Boomer Woman Blog

12 March 2009

Boomer Woman Dog-Sits: New Appreciations

I used to care about what got chewed.

I used to care about who/what sat on the couch.

I used to care about a lot of things. But dog-sitting Sherman this week has brought things into focus. I don't really need very many bristles on a broom. There are 3 couches in the dome; surely Sherman can have one of them. And time? I have new appreciation for what I can get done in 5 minutes, in 10 minutes, in (very occasionally) 30 minutes.

© 2009 Mary Bold, PhD, CFLE. The content of this blog or related web sites created by Mary Bold (www.marybold.com, www.boldproductions.com, College Intern Blog) is not under any circumstances to be regarded as professional, legal, financial, or medical advice. Or education advice. Or marital advice. Or even a tip.

11 March 2009

Boomer Woman Feigning Interest in Dog's Bone

If you ever need to keep Sherman busy for 10 or 12 minutes without interruption, you will want to do this:

Put on your dog shoes. These may have been your yard shoes in pre-Sherman days.

Pick up one of his chewing bones, no matter how slippery it feels.

Sit with your laptop, holding any cords and lanyards in your lap.

Place the slippery bone under your dog shoes. Speak softly and convincingly: "Oh, I'm glad I have my bone with me." You must communicate your satisfaction with owning a bone and having it beneath your feet.

Adjust your feet only slightly when Sherman approaches to chew on the bone. Apply enough pressure that Sherman will identify this as opportunity to chew on something of value to someone else.

(I am dog-sitting for Tom Bold. He cannot come home soon enough.)

10 March 2009

Dollar Cars & Penny Pizzas

If yesterday's blog about $100 houses didn't capture your imagination, perhaps today's blog on $1 cars and 1¢ pizzas will....

The marketing concept for "buy one car, get the second one for $1" is not brand new. But this month's promotions appear to be with fewer "gotcha" clauses. The deal is certainly a marketing technique but it also is providing a real benefit to dealers: moving inventory off the lot. Last week, Ford and Chevrolet dealers in Seattle joined in. ($1 deals typically specify what model of car can be chosen and also what other rebates are disallowed.)

For penny pizza? It's Pizza Hut's promotion that started with Lincoln's birthday in February. Get it? Lincoln penny? Not all locations participate, so you need to check Pizza Hut outlets near you. Poke around the Pizza Hut web site and you'll probably find a coupon or two to suit you. (You really do have to poke. Look for a tab for "Deals." Expect to have to enter your street address to access the coupon locator.)

09 March 2009

$100 or $9000 House

It caught your eye, too. Yesterday's Op-Ed in the Times: "For Sale: The $100 House." Admittedly, there is opportunity for urban legend here but there's also something appealing about the thought of creating new communities from "next to nothing." And houses in Detroit ranging from $100 to $1,900 qualify for that descriptor.

Cheap housing is always at hand, of course, even in good times. Location—geographic location—is the crucial factor. Sometime around the year 2002, my sister took me to see the new home of a young friend in Hot Springs, Arkansas. It was the $9,000 house.

Imagine a studio apartment free-standing, stucco on the outside, and the lawn consisting of a strip of grass between the house porch (yes, it had a porch) and the driveway (yes, it had a driveway).

My sister and I admired the existence of such a domicile and cheered for the young people who actually knew how to do the plumbing that the old bungalow required. We should all be so resourceful.

For boomers who can appreciate the history: our first home in 1979 (DFW metroplex) cost $48,000 for a conventional starter 3/2/2. Our third home in 1989 (marking a return to the DFW metroplex) was a better 4/3/2 for the modest cost of $85,000. We told realtors we wanted to see only houses that had been foreclosed upon. We were making a post-lay-off move and wanted to contain our costs to the greatest extent possible. In that season, foreclosures were available but had to be "located" and we had to be firm with realtors that we wouldn't look at any other type of house. Several years later, a friend told me that all the neighbors were tracking our purchase of that house. They were anguished that a house was being purchased below the six-figure mark. There was discussion about what kind of people we might be. The woman next door to us was quoted as saying, "Well, they have a minivan."

