Quotes from Mexico

Just when I was starting to feel really burned out at work, my job sent me to Mexico for work vacation for 3 weeks! Plus side: the company pays for everything, speaking Spanish is fun, Cerveza Mexicana. Down side: Missing 3 weeks of summer and summer softball. But I wasn't having such a great season anyways, so maybe it's not such a big deal.

I did my best to stay our of trouble while in a foreign country, especially under the prying eyes of many managers and the customer. But doesn't everyone tell a story that begins, "so a half a bottle of tequila later..."? It's only fair that I get to have one too! I told my friend my story but mentioned that I thought I had been discreet, to which he replied, "Is anyone discreet after tequila?" I can only hope so...

Quotes from work in Mexico:

"I can definitely improve your problem." ~Welchman Mark who is a consultant

"This stop watch is smarter than I am." ~Me, in preparation for determing cycle times

"Quiero comprar tu camara." "I want to buy your camera." ~unnamed line worker in the plant

Proudest Engineering Achievement of All Time

I found a typo in the Machinery Handbook, 24th Edition.

The Machinery Handbook is the Bible of manufacturing. It is 2500 pages of formulas, tables, and engineering goodness. A couple weeks ago, I went to the section on screws (as I am the queen of fasteners), and pulled out some dimensions and tolerances for an externally threaded part with M35 x 1.5 threads. One of the dimensions was wrong.

It looked kinda wrong to me when I compared it to the other dimensions in the table but it took me a couple days to get around to check the number with the formulas from the handbook. In the mean time, our supplier had consulted their Machinery Handbook, with the same typo, and modified their tool to the wrong dimension. Now, it's going to take 3 weeks and like $2K to make it right. Can we sue the publisher and make them pay for the changes?

Happy Surprise

My bathroom sink was slow to drain. When I felt like having some fun, I would take the drain apart to clean it. It's so gross (decomposing hair turns black and gelatinous) but it's sort of a hobby of mine. After my last disassembly, I noticed that the drain was still slow. After telling my-mom-the-English-teacher, she suggested I use a plunger to clear the drain. Even though I don't (usually, eh, ever) eat out of my bathroom sink, the idea of using a toilet plunger repulsed me.

I got over it and tried the plunger and can not get over how well it worked. Two plunges and my sink drains perfect now. I discussed my success with my mom and she was shocked by my incredulity. “Why are you so surprised that it worked?”

I told another engineering friend about my success and she was equal parts intrigued and skeptical. Her shower drain was slow and she used Draino to help, but with little success. She called me after our discussion and delightfully reported the plunger’s success with her shower drain. You wouldn’t think two engineers would be so amazed that a plunger would work in places besides the toilet…

Mutitasking, to the Nth degree

I work all the time now. It's not fun.

I get home from work most days between 6:45 and 7:15, clean the house a little, sometimes start to make dinner, and generally decompress before heading to the gym around 7:30. I spend an hour at the gym, then shower, and work on my laptop while I eat dinner, until bedtime. I've accepted that this will be my life, for who knows how long.

My brother called and left me a voicemail while I was at the gym last night. I really wanted to talk to him, but really didn't have the time. All the cardio from the gym made me realize I would have to spend some "me time" on the can when I got home. I called my brother and the first thing he says is, "You don't mind if we talk while I'm shaving?" I replied, "You don't mind if we talk while I'm dumping?" We laughed for a long time about that one. This is what it's come to. It's sad that we're grown up and have to multitask, but it makes me happy that I can still laugh about potty humor with my brother.

Last time, I wrote about some of my random favorite things. One of my LEAST favorite things are seeds in grapes. Grrr.

Ooof

Random things on my mind:
My favorite things about Christmas: Cookies
Favorite tool: Crescent wrench
Least favorite artificial flavor: Strawberry

Kudos to Olevia for making a fine 47-in LCD TV!

Kudos to Value City Furniture for giving me a full refund (including the delivery charge) when I bought a sectional that was too big for my living room.

