The Venting Thread

[apl68]

I guess this one truly does have to do with venting.  Have you heard about the safety pin trick to help reduce static cling from the dryer? Supposedly you attach a couple safety pins to a washcloth, towel, some piece of cloth, and the metal hitting metal inside the dryer should act as "mini lightning rods." 

Would an aluminum foil ball work better?

Is Al very conductive? I thought I remembered it wasn't....but I could be wrong.

Yes, very (about 60% of copper).  Used in certain electrical wiring systems.

I learned that in National Geographic when I was a kid.  You can learn a lot in National Geographic!  I've got to make time to read our copies of it more often.

[apl68]

A lot of illness in our community right now.  Our most beloved Board of Trustees member's wife is now in the hospital, and may need surgery.  And I just learned that a staff member who was off today won't be here tomorrow because her knee is causing her excruciating pain.  She was almost in tears from it.  We'll be okay without her, but I'm worried about her.  This problem seems to be getting worse for her.

[mamselle]

Ouch.

Besides their pain and your concerns for them, it also probably puts more weight on you.

My sister, who keeps trying to retire from her library-director's job--and did so for about 6 months, until the new person got a better position and moved on again--has just finished doing part-time coverage of her old position because they haven't been able to find someone to hire for it, again, yet.

And then a week later, they called and asked if she could cover the front desk per diem because someone's going to be out for surgery, too.

That library has a tether on her, I think...maybe they all do....

M.

[apl68]

Ouch.

Besides their pain and your concerns for them, it also probably puts more weight on you.

My sister, who keeps trying to retire from her library-director's job--and did so for about 6 months, until the new person got a better position and moved on again--has just finished doing part-time coverage of her old position because they haven't been able to find someone to hire for it, again, yet.

And then a week later, they called and asked if she could cover the front desk per diem because someone's going to be out for surgery, too.

That library has a tether on her, I think...maybe they all do....

M.

Sometimes you have periods where multiple people are out at the same time, and it's a scramble to try to cover everything.  The staff we have now is much more reliable than what we've had at times in the past.  It took long years to get such a staff in place.  One reason I know that this worker is truly in great pain is that she is very much NOT the kind of person to fail to show up at the drop of the hat.  Contrast this with a staffer we had some years back who suddenly quit with no notice to follow a boyfriend out of state.  She came back a few months later asking about her old position.  I told her there was no point in asking again after that performance.

[clean]

this morning we get an email from an MBA student trying to register, but dealing with a hold.  All faculty members got an email from this student asking for help.  Why?  Well, it seems that the director of graduate admissions sent a reply that included, and I quote, "I recommend that you reach out to the College of Business and inquire if you could be considered for full admission".  The student followed those directions and emailed the college of business - ALL OF US!! 

I sent a note to the person that sent those instructions that he/she should instead have provided the student with THE solution - contact the MBA Director, NOT the College of Business!!

Well now that asshole is annoyed at me!  Do I know HOW busy they are?  How many people that this office has dealt with this week? 

"Over past 7 days our 2 processors and a director received over 1500 emails not dissimilar to this one. Those emails come in addition to 2700+ application that we processed for Fall 2021 terms alone. We aim at optimizing our services to provide equitable service to every applicant. Our resources are not unlimited, and we need to make choices between providing good service to everyone or best service to a select group. I strive to find that golden middle and in this situation this has been achieved. We pushed back the hold within a short timeframe allowing student to register."

I am SO TIRED of assholes telling me how busy they are!  You know, if you were EFFICIENT, you may actually WORK LESS!    And the answer provided was not only inefficient, it was inaccurate!!  Contact the College of Business is WRONG!  "Contact the MBA Director" is correct and requires LESS TYPING!!!

After my last reply (that they were too busy to be sending stupid replies, admit a mistake was made and take actions to keep it from happening again!) I reread the email and IF I HAVE ANOTEHRR reply to send it will include, something like this:

, it seems that the Director of Graduate Recruitment and Administrations' goal is 'adequate' performance.  Note, "we need to make choices between providing good service to everyone or best service to a select group" .  In this case adequate (my word) or "good service" (his words), fell short!  We should be aiming to do better than "good" and take steps to improve when we fail to even meet the de minimis performance level of "good".  What do they NEED to provide the Best Service to the select group of the people APPLYING TO COME TO THIS SCHOOL?  That "Select Group" SHOULD be getting the best service!! 



what idiots!! 

