August 2007 Archives

   Ice cream tastes much better when you're not supposed to eat it.

   Happy 10th Birthday Lucy!

Psychological Traps – it’s not like a mouse trap where you can get your inner child to stop asserting itself at inopportune times. Although I could probably use one from time to time. It’s actually something that I learned about this week in class. Usually I retain classroom knowledge for just a minute longer than I need to, but this topic has me fascinated.

We’re learning about this in terms of how these traps affect decision making, and one specific topic we discussed was advertising. Basically, the premise is that advertisers frame things in such a way that makes you think you need something right away or because it’s such a good deal. Like the advertisement, buy one, save 50% on the next – the more you buy, the more you save. Well, you really don’t save anything because you end up spending more. But who cares about that when I can get a second pair of shoes on sale?

The thing that interests me is how many other things in our construct of a world is affected by these psychological traps. Framing is everything. Politicians do it so much that when they talk they can say the exact opposite of what they mean, and somehow still be telling the truth. Companies so it to us with their babble about the wonders they’re doing for us the consumers while they actually are just making a buck. It’s all around us like hellish crabs from a bad date.

I guess my point (if I must have one) is that I think we are too used to this crap, and too often we just block it all out. Hell, I block out our pres. every time he opens his mouth. But I think the lesson I’m learning is that we have to constantly question the things around us, especially the things that influence us in our decision making. Granted, he may be wearing a condom, but he’s still ugly as hell. The condom shouldn’t sway you…

   So the whole family decided to try the South Beach Diet this week. Here's what we've found so far.
   The diet as explained in the book seems to make a lot of sense. The book is an easy read, and provides a decent introduction to the diet.
   Grocery shopping takes a lot longer to do. We're having to read all the ingredients on the labels looking for "enriched," "hydrogenated," and the multitude of sugars that are put into everything. I'm sure this will get easier as we get used to what we need to be buying.
   Eggs for breakfast all the time is a little icky. I went to the SBD forums tonight and found some alternatives.
   We spend a lot more time cooking. I'm sure this is a good thing because we're not eating a bunch of boxed, pre-processed stuff. But seriously, it has become somewhat time consuming.
   Some of the recipes - either I'm cooking them very wrong, or they are just disgusting. The Quiche-to-go cups turned out like little clumps of spinach. The stuffed mushrooms were just spinach in mushrooms and somewhat tasteless. The "surprise" mashed potatoes, made from califlower, were like baby food and gagable.
   Our lesson from this week: We need to take some time before committing to this diet trying out some of the recipes and finding things that we can stomach. I'm all about eating more healthy and losing a few pounds, but gagging on the food isn't probably the best way to do it. I think that's called bulemia.

   We had a rather scary storm come through today. Actually, we've had some crazy storms over the past few days. We had one last night that was like a light show. But today's took the cake with 8 counties under a tornado watch, and a very scary, rotating cloud that went right near our house. There are multiple reports in the area that we live of funnel cloud sightings, and although I usually don't freak out in storms like this, I admit I was freaked out by this one. After the storm was over we watched the news, and from the weather reports it looked like the big rotating, tornado spawning cloud went right over us. J took a photo on the way home from work with his camera phone - maybe I'll post it once we download it.
   It was like a crazy movie for a few minutes - I was running around the house trying to get the cats into the basement. I couldn't find Ellie so I was trying to find her while the power was flickering on and off and the wind was howling like the movie Twister. Turned out Ellie was one step ahead of me hiding in the basement. (Actually, she's still down there...)

   I'm now on my second night of overnights this week. My schedule is so messed up - I hardly know what day it is. And to make it more interesting I'm working 6 days this week. Thank goodness my iPaq will remind me of what I need to do and when. If I could implant my iPaq I would be a Borg. I wonder if Borgs work overnight....

   Strangely, I had to pity the poor woman who was yelling at me....
   This woman came into my store today, made her purchase in cash, and left only to return 30 minutes later. She was very upset that she seemed to be missing her $50 bill. She explained that she must have accidentally given it to the cashier. We looked in the cash drawer, but didn't find it. I explained that I would be right back and that I was going to look into it to see what I could find out. The joys of modern technology allowed me to go back in time and see the whole thing happen. No luck.
   So I went back to this customer who was still visibly upset. I apologized that unfortunately I wasn't able to see where else the $50 might have gone - that I didn't see it fall on the ground, it wasn't left by the register, etc. Although this was not my fault or the fault of anyone at my store, I apologized and was genuinely sorry that I couldn't help her.
   Well, she was genuinely POed and began to go off on me. She claimed that perhaps the cashier had stolen it, and that I should search her. Yeah.... no, I'm not searching my cashier. Again, I apologized for the situation, but reassured her that there was nothing that I could see that indicated her $50 was taken by my cashier or that it was left at the store. She was not having it. Her voice getting louder, she thanked me with that sarcastic gleam that mad people get and exclaimed, "Thank you! Thank you very much! Now my dead son won't be getting any flowers today!"
   Random and unexpected, yes. Appropriate, not really. I managed to keep my mouth shut while she stormed out of the store...

   Ever since I was little I loved white chocolate. When I got a chocolate easter bunny in my basket it was always white chocolate. But apparently now that I am 30, the chocolate bunny doesn't like me anymore. I've recently figured out that white chocolate gives me a nasty case of heartburn. I've never had issues with heartburn until just a few months ago, and now I can't eat a bunny anymore. Bummer...