Flu Shots

I went in for an orthopedic guy to look at my wrist. I had to go to the Kaiser Hospital so parking sucks, even with my handicap permit. Because of this I went really early, and it turns out I found a spot right away. Having almost 45 mins to spare I saw 'Flu Clinic' and decided to get my shot.

My arm hurts, but I got my flu shot! The doctor took x-rays of my writs to rule out bone issues and wants me to get an MRI which I will schedule next week, and then a follow up with the orthopedic guy. If it is a cyst they can try to stick a needle in it to brust it (eep!!) or do surgery, or just ignore it. As long as it doesn't get bigger or something like that it's completely benine, assuming it is a cyst. I opted for the MRI as if it's not a cyst the MRI will tell us what it is and answer all questions (hopefully).

He did a low energy x-ray today that was kind of cool. It was real time, he said the radiation was a bit above being out in the sun, and he was able to move the wrist around and see how the bones were working together. It's not high resolution and he did get 'normal' x-rays done also, but it was kind of fun to watch my wrist in real time like that. There doesn't appear to be any bone issues, which is good.

I call next week to schedule the MRI, so we'll see what happens from there.

Voting and AI Classes!

I went and voted today. Voted for Obama/Biden, voted for Trains!!! and against the marriage ban and parental notification. Voted against the Republican representative that I'm not happy with for the House and when I wasn't sure I always vote against the incumbent.

And, I heard back from my adviser and my Artificial Intelligence classes were officially approved!! This means I"m not taking the Advanced Java class that really wasn't ever going to help me in my career and I get to spend two months focusing on something that actually interests me. I emailed my lead faculty asking about what happens next and I am very excited.

I had unofficial approval before but it's nice to know that it's completely official and nothing can go wrong at the last min. It's a good day =)

Home Strech for Programming Languages

Finished all the homework, all but one (rather large) question done on the final, sort of doing the last programming assignment. Completely on track for being done before midnight tomorrow. 94% going into the final so as long as I can do this last Squeak Smalltalk assignment and am verbose enough on the final we're good to go.

I'm kind of excited about next month's Computer Networking class. My first real industry job was at Novell a long long time ago but it's interesting stuff. Maybe I'll have a better understanding so when I get the calls to fix people's networks I can do a better job!

Doing dinner tonight with a friend from home who is in town, very excited about that. Kind of a lazy weekend but I'm alright with that too.

Still no official word on my Independent Study. I'm going to email my adviser this weekend asking about it, see if she can find anything out. I really don't want to take Advanced Java.

Hot weather and Wind

It's almost 90 outside and it's really windy. This is the kind of weather we get just before everything burns down. It's kind of making me a bit nervous.

Midterms

Got a 90 on my Programming Languages midterm. Puts me at a 95% in the class with one more programming assignment (easy full credit) a homework and a final to go. I'm not sure how much I'm really learning in this class, the languages we're studying are really outdated and I'll never use them, but learning is good no matter what, especially if I'm getting an A out of it.

No official word yet on my independent study, still waiting to know for certain.

Laundry

I never thought I'd actually say 'I'm happy that I can do laundry again' and actually mean it!

but I can and I am, clean clothes take on a lot more weight after you can't walk for six weeks.

Physics Midterm

Don't have my grade back from the Programming Languages midterm yet and took my Physics one today. Physics was tough, but the professor was open to giving nudges and hints and I think I did alright. She ended up giving me another copy of the test though because my notes had filled the first one up.

Class again tonight with a presentation and then another new language, but no lab this week so that lowers my homework level.

Grades finally in

My September class was Databases and my professor had some personal complications so grades were delayed. So I just got my grade today...

A-!!

I was kind of worried because since the professor was out of touch I didn't know how I'd done on the final.

My GPA is a 3.31 and I think I'm looking at a solid A this semester, depending on how I did on the midterm this last weekend.

I won't graduate Cum Laude but I should graduate with a 3.3 and I'm happy with that.

Now, to pass Physics =)

Lost a Decade

So I get a phone call today, apparently my nephew and his mother were having an argument on how old I am, since I just had a birthday.

My nephew declared that there is no way that I'm 36, I must be 26! And his daddy can't be 32, no way!

So I asked him what age I should be, that I'll be whatever age he wants, and he decided that I'm 26.

Works for me

Steven Hawkin's message to John McCain

McCain's Health Care

We've been hearing some about health care plans between the two candidates, mostly that Obama wants evil socialized healthcare that will cover everyone and cost you less than you're paying now (due to hospitals having to eat the cost of the uninsured) but McCain is starting to piss off even his big business buddies with his plan.

