Atlanta, Here I Come

Decision: Made

School: Agnes Scott

Living Arrangements: HELP!!!

Those of you who I know relatively well, and who live in the ATL, I need help! I’ll be moving back at the very end of May, but here’s the deal. School starts May 31 (I THINK). School here ENDS on May 25th. Doable, but I need your help. Yes, you! Anyone who can help apartment search, or who knows of people who need roommates… Please (I repeat), HELP!

Anyway, YAY Atlanta, I can wait to see you guys again.

How not to fail

Obedience class # 2 under my belt. Last night, the dogs learned how to sit and stay and the pet owners learned how to teach the dog. The best way to teach a dog something- make it nearly impossible for them to fail.

When it comes to sit, the trainer reminded us that dogs know how to sit. They regularly sit on their own, without any help from us. What they don’t know is the word “sit” and what ever funny gesture you have added to the word. I was amused at how many people seemed to take the reminder “dogs don’t speak English” to heart.

So the basic concept of the class was, use the dog’s natural urges and talents to begin training. Hold a treat just over the dog’s head and a little behind. As the dog leans her head back, her legs will naturally fold under and into the sit position. Say “sit,” feed the dog a treat and then praise the dog. It is virtually impossible for a dog to fail at obeying a command you have not given yet, so in the early stages, you give the command as the dog is in the middle of the action. It is all about timing. Also, it is all about consistency. Over and over, we are told in class that confusion is the worst thing we can do to our dog. The dog needs routine, repetition and consistency in order to succeed, and to be good pet owners it is our duty to provide these things.

When teaching a dog to stay, there are three things that affect the quality of the dog’s action: duration, distance, and distraction. A dog can only be trained around one of these things at a time; in order to increase the duration of a stay, one must eliminate all distractions and distance- at least at first. Again, this helps the dog not to fail. Over the course of the week, we are supposed to take the dog into a non-distracting environment (my living room, with TV and radio off, door shut), stand right next to her and tell her to sit and stay. Then, count. Mattie stays with no problems for 15 seconds already, so I am supposed to increase the duration of the stay by 5 seconds, but only when she is successful at her current level.

Wouldn’t it be nice if the real world made it virtually impossible to fail. If, when learning something new, like say how to have a full time job, someone would take away all the distractions. Or when trying to make a big decision, like whether to go back to school, quit a job or move to a new city, someone would hold a treat out in front of us and lure us into a natural position, then name it for us. I can totally understand why the trainer says that dogs don’t mind being at the bottom of the pack totem-pole- they just want to know where there place is and have someone tell them the rules of the game.  I wouldn’t mind having that kind of guidance either.  It would be grand to have a force in my life who strives to eliminate all confusion.

My “homework” for this week is to teach my dog to yield, which means in layman’s terms, to get the hell out of my way. According to the trainer, the head of the pack controls the living space. When I step over or around the dog, it is teaching her that she is in control of the space, which in her doggy mind means, she is the leader of the pack. So I am supposed to spend the week gently bumping into her whenever she is in my way and commanding her to “move.” She gets praise whenever she moves out of my way. This also includes when she is laid out and sleeping on the floor. The trainer clearly does not believe in the phrase, “let sleeping dogs lie.” In fact, if the dog is laying in a high traffic area, she strongly recommends that I again gently bump into her and make her move. The only place she should never be told to move from would be her bed because that would be confusing. According to the trainer, after 1 week of this behavior, Mattie will never get in my way again.

I figured it out!

Technology is only as good as the person using it.  It is simply a tool, yadda, yadda, yadda.

I figured out how to post my photos.  Check out the puppy.

 

Too busy to read about being too busy

I walk a fine line when it comes to being busy. Like many people, I am a thriving multi-tasker. My boss regularly exclaims how impressed she is that I can handle the minute details of four, five, six upcoming events at a time. I perform well under pressure and I actually feel that to a certain point, I am more efficient when I maintain a certain volume of work.

When my work load rises above this ideal level, the quality of my work begins to suffer a little, while the quality of my personal life, sleep and mental health decline somewhat dramatically. When I am too busy, I get cranky, irritable, easily frustrated and exhausted. I can not complete the simplest of tasks without analyzing where and at what priority it should be placed, which ultimately takes more time then just doing it. Being too busy is bad for my health.

However, when I dip below that level, I find my mind wanders, my attention shifts to reading the NY Times or updating this blog. While there may be only five or six tasks on my to-do list, it may take me all day to “get around” to finishing them. When there are no pressing deadlines, or piles of other tasks to complete, my work style is much less frenzied, but also less speedy.

Today, during the first “less than busy” day I have had in nearly two months. I stumbled across this article in the “most emailed” section of the NY Times home page. “Too busy to Notice You’re Too Busy.” Catchy title.

Anyway, the opening paragraph hit home.

RECENTLY I’ve found myself annoyed by how busy my friends seem. Putting aside the possibility that they are avoiding me, some are so on the go that they barely have time to tell me they do not have time to talk. Every phone call, no matter how short, seems to be interrupted by several others. That is, of course, if I actually get a live person on the other end of the phone.

Now, I don’t know about you, but I have a number of friends who drop off the face of the planet when they get busy. I think I probably do this as well. Over the last few weeks, as my job continued to consume every waking hour and some that I would normally have spent sleeping, I was less likely to answer my cell phone or check my gmail, even for my closest friends. (I did answer the phone for family, which I will post about later . . . big week for the littlest sis.)

Now, the supposition in this article is that you can’t get a live person on the phone because that person is already in a 3-way call with their boss and babysitter and has their spouse on hold, all while texting on their blackberry and driving down Clairmont Road. Everyone is so busy that they have to be in constant contact with their similarly busy friends, coworkers and family. I swear I saw a woman talking simultaneously on two cell phones the other night (back me up Nicole).

When does busy cease to be a good thing? When it interferes with your social life? Your sleep schedule? Your therapy appointments? When does being busy stop being something to brag about and starts being a drag?

It is difficult to articulate this threshold, mostly because there are few quantities to measure. Is 100 emails my inbox on Monday morning too many? Well, it depends on how many voice mail messages there are. Or how long the Monday morning staff meeting will last. Or if we have an event that day. If all of those emails are automatic replies to a mass email I sent out on Friday, notifying me that everyone and their kid sister is on spring break, then 100 emails will take no more than 20 minutes to dispatch. If, however, each of those 100 emails comes attached to a task I must complete, I am going to be way too busy to eat lunch that day. And 100 such emails usually means that there are tons of voicemails waiting and lots of meetings to attend about whatever is causing all of the emails and messages. This is when I am most likely to stop taking personal calls and hunker down.

There is no quantifiable definition (for me) of too busy, but there is a tipping point somewhere. It is hard to walk that fine, invisble line, but I am working on it. Some tell me it is all in the balance, work to non-work, keeping yourself centered between busy and relaxed. When I figure out how that is done, I’ll be sure to let you know. Unless I am too balancing to post on the blog.