the world's going to hell in a hand basket, and there's probably an app to track it

I just read a short article in the Oregonian about a couple of local guys who are designing an app to monitor, track and pay kids for chores. Young entrepreneurs dads Oscar Goodson, 24, and Adam Bickford, 27, are developing an app that would take the uncomfortable exchange of cash for chores and sanitize it by completely removing the human interaction between parent and child.

The article goes on to describe how parents can create a list of chores and assign a monetary value to each chore. Kids can log in and mark off the chores as they are done, and once completed and verified, the parent can transfer money remotely to the child's debit card. The parent doesn't even have to be in the same room with the kid. Goodson and Bickford have even figured out how to keep kids from scamming the system. Bickford said, "As parents ourselves, even though our children are pretty young, we knew that kids are sheisty and parents would want some sort of visual verification if they can't verify with their own eyes." So the app will allow video and photo uploads for that.

Really, dude? Kids are sheisty? According to the article, your daughter is 3 years old.  Three.  If she's already scamming you, you're in for some big trouble when she's 15.

So what's wrong with this whole idea? Lest you think that I'm just an old fart and a Luddite to boot, I'll explain. It's not the fact that it's an app. I have nothing against them. There are useful apps for everything, from creating your own custom music playlists, to flashlights and compasses to help you find your way home in the dark. There are even apps to help you manage your apps.

The big problem here is that you believe you can keep your hands clean in the trenches of parenthood with one. By using an app to monitor your child, to set up the chores, to spy on her remotely to make sure she's behaving, to track her when she's out of your sight, you are setting her up to try and scam you. She will grow up believing you don't trust her, and that she needs constant monitoring to make sure she stays in line. She will feel that she shouldn't have to do anything unless she gets paid for it. You, on the other hand, think this will make your job easier. You can monitor everything from afar, and it's only a matter of time before someone invents a punishment app that doles it out for you.

 In 40 years, I have yet to see a paycheck for cooking, driving, cleaning, tutoring, and the countless other things I did just to keep the household running smoothly. Why should kids expect to?

We gave our kids an allowance every week. We didn't bribe them to do chores, homework or to behave. Sure, it was a big fat hassle to get them to do their chores. Yes, we even tried once to put a monetary value on putting out the garbage, folding laundry and emptying the dishwasher.  It didn't take long before it set up an even worse situation where they started to ask how much we'd pay them to do little things.  (On second thought, maybe kids are a bit sheisty.) It took us far away from our goal of trying to teach them to be cooperative, team players who understood the dynamic of shared labor for the good of the whole family.
It wasn't an easy thing to undo.

When I was a kid, I had chores to do every Saturday. My sister and I couldn't go out to play until they were done. We didn't have to negotiate over whether 25 cents was enough for dusting or watering the plants or cleaning a toilet. We did the chores because our mother MADE us do them. We never thought it was fair. (What kid ever does?) We never had a clue that she was trying to teach us to take responsibility and help out even if there was no monetary reward in the end.  The reward was supposed to be a sense of satisfaction over a job completed.

I realize that cash will soon be dead.  Unfortunately, debit and credit cards really don't help kids gain an understanding that an allowance is a finite thing. If you give a kid a dollar, when they've spent it, it's actually gone. It's not gone in the "virtual" sense. It's GONE. In the actual sense. When they 're old enough to understand that, they're old enough to learn how to manage a debit card. Using that criteria, I know a lot of adults who are not old enough.

How about it? Got any thoughts on paying kids to do chores?
I'll check in later… but now I have to go empty the dishwasher.

deja vu all over again

The Daily Show
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So, I always wondered about that...I guess history does repeat itself!

i'm not buying it

It's  a crazy, crazy time we're living in...a time where people all over the world are rising up and protesting corporate greed and manipulation in large numbers - risking arrest and personal injury to send a message that it is MOST. DEFINITELY. NOT. okay for corporations to make huge profits at the expense of  the very people who buy their products.

