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RTDNTOTO 🐻 Random Thoughts Deserving No Thread Of Their Own 19 (2024)

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btrage said:
When I went Monday there were 5 of us.

Movie tickets: $44.00 - would've been $55.00 but I had a free ticket to use.
Snacks: $48.25 - 3 popcorns, 2 sodas, 1 Icee and 1 water
Total: $92.25

I think you won lol
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I think Tuesdays are the day to go. MJR is $5 all day on Tuesdays and Emagine are $5 through most of the day and $6.50 in the evening and both do free popcorn on Tuesdays (FWIW, I generally prefer MJR but the convenience of being able to walk to/from two different Emagine theatres usually wins out for me).

My oldest has a friend who lives in an apartment building in our downtown right across from one of the theatres and the friend's dad is a manager at a bar in town with good pizza and burgers. She has spent basically every Tuesday at that friend's place and they'll go to a cheap movie in the afternoon then walk to the restaurant for a free dinner and then wander around downtown for a bit. She's been loving Tuesdays this summer.
 
I'm watching what seems to be the early stages of a remuddling across the street. The siding company is removing original molding from around windows. I hope they reinstall those.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
I think Tuesdays are the day to go. MJR is $5 all day on Tuesdays and Emagine are $5 through most of the day and $6.50 in the evening and both do free popcorn on Tuesdays (FWIW, I generally prefer MJR but the convenience of being able to walk to/from two different Emagine theatres usually wins out for me).

My oldest has a friend who lives in an apartment building in our downtown right across from one of the theatres and the friend's dad is a manager at a bar in town with good pizza and burgers. She has spent basically every Tuesday at that friend's place and they'll go to a cheap movie in the afternoon then walk to the restaurant for a free dinner and then wander around downtown for a bit. She's been loving Tuesdays this summer.
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One of our cinemas has $5 seating on Tuesdays . . . since that is the day we have off together, that works perfectly for us!!

Jim
 
WSU MUP Student said:
I think Tuesdays are the day to go. MJR is $5 all day on Tuesdays and Emagine are $5 through most of the day and $6.50 in the evening and both do free popcorn on Tuesdays (FWIW, I generally prefer MJR but the convenience of being able to walk to/from two different Emagine theatres usually wins out for me).

My oldest has a friend who lives in an apartment building in our downtown right across from one of the theatres and the friend's dad is a manager at a bar in town with good pizza and burgers. She has spent basically every Tuesday at that friend's place and they'll go to a cheap movie in the afternoon then walk to the restaurant for a free dinner and then wander around downtown for a bit. She's been loving Tuesdays this summer.
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Here's a fun fact: If they sell zero tickets, they still run the movie audio, but not the video. That's because they only have so many hours of life in the projector and they want to preserve it. They run the audio because they are legally obligated to run a movie at the advertised time--if they advertise the movie and don't show it*, they can get in trouble. Running the sound counts as running the movie.

*force majuere (power outage, etc.) excepted
 
jumbach said:
Here's a fun fact: If they sell zero tickets, they still run the movie audio, but not the video. That's because they only have so many hours of life in the projector and they want to preserve it. They run the audio because they are legally obligated to run a movie at the advertised time--if they advertise the movie and don't show it*, they can get in trouble. Running the sound counts as running the movie.

*force majuere (power outage, etc.) excepted
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Wow! TIL!

the-more-you-know.gif
 
Thoughts About August...

I don't like August. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I feel gloomy about things I didn't do in June and July, and don't feel like I have the time to do now. Gloomy, gloomy, gloomy. When I was younger and in school, I enjoyed August just fine. A day in the life of a young man (and I assume a young woman) is approximately one million years long.

I do have a good August memory of a girl on the cross country team knocking on my window in the early morning to wake me up. She veered off course in her morning run to see me for a minute. We had just started to go out that week in the late summer. We ended up going out together all through the year. I can still see her face there in the window, framed by all that curly brown hair. We truly came to dislike each other over that year - familiarity breeds contempt and all - but in those first days it's something special, isn't it? Meeting someone? And it's not a bad way to wake up, to be looking up at that glass in the sun-spotted shade and see that face of someone you feel that intensely about.

See, I need to get those kinds of feelings back into my Augusts! Not the same, obviously, but I miss feeling intensely positive about things, feeling hopeful. All I feel in August these days is gloomy.

Also the entire world is on fire by August, so there's that.
 
