My final day at work and getting ready to move

For the benefit of Tori the comic above says:
Customer: I have to return this. I dont have the receipt, but it's unopened.
Clerk: Um, we dont sell this item ma'am.
Customer: Of course you do. Im certain I bought it here.
Clerk: Im sorry , but Im positive we dont carry this item. The register doesnt even recognize the barcode.
Customer: I dont care what your computer says. I found this old Grumbel's bag in my closet, so I MUST have bought it here. What more proof do you need?
Clerk: Let's just skip right to the part where I call the manager, shall we?

Yesterday had its ups and its downs. I was feeling better than I had in a week or so, namely because I'd had 3 days off and my feet weren't killing me like they had been. Basically my day started off great. When I got in, the department looked pretty rough, but not nearly as bad as it had been in the previous days. Within the first couple hours (I started at 5pm), I managed to get 3 aisles straightened up and all the reshops that I had found that were ours (but just in the wrong aisles) taken care of. I was scheduled with 2 guys ( both scheduled at 3pm) and that gay girl (scheduled at 2pm) but she'd been at the registers all day doing returns. The guys, on the other hand, werent register trained and had been trying to keep up with the department. Imagine the surprise that I was able to deal with 3 whole aisles and they hadnt managed to do one each yet. I took the shopping cart of the other departments worth of stuff to the front and sorted it into the proper reshop carts, then brought our two carts of reshops back and had one all put away before the guys even knew I was back. My buddy of the two suggested that I go catch a break so I decided to get my lunch in at 7pm. When I got to the floor redid my 3 aisles in about an hour's time. Again reshopping the stuff that belonged to us but were simply in the wrong aisles. I took the backet of stuff belonging to other departments up front again (boy the people in this store are damn pigs!) and started sorting them into the proper baskets. This trip up to the front really irked the shit out of me though. The main reason why is because there was no one up at the service desk to answer questions and I couldnt get anyone in management up there to save my life. I had a customer twist the hell out of my words after cutting me off as I was talking to her. *ugh* Rude bitch. So I felt no problem in correcting her error in a nice loud voice. Adding, of course, that had she allowed me to continue in the first place she would have known all her facts. Nah, had no problem dressing down a customer when it was called for. I havent all season and especially not on my last night. What were the bosses gonna do? Fire me? Nah, all I'd get is a slap on the wrist and a warning for the first offense. I got back to the department and told the one guy I wasnt going to the front again for the whole night as if I got treated like that again I was gonna bodyslam someone. I made good my promise and didnt go to the front not once the rest of the night. The girl scheduled with us didnt make it back to the department until 915pm or so. It was no big deal as 4 out of the 10 aisles had been clean for a couple hours and well maintained since then (I had gotten bored and not only done the 3 I was responsible for but cleaned up the next one over). I caught a break around 945pm and when I got back took a spin through the 4 aisles again. As I was going through one aisle, something caught my eye. I brought it to the gal I was working with and asked her if she noticed something odd about the product. She saw nothing wrong with it until I had pointed out the little sticker on the item. It was a price tag for $10. Mind you most items arent priced in this store except the seasonal items and the redboxed ones in toys. The particular brand in my hand was neither of those, infact it was a LeapFrog item which never bears a sticker. The sticker wasnt even one our store uses......wait for it.......it's one that BIG LOTS uses. Mind you, this product was definitely a return AND had to go past at least 2 other people before it made it to the shelf....and the newbie...the person who'd only been at the store 3 WEEKS noticed it. *insert eyeroll here* Being that it was a Big Lots sticker, my best guess is that our store had sold it some time ago and it had gotten discontinued as that's how Big Lots gets alot of their merchandise. If this is the case, that means when it got returned, it was no longer in the store's system and the computer had to contact the home office for a price so it'd be on file for sale later. If the returner got what the product scanned on our price checkers...well then they got less than what it was marked for. Oh well....wasnt ours to begin with anyhow.

Around 1055pm or so , I left the sales floor for the night. After punching off the clock, something told me to swing by the personnel office to see if I could catch a manager back there. I was surprised to find 2 managers and a floor supervisor in there. I asked to speak with one of them and explained that I had talked to the assistant over my area and what exactly was going on that that was to be my last night. Thankfully the assistant had mentioned it to the rest of the management staff. I was a bit surprised as I had worked for smaller companies that didnt have the amount of communication that this store has. The floor manager gave me my exit review and on the paperwork checked the box saying I was rehirable. This way if I go back to the same company again I shouldnt have a problem getting a job. I signed the paper and surrendered my name badge. I told her once I got my checks and my hubby came in, I'd surrender my discount card (hubby had it in his wallet) but no one had told me where to go to get my pay. Shoot they were right there in the personnel office.... woulda been nice if someone had said something during orientation about where to go. So anyhow I got my first 2 paychecks yesterday (one was a one day check for my orientation). I'll have another in 2 weeks time that will have 1 week's wages on it. Once we get to Virginia, I'll send the store my new address so they can mail me the check. I went to the front and got them cashed (thank goodness this company will cash out your checks for you). Then I met hubby at the front and while we were checking out, I took my discount card and brought it to one of the managers.

Today I spent the day weeding the junk off my desk and packing what I could. I decided what needed to come with us and what could go into storage. Yes, I did actually have a desk there. I was beginning to believe everything was just hovering there. Once I got that done I finished packing my crafts. Ive got all the plaster pieces ready to be shipped. Tomorrow I will be finishing up packing my crafts (like I only paint...puh-leez). I have to condense my paints and weed out the paint brushes. While Im at it I have to pack all my needle work and sewing projects. With any luck I'll have a corner and part of a wall in the guest room emptied out so we have a place to put all these boxes that are starting to pile up everywhere. Im hoping to have enough sorted by Friday to know what can be dropped off to the second hand stores. We've already decided that the sofa can stay as we'll have no room for it in an apartment. That's ok though as we have the futon that TxSis gave us and it's much lighter to move, takes up less space AND doubles as a bed...so who really NEEDS a sleeper sofa when you have all that. It's not as though either cost us anything anyhow.

I guess I'd better go. I know the time is going to reflect 1159pm but I actually started this around 10pm and it's really 137am now. I guess I ought to get to bed. Im not overly tired though as I caught a couple movies tonight while writing this (Shrek...which was on while I was catching Chicago's stream and A Knights Tale with Heath Ledger) and as such am a trifle keyed up. Ohhh no and the next movie up is one of my all time favorties...The Three Musketeers. What a wonderful cast this movie has Kiefer Sutherland (Athos), Oliver Platt (Porthos), Charlie Sheen (Aremis), Chris O'Donnell (D'Artagnian), Tim Curry (Cardinal Richelieu) and Rebecca De Mornay (Lady Sabine DeWinter). Some of the best lines I have ever heard came out of this movie (especially those voiced by Oliver Platt and Tim Curry...although Rebecca De Mornay's line of "and with a flick of my wrist I can change your religion" is quite priceless too.....). Anyhow I think Im going to catch this movie (for like the 43rd time) which means I may make it to bed around ohhh 4am or so....ahhh well.

Ok so my job aint so bad

When you have an 'I Hate My Job' day, try this:

On your way home from work, stop at your pharmacy, and go to thethermometer section and purchase a rectal thermometer made by Johnson &Johnson ~ Be very sure you get this brand.

When you get home, lock your doors, draw the curtains and disconnect the phone so you will not be disturbed. Change into very comfortable clothing and sit in your favorite chair.

Open the package and remove the thermometer. Now, carefully place it on a table or a surface so that it will not become chipped or broken. Now the fun part begins. Take out the literature from the box and read it carefully. You will notice that in small print there is a statement:

'Every Rectal Thermometer made by Johnson & Johnson is personally tested and then sanitized '.

Now, close your eyes and repeat out loud five times...'I am so glad I do not work in the thermometer Quality Control Department at Johnson & Johnson.'

HAVE A NICE DAY AND REMEMBER -- THERE IS ALWAYS SOMEONE ELSE WITH A JOB THAT IS MORE OF A PAIN IN THE ASS THAN YOURS!

Seasons Greetings

I received this one twice. Once from my daddy in this email and once from the friend he mentioned via the snailmail. The bold, itallic white is what dad added....the purple bold is what was in the letter that had been sent.

Just a note to wish all a happy season.Was going to post a long note with all the normal wishes but we received a "Christmas letter" from a friend and he expressed it the best so I quote

" To all our politically correct friends:

Please accept with no obligation, implied or explicit, our best wishes for an enviornmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the relitious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious and/or secular traditions at all. We also wish you a fiscally sucessful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2008, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice or other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country not the only America in the western hemisphere. Also, this wish is made without regard to race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee .

To all our other friends Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year."


And he is not even a lawyer. BEST WISHES TO ALL.

Today

Im doing some packing and weeding out of stuff. Right now Im working on my email account which is about 10% full. Normally I like to keep it around 2-3%, but since I've been working and busy doing other things I've been rather negligent in keeping it weeded out. As such, you're likely to find several posts for today as I attempt to bring the inbox down to a manageable level before our move...especially since Im not sure how often I'll be in to read messages and such on our trip. I know once we hit Tazewell TN I wont be in at all for a few days as the net service really sux there. Many that you find in here today will be emails that I felt needed to be shared. I have no special place to put them like I do with the jokes so they'll get placed in here for all to enjoy. If one post isnt your thing just skip to the next. Im sure there'll be something for everyone among these postings.