08 March 2009

Mud Room Basics with Sherman

Sure, it looks minor now. But imagine about 10 more times out the door, into the kiddie pool, and then back to the mud room. Aha! Now, I know what a mud room is!

I am tending Sherman for a week. This reminds of tending small children except that my children never tried to chew my shoes. Sherman attempts this while I am wearing them.

I have some goals for Sherman.

Montessori Dog. He will learn to put his toys away. Ethan says this is possible but will take a lot of work.

Polite Dog. He will learn to respect humans and not jump on them. The trainer at puppy school says this is possible but will take a lot of work.

Clean Dog. He will learn to clean his paws before leaving the mud room. No one is encouraging me that this is possible. But I once had a neighbor whose small dog walked 10 circles on a rug before entering the house, dirt-free.

This week? The goal is to protect my shoes.

07 March 2009

COP on the job: TARP Transactions

If you've been hanging around the cable news shows, you've heard Elizabeth Warren on her COP job: oversight of the TARP dollars, which essentially means oversight of Treasury. About a month ago, she spoke to Congress as well as many interviewers about the value of the Treasury Department's acquisitions using federal money.

In a short 6-minute-19-second video, she captures the main points (rather, questions) that the Congressional Oversight Panel has about those acquisitions. Even though the video is focused on questions, not answers, I recommend it. Warren is a professor accustomed to teaching; the message is clear and understandable. Her hand gestures in the above screen capture happen to be part of the message: price Treasury paid for assets versus value of said assets.

06 March 2009

Personal Technology: Cleaning the Keyboard

A friend requested that I address sanitizing keyboards. Can you believe the quality of friends I have? You could interpret that question a number of ways but Washington is holding a summit on health care and my friend wants to discuss the germs on her keyboard.

Well, OK. We start with the basic research: most keyboards are no more germy than any other item in the home or office. Workplace studies occasionally turn up one or two incredibly dirty keyboards that can only be thrown away but that's not the norm. (Actually, I can attest to the presence of such extreme keyboards. I was once the "new employee" who received such a board on my first day in the office... by afternoon, a secretary went off to a supply store to buy me a new one. But I'll admit that I still carry an image of that board in my head. Yes, keyboards can get pretty bad.)

My friend protests she is not being finicky. But a number of off-campus people come through her office and request use of her computer "for just a few minutes." Consequently, she is concerned about the wide array of ailments that can come from a mix of people. And she acknowledges that she has no immune system to speak of and therefore.... needs to know about sanitizing keyboards.

The list of strategies actually grew longer than I anticipated.

1. Computer turned off: alcohol wipes—allow to evaporate before rebooting.

2. Computer turned off: Clorox wipes—again, let dry.

3. Computer turned off: rubbing alcohol (90+%) on a terry cloth but only to the damp level—then let dry.

4. Computer turned off: rubbing alcohol on a q-tip. Yep, let dry.

5. "Medical keyboard" or food service style designed to be waterproof and thus soak-able in alcohol, bleach, etc. See Man & Machine for details. Costs go up to $200 but the Cool4kids board is only $50.

6. Keyboard cover/skin made of rubber or clear plastic. Google that.

7. Variation on that theme: keyboard "membrane" made of flexible plastic; a "universal" style is $11.95 from protectcovers.com.

8. Germ-resistant board with a product like Microban in the mix. Available for $30 and up. Good search term: antimicrobial keyboard.

9. Box of rubber/latex/non-latex gloves to make visitors put on before they use your board. (No, I wouldn't do it, either.)

10. Just say no, you can't use my computer.

Great photo is cropped from a larger one at spotcoolstuff.com.

