Cold, cold, go away

ARGH! I hate this. So I've just gotten my end of the deal from the family cold. Haven't had one for a while, but that's what I get for kissing my husband only he got more than just a cold. He also was sick to his stomach in addition to the freezing and coughing so at least I feel lucky in that sense without the porcelain king by my side. Nothing's more miserable cause you are still functionable, yet you feel like crap. It's all in the sinuses which makes it hard to think, hard to hear, and hard to see. My eyeballs even hurt. I guess I just need to buy some cold meds and walk around like a zombie, not that I already do.

Day 3 in the New Office

Today we had an evacuation drill. Very organized, very calm. I'm thinking, "Wow! This place has got their act together!" Well being that my old office would holler out over the intercom, "Code Yellow" but no one knew what it meant kind of makes a person leery. Well come to find out the next day there was a real and actual bomb threat that no one on my side of the building new about, so someone, or a couple of people actually, weren't doing their job. So yeah, this is progress. Sure, we aren't allowed to ask for Kleenex tissue as part of the office supplies, but the fact that people actually mark a roll to make sure you are there at the evacuation point makes better sense. Besides, too many "Milton's" over used their share of tissue back at the regional center anyway. On an ever brighter note, turns out there is a beautiful day outside and I am now stuck in here until 4:00 smelling leftover bagels.

Hmmm...makes you think...

"Employees especially respond to praise that comes from a boss or supervisor. Sometimes just a knowing look, smile or thank you is enough to give employees the message that they are recognized and therefore valued."

This is a quote from my friend's newsletter that she publishes for the regional agency I just finished working for. For me and the time I've worked on my team from day one to last week, nothing was ever said to mean anything more than a simple "Thank you" from my boss. Now that is enough for me, I was happy to have that. I'm not one of these girls that needs to have attention by acting like a fool to get it.

This is so hard today...

Today, right now actually, there is such an emptiness inside. This is so hard. To feel as if you are part of a new family that is. I guess while working for the regional side of things I really took for granted the closenesss that came from that. Here it feels like there isn't that type of bonding. I especially miss my friend, Lisa. I miss her a lot and it's sad to know that I finally found a really good friend that I coudl have spent a lot of good times with who actually had so much in common with being a full time working mom that we have to be separated now. I haven't had anyone around to be friends with like that since I started this job except for Julie, but she and I didn't work as close together as Lisa and I do. I miss our dark office. I miss the view. I miss the feeling of knowing just about every answer to anyone's questions. Now I don't get asked questions. I'm not needed like I was before. Is this impersonal sensation I am getting because I now work for managing the whole state rather than a region with too much to take care of instead of the ability to take care of each other? Don't get me wrong, everyone in this office has been so nice to me, but it just feels so impersonal here right now. I know it's cause I'm new here and it takes time to adjust to new environments and I'll get through it all eventually. I will and I'll be better. It's just hard to do at the same time I am missing my good friend.

OMG!

Okay, so I did have one occurance of something on my first day here at the Admin North building. I am sick of this drama, do I have to go through this type of thing again and again? Sure why not!! What kind of a woman would wear a mini skirt, knee high boots, and sit open legged leaning on the desk where at eye level in front of a coworker who is sitting in his chair? And if you were a woman who did that sort of thing at work, wouldn't you be embarrassed for you and the guy if someone had unexpectedly showed up to the scene who was new and being shown around getting introduced to people on their first day? I mean, hello, it's so obvious what you are doing!!!! DUH! After all what are these people thinking? This is work! Not a freakin' bar where you pick up on men! It's obvious that men get googly over this and can't control themselves, so women, KNOCK IT OFF! You are a disgrace to those that actually socialize romantic relationships outside of work where you are supposed to!

