Friday, December 20, 2013

I Take the "I" Out of iPhone

As time goes on, I am increasingly challenged on my decision not to have a smart phone.

Sometimes the issue comes up when someone sees my phone.

Sometimes the issue comes up when I ask for directions to a location ("Let's all meet at [restaurant name]. What do you mean, 'Where is it'?  Just look it up.").  

Sometimes the issue comes up when I have to correct an underlying assumption ("We can just require every employee to complete their lab safety inspection using an iPhone app on their personal phones.")

My slide phone (and landline) are generally met with an incredible level of disbelief.  It is never accepted without question.  Normally there is a barrage of questions about my reasons and motives, none of which are satisfactory.  So, to organize my own thoughts, and prepare for the next onslaught, here are the reasons I do not have a smart phone.

1.  I am cheap.  

There is no denying that my current phone plan is cheap.  I'm on a family plan with my parents which costs $20-$30 a month depending on which additional line I am considered.  Since my dad refuses to bill me, whenever I visit my parents I slip a twenty into his wallet and softly call out what I'm doing to which he replies "Okay, sure!" because his hearing aids aren't in and he's pretending he can hear me.

2.  I don't need another distraction.

Trust me, I waste plenty of time on the Internet as it is.  Between 10 pm and 11 pm, I spend a good half hour to 45 minutes consciously procrastinating going to bed by reading news and joke websites.  It's stupid and I know it but I do it every single day.  Plus, I'll admit I've been spending a ludicrous amount of time playing Jurassic Park Builder on the Nexus tablet I won at a conference (notice a theme of me being reluctant to pay for technology for myself).  I've been going into work around 20 minutes later than usual for the past six months just so I can poke at dinosaurs and collect their dino coins.  If I had dinosaurs in my palm all the time?  I can't even imagine.

3.  I would rely on it as a social crutch


Like everyone else.

4.  I own a GPS

Everyone, when trying to explain how useful a smart phone is, mentions maps.  Funny thing, that's what a GPS does.  Without a monthly subscription cost.

5.  I want to leave work at work

Because of the nature of my job, I'm on call for manufacturing 24/7 for a big chunk of the year.  I also frequently work weekends or holidays because cell culture experiments work that way.  Having a smart phone capable of having work email all the time would mean I have work email in the little time I currently have away from work.  I don't want the capability or the expectation that work invade every hour of the day.

6.  I want to leave email at work

Because my work requires so much email, I've started to feel like email is work.  Even to people I like.  There are a few people, like my friends from high school and my family, who I think "get" me enough that I can write in my natural voice, but with most other personal emails I have to exert a day job level of effort to avoid inadvertently sounding bitter or sarcastic.  

Sarcasm is my first language.  Polite and chipper is a hard-won second.

7.  I charge my phone around twice a week

Not all the time that it's not in my hand.  Not in the car.  Not with a borrowed charger at a party.  My phone battery lasts over four days, and that's only when it gets down to 60% and I charge it because I paranoid and always think of a massive emergency scenario where I'm forced to evacuate my home and would want enough cell phone charge to call my family.  

This is also why I fill my car with gas when it reaches the half tank.

8.  I want to be aware of the world around me

I feel time.  I wait in lines.  I read books on buses.  I remember things rather than Instagram things.  


9.  I don't want to carry something that expensive around all the time

If I lose my phone, it's not the end of the world.  Or the end of my paycheck.

10.  I don't want to be the most important person in my life

I'm part of what is probably the last generation that will remember a time before Facebook.  I've seen the Internet and social media twist slowly from an experimental realm you used to discover new things to a space where everyone carefully crafts an image of themselves, carefully choosing what to share, what to show off.  I'm starting to hear "Look at me!  Look at me!  Look at me!" reverberate inside my head when I look at Facebook or Instagram.  If we all think only about ourselves, what we'll post, how many likes we'll get, where do other people fit into our lives except as backup players on our stage (or likers to our posts, commenters on our status)?  I don't want my life to be all about me.  We're all players on the stage but it's not my stage.  

