It sucks.

Yes, I got a flu shot this season and I can still barely sit up.


(picture unrelated)

Update: Released from Hospital at 2 this morning with a diagnosis of Flu, Bronchitis and Inner Ear Infection and most importantly, documentation for work and school. The flu-shot either did NO good this year or without it I'd be dead. I haven't had the flu this bad in 25 years or more.
I'm getting better though. I can walk all the way to the bathroom without resting now, I can drink fluids without going into cough spasms and I've held down solid food for 4 hours. I've been in bed over 40 hours of the last 48.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 08:20 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Looks acary...and potentially monstrous.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 05:11 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Back on the 15th I mentioned that I'd lost a few classes in getting transferred to the new catalog. One of these was English 110...freshman English, which I had taken many years ago at a community college, only to have it not be honored now by ODU. Well...imagine my surprise the other day when I attempted to register for the course online and was told that I don't have the prerequisites.
I'm a senior...I'm working towards (besides my actual major and minor) a TESOL certificate..more to the point ENG 110 is THE LOWEST LEVEL ENGLISH COURSE.

Can someone explain this?

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 04:59 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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And for the ladies...

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 04:00 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 11:18 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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...and Santa's Wharehouse is hectic.

^{Art by Ueyama Michirou}

(So hectic that the previous post was a day late.)

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 11:59 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Yeah...THAT kind of week.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 12:35 AM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
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So earlier today,  at my folks house, I was getting of the shower when I heard a scream...not  an "eek!" a scream that could wake the dead. I threw a towl around me and ran out as my mom shouted in a hysterical pleading horrified voice..."GET DOWN HERE NOW"

I was halfway down the stairs when she ran into the living room and looked up at me with a face that could only mean someone died.

I was almost to the bottom when she said..."There's a stinkbug in the kitchen on the..."

...back up the...stairs into the bathroom, I quickly dried and put on pants as she began shouting stinkbug status reports with the urgency and intensity of Herbert Morrison covering a dirigible crash. "It's at the edge of the fan! It's right there. It's walking to the end! GET IN HERE!"
Oh the humanity..
She then ran into the living room and stopped me wanting to know why i had turned around to which I replied "...pants..."She explained that she couldn't reach the ceiling fan and the stinkbug was right over the cake mix and THANKSGIVING WAS GOING TO BE RUINED and I had to prevent the stinkbug from falling in the cake-mix (or the gravy) and....
I couldn't get into the kitchen from the dining room because she was standing in my way explaining so I went around and entered the kitchen through the hallway.

No stinkbug.

I searched. I searched. No stinkbug.

She ran and got my dad from the garage and the two of us did a thorough stinkbug sweep...but the stinkbug had left.

Or had it?

She glared in horror at the cake mix, the sugar and the gravy.

There was a good 15 minutes of dad and I sifting and pouring before we could convince her that the stinkbug had not  buried itself in her ingredients and had simply flown away.

In fairness she'd been working on this for a VERY long time.

In any event Thanksgiving dinner was awesome...despite the knowledge that somewhere out there the stinkbug still lurks.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 12:38 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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1 You should have added a girlish shriek as you turned around and ran back up the stairs...

Posted by: Siergen at Fri Nov 23 18:53:33 2012 (Ao4Kw)

2 STINKBUG!!!!!!

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Fri Nov 23 20:26:06 2012 (PiXy!)

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Well, Tuesday/Wednesday was a bummer for other reasons. In addition to a funk I think I've been passing the last item in my kidney stone reserve. Wednesday evening I was assaulted by a plate of Szechuan beef which wrought chaos upon my digestive track.

My plans to graduate in the Spring or Summer, comes down to class availability. I was informed that one class I need is unlikely to be available until next fall. In the grand scheme of things a 4 month delay and a very light load last semester is not THAT big a deal, but it is highly annoying. I'm going to speak to my adviser next week about taking it as a topics course over the summer, but I'm told that is unlikely because....'Because.' Meh...I'm almost there.

Lots of papers this semester. I still have 12 page, 8 page and 5 page papers coming up in various classes over the next 2 weeks.

I split the B&tB clip from the assessment post, which started out as just a cheer-up post when I got to rambling,

I've started to...oh my...What is this?

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 04:08 AM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
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Holo the iMac is in the iMac hospital with a few minor hardware issues (the SDcard slot doesn't work for instance) and some software problems that might include a staph infection.

School started this week and my joy at being on the final stretch ( I'll gradgeeait in Spring or Summer 2013) was tempered by the fact that the textbook category "under 200 bucks" was in the minority for me this year by a wide margin. This was demoralizing.

I was under the weather most of the week with a cold I'd picked up on the plane. This came to a head on Thursday morning and I called in to work. Around 3 AM I got up with an excruciating headache, burning eyes and sore throat. On my way to the loo I noted there had been a power failure. Then I noted that, even though the lights weren't on the fan was running, then I noted my father asking why I was fumbling around in the bathroom like I couldn't see....because all the lights were on and he could see me...

oh...

Noting this fully woke me up and I further noted that my eyes were in fact closed and wouldn't fully open. After some effort and panicked facewashing (and the loss of several eyelashes) I pried my eyes open, regained some of my sight and noted that the eyed were discharging blood and goop.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 03:12 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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About 3 hours ago I used one of the computers at a friends store, I sent an E-mail while I was there.
About 2 hours ago I started getting texts and E-mails from people telling me I was spamming them.