Boos for Motorola who made my cell phone that continues to frustrate me beyond all belief. (Don't ever buy the Motorola V300! It is a terrible phone! I can't wait to buy a new Nokia!)

Kudos to Vh-1 comedians who continue to crack me up with their commentary on music and pop culture.


I was in LA two weekends ago to visit Sushee. We were driving to Home Depot in Pasadena and we saw a guy driving a black mustang convertible. With the top down. In December. WITH A CHRISTMAS TREE HANGING OUT THE BACK!!! I loved it.

I also loved the restaurant sign that said "Fish 'n Chips" and right underneath "Chinese Food".

I want to reserve a spot in the Burrito Kingdom, another restaurant in Pasadena.

Sushee and I went to a shwanky party at a shwanky club on Sunset Blvd. I wore a $20 dress and $10 beaded necklace, both of which I got at Kmart.

Last Friday night, I slept for almost 11 hours straight. I can't rememebr the last time I did that. It sure as hell wasn't last night when I woke up crying because I dreamt one of my friends had died.

Working more than 40 hours a week sucks. I hate not having the time to do all the things I love to do. I knew that things were bad when it had been 3 months since I blogged AND I ran out of homemade frozen lunches because it has been so long since I cooked.

I made some kickass chicken dumpling stew last night. I like to buy the cooked rotisserie chickens when they are on sale. If they are particularly juicy, I save the chicken juice and freeze it. I pulled two of those frozen juice containers out of the freezer and used a pressure cooked to cook chicken breasts and potatoes. Then I added fresh green beans, celery, onions, carrots, garbanzo beans, and mushrooms and then cooked dumplings. It was fabulous. And there will be leftovers for freezing. Fabulous.

Winter workout goals

A couple weeks ago, I sat down and officially wrote all of my workout goals for the winter. Some of them are pretty lofty. One is to be able to do a pullup, unassissted. I think that is so bad ass. My brother helped me put together a workout plan to focus on training the important pullup muscles - back, biceps, triceps, shoulders, and as a side note, forearms, abs and grip strength. For the last two weeks, I've been practicing "hanging around" at the gym. I will hang from a pullup bar and then do ab work. It turns out I have almost no grip strength! Something tells me that lack of grip strength will be impeding my pullup goals progress...

Part Numbers at Work

As a steering gear engineer, I often have to find drawings in my company's computer system. It is Dos-based. It pretty much dates back to the steam-powered computer. My company's part numbering system used to be rather intuitive once you learned the system. Now, the numbers are sequentially assigned and it's damned near impossible to remember part numbers. I was trying to remember one from the other day and all I remembered was there was a Q, T, and the number 69. So I did a search for drawings with the search term "*QT*69*". I felt dirty. That one is for sure getting flagged. I can just picture our company's internet police, "What the hell is she hoping to find in our drawing system with the search term 'QT69'?! Fire her ass!"

My mom said what?!

My mom majored in English and in my entire life (26.5 years), I have never heard her swear. She thinks there are better ways to express yourself than by using profanity. I admire her self-control. So for the most part, her vocabulary is G-rated. At least, until the other night when she said something about someone being “pussy whipped.” I could not believe she said that. I laughed uncontrollably for 5 minutes.

Where the Sidewalk Ends

My parents have odd ways of acquiring things. My dad teaches at a ritzy private high school where the kids aren’t always very responsible about keeping track of their possessions. I estimate that more than half of my dad’s wardrobe has come from the gym floor at his school: ties, sweatshirts, dress shirts, everything. My mom is equally adept at finding stuff. Her most recent acquisition was a box of almost new books from a mother whose children were grown. My mom is a middle school English teacher, so she has use for children’s books/novels.