This first came from my SCSis:


Today...I wish you a day of ordinary miracles-


A fresh pot of coffee you didn't have to make yourself.


An unexpected phone call from an old friend.


Green stoplights on your way to work or shop.


I wish you a day of little things to rejoice in...


The fastest line at the grocery store.


A good sing along song on the radio.


Your keys right where you look.


I wish you a day of happiness and perfection bite-size pieces of
perfection that give you the funny feeling that the Lord is smiling on you,
holding you so gently because you are someone special and rare.


I wish You a day of Peace, Happiness and Joy.



Wishing you the best for 2008!

That, too, is my wish for all my friends.

The last few days

Translation of comic for Tori's benefit: A customer calls a department store and the assistant manager answers the call.

Assistant Manager : Thank you for calling Grumbel's

Customer : What time do you close tonight?

Assistant Manager: We close at 6pm tonight.

Customer: WHAT? I thought you'd be open late on Christmas Eve ! Why are you closing early?

Assistant Manager: So the employees can spend time with their families.

Customer: But what about the customers?

Assistant Manager: I guess they'll have to spend time with their families too.

Customer: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Heh heh heh. That comic strip is called Retail and is to retail what Dilbert is to the tech industry...ooohhhh so damn true. It takes place in a mall store which means the usual close time at the holidays is anywhere from 9pm to 11pm....sometimes later like midnight. But the store does close down for part of the evening. Now imagine the same conversation (if it happened at all) with a 24 hour store...throw in a couple hundred or more ESL's shopping there (assuming they even SPEAK E as their SL) and that would be how my Christmas Eve went.

Friday night the pace started picking up. We had a last minute shopper that had the cheek to gripe that the night crew was pulling pallets to the floor at 830pm. He said it was the wrong time to be doing it. I told him it was a good time as our shelves were nearly empty. He then countered with the "there's too many people in the store to be doing it" and I shut him up with the "but we're a 24 hour store which means we dont ever close so when's the best time TO do it??" Stupid people. *insert eye roll* Ok so he had a point but it doesnt really slow up so when ARE we supposed to restock our shelves??? At that point I was all for selling it down to the bare shelves, then I wouldnt have to tell people we didnt have something, it'd be bloody well obvious.

Saturday was really bad. Im sure I touched on that a bit. It was so busy that 1/4 of the shelves were empty before I even got in at 10am. By the time I left at 6pm, they were nearly 3/4 empty and things were flying off the shelves faster than we could pull them off the risers (the topmost shelves that are labelled "Ask associate for assistance"). Normally, we're told not to fill and stuff just take down what we need and maybe another 2-3 just in case. Nope, not Saturday. The assistant manager over the area cornered me after lunch and said to start pulling ALL the stuff off the risers and just stuff it anywhere there was space (which was pretty much everywhere). Here my feet are already starting to ache, my knee wants to give out and Im not liking heights too well. *sigh* Not about to tell him I simply cant or wont I told the manager I'd go as long as my feet and knees would allow to which I got a fair enough comment. In about 90 minutes' time I managed to get all of one side of the walkway done and decided that it was simply just too doggone busy to do much more. When the assistant manager came through again I told him as much....he noticed how much was down and the shelves were still looking bare and agreed that it would need to be done later. Around 4pm the department manager came in and I thought the poor guy was going to have a stroke. The group I was with, well we were barely keeping ahead of the reshops, and top things all off the group I worked with contained not only myself (who'd been working Saturday nights) but another guy that normally worked Saturday nights. NONE of my department manager's "dream team" was going to be working with him that night. Two of us were on the early shift and the third had been given the day off. He was stuck with the rookie and a few others that dont work worth a damn. Oh he was pissed. heh heh... He'd come up to me and said..."this is what we're gonna do" and I looked at my watch... he asked if I was leaving already and I told him 6pm. The poor dude's head nearly popped off.

Sunday was a 2-11pm shift. I cant remember who all I was working with that day. I know for sure I had the rookie and the one gal (who spent the last 3 weeks dropping the hint she's gay...not that it matters as Im, like one chatter was so fond of saying, stictly dickly). We were told this day to not attempt to clean up, just keep up with the reshops. I am so glad they said that because I would have had a stroke trying to do both. Not 2-3 days prior they'd been telling us things had to be perfect because the night crew didnt have time to reshop or clean up, there was simply too damn much for them to stock for them to bother. We had 5-6 associates in the area and were extremely hard-pressed to keep up with all the customers and the reshops. Again I left out of work having a rough time walking (even though I'd spent extra for supports to put in my shoes...). That place was absolutely trashed and I have to state now that the night crew did a major miracle getting it respectable by the morning shift. It was so bad that it would have taken "Jeanie", "Samantha", the whole Hogworts school (plus teachers, the Ministry of Magic, house elves AND the Order of the Phoenix) AND Merlin to set that place straight. It was so bad we could have applied as a National Castastrophe zone!

Christmas Eve was somewhat better. The customers didnt catch on for a couple hours that we were even open (thank God for small favors), however they figured it out in short order. We had the typical crowd in, the ones who havent even BEGUN shopping and wondered WHY there was nothing left. I took some real pleasure in being able to say no and point out that we'd had most of the goods a week and a half ago....full shelves of the stuff that was needed now. Ok, so, I shoulda got coal for that behavior but it's not MY fault they didnt pick it up when they saw it a week ago! Otherwise the day went ok. We had enough people in the department to get the reshops done in a reasonable amount of time and the 3 aisles I was responsible for were as neat as I could get them. It got to be about 10 minutes before 6pm and they started announcing the store would be closed at 6pm. I personally think they should have been announcing all day we were closing at 6pm and then started the reminders at 530pm at the latest. The hard part is that anyone in the first two aisles of toys simply cannot hear the announcements over the damn tvs in the electronics department (and not to mention the ESLs that dont understand them at all). Then 6pm came and they started with the "We're closing in 2 minutes" BS. They did this for 10-15 minutes....it got so that the L.Ps (loss prevention guys) had to start herding people out like so much cattle. There was a scuffle between one of the customers and an LP...chest to chest (or was it boobs to chest?) like a couple of roosters getting ready to spar. It got so rough they ended up calling some additional security in and had them posted at the entrances. One of the managers came back to toys about 15 minutes later to dress us down about the incident and the dude I was working with at the time told him that it was the LPs that did it...not us. Dude pointed at me and said that even I managed to keep my tongue and he KNEW how hard THAT was...LOL. Smart-ass. Man Im gonna miss him and the department manager. Anyhow as the manager was talking to the head LP dude, I saw the other LP racing down the walkway looking much like a rushing back with a cell phone attached to his ear. The discussion around me was rather animated until I said "and there goes number two at a dead run around the corner". All 3 heads whipped around and next thing I knew the guy I had been working with and I were quite alone. Seems they had not only last minute shoppers but a last minute shop-lifter as well. Good thing we had all the extra security around (including actual coppers) in the store.

Well we were told by management that clean up wasnt overly necessary again and when all the customers were out of the store we had to report to the front end. Once we got all the reshops done we'd be allowed to go home. Everyone pitched in as best as they could and when their area was done were instructed to go to their next favorite department and help out there. The entire compliment of the store was released around 730pm. I was so damn happy to be out of there. Management stood at the front and was wishing everyone a Merry Christmas and shaking hands. The assistant manager over Toys made sure to thank me for all the hard work I'd put in (Im sure he probably said that to a number of others as well though). I made sure to shake the store manager's and the head LP's hands as I doubt I'll be seeing them again before I leave from the store.

Not much else has gone on the last couple days off. My feet still hurt some but not to the extrent they had been. I think I may get through tonight without a pain pill. Good thing as Im down to one last pill and I may need that Friday night. Christmas day we just hung around the house and did not much of anything. The most we did was watch tv and hubby cooked supper. He got a nice winter coat from my mom and dad and I'd given him a couple dvds. Yeah...I was working and still managed to get him a couple small items! Had them the week before I started work, granted, and I didnt get to buy what I wanted to get him but he STILL had something under the picture of ivy on Christmas morning!! Take that last minute shoppers who made life hell for me! Today I nearly finished wrapping my dolls. I ran out of bubble-wrap. We could have gone out today but I simply didnt feel like getting out of my night gown and face the crowds....I've had enough of them for now thanks. The only other things I've managed to do since getting off on Monday night is finish up book 6 of the Harry Potter series (I'd had it nearly finished before I started back to work and hadnt picked it up since), started book 7 and redecorated all my web-pages. All my holiday decor is down now. I didnt really want to take it down until the first of the year but I dont know how busy we'll be and I dont know what kind of shape the net service will be when we first move in to the corporate housing. It's just best to pull it all down now instead of having it still up around February or March. Im not so fond of the decor on this page but I may have time in the next day or so to fix it.

I think that's about it. I think Im going to sign off now, curl up with a glass of egg nog and get another 2-3 chapters read in my book. Maybe I'll tire out enough for an early bedtime.

Merry Christmas

The candles flicker and there are some sparkle effects if you click the picture.

