Third Party
After the minor (really minor) accident, I filed a report with Texas Tech Campus Police, just a standard procedure I should follow. Then following the Campus Police advice, I called up my insurance company to file a report as well, in case if the other party called her insurance. Sure enough, she filed a report with her insurance company. Then, I began to get phone call from both my insurance company and the other party's insurance company investigating the accident. And all this while, I never deal directly with the other driver, at all. The only time I talked to the driver was getting her information after the accident.
In this country, whenever anything happened, they will go through a third party to get things resolved. Probably why insurance company charged a higher premium on anything, compare to other countries, for all the arbitration and mediation job they have to provide in addition to regular services. That's probably why too there's a large number of arbitrators and mediators in local legal office. Mind you, I know a mediator personally ....
This incident, couple with things that happened, I began to think that this '3rd party solution' phenomenon is not limited to legal issues only. Even the relationship also required a 3rd party. (by relationship, I don't mean divorce, child custody or anything that involve legal issues)
A friend's friend was having problem his wife, instead of talking and solving the problem personally with his wife, he went to a mutual friend and ask the friend to solve it. And of course, as expected, that failed. He ended up in lock-up for 2 days because his wife report to the police that he kicked her. And now, he is asking his friend if he should file a divorce and cancel the green card application for his wife.
Another case. He found that that he had problem with the girlfriend ('she'). He claimed that he tried to make things work and everything failed. He broke up with her, putting all the blame on her, saying that she kept upseting him and things of that nature. He told her that: ".... I had been telling XYZ (their mutual friend) about our problems since months before we broke up and XYZ certainly know what I had been through and ...."
Of all the people in the whole world, the relationship is between 'he and she', if 'he' has a problem with 'she', 'he' told a
third party instead of telling 'she'-- the person involved in the relationship. 'He' did not tell her anything about the problem and expecting that 'she' will change.
A good start. For whatever happen, go to third party. But these 2 'he' forgot about something real important. In legal issues, when you get a mediator, before he/she can begin to provide mediating service, you
must get the consent from the other party involved and that party has to agree on the mediator you chose in order for the result to be valid. In the 2 cases above, there's no such thing as 'consent' or 'agreement' that occur.
Happy Birthday
Happy Birthday!! AS!! I am sorry that I couldn't give you a surprise this year since you are not here in Lubbock. But I think that the surprise from last year is still fresh in your memory. :)However, hope that you like the gift we got you.
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We were signing a birthday card for AS yesterday before sending it out, since she is working in another city now. We came across this argument.
PA: if you were born in 1980, you should say that you are 24 years old now, not 25, cause you are not done with your 25th year yet. So, in the birthday card, we should say 'Happy 24th Birthday' and not 25th.
LB: The convention is 25th, you go with the number that you are turning into, not the number that you are done with.
PA: Then when your daughter turn one, you said "One-Year-Old" birthday, you don't say "Two-year-old" birthday. You are inconsistent here.
LB: No, that's just for the one-year-old only....
PA: And why not for the ordinary as well?
LB: ......
NW: I agree with LB, that's the conventional way. But I think PZ made a point too. I like the PZ way better than the conventional way though....
LB: ......
ME: Well, that sounds like a very good argument, especially for PZ and NW, since you both were born before the end of Vietnam War, of course you both like the idea....
The last part is a little of inside joke. A clue is LB is the only male in this conversation. If you don't get it, I am sorry about that.
Pineapple Ring Cake
This is my favourite cake. I used to make them from scratch, but since I found out that the cake mix package will give me the same result, I became a 'true industrial engineer'.
Recipe - the 'IE Way'
Ingredients :
- 1 package White cake mix, those that says extra moist
- 3 eggs
- 1/3 cup oils
- 1 can 20 oz crushed pineapple in its own juice
- 1 can pineapple rings in its own juice
Bake ware:
- 14" flat bottom ring tube pan
- Large mixer bowl
- Electric mixer
- Measuring device
Method:
- Grease the tube pan, bottom and sides, sprinkle some sugar on the bottom. *This will make the pineapple look a little brown, which look better when its done.
