alisandramel

Memo to the Spears Family:

Birth control. Look into it.

Not that I advocate (or even agree with the existence of) the pink jerseys, but...

From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (www.post-gazette.com)

Survey finds Steelers have largest female fan base

Thursday, September 13, 2007
The Associated Press

The Steelers have known for years their fan base included countless women - that was evidenced by all the pink official team jerseys they sell and the hundreds who attend their female training camp each summer.

Now the Steelers have proof that, when it comes to building a female fan base, Pittsburgh does it better than any other NFL market.

According to a Scarborough Sports Marketing survey of 220,354 residents in 75 United States markets conducted last year, Pittsburgh has, by far, the largest base of NFL fans who are women.

Pittsburgh is the runaway leader, with 34 percent of the women living in the Steelers' market identifying themselves as fans. Green Bay was second with 29 percent, but no other market surveyed had even one-quarter of its women identify themselves as fans.

Buffalo was third with 24 percent, followed by Cincinnati (23 percent), Kansas City, Jacksonville, Baltimore and Boston (22 percent) and Denver, Tampa-St. Petersburg and Washington, D.C. (21 percent).

Nationally, the average was 16 percent, which means that Pittsburgh has more than twice the number of female pro football fans than the average market, based on the survey's results.

Among men, Pittsburgh was second only to Green Bay in the percentage of fans - 38 percent of the men in Green Bay identified themselves as fans, compared to 35 percent in Pittsburgh. Also in the top 10 were Jacksonville, Boston, Denver, Buffalo, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Philadelphia and Cincinnati.

First published on September 13, 2007 at 9:19 am
Copyright 2007 Associated Press. All rights reserved.

I read this today and can't decide if I am more impressed by the nerve it took to do this, or repulsed by the sentiment behind it.

From Dear Abby's column on August 17, 2007

DEAR ABBY: My husband and I received a wedding invitation from my nephew's son, whom we have never gotten to know very well. Included in the invitation was a deposit slip to a bank savings account "in lieu of gifts"!
We later learned that everyone on the guest list received a deposit slip, even the grandmother. Is this proper? This is the first time we have ever heard of this, and frankly, we were rather insulted. -- PUZZLED IN COLORADO

I don't think a "How nice for you!" covers this one.

They clearly didn't think this through. I certainly wouldn't shred that deposit slip before throwing it out. In fact, I might feel compelled to tape it to the wall of a public restroom at Union Station or FedEx Field.

I went out for some nice girlie shopping and dinner with a friend on Tuesday.

Stereotypical guy reaction: "Wooohoo! Pizza and beer and sports/dirty movies/politics/whatever I'm not allowed to watch while the little woman is around!"

Dr. Steve reaction: "I can finally get the floors and bathrooms cleaned without you in the way, sweetie."

I am the luckiest girl IN THE WORLD!!!

I try not to complain about my travel woes, because everyone who travels deals with them, and in the grand scheme of things mine really haven't been so bad, but last week was a tad on the much side, so I decided to share. Don't you feel lucky?

I was scheduled to depart Colorado Springs on a Continental flight at 1:55 pm. At 1:35 pm the gate agent announced that we would not be boarding because the crew needed to change a tire on our aircraft. At a bit after 2:00 pm, she announced that she had seen mechanics looking at the tire and a manager taking pictures. At sometime around 2:15, she announced that we were going to board right after she loaded the FIVE UM's. (For those not up on airline lingo, a UM is an unaccompanied minor. Five of them. On a not so large aircraft. This was sounding better by the minute! Also around 2:15 pm, it started raining. Really hard. And really loud. So much so that the gate agent had to board us using hand signals because the PA system made horrible screeching feedback noises when she tried to use it. What turned out to be a hail storm pretty much stopped by the time we finishing boarding and were ready to go. Yay! We're less than an hour late! We're all going to make our connections in Houston!

Or not. The pilot announced that the recipient of the previously mentioned photographs decided that they were not comfortable with the amount of wear on the tire, so it would need to be changed after all. Except that they didn't have a spare in Colorado Springs and would have to fly one up from Houston (a two hour flight, which meant that none of us were going to make our connections). The airline did show mercy and let us back off of the aircraft so that we could all trudge back to the gate and stand in line for re-booking. Yay!