Punchline

Dec 24th

Dear Sir,
This is to acknowledge your latest gift of twelve (12) fiddlers fiddling, which you have seen fit to inflict on our client, Miss Agnes McHolstein. The destruction of her home was total. All future correspondence should come to our attention.

If you should attempt to reach Miss McHolstein at Happy Dale Sanitarium, the attendants have been instructed to shoot on sight. With this letter, please find attached a warrant for your arrest.

Cordially,
Badger, Bender and Cajole
Attorneys-at-law

***Evidentally the attendants were born, raised and trained in Texas.... :)

Pity party and next to last section of joke

I was so sore last night before the end of my shift that I was actually nauseous. It took a bit longer to climb into the truck but thankfully gravity helped me back out. I never made it to my computer to check for messages and hubby ended up bringing me a plate of food to bed which I didnt finish. Anyone who knows me knows I LOVE to eat and if Im off my feed...well it aint a good thing. I managed to get my uniform shirts and pants into the laundry but hubby had to hang them to dry. I was in so much pain I grabbed a couple painkillers that I had leftover and kept my happy ass in bed. They didnt do much, just took the edge off a bit and put me to sleep. I was asleep before 730pm. Yeah my friends know what that means as Im a night owl. I woke several times in the night to switch positions and once for a nighttime journey to the bathroom. I was up again around 7am , took my morning meds and 2 more painkillers and back to bed. I have a 2-11pm today and an 11-8pm tomorrow. God help me get through these two days. My feet simply cant handle these cement floors anymore so Im guessing the next job down the line is going to need to be a cashing job with a fatigue mat at the register....better yet someplace where I can sit to do my job. Gotta go and get a good meal in me, then wrap my ankles (Im beginning to wish I'd told them last week was my last week I swear), and hydrate my skin with 15 layers of lotion as it's very warm and arid (actually both definitions of this adjectives work...) back in toys. I'll probably drop a proper blog entry on Christmas day...assuming I can even move that day...more likely the day after.

****************************************
Next to last section of joke

Dec. 23rd

Listen, Fuckhead,
What's with the eleven (11) lords a-leaping on those maids and ladies? Some of those broads will never walk again! Those pipers ran through the maids and have been committing sodomy with the cows. All 23 of the birds are dead! They've been trampled to death in the orgy. I hope you're satisfied, you rotton, vicious swine.

Your sworn enemy,
Agnes

Dec 22nd part of joke...

Dec. 22nd

You Rotten Prick,

Now there are ten (10) ladies dancing. I don't know why I call those sluts ladies. They've been balling those pipers all night long! Now the cows can't sleep and they've got diarrhea. My living room is a river of shit! The commissioner of buildings has subpoenaed me to give cause why the building shouldn't be condemned. I've asked the police to get you.

One who means it!
Agnes

The start of a joke

I meant to start this on the 13th but couldnt remember where I'd tucked it away. I really need to stop putting things were they'll be "safe" because I can never find them again ( I guess they're really safe if I cant find em again!). Anyhow I meant to start this on the 13th and post a segment a day but since we're already on the 21st, I'll post all up to the corresponding day. The rest I'll try to post on the day it's meant to be posted. This is an old joke that I remember from way back.... I hope you enjoy it.

***********************************

The Twelve Days of Christmas


Dec 13th


Dearest John,

I went to the door today and the postman delivered a partridge in a pear tree. What a thoroughly delightful gift!. I couldn't have been more surprised.


With deepest love and devotion,

Agnes




Dec 14th


Dearest John

Today the postman brought your very sweet gift. Just imagine two turtle doves! I'm delighted at your very thoughtful gift. They are just adorable.


All My Love,

Agnes




Dec. 15th


Dear John,

Oh, aren't you the extravagant one? Now, I really must protest. I don't deserve such generosity - three (3) French hens. They are just darling, but I must insist, you've been too kind!


Love,

Agnes




Dec. 16th


Dear John,

Today the postman delivered four (4) calling birds. Now, really, they are beautiful, but don't you think enough is enough? You're really being too romantic!


Affectionately,

Agnes




Dec. 17th

Dearest John,

What a surprise! Today the postman delivered five gold rings: one for every finger.You're just impossible, but I love it! Frankly all those birds squawking were beginning to get on my nerves.


All my love,

Agnes




Dec. 18th


Dear John

When I opened the door, there were actually six (6) Geese a-laying on my front steps! So, you're back to the birds again, huh? Those geese are huge. Where will I ever keep them? The neighbors are complaining and I can't sleep through all the racket. Please stop!


Cordially,

Agnes




Dec. 19th


John,

What's with you and those fucking birds?! Seven (7) Swans a-swimming. What kind of goddamned joke is this? There's bird shit all over the house and they never stop with the racket. I can't sleep at night and I'm a nervous wreck. It's not funny, so stop with those fucking birds!


Sincerely,

Agnes




Dec. 20th


OK Buster,

I think I prefer the birds. What the hell am I going to do with eight (8) Maids a-milking? It's not enough with all those damned birds, and 8 maids a-milking, but they have to bring their goddamned cows! There is shit all over the lawn and I can't move in my own house anymore.


Just lay off me, smart-ass!

Agnes




Dec. 21st


Hey, Shithead,

What are you, some kind of sadist? Now there are nine (9) Pipers playing, and Christ do they play! They haven't stopped chasing those maids since they got here yesterday morning. The cows are getting upset and they're stepping all over those screeching birds. What am I going to do? The neighbors have started a petition to evict me.


You'll get yours,

Agnes



to be continued....

All the Christmas tree talk that's been going on in the blogs lately made me think of this picture that I socked away in my files a couple years ago (for Tori...it's entitled Dog Christmases and shows a family of dogs sitting around in a livingroom. One asks if anyone watered the tree and every other dog said they did it...).

I was talking to hubby yesterday and we've pretty much decided it's not going to be worth getting a transfer. Considering that we'll be going into corporate housing first and that it's not likely to be anywhere where we end up, there wasnt much sense in getting a transfer to one store just to have to transfer yet again. It just means I have to job hunt when I get out there is all. However, I'll have a few weeks back under my belt again and not a 4+ year hiatus to overcome.

I went in a tad early yesterday (Tuesday) and spoke with the assistant manager over the toys department. We had had a conversation last week or so ago about the fact I may have to leave on very short notice because of a trip back east to find a place to live. This week I told him that my last day was to be the 28th of December. There was just no way in the world with all the packing and stuff to do around the house that I could work past that date. With the trip coming up (Im guessing this will happen just after the first of the year due to timing...no sense going before because many places wont be open to show apartments) ...by the time we get back I figure we'll have about a week and a half to get the lion's share packed. I'm figuring since they want him to start on the 21st our goal to be in at least the corporate housing by the 14th so we have a chance to get used to the area. The assistant manager was fine with this...well he looked it but it's hard to tell with that dude because he's ALWAYS smiling. Kinda reminds me of Jack Nicholson's Joker in the Batman movies. Anyhow he asked when I was due on the clock. I told him I had 30 minutes before I was due on unless they wanted me sooner...which they did.

Last couple days have been really busy. You'd think a big holiday was coming up or something. Tonight (Wednesday) felt almost like a Friday night. It was fine up until around 830-9pm and then it was like the floodgates opened. I'd managed to clean 4 aisles before lunchbreak even though I was saddled with a person even newer than me. *sighs* We wont go into that as I really have nothing polite to say about him. Im just tired of having to repeat every. damn. word. every . damn. time. You'd think after 4 days he'd learn SOMETHING. I swear all the synapses arent firing upstairs. *shups* Anyhow after lunch I spent most of the rest of the time helping the department manager keep up on the reshops and attempt to go back over a couple of the aisles I had previously cleaned. I had told him that he needed to try and pick up as he was reshopping because I wasnt the one staying past 11pm...he was and it'd make things a whole lot easier on him if he did. Im not sure he entirely understood that. Something tells me he's an ESL *sighs and shups*. The dept manager did tell me he's going to miss me when I leave though. I take it not many have picked up quite as fast. It helps that he and I are an awful lot alike (highstrung) although Im more the perfectionist than he is. Maybe it's a female trait.

I think Im gonna leave it at that though. I just wanted to leave something in here as Im not certain how much time I'll have for anything tomorrow. We're supposed to be going out with a few friends tomorrow night as a last goodbye type of thing.

I've come to the conclusion that

...I'm DEFINTELY too damn old for this shit. It's a week later now and my body still hasnt adjusted to being on my feet for 6-8 hours on a given day. I hurt so bad coming out of work and Lord I could just fall over getting out of the truck when hubby gets me home. Then there are the bruises that started showing up...Im pretty sure they're ladder inflicted though. Top things all off my body's behaving much like a child in their first year of school. Any parent reading this will understand what I mean. For those that are kid-challenged let me explain. A child spends all his or her time with you the first 4 years of their life. The only germs they really come into contact with are mom, dad's and the immediate family's. Once the child goes to school for the first time, they are exposed to germs they havent been exposed to before. When this happens what happens to the kid? They get sick. I've been out of the workforce for 4+ years..... Yeah, that's right, I've come down sick as a dog. Sniffles, sneezes and aches (on top of the aches of using muscles that havent been used in years) like you wouldnt believe. At one point I was sure I had the flu.