Is basic formatting of letters and memos not taught anymore - I know this is a get off my lawn post but I spend way too much editing staff memos for simple formatting
 
I liked August because it usually meant a 2 or 3 week backpacking trip before college and after about 10 weeks of a hard and dangerous summer job.
 
luckless pedestrian said:
Is basic formatting of letters and memos not taught anymore - I know this is a get off my lawn post but I spend way too much editing staff memos for simple formatting
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It must not be. New hires coming in know GIS, the Adobe Suite, they can work in Illustrator, put together all kinds of designs, they know theories upon theories upon theories...but they can't organize their thoughts into a staff report, or format a letter to attach to an email. I don't get it. At least that stuff isn't hard to learn on the job, and I suppose everyone's writing is a little clunky when they first get started.

The most valuable asset of senior members of staff anymore seems to be the ability to effectively communicate to the public, and to be gracious with those who don't agree. A direct ursus quote to almost every new planner I've ever worked with: "Repeat after me: the City Engineers are smart. The City Engineers are our friends. We need them. We need them to like and respect us, so we need to like and respect them. Great. Now go apologize by asking him if we can get a copy of that sewer modeling report that we won't understand but will abide by. Yes, now."
 
I enjoy August because even though the first few weeks of the month are generally the hottest and most humid of the year here, fall is just around the corner and I can literally smell it and feel it. I was out on a trail run before work this morning and there is one particular section where I pass under some trees near a small lake and the angle of the rising sun filtering through the branches just gave me some very fall-esque vibes. It helps that by now there are usually a few leaves on the ground crunching under my feet. They haven't turned colors other than gray from the dust of the crushed gravel trail and probably only fell because a squirrel chewed a branch off above me, but still...

The first site of leaves on the ground, the lower angle of the sun, the smell of the "crispness" in the early morning today made me realize fall is just around the corner. That, in turn, made me think of our kids going back to school (after Labor Day this year :mad: ), which, in turn, made me think of my tradition of making fresh chocolate chip cookies on that first day back. While fall may be my favorite time of year, I think the first week of school is my favorite week of the year. I love making the cookies, I love how happy my kids are to come home on those first couple of days and have fresh warm cookies waiting for them, I love how quiet the house is during the day again, I love how the school year hasn't beaten them down yet (especially the teenager), I love how easily they get up for school that first week...
 
WSU MUP Student said:
I enjoy August because even though the first few weeks of the month are generally the hottest and most humid of the year here, fall is just around the corner and I can literally smell it and feel it. I was out on a trail run before work this morning and there is one particular section where I pass under some trees near a small lake and the angle of the rising sun filtering through the branches just gave me some very fall-esque vibes. It helps that by now there are usually a few leaves on the ground crunching under my feet. They haven't turned colors other than gray from the dust of the crushed gravel trail and probably only fell because a squirrel chewed a branch off above me, but still...

The first site of leaves on the ground, the lower angle of the sun, the smell of the "crispness" in the early morning today made me realize fall is just around the corner. That, in turn, made me think of our kids going back to school (after Labor Day this year :mad: ), which, in turn, made me think of my tradition of making fresh chocolate chip cookies on that first day back. While fall may be my favorite time of year, I think the first week of school is my favorite week of the year. I love making the cookies, I love how happy my kids are to come home on those first couple of days and have fresh warm cookies waiting for them, I love how quiet the house is during the day again, I love how the school year hasn't beaten them down yet (especially the teenager), I love how easily they get up for school that first week...
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We have 2-3 months of Summer left.
 
WSU MUP Student said:
I enjoy August because even though the first few weeks of the month are generally the hottest and most humid of the year here, fall is just around the corner and I can literally smell it and feel it. I was out on a trail run before work this morning and there is one particular section where I pass under some trees near a small lake and the angle of the rising sun filtering through the branches just gave me some very fall-esque vibes. It helps that by now there are usually a few leaves on the ground crunching under my feet. They haven't turned colors other than gray from the dust of the crushed gravel trail and probably only fell because a squirrel chewed a branch off above me, but still...

The first site of leaves on the ground, the lower angle of the sun, the smell of the "crispness" in the early morning today made me realize fall is just around the corner. That, in turn, made me think of our kids going back to school (after Labor Day this year :mad: ), which, in turn, made me think of my tradition of making fresh chocolate chip cookies on that first day back. While fall may be my favorite time of year, I think the first week of school is my favorite week of the year. I love making the cookies, I love how happy my kids are to come home on those first couple of days and have fresh warm cookies waiting for them, I love how quiet the house is during the day again, I love how the school year hasn't beaten them down yet (especially the teenager), I love how easily they get up for school that first week...
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Almost, Thou couldst convince me to like August... :)
 
luckless pedestrian said:
Is basic formatting of letters and memos not taught anymore - I know this is a get off my lawn post but I spend way too much editing staff memos for simple formatting
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I still use two spaces after periods, even though that has been passe for over a decade. Old habits are hard to break.