I do have to confess that the time spent finding somewhat affordable airfare at the last minute paid off, because I knew that I could still get home that night on another airline. (One of the few joys of flying into Dulles is that all the major carriers fly here, many times a day even!) The gate agent figured out where to put me and commenced telling the computer to make the change. Either she was slow or the computer was. The agent next to her processed three people in the time it took her to get my transfer stuff to print out, and she found my flights pretty darned quickly compared some of the other destinations. It really didn't help that she had to stop what she was doing to "help" with every person who worked to the front of the line of the other, seemingly much more efficient agent. I knew I was going to go on the standby list for the more favorable flight home from Denver (arriving at midnight instead of 5 am!), so I was antsy to get checked in with the new airline. I finally got the documentation for the new flights and headed to the new gate to check in.

The gate agent there was terribly helpful and got me squared away in short order, including entering my frequent flier number which would hopefully help in the standby queue. A quick run to use up the $6 snack voucher and visit the ladies' room, and we boarded. Sadly, once we were boarded and ready to go, the pilot announced a 45 minute ground hold for Denver. This was not good news, because we would touch down 25 minutes before the favorable flight was due to take off. I would make it to the gate in time to wave goodbye to the aircraft I wanted to be on.

It was my joy to learn that the plus of a ground hold is that is also keeps flights from leaving the airport in question (something I really should have been able to figure out on my own, but I was a bit overdone by this poitn!). My desired flight was delayed 30 minutes, so I had just enough time to visit the ladies' (yes again - I was hoping to board for a three hour flight!). Then the tense little dance in the boarding area, waiting for my name to be called from the standby list. Thankfully, it was a large aircraft and I got on. Yay! In economy plus, even (those five inches make a HUGE difference, especially on a long flight).

Of course, we arrived late into Dulles because we were delayed out of Denver. For the life of me I will never understand why the baggage return at Dulles is so freaking slow. It took 45 minutes from the time we touched down until the time the bags made it out. I know it was late and they were possibly understaffed, but 1) it's not like the airline didn't know they had delayed flights arriving and 2) 45 minutes has been the average for a wide variety of arrival times.

I think I'm still a tad out of whack from not getting to bed until 2 AM on Thursday night/Friday morning, but at least I'm home with my bags. All hail Corey, Lord of the Ramp Transfer!

I was tagged for the seven things a while back, but haven't had a chance to LJ them. I think I'll save those for a day or two, since this entry is plenty long.

Have a good one, and safe travels!

A moving article from an unexpected source...

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/columns/story?columnist=fowler_chris&id=2842707&lpos=spotlight&lid=tab3pos1

Silly me - I thought that the end of March would be an okay time to connect through Denver. I was WRONG!! There was a significant wait for de-icing, so it took a tad bit longer to get home than was originally planned.

Got to visit Allen & Les and the ridiculously adorable children. If I knew my kids would turn out like these, I would get pregnant ASAP! Maxine is growing up to be a very tall and lovely girl - she turned eight on Monday. Ben is an extremely energetic and friendly four year old. I'm not really up on my child development. Is it common for four-year-olds to use the word "compromise" correctly?

This weekend it is more work on getting Dr. Steve moved in and the House on Haunted Hill party. At present, my costume will be "hapless motorist who wandered into the wrong party and is seriously underdressed for the occasion." I have been offered the possible loan of a dress in the vein of "naughty nurse/candy striper" so we'll see if I get any more ambitious between now and then.

Coming soon: hockey playoffs, which will, for the first time in several years, feature my boys in a well-seeded position. Let's go Pens!

The moral of the story: When you have a root canal, insist upon a course of antibiotics.

As a first time root canal recipient, I didn't know this, so when the doc said I didn't need antibiotics, I didn't argue. I napped Wed afternoon and slept about 12 hours on Wed night and figured I was on the road to recovery. I was wrong. The pain was became increasingly worse Thursday evening and by Thursday night was so bad that even with Vicodin, I could not sleep. I called the doc's office on Friday morning and spent possibly the longest hour of my life waiting to hear back. They called in a prescription for penicillin which I retrieved and ingested ASAP. Unfortunately, it took a while for the drug to kill enough bacteria to reduce the pain, and I didn't get much in the way of sleep on Friday night either. Blissfully, the Vicodin began to prevail over the pain on Saturday morning and I slept much of Saturday and all of Saturday night. By Sunday the pain was down to a dull ache and I was almost human again! A few more decent nights' sleep and I should be back to normal. I guess all the sleeping should help get me re-adjusted and de-jetlagged as well, right?