Friday I had a doctor's appointment. Not because I was ill but because I'd set it 2 weeks prior. You'd think that somehow I knew this was coming but that isnt the case. I'd originally set it to get one last check-up in before the move, refill my meds and possibly get a flu shot *IF* I was well enough to get one at the time (damn Cigna nurses have been nagging me for months to get one). Well the day before I was due in I came down with the yucks. After a quick look over (temp 97.6F, and 5 pounds heavier than the last time I'd been in *sigh*) they determined that I simply had another sinus infection (thanks to the up and down temps) and placed me on a decongestant and antibiotic. The nurse was a trifle worried about my bp (130/70) because the top number was higher than I normally have but once I explained I was back on the workforce AND in the Toy dept she understood why. I'll need to keep an eye out for that just to be on the safe side.

Saturday was absolutely unreal. There were 3-4 of us in the department and we couldnt keep up with all the customers. It was so busy that the department manager finally told me to just quit cleaning the department and help him keep up with all the reshops. Every 30-45 minutes that poor guy was bringing a cart or two back to our area for us to reshop. By the time 11pm showed up, we'd only *JUST* caught up with the reshops. I asked management on Sunday how well the store did on Saturday and we'd done over $700,000...no wonder we had trouble keeping up. On Sunday we were lucky enough to have 5 of us in the department until 10pm. Unfortunately, we STILL had trouble keeping up. We resorted to keeping up with the reshops and cleaning as best as we could. Customers were still arriving in the department by 11pm. Management was wanting a perfect department because the night crew had too much stock to put up to have to deal with cleaning the department. I doubt they got it. Two of the people we had left at 10pm and of the three of us left only one was a full-timer with any real experience in the department. I stayed until 1130pm and the full-timer was scheduled with the other newbie (newer than me and I dont think English was exactly his primary language..) until midnight. Management was anticipating a $600,000+ day...I wonder if we made it. Over a million in a weekend...not too shabby.

Today was my day off. I was hoping to get some sleep in for the day and try to get rid of some of this cold but it wasnt to be. Hubby had a goodbye brunch to go to (1130am) and he'd also scheduled the lady from the moving company to come in and find out what was needed for our move (she was scheduled for 1230pm). He panicked on Sunday and left a message for her to reschedule because of his luncheon. I asked him where lunch was supposed to be and when he told me where...I told him to call her back and let her know to come on in, I'd stay home and meet with her (the lunch was at a restaurant I am definitely NOT fond of). She arrived at precisely 1230pm and we went through the house discussing what her company would be responsible for packing and what was going on the truck and what we were transporting. It was a really quick meeting. I think I'll have hubby call tomorrow and make sure all of us are on the same page. She'll be sending her report to the moving company and then they send an estimate to the company that's paying for all this. Then they will be getting with us.

I spent the remainder of the afternoon and evening doing the laundry and packing my girls (the porcelain dolls) up. I figured I'd get them out of the way first knowing how time consuming it can be to wrap them up properly. Each limb got bubblewrapped then the whole piece was wrapped again. Hubby had brough home some nice sturdy boxes the other night and plenty of the "poppy-paper" so I could get them packed. I got 3 boxes done at 4 dolls a piece. I have 4 more dolls to do but around 830pm I gave up because I was too tired to do anymore. We had supper and shortly thereafter my NYBro called so I talked to him for about an hour or so. Then I tried to get in here and actually started the blog but around midnight or so my PaSis called with some good news and she wanted to celebrate. She knew I was the only one of her friends awake at this hour so I got to hear it all first....plus she wanted to thank me for the package that showed up on her doorstep. I'd sent her 6 handpainted decorations...3 little snowflakes and 3 teddy bears (1 pink to represent her, a darkish blue for the older son and a baby blue one for the littlest son). As I told her, I wanted her to have something from me that wasnt tied to that problem child (husband)that's been giving her hell lately.

Got a note from mom n daddy earlier in the week and their package arrived. For them I'd painted a mini nativity scene (The Holy Family, a sheep, and 2 Wisemen..dont ask me why they only gave me 2 Wisemen and opted for the sheep...wasnt my idea) and a basset hound for her to leave up all year. Knowing mom the Nativity will be up year round anyhow. The package to my SCSis arrived too. In hers I'd packed a small stuffed monkey for her and 3 snowflakes. For her hubby I'd painted 3 cardinals (he's a Cards fan). They have blue and white winter gear on but I hear from her that he's likely to leave them up all year like he did with the cardinal Christmas ornament she'd bought him the other year.

I think that's about it. I grabbed the idea of the sitemeter from Chicago's site as I liked the idea (thanks Chicago!) of being able to see who's reading the entries. Not that it really matters to me but I just want to see where my general audience is coming in from. I see one on there already that I wasnt expecting to see at all (at least Im pretty sure it's who I think it is...I could be wrong). Canada, I just want you to know you're more than welcome here and can leave a comment when you feel ready to talk.

Well I better scoot. The alarm is going to go off in a few short hours as hubby has his exit interview at 7am today. I'll probably get most of my sleep after he leaves. He'll be going out with his buddy after the "long walk" for breakfast and some time together. They wont be seeing each other much after this as his buddy managed to snag a transfer and will be staying in state.

*HUGS* to all

My job, his job and my opinion on tags, memes or whateverthehellyouwannacallem....

Saturday was my first full day at work. I spent a good 5 hours or so on my computer based learning training. I got all of my necessary training plus most of the others done that day. After my lunch I got with one of the managers and told him I got my trainign nearly complete and pointed out that I may actually be of better use out on the floor if he'd just get me a place to lock up my purse (Ive since stopped carrying it so I dont have to bother having a locker assigned....I'd have to share with someone because there's 550+ associates in the store and not enough lockers). I went out to the floor and got my first taste of retail at Christmastime again. *ugh* I felt like I was crammed in a tin of sardines and the department looked like a hurricane had whipped through. When I got home I felt like I had worked longer than merely 3 hours on the floor. My body was feeling like it had been run over by a FLEET of fully loaded 18 wheelers. I ended up taking a couple of ibuprophens before going to bed I was so damn sore.

Sunday was my shorter day. I was only scheduled for 6 hours. First thing I did was finish up my computer based training (only took 30 minutes or less) and then I spent the rest of the day on the salesfloor. This day was rougher because I was sent into the Barbie/ Bratz aisle. Good Lord Almighty was it a blessed mess. Only about half of the merchandise was properly shelf edged labelled and I must have had at LEAST 15 price checks out of that aisle alone. It took me a good 3-4 hours of my day to get that aisle cleaned up and looking repsectable. By now Im thinking that Im definitely getting too old for this shit. I seemed to have made a good impression on one of the managers on this day as there were several comments on how good that area looked. Again, when I got home I was sore as can be. I was going to grab a couple ibuprophens again but opted for some Legatrin instead as my legs felt like they wanted to cramp up on me (Im prone to leg cramps)...plus that medicine has a bit of a sleep aid to it as well.

As several of you already know, Monday morning we got the call we were waiting for. Hubby got offered that job in Virginia. This was no surprise to be honest....not even slightly. They will be sending the letter of acceptance and a few other things next week. Next step is for hubby to have a drug test done and then the next step is for flights to be booked for us to take a 4 day home hunt in Virginia. He is scheduled to start work for them the 21st of January which means alot of work and very quickly on this end of things. I've already got my schedule up until the 27th of this month so Im going to need to get with human resources in the next day or so and give them a heads up so Im not being placed on a schedule after that point....at least for the week afterwards as we're not sure when the other company is going to schedule us for the trip. I may have to just have to have them lay me off early. I was hoping to get another week or so of work and go right into a transfer but it doesnt look like it's going to work out that way. OH and I found out today that hubby's company may run out of work for them a good week early so he may not need to go to work at all next week. He will have to go in next Tuesday long enough to do an exit interview.

Today was another 6 hour day for me. The department manager decided since there was 3 of us working in the department that it would be a good idea to divide up the area amongst us. He ended up with 4 aisles while the other gal and myself each had 2 aisles, splitting the girls half of the area between us. I ended up in the Barbie area again and had the aisle next to electronic. *bleah* I would have rathered the pre-school and Leapfrog/ VTech area for sure. Maybe I'll get lucky tomorrow. I spent a good part of the evening labelling the one aisle as I cleaned it up. Although management was appreciative that I took initiative to do this, they stated pretty clearly that they'd much rather we just cleaned and did the reshops. Something about not wanting the modular layouts messed up. *bah* I pointed out that most of their layouts were already a mess (I indicated a HUGE glaring error that was made by the night stocking crew..I mean Fur Reals cats in the middle of a My Little Pony display....puh-leeeze) and that it was completely time consuming (read a real waste of time in travel) having to run back and forth to the nearest price checker (7 aisles over). In the time it took me to do a price check (and I had a MINIMUM of 15 just out of the Barbie aisle alone on Saturday) I could handle 3 other customers. Well they saw my point but still wanted it done their way *shakes head and rolls eyes*. At least they figured out real quick I knew what I was talking about and had experience in salefloor work....I am definitely NOT a rookie. The upswing on these 3 days is the gal I was working with swore I was only 25...LOL.

