Thought I'd do a quick post since I won't have a chance to post tomorrow night before I leave. For those that don't know, I'm going out of town for 6 days. I'm driving, yes driving, up to Minnesota for my 2nd cousin's wedding. I haven't seen my aunt, uncle and cousins for about three years, since the last wedding, so it will be nice seeing them again. I'm leaving early Thursday morning, hopefully about 8 or 9 am, which will put me at my aunt's house mid-late afternoon. I will be returning probably late Tuesday evening.

Since it's supposed to be warm all week and weekend, I'm taking mostly shorts to wear. I'm also taking some snacks and stuff to eat inbetween meals. I learned three years ago that my aunt doesn't fix a lot of food for meals. So I was hungry all the time while I was there. I am taking some granola bars, some dried fruit, and some fig newtons.

On Friday (I think) I am going to a place called The Raptor Center. It's associated with the University of Minnesota, and they have all different kinds of raptors and birds prey there, mostly for rehab. I was told to bring my camera, unfortunately I still use the old film kind lol. If I go, once I get the film developed, I'll try to scan them so you can see what I saw. The reason I'm not sure if I'll go, is because I just read on the lady's blog that I'm planning to see there, that she is thinking about making a 5 hour drive north Friday to Saturday to see some bird that's rare in Minnesota. So maybe sometime on Thursday I'll call her to see if she's going up north or maybe it's after I stop in to see her Friday morning. Sorry, just kind of rambling here, lol.

This will probably be the last time I will actually stay at my aunt and uncle's house. My uncle has alzheimers and it's getting slowly worse. I was very clear with my aunt, I didn't want to be a bother or burden to them, that I was more than happy to stay at the hotel. She told me she thought it would be ok for me to stay there, and she did sound like she was looking forward to it last night on the phone.

For those that I won't talk to again before Thursday, have a great weekend, and talk to you when I get back!

Final comment about this asshole at work, I think when I go into work tomorrow, he should be moved to another cubicle. The phone guy was there this afternoon and switched his phone extension over, so he'll have to be moved tomorrow so he can get his phone calls. I actually think he'll be in a good spot. He's closer to the boss (who can keep an eye on him and his antics), he can annoy Cathy and not me (lmao), and he's closer to Mary, who talks on the phone to her kids almost every day and you just wouldn't believe some of the stuff we hear!

On to bigger and better topics! Every Tuesday, I try to go to Target and pick up any new cd's that have been released, since that's the day the new ones come out. This week, my plan was to pick up four cd's: Billy Ray Cyrus' new cd, Los Lonely Boys' new cd, Eric Church's cd, and Rodney Atkins' new cd. I found the Billy Ray cd, I found the Los Lonely cd, I even found the Eric Church cd, but no Rodney Atkins cd. There were two places for it, both places were empty. So I figured I'd run to a different Target by where I work on Wednesday to see if they had any. They didn't even have a place for the cd! Like they weren't even expecting it! This is the first time I've not been able to buy a cd when it's released. And this isn't even a big name, like Tim McGraw, or Kenny Chesney, or Toby Keith. This is Rodney Atkins, this is maybe his third cd total? So I figure...I still have to go try to buy another present or two for my Aunt's birthday celebration on Saturday, I'm going to Borders, which is right by ANOTHER Target, I'll stop in there Thursday after work, and see if THEY have one. Nope. Strike Three. Then at Borders I couldn't find the dvd I was looking for, nor did they have another cd I was looking to see if it was even a real cd.

Saturday before heading out to my Aunt's for the movie and lunch and presents, I'll run over to the first Target I went to. If they still don't have any copies, I'll get a raincheck and hopefully soon they'll get more in and I can still get it at the sale price of $9.99. Oh and Borders had two copies of it, but they were $13.99, and I won't pay that much for a cd unless it's Def Leppard or Pella! lmao So as I'm writing this I'm ripping the three cd's I did buy, and they are being added to the ever growing stack of music to send to Kerry. One of these days, I'm just going to send them by email and she'll get a surprise in the morning before work, lmao.

With so many thoughtful and kind comments and support from my friends, I have managed to look beyond my faults and see the good things I offer the world. You'll never know how much your love and support means to me, during this past emotional day.