And I don't want a device in my hand that implies otherwise.






Sunday, July 14, 2013

Giving Drugs to Strangers

Several years ago I told myself that I couldn't let fear of social awkwardness thwart my charitable instincts.  I have to repeat it to myself sometimes when I think I can help but don't want to because it might be weird.  So then I'll do it.  And it is always weird.

Today I was on a flight back from Atlanta and it sounded like a man a few rows up was asking for medicine from a flight attendant.  The flight attendant offered him Tylenol, but said she didn't expect it to help his son's ears.  A woman in the row ahead of him mimed holding her nose and forcing air into her ears as a method that might help.  While it seemed like the man was getting plenty of input about his son's ear pain, I had a sack full of drugs I thought I should offer.

When I flew back from Munich the first time, I had a cold I had caught toward the end of my trip.  That plane flight was misery; my nose was running the whole time, I couldn't sleep, and the pressure forced junk into my ears so bad that I got an ear infection and spent the whole next week recovering.  But that time when I went to the doctor for the ear infection they didn't hand out antibiotics like candy (which I appreciate) but they told me to take Sudafed for several days to dry up the mucus and give my ears a chance to heal themselves.

This trip, when I was heading to Atlanta, I was at the tail end of a cold but I didn't want to take any chances.  I brought two packages of Sudafed (the good, behind-the-counter, show-your-ID, assure-the-pharmacist-you-won't-make-meth kind), a whole bottle of Benadryl (dual purpose since I was staying with a friend with a cat, which I'm allergic to), and a bottle of lorataine (also for the cat).

So I went up to the man with my box of Sudafed and offered it to him.  When I got to their row I could see his son had tears streaming down his face, indicating why they'd gone to the lengths of asking a flight attendant for meds.  I tried to explain what Sudafed was, that I had previously had a doctor indicate it for mucus getting into the ears, and I tried to make him read the back of the box including contraindications.  But he seemed to be foreign and I wasn't sure if he could read the box and I'm pretty sure "contraindications" wasn't in the vocabulary.  After the lady one row ahead had chimed in that she thought it would be better to try the Sudafed before the Tylenol he had given a tablet to his son before I really knew what was happening.

And that is how I came to give drugs to strangers.

Of course, after this, I worried that I shouldn't have done that and kept watching to see if I could confirm the kid was 1. moving 2. breathing and since he was in a seat I couldn't see then I wondered what kind of trouble I would be in if he did have a negative reaction.  But not too long after he was trading seats with his sisters and going down the aisle dry-eyed.  When his father passed me on his way to the restroom he said "After he took your tablet it was like a miracle.  Now he is fine!"

And that is how taking drugs from strangers turned out well for someone once.  A story which should never be repeated to any impressionable young children.

Tuesday, April 30, 2013

A Bit of Unusual

I frequently feel like I am the weirdest moment in other people's day.

For instance, I recently went to the doctor because one of my pinky toes has been turning sideways and feels funny.  I figured I needed new orthotics for my shoes and was looking for a referral to a podiatrist but instead I was sent for X-rays and an MRI of the lower spine because my toes tingled when the doctor raised my leg, a "positive sciatic test".  Anyway, my HMO puts you through a whole rigmarole before the doctor will talk to you about your actual problem, checking on all your medications, weighing you with your shoes, coat, and purse still on you, etc.

This time, the nurse asked about my activity level.
Me: Well, according to my Fitbit I've been doing over 10,000 steps a day.
Nurse: [Lengthy silence while she stares motionless at the computer screen]
Me: Is there not a field for that? You could just say 20 minutes.

Then, later, when scheduling the MRI the clerk made me answer the gamut of questions to see if I'd want to sue them after the MRI.