On the other hand - many, many Americans will be abandoning their family tables tomorrow evening to shop until they drop, instead of spending time enjoying a holiday in which we are supposed to be giving thanks for all that we have.

Many retailers will be open for business on Thanksgiving this year. This is not new. For years, most supermarket and drugstore chains have had at least limited hours on Thanksgiving, but this has historically been more about getting last minute items like whipping cream or pepto bismol  than deep discounts on flat screen TVs or the latest must-have video games.

A Macy's spokeswoman said “There are many associates who would prefer to work this time as they appreciate the flexibility it affords their schedules for the holiday weekend." And a spokesman for Target said, "...we've heard from our guests that they are excited." 
Target evidently didn't bother to ask their employees how they felt about working on Thanksgiving. One of them started this petition.
At least Brian Dunn, the CEO of Best Buy said, "I feel terrible", about having to open on Thanksgiving.
Huh.
I for one, am not buying it.

I'll be hanging out, enjoying the holiday with my good friends and family, for whom I am incredibly thankful. And I won't even be anywhere near a Walmart or Target or Best Buy or Macy's.

Here's wishing you all a happy, healthy and all around wonderful Thanksgiving.

what are you waiting for?

word week, day three

The power of words, continued...

Would you buy a used car from this man?

unsolicited advice, part two

Last week, after an unidentified neighbor left an anonymous note on the windshield of my car, I wrote a blog post about it. (Click here to read part one of this little saga, and don't forget to read the comments) It seems that in their opinion I have been slacking in my gardening duties, and therefore, by my sloth, have raised the Noxious Weed Threat Level to ORANGE (see chart below)


I received many supportive comments from my friends in the blogging community (I'm truly touched that you're all so pissed off for me!) as well as from my lovely neighbors who assured me they wouldn't hesitate to come over and pull the damn weeds out themselves if they could only identify them.

What the passive aggressive note-writer didn't seem to know is that I have been battling this particular patch of weeds for years. In fact, along with the dreaded Canadian thistles (Cirsium arvense) the parking strip is also overrun with horseradish, for which there seems to be no known enemy. In fact, I'm now convinced that in the event of a nuclear bomb blast, it would just spread bits of roots everywhere and the radioactive horseradish would happily repopulate the earth.

In September of 2008, I finally gave the go ahead to use Roundup to clear the patch, after 17 years of attempting to eradicate the stuff organically. We sprayed it, and left it to die for several weeks, after which we covered it with thick black plastic and let it sit over the entire winter and well into the spring of 2009.

We finally pulled up the plastic in June, only to discover snow white shoots of horseradish growing everywhere, followed several weeks later by sprouts of Canadian thistle. I set to work once again, digging deep craters in an attempt to get out all the roots, then bored holes in the roots that remained and poured undiluted Roundup into them.

This was nearly a year ago, and with the arrival of warm spring weather in 2010, the buggers are back with a vengeance. And now some busybody is giving me crap about slacking.

I have been considering my options for the past few years and have come up with another strategy to thwart the weeds' plans for world domination, but I just haven't had time to implement it yet, as I've been too busy working hard trying to keep the mortgage paid and food on the table. So in the meantime, this will have to do: I posted a discreet sign in the parking strip to ward off any more well-intentioned public diatribes.

unsolicited advice...

To the thoughtful neighbor(s) who left me this note on the windshield of my car today in the pouring rain:

Thank you SO MUCH for your helpful suggestion. I will attend to it IMMEDIATELY.

Anything else you'd like me to attend to while I'm at it? Perhaps the color of my house is not to your liking?

And I really do appreciate you leaving the note on my car instead of knocking on my door and telling me in person. My psychiatrist says I need to avoid confrontation because I have serious anger management issues, even though I hardly ever act on my violent impulses.

Now, if you could excuse me, I must go fertilize my dandelions.

