Useless Conversation

[schild]

Did you read what I responded to or did you just have a complete knee-jerk reaction to a response I had for people who became, by choice, hyperfocused supernerds about a topic of their choosing?

That question is outside of my area of expertise. 

[Sky]

So yesterday my mom slipped on the ice and broke her wrist (compound on the radius). Then went inside and got dressed (!) and drove herself almost 20 miles to the hospital (!!).

She's fine now, we have a new specialist in the area who is a wizard with setting bones, she didn't even take pain meds today.

My poor fiancee, it's not my fault I expect women to be tough as nails!

[Merusk]

My 83 year-old grandmother was bitten by a rattle-snake after it bit her dog.  She then walked to the house, got a shovel, killed it and drove her dog to the vet before they made her go to the hospital.

I'm still amazed she isn't dead.

[Fraeg]

I guess I am just really slow, but I only just now realized that Supergreg

http://zmax.org/supergreg/sgdotcom/

is Sacha Baron Cohen

[Signe]

Superglue and Blistex are not the same thing.   

[Lantyssa]

I hope you tried to blistex a vase and not superglue your lips...

[Yegolev]

She didn't specify a body part.

[ghost]

Anyone got any recommendations for a gift for a 5 year old that is fairly advanced for his age in the intelligence category but way behind in the athletics/body coordination arena?  He has tons of Legos and already has a few video games that he likes to play.  Would love to avoid digital options, if possible, to try and get him out and about.  I got him soccer goals and a tee ball set for Christmas.  

[IainC]

If it's your 5 year old; books. If it's someone else's; a drumkit.

[Rasix]

Razer Scooter or a bike with training wheels if he doesn't already have them. Usage will totally depend on the kid, though.  My son prefers running, so it's a chore to get him to use the scooter and bike he has.     Some sort of giant climbable backyard set might also help with the coordination/strength issues provided you have the space for it.

[Yegolev]

Some people are born nerds.  Good luck with "fixing" that.

[Viin]

Is it too early for Technic legos? I say find the interests and hone them into skills.

[Signe]

Yes, I tried to Blistex a bead that had fallen off of a box.  I got nervous, though, thinking about how bad it would be if I had done it the other way round.  I told my sister and suggested that she would have had to rush me to the hospital but she said she would have just poured nail polish remover over my face.  :(  I'm not sure she loves me.

And I suggest Cranium Cadoo if he has parents who play games with him or one of those absolutely brilliant Rokenbok Architect Construction Sets that are really pricey for the brainy boy.  Those things are complete and utter bausomeness.  He will love you forever.  Or maybe a thumb piano.  Everyone should have one of those.

Or a really big box.

[ghost]

Some people are born nerds.  Good luck with "fixing" that.

Yeah, there will be no fixing him.  And we don't want to.  I'm just looking for something other than video games.  


The overriding issue is that the kid just doesn't seem to have a lot of interest in toys at this point.  He's tough to buy for.

[Rasix]

My son's pretty easy to buy for.  Although the focus is always pretty narrow and jumps a lot.  It was Star Wars legos (I loved this one). Right now it's racing.  He'll turn anything into a race.  If there's no cars at hand, anything close by will end up racing themselves including pencils, crayons, coins, pieces of paper, food, etc.   Of course, he'd love us to get him some of those dumb Angry Birds Go jenga toys, but that shit aint happening.

Nature/hiking kit might be fun if you've got decent hiking/wilderness areas around you.

[ghost]

I was thinking about some sort of science kit, but he also had a 3 year old and 1 year old little brother who may be hard to keep out of stuff.  It's getting time that the 5 year old had some grown up toys though.

[Samwise]

I'd suggest vaguely nerdy toys that must be played with outdoors.  Like a foam rocket, or a bottle of Diet Coke and a pack of Mentos, or a thing that blows giant bubbles.

The Explorabook was my very favorite activity book when I was around that age.  Out of print now but it shouldn't be too hard to find used copies.  Heck for that matter just flip through the Klutz catalog and see if anything sounds like it might be up your kid's alley.  I used to get the print version and spend hours just drooling over all the cool shit in there.

[Nebu]

I was thinking about some sort of science kit, but he also had a 3 year old and 1 year old little brother who may be hard to keep out of stuff.  It's getting time that the 5 year old had some grown up toys though.

A Big Wheel with a hand brake.

Spent endless hours on mine and you can spin out in the garage when weather is bad. 