I may not be posting in my blog for a long long time. I found out today that I have SO many faults that there are too many to list. So all my free waking hours will be spent working on them, leaving no time to blog about my boring life. And of course, working on all my faults will mean my life won't be quite so boring, and I might have something to blog about. What a dilemma!

I'm going to try to blog tonight, before I fall asleep. I got busy with an unexpected, but interesting, conversation on msn, and so now it's almost 2 hours later than I wanted to do this, lol.

Where to start....

BATS!

My bats are back! Boy are they back! Jeepers creepers, are they back! I have more bat droppings outside my sliding door than I think I've ever seen at one time. There just may be more of them there now than ever before. I'm still glad they're there, just not so sure about the possible numbers of them, lol. With the air conditioner going, I haven't had a chance to listen for them. I was thinking about shutting my a/c off tomorrow since the high will only by 83F, but then it's climbing right back up into the 90's, so I think I'll just keep it on. Lucky me. I would really rather have it off. Saves me money when I don't run the a/c.

It's getting closer and closer to my vacation days! Wooooo hooooo! I'm heading up to the twin cities (MN) on July 27, returning sometime on Aug 1. I'm looking forward to taking these few days away from work and everything. The traffic here has been running me ragged (I was gonna say bats, but I wondered if you'd think it was the bats instead.) Not only do I have to deal with all the commuting traffic 5 days a week, but I got an extra dose of bumper-to-bumper traffic Sunday night. I was visiting a friend for her daughter's 5th birthday party...bbq, pinata, presents, cake & ice cream, the whole bit. By the time I left there it was after 8:15pm, and the trip which should have taken me about an hour 15 minutes, took an hour 45. I was not happy walking in the door at 10pm, with laundry still to do, plus being all wired up from the traffic. The particular tollway I was on has THREE toll booths under construction AT THE SAME TIME. I was only going through two of them, but the first one I went through, had an 8 mile backup. Yes, you read that correctly, 8 mile backup (almost 13 km). Two lanes, no exits, nowhere to go, just me and all the other cars crawling. This is one of the major tollways people use coming from Wisconsin, so I'm sure there were some weekend travellers trying to get home. And poor me, just sitting there, complaining to my aunt on the phone that I deal with this 5 days a week, I don't want it on the weekend too. Turns out, there were only 4 lanes to pay the toll, one for I-PASS users (transponder and automatic deduction of toll from your acct), and three manual lanes. Well, our I-PASS lane was posted to be a 5 mph lanes, that's the suggested speed to go through it. We had to slow down so much for that, plus for all the people paying manual tolls, that we were backed up for what seemed forever.

Then to top it all off, the toll has been doubled at this particular booth. They are re-configuring the toll booths in each direction, so once it's done, the westbound side pays two tolls instead of the original three, and the eastbound pays two instead of the original three, with one in each direction doubling in cost. This is supposedly to help keep traffic moving. Yeah, I'll believe it when I see it. Same opinion I have about all the other work on every other tollway in the area. I have yet to see an improvement from any of the toll booths they've redone. I'm expecting my commute will never drop below an hour, even once everything is done and construction is done in 6 years. OMG, in 6 years, I hope to be the hell out of here, someplace where they don't DO road construction! Does such a place exist? Either that, or I'll have grown wings so I can just fly to work and not worry about traffic.

On July 13, 1932 Clifford and Alma welcomed a baby girl they would name Elaine Carole. She was born at St. Luke's Methodist Hospital in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the very same hospital she would deliver a girl of her own some 37 years later. She got married in Las Vegas in 1964. The man that would be her husband was rumored to have been her boss. She was a typical housewife, always there when her two girls returned home from school or a day at the pool. She never got to see the oldest get married, or have three girls of her own. She would have been a wonderful grandmother!

Happy Birthday, Mommy!

So I finally have something worthy of blogging about!

This past weekend, a co-worker (Annette) got married. Congratulations to her. She's nice enough, but she isn't very dedicated to her job. She doesn't really do much, she doesn't even handle that many accounts, and some outside salesmen don't even want her handling any of their accounts. So she was off on Thursday and Friday right before her wedding, and I believe the wedding was on Saturday.

