mighty_aphrodite

So...

Had my MA Latin exam today.  I wasn't going to turn it in, but I decided to anyway at the last minute.  I don't think I did too badly, so we'll see.  If I didn't pass, I have a year before I have to take it again (Have to make on exam attempt per year until you pass at your level) and I'm allowed to not turn in once.  It could be up to a month until I get it back, depending on who's grading and if the graders agree on my exam, or if they have to pull in a tie-breaker grader.  I had to do two out of four passages, choosing Augustine and Horace over Caesar and Vergil.  Methinks I may have passed.  I don't wanna jinx it, though.

Still all congested with the allergies and the glaven, but I have rediscovered the beauty that is VapoRub.  It's now on my list of miracle products, along with duct tape and chapstick.

In other news, I have now officially left stupidpetownersfor good.  I'm sick and friggin' tired of people judging me for buying my dog from a pet store.  My puppy came to me healthy and well cared for.  It's possible he came from a puppy mill, but I doubt it.  Even if he were, does that mean he doesn't deserve to be loved and given a home?  Get proper vet care and a good healthy diet?  There are plenty of people who adopt from shelters and then feed crap food and don't take their animals to the vet.  He may be "ill-gotten", but at least my dog is healthy and happy.   There was a big puppy-mill bust near here last week.  Guess how much the puppies are being adopted out for by the shelter that rescued them?  $375, $25 more than I paid for my dog, and I didn't have to fill out an application or invite a stranger in to my home to judge my fitness to be a puppy parent.  I hate self-righteous pet people.

You might as well hear the whole story, which is starting to get long and irritating. First I have to argue for hours on November 27 to get them to even consider repairing my computer. (Not going into that hell again). Then I send it in three days later via DHL: I hear nothing from Dell for over 2 weeks. Then I call to see where it is on Saturday (after first having to get customer service to give me the codes I need in order for me to even get through the system to the tech people- all those wonderful numbers on the bottom of your computer that I don’t have because –duh- they have my computer), and nobody can tell me where my laptop is or if it was even received. I'm told to call DHL on Monday to see if they have it. Very helpful, wonderful service, that is. DHL tells me this morning it was delivered on the first. I called back today, getting a tech who speaks beautiful colloquial American English (what a novelty) and isn’t reading off of a script! and am told I have to wait another two days to get any answers while he e-mails the depot asking where it is. (incidentally, does anybody remember that time about five or six years ago when Dell launched a marketing campaign, priding themselves on NOT outsourcing their “award-winning” technical support?) This at least was more help than the last guy could give me (he told me he had no way at all to check repair status), so I figured this was fine. At least I’ll get some answers, if slowly. Then, finally, three hours ago I get an e-mail that my computer has been received at the depot- 17 DAYS AFTER IT WAS RECEIVED AND SIGNED FOR AT THE DEPOT, ACCORDING TO DHL RECORDS:
------------------------------------------------
Dear ANGELA ANGELA,

Your Dell notebook has been received at the repair center.
What's Next?
• Please review your dispatch information below and keep this email for reference. If you need to make any changes to the dispatch contact information, please visit our Support Center or Click Here to chat with a live support representative.
• You will receive an email when your repair has been completed or if there are any status changes.

Dispatch Information
Dispatch Number: ********
Service Tag: ********
Contact Name: ANGELA ANGELA
Contact Phone: 319*******
-----------------------------------------------

The contact information in the e-mail I have finally received is totally incorrect. Obviously my first and last names are NOT the same, and the phone number they have listed is one from four moths ago, where my computer was originally shipped when I bought it nearly a year ago. I'm not sure how many times in the past four days I have confirmed my name and phone number, but apparently it was one too few. What idiots. I was told my entire repair and shipment would take about 5-8 business days and so far it has taken seventeen days, apparently for anyone to notice my computer was even at the depot (that is, if they didn’t just misplace it and not find it until I called to inquire and they couldn’t find it). 17 FRIGGIN’ DAYS. I’m told they get backed up this time of year. How? I understand that shipping delays happen over the holidays? But under-warranty computer repair? HOW? How does that make sense? My computer has not even been TOUCHED by a technician yet. This is absolutely ridiculous service. I will go buy an iBook before I EVER buy another Dell. From me, that’s saying a hell of a lot

Hey, I'll admit it.  The carpet looked like shit.  Not even denying it.  Do I feel a little shameless for asking for money back that I really don't deserve?  Not enough to keep me up at night. 

I'm annoyed. CTV (Canada) accidentally aired GA EPISODE TWO!!!!! last night, instead of the premeire. Damn Canucks get all the luck. I haven't found it online yet, nor am I likely to. ABC I'm sure, is watching the web like a hawk.

I got "ma'am"-ed at the grocery store today. Granted that the cashier was, like, fifteen. So maybe I struck her as a "ma'am". But damn... Do I look like somebody's mother? Maybe the latest hair cut was too much. (picture later)

I did get some good news at work today. Our manager is quitting to go work at her family's business and the store owner offered me her job for the next two months... kind of. I would get the work, but not the title. But I'm not about to quit the museum becasue I need at least one job I'm not ashamed to put on my resume. And I can't work 40 at the mall as well as 20 at the capitol. So we struck a deal. I'll be working 30 hours a week with a fifty cent raise. What really creeps me out is that she keeps saying that she wishes I wasn't going away because it would be great if I could stay and be her assistant. Do I strike you as McJob lifer? I'm sorry, but I did not go through undergrad, an honors thesis, my GRE, and all the grad school application hell so that I could manage a cookie joint.

