<p>We had a squirrel that had big turds</p>
<p>good news bad news. He has been in the kitchen. I am glad he is not in the bags of clothes and now I am off to buy out the hardware store’s traps.Just betting he is somewhere in the back of the built in frig.
Wish I had a friend with a cat. hmmmm…new business “rent a mouser”.</p>
<p>I have tried everything to no avail. I cannot get into any thread on the parents forum, except by searching on my name to get to this thread. This is true whether logged in or not. Two emails to “contact us” over two days have had zero response. All of the other forum links work. I have rebooted, reloaded my anti-virus software, and tried every fix I know. Is this the universe telling me I can no longer use cc. This is the only forum I read!</p>
<p>Page 2013 of the thread for the parents of the class of 2013 in year 2013. Is the end of the world coming? (Those folks who just got smacked by that meteor must think so. Scary. And it was just little bits, not a huge meteor.)</p>
<p>TA – have you tried clearing cache, closing and restarting your browser, and restarting your computer? Frustrating when what worked recently doesn’t work now.</p>
<p>Ticked off: One of my guests Saturday night apparently put two of our indoor chairs out on the back deck – for whatever reason – and we didn’t notice it until today, when they’re covered by 3" of snow. Grrrrr…</p>
<p>TA–hope you get to the bottom of it! If you write some profanity maybe the forum folks will find you…or a dirty joke or how about a political statement?
arabrab–wow. That must have been some party:)
Herman George Rat or Hermie for short is no doubt here but we have only had turds in two places near the kitchen which makes us believe (or just me as H is the land of denial) he is in the frig or dishewasher. There is not food lower than 3 feet in the kitchen. I bought many many traps today and all are loaded with provelone.
Just afraid of stepping out in the middle of the night…</p>
<p>I think clearing the browser history and cookies was what worked. I had a message from gmail that an attempt was made late yesterday to hack my account. I wonder if some backdoor entry was left that was causing that link to not work. I am changing every password in every account this morning (about 200) and making them all unique. This is a huge concern.</p>
<p>Good morning! Oregon, I hope Herman’s stay is short. If you want to make him feel especially unwelcome perchance you could flush him out with one of those anti-rodent frequency sound emitters. Maybe then he’ll stress-eat the provolone 
The problem is once you have a house that’s impervious to rodents getting in, it’s also hard for them to get out!</p>
<p>Because we’re in a wooded area with tons of rodents, the previous owners had told us they’d sealed up every nook and cranny to keep em out (and we continue their efforts by baiting the perimeters/attached a garages.)</p>
<p>Last spring, mcson had reported he thought he saw one of the singing frogs in the den, but nobody could find it. Then, after what must have been a desert journey of sorts, it turned up dead near the master shower a few days later. Clearly, it had given up getting out and instead was trying to find water! One of the doors out to the pool takes a long time to close and I suspect that’s how it had gotten in.</p>
<p>So, with graduation imminent, I still find myself with the sense of waiting for the other shoe to drop. Mcson had to redo one of the assignments last week for Eng, so we still haven’t seen evidence submitted that the course is in fact complete and credited. On top of that, and partly because of it, mcson is also behind on some new programming assignments (in a course I had suggested he not take) and is hunkered down this weekend trying to get caught up. In a surprise move, he told me that in truth, he has to stop hanging out so frequently with mcgf, because its so easy to be distracted when he enjoys her company so much that he ends up not getting anything done of his own. He’s apparently had this conversation with her now (on their anniversary no less) so I’m praying that she’s good about it and can understand that because of his processing speed issue it just really takes him a long time to get things done.</p>