She was due back to work on Wednesday with the rest of us, only she didn't show up. Now, our boss took that day off, so she could have left a message on his voice mail, and we wouldn't know it. When I arrive at work today, my boss is already there, a couple other people in my department are there, but no Annette. When someone calls in sick, or will be late, or out for whatever reason, we have a big dry erase board so other people in the office know who will not be in that day. There was nothing posted about Annette not being in today.

About 9am, I was walking past the fax machine that sits behind my cubicle. I saw some faxes on it, so I pulled them off and started looking through them to distribute accordingly. The first few were for one person, and the last two were for my boss. One was a typed letter from Annette, stating that she is officially resigning from her position at the company effective yesterday July 5. Who would FAX in their resignation? No phone call, nothing in person, just the fax. And she knew she was doing it; She took all her personal stuff home with her last Wednesday. Either none of us realized it, or we refused to acknowledge the possibility of her quitting. We all knew it was coming eventually, she's going back to school, after all. I guess she's going to be a Napra Path, but to quit over the fax?

I show it to one person, to see if she knew anything about it, she didnt. Then I quietly put it in my boss's in tray. About 9:30 or so I see him get up and go talk to his boss. I, of course, know what they're talking about. Then we all get an email, stating they'd like to have a short meeting about 10:30. I know what this meeting is about too. At 10:30, we all assemble in one of the conference rooms, and it is revealed to the rest of the department that Annette has chosen to burn her bridges and her friendships, and resign with no notice or instructions to anyone regarding her accounts.

My boss then proceeds to begin discussing the few accounts she handles, comparative to the rest of us, and offers his suggestions as to who would be able to handle some extra work. The two obvious people are myself and Mike, who sits next to me. We are the lucky ones. Everyone else gets to go back to work, Mike and I are kept to go over which accounts we'd get, and what mill's we buy from for those accounts. Like I mentioned, Annette didn't do much, so the accounts that Mike and I got aren't HUGE, but it will be extra work. Coincidentally, just this morning, Mike mentioned to me how slow he is right now. Perfect timing!

I will be handling two service centers/processors that are owned by the same parent company as us. They are like a sister company to us. They have several locations in the U.S., I will be handling the one in Alabama, plus one specific end user that is supplied by both the Alabama location and the Illinois location. Not a lot of work, but enough to make me busier than I have been. And I don't mind the extra work. Unfortunately, I would have liked to have gotten the opportunity to get caught up on my filing that's been piling up since last year. I've gotten some done, but there is still a lot left to be done, and as I file more, I pile up more, lol. So really, I'm not getting anywhere at all with it!

At 11:30, my boss and I went over to Annette's desk and started going through everything to sort through what is now mine, and what is now Mike's. I walked back to my desk with a stack of orders, faxes, invoices, product certifications, etc. Where to put it? Not on my desk! No room, lol. Onto the empty desk it went, the one Linda used to sit at. Once I could get a little more caught up on my own stuff, THEN I'd look at it. But it had to be today. If there was stuff in there from June, today was the last day to do it.

Finally about 2pm, I started going through it. I found some duplicate faxes, pitched all but one, sent the answer back to the mill. I also had to send them some shipping notices that we never got invoices for, dated 6/1. Who would wait a freaking month for invoices? We normally get them within a week! Got that all sorted out. I filed some stuff in my drawers that I don't really need to do anything with. I also put away some recent status reports that have been sent to the customer. That's one of the services we provide...once a week we print out status reports from the mill and send them to our customers so they know what's on order, what stage it's at, when it will be due, etc.

Glad tomorrow is Friday, it should be interesting!

Sorry, just not feeling very inspired lately. If something compels me to write about it, I'll let ya'll know.

Nothing new to post tonight. Worked all day, came home, talked with Kerry a little bit, finished a book I started the night before, did a couple loads of laundry, and went to bed. My life has hit the summer doldrums where I don't do much and the few things I do aren't very interesting.