As far as I understand, it's accepted to use the two spaces, but is discouraged.

Jim
 
ursus said:
It must not be. New hires coming in know GIS, the Adobe Suite, they can work in Illustrator, put together all kinds of designs, they know theories upon theories upon theories...but they can't organize their thoughts into a staff report, or format a letter to attach to an email. I don't get it. At least that stuff isn't hard to learn on the job, and I suppose everyone's writing is a little clunky when they first get started.

The most valuable asset of senior members of staff anymore seems to be the ability to effectively communicate to the public, and to be gracious with those who don't agree. A direct ursus quote to almost every new planner I've ever worked with: "Repeat after me: the City Engineers are smart. The City Engineers are our friends. We need them. We need them to like and respect us, so we need to like and respect them. Great. Now go apologize by asking him if we can get a copy of that sewer modeling report that we won't understand but will abide by. Yes, now."
Click to expand...
We recently had a resume from someone who used exclamation points after every sentence! Not just in her resume, but in her cover letter, too! It was really hard to read past all that! She may have had accomplishments! We never saw them though!
 
jumbach said:
I still use two spaces after periods, even though that has been passe for over a decade. Old habits are hard to break.

As far as I understand, it's accepted to use the two spaces, but is discouraged.

Jim
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Yes and yes. I refuse to change that habit. I see no issues with it.
 
After 3 years changed my WhatsApp number to my German number. 😢😕 It is funny how phone numbers can be part of your identity.
 
Two hour drive at 5:30 a.m. through thunder, lightning, and impressive rain, to get to a DOT workshop arriving in the a.m. peak. Suggested parking garage is full owing to a comic con in town. Navigate stupid one way streets filled with costumed comic con attendees to find an alternate I think might be open. Find a spot, walk to the stairway, discover I won’t be able to get back in without the ticket stub, which I left in the car. Decide to chance being able to walk in with someone smarter than me after the workshop. Decide to keep score on whether workshop could have been an email.

Final score: email - 921,433 - workshop 0. I’m too f**king old for this.
 
Gedunker said:
Two hour drive at 5:30 a.m. through thunder, lightning, and impressive rain, to get to a DOT workshop arriving in the a.m. peak. Suggested parking garage is full owing to a comic con in town. Navigate stupid one way streets filled with costumed comic con attendees to find an alternate I think might be open. Find a spot, walk to the stairway, discover I won’t be able to get back in without the ticket stub, which I left in the car. Decide to chance being able to walk in with someone smarter than me after the workshop. Decide to keep score on whether workshop could have been an email.

Final score: email - 921,433 - workshop 0. I’m too f**king old for this.
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TGIF, amirite?
 
Gedunker said:
Two hour drive at 5:30 a.m. through thunder, lightning, and impressive rain, to get to a DOT workshop arriving in the a.m. peak. Suggested parking garage is full owing to a comic con in town. Navigate stupid one way streets filled with costumed comic con attendees to find an alternate I think might be open. Find a spot, walk to the stairway, discover I won’t be able to get back in without the ticket stub, which I left in the car. Decide to chance being able to walk in with someone smarter than me after the workshop. Decide to keep score on whether workshop could have been an email.

Final score: email - 921,433 - workshop 0. I’m too f**king old for this.
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I'm getting to that point more and more. So much for aging gracefully.
 
Whose Yur Planner said:
I'm getting to that point more and more. So much for aging gracefully.
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Why is it that we get into birds as we age? All the sudden I think birds are so cool. I never gave two sh**s about birds until last year. Now there's a bird feeder on the back gate and my wife and I every morning are watching out the window, hoping they'll start using the bird bath, too.
"Oh look, the house finches are back today! They are sooooo pretty!" I hate old-ursus, he's boring. :)
 
dandy_warhol said:
After 3 years changed my WhatsApp number to my German number. 😢😕 It is funny how phone numbers can be part of your identity.
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ursus said:
Why is it that we get into birds as we age? All the sudden I think birds are so cool. I never gave two sh**s about birds until last year. Now there's a bird feeder on the back gate and my wife and I every morning are watching out the window, hoping they'll start using the bird bath, too.
"Oh look, the house finches are back today! They are sooooo pretty!" I hate old-ursus, he's boring. :)
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I was never into birds until I married my wife, who had always had pet birds. We had everything BUT birds growing up.

Just like kids, you go from loving them to wanting to strangle them and back again. But they are so dang cute.
 
ursus said:
Why is it that we get into birds as we age? All the sudden I think birds are so cool. I never gave two sh**s about birds until last year. Now there's a bird feeder on the back gate and my wife and I every morning are watching out the window, hoping they'll start using the bird bath, too.
"Oh look, the house finches are back today! They are sooooo pretty!" I hate old-ursus, he's boring. :)
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Next up
Bird Watching day trips
Participating in Bird Counts
 
ursus said:
Why is it that we get into birds as we age? All the sudden I think birds are so cool. I never gave two sh**s about birds until last year. Now there's a bird feeder on the back gate and my wife and I every morning are watching out the window, hoping they'll start using the bird bath, too.
"Oh look, the house finches are back today! They are sooooo pretty!" I hate old-ursus, he's boring. :)
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Did you ever see the episode of Mary Tyler Moore where Ted Baxter had a heart attack? Normally Ted was the least self-aware person you could imagine but after his heart attack he's suddenly making observations about things everyone takes for granted....like......salt. Have you ever noticed how it forms thousands of these tiny little crystals that look identical. This causes Ted's coworkers to think maybe Ted is on to something and begin to question and observe the little things in life everyone takes for granted. But true to an episodic sit com premise Ted is back to his good ol' shallow self by the end of the show.

I think as we age, in general, we feel drawn to increasingly look at the things around us and how they're changing. The birds, of course, have been there all along doing their bird thing all the while, but we typically only notice when we hit the time out button. The closer we come to realizing our own mortality the more often we feel compelled to hit that time out button to take stock of what's happening around us. That's a good thing.
 
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Maister said:
Did you ever see the episode of Mary Tyler Moore where Ted Baxter had a heart attack? Normally Ted was the least self-aware person you could imagine but after his heart attack he's suddenly making observations about things everyone takes for granted....like......salt. Have you ever noticed how it forms thousands of these tiny little crystals that look identical. This causes Ted's coworkers to think maybe Ted is on to something and begin to question and observe the little things in life everyone takes for granted. But true to an episodic sit com premise Ted is back to his good ol' shallow self by the end of the show.

I think as we age, in general, we feel drawn to increasingly look at the things around us and how they're changing. The birds, of course, have been there all along doing their bird thing all the time, but we typically only notice when we hit the time out button. The closer we come to realizing our own mortality the more often we feel compelled to hit that time out button to take stock of what's happening around us. That's a good thing.
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A quote from a Bonnie Raitt song. Life becomes more precious when there's there's less of it to waste.
 
ursus said:
Thoughts About August...

I don't like August. It leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I feel gloomy about things I didn't do in June and July, and don't feel like I have the time to do now. Gloomy, gloomy, gloomy. When I was younger and in school, I enjoyed August just fine. A day in the life of a young man (and I assume a young woman) is approximately one million years long.

I do have a good August memory of a girl on the cross country team knocking on my window in the early morning to wake me up. She veered off course in her morning run to see me for a minute. We had just started to go out that week in the late summer. We ended up going out together all through the year. I can still see her face there in the window, framed by all that curly brown hair. We truly came to dislike each other over that year - familiarity breeds contempt and all - but in those first days it's something special, isn't it? Meeting someone? And it's not a bad way to wake up, to be looking up at that glass in the sun-spotted shade and see that face of someone you feel that intensely about.

See, I need to get those kinds of feelings back into my Augusts! Not the same, obviously, but I miss feeling intensely positive about things, feeling hopeful. All I feel in August these days is gloomy.

Also the entire world is on fire by August, so there's that.
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August is gloomy, which is weird because its so hot and bright. The heat won't think about breaking here until at least mid-September. The only reason I like August is because school starts which I always loved as a kid. Plus Halloween and Christmas stuff starts to appear and football is right around the corner.
 
bureaucrat#3 said:
August is gloomy, which is weird because its so hot and bright. The heat won't think about breaking here until at least mid-September. The only reason I like August is because school starts which I always loved as a kid. Plus Halloween and Christmas stuff starts to appear and football is right around the corner.
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August is the last month where summer still reigns supreme. Sure, hot sunny days may still occur afterwards, but with September comes a feeling that change is in the air. You don't really have that with August. So live in the moment and gather up what the month has to offer while the sun is still shining. I've got wax beans to harvest this afternoon and plan to sow a bunch of bush beans for the fall garden. The beginning of August is also the beginning of the fall garden season for us.
 
