Pandora

OK, I've been meaning to share this service with others for a while and keep forgetting so I figured I'd say something about it here as it's being rather humourous this morning.

Pandora is a free music service that streams commercial-free music to your computer. What makes it extra cool is that you tell it a song or artist (or several) that you like, and it uses "music DNA" to compare that music to other stuff it its database that you may also like, and then plays songs you may not have otherwise heard. And it's free. It provides links to the Amazon.com and Itunes.com purchase points for each song (discretely, you have to click on the album cover to get to it). And you can have more than one "radio station" (I have rock/pop and mellow/new-age at the moment).

Now for the humourous part. I've told the thing I like Tori Amos, Michelle Branch, Evanescence, Savage Garden, Sting, and I can't remember who else in the Rock/Pop station. This morning it somehow decided that I must REALLY like 80s pop. As in it played three in a row from my early childhood (OK, elementary or middle school?) memories - Depeche Mode, Duran Duran, and Simple Minds. Not that I *dislike* any of those groups or even the particular songs (tho "Hungry Like A Wolf" just seems SOOOO dated). It just seemed rather odd to suddenly be transported back two decades.

As I was typing this it actually decided to return to the 21st century and played a Michelle Branch song ("Something to Sleep to") and now it's playing a song by Angela Ammons ("Walking Backwards") that I never would have heard without this service and I'm rather liking.

If you're reading this and want to hear what I'm listening to, I think you can search for my music by entering my email addresss. I'm registered on it using my dragonmama gmail account.

How the Great Northern Mall nurse-in went

(regarding a nurse-in at Great Northern Mall that I probably should have
mentioned on the blog before but I've been a bit out of it - more on that in
another post)

Well, none of the media showed up - though of course that's not why we were
there - but there were 11 nursing mamas present plus supportive spouses and
siblings and grandmas. We actually managed to be mostly on time (!) and
left the play area around 4:10 I think, moseying to Aeropostale (we're
mamas, we don't march, we mosey LOL). We spent a bit of time shopping in
Aeropostale (I actually bought a shirt - which I plan to crop to be a
nursing shirt - and some socks, both adorned with monkeys in honor of my
little nursing monkey). A few mamas nursed in their slings or sat on the
floor to nurse while there. The store employees were entirely polite, the
offending manager was NOT there. When I made my purchases I gave clerk a
few of the business cards I'd printed out (which say on one side "My child
has the right to eat here" and the text with law reference of the
breastfeeding law on the other side... editing out the words "her baby"
;) ). After that we moseyed to the food court and up to the mall management
office. On the walk there one of the Annas (G I think?) was nursing her
baby openly and some teens commented on it loudly to each other (not to
her), but other than that, I don't think there were any real comments made
(I could be wrong - share your story if you heard something I didn't). They
weren't open so we slid the envelope with our petition under the door and I
included at least one of the same cards I gave the clerk I think. Then
everyone disbursed for a bit and most of us wound up back in the play area
later, and then there was non-nursing drama caused by my son and husband,
which I'll post about later in a separate email so this one can be forwarded
on to others who may not be on one of these email lists and wanted to know
how things went.

I forgot to put any contact information in the envelope with the petition,
but I highly recommend as a next step that as many of you as are willing
call the management office this week. The phone number is 440-734-6300
according to their website, and their email address is
greatnorthern@westfield.com - the petition had over 70 signatures from the
website on it, and then those of the folks there added on at the end. I
wasn't sure about the legality of asking STRANGERS to sign the petition
(that may have counted as soliciting without permission on private property,
even if it was directed TO the OWNERS of the private property, and I didn't
feel like risking it).

Ahmie

parable fun

my in-laws are driving me insane with their procrastinating about moving to Cleveland. They've been unemployed for more than a month and have barely packed anything. Their health insurance runs out in the middle of August and Ohio allows insurance companies to deny coverage for pre-existing conditions if there is more than a 30 day lapse of insurance.  My 57 year old barely-English-speaking, no-high-school-diploma mother-in-law is on several prescriptions, including high blood pressure medication, but doesn't see the rush in getting her rear in gear to get here and start looking for a job (never mind that it took her as-clear-as-native-English-speaking college educated younger son more than 6 months to find a job in his field and I don't know if that even had health insurance).  I feel like I'm pounding my head against a brick wall.  So here's a parable.

There were two families who lived on either side of a windy mountain.  Near the top of the mountain on either side were large boulders, resting just feet from the edge of a steep cliff, at the bottom of which were the homes of the families.  The family on the west side of the mountain took turns going up the mountain every day to push their boulder the little bit that they could away from the edge of the cliff.  It only moved about a tiny fraction of an inch every day, barely further back than the wind moved it forward, but still the family persisted.  The family on the east side of the mountain watched the western family do this and thought they were tremendously silly, and the easterners continued on their daily activities as if there were no boulder, including going on a big vacation to the far west that they'd been planning. 

While the easterners were away, the region was struck by a massive earthquake.  The mountain shook and there were several avalanches of various sizes.  The family to the west had some minor damage to their house, and the easterners pointed out how like anxious busy bees the westerners looked as the easterners passed them on their way home from their vacation.  Their mocking stopped, however, when they arrived back to their side of the mountain where, instead of their home they saw a pile of rocks, the largest in the center that they had ignored while it was on top of the mountain.  They wailed and lamented their fate, and the western family felt bad for them but they knew there was little they could do for people who wouldn't do for themselves.

*bangs head on desk repeatedly*