I'm sitting here pondering what to type. I must be having a Kerry moment, lol. Not much went on today. Work was slow, but I did have enough to do to keep me busy for most of the day. I stopped at Target on the way home. I made a list last night so I wouldn't forget what I needed. I got everything on the list, but there was one thing I forgot to put ON the list. The envelope so I can mail the book to Kerry!! Grrrrrr. Now I'll have to start my list for next week already. No cd's that looked interesting, but that's a good thing because Kerry and I haven't been online long enough at the same time having enough time to send her the five cd's I have sitting behind me, lol.

We had a sporadic rain shower this afternoon, not sure if we're still going to get any rain tonight. The birds sure are singing up a storm though. Supposed to be really nice for the next week or so, will enjoy it before Mother Nature turns the thermostat up.

Well, an hour in the car didn't help. Watching the rain-shortened NASCAR race from yesterday didn't help. Reading emails didn't help. So, since I didn't sleep so well last night, I'm going to try to get to bed early, or should I say earlier, tonight. lol Making what will hopefully be a quick list of things I need from Target tomorrow, which shouldn't include any cd's.

Dang, it's Monday already. I'm posting part of this from work, will post the rest at home, if I can remember everything I wanted to say when I thought about it this morning.

I didn't sleep well last night, went to bed at 11pm, tossed and turned for an hour, got up and moved to the couch. I slept there till about 4:45, when I got up and went back to bed until the alarm went off at 5, lol. I hit off, and went back to sleep until the second alarm went off at 5:30, then hit snooze every 9 minutes until just after 6am. Then I got up and dragged my butt into the bathroom. I woke up quite quickly, when I pulled the bath mat off the tub to lay on the floor and this HUGE spider fell out from it. I screamed, then composed myself enough to walk to the kitchen, grab the fly swatter (also good at spider swatting) and the raid (just in case). I went back to the bathroom, entered carefully making sure of where the spider was, and smacked the hell out of it, lol. Boy was I awake by then!

Well, now I have an hour to try to remember what else I wanted to say. LOL

Pretty boring day today, not very busy at work, so I started some filing. I'm watching an episode of Supernatural that I missed earlier in the season, it's about the legend of Bloody Mary. Can't say I ever tried that one as a kid, lol.

I've kind of gotten back into a reading kick. I finished a book last night that I had started Tuesday night. And tonight, I'll probably start another one, and finish it Saturday sometime. I have a birthday party to go to on Saturday afternoon for two of my friend's kids. It starts at about 3, but shouldn't last too long. The Weather Channel says we could get some rain on Saturday, hope it doesn't rain during the party.

Got the four cd's I had sitting here ripped, so they're in MM and available to be played on a stream. Well, Supernatural is almost over, so I'm going to pick out a book to start once it's finished.

June 14, 1777, the date The Stars And Stripes was adopted as our national flag. 108 years later, a teacher in Wisconsin suggested his students celebrate the "Flag Birthday" or "Flag Day." In 1894, The American Flag Day Association, located in Illinois, held a children's public school celebration of Flag Day, with 300,000 children present. In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson proclaimed June 14 as Flag Day, and in 1949, President Harry S. Truman made it official with an Act of Congress, designating June 14 as National Flag Day. Americans are requested to pause at 7pm EDT on June 14 to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

Ragged Old Flag by Johnny Cash

I walked through a county courthouse square,

On a park bench an old man was sitting there.

I said, "Your old courthouse is kinda run down."

He said, "Naw, it'll do for our little town."

I said, "Your old flagpole has leaned a little bit,

And that's a Ragged Old Flag you got hanging on it."

He said, "Have a seat," and I sat down."

Is this the first time you've been to our little town?"

I said, "I think it is." He said, "I don't like to brag,

But we're kinda proud of that Ragged Old Flag.

"You see, we got a little hole in that flag there

When Washington took it across the Delaware.

And it got powder-burned the night Francis Scott Key

Sat watching it writing Say Can You See.

And it got a bad rip in New Orleans

With Packingham and Jackson tuggin' at its seams.

"And it almost fell at the Alamo

Beside the Texas flag, but she waved on though.

She got cut with a sword at Chancellorsville

And she got cut again at Shiloh Hill.

There was Robert E. Lee, Beauregard, and Bragg,

And the south wind blew hard on that Ragged Old Flag.

"On Flanders Field in World War I

She got a big hole from a Bertha gun.