Clerk: Have you ever had surgery on your heart, where they might have inserted something metal like a pacemaker?
Me: No.
Clerk: Have you ever had surgery on your head, where they might have inserted something metal like a metal plate?
Me: No.
Clerk: Have you ever had surgery to implant anything in your ears, where they might have inserted something like a cochlear implant?
Me: No.
Clerk: Have you ever had surgery on your eyes?
Me: No.
Clerk: Have you ever had surgery to repair a broken bone, where they might have inserted surgical pins or screws?
Me: No.
Clerk: Have you ever had any surgery at all?
Me: No. [Pause.] Is that in case they left something inside you during surgery?
Clerk: [Confused look at the questionnaire.]  I never thought about that before!

Monday, April 8, 2013

Pinteresting

Maybe it's because of who I follow, but I've noticed the things on Pinterest fall into a few distinct categories.

1.  Pretty pictures of wishlist type things - travel destinations, quaint forest cabins, fairy gardens, etc.
2.  Household hints that simply cannot all work ("Replace every cleaning product ever with an equimolar and therefore neutralized solution of white vinegar and baking soda!")
3.  Beauty tips, nail polish colors, outfit ideas, hairstyles
4.  Ludicrous, delicious-looking foods

This is partly why I think that men don't use Pinterest.  The other reason is that I did the math and men don't use Pinterest

While I'm happy seeing the first three pass me by, I did want to try some of the foods.  But really, when are you going to ever bake an Oreo in a chocolate cookie in a brownie in a tiramisu?  I wanted an excuse to cook some of the ludicrous foods so I threw a Pinterest-themed party.

Sadly, I forgot to photograph the food.  This is the closest I came:


Here you can see the pulled pork sliders, pigs in blankets, pizza dip, the ham and potato pancakes, the macaroni and cheese with tater tots, and the "cross between alfredo, lasagna, and mac'n'cheese".  Along with the guacamole-stuffed eggs that came later that made up the the savory dishes.  

The desserts I didn't get any pictures of but they were the stars.  We had Tofutti pumpkin cheesecake, pistachio toffee, Butterfinger blondies, brownies with peanut butter cups and marshmallow fluff, homemade peanut butter cups, and apple dumplings made with crescent rolls, Mountain Dew, and Nectresse.  

There were also activities.  I set up a craft station in the guest bedroom with things to glue on magnets and the ten Biblical plagues hand puppet kit I had.  My friend Jen brought her daughter Mariella who made this gem:



That is the puppet for the wild animals plague.  According to Mariella it's going to a birthday party.  It's so cute.

I also made a pinata.


I learned a few things about pinatas.  For instance, they have an upper weight limit on the candy you put in them.  And then, if you're butting up against the upper weight limit on your pinata, you should take that into consideration when you're having it.



Yes, that is a grand total of three feet off the ground.

Still, it did take three adults for it to break open.





And after spending probably 15 working hours making a pinata it was gratifying to see adults sprint for the candy and fruit snacks.  


Thursday, February 28, 2013

Intensity

Going to Georgia Tech means that you pass on at least 50% of the typical college experience.

Or that's what I gather from television.

There's the normal stuff like too many drunken parties and football.  But besides the rampant nerdiness what seems dissimilar is the sheer amount of work.

My memory of college is moving into a dorm in the fall, going to marching band practice and the football games, holding a few board game nights with my roommates and our friends, taking a 3-4 day trip somewhere over Spring Break, and until we moved out in the spring we were otherwise either going to class or doing homework or working on a group project for the rest of our waking hours.  That's how it was for everyone.  Of course there were a few activities, like my roommates and I would normally select a few television shows we would watch together (Gilmore Girls, Grey's Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, Lost, and Heroes over the years).  But oftentimes one or more of us would either do homework during the show or not watch it at all in order to do work.  The constant state of being was work, such that someone who was not doing work was actively and mindfully taking a break from work in order to work harder when they returned.  There was not "free time" - there were activities deliberately carved out of work time to prevent insanity.  But sometimes you couldn't afford even that and you just went insane.