The last time I was home, I sifted through the contents and came across my favorite childhood book, Shel Silverstein’s “Where the Sidewalk Ends,” a delightful collection of children’s poems. I loved that book so much that when I was a freshman in high school, and had to memorize a poem, and my more refined classmates were reciting Robert Frost, unfazed, I chose “Paul Bunyon” from WTSE. “He rode through the woods on a big blue ox, had fists as hard as chopping blocks, five hundred pounds and nine feet tall, that’s Paul…”

As I took a stroll down memory lane, skimming through the poems (ickle me pickle me tickle me too; I can not go to school today said little Peggy Ann McKay, etc.) with a big goofy grin on my face, I realized that the book I was holding, that came from some random lady, was in perfect condition, and I felt very sad. That book had never been loved by the random lady and her children. In fact, none of the books that she gave us had ever been loved. When I thought about my WTSE copy at home, with its dogeared pages, a ripped cover, broken binding, and greasy finger smudges throughout, I just felt very depressed.

I know that books are inanimate objects – they can’t feel the love. But they are written by real people who do feel love. By not loving a book, is that like, disrespectful to the author? Or maybe it’s like when you know, love, and adore someone, and you watch as someone else doesn’t treat your loved one the way they deserve to be treated and you can’t understand why it’s happening. Or maybe it’s more like pity on someone, knowing they have NEVER been loved the way they deserve to be.

It amazed me that a book I loved so much could bring so many unhappy thoughts.

Fun at the Bus Station

I was in Mexico and Honduras the week before Labor Day. On the Monday before Labor Day, I flew from Detroit to Phoenix to Mexico City and then took a 1.5 hour bus ride to Cuernavaca, Mexico. The bus ride was uneventful. The driver seemed to drive the speed limit and the bus was like a chartered bus – new, clean, relatively quiet, and 4 tv screens showing a dubbed movie.

Due to the nature of my travels, I was at a bus station almost every day that I was in Mexico. I started to notice that most of the bus stations had some sort of shrine to Mary, the Holy Mother, usually consisting of a small amount of tasteful artwork, a statue, and some decorative plants or flowers. Rumor has it that the larger the shrine, the scarier the bus station and bus ride. After safely returning from the ancient temples in Teotihuacan, I had to take a picture with the gigantic shrine to Mary, but only after expressing my prayerful gratitude.

Awkward Work Conversation

Colleen to Dwayne: "I was talking to Michael in the chemsitry lab and he did the hardness test on those balls from the ballnut from 2 weeks ago. They were hardness 54-58. Were they in spec?"

Dwayne, smiling and blushing, speaking slowly to Colleen: "Ummmm. No. The balls were soft..."

Colleen: "Yes, I know this is an awkward conversation. So the balls were soft. Now what?"

Dwayne: "Well I guess I go back to the supplier and talk to them about their balls..."

Just another day as a steering gear engineer...

Late Fee Waived

I pay bills twice a month and two weeks ago, there was a breakdown in my bill paying system. I was excited about visiting my niece and nephew and was paying bills right before I left. I thought I paid all of the bills that were due. I even recorded in my Excel spreadsheet/checkbook that I had paid all of my bills. Late last week, I realized I forgot to pay one of my cridt cards and they immediately charged me a late fee. I hate that I screwed up. But I immediately paid off the entire account balance and vowed to call them this week to ask for a refund. I prepared myself to go to battle today so I called BP Chase and politely asked them to waive my late fee since I have always paid my bill on time. They promptly (and without further whining from me), refunded my account. SCORE! BP Chase has forgiven me, I have forgiven me, and now I just need to not make that mistake again.

Thoughts on Michael Vick

DISCLAIMER: I was not the originator of these thoughts. I just agree with them and think they deserve to be noted.

The dog fighting investigation all started when a drug-sniffing dog found pot in Vick’s cousin’s car. That sent the authorities to Vick’s property, looking for drugs and instead, they found evidence of a dog-fighting operation. Do dogs look out for each other?

Lucky for Vick that the Atlanta Falcoln’s owner didn’t hang and drown him after he had a bad showing, Mr. Lifetime 75.7 Rating, Mr. Lifetime 53.8 Completion Percentage...

I'm not one of those crazy PETA people, but what was the purpose of hanging and drowning a dog? Why the mistreatment?

