Humor, Linkstorm, Weekend

Friday Links XXXIV

“I understand what it’s like to work all week and on Friday night just want to go and leave your brain at the door, buy some popcorn and be thrilled by something.”
– Don Cheadle

Here we are again, minions, and aren’t we glad?  This week has gone by very quickly, which is nice, but generally that implies the weekend will fly by equally fast, which is not nice at all.  Last weekend was almost a total waste: Jeff and I slept in both Saturday and Sunday and went to bed early, so before we knew it Monday had swung back around.  Fingers crossed for more relaxation this time around.  We’re going to catch up on some Dr. Who.  Big, big plans, I know.  Here are you links, enjoy!

Fascinating story on academic cheating.

Slowpokes.

Are you in need of some noir, kittens?  You look like you’re in need of some noir.  Mind you turn on the music first.

J. and I have semi-annual dentist appointments on Monday.  We (the human race) have come a long way.

Wedding season is winding down, but I still found this hysterical.

And this.  This made me giggle as well.

It was inevitable, of course it was.

Christmas is coming, and the goose is getting ordered.

Gah.  Right up there with indoor plumbing, here’s another reason to be glad we live when we do, she-minions.

The weekly sheep, kicking butt and taking names.

Humor, Husband, Marriage

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

“There are many men of principle in both parties in America, but there is no party of principle.”
~Alexis de Tocqueville

You know, sometimes I take a lot of things about J. for granted (he’s a really impressive specimen), but now and then his stellar points are highlighted.  A friend recently took me aside to ask if J. and I are politically in sync, because she suspected we weren’t and wondered how we dealt with it.  Election season has come to her house and she and her husband are not exactly aligned.  I was torn between thinking, “Oh, look, we are the very model of a modern [major] marriage,” and, “Ha!  Fooled another one!”  But on reflection, I was reminded again just how much I appreciate J. for the fact that he profoundly respects my right to disagree.

Working at a police department gives me ample evidence that not all marriages are like this.  Our congregation, nice as it can be, often provides examples that not all marriages are like this.  Even among some friends I’ve seen relationships made of people who do not respect the right to have differing opinions.  And this has always bothered me because it seems like such a basic human thing – if I demand the right to think and believe what I will, without reference to any other person, surely that means I have an obligation to render than same right to others.  My marriage is like that, all my close friendships are like that, but is it a commonality or a rare thing?

It is shocking to me how many people in marriages, partnerships, and friendships do not give one another the right to disagree.  How do you get through the day, much less an election season!  Every opinion is a potential battle, every thought a potentially traitorous action – it must be exhausting.  I know it is, I’ve seen so many people exhausted by it.

J. and I are not politically aligned (he’s center, I’m left of center), we’re not identical religiously, and widely divided on sports – but it doesn’t matter.  Our ethics line up, the values we look for in others we find in one another, we are a team.  When we disagree, we assume that the other person has come to their opinion through thought, personal experience, and logic, and we do not call one another idiots, bombard one another with new clippings (of varying degrees of authenticity), or rail against the other.  We do not make it a project to overhaul one another consciences.

I used to think this sort of relationship was normal.  I’m starting to wonder if I’m lucky.

Sound off, ducklings, I know many of you have wonderful friendships and relationships unaffected by dogmas of any kind.  Have you ever been in a situation where dogma made a work relationship, friendship, or family situation uncomfortable (goodness knows I have!), and how did you make it work?  Restore my faith in people during political open season!

Humor, Law Enforcement, Work

Fingerprinting Anthropology

“If you don’t have anything to match it to, you know, they’re just fingerprints.”
– Yvonne Martinez

Because everyone and their cousin have been getting fingerprinted lately, I started taking some unofficial statistics on their answers when inputting their biometric data.  The results have been interesting, you learn a lot about a person.

People who are from a state bordering Mexico and the Gulf, or are south of the Mason-Dixon line are three times more likely (when applicable, of course) to give their race as “White” rather than “Caucasian.”

Men are more than twice as likely than women to give their race (when applicable) as “White” rather than “Caucasian.”

When asked, “What gender do you claim,” there being several legally protected categories, men over 27 are four times more likely to laugh awkwardly or make a derisive sound than younger men before answering, “Male.”  Since I’ve been tracking only one female has expressed surprise at the question.

Asians are three times more likely to answer the question, “What ethnicity do you claim,” with their country of original descent (i.e. Korean, Japanese, Chinese), than those with Latin American ancestry, who are more likely to give their ethnicity as, “Hispanic.”

Individuals under 21 are less likely to have their Social Security number memorized.  International students and visitors under 21 in possession of a SS number are twice as likely than their American counterparts to have them memorized.