- Open the can pineapple rings, save the juice. Lay the pineapple rings on the bottom, 1 layer only, as many as you can. *The pineapple ring will make cutting and serving easier. You could know how many servings you have, serve a portion with 1 pineapple ring, or half portion by cutting the ring into half.
- In a large mixing bowl, add the eggs and oils, according to the proportion required on the cake mix instructions, usually 3 eggs, 1/3 cups oil.
- For the water, substitute with pineapple juice saved in step 2 and add water to make it 1 cup. The instruction required 1-1/4 cup, but juice from the crushed pineapple will make up the difference.
- Mix in the crushed pineapple (undrain) from the can with the other wet ingredients.
- Mix in the dry cake mix. Beat with electric mixer as mentioned in the instructions on the package.
- Bake according to the instruction on the box, for Bundt cake. Usually 350F for 30 minutes. Check doneness by inserting toothpick into the cake and comes out clean.
- Cool on rack for about 45 minutes, slide a knife through the side of the cakes and also the middle (the tube). Unmold the cake by turning it over into a plate and serve.
- You could serve the cake warm or chill it in refrigerator over night. I preferred the chilled cake though.
Variations:
Piña Colada Ring Cake: Substitute coconut milk for oil; add 1/2 cups of shredded coconut into the wet ingredients, soaked in warm water for 15 minutes and drained before adding.
For the recipe from scratch, I will have to look for it in my apartment.
Good Day? Bad Day?
I was supposed to be very happy this week.
I got a case study done on Monday. Our analysis for the case was right on target and my professor loves it. I went out to celebrate with my teammates and another group who also completed their presentation. Had a good time there.
I got my second price theory exam back yesterday. I did good over all, even though I knew that I made some stupid mistakes right after I submitted the exam last week. When the letter grade is based on a force distribution grading policy and you ranked in the top 15 in a class of 60, and there's only 1 exam left to go, you should be very happy, right?
I was thinking last night that I should have a happy week, since 2 pleasant events happened in 2 days and there's really nothing more than that I could ask for.
I have an advisor meeting this morning, at 11am, for classes to sign up for Spring 2006. I left my apartment at 10.20am, so that I could get to office earlier and prepare for it.
I was driving in the commuter parking lot looking for a parking spot. A car hit me, on the back bumper, passenger side. My car was fine, what kind of further damage can you do to an old 1986 Toyota where the original maroon color had faded to resemble a color of dust, the color that you will see in Lubbock when there is a dust-storm.
I am not worried about my car, but the other party is a new car and you can see an approximately 2 feet long black scratches on the back bumper. The driver was upset. Its probably because the car is 2006 model. New car. The driver asked for some information from me and she left to class. I decided to call up the campus police and just lodge a report. Just to make sure that everything is recorded. I believed that I am not at fault, cause I was driving on the road and she was backing up and she hit me. Anyway, I don't want to take the risk of having to pay simply because I didn't follow the proper procedure. Its a hassle to deal with insurance company. I had to call them up, report a case and will have to wait for them to call back. All I hoped that is that my insurance premium won't increase.
What a good way to start up my day! And of course, I was late for my advisor meeting, but it wasn't that big of a deal because I called the secretary in advance and had her informed my advisor.
Random babbling
I was browsing friend's blog and came across
Jacy's blog. She quoted something from the book, "
The Five Love Languages" by Dr. Chapmen. That post got my mind into work.
A lot of time, when the problem involves only 1 person, its so much easier to solve. When the number of people involve increases, the complexity increases as well, exponentially in fact.
Then, I thought of my boss' favourite saying on system, "if a method does not solve a particular problem, repeating the same method over and over again is not going to make a difference on the problem".
So, if after so many trials with different methods and the same problem remains a problem, remains unsolved, does this mean that its time to give up and move on? What about perseverance?
If the process of trying to solve the problem does not bring you any joy, excitement or happiness, but upset you and caused you frustration and insomnia, does perseverance mean any good?