First Day

Well my first day here at Admin North was slow but good. I and no one else will really know what I'll be doing for a while as things get filtered through the system, but I am glad to have a computer finally. I guess they thought I would just be able to hook up and go, but when the IT guys found out where my computer was from they wanted to wipe the slate clean on that puppy! Everyone was really nice and introduced me to themselves and have shown me around and all. Now all I need to do is just wait for the work to pour in, which it will. Eventually.

Talking about Dad's Chili Verde

And the verdict is....4 STARS! The verde turned out great! I think I did a good job and the men would agree. Spicy and full of flavor but not so spicy that you can't taste anything. I think I especially like the flavor of the egg mixed in with everything. If you're not one that likes to mix your food, well you'll have a hard time with this. I just eat the verde and potatoes burrito style in the tortilla and dipped it in my egg yoke. The house still smells of green chilies but it's the good kind of smell. I think I'll have to make this more often, even if they aren't dad's chilies.

Hmmm...what to wear for Halloween?

Obviously Savannah is a petite thing. Petite enough that she still fits in her costume from Halloween last year. Of the busy bee costume for 3-6 mos sized babies, drowned her last year but I think they manufactures make them big on purpose so that you can put their coats on underneath so if we really wanted to we could use it again. We put it on her the other night and it's just fun to see her reaction. She still hates it even more than before now that she can express herself better. (If you can't tell by the expression on her face!) But the funniest thing of all is that the pic of when she's older makes her look like she has an afro hairdo. LOL.

For this year, we don't know what she'll be. It's a toss up between an angel and a witch. Depending on what her disposition is for the week when we go shopping I guess. Last year picked the "Busy Bee" cause it was just after she started crawling and she was into everything. This year the holidays will be a lot of fun now that she's a little older. Unfortunately we'll all have to share the candy cause if we let her get to it she'd eat it right through the wrapper!

Some funny stories about Jake

I have been meaning to write about Jacob for a while now. I don't think he's had his own category yet just cause nothing major has been going on with him for me to talk about. So I wanted to tell a few funny stories about him that he will never live down. We just call them "blonde" moments. Enjoy.

Jake's embarrassing story #1:
When going to the grocery store one day, I had purchased some meat from the butcher. Even in this day and age they do still wrap some of the meat in butcher paper, you know, the white thick paper? It was a pot roast about the size of a 5 lb bag of flour. I like to have pot roasts every so often and this one was on sale so I was planning to keep it in the freezer for whenever I had time to do a big dinner. From day one my boys have always helped with putting the groceries away so I usually don't inspect what they are doing until after it's done. I make sure things are usually in the right place, but this time I really didn't bother to check and was in a hurry to do something else. About two weeks had passed by when something coming from my cupboard smelled like a dead mouse. I had the boys check to see if their hamsters were in their cages and that they were both still breathing and alive. I looked under the sink to see if there was anything theree. I just couldn't find where that smell was coming from. I told my husband about it, that maybe he could take a better look and at that time it was getting to the point where we could really pinpoint where the smell was coming from. It wasn't in the cupboards on the floor so I thought to myself, "This must be a really tricky mouse to get up so high and got stuck so that's why it died." I cursed at the cats for not doing their job and was disgusted they could allow us to have mice. So as we opened the cupboards the smell just poured out from what looked like a bag of flour. Jake had put the roast in the cupboard not looking at the package at all.

Jake's embarrassing story #2:
We went to Lotus Garden to try their Chinese buffet for dinner since we were right in the neighborhood. It wasn't our usual spot we go to but we thought to try it anyway. They have a Mongolian barbecue with the meat, noodles, and veggies displayed in front of the grill. I don't know if he had chosen the meat and veggies he wanted and had them cooked or if he smiply wandered over there thinking it was part of the regular buffet. When he returned to the table, the Asian waitress looked at his plate and laughed and said, "You cook noodle!" really fast in a hard accent. None of us could understand what she was saying and we hadn't noticed Jake's plate yet, so we kept asking her to repeat what she said. She laughed and laughed and repeated herself until we finally understood. When we looked at Jake's plate, there they were, raw noodles from the Mongolian barbecue!