The New York Times today had a piece on it.

Basically McCain wants to have health insurance benefits taxed as income, so now you're paying income tax on something you don't actually get dollars from. This effectivley drops your take home pay.

Then he says he'll give people a tax credit to cover the difference, but

"For some workers, depending on their tax bracket and insurance costs, the new tax credits would exceed the value of the tax exclusion, making the swap profitable. But with the average employer-sponsored family policy costing [b]$12,680[/b] this year, other workers would find the exchange a losing proposition. They would either have to spend more, reduce their coverage or persuade employers to make up the difference."

His cut is 2500 for a single person and 5000 for married couples, I see nothing here or anywhere else about numbers of children.

I have government subsidized insurance (long story that is another rant about this stuff) and mine costs 3600 a year before deductibles and co-pays. This free market won't give me insurance to the point where they were taking an episode of bronchitis in 05 and calling it chronic and used it as on of their excuses to deny me a bare bones insurance policy.

McCain will force people out of the group plans that employers get and send them out into the free market. However the free market can discriminate for pre-existing conditions and typically charge significantly more for an individual than the collective group the companies get to purchase.

So, McCain wants to lower your take home pay or more likely force you buy insurance on the open market. And anyone who says that their employer will pay them more, the same article states,

"A recent survey of 187 corporate executives by the American Benefits Council and Miller & Chevalier, a consulting firm, found that three-fourths felt the repeal of the tax exclusion would have a “strong negative impact” on their workers. Only 4 percent said they would provide additional pay to fill any gaps."

Employers are not going to pass any savings on to you, they're going to use it somewhere else, most likely making it more likely they'll make payroll. In the meantime your net take home pay vs expenses has just radically changed.

Twitter

I'm finally catching up on the trendy stuff and added Twitter. There is a link on the right here and it's all over Facebook. I'm not sure what the point is but far be it for me to not be electronically trendy!

Juggling school and life

I'm different from a lot of other women who 'go back to school' in that I don't have children and or a job while trying to go back to school. That changes things quite a bit compared to the things other women my age have to deal with, and for that I am grateful. Honestly I don't know how they do it, I'm swamped and I just have dogs and a bum foot to deal with.

It's funny how life turns out, and I'm very happy with where mine is, but it's not what I envisioned when I was younger. My timing is wonderful too, I'm going to be graduating in one of the worst economies in my or my parent's lifetimes and trying to get a job that will pay enough to not only life but to pay off the student loans I've acquired. At least I was able to get the student loans, that is something I guess.

I don't regret my choice on going back to school but I do wish I had done this 15 years ago. If I had then I would have a good 15 years experience and be established in my profession, with potentially really good job security vs starting out with little to no experience in my *cough* mid thirties saddled with obnoxious amounts of student loans.

Something needs to be done, I watched the DOW down almost 800 points at one point in time today, though it closed around 350 down. Putting my money in a savings account looks more and more attractive, and that really saddens me. I'm not even going to look at any investment accounts, though this trip this summer may be to Latin America instead of Europe simply due to funds. I'm just hoping things will rebound between now and then and prices on luxuries (like trips) will drop due to demand.

I'm actually tempted to pull my money out of the money market account and just pay down my home equity line of credit as I'm not making more on the money market than I'm paying on the line of credit anymore. I don't want to panic though and it would kill me if things recover before I pay for this trip. I'm not putting any MORE money into it right now, beyond my minimal monthly contributions. Any extra money is going to that line of credit and save me the interested between now and when I need to use it.

I never would have thought that a high interest savings account would be so attractive.

Bloody Hot

It's 88 in my room, and that is with the fan on. Not ready to turn on the air but I'm getting close.

I have the handyman coming on Friday to talk about an attic fan, I"m told that would help. Right now I want to melt. Here is motivation on getting a job, air conditioned office!!

Still don't know about last month's class but this month's seems pretty straightforward. We're just looking at four different languages and learning about their syntax and how they do things. I don't know if I'll ever use them but being exposed to things never hurts. I just have to install NetBeans again and I had just barely uninstalled it =/

Foot is better, not great but better. My referral for PT goes through on Friday so I'll know then when that is going to start.

There is something about getting your hair done that makes everything in life better :)

Birthday present for myself

I splurged a bit and got a new Roomba.

I have an older one downstairs but it really doesn't have the power to do the rugs in my room. Therefore it's sitting in the corner charging and I'll give it a test run tomorrow afternoon. If nothing else this will make me keep my room picked up, though we'll see how hard it is to keep up with the stuff the dogs drag under the bed.

