Rant VII: Now With 25% Less Drama

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North_Ranger

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Would you translate and prononce that, please? That looks perfect to spit at someone who's pissed me off.
vittu = Fuck! (as an expletive); cunt (as a noun)
saatana = a devil; if capitalized, Satan. Closest translation vis-á-vis its offensive value: Fuck.
perkele = a devil; can also be used capitalized for the Devil. Also considered THE most recognizably Finnish curse word. Closest equivalent: "Goddammit".
jumalauta = a portmanteau from the expression "Jumala, auta", or "God, help me". Used in the same context as English "Goddammit".
 

North_Ranger

Staff member
Didn't get the job. But the principal told me that she was so impressed that she sent my resume to another school in the area that was hiring on 3 temporaries for the rest of the semester. The only way I could have fucked up that 2nd interview more is if I'd stripped and danced on the table between my interviewers and me.

First of all, I didn't bring many extra resumes, and the school is waaayyyyy out away from my house. I must have accidentally given the principal two stuck-together ones, because I looked in my folder and there were NONE. So I tried to email the document to the school, and it didn't work in time, so the principal told me not to worry, that she'd get it from the principal who referred me. I felt like an unprofessional goof. Then I found out (I had less than an hour to prepare for this one) that two of the positions are ESL. They were asking me all these questions about how to be an effective ESL teacher, and I kept looking down while trying to think of answers and stuttering. The first interview was SO GOOD, and I was so frustrated by this one. I'm not that babbling idiot, but I was so thrown by something going wrong at the very beginning and then having almost no knowledge of the position I was applying for. I asked over the phone, too, what the jobs were! All they told me were the grades!

D'ahh. I know I'm beating myself up too much. I'm just annoyed. Pretty sure they're not gonna call me. Oh well... coffee. *slurp* Coffee + learning experience = not that bad a day when I put it all into perspective.

They're a pain in the ass, the interviews. I guess I don't have to tell you how I know that; I've been bitching about my interviews for several months now ;) But you always have to try and get back into the saddle. Be yourself in the interviews, try no to panic, and show the principal (plus other interviewers) you're the right person for the job. It's a big thing she sent your resumé on to other schools, though :) Means she was impressed at what she saw. Plus, that's a good way to get your foot in. After my three-month substituting gig ended the ESL teacher I was subbing for told me she would be retiring in 2012; hopefully that means she'll put on a good word for me if and when I send my resumé :)

Don't let this get you down, Seej, there's always gonna be a new opportunity for us teachers.
Added at: 01:26
I think it's great that you've put so much work into a madeup language like that :)
Nauti elon päivistäsi, oi naamioitu robotti. Sillä unesi voi pian olla ikuista...
 

North_Ranger

Staff member
Ei, suomea. No, Finnish.

Tolkien käytti kuitenkin suomen kieltä innoittajana kehittäessään haltioiden kieliä, erityisesti quenyaa. Tolkien did, however, use Finnish as an inspiration when developing the different varieties of Elvish, particularly Quenya.

Esimerkiksi quenyan laivaa tarkoittava sana 'vene' on suomeksi vene. For instance the Quenya word for a ship, 'vene' is Finnish for 'a boat'.
 
M

makare

Hmmm is there a Finnish mafia?


Also I knew that that was the joke.


Nobody gets me :(
 

Cajungal

Staff member
Thanks, North. :) I shouldn't complain. I got two interviews in one day, and at least one of them ensured that there's a principal out there who would recommend me to someone else. So... back to the drawing board. No more pouting! I might have a tutoring job lined up soon, so that's something at least.
 
Ei, suomea. No, Finnish.

Tolkien käytti kuitenkin suomen kieltä innoittajana kehittäessään haltioiden kieliä, erityisesti quenyaa. Tolkien did, however, use Finnish as an inspiration when developing the different varieties of Elvish, particularly Quenya.

Esimerkiksi quenyan laivaa tarkoittava sana 'vene' on suomeksi vene. For instance the Quenya word for a ship, 'vene' is Finnish for 'a boat'.
I finally know what Finnish sounds like now after having seen Rare Exports.
 
Sometimes I despise the technophobic administration at this place.

Apparently, our Nursing department demanded more space for their expanding program, and every one of their proposals for more space involved usurping a public computer lab. The administrative board, noting how much the program was expanding (and collecting revenue for the college) decided to not only give the nursing program our biggest, most used, and most social lab (and the place students hung out the most on campus), but all of our offices as well for our department, determing the IT staff should all split up into each building, since there was no other place for our department to go together.

So, not only will our public computer volume be reduced by about 1/3 overall, we'll all be at least one building apart from the network backbone, unable to function as a cohesive department without conference calls, group IMs and scheduled meetings, and lose our entire hardware work space, with half the office space, giving us nowhere to store OR work on hardware. Administration made this decision without even getting input from our department, as our admin rep basically made the decision without informing us.
 
