And GM wins big...
So I'm listening to the radio where I get most of my news feeds and I hear the line that UAW will take over the liability for retiree health care in their win over GM. I almost had to pull over to the side of the road, I was laughing so hard.
See, last year in financial accounting we learned that one of GM's largest expenses is the pension and health plan for the retirees. The union has forced GM into giving its workers gold plated benefits - everything covered at the company's expense and nothing being the responsibility of the employee. With the out of control increases in medical services, this platinum benefit becomes more and more expensive every year.
Maybe the UAW is hoping that the Democrats win the White House and Congress and the government will take over being the decision maker on health care - which is what Universal Health coverage is really. You, the taxpayer, will be paying the health care bills of all those who don't contribute to the system with Congress deciding who gets to be covered and who doesn't.
But back to the cost of medical care... Did you know that the latest trend in oncology (cancer care) is to have the doctor pick up a $831 injection and charge the patient and the insurance company upwards of $5000 for it?
Years ago there was outrage about hospitals charging $20 for aspirin but you don't hear much about the $100,000 for the $5,000 titanium implant.
So, good luck UAW - I think that GM just got the best part of that deal.
Labels: Healthcare, medical costs1
It's that time again...
Just got the call from HR, I have to take 63 hours off before the end of the year. And at that point I will still have 80 hours of PTO to rollover to next year. I figure if I take the 3 days after Christmas and the Friday before Christmas - that gives me a whole week while my sisters are in town.
If I take the Wednesday before Thanksgiving that would be a good thing - 5 day weekend.
The kids have UEA in October, I'll ask for that off and then DH has been wanting to run away for a weekend so that would be a good deal - take a Friday so we can have a 3 day weekend.
So that leaves me one more day that I should take off so that I'm not rolling over the maximum number of weeks. Maybe I'll call the county clerk's office and see if they need any election judges for the upcoming election.
Completion Anxiety Strikes Again...
Except this time it's completion of a class.
I should be studying for my Strategy final (class is staggered with another one so the final for this is Thursday and the next class starts next Thursday). Instead I've worked on FireDancer, frogged out a section of my TWRR and redid it, got Winter Carousel Horse ready for the SAL next week, pulled fibers and started Be a Witch, and basically done everything but study.
Can you believe that I lecture on time management and I can't get my head into my books in order to make the 2 page crib sheet the professor promised we could use?
Labels: Procrastination
Well, there goes that weekend!
My kids introduced me to a wonderful time sink. I spent all weekend watching Dr. Who, Torchwood and House. I think that
TVLinks could end up being a very dangerous thing for me.
On the upside, I did get a lot of stitching done. I frogged out and repaired my mistakes on my TWRR piece and I got quite a bit done on FireDancer. And I still can't believe Jack's last line on Season 3 of Dr. Who!
Disney Rewards....
I just did some Christmas shopping on the Disney website. This weekend was 20% off, $5 shipping and I had Disney Rewards dollars to pay for it. Yes, I finally figured out how to use my Disney Reward dollars. I feel stupid since I've had many of them expire before figuring out how to spend them. I feel better now though since I have Christmas presents coming.
That's right, this year will be an online Christmas again. I really hate shopping and it so much easier to do it all online.
Maybe I should go check out Clubco and see if there is anything that my membership there is good for...
A thought about the political season...
"It's addressed to the public and you have always been first to believe that the public does not think". He paused. But Dr. Stadler said nothing. "This book may have no philosophical value whatever but it has a great psychological value."
"Just what is that?"
"You see, Dr. Stadler, people don't want to think and the deeper they get into trouble the less they want to think but by some sort of instinct they feel that they ought to and it makes them feel guilty so they'll bless and follow anyone who gives them a justification for not thinking. Anyone who makes a virtue, a highly intellectual virtue out of what they know to be their sin, their weakness, and their guilt.
"And you propose to pander to that?"
"That is the road to popularity."
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
Okay, this is typed from the audiobook all punctuation is guessed at but the words are correct. I'll fix it when I have access to the text at home.
The State Fair Wrap Up...
And I made it to the Utah State Fair today to get pictures of my entries so I could share how I did. I was surprised at how few items there were this year. Most of the entries were quilts and I must have met and remembered something from the time I spent with the quilt quilds last year because I was amazed how many of the names I recognized. Anyway, on with the show...
This is the ribbon that I expected, my needlepoint cranes framed by Jill Rensel.
This little red musical ornament is the surprise prize. They eliminated the ornament category several years ago since there weren't enough entries. So this competed in the "Misc. Christmas Items" category. This means I compete against crocheted snowflakes, hardanger angels, and other items.
Cross-stitch stockings are their own category so they aren't in the Misc. category. It's amazing how many of the Donna Kooler stockings show up every year.
Here is my first place in the Advanced Amateur Needlepoint pillow category. This was the free ANG piece that we got at my first guild meeting. I finished it in a few days and sewed the pillow the night before I had to submit the things to the fair.
This is the piece that I would have been competing against in the Amateur Needlepoint pillow category. I'm so glad that I leveled up. The piece is a bolster pillow of Candy Cane Lane and it's gorgeous. I would have definitely lost to it.
They very nicely displayed Nicole's Guardian Angel next to my cranes. Made it easy to find her piece. She helped motivate me to get my items done in time for the Fair.
This Noah's Ark is the First place winner in the Advanced category where Nicole's Guardian Angel took the 2nd place. This piece was perfect, not a stitch mis-tensioned, not one strand out of place and you couldn't see the holes of the fabric at the corners of the stitches. It looked almost like someone had painted the picture on the canvas.
