Tag Archives: OSU

A Shit Show & A Happy New Year

Well, I was on vacation since the week of Christmas and I was supposed to get so much done. Um, I did not. I barely left the house and ate my way through just about everything we had. I can feel the weight gain as I type. But, here’s a recap of what did happen. I’m warning you now, this is going to be a long one.

  1. Ugh, it’s been rough to live in Columbus this past week. First, OSU lost to Clemson which probably most of you know. I didn’t watch it because I just…can’t. I am an anxious and angry fan. Then OSU basketball lost to WVU the next day. Then CBJ lost and the goalie got hurt because of stupidity. So there’s that.
  2. I binge watched The Witcher on Netflix. It took me three or four episodes to decide if I actually liked it and finally decided on yes. I did have to watch it with the closed caption on so I could understand what they were saying and they were speaking English. Whoever was responsible for the sound mixing on this show sucks. However, it did make for some great reading. There were some “Hmm’s” from Henry Cavill, quite a few “sigh”s every time someone took a breath. I kept yelling at the screen, “that was a snort you idiots!”. Then there was the “whooshing”. I shit you not. Every time the wind blew, the cc marked it as “whooshing”. It was amazing. On top of all of that, I keep humming that stupid song in my head.

You’re welcome! #sorrynotsorry

Now, the timeline is screwy but once you figure it out, it makes total sense. The sword work was quality and Henry Cavill did all his own stunts. I read an article about how big a fantasy nerd he is and quite frankly, it makes me adore him all the more. There are a couple of points that need to be addressed. Gerald of Rivia and the Bard Jaskier are the Bromance I didn’t know I needed in my life and Yennefer is a BADASS. I love her. If you haven’t seen the trailer, here you go.

3. I followed my binge watching with something a bit more low key and WAAAAAAY more soapy. Welcome to Virgin River.

OMG, this had every cliche plot twist you could imagine.

  • Dead husband and child…got it.
  • Woman running from her past to a small town to forget…got it.
  • PTSD Irag Vet leading man…got it.
  • Battered woman hiding her and her kid from an abusive husband…got it.
  • The woman the hero didn’t actually love is now pregnant right when he’s finally discovering love…got it.
  • Oh, and did I mention the heroine can’t have kids…got it.

The only thing we’re missing here is amnesia. I expect season two will not disappoint on that front. And yes, I will be watching it.

The best part of all of this was that Ross was around while a few of the early episodes were on and he was CRINGING and talking about how bad it was. I got a couple of “really?”s out of him which just made it more fun for me to watch it. Bahahahaha! I love torturing him. It brings me joy.

4. Ross and I went to see StarWars: Rise of Skywalker. It was – meh. There was a point, and I realize this is stupid but I’ve been watching Luke try to lift that fucking X-wing out of the Dagoba swamp for like my entire damned life so when he finally lifted it out of the sea for Rey, I was so fucking proud. That was the highlight of the movie for me. There were parts that were very heavy handed but then I remembered that when I was a kid, we get the “certain point of view” lecture and I remember thinking (when I was six or seven back in the now distant 1980’s) how profound that was.

5. I got pod cast equipment for Christmas which is exciting. This means that I can record my own work for audiobooks because I’m too poor to hire a professional. To all my friends that said they couldn’t read my books because they heard my voice in their heads…this won’t help you.

6. Last by certainly not least the shit show that is RWA. No, i’m not joking. #RWAshitshow was actually trending along side #Istandwithcourtney

This shit has now been covered by the NYTimes, Washington Post, The Guardian, as well as several other national media outlets. Feel free to review any or all of these articles. There’s a pretty good recap on twitter by Cate Eland (or see below).

The worst thing is, this keeps getting worse. With each new release that RWA puts out, they just keep digging themselves a deeper hole. The reality is that I wasn’t going to renew my membership in August with RWA or my local chapters this month for my own reasons. I’ve often felt marginalized because of the genre I write and I never really fit in. I’ve discussed that here before so I won’t rehash. I’m not surprised that those people, particularly women and men of color, were also marginalized. RWA focuses too much on a mold of romance and if you don’t fit in that mold, they don’t want you.