Jake's embarrassing moment #3
Before I got married, the kids and I would often go out with my parents for dinner. Different Chinese buffet, different city. All was well and we were done eating. The kids always go for the soft serve ice cream afterward and there are usually toppings available. I was sitting at our table visiting with my brother and as Jacob walked up to sit next to me with his bowl of ice cream, he sees the expression on my face and utters, "I know. I have too many sprinkles." I laughed out loud as hard as I could and said, "EW! You put bacon bits on your ice cream!" He was shocked. In one sense he didn't believe me and didn't want to admit it but in the other I knew he knew. We dared my brother to taste the ice cream with the bacon and he did! I wished I would have not said anything to see Jake's expression after his first bite!

Dad's Chili Verde

I'm finally going to try my hand at Dad's chili verde tomorrow for breakfast. Since mom brought so many chilies last week for our salsa, I can't let them go to waste. But it's sad to know they weren't planted with Dad's hard working hand so I think of it like this, they were still grown in his soil which still make them his. Dad would roast the chilies, peel and seed them, then he would make his verde sauce, add some pork and seasonings and serve with his famous fried potatoes and warm tortillas aside huevos. One of my best memories of spending time with my dad during the last decade is peeling the chilies with him. As I was roasting and peeling them tonight, the scent that brought warm feelings gave me a smile on my face letting me know that he was right there with me. I hope it turns out just like his. Just like the way I'll always remember.

Saying my Goodbyes...

"Fair Thee Well...."
So today is my last day of working in the regional center office. I have had such great friends at work here. I am going to miss them so much. We have had so many laughs together and memories that being separated from each other will be the hardest part of all of this consolidation of admin stuff. For me, it takes good time to develop a relationship with someone to actually consider that person a friend, in fact I don't go out of my way to make friends, if they happen, they happen. So to finally relate with a small group of friends individually or together is always something earned over time. Since I don't really have friends outside of work that live nearby who I don't really talk to very often so it's been so good to have them at work. They were one of the main reasons I got up in the morning to come here everyday. Where else can I go to talk with other women about the working mom stress, the funny things husbands do stuff, the emotional "TMI" stuff, the sharing of good recipes and baked goods from home, the housework tips, the funny kids stories, and the good advice from one working mom to another?

It's funny how we've been treating every day this week as if it's our last - going to lunch, eating chocolate, reminiscing, and bringing in treats for each other. I guess reality is really hitting so we're getting our friend fix now before we all go our separate ways. I wish them all the best of luck and plan to keep in touch with them as much as I can to see how they are doing and will be thinking of them through my next endeavor. Thank you ladies for being my good friends! I will miss you greatly, you are one in a million.

Yay! I'm so excited!

So my brother's been fixing up my car and we also had new tires and alignment for it done and can I just say I'm so excited! It runs like brand new! Yay! No veering to the left anymore, no grinding dust on my brake pads. Thanks to my brother, Marty. I am so appreciative to have brothers that are mechanics cause in this day and age you can't trust a greasy stranger to be honest with you about your car in order to make a buck or two.

"Working Mom-isms"

I guess in the interim of trying to find a temporary babysitter while mine is out on maternity leave and my moving to the Finance Office at work, I am in the midst of so many thoughts of "working mom-isms." I don't know if that is a real term, in fact I'm sure it's not, but I've come to add it to my dictionary for the week. Being a working mom, I'm sure those of you out there also tend to ask yourself if this work thing is all worth it for your family. Of course it is and it isn't. Is it worth it for you? Most of the time it's not but in a lot of ways, it is. I mean there's pride that comes with working outside of the home, but to be honest it's just more work. To tell you the truth if I were to quit today, all my extra time aside from taking care of Savannah would be invested in cleaning my house. So would I be quitting just to do housework? No, not really, I would have more time after school and at night for the rest of my family without worrying about putting the laundry away or getting the check book balanced. The only problem in fully quitting for me would be taking away my abilitiy for personal growth. I think working has really helped me to becoming a true individual. It has helped me find myself in so many ways that I couldn't get from anything else.
Earlier I was blogging about organization so I hit a few other places while surfing the net and came across a very true to the working mom's heart article. It's given me good insight to not expect so much to be done at home and make compromises where they can be made rather than get mad and feel like I do it all so that I can enjoy the time I do have at home. My husband tells these same things to me all the time, but I never want to listen. I just want my house organized at all times so I can feel at ease with life. What's wrong with that? I admit, I'm not as bad as I used to be, but there are many days where I feel frustrated to come home and still see a need to work. Don't get me wrong though, my boys are awesome at helping with their chores, if they are reminded. I just need to reprogram the way I think, cause I really don't have to do it all, but there are some days that it feels that way and my husband can vouch for that! See this article!

Here we go...

So I just heard that the office I'm going to move to next week has very poor morale due to some decisions and the fact that people are being slotted into other jobs and being asked to move out of their cubicles. I am very leery about all of this, more so than I was before. I guess I have to walk through those doors with my head high and remember to not take anything personal, none of this is my fault! So I gave myself a "Hard Working Mom of the Week" award since this is all taking a toll on me personally in addition to the babysitting dilemma. YIKES! Here we go on the low end of the rollercoaster, eh?

Brrr!

Brrr! It was a cold ride to work this morning, with the window down that is. I've been driving my dad's truck for the last week while my brother is working on the 30,000 mile service on my car. The truck is about 17 years old and it has electric windows and locks that have worn over time and sometimes they work and sometimes they don't. Well Friday afternoon it was freakin' hot and I was stuck in traffic for about an hour, so instead of running the air conditioning, which by the way works very well - go figure, I just rolled the window down a ways. Well this morning I saw that it was down and was hopeful it would go back up as sometimes there are no problems, but I was wrong. So here I am, state worker on her way to work, rolling down the highway at 65 miles per hour holding my hair in one hand and the steering wheel in the other and the heater is going but not really warming me up other than my feet. You'd think if it's going to be 80 degrees during the day, how could the morning be so cold? No better way to start a Monday morning at work...

Garlic fingers and a smelly house!

This weekend my husband and I canned salsa. Yeah! We did it! This is the first time for him for ever even seeing this kind of thing done and this is the first time for me for actually doing it without a friend or family member helping. So yeah, we're pretty proud of ourselves! Garlicky smelling fingertips and a spicy smelling house later we had canned 23 jars. If we wouldn't have ran out of a couple of rings, we would have had 25 jars, but that's okay. And my fingers still smell like garlic.

It's funny how the weekend worked out though. We were supposed to go to my sister's house for a BBQ on Saturday and she lives like two hours away so it would have been an all day event. Well she and I were supposed to can some tomatoes and possibly juice depending on how much tomoatoes I would have brought up from mom's garden, but turns out she had canceled Friday night, after I picked the tomatoes. So here Charlie and I are with a box full of tomatoes in the pantry that needed to be used within the next couple of days. Of course we wanted to take our shot at salsa, and since we had mom over for dinner on Sunday and she brought some green chilies with her and more tomoatoes so we could make use of them and take our hand at trying it. Funny thing is after all those tomatoes we had, I forgot to save one for our hamburgers this week! DANGIT. I guess I will have to stop at mom's for one measley tomato on my way home from work.