It seems some Ukrainian jackwagon hijacked my account and tried to sell everyone I've ever E-mailed weight loss products.

Golly! People I hadn't heard from in years hate me now.

After an hours go-round with AOL I got my account unlocked and all seems to be well. My friend knows and has disconnected that computer.

I have McAfee on both the MAC and Windows partitions of my Mac and it says its clear so I don't think that there is any virus problem with my system.

I sincerely apologize to anyone who got spammed.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 07:39 PM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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1

Presumably you now know this: never, ever, use a password-protected service on a public access computer.

Also, get rid of McAfee on Windows and use Microsoft Security Essentials instead.

 

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Mon Jul 9 20:41:53 2012 (+rSRq)

2 (Also, never use a password protected service on your own computer if you're connecting to a public-access Wifi.)

Posted by: Steven Den Beste at Mon Jul 9 20:43:01 2012 (+rSRq)

3 ...and make sure you didn't re-use that password anywhere else.  A close call along those lines inspired me to start using the LastPass plugin for Firefox.  I'll never be *able* to type the password in on another system, for one thing.

Posted by: Douglas Oosting at Mon Jul 9 22:33:02 2012 (N9Lwt)

4 And never feed them after midnight!

Posted by: Pixy Misa at Tue Jul 10 05:54:16 2012 (PiXy!)

5 LastPass is not applicable to public computers, I think. Multifactor auth is, however.

Posted by: Pete Zaitcev at Wed Jul 11 20:51:06 2012 (5OBKC)

6 Pixy: http://forums.thedailywtf.com/forums/p/26374/297100.aspx#297100

Posted by: RickC at Fri Jul 13 23:18:30 2012 (WQ6Vb)

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Just a quick status update.
For those understandably uninterested in such matters, it's discretely beneath the fold.

^{Unamused young lady is the indefatigable Homura Akemi from Madoka Magica.}  

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 08:18 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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All papers are turned in.
Now onto Exams.
Apologies for the light posting. Short summer courses are quite vexing.

In other news Ubu is also experiencing some vexation, but of a different sort.

I may have found his problem.

^{Source unknown...but is likely someone familiar with Apple's quirks.}

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 12:30 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Today I went to my Literature professor and asked him for a replacement syllabus. He gave me a lecture on the importance of attendance (I'd missed class yesterday due to fallout from my grandmothers death). His response to my reason was not one of excessive empathy.  In any event he handed me the syllabus, I stormed out of class and went to lunch.

After lunch I grabbed my binder out of the car , went to the library to study, pulled out the "syllabus"and noted that it was, in fact, tomorrows test.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 10:52 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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It looks like Don has graciously provided Tidewater with some of his Midwestern weather...

Several of these obnoxious little boogers have touched down to wreak mischief over the last few hours. We have a warning until 10pm and watches until 2AM. Tornadoes are not unheard of here but so many in one day is rather unusual.

Of course we also got some of our more normal weather...just spectacularly so...this is Warwick Blvd in Newport News about 4 hours ago...

^{This area is about a hundred feet above sea level with the cliff overlooking the river only about 2 blocks away and yet...}

The street filled remarkably fast. At one point water was flowing OUT of the storm drains. The intensity of the rain at times was incredible.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:51 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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We are NEVER going to get the bottom of my dads boat painted.

^{HT Siergen in the comments.}

On the upside...Georgia is FINALLY going to get some rain.

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:29 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Due to a variety of issues (Hospitalization, taking care of my mom after her stokes, kidney stones ) I had to drop most classes last semester. In order to catch up, I'm taking 9 credits in the first summer session at ODU, since this is one of the two short sessions this means 3x2.5 hour classes a day plus getting up at 3AM for work. I'm also studying for a placement test in July and working towards my online TESOL certificate on weekends.
 Posting will be light and largely restricted to weekends for at least the next month.
As partial compensation here is Rin...

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 08:05 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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I recently discovered when trying to add a course to the second summer session that that there is a 14 credit per semester limit on what I can take at ODU now. There is a 6 credit limit on summer classes. As I had already signed up for 9 summer credits this left me worried that I would be dumped out of the classes I had enrolled in.  Additionally this complicates my plan to graduate next spring. My own illnesses as well as the time I took off to deal with Mom's strokes caused me to drop multiple classes and the summer sessions were key to my making good on part of that.

My ODU G-mail account soon provided me with some clarification on this matter. It seems that the limit was imposed because of the fact that I'm on academic probation.

Well this is logical. It makes sense to limit the number of...

...wait....

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 05:52 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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^{We'll let this young lady comment on that for a moment.}

Well in this case summer is 14 days long as I'm taking a full load of summer classes next session. Of course I'm working too.

But hey...exams are over.

***

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 09:45 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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XamCram...It's 2AM, my brain is fried...I'm gonna watch Bodacious Space Pirates, then turn in.
Monday is my exam day.
Blogging will resume shortly thereafter.


In the meantime here here is an important life lesson from HELVITICA STANDARD.

^{If you can figure out said lesson...please tell me.}

Posted by: The Brickmuppet at 01:11 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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