plays Dr. Daniel Jackson on the show, was also in the TV movie Door to Door about Bill Porter, a disabled Watkins associate. (I don’t remember him in the movie, it’s a small-ish part, but of course when I watched it, I wasn’t looking for him) So, not only can we connect Michael Shanks to Kevin Bacon (via Kyra Sedgwick) BUT now I’m just 2 degrees of Michael Shanks via Watkins ;-) *snarf*

Ok ok, that’s stretching the game a little but :-p  ¶ 1:42 PM 2 Comments

  Unemployment Rate Climbs Again from the Morganton News Herald (Where I've applied for a job btw)

MORGANTON - Burke County's unemployment rate, along with the state's rate, was up slightly in June. Burke's rate went from 5.6 percent in May to 5.8 percent for June.

The state's unemployment rate climbed from 4.6 percent in May to 4.8 percent in June.

"The number of those unemployed increased in June mainly due to new students entering the labor force during the summer break," said ESC Chairman Harry E. Payne Jr. "We are continually encouraged by new job announcements and by the expansion of business across the state. Employment is up by more than 118,000 since June of last year."

Over the year, employment increased in all but four metropolitan areas, say employment officials. Rocky Mount, Hickory/Lenoir/Morganton, Greensboro/High Point and Goldsboro metro areas all showed losses.

The Hickory-Lenoir-Morganton metropolitan statistical area had the second highest unemployment in the state, going from 5.6 percent in May to 5.8 percent in June, according to information from the Employment Security Commission.

Burke was behind the Rocky Mount area, which was at 6.9 percent unemployment in June.

Catawba and Caldwell counties only showed a slight fluctuation in rates from May to June.

The national unemployment rate remained at 4.6 percent.

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One thing to note of course is that unemployment stats only come from those who are collecting benefits, not from those who have been collecting so long that they've run out, but are still unemployed. Nor from those like me who are not eligible to collect for one reason or another. (in my case because I haven't worked enough in the US to collect). I do wonder tho how the rate can go up because students are out of work? I wouldn't think they'd be counted, but who knows!?

The job search continues! Yesterday I sent resumes and cover letters to a couple of companies that I had applied to either on-line (the newspaper) or in their offices on their standard application form. Just wanted to keep my name coming up for more consideration ;-)  ¶ 11:12 AM 0 Comments

  Nah! You don't say! from today's Toronto Star

Heavy net users are loners, study shows
Aug. 2, 2006. 09:15 AM


OTTAWA (CP) — There's a new study that says heavy Internet users lead a considerably different lifestyle than people who do not surf the web.

Statistics Canada says it found that heavy Net users spent less time to socializing with their spouse or partner, or their children and friends.

And they tended to stay at home, showing less interest in outdoor activities than non-users.

Heavy Net users, defined as those who spend more than an hour a day on the web, also devoted significantly less time than non-users to paid work and chores around the home, and less time sleeping, relaxing, resting or thinking.

The agency says that what is striking is the amount of time they spent alone.

Heavy users were alone nearly two hours longer than non-users.

The study also found:

Heavy users spent an average of 33 minutes less time each day than non-users on domestic work, such as child care and housekeeping."

Spouses and children in particular bore the brunt. Heavy users spent about half an hour less with spouses and with children than did non-users."

Heavy users were less likely than non-users to say they knew most or many of the people in their neighbourhood."

Heavy users spent less time in active sports, engaging in civic and volunteer activities, or attending sports events, movies and other events. But they did express greater enjoyment in participating in clubs and social organizations.

And they remained interested in traditional media.

Both users and non-users spent about the same amount of time, just over two hours, watching television during the day.  ¶ 10:47 AM 1 Comments

  ACK! Poor puppy! WARSAW (Reuters) - A man was bruised but alive on Wednesday after a Saint Bernard dog thrown out a two-story window landed on him as he was walking down the street in the southern-Polish city of Sosnowiec.

The 110-pound dog was pushed out of the window by its drunken owner Monday, police said.

"The dog had a soft landing because it fell on a man," said police spokesman Grzegorz Wierzbicki. "The dog escaped with just a few scratches."

"The man was also more in a psychological state of shock than physically hurt," Wierzbicki added.

The one-year-old dog, named Oskar, was placed in an animal shelter while police investigate its owners for animal abuse.

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I wonder if George and Bruno would like a brother? ;-) And how much it would cost to get him on a plane to the US?! The poor thing!

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Still no word on the job front. Someone from R-Solutions was supposed to call me yesterday afternoon but never did. I tried to call the company I had applied for the office job, but got company voice mail and didn't know who to search for. I will try again tomorrow morning. In the meantime, I'll keep looking I s'pose.

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James mentioned something interesting to me the other day. He said I should advertise Watkins products on Survivalist websites. I found out the shelf life of the Watkins Energy Bars (the chocolate mint are very yummy!) is 9 months, and the soup mixes are 2 years! I think the Soynilla protien drink mix is also 2 years. We have a fairly good supply of soup and Soynilla in the cupboards, just in case the Apocolypse is on its way! ;-)

Of course its not so far fetched for storms to come through here and knock out power for a few days. The ice storm near Christmas last year had half the town blacked out for 2 days. And a couple years ago the river overflowed and flooded the other half of town, knocking out power and other utility services. Its not such a bad idea to have a few non-perishables stored away.

With a few weeks still left in the hurricane season, ya just never know!  ¶ 3:04 PM 0 Comments