Now...for that last part of my title. I may come across as an ole stick in the mud but I do not play those tag/meme games anymore...period. I get more than enough of those things in my email and between those other accounts I get at least 2-3 a week and oftentimes the same one several times over. Im really sick to death of getting them and if I was to never see another again I'd be quite happy about it. No offense to anyone but please dont bother tagging me again. Yeah, I realize I probably have upset a few of you or at least disappointed someone...oh well. It wont be the first time and certainly more than likely wont be the last either.

Well I guess it's time for me to go to bed...it's been a long day.

early to bed,first day, phone call

I am so proud of myself. Last night around 6pm or so I turned OFF my computer and left the office area for the entire night. After doing dishes and eating supper, I got a shower and folded all the laundry I'd washed then I spent the rest of the evening in the bedroom. By 1030pm or so I was sleepy and instead of fighting it as per my usual I crawled right under the covers and damn if I wasnt asleep before midnight. Yes...you saw it right...BEFORE MIDNIGHT and I wasnt even sick...imagine that. UNfortunately it also meant I was awake by 1am and not wanting to go to sleep again....I ended up fighting with getting back to sleep until nearly 3am. *sigh* Well so goes getting to bed early... at least I made a good attempt at it! I didnt sleep so well after that though. I kept tossing and turning and my mind just did NOT want to shut off at all. I guess it figured I'd gotten a few hours and I needed to be up and going. I was awake by 630am and since there was only 30 minutes until the alarm I figured I may as well just get up.

My cab showed up around 810am or so. Thankfully the ride isnt going to cost me much when I have to take one. Less than an hour's wages one way. With the hours that I'll be pulling I wont have to cab it too often and when I do have to it'll be after my shift. Not that I honestly want to be riding a cab at that hour of night. They have me mostly on the 5-11pm shift with Mondays and Thursdays off the next two weeks. My Saturday shift is my longest at 2-11pm. Basically, if I was still streaming, I would have to drop my spot completely or stream the midnight to 3 am shift. With the hours Im pulling I may be online even less than I am now and Im not sure how often I'll actually be blogging but keep checking back just on the off chance I have an interesting night. Today was mostly alot of talk and the next two days are going to be alot of computer based learning (you watch a video on the computer and then answer a series of questions based on the video....simple stuff just time consuming). By Sunday evening I should be hitting the sales floor. I went shopping after work and got myself 2 pairs of khakis, a pair of jeans and 2 shirts. I think I'll be hitting Kohls on Monday or maybe tomorrow afternoon to see what they have in the line of navy shirts because I forsee not being too comfy in those 2 I bought at WallyWorld today. I find them a bit on the warm side. The jeans are for Fridays....we're allowed to wear jeans on Fridays only for a donation of $1 which goes to CMN (Children's Miracle Network). A good cause in my opinion.

The first thing we did today during orientation was a game. They had this board game of a "shopping" experience in "another store". The object was to get around the board and make it out of the store with your piece still registering in a "satisfied" or higher position. If your piece hit zero, it meant you were completely dissatisfied and your shopping trip ended. My team made it 3/4 the way before crashing and burning and our "customer" left in a huff dropping everything they were going to buy on the floor on their way out the door. I deeply suspect that that game is geared so it cannot be won period. It was a good way to loosen the group up some and prime them for the lectures though.

By the time I got out of training, hubby had gotten back to Dallas and was on his way home. He hadnt heard anything from the company last night nor this morning before he left. They ended up calling here around 940am and leaving a message for him to call back on Monday. *bah* I wanted an answer TODAY!! *snorts* Im guessing that if it was a "no thanks" they would have left that information on the answering machine so maybe it's a "yes, lets discuss money". In any case I wont know for a couple more days now. *insert huge eyeroll*

I think that's about it for now. Time to shut off the puter and spend some time with hubby...

Ask and ye shall receive

Updates updates updates!! Yesterday hubby left for his interview and I crawled my happy ass right back into bed. My TxSis called around 11am or so to let me know it was cold and snowing in Virginia. Ummm yes I know, not much I can do about it since he left the house at 8am and was probably in Atlanta by the time she called. I told her he brought a jacket with him and some gloves. I dont remember much more of the convo because I was only 1/3 awake but I do remember her saying that I sounded like I was on drugs at which I pointed out that I had just got to bed around 5am or so and was up to see him off then back to bed and she'd woke me up. Im sure I came across snippy and all but unfortunately Im still on a night schedule sleepwise and it WAS before 3pm...

Yesterday afternoon I got a call while I was out getting the mail. For some reason I didnt check the phone when I came in because I had only been outside for less than a minute. Imagine my surprise this morning when I realized the messages indicator was blinking. It was WalMart and they said if I was still interested to please give them a call. There is an orientation tomorrow morning at 9am. Nuts...this means I really DO have to be to bed early tonight. I think I'll crawl in around 10pm or so...that's when I got really tired last night anyhow (then by 11pm I caught a second wind and was up until 5am or so). I called them around 3pm to confirm I'd be there.

Hubby called around 1130am-12pm today and let me know he had a total of 5 interviews today. Actually he said 4 but one lady met with him twice so Im counting it as a separate meeting. He says that a majority of the meetings went well....except for the next to last one. I think he referred to it as the "psych" part of the interviews. I am thinking he's meaning like those long questionnaires at the end of job applications.....those ones that let the prespective employer see where your head's at. He's since called back @ 3:50pm to talk about it more. He has mixed emotions at this point. He says that he feels good about the interviews and feels that there may definitely be a job offer as they said they'd call one way or another either tonight at the hotel or leave a message here at the house by tomorrow (which means look for another blog entry tomorrow night or Saturday morning depending on the schedule I get). Although hubby's feeling good about the company itself, he's not so fond of the area. It's much too crowded for his liking and the prices are horrendous. It looks like he's going to have to bite the bullet and plan on a 45min- 1 hr drive one way each day to get to work so we can live in a reasonably priced apartment (ugh...back to an apartment again...*sigh*). I wont even repeat what he said about the traffic in the area (thank goodness he'd had fair enough warning from TxSis regarding that). So now Im not so certain where we are. I think we've decided that we'll need to just go with the flow and take the job if offered. We also discussed the possibility of him contacting the 2 in NC and or calling the one here in Texas to see how good the chances are of employment with them. In anycase I reminded him that even if he did contact the others and they said chances were good but not til the top of the year...it still didnt guarantee employment whereas a firm job offer from a company in an area we weren't too happy with is better than waiting on the others just to find out that they had nothing for him. Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll call him after the offer was made with this group...who knows.

Well I'd better get going...it's time for supper and I wanna get a shower in tonight before bed. Before I do that, I have to drop emails to those that dont read this blog and get them caught up. Definitely need to get to bed early tonight so if I nod off (like I did last night while watching tv and reading) I can just sleep through until tomorrow. No sense encouraging that second wind to show up ya know.

When it rains it pours!

I took my title out of a comment Alice left me on my homepage. Holy frkn shit the day I had today!! As hubby is on the nightshift and Im trying to keep close to his schedule if at all possible I crawled into bed roughly 6am this morning. I must have been dead to the world when hubby came home because I never heard him come in. At 930am we got a call and the ringing got me clear out of bed and I was at the desk in the bedroom before fully awake. I heard hubby on the phone and figured he's handling it so I start to crawl back into bed. Then he showed up at the bedroom door with the phone....it was WalMart wanting to talk to me. All those apps, all that waiting and today of all days.....a company calls to schedule an interview. *shakes head* Top things all off they wanted me in this morning at 1130am. Well I guess that shoots crawling back under the covers outta my plans for the day as hubby said maybe it'd be a good idea to at least go to the appointment. *sigh* I re-iterated that it didnt make sense to go to this interview if he was going to his interview as Im thinking if they're paying for hotel, flight, car, food AND reimbursing the money he pays out to get to the airport (a fact he failed to share until today) then damn well sure they're probably looking to hire him. I mean why bother when Im really sure we're going to be moving it's not fair to me OR the company I interview at! But he insisted. So I went to my interview , which turned into 3 interviews one right after the other, and I was completely up front about things. I figure, worse case they'll say no right?I told them that hubby's company was closing the plant he is in and that he has an interview in Virginia in 2 days and with all that the company was paying out to get him there that I was pretty sure they were serious to hire him AND that it was likely that I'd only be able to stay a couple weeks ...four at the most. After all that, they still decided that they would like to go ahead and give me my opportunity to get my feet wet again. The understanding we came to was to place me on seasonal work. If it looks like Im going to have to move around then so be it...we'll look at a transfer OR I'll be first laid off. No problem there for me. *IF* we end up staying and WalMart likes my work then the option is they keep me. In any case all cards were placed on the table and both the company and I are on the same page (so they cant say I wasnt open about the situation). I also explained that due to my driving situation (namely I dont) that there is no calling me at the last second and expecting me to just pop in within 10 minutes' time even though I was just around the corner because I'll be at the mercy of cab service. Now for the good news....they're sticking me in the toy department. ~grinz~ Much like what I was doing at Toys R Us...cant argue there....plus they're starting me out 70 cents higher than the per hour I requested. I'll know for sure once they've done the background check and get the results of the drug testing they did on me whether or not I have the job for sure. They'll call me back in for orientation once they decide. Im figuring since the second interviewer said they were entering me into the system AND told me how much I was keyed in for my pay that it's more than likely a good sign I should go shopping for clothes that are dress code compliant.