Individuals who don’t have their social security memorized are twice as likely to be carrying their SS card on their person.  (Editor’s Law Enforcement Note: Don’t do this!)

Individuals over 25 are more likely to have cash on them when paying for the service.

Individuals getting fingerprinted for Bar exams are most likely to wait until the last day to turn in their applications to get fingerprinted, and thus are more likely to be brusque and hurried through the process.  (Not scientifically verifiable.)

Humor, Linkstorm, Weekend

Friday Links XXXIII

“Cheers to the freakin’ weekend, I’ll drink to that…”
– Rhianna

Thank goodness for the end of the  week, muffins.  I’m tired and I want to watch Götterdämmerung tonight in my pajamas and a big football game tomorrow (we’re pancultural like that).  Also, I really should clean the house at some point because it’s getting unfit for human society.  Most importantly, I intend to nap with great enthusiasm.  Let me know what your plans for the weekend are, darlings, and here are you links!

I, for one, am grateful the corsets didn’t make it.

I’ve always wanted to go to Iceland (flying through the airport simply doesn’t count), and this photo log is not making my craving any easier.

As we move forward into this political season, I expect to see a lot more of this going on.  Brace yourselves.

Therefore, in the interest of increased meaningful cultural dialog, here’s an excellent explanatory piece as to just why the film mocking the Prophet Muhammed is as offensive as it is.  I enjoy learning about religions and have tried to learn about Islam, but this explained a few things in a really good way.  The more you know, kittens.

Current beauty craving.  Because there are some days where washing your hair is just going to have to wait until you get back from kickboxing class.

Other beauty craving.  The 90’s style dark lips (thankfully sans darker lip liner!) may not be my thing, but this is totally wearable.

Dr. Who is back (that shrieking you heard was me losing it)!  To that end, here’s a funny t-shirt for the lovers out there.

History Nerds!  This is amazing!

Most of us type it at least once a day, now here’s why.

The weekly sheep.

Family, Humor, Husband, PBS

Reason #498 Why I Love My Marriage

“I have witnessed and enjoyed the first act of everything which Wagner created, but the effect on me has always been so powerful that one act was quite sufficient; whenever I have witnessed two acts I have gone away physically exhausted; and whenever I have ventured an entire opera the result has been the next thing to suicide.”
– Mark Twain

PBS (my Great American Love) is in the middle of doing Wagner’s entire Ring Cycle on it’s Great Performances at the Met program, starting with an introductory program on the staging of Robert Lepage’s fantastical set for the Met’s production.  We’re loving it and staying up way too late to enjoy it.  And we would feel bad about listening to Wagner late at night except that our neighbors have been treating us to a  rather tone deaf rendition of Les Miserables for the better part of the week.   We’ll see your French suffering and raise you the fall of the German/Icelandic gods.

Of course, tonight is Die Walkure, so we had to prepare properly.  Naturally by watching this.

The Small Dog editorial team: mature, educated, cultured.

Humor

Where Have You Been?!

“What follows will be my book-the book of Catherine, called Little Bird or Birdy, daughter of Rollo and the lady Aislinn, sister to Thomas, Edward, and the abominable Robert, of the village of Stonebridge in the shire of Lincoln, in the country of England, in the hands of God. Begun this 19th day of September in the year of Our Lord 1290, the fourteenth year of my life. The skins are my father’s, left over from the household accounts, and the ink also. The writing I learned of my brother Edward, but the words are my own.

Picked off twenty-nine fleas today.”
– Catherine, Called Birdy Karen Cushman

Writing is hard, kittens.  Coming up with something to talk about that is engaging, interesting, clever (hopefully), and worth someone’s time to read is hard.  The reason I blog is to keep my hand in with writing until such a time as I can try and make it my full time career, but it is hard.  And I find that when I take breaks, or frankly get busy trying to get through the day job, it can be difficult to start up again.

Case in point.  Work got ridiculously busy a couple of weeks ago, to the point that I was staying late and even coming in early some morning to just get through my To Do list that day.  I had no free time to even think of things to write about.  Around about the same time a couple of things happened that made be extremely – well, not angry, let’s say terminally grouchy, and I made a conscious decision not to write for a few days because blogs are trick mediums.  You can spend hours clacking away at your keyboard only to hit publish and find out too late that you over shared something, or divulged something you did not really wish to.  Blogs, in my opinion and speaking strictly on behalf of Small Dog Enterprises, can be places of blowing off steam (as long as you tell a good story to go with it) but some people have a tendency to use it in lieu of therapy.  There’s nothing wrong with it, but I know it would be a really unhelpful and pointless thing for me to do.

