CaBil! Long time no see. How are you?

That's all I got at the moment as I am running out the door.

He's done nothing but sleep since I brought him in this morning. Just conks right out on the carpet. Or in the car. The only problem was trying to navigate roundabouts. He kept sliding around.

Man, one of the new people here just totally land-mined a conversation. I have a standing jibe thing going with one co-worker, and we got to talking about language and ethnicity, and she (not jibey jibe) got an innocent look on her face and started asking what people's names meant.

I've given my suffix sob story, and she turns to Jibey McJiberson, and he doesn't know. Looks it up, and he's apparently Supreme Lord (which she knew, since she's all-them-lingual) and now he won't stop crowing. However, the boss's name means he who can not be defeated, so I'm not sure about the immovable object/irresistible force thing we got going on.

I need to look up communities that deliberately name kids unflattering names to avoid provoking the gods. I know it's a thing, but I don't know whose thing it is.

And while I'm random--I'd love to put in a standing order with someone for True Lime and True Orange. Why can they not be sold in stores near me? Such a cheap item to buy online onesy twoesies.

Brenda--your Rishi friend needs to know that the purchasing process on his website feels interminable. I've gotten distracted twice, and now won't be surprised if I don't have to start all over again. It really doesn't feel efficient.

(And I wish I knew why Paypal doesn't have better penetration--from a customer point of view, it's definitely my preference for purchases under $50 or so. Not enough ROI? Security? Gnargh.)

The internet generally seems to agree that having the crate in the room is probably better.

He'd probably be fine out of the crate, to be honest, but 1) I don't want him tearing up the house if he's bored or scared, and 2) the house isn't safe for him. Even if I shut the bedroom doors, there are electrical cords he could chew on.

Happy Birthday, Jess!

And Happy Anniversary, Teacups!

Lucky dog, Dana.

And, yes, have to vote no on the Rishi ecommerce (is that word dead yet?) experience. Don't bounce me back out to where I need to add the CC info again because of a "wrong" phone number. Firstly, I don't want to tell you my number. Secondly, this is the second time you're having me enter it anyway. It's still the same as it was, even if I can't read field prompts on subsequent pages.

Don't know about naming conventions, but i know older Jews who don't like to celebrate Birthdays because that might attract the evil eye. They don't like compliments for themselves or for people they care about for the same reason. Of course Jewish naming tradition is to name the kid after dead people. Naming after someone living is bad luck. (If a name happens to be coincidentally the same as someone living that is fine as long as the intent was to name after someone dead, usually a dead relative. ) Don't encounter this much among the young or middle aged. Usually over 70 and actually not that common there. Much more common when you get to 80 and above. Althougha lot of middle aged Jews I know say canahurrah (sorry don't know the right spelling,but that is not it) when any good fortune is mentioned, and "knock on wood" or when potential bad fortune is mentioned.

Of course Jewish naming tradition is to name the kid after dead people. Naming after someone living is bad luck.

The way that I've heard this tradition explained is that it might confuse the Angel of Death, and when the Angel of Death comes to take the older person, he might accidentally take the baby instead, if the baby and the older person have the same name. You don't need to worry about that if the older person is already dead.

It seems like the Angel of Death is easily confused by names. There's also a tradition of changing someone's name if they're close to death, because if they have a different name, then the Angel of Death won't be able to find them.

I'm pretty sure that most of these traditions are just Ashkenazic. And I know that German Jews are more OK with giving someone the same name as a living person than Eastern European Jews are. German Jews who came to the US would frequently imitate the "American" traditions and name the first son after the father, while Eastern European Jews who came to the US would almost never do that.

Just had annual review. Very complimentary, but that doesn't really help all that much, y'know? I'm glad my boss has lots of confidence in me, but that doesn't help get the work done...

(ETA: I should say, much better than that they give me too much work and then berate me for not finishing it! Could be much worse)

Hopefully my sister remembers what the hell I'm half remembering about the naming crap.

I just called to activate my replacement credit card, and I'm happily entering my CC# and stuff, and it hands me over to a person. I'm thinking something's wrong, but when I asked her "Why human?" she said "Oh, if a person's available they turn it over to us, for the personal touch."

I did mention that some customers are actually trying to avoid being touched, but I doubt Citibank will be taking me up on that.