Your slightly disgruntled neighbor,

Petunia

let the wild rumpus continue!

drawing by Maurice Sendak, from Where the Wild Things Are

The big debate over health care reform has turned into a wild rumpus. Republicans (yeah, I'm talking about you, Sarah Palin) are whipping the easily-led masses into a frightened frenzy with crazy talk about "death panels," and painting melodramatic scenes that could have come straight out of a cheesy 1970s sci fi flick.

But seriously, everyone I talk to in this country has a story about receiving bad health care or has experienced insurance company nightmares, or knows someone who went broke trying to pay medical bills, or died because they couldn't afford treatment. So why are we only hearing stories about problems in other countries, like England and Canada? It's because those countries, along with most others in the developed world, have some sort of universal health coverage for all their citizens. Things are out of control here, and we need to take drastic measures to ensure equitable and affordable medical care for all, not just those who can afford it.

Yesterday, I heard an interview with former presidential candidate, Ron Paul, (a doctor himself) in which he commented that he did not believe that medical care is a right. I'm guessing he believes in the survival of the richest fittest. Those are some reassuring bedside manners you've got there, Dr. Paul.

I'm getting tired of listening to tirades against everything President Obama is trying to do to fix long-broken and corrupt programs and institutions in this country. We need to initiate genuine and necessary change. What we don't need is to waste our time wading through a smoke screen of knee-jerk opposition based on idiotic rhetoric, and listening to bozos call the president a liar. (I'm talking about you, Joe Wilson)

This is a free country. Everyone's entitled to an opinion. We just need to make sure our opinions are well-reasoned ones based on facts, and not on fear, half-truths and innuendo. There's a lot at stake here...let's not screw it up by being too lazy to check our facts before we open our mouths, okay?



Otherwise, we may end up living in a Groucho Marxist state instead of a Democracy.

on a roll...

I seem to be on a roll with packaging issues lately. 

Dear Trader Joe, 

  We need to talk. It's about your little packaging idiosyncrasies. As in, what the heck is up with your package designers??? On the one hand, you package your recycled toilet paper in coded, recyclable plastic, and on the other hand, your cookies (your extremely addictive little cookies) are packaged in non-recyclable plastic containers. You gratuitously shrink wrap most veggies, yet your frozen fish is packaged in the smallest vacuum pack possible.  I don't get it. 

It's maddening, I tell you. Usually I can get past it, but the other day it got out of hand. I was making Irish soda bread, and grabbed for the baking powder and baking soda. I ended up having to throw out about 3 cups of flour and butter as well as the above mentioned ingredients. Why?

 Check this out:

This is the iconic baking soda package, right? Pretty much everybody copies this box, because it screams BAKING SODA. 

Just like all tissue boxes look like Kleenex brand boxes. They're icons. You don't have to promote an icon. Everyone knows what it is just by glancing at it, right?

 And this?

Baking powder comes in a small, round cardboard container, usually with a plastic lid to preserve freshness.

Like this.

And this.

So Trader Joe, I ask you: What the heck is this?!


I know. It says "BAKING SODA" right there on the label. And I myself am not exactly a packaging neophyte. I've designed packages and labels for years. In fact, I regularly read the fine print on labels to compare ingredients, nutritional analyses, and even look for who owns the damn company in case it's someone I'm boycotting at the moment.

I just can't believe I missed this.

Sigh. Happy Monday. 

damn yankees

I know I'm gonna get a lot of heat for this, but...I'm saying it anyway: The Yankees suck.

And here's why.

Sheesh! As if I needed another reason to hate the Yankees- that overbearing, money-bloated, pseudo patriotic, holier than thou symbol of everything baseball isn't...

On Tuesday night, during the Yankees vs. Red Sox game in the Bronx, a Yankee fan attempting to leave his seat to go to the restroom (during the 7th inning stretch, for God's sake) was stopped by two of New York's finest, who told him he'd have to wait until after the cheesy recording of Kate Smith singing "God Bless America" was over. He replied that he didn't care about the song, he just had to use the restroom. The cops then reached over and pinned his arms behind his back, escorted him downstairs and shoved him out the front gate of the stadium, telling him to get out of the country if he didn't like it. WTF?!