Of course, I have to get work done for the crown this afternoon, so I could be back in PainTown by tonight. All I can say is that am very grateful that I do not have a condition that requires constant pain management - I don't know how you all do it.

Made it home from Hawaii yesterday in one totally exhausted piece. I flew back to Honolulu from Pago Pago on Sunday night, and of course did not get any sleep on the flight. The hotel was very kind and let me check into my room very early, so I was able to sack out for a few hours Monday morning. I took the bus over to Waikiki and finished up my souvenir shopping. I tried to get to bed at a reasonable hour since I had to be up at 4:30 am to catch the airport shuttle to check in for my flight by 6:00 am. Except that I couldn't sleep. Every time I laid down, a portion of my jawline started to throb. The pain subsided when I sat upright or stood, but neither of those was terrible conducive to sleeping. I did manage to catch a couple hours on the flights home, but last night was bad. I was taking 800 mg of ibuprofen every two hours and it still hurt too much to sleep. My dentist is out of town until Monday, so this morning I called another dentist I had previously seen for an emergency filling repair. After hearing my symptoms, they immediately referred me to an endodontist. Miraculously, they were able to fit me in this morning and I just got home from my very first root canal. The anesthetic is starting to wear off, so it's time for some Vicodin and sleep. As pinkleader always likes to say, "Better living through chemistry!"

Dr. Steve is here and is taking very good care of me. Time for a nap.

I did get to see some pretty cool stuff in Hawaii, but I wasn't going to pay the $14 per day the hotel in Kahului wanted for internet access. And neither was my company, so the updates had to wait.

Last Saturday morning, we went to Pearl Harbor and the USS Arizona Memorial. The visitors' center and museum was packed, but I did manage to learn something about the attack. The Arizona Memorial itself is quite a lovely tribute, and I found it very moving.

In the afternoon, we hiked up to the top of Diamondhead. It was a steep trip up a path, then 74 steps, then a tunnel, then more steps, then circular steps, then out through an old window slit, then a few more steps to the very very top, but it was worth it. The view was quite spectacular.

On Sunday, I flew to Kahului on Maui. That afternoon, my coworker and I drove up to Haleakala. It is a dormant (or maybe extinct) volcano than looks like I expected a volcano to look - lots of brown and reddish rock, jagged edges, and cooled lava. The crater at Diamondhead has been filled up with transplanted trees and plants, so it didn't seem very volcano-y to me. This was different. We skipped the hike down into the crater due to time constraints, but overall another amazing view, this one from up above the clouds.

Monday we did the lame tourist thing and drove to Lahaina to eat the the original Cheeseburger in Paradise. Yummy burger & fries, and excellent live music.

Tuesday we did the exhausted worker thing and just bummed around the hotel and grabbed a quick dinner. I did take advantage of the nifty oceanfront path that runs along the coast in front of all the fancy-schmancy resorts in Wailea.

Wednesday I flew to Hilo, met up with a different coworker and completed our survey there. That evening we drove to Volcanos National Park and watched the glow of flowing lava from a nice safe mile and a half away.

Thursday was a travel day - back to Honolulu and then on to Pago Pago. I did enjoy the lovely Japanese style garden just down the street from the hotel in Hilo, and then it was off to the airport. I was unpleasantly surprised by the rain shower that dumped on us during deplaning in Pago Pago and how by long it took to get through immigration and customs (Aren't they part of the US? Why do we even have to go through that?), and was pleasantly surprised by how nice the hotel is here.

Friday morning I met my contact and started my survey at the airport here. They don't have another jet flight until Sunday evening, so I will have to return to complete my survey. I am on that Sunday evening flight, so it will be like Alaska again!

I drove around the island a bit on Friday afternoon and evening. It is picturesque in spots, but there are no good places to pull over and take pictures of the lovely scenes. I drove past the Starkist cannery here and won't be eating canned tuna for a while. What a smell! This afternoon was a lunch outing and some shopping, but mostly I've been bumming around. The weather has not been cooperative and has been mostly rainy since I got here, so I don't anticipate much activity tomorrow, either.

