talisyn

This is a great time of the year to have a birthday! I hope you had a good one

You know, it's that kind of attitude that makes me glad teachers are generally unarmed.

I have the best thoughts at work, but I forget them all in the little surge of adrenaline the moment my time card goes through at the end of shift. I spent about 2 hours last week wondering how come I could lift over 6,000 lbs of chopped onions and green and red peppers in increments of 30 lbs for 12 hours, but I find it hard to pick Christmas ornaments off the floor. I gave up on the answer and moved all the ornaments out of Gwenzilla reach :)

How would you like to get from San Diego to Seattle in 8 hours? World's longest fast train line opens in China - Yahoo! News I would love it if the USA had the kind of infrastructure to allow these kind of train travel times. Minus the bribes and dead bodies... Maybe the reason we don't is attitude of 'We have planes, we don't need trains!'?

Well, that kind of mentality worked so well in the last 4 years from the republican side

Our teachers have had wages cut for years, and now the national debate is should they carry guns in the classroom? Let's reinstate their regular pay before asking them to take on this huge responsibility.

I need to find the book again, I didn't remember them ever meeting Elrond. Thanks ^^

Rivendell was in The Hobbit? I don't recall that..there was an elf city but it was a different group of elves. In fact, it was Legolas' group that Bilbo and co. met up with, wasn't it? Because Legolas was from the deep forest elves..gah I'm such a nerd. If it ended up with the group looking at Smaug's mountain then they must have met up with Beorn. Was that a good portrayal of the shape-shifter? He was one of my favorite characters.

If Genie had been a boy she would have been named Calvin ^^

See, mom, I told you this one would take off PC, this is actually a lot closer to what a union is suppose to do than a lot of what has been discussed in this thread. People talk and talk about collective bargaining and contracts, but it is much more basic and personal than that. A union member has a right, because of dues paid, to a knowledge base of state, federal, and local laws governing wages, work conditions, et al. Yes, everyone should know their rights and be able to argue for them effectively. But sometimes it's easy to forget laws when you're under pressure. Like when you are called into your supervisor's office and questioned about something (anything) dealing with your job, and your supervisor just happens to be going through a bitter divorce/15 year old daughter just announced her pregnancy/some idiot plowed into his/her new car right before work/horrible toothache it's a welcome relief to be able to say 'I think we should ask the Shop steward about this question'. The time it takes to get the union rep into the office is usually spent dialing down the tension, and a 3rd party who is not involved in the situation but is authorized by both company and employees to arbitrate can be extremely effective in making everyone see everyone's point. I'm glad everyone here is so smart and cool that they don't need that kind of help. I, personally, have seen grown men and women leave their supervisor's office in tears because of unfair business practices. I have seen people specifically targeted for removal of position for nothing more than the boss wants someone else in that job. This has happened at both my current job and when I worked for the Evil Empire. The difference being, at the Evil Empire they could only go up the store chain of command, and those individuals were quick to point out 'at-will employment'. But where I work now a good steward will be sure to mention all those pesky laws like the ones regarding unemployment for unfair termination (even in Idaho) and often that helps cooler heads prevail. A good steward will also be sure to point out the decades of great production, the awesome cost-saving ideas a few months ago, and low absentee rate. Same Right to Work state, often times different results. Now, I'm not saying that every time a shop steward is called in the employee is saved lol. A lot of times the employee either did do something or did not prevent an event, that deserves a warning or termination. But a lot of times they didn't. A good union will be able to help both the employees and company. This is long, and I apologize. It's hard to think and type clearly after a 12 hr shift while nursing a 2 yr old monkey who likes to poke her toes up my nose But I hope it helps to explain that people are the same as they were back in the dawn of the Industrial Age when almost everyone now says 'unions were needed then...' , and I believe that until Christ comes in all His glory there will be those willing to exploit people's desires to feed and clothe and shelter their families (and take them to Disneyland. Nothing wrong with working for a middle-class life). *cough*evilempire*cough*

I don't know, BrioCyrain. I would like to know why my awesome sister hasn't had a date in years. What with all the single LDS guys in the area. Seriously, why is it hard for good LDS singles to date?

I found it incredibly interesting that the 'right to work' law in Michigan explicitly does not include police and firefighters. I need to see what Idaho law exempts.

Unions are only as good as the members want them to be. This may be a good wake-up to complacency. When I wrote about polite, I meant sometimes vigilance about things like workplace practices need to be rebooted occasionally. That being said, I think this journalist in question needs to go to more large gatherings and shout interesting questions, in the name of true journalism.

Sometimes polite doesn't work.

If i were president at the end of the world I'd be there, too ^^

You should go on a mission :)

I thought it was 12-12-2012, which was when a sister turns 40. I was just gleeful about it until I heard it was actually 12-22-2012 ><

The right thing is for this child to be put back with her dad, end of story.

I feel your pain. When my 13 yr old daughter was 12 she decided she wanted to be Wiccan and proceeded to tell me all about how Christians co-opted major pagan events. I was then able to talk to her about Latter-day and Early-day Saints and how, if there have been people preaching about Christ since the beginnings, then Mithra et al were a co-op of Christian beliefs. I had fun, and she got something to chew on. And she still has to go to church with us

The parties are tools of our corporate overlords. Until their power is curtailed any plebian discussion of political parties is moot. Wow I'm cranky. I'm off to find a wild chocolate candy Santa and redistribute it's head to my stomach.

This case was messed up in regards to the father. He should have been given back his child immediately. Wasn't there another similar case recently, involving parents who were not married, but the father desperately wanted his baby? Anyone know what happened with it?

I have some breastfeeding-friendly pages in my Facebook feed, and while the vast majority don't show more than a bikini top would, there are a few that I just can't look at lol. But what I noticed was a page would have some pictures and a random person would go on and report every single one as spam or whatever and Facebook automatically takes them off, leaving the admin to protest to get them back up. That is a level of determined weird that I just can't grasp. About babies...Gwendolyn absolutely refused any sort of covering. Sheer, windowed, soft, firm, she hated it all. It didn't have to touch her face, the mere fact that she couldn't pop off and look around at her blurry newborn world would send her off. I got very good at wearing baggy shirts that I could wrap around her body while leaving her head free. I also found really neat nursing tanks. I discovered that when nursing Gwen my brother thought my little roll of tummy chunkiness was my breast, and the nursing tanks took care of that issue. But now that my toddler is 2 she's decided that the Taliban are right about burkas. She loves blankets over her head, loves crawling under my tshirts, and loves nursing in bathrooms. Children are so odd.

I pronounce it 'hwat'. My oldest says 'wat'. I blame texting.

Well, think of it this way: does Genie's great grandkids have a responsibility to do work for Gwen?

I'm going to be the odd one out (nothing new lol) and say that I would have sent my daughter to the birthday party. The kids are 8, and the little girl didn't deliberately ask for her bday to be on Sunday. That's kind've like not allowing your child to have a birthday party on Sunday. No one ever invited family and friends to a Sunday birthday get-together?