Do you have latest glibc errata (glibc-2.2-12 at this point) installed?

I am unsure if I am executing the correct commands, because RPM keeps
bouncing me out....

1) // attempt to install glibc-common before glib-2.2-12
   // as follows
   rpm -ivh glibc-common*
error: failed dependencies:
        glibc < 2.2-12 conflicts with glibc-common-2.2-12
2) // list all rpm entries on my RHAT 7 machine
# rpm -qa | grep glibc
glibc-2.1.92-14
glibc-devel-2.1.92-14

3)  // since rpm identifies glibc-common-2.2-12 as a depency, lets
    to install glibc-common-2.2-12 
rpm -ivh glibc-common-2.2-12.i386.rpm
error: failed dependencies:
        glibc < 2.2-12 conflicts with glibc-common-2.2-12

any help would be appreciated

You have to upgrade glibc and glibc-common at once, such as in:
rpm -Uvh glibc-2.2-12.i686.rpm glibc-common-2.2-12.i386.rpm
the rest can be done with rpm -F, one by one, whatever you want.

how does this affect the workaround as described in bug # 18391
I have included the document for your perusal
http://ftp.valinux.com/pub/support/hjl/glibc/sdk/2.1/README.Oracle8i

problem solved 
the new rpm works and regression tests OK the new library