Seriously, do people not read?

I mean, true, "SHANNON" is more or less common as a first name depending on where you live. But no matter were, in North America, it's not an unheard of name.

Perhaps it's that it's not all *that* common a name that makes people so incapable of noticing a slight variation in spelling.
"Shannon" is the name of a city, a river and an international airport. It's also a not uncommon last name, or first name. My name is "Shannan" spot the difference? It's small, true. ShannOn is not my name. ShannAn is.

Seriously, there are people I receive regular emails or other correspondences from who, after months, even years, cannot seem to see that every time I write to them or reply, I sign ShannAn even though every time they write to me the address me as ShannOn...

I don't want to do the snarky "FYI, my name is spelled with an 'a', not 'o'" to either the president of my library board, nor the president of the ALA division's board I'm on... But seriously, I am the only one who checks to make sure I'm spelling someone's name correctly? Perhaps I'm more sensitive to checking how someone's spelled their name in a message before replying because of how badly my name is regularly butchered?

*sigh*, here ends rant #382 regarding my pet-peeve #427

Movin' movin' movin'

Moving is *so* much fun!

Do you believe me? Yeah, didn't think so. Ah well, in the end - once it's all done and I'm in a *much* bigger place, closer to work it'll all be worth it.

Started yet another new original story... not much so far, but an interesting premise I think. It'll take some research if I'm going to keep going with it. We'll see.

I took three loads of smaller things out to the new place. Of course it's all in the garage at the moment because the chick who was meant to clean the place this afternoon... well, didn't and I don't want to start putting things inside until she does so as not to block anything getting cleaned. *sigh* good help is *so* hard to find. ;}

I'll pack up a couple of boxes tonight. I'm not going into work tomorrow until 5:00pm for the board meeting at 6:00. I'll take a couple of runs out to the new place, hope the cleaning gets done and I can spend the night so I'm closer for catching the 6:00AM ferry Wednesday morning to go to Seattle to meet my dad who's flying in late on Tuesday evening.

Busy, busy, busy!

I did something interesting today.

For the first time ever, I was summoned for jury duty. And what do you know? I was selected to sit on the jury.

it was really interesting to see how the process works first hand. It's so very different from what you see on TV. They never show how often the jury has to get up and leave the court for a few minutes or more so the lawyers can duke something out over whether or not we can see or hear something.

I get absurdly excited by things like this - society functioning because we agree to stuff like this. We as people agree to give up our time to do this (yes, it's a summons, but still we could resist and get rid of the process) and the accused agrees to put his/her fate (if you will) in the hands of these random people. Also we are asked these questions - and it's on our honour that we're answering honestly that we will remain objective and decide on merits *alone*. I get just as ecited by voting...

It's a very different experience, I'm quite sure, from what happens in bigger cities etc. but there were seven of us chosen to sit through the trial and then randomly one was released as an alternate just before we went to deliberate. The deliberation was brief and we were all on the same page.

I worked carefully to remain neutral and I think I did ok. We're done, so I'm allowed to talk about it now. I did think about how I might be influenced. It was a domestic violence case - and without going into details, there was real cause to wonder at the charges and in the end we found not guilty.

Do I think I'm influenced by society to find the man's story more credible than the woman's? No. Do I think I'm influenced by society to find the woman's story more credible than the man's? No. Am I influenced by society to believe that only a woman can be threatened by a man? No. Am I influenced by society to believe that it is less/more/as likely that a man can be threatened by a woman? No.

I do tend to look inside and think about and examine my motives and thought-processes. I have looked inside - I have looked at every angle and I am comfortable that I and we reached the correct decision based on the evidence presented. The letter of the law was met. I'm also comfortable with the decision from the moral / spirit of the law aspect as well.

Still, I'm tired. An early morning - and it went until 5:30. I went to the gym and got a good workout, then came home to a note on the door saying the owners will bring more people by tomorrow to see the place. I had a case of pop out on the deck - it was on its side - and now it was open and the tins all over (including two under the deck where I can't get to them). I did warn them it was messy, but that was unexpected when I came home. It wasn't like that when I left. Can't have left a good impression with the people seeing it today. Oops.

One of the things about TGAW that I've always enjoyed is his total willingness and ability to say exactly what's on his mind. Boy pulls no punches. Don't get me wrong - he's not mean or rude exactly - just 'frank' and 'unfiltered' sometimes.

I suppose it should piss me off when this is turned on me. But strangely it doesn't. I laughed when he commented on the new person's willingness to work Sundays: "Of course she is, she knows it's a sweet deal!" (We're only open half the day and the FT person who does this shift does it as a full day - there's time before opening of course...).

So, I find myself laughing after a recent conversation with him. I was working on YALSA stuff - committee and board stuff and made a joke about them seeming to know that school was back in and summer reading over so they were sending all the work at once. I'll give him he phrased it very delicately - it was cute really how carefully he tried to say it - so much so that I ended up finishing the comment for him when he said that he wondered how much stuff like this was work for our library vs how much was going to look good on my resume.

I confess - I laughed right then when he said it. I didn't feel the need to defend myself to him or anything - only giving him an abbreviated version of the 'party line' of how this kind of thing benefits the library as well. I also smiled and said that yes, in fact it *did* look good on paper. I know I should be annoyed - that he thinks this, that he said this... but I don't know, it's just so funny - and I just don't feel like being pissy about this - plenty of other things to be pissy about ;)

I'm in a funny sort of mood today. I'm off work for the holiday (I get Tuesday off for Labour day because of the way my schedule works) and I really should be doing almost anything but goofing off online (like packing, cleaning, writing, going to the gym...) but heh I don't feel like it just now.

I'm moving!

Yay! Next week, the week after... sometime this month - into a 2+ bedroom house just up the hill from work so I can walk in and even home for lunch. It's more than I've been spending - by like $350/mo, but it's 1100sqfoot instead of 337sqfoot - quite a difference. Plus a spare room, a full kitchen, a tub (not just a teeny shower stall) and a "den" sort of room that I can use to set up my desk (which lays disassembled in storage at the moment) in a seperate room for my computer and books which I hope will help me with focussing more on writing which is something I really want to get serious about. Plus, the lady I'm renting from is someone I know - my old boss actually and she's leaving a king-size bed for the spare room.

Life is good in the galaxy of me

(sorry about that ending - I'm watching the science channel - a show about galaxies colliding and super black holes and what the universe will look like a google years from now according to quantum theory. Quite interesting actually - what can I say I am *such* a geek)

What?

Tourists... yeah, sure they're the economy in my wee town, but gah! Truly, with tourists, it's a love-hate relationship. Of course it could be that I'm just jealous because I'm working (not at a tourist attraction, but still) and not off travelling and being touristy someplace myself.