She turned blood red in World War II.

She hung limp and low by the time it was through.

She was in Korea and Vietnam.

She went where she was sent by her Uncle Sam.

"She waved from our ships upon the briny foam,

And now they've about quit waving her back here at home.

In her own good land here she's been abused --

She's been burned, dishonored, denied, and refused.

"And the government for which she stands

Is scandalized throughout the land.

And she's getting threadbare and wearing thin,

But she's in good shape for the shape she's in.

'Cause she's been through the fire before

And I believe she can take a whole lot more.

"So we raise her up every morning, take her down every night.

We don't let her touch the ground and we fold her up right.

On second thought, I do like to brag,

'Cause I'm mighty proud of the Ragged Old Flag."

I'm posting early tonight, since Kerry's in bed already, maybe I'll go read or something after this. Beautiful day today, too bad I was cooped up inside at work. Tomorrow we have a chance of some storms, not sure whether we'll actually get any rain or not.

Not too busy at work today, I had enough to keep me busy for most of the day. We had some email problems this morning. We could send emails out, but anything coming in from outside our office wasn't coming through. It finally started working around lunchtime. I have some shipping documents that I have emailed to me, so I held off on some of my invoicing, waiting to see if they came through. Of course, as soon as I gave in and finished it, they came through. I'll invoice them tomorrow, so no real problems. I also completed my monthly inventory reconciliation. It went MUCH smoother this month, only took me parts of two days to do it, as opposed to several days last month. We usually get them around the 10th of the month, and they're due on the 15th, so I finished mine with plenty of time to spare.

I stopped at Target on the way home, as I mentioned last night in my post. The cd's I ended up getting are The Goo Goo Dolls, Dizzy Up The Girl (older cd from a few years ago, it has Iris & Slide on it); Blaine Larson, Rockin' You Tonight (new cd); Three Days Grace, One X. I remembered most of the things I wanted to get while I was at Target, but one thing I did forget, the envelope to mail Kerry the Bill & Susan Hayes book. Guess that will have to wait till next week, if I don't forget again, lol. Oh, and I did see one copy of Oakdale Confidential at Target, it was only $13.86! I didn't buy it, because it would mean nothing to me since I don't watch ATWT.

Tomorrow (Wednesday) is Flag Day in the U.S., don't forget to show your patriotism and fly the flag, or if you can't do that, wear a flag pin. I, of course, was off one day with my outfit, and today I wore navy slacks with a light blue top that has U.S. flags, and stars, and fireworks all over it. I didn't even think about tomorrow being Flag Day and that I should have worn this tomorrow, lol. So, I'll wear my little flag pin tomorrow instead.

Short post tonight, I HAVE to get to bed. I could have fallen asleep on the couch about 7:30 tonight, and almost did. I watched Sunday's race that I taped, almost didn't make it through the whole thing, but with the aid of the fast-forward button, it was completed. Besides, I already knew who won, I accidentally heard on the radio this morning.

Work was busy today, had a few minor problems to deal with, but nothing too bad. I stopped on the way home from work to get my oil changed, and thought "Chinese sounds good tonight, and it's just across the street." Forgot they're closed on Monday. So much for that idea.

Tomorrow night I will be stopping at Target for my weekly cd purchase, there are two cd's to get this week, although I can't remember at the moment which ones, lol. And I'm sure there are a couple other things I need to pick up, which I'll have to try to remember tomorrow. Off to bed I go!

It's Sunday night, the weekend is almost over. Another quiet weekend here. I was supposed to be out of town, but the schedule got changed due to the person I was going to be staying with having a sister that messed it all up. Now I haven't been able to reschedule, because none of the weekends through the end of July work for everyone.

I still have two cd's to send to Kerry, we haven't been able to hook up online this weekend at the right time to do the transfers. Tomorrow night Kerry has class, so maybe Tuesday night we can do it. Plus I have a book to send to Kerry, I have to remember to buy an envelope for it on Tuesday night, then I can go mail it.