My Amazon shipment arrived today. Im really happy as now I have a couple small gifts to go on the sofa for hubby to open. He was waiting on me to open the box but I just left it on the printer and refused to touch it again until he was gone. LOL He goes..."so whatcha get?" I held the box up and shook it gently (thank goodness they packed it so nothing shifted and made noise) and stated that I heard a cd in there for me...LOL Mind you the box is much larger than a simple cd... *giggles*. He's left for the night and I've since opened it, retrieved my Jordin Sparks cd and hidden the box with the rest of the contents elsewhere in the house (and honey....if you're reading this and think you're gonna look...forget it...it's boobytrapped) heh heh heh.

Anyhow, I've ripped the cd (why? I dunno...I wont be streaming until this job situation is settled unless I decide to see if I can go on a fill-in only basis...) and am listening to it now. It's not bad...better than I expected to be honest. Her disc will work well when Im playing my Natalie and Cherish cds.

Well I guess I'd better wrap this up because I gotta pull up some apartments I want hubby to check out while he's back east....get the info and directions printed out for him. He's got a service coming to pick him up tomorrow at 8am which means he'll be home a bit earlier than usual. I hope they send him home earlier than he's planning because the poor guy got zippo in the sleep department today. He caught 2 hours at work before coming home...an hour before my interview and that's about it as we didnt get back to homebase until 2pm or so and I had to cut his hair and he had to pack yet. By the time all that was done it was nearly 5pm...no time for a nap. I hope he sleeps some on the plane.

What a beautiful day!

Today started mighty early for me. I'd only gotten to bed by around 4 am or so and something made me get up at 930am or so. Not sure why my mind wouldnt let me sleep because my body was definitely saying it was still exhausted and my mind wasnt in full gear either but neither would let me sleep a minute past 930am no matter HOW deep I buried myself in the blankets. *sigh* Oh well. Of course hubby'd been up since 6am Im sure and was already raring to go for the day. Man I wish he'd keep to the same sleep schedule on off days as he has on work days!! The smell of fresh biscuits was wafting from the kitchen right down into the bedroom so my nose decided to let my belly and tastebuds in on this fact and of course the rest of me had to follow its happy ass out of bed (it's a conspiracy Im tellin ya).

I got myself up and going (sort of)..man I wanted a cuppa tea but I didnt have any ready and didnt feel like waiting for the pot to get ready either. After a plate of breakfast (courtesy of my DH) and a few minutes to wake up, my hubby asked for like the 3rd time when I wanted to go get groceries. *sigh* Ok ok, I'm getting ready.... Then he decides that we're not going anywhere until after the mail shows up *grumble* ok..fine. Im mighty thankful we waited though because my new motherboard arrived today as well as another surprise for me. Ok, so it wasnt much of a surprise really but it was something I'd been looking for for the last 4 years and I was so happy to get my hands on it today. You see, when I ran from Pennsylvania in 2003...I'd left a couple of my most prized porcelain dolls with a friend to send to me when I got settled and the one I treasured above all managed to get broken beyond repair while in her possession. It was a Geppeddo brand doll....a company that has been out of business for several years now. Needless to say, there wasnt any calling the company for spare parts or anything to fix it. The doll in question Im guessing is fairly rare as I couldnt find a listing for it anywhere to save my life. All other Geppeddo dolls I could find on EBay, just not this particular one. Why is it so special? Because a friend of mine thought to buy it for me one Christmas when she was buying for the rest of her girls (one daughter, two in laws and one "adopted"). This doll wasnt exactly the prettiest on the kiosk but I kept getting drawn to her..mostly because she had a really reasonable price (most of the dolls on the kiosk were running close to $100 and this one was only $35) but also because she was a gypsy doll. I was heartbroken when I found out the foot was shattered beyond repair....it's not as though I could take a shoe and glue to the her leg and hide the damage as she was meant to be barefoot so shoes would look very out of place on her. I searched for 4 years now on EBay to find this same doll to replace the broken one and wouldnt you know this year 2 went up for auction within 3 days of each other. Hubby knew how important this doll was to me so he kept close eye on the auction and made sure to win it. She showed up today...the postman wasnt even off my porch before I was getting into that shipment for sure ;).

My new motherboard also showed up today. Hubby, the darling he is, got it installed into my computer....fired up the computer and.......................&%&(%^$&^!!!!! It still wouldnt work. He then says that maybe it was the power source and that he has a spare in the garage. I, for the life of me, still dont understand HOW the fan and monitor and such would work without a powersource but some how it does. So he went out to the garage, got the spare powersource and everything fired up fine. Ugh...been on the laptop 3 weeks and if we'd even thought of that I coulda had it fixed the night it broke down and saved us some money too. The only thing that DIDNT work was the sound....speakers were plugged in, on and didnt have the headphones plugged in....everything that should have been clicked in the volume control was. So what does he end up doing? Ripping out the new motherboard and putting the old one back in...voila...it works. *insert eyeroll here*. I aint gonna argue of fuss though because he has had alot on his mind lately. Im just glad he got it fixed before next week....my back is killing me.

Oh and the company called again today and then emailled to firm up plans for next week. He flies out on Weds at 1030am...lays over in Georgia and then arrives in D.C. that afternoon. His interview is 930am on Thurday so I may know if he has the job or if we gotta wait by that evening. Im not going to promise any news by then because he's going to take a few notes out with him with directions to a couple apartment complexes so he can look for some new digs. There have been a couple we've seen on line that are rather reasonable in cost considering the area and look nice too but I'd like him to at least eyeball them and talk to the leasing offices. Friday he flies out in the morning and I should get to see him by that night. I'd really like to see one of the two in NC come through this week as the rentals in that state are soooo much cheaper but we'll need to take what we can at this point. I've been checking out the weather there and they're running 13-15 degrees cooler than us. Im beginning to wish I asked Santa for a new winter coat for hubby as I believe he's gonna need it in short order.

So hot!!!

So damn hot that I havent even had time to go to my email yet or grab breakfast or nothing. Shortly after I got up (I went straight to the kitchen to cut apart those pieces I finished last night), I'd say maybe 20 minutes later....hubby got up to let the dog out and asked if I'd been to the computer. No I hadnt, why? He says that the tentative plan is for him to be gone from here December 5-7th to Virginia. No, the gal hasnt gotten all the plans and stuff itinerized BUT he's on the schedule for a meeting. I dont remember hearing the phone ringing this morning (we have a handset in the bedroom as well as the kitchen and the home office) and hubby said that he called the company this morning before he came to bed. They'll be emailling him the final details later. I may be editting this later if that email comes in today.

Tuesday:completed projects and a phone call

Well today I finally finished up all those little projects that I've been hoping to get completed before week's end. They are all painted, varnished and glued to the scrap green felt. All I'll need to do is separate the pieces and trim down the excess. Once that's done I can pack everything up. With any luck, I'll have it ready for shipment Friday.

After some consideration and a couple conversations with family, I decided to have hubby go ahead and call that company when he woke up for the day. The reason being is that the company's going to need time to book his flight and schedule his face to face interview. We only have 3 weeks left and then there is no job. It would be awesome if we could have another job lined up by then. Like everyone whom I've talked to has said, this company has now made 3 calls to talk to him and evidentally has a very strong interest in having him join their company. If they weren't, they wouldnt be paying his flight, car, hotel and food for 3 days just to meet with him for an hour or so. Hubby placed the call around 330pm yesterday and no one was available so he left a message. With any luck, we'll get a call from them later this morning. I'll keep everyone updated on our progress in this.

Holy Frijoles!!!

Talk about a fast response! We got a call from that company in Manassas at 945am today. Hubby was talking to someone he addressed as Samantha who was asking him how the interview went. She must have known the answer to that because she was calling to see about setting a face 2 face interview...on their tab. Hotel, flight, car, food...all paid by them. He gave them the "let me talk to my wife" delay to buy himself a day to think on it. Mostly it's because he doesnt want them to spend money if it's not going to be a good fit but Im thinking he's wanting to give one of the local companies a chance to call back. I told him he'd be foolish to not take the opportunity. Even if it doesnt result in an offer it's good practice getting infront of a prospective employer and it's on someone else's dime. Besides the local company has had just as long to get back to him as this company has. You snooze you loose you know!

Con: There would be a HUGE move right around the holidays.
Pro: They pay costs...30 days temp housing , 30 days temp storage and something else I cant remember. Also sounds like they're willing to wait until after he gets his severance package which is a HUGE plus. Only 3 more weeks to go and we have a house to prepare to sell!!

Con: Overtime is not on a daily basis like we're used to...it's after 40 hours.
Pro: The base pay is going to go up. Where he's at now, he's paid X amount an hour and Z amount after the 8th hour on a day...averaging Y on an hourly basis. The amount on the table is about $1/hr more than what he's making per hour now (the Y figure) which is a good thing. Gotta make it worth the move.