As it turns out, Yankee Stadium has an actual regulation requiring that fans be held captive during the singing of patriotic songs. I kid you not!

A spokesperson for the NY Civil Liberties Union said this is a violation of constitutional rights. For its part, the NYPD's official statement said "The officers observed a male standing on his seat, cursing, using inappropriate language and acting in a disorderly manner while reeking of alcohol...".

Ever been to a game at Yankee Stadium? I have. Let's just say that statement describes about 40% of the fans on any given night. (60% if you're in the bleachers.)

But this poor schlub just needed to pee.

So there you have it.

Patriotism by force. Is that really the American Way?

That's why I hate the Yankees.

Also because my mother was born and raised in the Bronx, my father was from Massachussetts, and I grew up in Flushing, Queens. Everybody knows you can't be a Yankee fan and a Red Sox fan... so I say:

Let's go Mets!

P.S. To quote Crash Davis from the movie Bull Durham: "...I believe there ought to be a constitutional amendment outlawing Astroturf and the designated hitter."

Yeah.

how to cope with junk mail

Thanks to my wanton spending habits fabulous credit rating, I receive tons of unsolicited credit card offers from companies like Capital One, American Express, Discover, Chase, and others every month. Frankly, it's beginning to piss me off. I've tried writing to them and calling them in an effort to stop the unnecessary destruction of millions of trees, to no avail. So, to keep from being buried alive, I've developed a strategy for clearing the decks and at the same time get a bit of satisfaction out of making them pay more for the privilege of asking me to allow them to help me purchase more useless crap I don't need and can't afford.

How to cope with junk mail in six easy steps

Step one: open envelope and remove all contents.

Step two: set aside postage paid return envelope. (Note that it's first class postage!)

Step three: tear remaining contents of envelope into tiny pieces.
(Don't forget the original envelope!)

Step three(a): I like to leave the section with my name intact, so they know who sent it...
but so far they haven't taken the hint. I'll get another offer from them tomorrow.

Step four: sprinkle tiny pieces liberally across desk.

Step five: carefully place all pieces into return envelope and seal.


Step six: disregard scary legal stuff on back of envelope; this is not directed at you. Note the customer locator code...this indicates that they will know who you are, just in case you insult them or something.

You're very welcome!

just a little rant

I've been reading lots of other blogs in the past week or so, spending way too much time reading accounts of blogger conventions, both real and virtual. And some of these accounts are kind of, um, boring and maybe just a little too self-serving for my taste. That said, I've probably just pissed off the few people who actually take the time to read this, but I guess I'm just pissed at myself, really. All this time spent perusing these accounts from BlogHer were a convenient avoidance maneuver. I should be spending time in my studio, getting ready for upcoming shows, making stuff for my etsy shop, and planning for the next three weeks teaching. Or at the very least, I could have been tackling a few projects around the house that need attention, like vacuuming or laundry or mowing the lawns, or writing letters to my congressman.

Meanwhile, out in the real world (as opposed to the virtual one, although lately I'll admit it's hard to tell which is which.) The shit has hit the fan. Really. Have you noticed how the world seems a bit surreal lately? Everyone seems to be walking around in a daze, like they're pretty sure this is just a crazy dream and they'll be waking up soon, so why should they bother paying too much attention? Have you seen this video of our President? The man who's known as the leader of the Free World? (In this country anyway) What the hell is going on, and why is he still talking?



Recently I've been feeling as if I've suddenly lost my voice. Not my physical voice; it's more like I've lost my psychic voice, the one I hear in my head. The world is going to hell in a handbasket, and I can't put the words together succinctly enough to make sense of it. So I'm resolving to go to my studio and make stuff. I'll listen to NPR, stay away from my computer for a bit, and try to make sense of it all. Because, I'm sorry, but in the end, I really don't care that she wore purple tights to BlogHer.