I am so fucking pissed I can't even see straight. My German history professor diverted from the syllabus and gave a lecture on "Germany in the Age of 9/11" which basically consisted of a long string of criticisms of the Bush administration's foreign policy occasionally punctuated with the qualifier "Most germans thought...". and half of what she said was totally fucked up. Example: most Germans thought that if Americans really believed a.) that the war would be over quickly, b.) that restructuring the government would be easy and without opposition, and c.) that few civilians would get hurt, that those Americans were stupid." I'm sorry, when did we make those claims? I seem to remember Bush saying that we wouldn't be out of Iraq any time during his presidency, that work would go on in Iraq long after he was out of office, and that it would take a lot of hard work and would cost some livs in the process.
Then she moves on to talk about the 'selfish" nature of American foreign aid, saying that we only gave aid so that we could force third world countries to buy our expensive products, and that "Germans felt" that the real way to prevent international problems was to eliminate economic misery so that nobody would want to go to war and everybody would be happy. Socialist drivel, pure and simple. Finally, she expressed the opinion that, since the US was the world's only super power, we had upset the balance of power, and when that kind of thing happens, the sole power is likely to run amok. She said, Americans either had to voluntarily restain themselves, or else Europe had to become strong and united so that they could "check" the US if it should become necessary. That Americans didn't know what war was really like becasue tey hadn't fought one ontheir own soil in so long. They didn't know what it was like to be bombed, the Germans did.
Excuse me. For one, the Germans were the perpetrators, hence they were bombed. In the second place, we were putting our lives on the line to rescue them from a dictator. We then pulled them out of the depression and gave them demoracy. Don't like us fighting foreign wars? Then don't ask for our help next time you start one. There's a reason we don't have domestic wars--we know what the fuck we are doing.

This has been the weekend from hell... You see, we are so short-handed at work right now tha if somebody calls in sick, we are totally fucked. Well, this weeked, we were fucked. I was the only person to work in my department the past two days, and we only had one person to close produce that past two nights (and he is having to close my department tonight,too, as well as last night). I worked 11.5 hours yesterday and 9 today. I mean, I got overtime, which I guess is a good thing, but i am soooooo friggin' tired. I won't be reaping the benefits of this overtime for another two weeks, but when I do, I'll bring in 324.37 (before taxes) just for this week. So that's cool. Other good things: I am not going to miss Housewives tonight, I get to spend the evening with my hubby, and I can now study for my Greek midterm tomorrow (all of this if I stay awake long enough to do it).
In other news:
I applied for a new job
I didn't get funded at UCSB (I'm third on the waiting list, but I can't very well agree to go there without knowing for sure if I can pay for it, which they won't be able to tell me until everybody accepts or denies admission, which few will probably do before the deadline. *sigh* And if i do get funding it will probably be only partial. *sigh* And David is really set on me going there *big sigh*).
My feet are killing me and I'm going to try to take a nap now.

Well, I was having a good day... until Rosemary the sarcastic bitch had to go and kill my post-grad-school-acceptance buzz. We all have our bad days, right? Well everyday I spend in that class my performance gets worse. I do understand the material- at home. But with the grammar Nazi staring me in the face while I'm trying to translate and making sarcastic comments every time I screw up, I totally blank on things I know I know. Every time I stumble on a point of grammar, she says something like, "Those of you who are planning to go to grad school might do well to look at Smyth #..." Granted, all five us are going on to grad school, but my fuck-ups are the only ones that provoke this particular response. Today, I think she went too far. I had forgotten to look up two vocabulary words and was stumbling over a construction I'd never seen before, and her response was, "And you just got into Santa Barbara?" I wasn't sure whether I wanted to cry, scream, or punch something, so I just sat there... and ran out of the room the moment class was over. I'm used to her talking down to me, she's never shown any of us anything but contempt. But singling me (and Katie, too, for that matter) out for verbal abuse is going beyond a lack of professionalism, it's just fucking rude.

On a higher note, David and I are eating out at a classy joint tonight and seeing Shakespeare on Valentine's Day. I need to try to focus on the positive, here.

Today's description of the Roman gods behavior was, "the stuff of trashy novels." By all that is holy, I hope we get past the fifth century soon, before I chuck something heavy at professor Berman.
In other news, I seem to have misplaced my LSJ. Therefore, I shall be Perseus-ing in the wee hours of tomorrow morning at the main library. *sigh*

Semester from hell, and I'm only 3 hours into it. Profesor Berman and I are NOT going to get along. Today she started the class with a lecture on the Roman culture and religion from which Christianity sprang. Her utter contempt for the classical world could not have been more plain. She described Roman ritual as an excuse for free food and the gods as "idiotically fickle," made generalizations about mystery religions that weren't all true- such as, the cults became popular, so the Goverment syncretized them all. How about Cybele? Brought to Rome by the government on purpose. And she went out of her way to describe the most bizarre aspects of the culture, omitting the explanations thereof and making the Romans look brutal, superstitious and flaky. She mentioned the exstatic castrations of Cybele's priests and the blood baptism of Mithraic followers without explaining the origin of the practice. She mentioned that the paterfamilias had the power to kill any member of his household at will, without the qualification that his was hardly EVER done. Not that any of her facts weren't straight, but her analysis of them is terribly biased. /me grumbles at anti-classical hardcore Medievalists. We're talking about a centralized state with a professional army and highly developed arts and education, here, that it took western Europe over 1000 years to regain. She can dispense with the contempt.