testing... testing... testing

Work crews are ripping apart our sidewalk as I type.  They've been repairing gutters in our neighborhood for the past few weeks and are on our street this week.  Jackhammers, bobcats, dump trucks... much excitement and noise to be had on this good Friday.

I got the dogs all inoculated this week.  Recall we were testing out some chill pills - namely Trazodone - for Penny as she's historically been a big old Drama Queen at the vet's.  She didn't seem to have any adverse effects from the drug, so I wasn't sure if she'd be any different for her vet visit.

But I'd say it went a little better than past experiences.  She wasn't thrilled to be there, but didn't put up as much of a fight.  Where normally she'd wriggle and squirm and whine, this time, she sort of just froze in place, seemingly trying to make herself invisible.  Actually a pretty workable response when it comes to being examined and vaccinated.  

In my last post, I showed Penny looking a bit stoned on the futon while on the Traz.  This is her off of it later:

A little more alert and sober looking?

Merlin was his usual gentlemanly self, and both dogs got an overall clean bill of health.

In other  updates, remember that library book I ruined?  Well,  I took it back this week.  

I'll note that I did actually try the iron test to get the pages back into smooth submission.  From my experience, ironing does NOTHING to remove wrinkles from paper.  NOTHING, I say!

I didn't feel right just plopping the book unceremoniously into the book drop, so I walked it up to the desk. There was a young guy, probably a student worker, at the desk when I fessed up to the tea damage.  He looked it over and said, "Hmmm, lemme ask my supervisor", and took it to some mysterious out-of-sight realm of the library.

He returned a couple of minutes later and said it was fine, they would just note the damage so that future checker outers won't get the blame for it.  I was then free to go about my life without ever showing my shameful face to the mysteriously realmed supervisor. 

Speaking of tests and shame, earlier this week, I read that the SAT cheater who took tests for rich kids was sentenced to a couple months in prison and two years of supervised release.  Okay, but what bothers me is how some refer to him as a "really smart guy" and "test taking savant" or "guru" because he could take those tests without knowing the contents ahead of time and get the score close to what the bribers wanted.

Puleez, SAT and ACT are for assessing readiness for college. Most of the test takers haven't even graduated high school yet.   Mark Riddell was the test prep director at a  boarding school. I've tutored these tests for years, and there are LOTS of others doing the same thing.  Any grown a&& adult tutor - again, LOTS of people - worth his or her fee can do what Mr. Really Smart Guy did.  

I just don't like seeing him put on some sort of pedestal.  Exceptional traits about him, apparent from this story, include his greed and lack of morals, not his intelligence.  

...Okay, rant over.  Love you too.  

Abby, ruiner of library books.