05 March 2009

Homeless concern

A friend in Missouri wrote to me with a concern she and her husband have:

I was reading your blog... Hotel Whitcomb, etc., and speaking about the homeless... For the past few months, a young couple has been coming to our house looking for work/money. They said they are homeless. He is an unemployed construction worker. His wife has health issues and cannot work. He tries to earn $20 a day so they can get a room for the night. There are no couples' shelters in our town—there is nothing for women unless they are battered. I checked with a food bank about that and what they say, is true.

We have given them $20 - $25 from time to time. The other night they came by at nearly midnight. We feel terrible for the couple. However, we feel, it is not a solution to just give them money. So. I got on the Internet and the phone and found some resources for them. They haven't been back, yet. I have the page I printed up right by the door for them. I still feel badly planning on not giving them money the next time; however, eveything I read and everyone I spoke with said, "Do not give them money." I hope things get better for everyone in the near future!

04 March 2009

More Value at Your Fast Food Restaurant

Actually, this blog is more about retreat. We wondered how fast food restaurants could afford to discount food although we understood the purpose. Keep us in the fast food habit, even in tough economic times.

Sonic is keeping its Happy Hour but, at least in my neighborhood, retreating on some other promotions. Of interest, the notice of the change begins with Sorry for the inconvenience, but due to rising food cost, our happy hour, and the addition of the new dollar menu, we are no longer accepting....

Kentucky Fried Chicken found reason to join the dollar menu crowd but with a bit of self-protection. The Ultimate Value Menu features 10 items that begin at 99¢. That causes a let-down for the value meal seeker. Enough so that a friend actually called me to report this menu as not worth the drive-through.

And the retreat that made the news in my town (yes, the news) was a local Quizno's that stopped honoring the free sub intended to be part of the Million Subs Giveaway. This would be akin to Denny's give-away last month of the Original Grand Slam Breakfast during an 8-hour period. The Denny's promotion was a marketing success: the restaurant made Google's top 40 searches list and Twitter's top spots at #1 and #7.

The lessons might be: set your give-aways for a limited time that all your stores can tolerate, sell something for less than a dollar and don't try to lead the customer to slightly higher prices on the same promotional menu, and offer only dollar items that you can maintain for a long while. If the purpose is to maintain the loyal base, hunker down with your customers for the duration.

Actually, I wouldn't mind a Recovery Menu. Maybe tie it to the market. But not yet.

03 March 2009

View from 22D, and E, and F

View from my seats, plural because I had three seats on my flight, for the second time in five days. The seating behind me was even more sparse but also darker and it didn't photograph so well.

From Dallas to San Francisco, I was on a Tuesday evening flight at 7:30pm. I considered the wide open seating a delightful gift from the skies.

From San Francisco to Dallas, I expected some empty seats because that's sometimes what a Saturday afternoon flight affords. But I was still surprised at the number of empties.

Both directions, first class was full. I usually prefer first class. Not this week. But that's my selfish comment about having elbow room on a plane. From the perspective of the national economy, I'm not really rooting for elbow room.

02 March 2009

San Francisco Hotel: Winter's Cheap Deal

Finding cheap hotels: a sign of our times. This one was ultra cheap and still provided a clean environment, a big walk-in closet, and free wireless Internet access. All for $65/night in downtown San Francisco. Oh, with a BART/Muni station literally outside the hotel's front door.

The Hotel Whitcomb is "down Market," meaning a full 4 of 5 city blocks beyond your preferred location. For me, that meant about 4 blocks west of the Westfield Mall but with plenty of food close at hand if I wanted: Starbucks in the hotel lobby, Subway and Burger King across the street, Carl Jr's a couple of blocks on the way to the Westfield.

(Inside the Westfield Mall are full scale restaurants, the country's best food court, full cinema, and the usual collection of mall stores.)

