I'm trying so hard...

...to get my pricing homework done and to stay on top of my readings:


I wonder how much our cat knows about elasticity of demand...

Are You As Smart As Melly? Take her U.S. History & Government quiz to find out!

During my cleaning frenzy today, I found my U.S. History & Government quiz on foreign policy:

Word Bank:

• Delome
• Treaty of Paris 1898
• Platt Amendment
• Panama Canal
• "dollar diplomacy"
• Good Neighbor Policy
• Roosevelt Corollary
• Open Door Policy
• Yellow Journalism
• Russo-Japanese War
• Olney Interpretation
• "moral diplomacy"

Quiz:

1. _____ Foreign policy approach that encourages U.S. investment in other countries.
2. _____ This policy means less emphasis on intervention and more on Pan-American cooperation.
   
3. _____ U.S. foreign policy approach to China: promoted equal trade rights for all nations in China.
4. _____ Sensationalist writing used in the media to create a "war like" mood.
5. _____ This interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine claimed that "Today, the United States is practically sovereign of this continent..."
6. _____ As a result of this , U.S. power increased in Cuba and Cuba became a U.S. protectorate.
   
7. _____ President Theodore Roosevelt negotiated peace between the nations after Japan and Russia fought this war.
   
8. _____ President Wilson used this policy towards Mexico conducting foreign affairs in terms of judgments about right and wrong.
   
9. _____ This addition to the Monroe Doctrine called upon the U.S. to intervene in the Western Hemisphere and act as an international police power when necessary.
10. _____ This ended the Spanish-American war.
11. _____ The area in dispute between the U.S., Panama, and Colombia
12. _____ Spanish minister who wrote a letter criticizing President McKinley

You have one week to take to this quiz and submit your answers in the comments. Bonus points for guessing how old/what grade I was when I originally took this exam. I'll post the answers on January 25th.

Catching up with Dan

I haven't hung with my friend Dan since July and before that it had also been at least six months since our last get together. We grabbed dinner this evening and in between bites, we joked about feeling old (we've been friends for almost 10 years!) and reminisced about high school.

We also HOUSED seven rolls of sushi and an appetizer. YUM!

It's funny how there are some friendships where it doesn't matter how much time goes by between visits because it always feels like no time has passed....

I'm not alone and it could get worse...

It turns out that I'm not the only one having a "terrible, horrible, no good, and very bad" week:

When I apologized to my professor for being late, he told me that he was sympathetic to my situation because his car died the day before and he was taking a taxi to and from work. (What are the odds?!)

My week could have been much worse:

A friend of mine also missed class because of car troubles. In her case, she was in a car accident. All of a sudden my "terrible, horrible, no good, and very bad" week, didn't seem so awful.

Things are looking up:

Although I'm still fighting my cold (it's winning), I felt well enough to go to the office this morning. When I got there, the first voice mail I listened to was from the Team Bank of America chairperson asking me to join their executive board! It made my morning to find out that I'll be helping to plan the events and volunteer initiatives that I love participating in.

First my phone...

...then my car died tonight. AAA took forever and I missed the first GBC meeting of the quarter. When I arrived on campus, I was that annoying person who was a half hour late and had to awkwardly find a seat in a room with over 90 students. Waiting for AAA made my cold even worse and being sick makes me grumpy.

If I was in elementary school, I would quote Alexander and say that I am having a "terrible, horrible, no good, and very bad" week.

On a positive note, I had a good day at work and think that I will enjoy my pricing class.

Unreachable

Not by phone, not by text.

My phone died [I'm not surprised] this evening and won't be replaced until I receive a new one from AT&T's warranty department.

Until then, the internet (or snail mail) is the only way to :p

114 Years Old

Simply Amazing:



I hope I live to see 114 birthdays. :)

My phone is going NUTS!

If phones could take drugs, mine would be on crack.

When I turn the phone on, it rapidly highlights every icon on the menu and won't let ME select anything:

• If I open the address book, it opens the Internet...
• If I open my missed calls, it opens the Internet...
  
• If I text, it inserts random 6s or opens the Internet...
  
• When I try to outsmart my phone by opening the Internet, it goes back to rapidly highlighting everything on the main menu and selecting nothing.

Arg! The only silver lining is that my current phone isn't dialing my cousin every time that I turn it on, check my voicemail, or try to make outgoing calls. When I hung up my pink razr, it would start redialing her number. I had to let it go to voicemail just to let her know that nothing was wrong, I wasn't trying to get in touch with her, and to ignore my calls until I fixed my phone.

That was also a fun problem to explain to ATT customer service:

ATT: Did you try (insert troubleshooting suggestion here)?

Melisa: Yes, and it started calling my cousin.

ATT: Did (insert troubleshooting suggestion here) work?

Melisa: No, it is calling my cousin

ATT: What about (insert another suggestion here)?

Melisa: Nope, it is calling my cousin again

Maybe I should give up on pink, suck it up and just get an iPhone...

I'm a bull riding champion?

I stopped by Elsewhere Cafe on my way home from Christmas #3 to catch up with my close friend Jules whom I haven't seen since I was "living in a studio with a kitchen smaller than most people's closets" That was two years and three addresses ago.

While I was there, I found out that there are rumors circulating around my hometown that I am a bullriding champion. Not only am I bullriding champion but I also won the state finals?!

I am mortified but Jules thinks that I should keep it going by making ambiguous comments like, "That was in my past" or " I only do that on weekends."

One of my favorite Story People prints...

I love Brian Andreas' Story People artwork and this is a video of one of my favorite prints: