Semi-Productive Day

It was my day off today. We had decided last weekend that we would be painting the master bedroom. We also put up a new ceiling fan. The old one made lots of noise, didn’t always worked and some of the light sockets didn’t work on it. The new one has 4 working lights and we are trying out some “sunlight” bulbs. They are bright, doesn’t have the yellow of the others and they take a lot less power then regular bulbs.

So we first we got everything out of the room, broomed the very dusty ceiling, Harold fought with the fan for over an hour and then we started on the painting. It is looking good.

Once we get it back together I’ll take some pictures & get them posted. It probably won’t be until tomorrow night since I have to work early in the morning.

We are finally done with the seasonal crowds at work. It feels both good and weird…..when you don’t have to kill yourself to get something done.

I got a really sweet surprise the other day at work. Jackie gave me a certificate for where I get my nails done for my birthday. She had actually gotten me a candle holder with a cat on it, but (very appropriately) her cats broke it and they threw up on my card. I just think that is so funny, since we are both cat people and we both are so use to our cats doing something funky in our lives. =)

We have already made plans for my next day off. I have 2 days off together and we planning on heading down to Ft. Lauderdale to spend it with friends. We are looking forward to getting out of here even if only for a day or two. =)

I’m going need to head to bed soon & I want to do a little surfing…….so I’ll chat with you later.

End of the Weekend

Well, it sucks……..I have to head back to work today. It wouldn’t be so bad if I didn’t know that we have a ton to do without enough folks get it done and I haven’t had a fully weekend off since before Thanksgiving…..which gets old. But I did enjoy this weekend, even though the Colts lost. =(

I got all but one of the evaluations done, since his isn’t under the deadline. I really didn’t feel like doing them. A few that I had to do were on some of our best employees, those were hard in that you can’t just give them a perfect score, there is always room for improvement as a basic part of being human. So net picking is involved. A few were on those that can do a good job but are so inconsistent and depends on their “moods” that I don’t feel that they have earned a raise. These evaluations are based on what I see, Cheryl needs to go over them and change what she sees as the general manager and then send them to our DM.

We are going to start prepping the master bedroom this week, so on my next day off we can be ready to attack with the paint brushes. =) We are tired of the white. Unfortunately, prepping is not as easy since I have a lot knick-knacks on my hutch that I need to take down so we can move it.

I did get some reorganizing done on some of my cat pictures that we have take over the years. So the cat page is done! Didn’t take me a long as I thought it would, so that was cool.

Mom called yesterday. Sounds like Heather really enjoyed the books we sent. =) Told mom that our idea for the summer was for them to come down about a week before their anniversary, visit for a few days and then leave us the kids for a few weeks. This would be great for them not having to worry about the kids for their day. =)

Well, unfortunately I need to finish this up and get off to work. My bike wheel is fixed so I’m going to ride in and get some cardio in.

My Saturday

Harold spent the day working, I worked on laundry; got a few more receipts entered while we have the playoffs on.

It is has been windy as heck all day and chilly. They have been giving freeze advisories for our area. I may have to get something warmer on other then shorts and tank top…….lol It is still weird to me for this time of year not to have snow, I don’t believe I’ll ever get use to it. Of course, once I get to a more normal climate it will take me time to get use the colder weather again, but I think I can do it. =)

Yesterday at work, Cheryl and I got about 3 interviews done. They did well, now she just has to get a hold of our DM and get him down to interview them and another that we had already interviewed. We really do need to get our 4th manager.

We are suppose to get our budget for next quarter this Tuesday, hopefully we will actually get it. So we can see if they actually gave us our budget for the 4th manager and be able to hire a few folks. We are extremely stretched and when someone needs or calls off, we are screwed. And working that way gets old and is bad for morale. But it all depends on the budget. =(

I got a call from Sandy yesterday. Her sister Chrissy (who use to work for me at Fannie May Candies) had gotten an internship and was wondering if I would give her a reference. I’m like heck yeah!

I had never meet Chrissy before I had interviewed her. And, of course, hiring a relative of my best friend is a risk. But she worked out very well and I would hire her in a heart beat. Sandy gave her my info and Chrissy gave me a call. We talked for about an hour and it was great to hear from her.

I can’t believe that she’ll be graduating from Purdue-Calumet this year. Time has flown. Her internship would let her use her art and help people at the same time. She would be working with kids that have been abused and she would be helping them to express themselves through drawing. It is a great opportunity with possibility of full employment after graduation. I did tell her to prepare herself for what she’ll see and that Sandy is a great help when you need someone to talk to.

So I should be hearing from someone this week looking for a reference for her. =)

Day of errands and follow ups

Today I had to run some errands for Pauline, so I started around 9 am and had about 4 places I need to stop at, at the last stop it was only 9:40am and it opens at 10am, so I decided to go to a Sports store and look at what they had to kill some time. On the way back to the store I saw our buddy, the homeless guy panhandling.

Now I was pretty far from home and on the edge of town where I normally do not go, so I was not expecting to see this guy here so far from where we normally see him. So I pulled over and parked 200’ away or so and called the Police, they told me I was in the West Side and not the East side town so I had to call the West Side’s police and they would get the information I need to complete the complaint I had filed against him. Ok, no problem.

So I call the West Side cops and after a 10 min discussion I convinced the dispatcher that yes, I did indeed need a officer to meet me so he sent one, and about 20 to 30 mins later an office showed up and as soon as the guy in question saw the cop car he crossed the 4 lane road to the East side. As soon as the cop got to me I explained the situation and the guy stood across the street watching us and the officer then told me, he is no longer in the West Side, but back in the East Side. Grrrrr.

But after talking to the West Side cop, he agreed to go over and ask his name and get whatever information he could get from him and asked me to drive 2 blocks away and he will met with me and fill me in on what he finds out. So I do as asked and a few minutes later I see an East Side cop drive by (double Grrrrrr) and then the West Side cop comes to where I am and gives me his name.

Said he had no ID and wanted no trouble, the Cop asked if he had a bike incident at the park, and the guy said no, and then asked in reference to me since he saw us talking, “Is that the guy” and the cop asked, “What guy”, he replies “The guy from the park”, the cop then said I thought you didn’t have any issues? And then he admitted that he almost ran into us since it was so dark. So he just confirmed everything. The West Side cop then said to be careful, that it sounds like he is pushing peoples buttons for no reason and that the next time it happens bad things could happen, and he says he doesn’t want to hurt anyone and it was an accident and wont happen again.

So we shall see. I called the East Side cops and gave the information of both the guy and the West Side cop, so everything is in order on my end. I truly hope this is the end of it. I am not really a violent person, but I am ½ Irish and ½ German which is a mean combination and I have been in many scraps when I was a wee lad and I will do whatever it takes to protect my wife.

I do feel somewhat bad that it has had to go this far, but what else can I do? I have to protect my wife and myself from harm and legal issues. I am also buying her some MACE today so she can have it with her when she rides to be more protected.

Only to me…

For no real reason other then to get out of the house we decided to go to a New York style pizzeria near us since we have never been there before. We go in, look at a menu and ordered at 6:14PM and grab our drinks and sit down and talk. At 6:45PM Pauline asks where our pizza is and since it’s taken so long, we need it made it to go now. At 7:10PM we see a group of people who came in at least 30 minutes after us eating a pizza, so I asked for a refund, which caused a conference of the minds of the 3 workers as they tried to figure out what went wrong.

So I had to call one over again and repeat my refund request, he then wanted to make things right which I understand and was cool with, but I had waited an hour for no reason and to make it worse Pauline had asked 30 mins later what was up, so they had 2 chances to get this right and failed both times, so we got a refund and refused their free pizza voucher.

Now what is so crappy about this is, I was not hungry and I am still not hungry. It was more of a “let’s try this” and to get out of the house more then going out due to hunger, so we just wasted an hour for no reason and now I get to cook dinner.