Con: It's a rotating shift... 4 months days then 4 months nights and back again. 12 hr shifts(?)
Pro: We're already used to this. So there wont be too much change to get used to. Besides once he gets in a place, he may find someone like his buddy here that prefers a certain shift and he wont have to change. That'd be cool.

Anyhow, this is where we stand at this point. Will let everyone know when the face 2 face is set for as soon as I know.

Change of decor and a phone call

Ok, so sue me....I wasnt completely happy with the last batch of decorating I did on this page so I redid it. Normally Im not much into green (you wouldnt know it with this layout and the one on the Home Page) but these two layouts turned out so damn nice!!

Hubby got that call we were expecting promptly at 330pm today. He talked with whoever was on the other end for about 20 minutes or so. After he got off I asked him how he thought it went and he said he felt much better about this call than the last two. He down graded the other two calls to 3 or 4 out of 10 and this one was rated a 7-8 out of 10. He sounded so much more relaxed on the phone this time too. I am grateful for this. My biggest worry was that he'd sound as nervous or worse.

Gonna make this a short entry tonight as Im really not feeling 100% today. Let's just say I am actually snuggled in my robe yet it's warm enough in the house for me to be running in shorts easily. I think he brought something home from work again. It's either that or the fact the weather's been playing yo-yo lately. We're up to the 50s and it's supposed to be close to 70 in a day or so. Im hoping if I catch it early and does myself with some cold medicine it'll go away in a day or so.

job updates and other stuff

I was telling you that last week hubby got a call from a company in Virginia. After several days of not hearing anything last week, I commensed to job hunt once again. I filled out 3 more apps Wednesday this week. Two were for stores I had already applied to and one was for Home Depot. I figure the two I reapplied to had new positions available (one business had several I was qualified to do) and that this would serve as a reminder I was still job hunting and that my availability had changed somewhat. Im really kind of hoping for the one company as it had at least 2 positions in the stock area and one is overnights.

Yesterday we got another call from that company in Virginia. Go figure I'd given up and applied to those other places.. Anyhow, the etch leader had decided against him but the company itself is still interested so another boss there is going to be calling at 330pm on Monday. Hubby told me this happened when he first applied to Texas Instruments so Im guessing this is a good thing. Personally a good thing would be an answer so I can just come out of Limboland. Now just watch....something will come through at the same time for both of us and we'll need to make a decision. *shakes head*

In other head shaking news, I was in chat last night talking with some friends when my MSN chirped at me....with a message containing a crack that listening's better than streaming right? Yes indeed. No it wasnt him, but it was his woman. We talked for a while and the excuse I was given for the no contact? Oh he "didnt receive" the email I'd sent and that he always removes people that arent going to be there for a while. Yeah right...there have been others that were no shows and no contact that stayed on the schedule a helluva lot longer... where I at least was making it every other week AND had at least forewarned him. The offer was made for her to send what all he got I was pretty much able to tell her what had been sent and then I turned around and forwarded the email I'd sent to him. It's about 24 hours later and I've yet to get a response. Maybe because I was pretty pissy in the MSN communication. At this point I still havent been added back on the schedule. Do I care if Im put back? Not really. I am still a tad miffed about the whole thing though. Im giving it another week and then just going to block and drop.

Last couple days I've taken and redecorated my web pages. My myspace page has the same pattern as last year because I simply couldnt find anything I really liked for that page. Two of my blogger pages and my other myspace are all decked out for the holidays. I even got decor up for a friend's myspace. That's pretty much all Im going to do in the line of decorations though...other than that Im being humbuggy about the whole season. No sense digging everything out and putting it up if there's a chance I may be packing things up around the holidays. Of course my luck is that if I dont we'll end up here still. *shrugs*

I guess I better close this out. I really need to finish painting those pieces so I can get it all shipped this coming Friday. Not sure if I really feel up to working on them tonight....actually more enclined to grab a mug of hot chocolate, a heating pad and curl up in bed with a book (Im into book 3 of that series now).

Catchin ya'll up

Just doing some catch-up here. As most of you know my main computer went *poofs* on me over a week ago. My hubby thinks it's the motherboard and has managed to win one on EBay that he thinks may fix my problem. Right now we're just waiting on delivery so he can get it installed. With any luck this will completely correct things for me. I know the *poof* wasnt my harddrives as he bought a shell to make my C and D drives externals so I can access the information on it. Unfortunately, all the programs I had in there will need reinstalling Im sure. Oh well, there isnt anything of major importance in there anymore since Im no longer streaming. Anyhow, I havent been writing much because of how I have things set up. Im still on the laptop in the livingroom. Ive got this baby set up on a tv tray on top of the coffee table. It pretty much brings it up to a good level for me but I also end up having to sit on the edge of the sofa to reach it. Needless to say the lean Im at pretty much aggravates my lower back and the edge of the sofa itself presses on the nerves behind my legs which means they go to sleep every now and then while Im at the keyboard. Hence the reason why Im not in as often as I used to be. Oh of course I could always clear off my kitchen table and set up out there but #1 the chairs out there beg for mercy everytime I sit on them (actually they scream in agony but does that really matter), and #2 if this is an easy fix, there's no real sense in setting up for just a week or so in the kitchen. If it's going to take longer, I'll just have the CPU from the bedroom brought into the office for my use. In any case, Im making use of this time away from the computer.

During the last week and a half or so, I've been spending more time painting. In this time, Ive managed to complete 18 small pieces and get 8 more started. Twelve of the 18 are pieces to a couple Christmas gifts for a couple friends. All I'll need to do is buy some gift certificates for the others on my list and my shopping's done for the year. I wont be posting the pictures of any of the crafts I did as gifts this year until after the holidays because the people who are getting hand crafted items all have access to this blog (they just dont necessarily leave comments). I have 8 more started, a small one for myself and at least 1 of the others is for my folks....something they can have that I made that can be left up all year around (I painted them ornaments a few years back).

When Im not painting, Im catching whatever movies are being aired on tv. I usually catch approximately 2 movies a night. May as well, nothing much else to do around here with hubby away all night. The last couple nights I've been doing some reading too. I actually broke down and started the Harry Potter series. Oh, I know I had said that I wanted to wait until the movies were all out but that would be another 2-3 years. What Im doing is watching the movie first then reading the corresponding book. Depending on how this goes will determine if I read past the 4th book. If it goes anything like the first book did, I probably will end up stopping after the 4th book. Needless to say, I was awfully glad I watched the movie first because if I'd done it the other way around I would have been sorely dissappointed....just like any other time. My only guess is that they didnt do their research properly and not realizing exactly what kind of a phenomenon this was going to be, simply just "whipped something together". There were definitely a few lines in the first book that were LOL funny and would have worked well in the movie. I got through the first book in less than a day's time and watched the second movie this evening. I'll be starting reading the book later tonight.

For the benefit of those I havent had a chance to talk to (my NYBro for one) and for those who have reading programs and cannot access my "Home Page", hubby got a call last Thursday around 10 am from a company in Virginia that expressed some interest in his application. He got to talk to the HR (human resources) Director for a little bit and was told that the lead in the etch section would call him back around 2pm the same day. The leader called and talked with hubby for a good long time. It sounded like he was testing hubby's knowledge with systems and stuff. It also sounded like alot of what was asked was stuff hubby learned in school 11 years ago and hasnt had to put into use since. Hubby gave the call a 50/50 shot at the time. We were kind of hoping they'd call back again but we havent heard word one since. My only hope right now is that they had a few more applications to call first before they decide and that they'll call after Thanksgiving. It's getting awfully close for my liking to be honest.

As for myself, I havent had one bite since Target called. Like I was telling a friend the other night, most companies will have their seasonal staff in place at this point and mostly trained because "Black Friday" is this week. Only hope for me at this point is that a company decides they need someone permanent and calls this next week. Im beginning to think that I may have to go to that temp agency down the road and see what they have. You all do know that if I had gotten a job, then the call from Virginia would have come through....that's just how my luck runs.

Saturday

Saturday was pretty good considering all things. I painted some (should *FINALLY* have those pieces done this week) and baked some brownies. My bro from NY called and we talked for a while. A package showed up from my SCSis....a 10 disc set of Led Zepp *whoot*. Kinda sad about it because it was sent for me to use in my streams....*shakes head*. I finished putting my contacts into my new phone...we got it at Wally World for $20....my other cell was needing replacing as it was 4 yrs old and things were wearing out on it. Took my banners off my MySpace and Blogger accounts. Maybe someday in the near future new ones will go up, maybe not. I gotta decide if I enjoy my freedom. Really would hate to waste all that great music I have though.

I spent part of the night in chat with some friends. Thanks for the warm welcome there. So sorry it got busy over here and I couldnt chat so much. Im getting the feeling the one chatter has no clue who I am in chat yet. Maybe that's best for now. I had trouble getting the stream to turn on over here though as hubby has some other music program as the default over here. thank you Chicago for sending the link. Unfortunately, before I could get it emailed to myself again the damn puter decided to reboot itself immediately so yet again I lost it. Not sure what hubby did when he installed WinAmp over on the laptop but it looks funky and Im not likin it any...and real player...well didnt want to open the link when I grabbed it in the room either. Ah well. I managed to hear most of the stream anyhow between tech problems. God how I want MY puter back!!!

Well it's nearly 430am...guess I'd better mosey into bed....