The Treadmill Was My Bitch

Monday night is usually softball night for me but since it had rained all day for 2 days in a row, my game was cancelled. My lifting buddy (who plays soccer on Monday nights, which also got cancelled) and I made plans to meet at the gym. My workouts for the summer have consisted of softball games every weekend, waking up at 6am 3 times a week to run 2.2 miles (or something like that), and doing pushups. My weight loss has stalled but I’ve been feeling really great. I don’t feel lazy, I’m only tired when I don’t get enough sleep, and I just generally feel like I’m in a constant state of readiness to kick ass.

Last night, I decided to run a timed mile on the treadmill. I looked back and saw that my previous lifetime best on June 1 was 8:26, setting the treadmill to 7.0 mph until the 7:30 mark and then upping the speed to 8.0mph. Last night, I started at 7.1 and was going to follow a similar procedure, if possible. As soon as I started running, I was thinking, “damn, this feels really good. I don’t even feel like I’m trying hard.” I resisted the temptation to speed up. (I’ve fallen into that trap before and then been disappointed when I got too winded too early.) I got the ¾ mile mark and still felt really good so I sped up to 7.3 and then 7.5 and then 8.0 and then 8.4 and then ran the last 40 seconds at 9.0. I smashed my personal best and finished at 8:12. I was absolutely delighted. I had no idea I would close in on an 8 minutes mile so quickly. Losing 10 lb and continuing to run 3 times a week should get me there before new years. Hell yeah!

Successful Cell Phone Surgery

I bought a new cell phone a couple months ago and I’ve been generally dissatisfied with it. My Nokia 3595 was on it’s last leg and I figured it was time to upgrade. The obvious choice would be to sign up for a new plan and get a new phone but I have a really fabulous plan that is so wonderful and cheap that ATT/Cingular won’t renew it and no other carrier will match it. (For $80, I have 3 lines, unlimited ATT calling, unlimited nights and weekends that start at 7pm, and 900 anytime minutes.) I’ve repeatedly asked ATT if they can renew this plan and they always tell me no and give me unappealing options.

So my way of “sticking it to the man” was to buy a phone off ebay. I researched for about a month, reading phone and seller reviews and ended up getting a Motorola V300 camera phone, with all accessories for just under $50. The phone had issues from the beginning.

The hands-free ear piece has never worked quite right – people can’t hear me when I talk on it. The most annoying thing is that sometimes, pressing the buttons towards the top of the number pad would reset my phone. So if I was talking to someone and tried to put them on speaker, they would get hung up on. If was a dialing a number and pressed the call button, the screen would flash like it was having a seizure and then boot me back to the main page, without ever making the call. But it would only happen sporadically.

After much googling, calls to T-mobile, Att, and Motorola, trips to phone stores, I was fed up. I wanted to perform surgery on the phone but needed a special tool – like a baby Torx wrench which I bought at Lowes. It took me days and further googling to figure out how to completely disassemble the phone. I found it to be completely unintuitive, which I guess Motorola does on purpose so that people aren’t constantly taking apart their phones. It made me long for my Nokia.

I took it apart repeatedly, checking for bad wiring or shorts or something. Truthfully, I didn’t know what I was looking for.

I had been composing a nasty letter to Motorola in my head. I was going to lambaste them for allowing such a piece of crap to be allowed on to the market.

Then, one day, it finally hit me. All I needed to do was torque the screws down tighter and that would stabilize the number pad and then my phone would no longer have seizures! I performed the operation and now have NO PROBLEMS WITH MY PHONE!!!

Finally, my expertise in screws (from work) was useful.

Just when I was feeling really great and really smart (two successful experiences with threaded parts – shower head and cell phone), I realized that I forgot to pay one of my credit card bills and was 4 days late. Stay tuned for my battle with the Chase BP Visa people about getting a $39 late fee waived…

I <3 Google

I celebrated the 4th of July by painting my bathroom. I truly enjoy painting when I’m in the mood for it (which doesn’t take much) and when I have the time to dedicate to it. There’s something therapeutic about giving a room a new beginning. I also take a lot of pride in my work – I like to do a good job. I usually throw some music on and go to town.