I’ve been reading my digests pretty much everyday and following this shit show on twitter. Honestly, I’m disappointed in some people and incredibly proud of others but that’s to be expected.

So there you have it. Happy New Year everyone!

Crazy Neighbors

So, we all have that one neighbor that drives us nuts.

Maybe they put too many Christmas decorations up.

Maybe they mow their lawn at 6:30am.

Maybe they have raucous parties and don’t invite you.

Maybe they have loud sex and again…don’t invite you. Listen, I don’t judge. Oh wait, I do but don’t worry, I’m probably judging the neighbor for the lack of invite and not you. You do you.

Whatever it is, we all have them.

I have one that might actually be certifiably nuts. She has a yard compulsion. She rakes leaves when the first start to fall even though there’s a tree full of them. The part that bothers Ross is the raking of leaves on our side of the street. I don’t know why this bothers him but it’s like there’s an invisible line down the center of the street and she crosses that every fall to moves leaves on our side of the street. This really gets under his skin. I think she has this vision of what our neighborhood should look like and it resembles the Edward Scissorhands standard.

She shovels snow in the middle of a blizzard. It’s like the guy who waters his plants while it’s raining. I’ve seen one of those in our neighborhood too. I actually stopped my car to watch because I couldn’t quite comprehend the logic of that. He was out there with an umbrella in a pretty heavy rain…with a hose,,,watering his flowerbeds.

This woman, literally, shovels the street in front of her house. BY HAND. It’s not like she’s got a snow blower and is making passes. She’s clearly in her sixties or seventies and is using a shovel to clear the street. But only in front of her house. Which makes no sense because anyone driving is going to drive on more parts of the street than just in front of her fucking house.

So let’s bring this back around to why this crazy person matters. On Wednesday, here in Columbus, the temperature (in my neighborhood) was -3 outside with a windchill of around -22. These are temperatures that are unsafe to be outside. In fact, OSU canceled classes.

Let me repeat that because it’s worth noting since OSU didn’t even cancel classes the day after a terrorist attack. On Wednesday, due to unsafe weather conditions, OSU CANCELED CLASSES!

I stood in the large picture window and watched this woman…sweeping her driveway first…then the sidewalk…then THE STREET…with a broom. Because there was a dusting on the ground and not enough to justify a shovel. At some point, her husband opened the front door and yelled at her to get inside because she was being crazy. I assume that’s what he said by the hand gesturing that was going on. I didn’t open the door to find out because it was fucking cold yesterday.

She was out there for almost 30 minutes which in those temperatures was plenty of time for frostbite to set in. And here it is. This is me judging. I don’t care, though, that’s nuts.

I know you’ve got them. What are your crazy neighbor stories?

Tickets, Fees, and Basketball

It’s been a while. I know. I know. I’m supposed to be posting on Monday and Friday EVERY WEEK! And I’ve skipped *cough* three posts…maybe. Yes, I am a horrible blogger. But we all knew this already.  Now that I’ve been properly chastised, can we discuss something really important. Ticketmaster.

I have purchased quite a few tickets lately which is so unlike me. Scarlett and I are going to A Charlie Brown Christmas next month, then I bought Ross Weezer/Pixie concert tickets (he’s going to make me go with him *sigh*), and then Disney’s Frozen on Ice – that’s right! I bought Disney on Ice tickets! I am not ashamed. Anyway, this means that I’ve gotten charged approximately $140 just in transaction/service fees. WHAT?!?

 

That’s just a rough estimate, by the way, it was probably more.

WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK, TICKETMASTER? Seriously. I don’t think I would feel so robbed if that was included in the price. When I’m looking at tickets and the price is $56 each, I think I’m paying $112 for two tickets which seems like a good deal. Then, you slap the service fees on there and suddenly it’s a $151.60. We won’t even talk about the Disney on Ice tickets where I bought three tickets.

The reason we’re talking about this is last night, Ross and I were looking at NCAA Tourney tickets. The first weekend is going to have games in Columubs. COLUMBUS! If you’ve read my blog regularly, you know I love college basketball. LOVE! I cannot express to you the amount of joy college basketball brings. I watch the stupid games where I have zero investment in November. The OSU men’s basketball schedule is on my calendar. Ross and I take days off at Tourney time to go to the bar and watch the games ALL DAY LONG. I cannot emphasize how much I love college hoops. Those tickets were (and these are the cheap ones) $198 EACH. That would mean that with the extra fees, we’d pay close to $500 for basketball tickets. I love basketball but I’m also cheap. I just don’t think I can justify $500. And now I’m incredibly sad.