For dinner we had my yummilicious basil rub roasted chicken. I just love that stuff! The breasts are so flavorful and tender and the drippings make the best gravy too. Mmmm...I hadn't actually planned on mom being over for dinner until next weekend, but with the change of plans we made it a week earlier. It's funny how things end up working out, but it sure makes the weekend feel productive even if does fly by when there are too many things packed into it. Here's the recipe for the chicken:

Roast Chicken Sweet Basil Rub

5 lb or close to Whole Roasting Chicken
Stuffing (if desired)
1 Tablespoon Salt
1/2 Tablespoon Lemon Juice
2 teaspoons Sugar
1/2 teaspoon Black Pepper
1/4 teaspoon Garlic Powder
1 Tablespoon Basil
1/4 teaspoon Onion Powder
2 Tablespoons Olive Oil
1/4 teaspoon Paprika

Mix salt, sugar, garlic, onion, paprika, and lemon juice together. Next, add black pepper, basil and oil. Mix into a paste-like consistency. Rub mixture on breast and thigh area of stuffed whole chicken and cook 20 minutes per pound in a Reynold's roasting bag.

Organization a Must

It's funny how stuff comes about throughout the day makes you think about things. I was training a co-worker on some of the duties he'll be taking over when I leave to work for the Finance Office. As I was handing the information over to him he seemed to be overwhelmed with how organized I had kept things. He stated, "You are so organized. I need you to come and work on some of my stuff." I laughed and told him my husband had just said the same thing to me but not five minutes earlier. Coincidentally, he and my husband happen to be in the same type of job. Aside from the point that the industry of faciilities management expects too much paperwork to be done on top of keeping the building running and the staff happy with their offices, is that I came to the conclusion that organization skills and motherhood go hand in hand.

Being a mom is like a full time job. You have deadlines to meet, tasks to delegate, supervision of staff, budgeting and accounting duties, appointment making, and most of all you coordinate team building exercises like no one else. In some essences mothers have an advantage to being organized for these reasons. I mean don't get me wrong, organization skills take good practice, a little disciplining, and some OCD tendencies, but if a person isn't put in the situation to manage something like that they may not thrive on it the way we moms do. It's hard work to be organized and if you've been doing it as long as I have it tends to become second nature. I just hope that when I leave my coworkers, there are not strings untied and things aren't left "undone." I think the aim for my goal this week is to be able to look behind me and know things were taken care of leaving a good impression with the staff who are staying behind.

Can you believe this?

Have you ever heard of a cat who eats raw macaroni? So we got home late last night and didn't put all of the groceries away and wouldn't you know it but there was egg noodles all over. Yes, Kittens has gotten into the package of egg noodles and ripped it open to eat them. I'm telling you this cat eats everything and anything but to actually go out of her way to get to it is just retarded! I guess that's why she's so heavy and fat, not including all her fur. I wonder if there's such a thing as kitty counseling, I mean is she just eating cause she's bored and depressed or could she really be that hungry?










Here is the wanna-be Garfield caught eating raw macaroni a while back ago. Yes, this isn't the first time!

Can I just say...

that stress is not good on the face? I mean I've always had bad acne my whole life, , yes pizza face, but I've felt I've outgrown the hormonal breakouts that occured all day long every day and things were finally toning down for good. But no. Not these past two weeks. It's like being 14 all over again. And then I find that when I'm nervous I start to pick and touch my face even more which is not good for your complexion anyway. So I wonder, do I have acne at all or am I finding impurities and bumps in my skin picking them so much they look like zits that are being healed over? All I know is it really needs to stop and it won't until I am safe at my job again or I sit on my hands. I hates it! I hates the insecurities!

Oh, and my poor husband. He had to have an ingrown toenail removed yesterday. Oouch!! I wouldn't want that, but if I could, I would trade him since he is really suffering and has a job where he is on his feet all day and I don't. I guess those things can be a b*tch if you know what I mean and I think toes are more sensitive than you think with all those nerve endings and such. I feel bad for him and I hope by the time he reads this, he's feeling better.

Jen's got a point

So I was reading my sister's blog this morning and thought, "This is so true. And how do you tell someone other than a friend or family member that you gotta go?" Just the other day some people gathered around my cubicle as I was already standing up to leave to go potty and they all started a conversation. Luckily I could sit down to help relieve the pressure, but if I hadn't had that option I would have been in the same boat as Jennifer. I'll bet after you dart away like that, they must think you are psycho and then realize what you were doing when you come back a few minutes later so it wouldn't have been any different if you had made the announcement to them that you had to go anyway. She's right about the blogging too. This is such a good way to share with people about anything you want to and for them to read it on their time if they want to or not.