I didn’t have enough time to finish on the 4th so I put off completion until the following Saturday. So for 4 days, I showered in the other bathroom.

About a year ago, I got fed up with the $7 showerhead in my bath and indulged in a wonderfully luxurious, full-body shower head that and I quickly realized how inadequate my showerhead in the guest bathroom is. It paled in comparison to the showerhead in my bathroom. The high end shower head is one of the best things I've spent money on.

I was shopping at Bed Bath and Beyond for a friend’s wedding gift and ended up buying a second luxurious shower head, this one for my guest bath. I tore open the packaging and eagerly attempted to install it. I remember the last installation being very simple – screw the old head off, screw the new head on. I worked for about 20 minutes to try to screw the old head off (it was metal threads mating with plastic threads) and actually worked up a sweat. I didn’t know what I was going to do if I couldn’t get the old shower head off, especially since I had already destroyed the packaging that the new shower head came in.

So I did what I always do when I have a question and don’t know the answer. I googled “loosen overtightened shower head.” After searching through about 20 webpages, I read a tip that said to soak the old shower head in vinegar. So I put some vinegar in a grocery bag and then twist-tied it up to my shower head. It looked pretty silly but soaked for almost 24 hours and when I went at it again with my wrenches the next day, to my shock, the head came loose! I can not believe that the vinegar worked! I love that I learned from another adventure in home improvement.

American Idol

This morning, I heard that the American Idol summer tour is sponsored by Pop Tarts. I smiled to myself - doesn't AI produce pop tarts?

Tilex

Tilex gets its own post on my blog because of its miraculous cleaning power. I recommend it to anyone who has gross grout in their shower. My shower mildew turns red. Then when I'm adequately grossed out, I shoot some Tilex on it and in 5-10 minutes, the grout is white again. Absolutely amazing.

Women's softball

Last fall, I played on a women’s softball team. It was the first time I’ve played on a women’s team since my college ball days (3.5 years). They play with a smaller softball than the standard co-ed ball.

My team had a mix of young women and older women. I would say the age range was from the early 20s to the mid 40s, and we had some really good players. The older players are kind of funny because many think that they’re still in high school in the 80s. They’re really tan, have 80s style haircuts, with frosted highlights, and still wear they’re 80s style uniforms – tight polyester softball shorts layered over white sliding pants. The younger women tend to wear regular workout clothes – mesh shorts, t-shirts, whatever. There is no team uniform.

Last fall, we played a team of 20 somethings that did have a uniform – matching black sexpants (fitted through the waist, butt, hips, and thighs, flared at the bottom) with a baby blue stripe down the side that matched their baby blue team baby tees. They seemed to be an exceptionally cute team (especially for a softball team) and their fans were all of their boyfriends, fiancées, and husbands. (It’s unusual to have fans at an adult softball game.) Basically, that was the girliest softball team I’d ever seen in my life. We mercied them in 5 innings.

Last night, I was a sub for a women’s team I’ve never played with. I’ve played co-ed with the girl who asked me sub and she’s pretty good so I agreed. I show up and realize, I am a sub on Team Sexpants. The girls are mostly in their 20s, impossibly cute, wearing sweatpants sexpants, and some of them even played wearing their engagement rings. And they didn’t look like very strong ball players. Our opponent was a team of stereotypical 40 something softball players (see description above).

We got our asses handed to us in 4 innings (the slaughter rule was in effect). The other team was very nice while beating us into submission (in their 4th at bats, they batted all the way around twice and some players batted three times) and after the game we shook hands. I looked each of them in the eye to see if each of them really fit the 40 something softball player stereotype. The very last girl on their team was actually a 20 something! She cleverly disguised herself in the 40 something uniform and a femmullet but she didn’t have enough wrinkles to be 40. I looked at her, said “good game,” and I knew her secret…

I flipped on one of the cable news stations last night before I went to bed. MC Hammer was talking with a news anchor about bringing troops back from the Iraq war. Why was Hammer allowed to touch this?