I now regret even responding, but when an administrator sends students on a 'quest' to find the correct person to help by sending them to 'the college of business' ... ANSWER the damn question, dont say 'look it up'... 

[downer]

Is it just me or did the Blackboard textboxes (powered by TinyDoc) become far too large for everyone?

[the_geneticist]

Canvas has "updated" to include spelling suggestions in the search boxes.  This would be OK except it's automatically changing the name I type into the search field for the grade book.  I don't know if I can turn off this "feature".

[AmLitHist]

I am SO TIRED of assholes telling me how busy they are!  You know, if you were EFFICIENT, you may actually WORK LESS!   

You and me, both, Clean.  For the past 5 years, our chair keeps reminding all of us faculty how incredibly important it is that we leave him and the secretary alone because they're so busy.  With what, exactly?  We barely have 2,000 students (headcount) on our campus these past years; there have been 2 voluntary separations and a RIF; online scheduling has been taken over by the OE department; and one of our two combined departments has only 3 faculty members (all of whom have to scramble every semester to make load), and the other has just 5.  Compare this to when I was chair for two years, with 7800 students bursting the seams on our campus, and with 17 FT and 40 adjunct faculty, scheduling 210-240 sections every semester, adding sections and hiring adjuncts just hours before class time (or sometimes sitting in myself for the first meeting) just to keep up with demand.  And nobody gave two good damns about whether or not I and our then-secretary were busy.

Of course, the current chair could, as my BFF puts it, "screw up a junkyard," so there you go.

The good news is, he's retiring at the end of the semester. We'll probably get another just like him, or worse.

[Parasaurolophus]

Ugh, just send me the email already! I'd rather not entirely upend my plans for tomorrow and the rest of the week.

[mahagonny]

I hate, hate this kind of thing. Imagine if it were your son or daughter.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/investigations-widen-into-deadly-stampede-houston-rap-concert-2021-11-07/

My love affair with rock concerts ended years ago when a crowd pushed me so hard I picked up my feet. I was probably 17 years old or so, weighed about 120 lbs. My feet didn't touch the floor as I was carried perhaps some 30 feet. Like the reckless fool I was, I thought 'hey this is fun.' Then I saw my friend Greg trying to use his arm to create space for a girl who was in distress. He ended up injuring his arm. It was total mayhem. Never again.

[Parasaurolophus]

Ugh, just send me the email already! I'd rather not entirely upend my plans for tomorrow and the rest of the week.

Nope. Fingers crossed it's just a one-day delay.

[Economizer]

In this Covid era many of us have experienced declines in our modest incomes as the prices of menu items at restaurants have often inceased sharply. Since gratuity, "tip", amounts are   most often based on a percentage of the cost of the meal, wait staff have had, in effect, a raise. Many, though, due to hard times, expect a rise in their "tip" percentage. Often this happens. But most times, with me as patron, it does not. So, look "honey", know that if you are lookin' for more than 20% from me, there is gonna need to be sex or somethin' involved!

[apl68]

Of course, the current chair could, as my BFF puts it, "screw up a junkyard," so there you go.

In blue-collar circles the term is "could tear up an anvil."

[apl68]

I observed this morning that over the weekend somebody dumped a load of junk--not just trash but junk, including an old golf bag and a water cooler--into our dumpster.  I'm concerned now that the haulers might give us trouble over that.

[lightning]

In this Covid era many of us have experienced declines in our modest incomes as the prices of menu items at restaurants have often inceased sharply. Since gratuity, "tip", amounts are   most often based on a percentage of the cost of the meal, wait staff have had, in effect, a raise. Many, though, due to hard times, expect a rise in their "tip" percentage. Often this happens. But most times, with me as patron, it does not. So, look "honey", know that if you are lookin' for more than 20% from me, there is gonna need to be sex or somethin' involved!

At a restaurant that I frequent, I noticed that the automatic tip calculations that appear at the bottom of statements are no longer 15%/18%/20%. It's now 18%/20%/25%.