<p>In a way, it’s a sign of EDM that he’s done this, but its also kind of frightening – that he needs to, that he’s yet again gotten behind at a time when his energy and focus should be on his senior thesis, not on catch up and running sound for other people’s plays or laying out/illustrating underground satire magazines. I know it’s his to figure out but as usual, it all feels like a cliff-hanger and i feel like a bit of a helpless bystander. I’ve heard a draft of one of his compositionsfor the thesis and it will take some time to get it to the place where it represents his talent fully realized. He says his adviser is great on interactive stuff but does not seem inclined to offer constructive criticism on the composing end of it since he’s not a composer…which comes back to my initial concern about the composer/mentor he wanted for sr thesis being on sabbatical. </p>
<p>So, it’s not shaping up to be a smooth finish. But hey, no wine before its time!</p>
<p>I think I really understand now what an older friend of mine did years ago. She has a son who was very ADHD with a lot of learning disabilities thrown in. She and her husband ran a large farm/orchard operation. When her son got into the nearby university, she enrolled also to get a degree (which shed never done, as she married young and ran the farm.) I had gone back to for a third attempt at completing my degree, and mcson was a toddler. That was how this friend and I met.</p>
<p>At any rate, she’d tried to explain to me that while she wasn’t in any classes with her son, it was important that he’d see she could do it, because it would egg him on. So there she was still running the farm, doing hr and payroll for hundreds of seasonals, managing/housing/feeding the Mexican migrant lead hands, managing the house, staff, finances etc. all while working her butt off to get a degree at 50. And she was right, it did motivate her son. He graduated, and landed a really good, well-paying job, which clearly also gave her tough-crowd husband a new respect for him. </p>
<p>It sounds a little extreme, but I can totally get it now. He could see what she did to manage her time, and just habituate to the pattern. Executive function did end up developing for him, and ironically, he now manages a lot of people. </p>
<p>Mcson says he’s going to set up weekly meeting at the LD office to create some coaching/accountability into his life again. I hope it helps.</p>
<p>Dte, you made me laugh out loud. There you go, trying to “up” everyone with turd size. Just reminded me of my SIL who thinks everything is somehow a competition. I don’t mean to say that you really meant to do that at all, but I just thought it was funny.</p>
<p>CC `13 Meet-up April 27-28. Washington DC area.</p>
<p>:: rummages in the CC refrig, finds the cream cheese, throws it out ::</p>
<p>I test these things so you don’t have to. </p>
<p>Magical thinking isn’t just for students; whatever made me think the cream cheese would be okay after sitting in my office unrefrigerated for four hours?!</p>
<p>Please let me direct you to the farm-fresh egg omelets, steel-cut oatmeal with fresh blueberries and/or strawberries, croissants (plain with Brie, almond, or chocolate), and muffins (lemon poppyseed, carrot, blueberry, cranberry orange, raisin bran, and banana). Coffees and teas are on the beverages table, fresh fruits (pears, blood and Temple oranges, grapes, bananas, and importer persimmons) are in the bowls in the center of the buffet, and fresh juices are being made now and will be out in just a few minutes. Bagels will be delayed indefinitely. Apologies from the kitchen.</p>
<p>~~~</p>
<p>In other news, one way to get my son to respond to emails is to let him know that if I don’t hear from him by [one hour from now], I’m calling Campus Security because now I’m worried that he hasn’t replied to my texts, emailed, attempts to call him. He wanted an eye appointment (he lost his good glasses and is using broken ones with old lenses), I got him one, but by golly, he’d better be on campus and awake when I arrive to pick him up for it! </p>
<p>And now, with the fear of embarrassment of having Campus Security come to his door, I know he is at least aware of my arrival time.</p>
<p>Owlice - You must come to the meet-up so we can sample your goodies in real life!</p>
<p>And you go, girl. Your boy better respond or he will be sorry he didn’t.</p>
<p>I wasnt competing, Eddie. I was suggesting an animal it might be. My H insisted it was mice i said it had to be something bigger and infact it was a squirrel. We got a have a heart trap. I am under the weather from an infusion (my last yay) and I was to short in my response.