So, I step back.  I take breaks.  I feel it’s right to do so.

But then I try to get back into the swing of things and feel so utterly stumped.  Writing requires practice, there are few geniuses at it, and even most of those require some forethought before they put pen to page.  I find when I get out of the habit of writing, just like exercising, or putting on my makeup, it can get easier to put it off longer and longer.

So down with laziness!  Things have returned to normal (as normal as they ever get here in Nowhereford, Noneofyourbusinesshire University PD), and my neglect of practice will end.  What have you been up to in the last couple of week, minions?

Humor, Linkstorm, Weekend

Friday Links XXXII (Heavy On the Pics)

Fridays are not ‘pants optional’.
– Nancy Cartwright

Better late than never, darlings!  Here are your links, quick and dirty.

Tom and Lorenzo get some well deserved kudos.

Here are the top fifty “Pictures of the Day” for 2012 as chosen by Twisted Sifter.

I wonder if this actually works.  Because this was a week of lethal irritability, kittens.  I could have gleefully stuffed a fist down more than one throat.  Luckily I’m sensible, mature, and much better behaved.  Drat.

J. found more Muppets goodness and insisted, insisted I share them with you.  The whole Small Dog clan loved you, minions!

Downton Abbey is inching closer.  Here’s the full promo, recently released to whet the appetites of ravenous devotees.

Teeth.  I can’t stress how important they are.

Good dog!

The weekly sheep is number nine.  Beware.

Humor, Linkstorm, Weekend

Friday Links XXXI

“I am somewhat exhausted; I wonder how a battery feels when it pours electricity into a non-conductor?”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure Of The Dying Detective

Any week includes the following in a conversation with your best friend, “Wait, you’re having a torrid, clandestine co-worker affair with a nice Jewish boy?” must have been a good one.  And it has been, busy but good.  This is the same friend who once had a man ask her to be his mistress, for the record.  Apart from being an extraordinary friend and wonderful all around person, she is an excellent dinner guest – her stories are amazing.  Anyway, I’m fiercely glad it’s a long weekend, because good as it’s been, I’m ready for a break.  What are you doing next Monday?  Sound off in the comments.

Check this out, and then respond with your best skewers!  I expect some great zingers in the comments, minions.

What’s that, she-minions?  You’re having a bit of a blah day, and you need something scrumptious to look at.  We live to serve: behold!

Of course.

We had the musical Camelot on VHS when I was a kid (remember VHS?  Did I just out my age?), and though I recall being extremely irritated with several of the characters for their life choices, I loved the look of Vanessa Redgrave’s Guinevere.  I remember being extremely taken by her first knuckle ring and thinking how unusual and elegant I found it.  Alas that my fingers never grew into long aristocratic tapers, so I could never pull them off, but more lengthy she-minions are encouraged to try.

This mouthwatering recipe is brought to you courtesy of the ever lovely Janssen.

New TV seasons are starting up soon and frankly I could leave most of them.  But my guilty pleasure of Downton Abbey will be back before we know it.  Here’s a cheeky cheat sheet just in case you’ve gotten confused as to what’s going on.

Message in a bottle! (Sung to the tune of the Sting and the Police song of the same name)

Impossibly pretty people with impossible access to impossibly high end products lead us lesser life forms in search for the perfect red lipstick.  I only post this because I love red lipstick.  What?  It’s my blog, I’ll link what I want!

This is a horrible product  that would give me heart attacks galore.

The President responds to Clint Eastwood’s (bizarre, odd, discordant, rambling…) bit with the chair at the Republican National Convention.   Politics aside, Twitter burn!

Transporting livestock – get creative.

And speaking of, the weekly sheep.  You know, just being adorable.

Humor, Work

Backstory is Overrated

“You’re the Anne to my Mitt.”
“Huh?”
“You make me look better.  I’m not exactly a nice person.”
“Yes you are!”
“Darling, I just stabbed you with a fork.”
“…Yeah.  That’s true.”
– C. and J.

This is the first time I’ve gotten on WordPress in days, kittens.  It’s the first week of the term and the stress is unbelievable.  This year, instead of spacing the hiring, the start of the term, the various upgrades to university systems (and their inevitable collapses and IT breakdowns), the start of the football season, and the training of our new employees, we get the dubious pleasure of all the aforementioned at once.  Last night I bit the bullet and took drugs – and it was glorious – because I haven’t been sleeping, and when I did manage to doze off I was grinding my teeth.

So, this is just a little reminder that Aunty C. hasn’t forgotten you.  Small Dog Snark Inc. will be up and rolling again shortly.  In the meantime, what are you up to, darlings?