And all that work didn't mean anything if you didn't know your stuff.  There might have been A-for-effort classes at Tech but I didn't get to take them.  Professors made it clear that classes weren't graded on the premise everyone started at As and they took points off.  No, everyone started at an F and had to earn points to get to an A.  I actually took very few classes where points had any absolute meaning.  In most of my engineering classes everything was graded on a curve, so you did not need a certain amount of points to get an A - you needed to get more points than everyone else to get an A.

One class that didn't use a curve was Physical Chemistry II, which was the quantum mechanics class.  I took that class the year it was at 8 am, and the professor was the hairiest man I've ever seen.  In that class, getting 33% of the questions right on the test was a C.  An A was 66%.  I think that demonstrated well how impossible the material was that no one could know 100% of it.

When the workload at Tech got especially bad, like at the end of a semester when projects were due and everyone was studying for final exams and you had to move out of your dorm room within 24 hours of your last test so you had to pack your entire room while you studied, there was a special state you could get into that I can only describe as "intense".  It was a single minded focus on the tasks at hand with a cold and efficient prioritization of all the other features of your life.  Your mind became hypervigilant and you could lay almost all emotion aside and solely work.  Everything fell by the wayside.  You would know exactly how long you could go without doing laundry, without eating, without buying food, without taking out the trash, so you could work as long as possible before having to waste time on those things.  You would say no to friends and fun with no regret or guilt.  It was all gone.  You were just an automaton with one goal: survival.

Since college, the intensity has been very rare.  But now it's back, and it's almost comforting.  Being a single-minded extremely busy automaton is way better than being a pretty busy worrywart.  Cold, hard, and focused.

I will say, it's easier to deal with when you have a car, your own washing machine, and enough money to buy convenience foods.

Monday, February 25, 2013

Quieting the Voices

Sometimes I wonder if the way I think is fundamentally different from others'.

The first time I realized this might be true was in college, when I was having dinner with my roommate Karen.

The cafeteria that night had a chicken enchilada casserole.  We remarked to each other that it was actually quite good, then we each concentrated on eating for a few minutes, after which I volunteered, "I wouldn't care if there were insects ground up in here as long as I couldn't taste or feel them."

To Karen, this statement came out of left field and she made me explain my train of thought.

First, I had thought of how the chicken enchilada casserole was the least adulterated form of meat the cafeteria had offered in a long time.  The chicken was therefore the purest protein we had recently eaten.

Then I thought that chicken was actually one of the most efficient meat-producing animals.

Then I thought of how insects are actually the most efficient meat-producing animals, in terms of how much of what they eat is converted to meat.

Then I thought of how despite that insect meat isn't cost effective because there isn't a big enough industry to have economies of scale.

Then I thought how McDonald's is accused of padding their meat with things like insects but that wouldn't be logical because insects are more expensive.

Then I thought I wouldn't mind if more traditional forms of meat were padded with more efficient protein sources like insects as long as the taste, safety, or gustatory experience was not compromised.

When I explained that to Karen, she said, "That whole time all I was thinking was 'Mmm, food'."

What I wonder about now is if my thought processes influence my need for near constant audio distractions.  Over the years I've realized that the only time I don't want noise is when I'm talking with someone or writing and need to be able to concentrate on my mental narrative.  Otherwise, I prefer to have music or TV in the background or my brain gets impatient and it will choose to create its own, often pointless narrative which takes the form of endless worrying or complex and sarcastic Facebook posts.  At work, data analysis and lab work practically demand music or my brain is going to zone out and I'll make mistakes.  It's almost as if I don't get "quiet" - my brain will provide the noise itself so I get more effective "quiet" with actual noise.

One of my main disappointments with alcohol (besides the heartburn it gives me) is that it does nothing to quiet my brain.  I would be very interested in a product that could shut my brain up sometimes.

Friday, February 22, 2013

Lessons

Things I have learned the hard way:


Doorknobs: you have to turn them before they work.

Nail polish remover is capable of dissolving some scissors.

