Painting Day

Up to the roof top Mommy crawls
Time to prime and paint the walls
Shinny up the ladder without a scratch
Now the room has walls that match

Cork Rot

As a wine drinker, I found this really interesting.  Some of those bottles that just don't seem to have a bouquet at all...this could be the reason.

Now they need to develop a tester for such a thing.

http://www.ibtimes.com/nasty-molecule-behind-corked-wine-alters-your-sense-smell-study-1407248

Graybeards

I have been quietly (or not, if you're my family) covering my graying hair for years.  It was quite an unpleasant surprise.  I'd been highlighting (or frosting, as we called it in the 80s) my hair since 8th grade, so, when I decided to go "natural", I was expecting a dark blonde.

But I got a dark blonde with "magic sparkles" as my daughter would say.

And despite my protestations about being too young, I also agree with my family who remind me that it's not the age, it's the mileage.  

But it was really quite something when I got my first gray granny hair in my chin last year.  Those little F-ers are SO hard to find but you can feel them all prickly, and you end up nearly digging a hole in your chin trying to pull them out.

And, still, with all of this graying evidence literally staring me in the face, I feel that I am really not that old...

...right!????

Well, it finally happened.

For the entire week, I've interviewed with hiring managers who are younger than myself (at least based on their listed LinkedIn experience).  It was one thing to have a doctor that is younger than you, which really does make one feel quite old, but to work for someone with less experience than yourself...well, that is quite a perplexing feeling....particularly since I'm not quite middle aged....yet.  It makes it quite obvious that my career in IT is quickly coming to an end unless the world changes soon.

It just goes to show you that people get promoted or hired into management level roles that used to take decades to ascend to within a company.  And the people that are hired have no experience in managing, but they're young and willing too many hours for entry level pay and a management title.

What has the world come to?

How To Remove Yourself From WhitePages.com

Another site to remove yourself from.  This is a biggie- a lot of other sites reference whitepages.com so it's a good idea to clear yourself out of this one.  The interesting twist is this:  white the site doesn't allow you to completely hide your information, it does allow you to completely EDIT your information. 

What you'll need:

Just the website

1.  Navigate to whitepages.com and search for yourself.

2.  Click the Edit pencil icon to claim the profile.  Don't worry- you don't have to give them more info.  In fact, if you do this in an Incognito window, it's probably even safer.

3.  When the page reloads, it asks if you want to sign in using Facebook.  DON'T.  This will link your Facebook account and all of its information to this site.  Click the "Not interested in using Facebook" link, instead.

4.Once you make your account, you are brought to your "account home" page.  You'll see all of the information that whitepages.com has about you.  This is where you can get sneaky.  The only information that this site requires is that at you have the First Name, Last Name, and Age populated....but it doesn't have to be with your info.  

5.  Just click the "Edit" button in that cell to navigate to the detail page for that data.  

6.  Edit the data.  

7.If it's not required, delete it.  Make sure you SAVE.  

This, I think, is the safest way to remove your information from this site because it won't be coming back.  

8.  However, as an added precaution, you can click on the "Privacy Settings" on your account page.  This will show the Privacy Settings for you account.  

9. Select the "Hide all information about me" checkbox.

10.  Click Update.

Make sure you repeat these steps for your friends and family, or your information will show up under their's as a relative.

Unclog Your Nose At Your Feet

Honestly, I didn't think that this would work when I read it, but it honestly does:

Next time you have a stuffy nose (like from a cold), put the Vick's or Tiger Balm on your feet.  It works a LOT better than putting it on your chest....and then everything you smell doesn't smell like Vick's.

Works great on children, too, especially since they won't want anything on their face, but massaging their feet- they're ok with that.

Gotta Love Stringing Christmas Lights

Oh Christmas Tree,
Oh Christmas Tree,
Your lights oft confuse me.
Oh Christmas Tree,
Oh Christmas Tree,
Bulbs change almost yearly
Your flashing lights are tangled vines
And snag on every branch - OH FINE!
Oh Christmas Tree,
Oh Christmas Tree,
Try my patience clearly.

Monsanto Conspiracy Theory

Back in the day, I was a genetic scientist.

And now I'm not.

Why?

Because the reality of genetic engineering is this:  We have no idea what this genetic modifications will mean to the world's ecosystem in the long run.  The whole butterfly-flapping-causes-a-hurricane thing.  And these are serious changes that are being introduced.  Here are the most common purposes:

1. Placing genes for immunity to pesticides in foods...and then dumping large amounts of pesticides on the foods. (uhm, yum?  What are all the pesticides going to do to us?  And with such a detrimental action as obliteration, how long do you think it will take weeds and whatnot to gain immunity to the pesticides?  After all, bacteria and fungi have made our antibiotics nearly useless now...and that's less than 50 years before they became worthless)
2. Placing homemade genes to overcome human diseases into viruses and then pumping those into humans.  (seems that it would give the viruses a distinct advantage in some human hosts- possibly even cause the viruses to learn how to disable the genes just so that a mutualism relationship forms and protects the viruses...that's how mitochondria got trapped, after all).

So, you can see I was super popular among my peers, but biology is going to reach a state of equilibrium or homeostasis (or strive to) no matter what type of change you introduce- that's the law of life.  It makes sense, right?  If you're cold, your body will shiver until you warm up.  If you're hot, you sweat to cool off.  If you're sick, your body ramps up the immune system to deal with the infection.

Well, large companies, like Monsanto, have been making BILLIONS of dollars developing the pesticide-resistance crops.  In the late 1990s, they were summarily banned by Europe and the US because the side effects of the genetic engineering seemed rather risky.  

That, along with the stupid mistakes from the medical community, killed the field of genetic engineering at that point.

And I joined the IT world, which pays better, anyway.

After almost 15 years of lobbying, Monsanto is poised to actually win the EU over to its product line.  And, if I didn't know any better, scientists like this, are really working for Monsanto to develop really shitty experiments and thereby make any opposition to Monsanto seem poorly thought out....and then Monsanto wins without any real fight.