MM - BBGC - Life After WLS

Dear Santa

Dear Santa (The real one, not the creepy pedoSanta circa 1980something...) -

We all know the best way to spread Christmas cheer is to sing loud for all to hear.  But I would like to skip all cheer this year, please.  I haven't got any spirit and I would like to suggest post-poning, perhaps ... in May?  I like May -- it's warm.  I mean, people in Florida still put up sparkly trees and it's like 75 degrees there.  How about it?

I am sure it's because I'm not living at home, and I haven't got any lights on a tree.  I'm not playing any seasonal music,  I'm not making cookies, there's no fudge in sight, and there's no holiday cards coming in.  I haven't even done any real shopping -- haven't stepped foot in a mall! 

I haven't done anything remotely Christmas-y this year, even the one elementary school choral concert I attended, they sang Katy Perry.

I haven't given to the Salvation Army Bell-Ringer yet!  It doesn't feel like the holiday season.  I am sure by the spring, I can gather some jingle in my bells, or at least some jingle in my wallet. 

(And this is where you visualize me as The Grinch.  But, we do know how that ends.  It's all good.)

Where is that Roast Beast? 

 

A SKY FULL OF LIGHTERS!

This is why I fail as a parent.

READING OUT LOUD IN AN INSIDE VOICE - What motivates US?

I don't have an iPad, Kindle or Nook:  BUT I NOW HAVE ACCESS TO A LIBRARY.  Old school, I am.  (I was also very late in getting a mobile phone and the internet -- you wouldn't expect that from a blogger but it's the truth.)

I took the little ones to the public library last week.  I quickly realized it was difficult to keep a certain small person from READING OUT LOUD IN AN INSIDE VOICE because she didn't really know about libraries and being quiet in them.  I haven't been inside a library -- since -- moving to this town.  Before that, we could walk to the library in our previous town, but I didn't do it often with babies to you know, get MYSELF a book to read.  She will learn, since her big sister was all in her face,

"You do KNOW this is a place where you HAVE TO be quiet?"  

The girls got signed up for library cards -- and picked out books -- each checked out two.  While my four year old was not really interested in a book, since was more interested in the toys.  

"Why do they have toys here?  I thought we were 'posed to be quiet?"  

My soon to be fourth-grader just was thrilled to find a tasseled book-mark.  

It's the little things that motivate us:  like the walk to the library for the promise of a new book, or is it?  After convincing the lady at the check out desk that I Really Did Live In Town, I checked out this book:

 

Book Description -

"Most people believe that the best way to motivate is with rewards like money--the carrot-and-stick approach. That's a mistake, says Daniel H. Pink in Drive. In this provocative and persuasive new book, he asserts that the secret to high performance and satisfaction--at work, at school, and at home--is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world. 

Drawing on four decades of scientific research on human motivation, Pink exposes the mismatch between what science knows and what business does-and how that affects every aspect of life. He examines the three elements of true motivation--autonomy, mastery, and purpose--and offers smart and surprising techniques for putting these into action in a unique book that will change how we think and transform how we live."

I'm just into the first chapter -- and it makes a lot of sense to me.    

The higher the reward, the lower the performance.   People need to be DRIVEN to TRY.  

There needs to be an internal motivation to try -- for various things -- but especially jobs -- beyond income.  

The best use of money as a money as a motivator is to MAKE people not WORRY ABOUT MONEY. If you people enough that they aren't concerned about their basic needs, you take the issue off the table.  They no longer have that worry, fear and anxiety constantly stalking them.  (Although, I wonder how much of THAT motivates any number of us.  Mama's gotta pay the electric bill, you know -- you do what you have to.)

According to Pink, paying someone over and beyond their needs does not increase performance for tasks!  Being overpaid doesn't make a person ANY BETTER at their job, or motivated to DO any better.

But, does being underpaid (waves to half of the country...) create a situation where you are constantly stressed PERSONALLY about your situation and does effect your performance AND potentially effect your income?  I think so.

Does this make sense to you?   *goes to read more...*

I could have bought a car.

Yesterday was spent chasing paperwork to finalize my lease agreement for the apartment.

In a torrential downpour of huge black rain cloud proportions.  

Yesterday afternoon, the lease was signed, after I asked to see the unit to make SURE it was in the same condition as the model I had been shown.  Since we are in a high-rent area, things aren't Always What They Seem, and people will pay anyway.  

This is me, walking away ...

I am in week two of a very entry level math course for college.  I haven't done any sort of math, beyond retail or grocery-store calculations since 1996.  I suppose it might be frightening to know that yours truly was in fact, a Cash Office Manager for a retail store, and a banker at one time.  Yes, that means, I was In Charge Of All The Monies.  <shrug>  I did okay.

But, I am not great with working out math problems on the page -- especially if they get wordy.   "If a train leaves..."  Yes, no.  I cannot calculate.  You want the interest on how many months of what kind of loan for who, why?  I focus on the wrong details.  I am too literal. 

I  just  'walked away' from my work  before I threw it.  I'm taking an assessment, and quite frustrated at this choice:

...because I'm using it.  I don't know.  

I haven't done this stuff since high-school, and opening the book and reading about it is like *blank stare* to me, and worser still is LISTENING to someone else discuss math? <crickets>

Worser-er?  Is that in the time it took to open this blog page, click on compost, realize I had a chicken roasting in the oven, remove it, debone it and come back?  The school's program timed out and I lost my work.  Begin again.

But, in the way that I am a professional procrastinator, it's too late to start again, I'm too sleepy to attempt it and would likely fail the assessment entirely.  If I'm going to fail, I want to DO IT BIG.