[Sky]

Aren't you in Texas? AR-15.

[Nebu]

Aren't you in Texas? AR-15.

Only pussies have an AR-15 in Texas.  You want the other kids making fun of him?

[Rasix]

I thought he moved to Kentucky.  I guess the same applies.

[Abagadro]

My boy liked the hexbug/nanobug toys around that age.

[WayAbvPar]

Those things are fucking cool!

We spent some time on a beach last September fall collecting rocks. Well, I sat on a piece of driftwood and read my Kindle in the sun while my family collected rocks  . My son (5) was very excited when he collected them all into a clear Starbucks cup and presented them to me. He talks about my 'rock collection' at least twice a week. So my wife got him a rock tumbler for Christmas. He was REALLY excited.

[Teleku]

So in a hilarious coincidence, there is a not small chance I'll end up in Benin for my next tour.  I am so going to blame F13 and all you fuckers somehow if that actually happens.

[Signe]

    GIANT BUBBLES!   

[Merusk]

Here's a new one for me, I don' t know if any of you long-term administrators have heard it.

Today IT migrated a user over to Office360, and she called the Help Desk immediately afterwards, irate as can be.  "Where are all my files?!"

As he was troubleshooting she said, "No, the stuff in Deleted Items!  I keep important things in there!"

To repeat: "No, the stuff in Deleted Items!  I keep important things in there!"


She's an accountant. 

[Ironwood]

Make sure you give her the extra five she's missing.

(Also, I've migrated four and half thousand people to 365 in the last two years :  I always state up front that Deleted Items is controlled now by MS and, basically, you're FUCKED if you keep shit in there.)

[ghost]

I thought he moved to Kentucky.  I guess the same applies.

Other way around.  I'm from Kentucky, moved to Texas.

[ghost]

What about some sort of drawing deal for the iPad?

[Engels]

She's an accountant. 

Yep, we just migrated our staff from XP to Windows 7 this week, and our fiscal specialist wondered if we had transferred her Deleted Items too. Thankfully, we had her old machine. She's a crazy hoarder type. Nice gal, but I think all fiscal people are terrified of losing any paperwork ever in their lives, so they hoard.

[Hammond]

Here's a new one for me, I don' t know if any of you long-term administrators have heard it.

Today IT migrated a user over to Office360, and she called the Help Desk immediately afterwards, irate as can be.  "Where are all my files?!"

As he was troubleshooting she said, "No, the stuff in Deleted Items!  I keep important things in there!"

To repeat: "No, the stuff in Deleted Items!  I keep important things in there!"


She's an accountant. 

Bahahha yep been there. Its even better when you have that conversation face to face. But like Ironwood said you have to prep the users before hand so they are ready for that stuff disappearing. Now if they didn't read the 45 emails that explained that yes indeed you are not going to be able to store the last 10 years of correspondence in the deleted items folder you are not really at fault.  (and yes I have been there to)

[Yegolev]

What about some sort of drawing deal for the iPad?

Does he like drawing?  Just a huge paper pad, then?

My son, he doesn't like much of anything except games.  Of that, most of it is Minecraft.  I put very little effort into modding it for him, instead telling him that he had better learn Java and read some mod tutorials.

ANYWAY, he's awful to try to buy anything for.  Technic is fine while he is in a robotics class/camp, but at home he doesn't do anything with it.  Same with Scratch.  Loves science, you know the Grade School science that we all thought was awesome because it involved posters of Jupiter and things that exploded into foam, but doesn't play with science kits.  At this point I've mostly given up.  He will find something to do that interests him, I assume, and I'll help him when he does.

What does somewhat seem to work is if it is something that I do (except boring text coding, no, that would be too easy).  He will play baseball and ride bikes with me, but won't do it alone.  In the end, though, that's fine because I do enjoy that sort of bonding.

[Chimpy]

We were talking about that today actually, the whole "I was storing stuff in my deleted items folder and it is gone, can you get that back?" thing.

I don't get how people equate the trash as a place to store stuff, but of course I did talk to one lady who thought the recycle bin in windows was where you dragged things you wanted to reuse. 

[Merusk]

My brain still refuses to process the whole thing.  I just can't fathom it, at all.

[WayAbvPar]

We have a guy here who uses the name 'temp' for folders that contain utterly vital data. I don't have any idea why, but I just about destroyed a production machine when trying to clear disk space one day. Glad I asked before I wiped it.