Below are some pictures of some of the other displays that I enjoyed. Usually there are more than 2 Teresa Wentzler pieces, but as I said, there were not that many entries this year. I'm sorry that the sampler on the left has glare off the non-glare glass.
The one on the right is Heirloom Homecoming by Victoria Sampler. There were some other pieces that I wanted pictures of but the fair was opening to the public and I had to get back to the Hunter Education booth before the kids got there.
Gotta love the new TA - NOT!
Just so you know, I've been enrolled in an Economics course as a pre-requisite for the EMBA program. I paid for a Web Course and then found out the professor wanted all the assignments sent to him by snail mail. I complained about it and for the first 9 assignments he's been fine with my scanning them and sending them as online attachments.
As of last week, the formula that has been getting me 97/100 is no longer acceptable. He gave the last four assignments zero points and wants me to snail mail the originals and pay the $10 per assignment for re-submission. In keeping with his copyright request, I destroyed the originals after they were scanned so I no longer have them.
I've sent a letter to the head of my department asking him what an Incomplete in this course would do to my current program. I'm 50% through the EMBA program and have a GPA of 3.33 right now. They are discussing removing Economics as a pre-requisite for the program. If I have to have it, then I'll take the "I" now and sign up for a daytime class at the local campus during Winter semester.
And so it begins...
Only the 2nd week of school and my son at "Geek High" has been asked to run away for the night - he's going to stay at a resort with a school friend so that they can go to the star party with the astronomical society. Yes, I do believe that they'll do that and that they will go to Oktoberfest tomorrow and try to speak German with people. No, my son knows no German other than to ask, Sprechen Sie Deutsches?
I wonder what will happen if they meet someone who says - Ja.
By the way, I've added a Babelfish translator to the site if you would like to read it in a different language.
Successful Compartmentalization - - Security Breach!
Years ago I guest hosted a radio show known as Wilde in the Night. I was doing a Valentine’s segment and talked about this new up and coming thing called Internet dating services…(give you an idea about how long ago that was?) The regular host felt that success in the digital world would go to those who could successfully compartmentalize their lives.
Of course, it was just a few years after that when Heather Armstrong taught us about being “dooced” from a job for failing to successfully compartmentalize.
My family calls me paranoid because I keep my off and online lives completely separate, to the point that I don’t use the same names. It makes it really easy to tell what in the PO Box is junk mail and what is real mail and I’ve never had spam to my offline name. But I have two instances now where things overlap. For the first time ever, my real name will be appearing with a picture of me on a website (no, not this one) and not just one website but most likely 2 separate websites – two that are compartmentalized in my life and I hope to keep them that way.
On another side, what brought this whole subject up is that through freak opportunity, I ended up sending an invitation to
www.goodreads.com to one of the other students in my EMBA class. It was one thing to tell marketing class that I own Shondratasha since the first 4 pages of Google on that reference are all me (I didn't know I had a webshots page!). But it’s another thing to link someone to my profile where they can see the kind of company that I keep in my online life.
As a good crossover (knows me in both settings) friend put it - - It’s time that some of the offline people discovered the Stasha side of you.
A thought for today from the iPod
Don’t waste your time on jealousy. Sometimes you’re ahead, sometimes you’re behind. The race is long.
From
Everybody's Free
Who is John Galt?
It's September 2nd - can you answer the question - -
Who is John Galt?
A quiz from my DD's blog
1.) Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 18, and find line 4.
And do what with it? Oh, you want to know what it is? - - "because they believe that their interdependence is such that goals are in opposition and both"
2.) Stretch your left arm out as far as you can. What can you reach?
The Scrappy 12 Patch Quilt that needs to be bound.
3.) What is the last thing you watched on TV?
Not pre-recorded? Umm late night Oprah the night before last otherwise it was a CSI Season 4 disk
4.) Without looking guess what time it is?
Around 2 pm
5.) Now look at the clock. What is the actual time?
1:50 pm
6.) With the exception of the computer, what can you hear?
The party shuffle on iTunes, the dryer, the birds
7.) When did you last step outside? What were you doing?
Last night to make sure the vehicles were locked before going to bed
8.) Before you started this survey, what did you look at?
My econ homework
9.) What are you wearing?
Capri’s and a T-shirt
10.) Did you dream last night?
Not that I can recall
11.) When did you last laugh?
It’s been too long since I had a good rolling belly laugh – maybe that’s why I’ve been so bitchy lately.
12.) What are on the walls you are in?
A painting by my Great grandmother and shelves with my stuff on it.
13.) Seen anything weird lately?
Pictures of desiccated dogs that people think are mythical blood sucking chicken killers
14.) What do you think of this quiz?
I don’t think we’ve spent enough time together for me to really have formed an opinion
15.) What was the last film you saw?
"Kiss Me, Stupid" – Great classic film with Kim Novak and Dean Martin
16.) If you became a multi-millionaire overnight, what would you buy?
My freedom from the workforce
17.) Tell me something about you that I don't know?
Well, as you're a quiz, I think there's a lot about me that you don't know (So I stole my daughters answer)
18.) If you could change one thing about the world, regardless of guilt and politics, what would it be?
Women everywhere would receive an education – 3rd world countries improve when the women are educated.
19.) Do you like to dance?
Depends on the partner, oh you mean solo? Only on stage.
20.) George Bush
An excellent example that severe dyslexia is not a handicap.
21.) Imagine your first child is a girl, what do you call her?
I wanted Elspeth. I think she’s grateful that her father won.
22.) Imagine your first child is a boy, what do you call him?Well my first was a girl but we had been considering Matthew.
23.) Would you ever consider living abroad?Did that in college – you mean now? Well maybe if the right job came along.
24.) What do you want God to say when you reach the pearly gates?"Well done, my daughter, I love you."