Tomorrow evening I finish my survey and then I fly back to Honolulu on the overnight flight. Rah. I stay in Honolulu tomorrow night and head home on Tuesday. Yay! I have certainly enjoyed this trip, but I am sooooo ready to get home. I miss my house and my bed and my cat and my man. (Not necessarily in that order!)

Hope everyone had fun at KASF, or working on their kitchens, or whatever else was on the agenda for the weekend. See you soon.

Made it in to Pago Pago tonight. It is actually pronounced like "Pango-Pango" with a short "a" and not much emphasis on the "n". I actually got to do some stuff in Hawaii in the past week, but I haven't had much internet access to allow for reporting on it. I should have a chance to write an update this weekend.

Hope all is well at home - it the new batch of ice & snow melted yet?

After waaaaaaaay too many hours in airplanes, I made it to Honolulu in one piece. After an annoyingly long wait for a taxi, I made it to the hotel. I checked in with the bell captain as instructed, and shortly thereafter, a lovely arrangement of tropical flowers was delivered to my room. I told Steve not to send me flowers for Valentine's Day, because I wouldn't be home long enough to enjoy them, so he arranged for me to have some at the hotel. Is that ridiculously sweet or what? He also arranged for me to have a massage this morning as a late birthday gift. I am having trouble adjusting to someone doing such sweet things for me.

We are staying in Waikiki. I took a walk on the beach today and decided that it is not going to be one of my favorites. There are too many obstacles (like breakwaters, walls of lava rocks, boats for rent, and people) to be able to walk along the shore - I kept having to detour around stuff. And did I mention that it was really crowded? Of course, it was a holiday, so maybe things will slack off during the week. Plus I won't get out there until after work, so maybe the crowds will die down by then. Otherwise I'll have to hope for better on the other islands.

I did manage to get a bit pink between my walk and some time poolside, but I'll stop talking about it while anyone still loves me. It looks like things are finally warming up at home, so hopefully folks will be out from under snow soon. Take care!

Yay! The reports are all done. Just need to post the last one to the server for editor review and then boss review.

Other than that, I've been getting ready for "The Work Trip Which Will Garner Me Exactly ZERO Sympathy." And really, I don't expect any sympathy when I'm off to Hawaii and American Samoa for just over two weeks. Especially given our recent weather. Just promise you'll try not to hate me when I come home with a tan.

I do, however, want you to think back to early in your relationship. Remember when you'd only been seriously dating for a few months, and even one night apart was no fun? How you wanted to spend all of your time together and hated having to go to work and talked on the phone daily, often more than once? Yeah - now thing about being away for sixteen days during that. I know, I know - I'm a grown-up and it's okay and we will survive and blah blah blah, but I'm still going to whine about it a little bit.

On a cheerier note - how about those Penguins??? 12-0-2 in their last fourteen games! I've probably jinxed them into losing spectacularly to the Devils tonight, but they are still in the playoff picture, which is a rather remarkable improvement over last year at this time.

Yay! It's me, the slowest of the lemmings.

Regarding Sir Roland - ABOUT DAMN TIME! Theo wrote a lovely ceremony to which the participants more than did justice, and the V'ermine Triumvirate (and spouses) worked their usual magic with the hospitality.

Being at Ymir reminded me how much I miss going to events and hanging out with the many amazing people I am lucky enough to call friends. Before you get on me about going to more events, let me explain why I don't. I travel for work. A lot. I average two weeks of travel per month. The last thing I want to do on a weekend is pack again and travel more. Some folks made a list of their event travels for the previous year. I made a list of my work travels. This is just from the current job - I need to go back through expense reports to find the trips before May 2006.

May 22 – 26 Portland, Eugene, Redmond OR
June 5 – 8 Boston, MA Providence, RI
June 18 – 24 Phoenix, AZ
June 29 – July 5 VACATION!! – Soldotna, AK
July 16 – 30 Various cities in AK
August 20 – 25 Austin, San Antonio TX
September 10 – 15 Houston, TX
September 25 – 27 Milwaukee, WI
October 16 – 20 Albany, Saranac Lake NY
November 13 – 17 Eureka, Redding, Chico CA
November 27 – 30 Omaha, NE
December 4 – 8 St. George, Cedar City, Moab UT; Page AZ
December 10 – 14 San Juan, PR

For the record: Eating out every night is not as cool as you think.

Now this little lemming has to get back writing reports from her most recent travel. It was even colder in New Hampshire than it is here!