Back to the Whitcomb. It has its share of homeless on the corner; comparable to the level outside the Hilton on nearby O'Farrell. In winter (the cause for the low rental rate), there is no room service although there's still a full-service restaurant on site in addition to the Starbucks. I would call the hotel aging and a little worn in the guest rooms. The renovations are more obvious in the lobby and meeting rooms. Billing itself as an historic hotel is fair. The self-label of "luxury boutique" is marketing, not accurate description. My $65/night rate was an online special. The rate is about double that in summer.

Internet access is just a tad slow but I've suffered through worse (at luxury boutique hotels). Cell phone reception is spotty up in the hallways but that could be my carrier, of course. Clientele includes international tourists and U.S. business travelers. I was comfortable walking alone to the hotel between 8:00 and 8:30pm but recognized that I wouldn't have felt so secure at 10:00pm. Orpheum Theatre is across the street and Civic Center within reach, so there is evening traffic.

City Hall, public market, public library, and other resources are just a block off Market, so a walk to these treats is less than 5 minutes. For reference, my old and slow walk to the Westfield took 20 minutes. You could have done it in 15.

01 March 2009

Zip Cars: Hourly Rentals in 100+ Cities

San Francisco's showcase of green vehicles (with special parking spaces with charging stations) includes zipcars. Those are hybrid cars for rent by the hour or day and, best of all, they are located all around the city for easy access.

You have to plan ahead to get started: register at zipcar.com and wait for your Zipcard to arrive. But then you are pretty well set to travel to large cities and pick up a car at your convenience. Your card is simply waved around the windshield for access and activation. You get in the car. Drive it around. And return it to the parking spot.

To find available cars, you check online or on your mobile phone and "reserve" the car so that it will be unlocked with your Zipcard. Nifty maps. Directions. A child could do it. But can't because you have to be a licensed driver.

Cost is reasonable (roughly $10/hr or $60/day) in that it covers rental and gasoline up to a daily total of 180 miles. Probably best of all, the cost covers insurance.

zipcar cities: Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, London, New York/New Jersey, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, Toronto, Vancouver, Washington DC. There are actually more than 100 cities... and more than 100 college campuses, too.

Personal comment: After seeing the zipcars in San Francisco, I came home and started my sign-up. What made the decision for me? Being able to add/drop family members from my membership. I'm doing pay-as-you-go.

28 February 2009

San Francisco: EVs Showcased

Front and center parking at San Francisco City Hall is reserved for the plug-in hybrids that form the Green Vehicle Showcase. Charging stations (swipe a card, plug in, charge up) replace parking meters and "zipcars live here," too.

San Francisco is promoting both green auto technology and car sharing, both of which can impact a city dramatically. The Green Vehicle Showcase hosts the city's own electric fleet of cars as well as the companies in the city that rent hybrids to members (per hour and per day rentals). The Showcase is the mayor's idea and it rolled out just a little more than a week ago.

EV (electric vehicle) charging stations are slowly emerging around major cities. Yesterday, I spotted a commercial garage sign (in San Francisco) advertising "charging station inside." That is necessarily more than an electrical outlet. The charging stations include a display for tracking the charge and connect to a network that tracks all the registered cars. But I'm guessing at home an outlet will do.

The City Hall showcase is set for 2 years.

27 February 2009

The iPod Vending Machine

I've never actually worried about Apple making money from its vending machines but I have wondered if it ever did. The usual scene: airport travelers turn and look at the machines, perhaps slowing just enough to admire the contents. (Apple is very good at presentation, of course.)

This week, at DFW Airport, I watched as long as I could before my boarding number was called. Someone was actually buying. Here's the frustration: I had to leave before seeing how the product would emerge from the machine.

26 February 2009

Recession Busters! Marketing!

The "recession" is making its way onto sale signs.

This one is called Recession Busters!

The sign is for discounted t-shirts.

The location in Terminal C, DFW Airport.

During my observation over an hour's time, no customers entered the shop. Overall, the airport crowd was light. And on my flight, I had 3 seats to myself.