Vegetable stock, made in the crockpot, can putrefy if you let it cook longer than the recommended time.  The smell will wake you up from a dead sleep.

"Container compatibility issue" means "that bottle of sodium hydroxide is going to dissolve on your desk".

If it tastes rotten, stop eating.

If you are the youngest, most junior, and only female employee in a room, don't do anything they tell you without checking with your boss first.

Never serve salad dressing out of a cow creamer.  You will never get the garlic out of the hollow legs.

Apple pie, muffins, and toffee are all flammable.

If your date ever says "I don't know how I'm going to explain [you being here] to my roommates", leave.  Leave right then.

When you're somewhere unfamiliar, double check that the icon on the bathroom door has a skirt.

When it doubt, don't mix that chemical with bleach.

If you mix that chemical with bleach anyway, do it in the fresh air.

Just because you splash things in lab into your mouth all the time doesn't mean that anyone else does.  Stop mentioning it out loud.




Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Sick Day

Today is my first sick day in a long time.  I don't always make the best decisions at 3 AM, but this is a good one.

It took a while though.  When I started feeling bad in bed my brain thought it would be most effective to explain the discomfort through a dream.  The dream started explaining that I had a troublesome genetically modified cell line at work and it was giving me grief.  The rest of my brain wasn't with it enough to figure out that there is no possible way a cell line can give you a stomachache, but it did know that lately I hadn't been working with any troublesome cell lines.  After a while all of my brain finally clued in that this wasn't a problem with any of the eight cell lines it kept listing in my brain by name, and that the problem was me.

By 6 AM I had already gone through my entire day's schedule and knew I wouldn't miss anything too major if I didn't go to work.  Yesterday I had somehow had a very awesome day of getting things done so today's agenda was mostly make a set of slides even prettier and review two short documents I already had requested access to, printed, and tracked down ancient comparitors for.  While I wasn't sleeping I also had already mentally composed the emails to my boss and my reports so I fired those off too.

I know at work we're not required to say what we're sick with (and if I remember my manager training right your boss can't ask either).  But I volunteered that it was food poisoning 1) because I'm suspicious of the shrimp curry we had at our lunch meeting and 2) I think you get fewer emails if everyone pictures you barfing than sitting sedately on the couch drinking tea and wiping your nose every once in a while.  I don't know why I always think the lunch meeting food is going to someday poison everyone, but if it does, I want them to have all the information they need.  What? Everyone but the vegetarians are out sick today? Call the health department!

Or report it anonymously online!  I found that website once and work is technically in San Mateo County too.

Once several of us agreed that the two giant key lime cheesecakes at our meeting hadn't agreed with us, but that was more likely the unexpected richness than anything microbial.  That was back when we used to get two giant cheesecakes or a sheet cake for 10 people.  I wonder why that stopped.  That must have been a different caterer.  Plus, I see how the food is delivered about an hour early, and how the leftovers get sit out all afternoon.  I'm kind of surprised we don't have more food poisoning, actually.

But in truth, I probably gave this to myself.  Most of the leftovers I ate last night were only five days old but before dinner I snacked on an English muffin and I used butter from a butter dish I had only recently unearthed, and it didn't taste quite right.  Unsalted butter never tastes quite right, spread on things, which is why I was using old butter dish butter because I was hoping it dated back to when I had bought salted butter (yes, I realize how stupid this is as I write it).  But it was unsalted too.  And might have been a little rancid.

Once I can stand to stand I'll clean out the fridge.  Protect me from myself.

Saturday, February 16, 2013

How to Facebook

If I had my way, Facebook would be different.

Instead of:
I'm in the ER again! OMG, what's going on?
It would be:
I'm in the emergency room for the third time this week for chest pain. The doctors have eliminated heart attack and angina. Today I'm in for an imaging procedure.  I would appreciate your thoughts and prayers during this time.

