duhra

Well today has been fun! I took both mom and dad out to see The Avengers (2nd time for me) and I think they enjoyed it. They don't go out to the movies very often. Heck, I don't go out to the movies very often.

While Tony Stark is always a hoot I have to say that, in the battle scene at least, I was really digging the Hulk. He was well cast and absolutely hilarious at points. I will not say in here in case any of my few readers haven't seen it, but boy! The Hulk sure knows how to use his "skill set!"

Also, I had a surprise visit from Snowbunny and her older sister this evening. We three went out for a walk around the neighborhood and chatted, mostly about stuff from our high-school days. A pleasant and refreshing evening. :)

Not much else to report right now. Either that or my fingers and brain just aren't connecting to the creative juices that normally flow so freely (ha ha). I hope all y'all had a nice Mother's Day and have a good week too.

So my week has been different. I asked to have Saturday off, a day I usually work, so I could attend a class on terrarium building. As such I had to work yesterday in exchange. So I didn't get around to posting yesterday, having come home late and more tired than normal.

Remember awhile back I made a post about how disrespectful it is to talk on your phone while you're picking up your meds? I just wanted to reiterate: Don't do that! *slaps wrist*

I had a, well I was going to use the word gentleman but I don't think that's the right species label, come up to the counter yesterday on his cell-phone and get a bit irate when I wouldn't ring him up unless he was off the phone.

I'm sorry, but not only is it company policy, it's in violation of federal HIPPA laws and is rude to boot. So I won't let you stay on your phone because I don't want the person you're talking to to hear about the next customer's hemorrhoid cream and how best to apply it. Not everyone has good hearing and that can make things a bit awkward at times. Let's keep it as non-awkward as possible.

Appleseed is coming up in June and my family is getting ready to go and have a blast this year! LnS and I went out and about to start the hunting and gathering of supplies like, a rifle, scope, mags, sunscreen, hat, etc. etc. I had a great time hanging out with him and getting most of today's list checked off (though a few things had to be ordered in) and had a good lunch over at Cabela's. Mmmmmm....elk burger....yum!

I was even feeling good enough to go out for a bike ride upon returning home. This is a bit unusual for me. Usually after spending a few hours walking around stores and driving around town between stores, I'm tuckered and just want to sit down and watch something. Not today. I was still feeling perky and active. I even managed to ride my usual course (up the hill to the local shopping center) without walking the bike part way which is what I've had to do pretty much ever since I started driving my car. This is great!

I have a bit of a case of writer's block today. I just can't think of what would make for a good post so I hopped over to LiveJournal's list of writer's-block-fixers. The one I picked, because most of the others left me blanker than when I started, was this:

"What subject(s) do you think kids should be taught more about in school? What do you feel gets too much emphasis already?"

I'll start with the latter part.

I think that "feelings" gets way too much emphasis in schools right now. We must make sure we don't hurt the students' feelings, we have to build up their self esteem, we can't do anything to make them feel upset/angry/sad.

My fourth grade teacher was like this, at least as far as I can remember. She wanted to make sure no one felt left behind or left out. While I did like the idea of "everyone gets to feed the class pet" I didn't like her take on the rest of course material.

Math is a great example there. In order to make sure we don't hurt anyone's feelings we spent over HALF of the school year going over addition and subtraction when my third grade teacher had started us on our multiplication tables in the last month or so of school. This is becoming common. We mustn't let any child feel they are inferior or left behind.

Guess what? That means there are people who have graduated high-school that can't do simple multiplication. HIGHSCHOOL. They can't do 5x4 without a calculator and if you get any more complex than that and they can't do the math WITH a calculator. I've met people like that. It's scary to think that they are holding any job better than flipping a burger. Do you really want to wonder if your cashier can figure your change without the machine telling them?

So a few kids think they're not as smart as the rest of the class? We can't have that. We have to build up their self-esteem.

Except we can't. No one can build a person's self esteem but themselves. When you study hard and finally pass that exam you feel great. When you piece together that difficult puzzle you feel pride. When you beat your old high score on a game you feel awesome and all of those things help you feel better about yourself. You feel like you're improving and that is what self esteem is about in my eyes. Do you feel as though you are improving against yourself and are you an asset wherever you are?

Ok, now that I've ranted on that long enough, I'll go back to the latter part of that prompt.

What do I think should be taught more in schools? Logic. Cause and Effect. How to actually think.

Too often we see people blindly following what other people say or believe. I can't stand someone who says we have to raise wages because the cost of living has gone up, or how evil the drug manufacturers are because they're drugs are so expensive, or how the fat-cat 1%ers need to pay more in taxes so we can all get out of the poor house.

Schools don't teach how to think anymore. They teach facts and say "repeat that back. Good. Now go do the same thing for life." People look only at the surface of whatever issue is at hand. Cost of living gone up? Golly gee, couldn't possibly be because we keep raising wages that that cost keeps rising. Drug prices skyrocketing? Couldn't be because of news laws being put in place that make it more expensive to manufacture those drugs. 1%ers need to pay more? Well bust my buttons, of course they don't need that money to put back into businesses to generate the jobs your working at right now!

...Ok. Well. That appears to have been a good prompt to get me typing. Hmm. I'm actually quite surprised that lasted so long. Nice!

The past two days have been quite interesting. Mom's been sick since late Sunday, one of my coworkers was sick yesterday, and another's kid was sick as well. Top that off with my own bout of nausea and increased trips to the bathroom both yesterday and today and, well, you get the idea.

We be sickies.

