Sunday, April 22, 2007

Credit Where Credit Is Due


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Zona: Honduras
Responder a: hercilia20042000@yahoo.es
Fecha: Jueves, 27 de Abril del 2006, 17:14:48
Más anuncios con: cancion jamas de lidia handal


I found this request while looking up the song "Jamas" and I got steamed. What they are looking for is:

"The sheet music for the Lidia Handal song "Jamas."

This made me nuts because according to family lore - Jamas is not a Lidia Handal song. My grandfather wrote that song and then sold it to Ms. Handal and she passed it of as her own. My grandfather Jose Maria Cabus composed the piece, not Ms. Handal.

I Can't Stand Elizabeth Hasselbeck!

A few episodes ago, the women of The View were discussing Valerie Plame and Elizabeth says, "How could a woman that cute go undetected?"

The inital knee-jerk reaction is to assume that Elizabeth is saying a woman that attractive can't be smart enough to go undetected. I don't think that's what Elizabeth is saying.

I think Elizabeth is saying, "How could a woman that attractive go unnoticed?"

This just gets my feminist panties all up in a bunch because it's so looksist.

Regardless of Plame's ability to get the job done, Elizabeth thinks it's impossible for her to be a convincing CIA operative because she's just too pretty. I suppose in EH's mind, only an average looking woman (a brunette of course) can pull off being a CIA agent.

In general I don't agree with EH's politics, but that's not why I dislike her.

I dislike her because she's unable to have a coherent argument. She just gets all high-pitched and emotional so whatever her point is gets lost on me.

I tend to get annoyed with all of the women on The View because watching them argue is like watching me argue with my brother and father - you only when if you have the loudest voice.

But, I bet EH the kind of person who cries to win an argument with her husband.

In all of her political views, EH is such a throwback. She's a huge Bush supporter, she's pro-life, pro-NRA.

Geez - the only issue she doesn't take on is working mothers.

OH NO - instead little miss pro-life-conservative-on-most-issues sympathizes with working mother's guilt.

Why?

Because she is one.

Wow - a conservative whose politics duck and weave to suit her needs.

Such a rarity.

Thursday, April 12, 2007

DIY 2

Before the renovation, this is how much room we had to cook and move around each other:



Right side of kitchen:



Left Side of the kitchen:



When Steve took down the left side of the wall between the dining room and the kitchen he exposed the backside of the fireplace in our room. I love the look of exposed brick and Steve agrees that it adds character so it's staying.

Once the cabinets and the wall came down:





About a third of the way up the chimney, this is what Steve found. We think that at some point there was a wood burning stove in our kitchen and this was part of the ventilation for it. If you're looking at this and you know what it is don't be shy: leave me a comment and fill us in.

Eventually, all that was left of the left side of the kitchen was plaster and lathe.



The lathe is then covered by drywall. Sasha, is totally unimpressed.





The glorious pantry that went up where the cabinets and fridge used to be.



One of the finishing touches will be to turn this into a custom built-in with walls, doors and fancy crown molding.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

DIY

I'm a great idea person, but when it comes to actually doing I tend to falter. So, like any great idea person, I've chosen to surround myself with do-ers. which is totally why I married Steve.

The thing with marrying a do-er though is that you have to be really careful with the things you say. Otherwise, your relaxing day off can turn into this:



That's me tentatively holding the hammer and probably thinking, "Yeah, I can totally help you out here . . . geez, this hammer is really heavy."

In December of 2005 this is what our living room, dining room and kitchen looked like if you were standing at the front door.




Then I painted.




(I love how Sweet Pea's turned away from me all, "Get that camera out of my face bitch!" She still hasn't forgiven me."

Then I said to Steve, "You know, we never actually dine in the dining room. Wouldn't it be awesome if we took down that wall between the kitchen and the dining room and remodeled the kitchen?"

And, I came home to this:



Yeah, the left side of that wall is just gone and there's just a tiny bit above the doorframe hanging from a single nail.

Now, if you'll look just past that counter on the left side you'll see what used to be a set of cabinets with red hardware and the refrigerator. Remember that because that area has been totally redone and will be shown later.

There were a lot of things I didn't like about our kitchen: it was small and only two people could fit in there comfortably, I couldn't hold a conversation with someone in the living room while I was cooking (or watch tv while I cooked) and I had no pantry. Remember that - no pantry.

So, that left wall came down and eventually Steve took down the cabinets around the refrigerator and temporarily moved the fridge. Check out this wall paper behind the cabinets.



(To Be Continued)

Sunday, April 01, 2007

Memories

I work at a bank. I don't talk about work because I am paranoid and I don't want to get "dooced."

Anyway, this isn't really about where I work now. Let's just say that I never realized that there would be this perpetual cloud of doom hanging over my employment status. It seems that banks are pretty volatile environments: need to make this year's projections? Fire 500 so management gets their big fat bonus checks. Possibility of a merger or buyout? Pray to Jesus the new owners give you at least a few weeks to find a new job.

So, that's what life has been like at my new job - FUN!

This entry though is more about a job I used to have.

I once worked for a non-profit that "seeks to educate and inspire young people to succeed in a global economy." I worked for the education team and my job title was "Editor." For the 10 months that I worked there, my job was to review participant evaluations and determine what curriculum changes needed to be made to our K-5 products.

We started at K as it needed a major overhaul.

What I didn't quite understand when I got hired was that I was going to actually have to re-write the entire curriculum: from step-by-step volunteer instruction manuals to activities and corresponding manipulatives.

I don't want to mislead anyone though.

I had a lot of input from a small review committee of educators around the country. They helped me develop a comprehensive list of learning objectives, concepts and skills that made sense for 5-6 year-olds. However, when it came time to create the corresponding activities - that was all left up to me.

The main component is a storybook with 5 short stories that introduce the economic roles of individuals - pretty heavy stuff, but I did my best to make it fun.

I keep listing this on my resume because it's one of the projects I'm most proud of. I even keep saying that it's still in use nationwide, and it turns out I'm right.

My friend C has a child in kindergarten and she came across one of the books created for this program. Incidentally, this was the first time this non-profit actually credited an author (yours truly) for the work produced. She just sent me an email asking if I was the same person listed in the book.

It's strange because with all of this instability at the bank I keep thinking about the jobs I've held in the past and which one's were my favorites.

Working at the economics-based non-profit was by far the best.

It's nice to know that what I created still holds up six years later.