Instead of:
Well, guess what?  ____ and I are having a baby in August!  That's what happens when you can't take birth control pills.
It would be:
____ and I are expecting a baby in August!  We're thrilled.

Instead of:
My #$%^&* husband left today.  How am I going to explain to our four kids that Daddy just doesn't love Mommy anymore?
It would be:



Instead of:
[Below a photo of a newborn] One year. Miss you my angel!
It would be:
One year ago today my brother and his wife moved to Saint Louis.  I miss my little niece so much!


Otherwise I spend too much time worrying people's future children are going to find out horrible crap from future Facebook archives, or that someone is dying in the ER, or that a baby died. 

Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Decision Making

I greatly enjoy that Tuesday is garbage day.

This is not because I like taking out the garbage.

I have always disliked taking out the garbage.  In college taking out the garbage was one of the contentious chores between the roommates: we all hated doing it and unlike mopping the kitchen floor, scrubbing the shower, or wiping down the stove, we couldn't ignore it for entire school years at a time.  Living in a seven-person apartment made the garbage situation even more unpleasant, especially because the various randomly-assigned roommates who filled the spare bedrooms when true friends were gone for some semesters tended to do things like fill an entire trashcan with pizza boxes and beer bottles and then disappear into their room never to talk to us again for eight months (yes, that happened).

But taking out the garbage became a new height of difficulty after I graduated and lived alone for the first time.  The trash in college was an unpleasant game of chicken where someone would eventually decide nothing more could balance on top of the can.  Living alone, the issue was not volume.  It was smell.

To explain this I might need to explain a bit of how engineers think.  I don't have experience with it personally, but I imagine normal people make decisions based on a few straight-forward axes.  "What do I want to do?"  "What do I need to do?"  "If I want to do it, can I do it?"  "If I don't want to do it, can I delay it?" Etc.  Engineers have an additional criteria which complicates everything else.

Efficiency.

Efficiency can by itself be variable.  Do you want to be efficient in time usage?  Cost?  Effort?  Engineers know that it is unlikely you can have all at once, so the decision become which type of efficiency is more important in any given situation.

Left alone to my own devices, the garbage became a problem of inefficiency that I couldn't solve.

The main problem was that I didn't generate enough trash to fill the can before it began to smell.  I deemed it inefficient to take out the trash before it was full.  This is because taking out a partly full bag of trash was inefficient in all variables - time, cost, and effort.  I would have to take the trash out more often.  I would have to buy more trash bags.  And the trash bins were far on the other side of my complex, down a flight a stairs.

So the smell became the enemy.  I tried freezing food scraps to prevent them from rotting in the trash, but some scraps inevitably made it to the trash anyway.  I tried buying the odor blocking crystals touted by the radio morning show I listen to.  I tried buying scented trash bags.  I tried buying scent-blocking trash bags.  I tried double-bagging the trash can and then tying off the inner bag when it started to smell.

Nothing worked.  I was left with an inefficient system where I played chicken with myself of how long I could stand the smell of the trash.

I lost that game, over and over.

But now that I moved, Tuesday is garbage day.  Tuesday is the day the truck comes to pick up the garbage, so Monday is the night I have to move the trash cans to the front.  And since I have to move the trash cans to the front, I might as well use that day to take the trash out from the house.  There is unlikely any true efficiency benefit, since I spend more time taking out the trash, and I take out partially full bags of trash more now than ever.  But my perception is that I am "getting my money's worth" much more by having trash in the bin at the curb each week so that my $17 a month doesn't go to waste.  Monday comes and without question, I will empty the recycling and the trash into their bins and wheel them to the curb.

Sometimes I just really, really, really like to be told what to do.

Sunday, January 27, 2013

Color Conundrums

My system for picking paint colors is horrible and inefficient.

The first rash of painting in my house was done before I moved in, and the colors were selected as follows.

Living room:
Looked at gray paint chips, two samples, chose the lighter one. Boom - living room is painted Bay Waves by Valspar.

