Time

My Dad used to tell me that as he got older, time seemed to speed up ,and the days and weeks just flew by.He was around 80 when he told me that, but I'm beginning to feel that way already, so I can't imagine what it will be like when I'm that age. I suppose the lesson here is "make every minute count," but nobody does that, we all waste time. An alternate lesson might be, "Try not to feel guilty about all the time you're wasting." That's a lesson I have a better chance of being able to live up to.

An un-scientific Mind

Things I wonder about:

1. Last week we recreated a science experiment that I saw demonstrated on TV by someone from the Museum of Science and Industry. (See the video below.) We threw a cup of boiling water into the air when it was 9 below zero here, and the water froze mid-air. But when we tried it first with cold water, which intuitively seems to make more sense, since cold water is already, well, colder, it didn't work. Why?

2. The shortest distance between 2 points is a straight line; but if you're flying from, say, Paris to Chicago, you have to follow the curvature of the earth, so does that mean it's not really a straight line? If you really went straight, would you have to bore a tunnel through the earth?

These are the things I wonder about, because in His great wisdom, G-d blessed me with a very curious mind, but unfortunately not the mathematical or scientific talents to understand those things!

Quilt

I made a quilt for my granddaughter. I just finished it tonight. Here's a picture of it.

Why I even hate ONLINE shopping

I lied in the post about yesterday when I said the rest of the day passed uneventfully.

Here's what happened:

Walgreens is having a sale on digital prints: 15 cents each for 100 or more. I haven't put any photos in the photo albums since last February, so I decided this was good time to get this project done. At about 9 PM I sat down at the computer and began uploading a year's worth of digital pictures to the Walgreens website.

It took 3 hours.

At the end, when it was time to order the prints and check out, some problem had developed with the website and it wouldn't let me place the order. At 1 AM I gave up and went to bed, figuring I would just leave the photos in my "Photo Cart" and try again in the morning.

Which I did, but the website still wasn't working. So I gave up for the second time and went to work.

Tonight when I came home from work I tried again, and got this very unpleasant message: "YOUR PHOTO CART IS EMPTY."

aaarrrrgggghhhhh!

See, THIS is why I hate shopping. Even online shopping.

Winter Still Life

Have A Nice Day

Yesterday morning I discovered that it's possible to be an idiot in at least 3 different ways, and all before 9:00 AM.

Way # 1: I congratulated myself for getting out of bed as soon as the alarm went off at 6:45, and spent an hour on the treadmill; and when I went back upstairs at 8:00, hubby said, "Weren't you supposed to meet Ida for breakfast at 7:45?"

Oops. I spent 10 frantic minutes trying to get in touch with Ida, without success, since I don't have her cell phone number.*

*Later I called Ida to apologize for being an idiot, and she said, "That's OK, I'm an idiot too- I wasn't there either, I overslept."

Way # 2: When leaving for work at 8:40, I stepped out into the lovely, powdery, unblemished snow that had fallen during the night--and promptly slipped and fell all the way down the steps and landed on my butt at the bottom. I was holding my car keys, three matted 11 x 14 photographs, and a bulletin board. The prints got full of snow, the bulletin board broke into pieces, and my keys went flying. It took several minutes to find them.

Way #3: Since I was late by the time I got to work, due to the falling incident, all of the spaces in the parking lot were full, so I had to park on the street. Remarkably, there was a space right across the street from the building. I backed into the space--but before I was all the way in, the car got stuck in a frozen, rutted, gray mess of ice and snow, which isn't surprising since the City of Chicago does not believe in plowing the side streets. Now the front of my car was sticking out into the street, and I couldn't move it forwards or backwards. I went into the building and asked the maintenance man for a shovel, and he (and another large man who was passing by) spent half an hour getting my car out. I found another, cleaner, spot in the next block, and finally got into my office, with fingers and toes frozen and boots wet and filthy.

Fortunately, the rest of the day passed uneventfully--when the day starts out like that, it can only get better!

New York Times

When I took a copy of today's Sunday New York Times off the rack and took it to the checkout counter, the clerk scanned the bar code three times, staring doubtfully at her screen each time. "It should be $5.00," I told her--the cost of the National Edition here in Chicago.
"Wow, that seems like a lot of money for just a newspaper," she commented. "Why is it so much?"
I was momentarily speechless. How to explain to this gum-chewing, twenty-something convenience-store clerk the value of the Sunday Times? It would require explaining a whole world of culture--history, literature, music, philosophy--and even though Chicago isn't exactly a hick town, I quickly realized we weren't going to bridge that gap in the next ten seconds.
"It lasts all week," I finally said. An insufficient explanation, to be sure--but perhaps enough to pique her curiosity and induce her to glance at the front page between customers--and opening her eyes to world she didn't know even existed.
Thank you, New York Times.

9 below in Chicago

Strange but true: when it's 9 below zero outside, if you throw boiling water into the air, it freezes before it hits the ground. I saw this demonstrated on the news tonight, by someone from the Museum of Science and Industry, and then we tried it ourselves.

I have no idea why this works. We tried it first with cold water, because one would think that cold water would freeze more quickly. But it didn't work. (Physics teachers, or anyone else who paid more attention during high school science class than I did, feel free to explain.)

I want that job

The weather forecast for today, from last night's 10 PM newscast:

Blizzard warning: near-zero temperatures; 2-5 inches of snow; 35-mph winds; whiteout conditions due to blowing snow.

The actual weather conditions outside my window at 8 AM today:

Less than 1 inch of new snow; 20 degrees; light winds; good visibility.

I want that job.

Seriously--what other job is there in which the expectations for accuracy are so low? All you have to do is show up and look presentable on TV, and as long as you don't predict anything extremely unlikely, like snow in July, no one will hold you accountable.

This is what I imagine the job description might look like:

Position avialable: Weather Forecaster

Responsibilities:

• Prepare daily creative fiction segments for 5-minute spots on local news broadcasts

Qualifications:

• Must have suitable business attire and no obvious unpleasant facial deformities.
• Fluent vocabulary of words which the general public does not understand, i.e. "dew point," "cold front," and "heat index." (Being able to explain or even understand the meaning of these terms is not required.)
• Blatant disregard for facts, and the ability to deny and/or cover up obvious mistakes and gross errors of judgement, are a definite plus

Note: Former staffers of the Bush White House are strongly encouraged to apply

Customer Service

When I shop at Jewel, I almost always use the self-checkout. I hate waiting in lines, and except for the clueless and technically challenged shoppers who always seem to be in front of me in line, and cannot figure out for the life of them how to scan their first item--and except for the endless-loop malfunctions: "Please place item in bagging area," followed by, "Unexpected item in bagging area. Please remove item before continuing" -- it's usually faster, or at least it feels faster, which is just as good.

Last Friday, I stopped at Jewel on my way home from work, and since it was only two hours before Shabbos, I was in a hurry. I grabbed my receipt and my groceries and dashed out to the car, only realizing a few minutes later that I had left my gloves sitting next to the self-checkout. As I went back into the store to get the gloves, it occurred to me that it would be helpful to many shoppers if, in addition to the self-check computerized voice saying "Please take your change," "Please take your receipt," and "Please take your items," it would be really helpful if the voice would continue, "Please take your gloves."

I'd like to suggest a few other helpful phrases:
"Please take your wallet."
"Please pick up the pen you dropped on the floor when you opened your purse to take out your wallet."
"Please pick up that used tissue that fell out of your pocket."
"Please take any and all small children you broughtwith you into the store."

Now that would be customer service!