I didn't buy this from iRobot's website though, I payed 60 dollars less shipped. I'm so excited!

Database almost done!

Final, done and completed, got a B before the written extra question but I don't see that coming up much.

Homework done, not perfect but I can revise it so I may next week, we'll see.

Extra credit done and turned in

Project was presented by the class and I'm in charge of putting it in a paper. A potential candidate has been sent to the class for approval. I think there are some errors so it's not done yet, but it's very close and isn't actually due till tomorrow.

Physics, got some homework and a lab to finish writing up, but that isn't due till Tuesday so while it needs to be done there isn't the huge stress.

I really can get a lot done when I put my mind to it!

The House is Clean!

Now, I've never been known for being a neat freak, in fact I tend to give neat freaks panic attacks. However I have certain thresholds of clutter and other thresholds of actual dirt. The dirt and grime threshold would make any neat freak proud, I just don't care much about clutter.

I'm also lazy, so I tend to keep my room just above what pisses me off and then ignore it. Well that all falls apart when I suddenly can't walk or carry anything. Add that to the fact that the dogs sleep with me and you suddenly have a room that is driving me nutty.

So I finally got schedules synced with the place that cleans for me and I'm in heaven. I'm running the roomba all over my room right now. The floors are clean(er) (they need an actual scrubbing but that will be another day), the sheets are changed and my room no longer smells like my dogs. Now I can keep up with the day to day stuff, it was the fact I couldn't do much for a month that had me all creeped out.

On the top of my list of things I want to do when I have an income again, have professionals come in at least once a month (more if I can afford it) and do all the cleaning I don't like doing.

Now it's laundry time, my roommate will carry it all upstairs for me but I can do the 'inbetween' stuff. I study much better when it's not icky in here.

Find out if you're registered

http://my.barackobama.com/vfc

It asks for your email address and I did get an email from them because I didn't actually finish the process and they were making sure everything is alright. It also asks for your address because that is how it checks to see if you're registered. I have no received any mail from the campaign and I believe they don't store the address but I can't swear to it so I wanted to mention it. You can give them a bogus email but it would be a waste to give them a false address.

Here is the email they sent me

Dear Ester,

Make sure your voice will be heard You're receiving this message because you recently visited VoteForChange.com, our one-stop website that lets you check your registration status, register to vote, apply for an absentee ballot, or find your early vote location -- all in just a few minutes.

Our records indicate you didn't complete the process all the way through.

If you got all the information you needed, great. We hope it was helpful.

But if not, and you stopped for some other reason, take three minutes and finish the process today.

Visit VoteForChange.com and make sure your voice will be heard on Election Day, November 4th:

http://my.barackobama.com/vfc

Your friends and family may not know about this easy way to register -- please pass this message along to everyone you know and make sure they're registered!

Taking this step is one of the most important things a voter can do to bring about the change we need.

Thanks for visiting VoteForChange.com, and for all that you do,

Obama for America

And it had a donate button on the bottom, but wasn't actually asking for donations. Anyway it's important for everyone to be registered and they say later on they'll even have the address of where you're supposed to go to vote.

Parking and crankyness due to ankle pain

So I was running a bit late today and got down to campus about 10 mins before class started. Due to the lack of parking I emailed my prof telling her I would most likely be late.

I drove around for half an hour and didn't find a spot. I have a parking placard so I can park anywhere (including timed spaces) except red zones and there was nothing that was close enough. I did get a bit picky and decided to not park half a mile away because damn it, my foot hurts.

So I came home. I've got an ice pack on my foot and I'm about to email my prof and apologize but I'm really not going to hobble half a mile because of the lack of parking. If I was willing to do that I'd take the public transportation down, but the stop is too far away from my class and I'm not up for walking that far yet, even with the crutches.

So I'm going to study a bit from home and then work on Database stuff till class tonight. The parking placard was supposed to make things easier, but it doesn't when not only are all the handicap spaces full but the other ones are too.

Physics and eternal Database setup

Physics test wasn't great, I have to keep reminding myself that I only HAVE to get a C so it will tranfer, but it's a pride point to get a good grade! I also have to remember that this class isn't four weeks, there are other tests and places to earn credit.

I'm working through last week's homework and decided I needed to take the (literally) hours of set up to install the programs I need to do this correctly. Add that to the tutorials to learn more of Microsoft's programs and it looks like I haven't gotten much done today, but I really have!

The goal is to either finish last week's database homework or make huge inroads into it with all of the tools set up and understood. Then I need to (also today) put the framework of the second Physics lab into digital format and get the calculations done.

I need to eat somewhere in there too....