Verdict:  Love it.  This is the right gray to go with my eccentric green couch, massive Ikea pussy willow print, and to blend into the dining room color.

Dining room:
Endless pouring over blue paint chips, two samples, chose the darker one. Boom - dining room is painted Tinsel Beam by Valspar.


Verdict:  Love it.  This is a great light blue on the edge of slate blue which blends seamlessly with the living room gray.

Bedroom:
Sorted through green paint chips, one sample of sage green, it looked like puke.  Scrambled to choose a second paint chip, got a sample, thought it was okay.  Bedroom is Desert Seedling by Valspar.


Verdict:  Like it.  It's a good girly mint green, but I had intended more of a sage green.  I also find this green hard to accessorize or match with anything because I don't shop a lot and I'm an engineer.

Craft room:
Endless pouring over yellow paint chips, two samples of butter yellow, chose the darker one, Maple Cream by Valspar. 


Verdict:  It's too dark.  This room is very small (that desk is the actual width of the room) and it's also dark - that window is under a porch.  I also used satin paint, which was too shiny for a small room too.  If I repaint this room (and I might) it would be two to three shades light, in eggshell finish at the shiniest.  This room's walls also have an issue where the paint will stick to anything that leans against it.  If I repaint I would investigate super-duper primer like the VOC-heavy, this-might-be-the-most-ethanol-intoxicated-I've-ever-been BIN Zinsser shellac-base primer I used on the kitchen cabinets.  That stuff seems to penetrate well, and for this room it would have to get through not only the two coats of Valspar primer and two coats of Valspar paint put on during my ownership of the house but also the blue paint I was covering up, and however many layers are between the blue and the pink layer that shows up after the peeling.


The next wave of painting was for the third bedroom.  Since I wasn't under the time-crunch of having to move in, this time I wanted to make sure I chose the right color.  I wanted a warm, ocean blue to cover up the horror of the icy toothpaste green the walls and trim (the musty, unpleasant upholstery in this photo was ripped out far before I got around to painting):



Third bedroom:
Endless pouring over blue and teal and green paint chips.  No fewer than six samples.  Maybe more.  Maybe I didn't photograph all the samples.  Maybe I don't want to go to the shed and count the sample containers.  In any case, I settled on Behr Aqua Spray, adjusted to 75%.


Verdict:  I like it, but it's not what I intended.  I wanted it to be slightly greener.  It's also darker than it should be.  But this room is big enough that it's not too dark.  So it's good, it works.  And this room taught me that if you're trying to paint something white that wasn't previously white, like that trim, use primer!  Three coats of paint, all done with an artist's brush by hand, shaping out that inexplicably wave-shaped trim.  I thought that green wasn't very dark but it was.  It was.



Kitchen:

Benjamin Moore doesn't sell samples.  I had decided to use their Advance paint, so I would have would be chips.  So I taped some paint chips on the cabinets, liked Marscapone, bought it.  Choosing the wall color was a cycle of taping paint chips next to the tile, choosing three samples, mulling over it, choosing the one I had liked first on the chips, Benjamin Moore's Everlasting (which I remember as "Perdurable" which was the Spanish name on the chip).


Verdict: These were just the right colors.  The white is not too white, the tan is warm and is bold enough to offset the amount of white cabinets, and to draw away from the bold tile.  I'm very pleased with how these turned out.


The next painting job was the bathroom.  Choosing a bathroom color was difficult because the tile and linoleum are black and white, and I couldn't decide what color went with them.  Yes, they're neutrals but still certain colors "go" better.  I can't explain it, color is something I'm weird about.  I've read that women who are carriers for color-blindness, like I am, might actually see an expanded palette of colors, which might explain it.  The bathroom was also difficult because I had to see past the dolphins:


That wallpaper border is dolphins, the shower curtain was a double-layer thick of dolphins, the robe hooks were shaped like dolphins, and the light fixtures were Baroque gold.