March Madness 2017

If you know anything about me, you know that March is my jam. I love the NCAA Tournament to an unhealthy level. Every year, Ross and I take the first Thursday and Friday off to sit at a bar and watch all the games. We drink. We swear. We make both intelligent and unintelligent conversation about what’s going on. Basically, in a group of our friends all consisting of men, I’m the only woman sitting at the bar. I’m usually the most vocal. This is what love is. Although, Ross refuses to go to a live game with me. He objects to my behavior. I say, if you don’t want your children to hear that type of language, don’t bring them to a sporting event. If nothing else, they’ll learn how to use swear words properly.

If you’re my friend, you’d also know that I love Buckeye basketball. Behind Walt Disney, Thad Matta is God. However, they sucked this year. SUCKED! Sucked to the point that I couldn’t watch them. It depressed me. I’m an angry fan. I expect the best and I get upset when my teams fall short of that expectation. Harsh? Perhaps. But that’s the way I roll. No apologies and no settling. My Buckeyes are not in the Tournament this year. That makes me sad but the reality of the situation is that I’d rather not be in it than be embarrassed.

So, regardless if my team is in the Big Dance or not, I’ve filled out my brackets (3 to be exact), I’m excited to hang out with my friends this week, and I’m excited for basketball.

March Madness!

Well, I was going to write today about how much I love March Madness and anyone who knows me, knows how CRAZY I get during this time of year. But today I am sad. I filled out my bracket with all the hopes in the world that OSU could put up a fight against Syracuse. It doesn’t really matter now does it? This is the most depressing sight in the world today!!!!!

Ohio State falls to the No. 11 Dayton Flyers, 60-59.

For what it’s worth, Dayton played a good game and the fact that the NCAA site kept crashing was driving me nuts, distracting me a bit from the actual game. Really NCAA???? At this juncture, you haven’t figured out that there’s going to be heavy traffic to your site in March? Anyway, for those interested…here’s my bracket. As you can see, I’m already in the hole.

ESPN - Tournament Challenge - mikos_Page_1

Meeting Agenda

Here was the agenda for my meeting today…NO JOKE!

I)       OSU Email is the preferred service.
A)     Checking you email
1)      If you have your OSU email forwarded to another account always check your SPAM/Junk folder.  There are no excuses for missing an email because it was in your SPAM/Junk Folder.
2)      Employees of the University (GRA, GTA, GAA, or fellows) need to check your email at least once a day, Monday through Friday.

In addition to checking your email please read the email thoroughly.  If there is an attachment you might want to consider opening it and reading it.
B)      Responding to an email is just as important as reading it.
1)When there is a question posed to you in the course of an email please respond
2) If something is asked of you, please make sure that you reply to this email.
3) In certain circumstances an email will be sent to you directly from the Graduate School asking for your response. Under that scenario please respond immediately and copy Darla and me.
II)     Deadlines
A)     Graduate School and Registrar-Their deadlines are beyond our control.  If you miss their deadlines we will do anything for you
B)      Internal Deadlines- These are written in places like the Graduate Handbook.  We also send reminders concerning due dates.  When you fail to meet these deadlines you may think that you are in the clear, but in reality they will be taken into consideration for things like funding.
III)   Registration
A)     The windows to register open months prior to the start of the next term.
B)      Please register when your window opens.  If you are waiting for your TA assignment then please register immediately after you receive the assignment.
C)      When registering for Independent Study, remember to register for the correct course (5193=MA/MS, 7193=pre-candidacy PhD, and 8999=post-candidacy PhD).  A failure to register for the correct class post-AU13 leads to your Independent Study Proposal and Update being marked as incomplete.  This harkens back to reading your email.
IV)   Degree Requirements
A)     Know them, they are located in the handbook
V)     Excuses
A) Do not make them. They are usually ridiculous, without merit, and no one wants to hear them.