Quote from Bitterkat

September 13, 2005

sharing...oversharing, and blogging

My poor co-worker. She really needs her own blog. The lady loves to share. The nice thing about a blog is you can share away and if someone actually reads your blog and gets bored they can just quit reading. No one gets their feelings hurt. It's all about the sharing. It's not about the listening.

Take today:
I really had to go to the bathroom so I jumped up out of my chair and was immediately blocked by oversharing co-worker. She had this look on her face that I know really well. It's the look that says "I am so excited and I have to share...I just have to."

So I stopped but kind of started dancing around (gotta go!).

Coworker: "I made a marinade for my chicken that I'm bbq'ing tonight."

Me: "That's great!" then I tried to run past but could see that she wasn't ready to let me through.

Coworker: "It's got all this stuff in it. You'll love it. You have to hear..." and then she named the ingredients one by one counting with her fingers.

"Balsamic vineger""Italian dressing""Olive oil""[some other stuff]""Ketchup""Hot dog mustard""[some other stuff]""and a touch of lime!"

Her face glowed with excitement!

Then I jumped up and down and squealed, "Yay! That's interesting!" and then quickly ran away to the potty.

She's a sweet lady. But she really needs a blog. A place to share the random crap and stuff.

Coming soon: I share another random recipe from the 70's recipe book.

C is for cookie, that's good enough for me.

One of my favorite things in this world is chocolate chip cookies, that with a cold glass of milk. Mmmm, nothing better. So I'm told I make a good chocolate chip cookie. Well not to boast or brag, but I do like my chocolate chip cookies too. But what's not to like about them and any other cookie made by any other person? So sugary and chocolatey all warm and gooey fresh out of the oven?

I wanted to share with you my recipe which isn't a recipe at all, it's just my way of making the cookies and since people are always asking me how I get them to come out so well, I thought I would share what I do. The trick for me is to use butter flavored Crisco in stead of real butter or margarine. Real butter and margarine cook differently so I think that makes a big difference.
I had plenty of help from Jake and my husband eating the dough, Michael eating the fresh baked cookies, and as you can see from Savannah cleaning up. Usually the broom wins these fights since she is so little.

Tammy's chocolate chip cookies:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Using a regular chocolate chip recipe off the back of any baking product, I take the eggs, sugars, and butter flavored crisco and cream them together with a hand mixer until smooth.
Next mix in the salt, baking soda, and vanilla.

Finally I add the flour to this mixture. I don't add exactly what the recipe calls for, I just add 1/3 cup at a time until it looks like it's at the right consistency. Doing only a small amount at a time makes it easier to blend in. I use the hand mixer at first making sure flour is mixed in evenly after each time I add it. When it gets too thick for the mixer, I then switch to a wooden spoon and keep adding the flour 1/3 cup at a time until it is at a good form, sticky so that it sticks together, but not gooey on your fingers that you can't drop it onto the cookie sheet.
Then I mix in the bag of chips. Take a spoon and form the dough into dropfuls onto a silver air bake/aluminum cookie sheet. Not sure what they are called, but they work better than the dark pans.

Bake one cookie sheet at a time in the center of the oven for about 13 minutes or until there is browning starting to form on the cookie. I alternate between two cookie sheets so there is a batch in the oven the whole time. I let them cool about 5 mins while the other pan is cooking and then start all over until the dough is gone.

When they are cool enough, put in an air tight container or sealable sandwich baggies. This will help keep them soft.










The tops of the cookies should have a few spots starting to brown telling you they are ready!