The color decision for the bathroom went something along the lines of "I like green.  I'll do green."  Choosing the paint color went like this:

Bathroom:
Looked for green/black/white bathrooms online.  Couldn't find many.  Looked at color suggestions on Young House Love, liked their previous nursery color.  Poured over paint chips.  Got two samples: one the Celery Sticks Young House Love used, one a similar Benjamin Moore color.  Liked Celery Sticks but after the third bedroom experience thought it might be too dark so I went to Home Depot and asked for a 50% lighter sample.  It was twice as dark as the original.  Argued with the guy behind the counter.  He re-made it three times and it kept turning out darker.  I refused to pay for any of the samples and left, never to return to the San Carlos Home Depot again.  Went to the San Mateo Home Depot, they made a sample that at least was lighter but now looked like a different color (much more yellow).  Made my own 75% sample by mixing the two previous samples, it was okay but I was indecisive and just went, "To heck with it.  I like Celery Sticks, just do Celery Sticks".  So the bathroom is Celery Sticks.






Verdict:  Freaking love it.  This is my favorite paint color in the house.  A lot of the other colors I chose because they're nice or sophisticated or they coordinate with what they need to coordinate with.  But this green is for me.  I love green and this is the right green.


What I've learned from all this is to go with my gut.  If I like it, I'll like it.  If I think too hard I might not make the right choice.  Since I'm the person who has to live with it, it's my opinion that matters.

I've also learned that contrary to what you would think, any color will look better once it's over a giant wall.  Not sure how that works.

Friday, January 4, 2013

Discounted

Sometimes there's an exact moment when you realize why something ended up at the outlet store.

Today I got this jacket I like at the Gap Outlet in Milpitas.



Then I was curious about whether the zipper could go all the way up and discovered the placement of those snaps that hold down the collar wings.


Hello, extra nipples.  Hello, way in which I will never wear this jacket.  It's weird to meet you.
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Thursday, January 3, 2013

Statistics

My parents did a very good job of raising me to be race-blind, which has resulted in some social embarrassment ("Why are they casting an Asian actress for Cho Chang in the Harry Potter movies?  Isn't she blonde?" "What do you mean the guy who plays Morpheus in The Matrix is African-American?").  But lately I've realized that I have some deeply held prejudices on male/female behavior.  Well, mostly male behavior.  And it's not many.  Mostly it boils down to these two.

1. Single men do not own cats.
2. Men do not use Pinterest.

I don't know where the cat one came from.  Maybe because it's always crazy old cat ladies.  Multiple cats are the sign of female spinsterhood.  Maybe it's because I went out with one guy who turned out to have cats and he was the most immature, tied-to-the-apron-strings person over 30 years old that I have ever met.  And of course there are exceptions.  Men, as part of a couple or a family, can of course own cats.  There just has to be a woman or a child as part of the equation for it to be normal.  Alternately, if a single man had inherited a cat from a relative and his ownership of the cat was keeping the cat he already knew and loved from death or stranger adoption, then sure, that's fine. 

The Pinterest one I wasn't sure of.  So I had to figure it out.  Why did I think men don't use Pinterest?  Just because everything I see on there is about crafting, cooking, decorating, cleaning, and exercising?  I noticed that Pinterest knew exactly how many of my Facebook friends were on Pinterest.  I know how many Facebook friends I have, so that was pretty simple math.  With the data set of my Facebook friends I found that:

44% of my female friends had a Pinterest account
10% of my male friends did

Of those with Pinterest accounts,

23% of my female friends were inactive
59% of my male friends were

where inactivity was defined as accounts with fewer than 20 pins and no activity within four weeks.  So in total,

34% of my female friends actively used Pinterest
4% of my male friends did

If I also eliminated accounts with no activity within five months, only 2% of my male friends were active on Pinterest.  Of those four, two are artists, one uses it for his travel business, and the last one is my cousin.  Three of those four are married.

So that's why I don't think men use Pinterest.  Because 98% of them don't.

Good job, brain.  Now work on remembering how doorknobs work.