As for the book I was reading, it was an Amanda Quick book, the pseudonym for Jayne Ann Krentz. I don't remember the title of the book, but it was a romance novel set in the early 1800's. Woman is intrigued with man, man decides to marry woman, woman gets into trouble, man rescues woman, man and woman profess their undying love for each other, the end. I started reading it Wednesday night after Kerry went to bed, got through just less than half the book. Thursday night I decided I wanted to finish it since I was enjoying the storyline. So I came home, and while I was eating dinner, I started reading, and was done about 10pm. I'm not sure what book I will read next, but I can almost guarantee you it will be another romance novel, lol.

Was too involved reading a book last night to post. Today I was in a strange mood, didn't want to be at work, didn't feel motivated, and when I got home, I had no desire to get on the computer. So I finished the book I started last night. Once that was complete, I figured I'd better come and get my emails, and do my nightly blog rundowns before heading to bed. About all I can say right now is, Thank God Tomorrow Is Friday!

Today seemed to wizz right by. Despite not having a lot to do, I sure kept busy. Before I knew it, it was lunchtime, then all of a sudden it was 4pm, and time to go home. I did my invoicing for the day, and worked on a couple spreadsheets that were requested. And that's about it. I wonder what tomorrow has in store for me?

Tonight I helped Kerry polish up her case study for her marketing class. She had the rough draft all done, with all the information, I just helped her put the information in easier to read and understand sentences. She gets all the credit for working so hard on it. Reading through it initially, it was very well thought out, she had great ideas and ways to implement those ideas. And knowing her teacher already thought she had done a good job on it, even at the rough draft stage, really helped boost her confidence. Add to that the 86% she got on her mid-term, and I would say Kerry is flying high, lol. Congratulations, Kerry! I've always said you are smarter than you give yourself credit for!

Well, time to go take the laundry that has been sitting in the washing machine for 4 hours (/eye kerry), hang it up to dry, and go to bed. I have to try to leave by 6:45 tomorrow, because it's now taking me 1 hour and 15 minutes or so to get to work if I leave at 7. So if I leave 15 minutes earlier, I should be able to get there by 8.

I used to be hooked on The Animal Planet channel. Some of my favorite shows were The Crocodile Hunter and Animal Precinct. Animal Precinct was interesting since it was a show about Animal Control officers in New York rescuing animals. But they didn't have new episodes very often, so I stopped watching it for awhile. Then Animal Planet came out with another show, Animal Cops. I started watching that show too, enjoying seeing the different officers rescuing needy animals. But then that show started showing a lot of repeats, so I stopped watching that too. Soon after, another Animal Cops show came out that took place in Houston. Then Animal Police: Miami, Animal Cops: San Francisco, and the latest is Animal Planet Heroes: Phoenix. Some are better than others, but being busy doing other things most nights, I never really went back much to try to catch any of these shows.

With Kerry in school tonight, I was channel surfing, and happened upon Animal Planet, and Monday seems to be the night when they show a bunch of these. Tonight was Animal Precinct, Animal Police: Miami , then Animal Planet Heroes: Phoenix (which I've never seen.) First on Animal Precinct was a lady who had 77 dogs & puppies. Yes, that's two sevens, 77. They allowed her to keep 4 of them, they took the other 73. What really got me was a story about a dog that had a rubber band put around it's muzzle to keep it from barking. OMG, I actually had tears in my eyes as they were explaining the damage done. Fortunately, they fixed him up and he was given back to his owner. It wasn't her that had put the rubber band around his muzzle, it was her boyfriend, whom she had kicked out by the time they rescued the dog. But why she didn't just take the rubber band off, I'll never understand.

Then on Animal Police: Miami there was a lady and her mother, and they had over 60 cats in their house. But not just any house. This house was filthy! It was stacked 4 feet high with papers and boxes and cat piss, and STUFF! Before they could even begin to find the cats, they had to have the house cleaned out. They had a whole group of people come out with masks and gloves, and they just started bagging stuff up and carting it outside into a huge dumpster. Eventually, the cats had no place to hide, and they were able to round them all up. They left two of them to the two ladies. Some of the cats were too feral and had to be put down. The rest were treated for some minor ailments and I were all adopted out.

Definitely a happy ending for all three stories, but it made for an interesting night.

Oh, and an update on the bats. I have not seen them back again since that first sighting, so I don't know where they went or when they'll be back, if they come back.