Sesame Street has started having Cookie Monster advertise eating vegetables. When I was kid watching the show I never got the impression to pig out on a bunch of cookies from watching him do it. Or did I? Maybe that explains my love for these cookies? Hmmmm...we might have something here. Cookies are a sometimes food? Do these people think that parents allow their kids to eat cookies whenever they want? Maybe some parents do, but Sesame Street shouldn't feel liable for the kids eating habits just from watching the show. Check this post out...

It's a Sheba, Sheba, Sheba!

As my dad always used to call out to her. So we adopted Sheba from my sister-in-law this weekend. Turns out we happened to mention to mom we were in the market for a fence so if Kathy ever wanted to get rid of Sheba, we'd take her since it seems Kathy's has never been all that into her as a pet and we have known we wanted to get a dog sometime after getting our fence in. Because my mom lives with my brother and Kathy, no more than she mentioned my suggestion to her, Sheba became ours. I think the fact that the cops were called in about her barking the night before last from someone in my mom's neighborhood was the reason why we rushed our decision on taking her before the fence is in, but we figure might as well start bonding with her now. She's actually a really good dog. Now you know if it had been a Marmaduke dog there would have been no volunteering...so the fact that she's a patterdale terrier and a jack russell (little thing with hardly any fur, less than the cats even) made the decision to take her an easy one. Savannah and the boys really could use a dog and the dog could really use them. Kids and dogs go hand in hand, in fact they are running around together upstairs right now. It's not that Kathy didn't lover her, she just didn't pay the attention to her that she needed. But boy, she's a hyper little thing and I guess so is Savannah and Jacob and Charlie! So here's to a new era of doghood for our little family. I myself haven't owned a dog, EVER, unless you consider the German Shepherd named Belle mom and dad had when I was a kid and all the litters of puppies she had around her, but that was AGES ago! Luckily my husband's was raised around dogs so he'll know how to take good care of her when me and the boys can't figure it out. I feel so bad though, last night we took her harness off and it just snapped off like a rubberband. I don't think Kathy realized that maybe Sheba grew into it and should have had it loosened it a little for her, that and she always left her on the leash. So her fur and skin is so raw she is scratching it to death as it itches with healing, but she still seems to be a happy camper. Now the cats? Well, that's another story. Let's just say that they've disowned us and still haven't come out from under the box springs of Michael's bed in the basement bedroom. Not for food, not for water, nothing. It's been almost 24 hrs now and I wonder how much longer it will be before they'll get with reality and come out. LOL!










Jake and Savannah playing with Sheba in the back yard. (Note there is thick grass now!)











Jake loves his new pet!











That is one tired out dog! I don't think she had a nap all day and she sure is worn out!

Two more weeks...

And I'm off to work in my new office in the big city. Yep, they've given me a date now, the 26th. It's a week sooner than I expected so now my apprehensiveness has advanced 2/3 more than it was before I got the news yet at the same time I feel some change will be good. I think it's just hard to be the newbie all over again and working with the big wigs is...well...sort of intimidating. (Yikes....)

The drive will change a bit. Okay it will change a lot. I will be able to carpool with my husband since he only works about 7 miles away from the office I will be working. I don't know if that's a good thing or not cause they say that sometimes too much time spent together can harm your relationship. I'm sure I'll have my share of Bob & Tom and he will have his share of Radio from Hell since we both agreed we would take turns listening to each other's stations. I'm interested to see how our fuel bill changes after a month and that will definitely help our budget! (Don't even get me started on the gas prices!)

I'm such a GEEK!

Take some advice from me, if you are working around new people or will be, give them a chance to get to know you before you make jokes. Obviously my joking style is subtle and people don't always recognize it, so I should have known when to keep my mouth shut in front of my soon-to-be supervisor. Yesterday I was invited to the office where I will be transferred to for an accounts payable training for our the new imaging payment system. Well needless to say, I thought I made a funny in reference to something she was saying. Turns out she took it serious. We were talking about the process of approvals and she used the example speaking for herself, "I will approve this at this time and yada yada," so I say, "Wow. Sounds like you'll be a busy woman." (Meaning that she will be approving all of the accounts payables for the whole state, but knowing that she wasn't it was supposed to be a joke. I'm not that dumb!) Then she saids, "There will be more than one person approving transactions." Duh, I knew that all along! So it must have been the way I said it...ugh.