D2 is telling me about conversations she s having with friends. Some of their parents are very controlling, and had high expectations of them in HS. She told me she never felt that way, as she knew we were satisfed as long as they were doing their best. (ad that can vary on any given day). She said one of her friends mom is still controlling checking her text messages, making her write down all of her friends and calling them to make sure she is there. My says this girl has never been a troublemaker. I said preferred to assume innocent until proven guilty, and felt fortunate my kids never gave me cause. or anything of any consequence. I think she appreciates the way she was raised, but like said they are pretty good girls. Dont know how I would have been if theywere trouble.</p>
<p>Thanks for stepping up to plate with dates and locale, eddie!
I’m in!</p>
<p>Whoo-hoo!! DTE, congrats on last infusion and best wishes for wonderful health for decades to come!</p>
<p>PS I have to vent about one of my students… she is about my age, very successful, but one of the worst students I have ever had. Her responses in class are anecdotal at best and her writing is atrocious. It’s a virtual cornucopia of run-on sentences, incorrect subject-verb agreement, misspellings, and total disregard for APA. She has lifted entire passages from sources which technically is OK but then offers no analysis of what she has entered. I’ve consulted with her and even given her a paper by a former student so she could get an idea of what’s expected. I gave her a terrible grade and she actually told me that she’s always been an over-achiever and doesn’t understand how this could happen. I told her over-achieving does not mean submitting assignments days early (which she always does) so one may cross them off a list. Oh lord, and she has signed for anther course of mine. UGH…</p>
<p>woody, I’ve had students say "I’ve never gotten a B before, " and have sometimes wanted to reply, “that’s odd, you’re pretty much a B student.” But I’ve never said anything like that. Kudos to you for coaching this student along; but it just may be too late to make a difference – and she doesn’t seem to want the help. (And I know the feeling when you look at the roster for next term and sigh …)</p>
<p>Going to make every effort to make it to the meet up!</p>
<p>woody and Zetesis, If you find you’re going to come to the meetup that eddie posted about, you can request to join the private Facebook group. That is where the details would be and we would need to know how many people for dinner Saturday night in particular. The details really won’t be on this public forum. The facebook group is private and is setup for those interested in coming to the meetup.</p>
<p>dt–I thought it was funny too and I did look up the info on squirrels and it could be one. I just did not see a tail but I was running to the door and all I saw was a a round furry ball. I am leaning towards a juvenile tree rat. I do not think it is a mouse–just too big. We put 11 traps throughout the house and not even a dropping this morning. I had left the door wide open yesterday while gone. There was a single turd in the hall and two in front of the dishwasher when I returned. That is it. Maybe he is constipated? Maybe ran out to the deck (leaving no evidence seems unlikey, though) but the deck is 35" on a hillside so if he ran down a footer he had to have used a parachute.
Today is our 31st anniversary. We are going to watch the Wallflower show at home and then a late dinner at a new place. Nothing fancy as we decided a few years ago that we will celebrate every year on a date that is not near Vday. Spain will be decided on this week and super good meal with toasts sounds special. D is talking to BF about joining us. That actually would be fun. We have offered accomodations and dinner and car expenses to both and they have their tickets and bfast and lunch, etc. H and I tend to argue while traveling so I am thinking we need to have witnesses. It is usually my fault though:(.
DT many good thoughts for your good health. So nice your D’s appreciate their parents.Last fall D said I had never criticized her body (her friends were sharing such stories) and I was very touched. My mom still fits in digs and I was determined not to ever critique my kids.</p>
<p>Dte, congrats on your last infusion. It has almost been four years for you. I remember you found out about the time our kids were graduating from hs. I know you weren’t competing with turd sizes. 
It just cracked me up this morning.</p>
<p>downtoearth, wonderful news about this having been your last infusion.Hope you feel less under the weather soon.</p>
<p>oregon101, Happy anniversary! Hope you have a wonderful evening with your husband!</p>
<p>February 16: and we have all the windows in the house open. Yeah, we need rain: but boy what a gorgeous day. Or, shall I say: It is blue and warm and fine and true.</p>
<p>Ok re: private Facebook group. I have no idea what that means but will figure it out. Count me in for dinner.</p>