Took mom to see the doctor today and the entire household here took a much needed nap this afternoon. Both mom and I are feeling better than we did yesterday though neither of us feels 100%. Mom's got it worse than me, whatever this is. I hope she starts feeling loads better soon. It's no fun being sick or having a family member be sick. Grrr....

After a particularly rough rush of customers yesterday I went to pull some drugs off the shelf for filling.

Me: John! My knight in shining armor! Take me away from this castle guarded by Bowser!

John: Uh...ok. Mary? Do you know the driving directions to WestHills(mental institute)?

Mary: For Duhra or for you?

John: *pause* Maybe both?

Me: I have a room reserved if you'd like! :D

I'm not sure whether we need new drugs or not. All I know is now I have to go pay the ninjas.

So Facebook has decided that we are all going to switch to the new Timeline format whether we want to or not. I've been informed that mine will change later this week. I've been watching some of my friend's timeline profiles in an effort to acclimatize myself to it and stop the initial feeling of "change is baaaad!" that keeps getting bleated everywhere I go.

I've been trying, but I just can't do it.

I don't want to see all that stuff on my wall. Bits and Pieces of everything I've done since I opened a Facebook account years ago. I don't want to see it and I sure as flying chickens don't want others to see it. I also don't want to spend who knows how long going through every. single. post. in that time frame and switching them to private or friend's only. It would just be too much of a hassle.

As such, I will be closing my Facebook account come Wednesday. I've already put up a post on my FB page notifying all my friends about that, but I figured that since I more or less skipped out on my Friday post, this would be a decent enough make-up post.

I'm sorry to all the people who would tell me "It just takes some getting used to." I'm not going to change my mind. I do hope to find a sufficient replacement site and if I do find one I will be sure to tell everyone I'm still in contact with about it.

Hope everyone has a happy spring celebration of your choice!

It's Friday. So I should put up a post about what's going on right now in my life or something neat and nifty that I found out about in the news right?

*insert mental image of a blank piece of paper + me tapping my pencil*

...yeah. That's about all my brain can come up with.

There hasn't really been anything of outstanding interest happening this week other than the alluded-to-in-my-last-post fixing of my car. Which reminds me. My car is fixed. 8D

Hung out with a friend on Wednesday...got various chuckles from customers at work...drove my car...sat out in the sunlight for awhile...painted my nails...

ummm....yeeeah. I think I'll stop while I'm behind. Otherwise I may start posting about whatever weird dream I had the previous night. That would not end well.

This week has been anything but sunshine and daisies. Work has been a bit extra stressful with my having to be driven to work on Kietzke. My car was not completely fixed and rumbled around 25-35 mph and I didn't like the sound of it above that speed. Mom's car finally got out of the shop working, though still in need of repairs while's Dad's went in. So I get driven down to work at Kietzke where I get to work with LeadTech.

Oh boy do I just looove to work with LeadTech. She knows everything that goes on in the pharmacy and knows how to handle every problem. And all the customers love to stop and chat with her because she's so friendly.

I've gotten used to the way things run at MaeAnne so when I returned to help out at Kietzke I tried to implement the "workflow" ideals I had there. Yeah. Not happening. I manage to get into a small tiff with LeadTech over who does a particular task and go grumbling to fill pill bottles. A few minutes later LeadTech suggests I transfer back because, "You belong here."

I kid you not. She seems to really enjoy working with me despite our differences. She wants me to come back to Kietzke.

Then while I was working over at MaeAnne we were busier than a bee's nest surrounded by hungry bears carrying piranhas. Top that off with my sweet little Koko's transmission line going out on us and I have not been an overly happy camper.

But!

Hopefully (and I say that because I haven't driven it very much yet) it's fixed! Turns out that along the drive line behind the transmission there are a pair of interconnecting flanges. Flanges being...think of two gears only the gear teeth being on the flat side of the circle. They normally mesh together and turn the whole drive line. Except the flange on the transmission side that was supposed to be held in place with four bolts was now only hanging on by one. Soooo yeah, not good. At. All.

So hopefully my car is back in business though, again, I won't feel comfortable until I've driven it for a few days without problems.

Now if you don't mind I'm gonna go cry those tears of joy I would have yesterday if I hadn't been at work when Dad told me the car was good.

Hi y'all! Yes I know I missed Friday's post. And yes I know I didn't make up for it on Saturday. Boo.

Anyway, my aside. You know how your mother always told you to cover your cough? Yeah, could you have her talk to half of my clientele? They seem to think that coughing on my signature pad is a-ok. It's quite bothersome because every time I see someone do that I have to use sanitizer on that thing and the pen and the counter to get rid of whatever they just expunged.

Of course, I know many people do cover their coughs, sneezes, etc. And I'm grateful. But uh...how you do so makes a difference as well. Case and point; a lady came up today to get a cough syrup because of her, three guesses, cough. She hacks as I'm pulling her prescription out of the bag and set it on the counter. She covers her cough. With her hand.

The same hand that she then uses to sign my signature pad. And she's been shopping around with that hand on her shopping cart, touching the boxes of food and who knows what else. She's probably going to hand me money with the cough-hand.

This bugs me. If you're going to cover your cough, think about how you do it. Don't use your hand, because you'll probably have to hand something to someone later and you'll be handing your germs with it. Cough into your elbow, or arm, or handkerchief if you have one. Please, I don't think you want to hand your germs to me to send out into the world unknowingly.

Ok, that's it for my knit-pick. I just wanted to get that out there because it's so prevalent in my line of work. That plus I hate the look some customers give me when they start to walk away and see me go straight for that sanitizer. Like they think I think they're full of icky germs.