I'm such a blockhead. My soon-to-be new boss is actually very nice even though she is a very sharp woman, she does not come across as condescending as a lot of people who are smart do. She seems to have good managing skills and listens to your point of view, but then again I haven't really worked for her. I guess cause one of her staff suggested to me that she is and can be hilarious, that I thought she'd know I wasn't being serious. But like I said, takes people to get to know you.

So now I'm thinking maybe I will fit into this new accounting group I will be working with soon, dry humor and all. You know what they say birth control is for accountants? Their personality!

Refugees

So the governor is housing 300 New Orleans refugees right now at Camp Williams. They say that half of them want to relocate with other family members in other states and the other half want to stay here. I think they are all feeling overly welcome from the hospitality of ours and the other neighboring states trying to help comfort them. My only worry is that when all the newness of trying to get them back onto their feet is worn off, they might not be so happy to stay here. In the business I work for, we strive to get people out in the workforce, but I hope these people don't jump too fast for what is already a heavy populated area growing at a fast rate. I'm not a counselor helping them out, but for those that are they gotta wonder if they do stay in the state if they will end up back in their offices looking for jobs or training a year from now. And who will pay for their training for them while they are jobless? Will our Unemployment office pay their UI checks? I sure don't imagine that FEMA will pick up the bill after all is said and done. And do these southern people know about the type of community they are getting themselves into? I mean we're talking on the other spectrum of New Orleans style living. I bet some of them will cling to the change of scenery, dry valleys, and the secure feeling they have after all has happened, but as far as work I imagine a lot of them will be going to SLC since there really isn't much money or choice of jobs in Happy Valley. I suppose, if I were in their shoes, I guess anything right now is better than nothing. Good luck to them regardless of where they stay, they've been through hell.

We're Back!

Well we're back from Goblin Valley. $160 in gas later I was wishing I would have just listened to Charlie and bagged going no matter what my desire was, but what ya gonna do? The prices of gas shouldn't stop me from getting my family out into nature should it? When we got there it was pouring down rain. I was worried that it would be like that the whole time but in the back of my mind I knew it wouldn't. The next morning we awoke and yes, it started to get hot....we ate breakfast, had a messy diaper accident, and then went to the valley of the goblins. Stupid me, after I had my sister go to all the trouble of sending me her back pack carrier to lend to us so that we could pack Savannah around while we explored the rocks, I forgot the dang thing. I had kept it in the motor home from the trip we took a month ago at Palisades, but then Jacob had used it in between and I had forgot to make sure he put it back in. Duh! But all's well that ends well and I'm glad to be back at home. So's Savannah. She really is at the point where she doesn't travel well. We'll have to keep that in mind for any next year's plans. Now that I'm relaxing at home, I have more time to think about work. I've been very apprehensive thinking about all the changes I'm about to face. And because I'll be "alone" without my friends is why it's the scarriest for me. I have been in my job over 5 years on the same team in the same building with the same boss. So yeah, a little anxiety there. I need to just take it one day at a time. I used to be so good at telling that to myself after going through my divorce and quitting the drugs...I guess I kind of gotten out of the habit.

Have a good weekend!

Well it's a holiday weekend. Yay! When I randomly have suggestions of where our family needs to go from time to time, like camping or a day trip, my husband tells me, "Make the arrangements and we'll go." So for this weekend I made reservations to stay at Goblin Valley. As of right now I don't even know if we are going for sure. With the way gas prices are I'd rather spend the money on movies and pizza or something we can do at home. But then if we do that, it feels as if this summer will be a waste. What to do? We already have mom's RV waiting at home to pack and go, but it would be great to not go anywhere either.