Unfortunately, the tech market is terrible out here, and I am not in a financial position to do anything drastic. My first order of business is going to be to use what leverage I have here to resist as much of the decision as possible, and I've already written a strongly worded note to our admin rep and the rest of the admin board. If they insist on cutting the public lab, I'm also going to make sure the student body knows right away, and make sure the student paper and association is given the facts on the matter, since nobody complains like students.

We've also spent the past two hours developing another workable proposal that would cut the least used public lab space and provide 80% of the space they want for their nursing lab area. We've also run computer traffic data and estimates on the student body effect, indicating that our proposal would increase nursing space by 80% while forcing a 3% reduction in public computer availability based on usage from fall. Their proposal, on the other hand, would increase nursing space by 100% while forcing a 60% reduction in public computer availability based on usage from fall. Again, this information will quickly make its way to the student body if they reject it.
 
It sounds like you've got a good game plan, so I hope it works out. I also hope your students turn out to be as vocal as you hope they are.
 

North_Ranger

Staff member
I finally know what Finnish sounds like now after having seen Rare Exports.
Incidentally, Baer... I just recalled the kind of Finnish that was used in Rare Exports. Finnish is strange in that way that practically no one speaks the official, grammatically correct form; that is used almost exclusively in writing and official speech, such as by politicians and other speech-makers. The majority of Finns speak a variety of regional accents, the Lappish accent in Rare Exports being one example thereof. For most Finns it sounds hard, to-the-point, with highly emphasized /k/ sounds that feel like a woodpecker hitting you in the ear ;) Culturally it denotes some manner of rural upbringing and a kind of harshness; that life is going to kick you in the ballsack so you might as well kick it back, and there's no point in wasting time being fancy-schmancy or timid about things - such as in the early part of the movie where the men and boys alike come armed to cull the reindeer herd.

Just something I wanted to point out, perhaps slightly out of boredom ;)
 
Hmm, very interesting. I'm not sure my untrained ear would have been able to tell the difference, but it is interesting nonetheless.
 

fade

Staff member
I woke up this morning to find my cat dead by the road in front of my house. I thought he was in when I closed the cat door last night. I've never seen him go in the road before. Poor cat. He was my buddy. :'(
 

Dave

Staff member
I woke up this morning to find my cat dead by the road in front of my house. I thought he was in when I closed the cat door last night. I've never seen him go in the road before. Poor cat. He was my buddy. :'(
Dude. That's horrible. I'm sorry to hear it.
 
I woke up this morning to find my cat dead by the road in front of my house. I thought he was in when I closed the cat door last night. I've never seen him go in the road before. Poor cat. He was my buddy. :'(
I'm so sorry.
 
I have a friend that I haven't really talked to in years. We used to be the best of friends but life got in the way and we drifted apart. Anyways I just found out that said friends baby has leukemia. I am not sure on the details I only found out this much becuase a friend of my parents happens to be the uncle of said friend. But I am torn on one hand I want to contact my friend and tell him I am sorry for what is happening and offer my condolences. But on the other hand we have drifted so far apart that he didn't even contact me directly with the news so I would feel weird just contacting him out of the blue.
 
R

rabbitgod

Condolences to everybody above.

My wife and I had to put our dog down tonight. He went in for an MRI because he was throwing up a lot and had a few convulsions at 330am. Sadly he wouldn't recover from the anesthetic and the MRI revealed a mass in his brain. They said he was walking around this morning and was generally pretty happy and that his crash happened while out of it so he didn't suffer. Further sadness because my wife is out of town and we had to do the whole thing on the phone.

He was a great dog. The perfect buddy. I'll miss him terribly.
 
I'm sorry to hear it rabbitgod. I'm glad to hear he was a happy pup and I'm sure he was lucky to have you as an owner.
 
my condolences as well, putting your pet down is the most heart breaking thing you can do. I cried for a week when i put my lest dog down, and I am not sure if I will survive putting my next one down. but if you get another one, please think about adopting, most of the dogs in shelters are really good pups. my current pups have been the best dogs i have ever had.
 
Welp, here we go.

My granpa was sent to the hospital last week Monday because he needed a tumor removed in his lymph node. During the operation, another lymph node/track got nicked and he had to stay another week on a special diet. When I went to visit him this afternoon, he was feverish (which had started only two hours prior apparently), his bladder hurt like hell and his face was all swollen. My mom and I were sitting there when somebody comes in for a regular blood test. He tries to sit up, starts wheezing and puffing.

Long story short, he is in the IC now, in stable condition but under sedatives. Turns out something in his throat had swollen which obstructed his breathing, so they gave him a tube down his throat to help with that. He's under antibiotics for the fever (which helped according to the doctor) and the fever itself was apparently the result of an infection somewhere. He'll stay asleep for at least four days, but treatment is gonna last another couple weeks probably.

It was a stressful afternoon/night and I am giving literally zero fucks about everything right now.
 
My daughter has been coughing. A lot actually. This is the first time I hear a baby cough that way. It breaks my heart. The doctor tells me that she suffers from allergies.
 
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