Oh how wonderful part deux

Ya ever have one of those days when you cant even get vertical much less put your fuzzy bunny slippers on before the day starts to throw things at you? Well friday , as you could tell by the beautiful picture I posted then, was one of those days. Thursday hubby had had an ENT appointment at 10am so we'd gone to bed early Thursday night because we were tired. Friday, hubby got up around 9am to pollute his lungs and take out the outgoing mail (we never put it out the night before if there are checks or cards involved). What a beautiful surprise to wake up to your mailbox knocked over. Mind you, the bugger wasnt just the box and a post. Oh no, that baby was cemented down and a good 2-3' sunk into the ground. I wish I could post the picture of it but since Im reduced to my laptop and I dont have access to the necessary cords to get the picture off my camera at this point, it's simply not gonna get posted until Im back on a regular desktop computer. Anyhow...he comes in to get his sneakers on and lets me know what happened. *sigh* The post couldnt be salvaged so he ended up having to buy the whole kit...another $50 that really could have gone elsewhere besides where it was ending up going. This sucks. I got myself up and going while he was out and started the apps I needed to get done. I managed to do 7 or 8 that day. It took me all day because I was making damn certain the stores were within a certain distance from the house (dont wanna spend a whole lot on cab fare ya know).

He got home and got the new post and box up, then mowed the lawn. While he was out mowing the postman showed up with more bad news. One was a bill we were expecting (just not expecting the amount DAMN!) and another was from the city we live in. Damn code compliance. Seems they dont like the truck parked in the front lawn because it wasnt an "improved parking area" or some shit. Top things all off, since they snail mailed the letter we only had less than 24 hours to get the truck moved. Yeah great. Damn thing's too heavy to push so there's no getting it into the driveway without it being towed...it had been placed there so hubby could get in and out of the garage with that big honkin Torino. Did I mention the truck wont fit through the doors of our garage? Hubby ended up having to call the repair shop we utilize and have them remove it. He told them since it needed to be fixed anyhow to just keep it at the shop and take their time fixing it because it'd be 2 months before we can pay for it anyhow, just tack on a storage fee. Thankfully,since we are such good customers (read we have alotta repairs because of such old vehicles), they didnt charge us for the towing. I wish we'd thought to just send the POS over that way in the first place.

While he was messing with that I was attempting to get those apps done. A couple of them had PDF files so you could snail mail the app in. This is about the time the printer decided it didnt have enough ink. Got the ink changed out and then it decided that it was out of alignment and had to be corrected. Of course, if it's not something I have to do daily I cant remember how the hell to fix it. By the time hubby came in, I was near tears and ready to hit the sangria in the frige (it wasnt even 1pm either...). Hubby got it fixed for me and showed me yet again how to do it (yeah like I'll remember in 6 months or so when it needs doing again!). After I was pretty much done, I turned the puter off and went to watch tv. Later, I went to turn on the puter and it gave me fits (see previous entry) so I left the office and let hubby deal with it.

While he was trying to trouble shoot the problem, I figured I'd drop the chatsite owner a note and let him know I definitely would NOT be able to come in to stream (all my stream stuff is on that puter) on Saturday. The arrangement I had with him was that I'd come in ~when~ I was available on Saturdays and stream. Since my resume is heavy in retail, it stands to chance I will have to work Saturday nights. I missed one stream due to a meeting and one because I was so ill that I slept through my streamspot. Otherwise, I've been there every Saturday regular as clockwork....even after every one of my friends left the site. Why'd I stay? Because although I knew much of what went on I "didnt know" if you know what I mean. To be honest when TxSis left I shoulda taken my happy ass right out of there. Well, before dropping him a note (gotta be polite and do the right thing) I checked the schedule on site. I dont know why I did, I just had the feeling I should. Surprise....I wasnt on the schedule at all. Now according to our arrangement, I should have had at BEST ** next to my nick but ohh no. I was completely removed. Lord knows how long I've been off...I know I was still on last week when I sat in that room for 3 damn hours streaming to a nearly empty room....AGAIN. Needless to say, I wrote him a note and let him know I had trouble with my computer (mind you he KNOWS I have a laptop and that I never set it up for streaming) and that I'd noticed that I was no longer on the schedule...I guess I'm fired? Well as of 354am SUNDAY morning, I've yet to hear from him. No acknowledgement yes or no. My best guess at this point is that I've been fired since he doesnt deem it necessary to communicate with me. As such, you'll notice all banners I had up advertising that chat site have been taken down. I refuse to waste space on my sites giving free advertising for someone who needs to get the damn burrs out of his ass. I havent decided what Im going to do yet...I've always said if anything happened at this site my headphones were getting hung up and permanently. Maybe that's just best. I have seen a couple other programs out there, though, that will allow me to do my own show...maybe I'll look into them. Tired of chat sites that pull shit like this. Last note to the site manager in case he decides to actually read this (yeah right...he's got access to here but never reads it anyhow...) I know what you said to whom about me and the only damn reason I DIDNT leave when I found out is because I "didnt know" what was said....capice?

Oh how wonderful!!!

For those that know me well, know that the title is just dripping with sarcasm. Yeah friday night my computer, the one thing that keeps me occupied during the course of these long lonely days, the recepticle of all things musical and artistic for me decided to go *poof*. I cant tell you how aggravated this makes me. It started nearly a week ago when some strange things started happening with it. It started so innocently. I had been working most the day on projects and decided to play one of my games. It had been one of those days and I needed to blow off some steam. I like to play games that let me shoot or blow up things when I get this way. I figure at least this way Im blowing off steam and nothing and no one's getting hurt. I wanted just a quick game so I had chosen to play a hunting game. I was rather surprised when it told me that the game wouldnt start. Why surprised? Well because I had played it earlier in the day with no problems. I tried rebooting, checking the connections...everything. I even ran my virus protection programs...yeah I said programs. Sometimes just having one wont catch everything. So anyhow, I run the programs and find nothing. It got late so I gave up and went to bed thinking that I'd just rip the program out the next day and re-install it when I got up.

The next day I woke up and went to my computer. Turned it on and once everything was started up I turned on the game again. Wow...the game started up no problem at all. Hmmm. the rest of day went without event on the computer. Every program ran perfectly just like it should.

A day or so later, it went the next step onto the freaky scale. I had been on the puter all day again as usual. I turned it off for a couple hours so I could watch some tv programs. When I got back to it....it wouldnt turn on. The monitor fired up, the fan was working in the CPU but nothing else. I tried rebooting and checking the connections again. The next attempt to fire it up I got the normal start up screen, or so I thought...then it told me there was an error and gave me the black screen again. I tried another reboot...nothing. I decided to write hubby a note that my puter was fkd and please check it...while I was writing I turned it on one more time and voila...it worked perfectly. Hmmm.

The next day... it started up fine. The only problem it gave me was while I was reading an article. I had a grand total of 2 windows open (not the usual 5 or 6) and the damn Internet Explorer turned itself off. Usually I get a warning before IE does this but this time...nope. It just shut itself off. Hmmmm. The rest of the day it worked fine. In fact the next several days it was fine. I was able to do all the research I needed to do and no hassles. Then came Friday...

Friday was the day from hell. Pretty much started the minute we got up and lasted right up to bedtime (thats a story for another entry though). My computer fired right up nicely and didnt give me a lick of trouble all morning. I managed to get several applications filled out and was running it with several windows open at any given time (I was checking Mapquest to make sure the businesses were close enough). When 8pm showed up, I turned the computer off so I could watch one of my tv programs. I got up after my program and went to fire up the computer to finish up my work. Again I get the fan, monitor and nothing else. Thankfully, hubby was home this time. I told him this wasnt the first time this happened and detailled what happened during the week. He told me to shut down and turn it back on in a few minutes. While I did that he went out to pollute his lungs so he didnt get to hear the God-awful noise that came up with the next firing up. When I turned it on, it looked as if it was going to start up no problem but then the screen got stuck it all the stuff that normally comes up and then said that the floppy in my A drive was either corrupted or stuck or something. Thing you need to know here is that I DONT HAVE AN A DRIVE in my puter.... C,D,E and F...yes....A ...no. When that message came up it emmitted a beeping that I'd never hear come from my puter before. Needless to say, I shut it off again and let hubby know when he came in. We tried to fire it up one more time and got the black screen again. He's guessing the puter's motherboard is pretty much shot. I wonder why, it was installed when the puter was built...4 yrs ago....and Im on it continually. So now, Im basically stuck with using the laptop. It's not the least bit comfortable on my back to say the least. Hubby's' said he's bought a drive casing (?) for my 2 harddrives so I can move the information over to another computer. He says I wont be able to access the programs but I will have access to my artwork and music at least. With any luck (and assuming he aint tired when he gets home later this morning) he'll have that all ready to go. I think we decided to have it so it's accessible on the laptop....I forsee some more sore backs in the future. Maybe I should have him hook it up the the spare unit in the bedroom. I'd have to clean up some in there, but it beats having my legs go to sleep while Im sitting on the edge of the sofa trying to access my laptop which is presently sitting on a tv tray on top of the coffee table. On the other hand, if I use the laptop, I will be able to watch tv in the livingroom (can you say big screen?) while I work on the computer.......