As a youngster, August wore two faces for me: the early part included my birthday, which of course is a good thing to a kid. But the end saw the approach of school (the day after Labor Day), and that was a bad thing. While I didn't ever really hate school, I did dislike surrendering my autonomy to some stranger authority figures. The more August passed, the worse the feeling of impending doom.

As an oldster, August wears only one mask now, and it is not favorable. I don't need to be reminded of my own aging, so birthdays aren't necessarily a good thing anymore. (Being above ground to note their coming and going is better than the alternative.) It is the heat and humidity I can no longer abide. It won't abate this month and is sometimes the absolute worst month for it. (The heat index here yesterday was 108', for crying out loud, and it's only August 1!) With climate change, the nights won't even begin to cool until mid-September so that there are 31 dreadful days before one can even begin to hope for fall. Misery, I tell you.

How folks in the south (sorry @Whose Yur Planner and others) tolerate such a clime is beyond me.
 
michaelskis said:
Wow, the TN Driver’s License Center is beyond a pain. I have been here an 75 minutes now…View attachment 63004
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That's one thing I miss about working for the state. "Oh, you drive for the state on state business? Here is your new license." In and out in three minutes, assuming no driving issues (which there aren't, with me. 30 years, 0 accidents/0 tickets)

Reno DMV is a Royal PITA, but, luckily, I only have to see the inside of the building once every 12 years.

Jim
 
kms said:
I was sad when my mom died. I think I wad equally sad when we disconnected her phone.
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Thanks to the portability of phone numbers, my siblings and I have already had conversations about who is going to take their number when Mom and Dad are no longer with us. They've had the same house phone number since the early 1970s and there are only three particular digits in it and when reciting it, it's impossible to not do so in a sing-song voice, so it's super easy to remember. I ran into a friend from high school a few years ago who I hadn't seen since the mid '90s and he made a comment about how although we were never particularly close friends, he was always tempted to reach out over the years because he could still remember my parents' number and he figured if they still lived there, they'd be able to put him in touch with me.
 
For those keeping score at home, I just renewed both my passports by mail.

American passport came within two weeks.
Canadian passport took two months. (Hey, it now mentions King Charles on it instead of Queen Elizabeth!)

I thought the US Dept. of State was very backed up, but apparently not.

Jim
 
WSU MUP Student said:
Thanks to the portability of phone numbers, my siblings and I have already had conversations about who is going to take their number when Mom and Dad are no longer with us. They've had the same house phone number since the early 1970s and there are only three particular digits in it and when reciting it, it's impossible to not do so in a sing-song voice, so it's super easy to remember. I ran into a friend from high school a few years ago who I hadn't seen since the mid '90s and he made a comment about how although we were never particularly close friends, he was always tempted to reach out over the years because he could still remember my parents' number and he figured if they still lived there, they'd be able to put him in touch with me.
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After my dad passed away, when my mom moved to a condo we switched the house phone number they had used since 1972 to her cell phone. It still makes me a little happy when I call her (which is not as often as I should.)
 
ursus said:
After my dad passed away, when my mom moved to a condo we switched the house phone number they had used since 1972 to her cell phone.
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Does that work only if they stay within the area code?
 
luckless pedestrian said:
Giving up my 617 cell number when I moved to Maine was traumatizing, yes
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It's been 20 years and I have kept my 508. The one downside is when I get this one cashier at the hardware store (my phone # is my loyalty number):

"508? Where in Mass are you from?"

"oh, I lived on Cape Cod years ago, in Hyannis and then Brewster when I got my first cell phone."

"I have a nephew in Chatham. It's nice down there."

"Yes it is."

Every. Single. Time. At least half a dozen times I have had this conversation with her at the register. I am equal parts bemused and frustrated.
 
Now that land lines aren't much of a thing and the companies aren't weird about porting your cell numbers, I figure no matter where my kids (or we) go, they'll just have the same cell numbers they've had since they first got their phones. Pretty cool.

Also, they should thank me EVERY DAY that when they were young I set up gmail accounts for them. You're welcome, normally emailed child, when you fill out a resume you don't have to put "fallingatfailingrockstar33778@gmail.com". It's just your name, bc your nerdy dad set it up for you in 2007.
 
ursus said:
After my dad passed away, when my mom moved to a condo we switched the house phone number they had used since 1972 to her cell phone. It still makes me a little happy when I call her (which is not as often as I should.)
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Brilliant! My mom still has her house phone and hopefully she (and it) will still be there for 20 years to come. But someday, I need to remember this conversation and decide who in the family gets that number that my parents have had since 1977!
 
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