25 February 2009

Airblade: Drying Hands

DFW Airport has a new machine in the ladies' room. It's an Airblade. And as soon as I saw it, I related to it. This is the fix to air-dryers blowing germs all over public restrooms.

The Airblade shoots a strong 12-second gust of air on your hands after you lower them in the contraction shown above. I read the short instructions on the machine (you don't touch anything; you just lower your hands and then raise them slowly) and braced myself for the experiment. The intense shot of air has no pain associated with it—but watch your skin "blow around." Not something we often see.

I also checked out the machine on the Dyson web site. No clue as to cost but the marketing materials present Airblade as the most hygienic and cost effective means for removing water from hands.

24 February 2009

No Internet Access for Laptop

Horrors! Internet down at the Hilton. I must remind myself that free means I paid nothing. And then I remind myself that this is the hotel that permits pets to enter free of charge. The neighboring hotels charge $100 and $150 fees (not deposits).

And I settle into slow keyboarding. Yes, blogging from the iPhone.

23 February 2009

Dog-Friendly Lists on the Internet

Determining where dogs are welcome is a daunting task. I have recently made web searches for hotels, restaurants, and parks where Sherman can visit.

First, the web is not chock full of information on dog-friendly locations but that's the best search term, anyway. "Dog-friendly hotels...." (or parks, or restaurants) in a search typically produces an outdated list that requires checking out every link, anyway. At least, it provides a place to start.

Listings for dog parks are pretty accurate even though the number of parks is not high. I still follow through with the city parks web site to locate park regulations.

Listings for hotels are not very accurate. And neither are the hotel web sites themselves. You cannot assume a "pet policy" is up to date (or even if it were ever accurate). Confirming a pet's welcome requires a phone call to the hotel. Important: ask if there's a fee to have a dog in the room. And also ask if there's a deposit.

Listings for restaurants that welcome dogs are least helpful. (Right, these are restaurants with patio seating.) Locating a restaurant to take your dog (on a leash) is likely to involve a drive-by for visual confirmation that dogs are around.

The photo: Sherman at his first hotel. A Hilton that required no extra fee and no deposit. If you were wondering... yes, that's a regular size office chair. Yes, that's a five-month-old puppy.

22 February 2009

The Cost of Fondue. The True Cost.

Perhaps you recognize this platter of sweets. It is the dipping set for chocolate fondue at The Melting Pot. I enjoyed it with friends earlier this month as they helped me prepare (with words as well as pictures) for a conference presentation called Have You Tried Chocolate Fondue?

The talk isn't about fondue at all, or at least not much. It's about assessment and engaging faculty in the work surrounding it. Last year I attended the happiest assessment meeting I had ever seen. And I attribute the happiness to the fact that the hosts served lunch with chocolate fondue.

A friend asked me why I didn't just make fondue rather than go to a restaurant to photograph it. First, it never occurred to me. Second, I am certain that the ingredients and time would far exceed the cost of the restaurant.

But that raises the point of what The Melting Pot costs. Fondue (ideally, cheese for bread cubes followed by broth for vegetables followed by chocolate for strawberries) costs what you would expect. Plan on at least $20 per person even if you share some items. Here's the real cost of this restaurant: time.

Depending on what you consider a leisurely meal, The Melting Pot will either delight you with the generous allotment of seat time in a comfortable booth... or try your patience as the clock rolls right through the second hour. A meal of fondue can last longer than a movie.

21 February 2009

Mowing the Yard: Green Paws

In Texas, we're already having to mow the yard. As reluctant gardeners, we do not bag grass clippings. Over the years, that's become the recommended strategy for healthy lawns. (So, we used to be bad lawn-tenders but now we're good lawn-tenders.)

The happy news about mowing this year is that Sherman is willing to follow behind the mower, not chase it or attack it (his vacuum cleaner behaviors). The distressing side effect is green paws. Or maybe not. Sherman doesn't mind. The stain wears off in a day's time. And I cannot see where it transfers.