won't bore you with the details

work has been crazy busy. we're getting ready for several events within a two week time period (some are overlapping).

one of those events is a sale at the kids store. i offered to make fabric banners for it, so that we have reusable ones for years to come. i am in the home stretch, and the good thing is they aren't needed for another week. yeah! being ready in advance! go me!

the thing is, sewing on those banners has made me itch to make something. perhaps a pillow. i've always adored making them and our house could use a little updating. also, was thinking i have some friends i've never made one for that should receive one.

i think i am going to have my friend, who is coming over shortly, look at my fabric stash. it's the stash that has gotten out of control before, but has since been reined in...and it's why my yarn stash stays small (i learned). perhaps i will do a little embroidery too? i just don't know. all i do know is that knitting makes me warm and i am itching to do something a little different (although i can now honestly see a cream colored stockinette stitch pillow with big wooden buttons...kill me).

so yeah, i think i'm going to pull out the fabric stash and dream.

tomorrow

The word has been sent out that we are going to plan on opening tomorrow. Even if it's late, but we're shooting for regular hours.

I am going to walk to Hawthorne and then if I need to, I will bus it from there downtown. I think everyone should be okay for getting in. All of them can catch a bus to work (even the ladies who work at the mall).

It's critical we open. This time of year is not the time of year we retailers want to be closed for many days.

I just hope tomorrow is a hair warmer. Even if it were in the 30's would be lovely.

business as usual

So we are opening the stores like normal. Well, perhaps a couple will open a bit late since public transportation is the way most of the employees are getting into work. I am fine with them running late due to that issue.

I, however, will be driving to the mall store today. I am scheduled to close that location. Not looking forward to the drive, but the highways are actually quite cleared. It's the side streets I may end up having a bit more trouble with.

Even though the sun is shining, the wind is also blowing and it feels like 10 degrees outside. I swear, it's almost like we never left Kansas!

So, since I'm not working until later today, I get to have a "leisurely" morning around the house. Yeah, my stomach is in knots and I'm anxiously waiting to hear from everyone telling me they arrived safely. I told them all to call me when they got to the stores, just so I would know they were safe. I swear, I'm such a mom!

snow day

I got up this morning with the intention of driving to our store at a mall in Hillsboro. It's on the other side of the city from where I live so it takes a little time. My co-worker was supposed to come and pick me up, but after I woke and saw the snow I was not surprised by her call asking me and my four wheel drive Subie to do the driving. Not a problem.

I called my boss as I got gas because it was really coming down on our side of the city. He said it was not bad out his way (he lives near the store at the mall). Off to my friends house to pick her up. We were driving right along, snow blowing around us, when our visibility dropped drastically. I handed her my phone and asked her to go ahead and call our boss.

He and I spoke, after I've pulled over in preparation for taking her home, and decided to not open today. I then called the mall office and left a voice mail saying as such.

The drive back to her house was not that bad. The snow had seemed to let up a bit in that area, but the roads did feel a little slicker. I popped in, met her husband (who was real nice and easy goin'...I see game nights in our future), smooched on her dog, scritched the two cats ears and called the people who were scheduled to go into work today to tell them to stay home and be safe. My favorite response, "what? I don't have to go to work? That rocks!" I told her happy snow day, but be prepared for work tomorrow.

Of course if it's not cleared up at all, we may end up making that call again.

The drive home from her house was a bit rocky at times, but when I got home I called my parents and thanked Dad for teaching me how to drive in this mess. Now I've got my jammies on (well, at least the lounge pants) and am waiting for our neighbor to text back whether they are coming for tiny pies or not.

I leave you with a site I just walked in on...

life

Isn't it interesting how life sometimes seems to fly by? I mean you blink and we're near the middle of October already.

Work has been a bit stressful for me. Yep, in the world of comfort shoes, there can be stress. My boss is out of the country until the 28th, leaving me in charge of the check books. My co-manager was away for a few days. This was the perfect time for someone to get sick. So they did. I worked an 11.5 hour day on Thursday. I'm taking it slow this morning and going in when the store where the office is opens at 11:00. I have to close my old haunt tonight. Then, I am getting a day off!

Tomorrow we have potential plans to meet up with Jill and Mark at Sweetness Bakery, plans to go to Wolfgang's first birthday (he's a baby of some friends of ours), and plans to hang out with Shannon and Kiley.

I am looking forward to every single minute of tomorrow. I am also hoping to go get some yarn to start making a baby sweater for a very special someone in my life (sorry, not disclosing at this time, other to say it is NOT me). I am over the moon, however.

Today is going to be an easier day. It's going to be a less stress filled day. It is going to fly by like yesterday did (I got to work all day at my store...the one downtown that I worked at full time for five years).

So, I am going to go heat up another cup of coffee, scratch Chloe's back a bit more, and maybe take a bath.

63F

It was a chilly morning as I awoke to the soft sounds coming from my alarm clock (I have it set to a radio station that is not too jarring). No animals climbed across my head, chest, body. Simon was content to snuggle up and keep himself warm against us. Josie was starting to rouse, but had yet to come over to my side of the bed to poke me with her cold, wet nose. Chloe was not in the room with us.

I actually turned on the heater in the bathroom downstairs this morning as I fed the crew. I figured if I turned it on at that time, it'd be warm by the time I went down for my shower. It was.

The past few days I've been walking, riding my bike, relying on my body power to get to work. This morning, I decided to take the car. I need to run down to Portland Fixture (I LOVE going to this place and poking around) to get some things for the kids store. I figured it would be easier to use the Subie as opposed to strapping something to my back or relying on getting a car from one of the guys here. Yesterday I'd hoped to borrow Ahmed's car, but he had people with him and I didn't want to leave them stranded at the office.

Speaking of work...I better get to it. I've got photos to take and load up to our site. I've got fixtures to go buy. I've got shoes to unload and figure out where I am storing. I've got a day ahead of me...

crumby? crummy?

I woke up in a little bit of a foul mood this morning. Perhaps I had a dream that I am not remembering that left me feeling a bit "meh"?

Perhaps it was the knowledge that a "fun" day was waiting for me when I got into work?

Maybe it was just...I don't know.

I hate it when I'm asked/told to do something a particular way and when said thing is done in that way and the outcome is undesirable, I get blamed.

I'm having a bitch of a day so far. And honestly, it's probably best for me to not write right now. Yoga will be welcomed with open arms this afternoon!!!

really?

So I am sitting here at work, once again. It's been a much busier Labor Day than I thought (read feared) it would be. This makes me happy. However, what makes me cranky is the girl who just came in and very cheerily stated, "Oh, your working on Labor Day. And we're not..." giggling the whole time.

I want to write a book and call it "Stupid things that come out of customer's mouths" or something like that. I'm sure with the staff here we could come up with a large selection pretty darn quickly.

One of my faves was, "the sign on your door that has the hours...it's not right, is it?" said to me 45 minutes AFTER we'd closed. When I said yes, they proceeded to hang around even longer. I finally told them they'd have to come back as I had a life to live outside of the store.

I just have to wonder about people sometime.

what you think?

before:

after:

wanting to tap out

Today has been quite the day already. Actually, as I told Kevin this morning, I was already tired by my day before it had even started.

This morning I got up and went to our friends house to feed their cats as they are currently out of town. That was lovely, Vincent only attempted to eat my hand once. Stella hid the whole time.

After that I zipped over to our other friends house to help load up a Uhaul and move them to their new house. I am a nerd and love packing the truck. Everyone kept asking me if they could help me and I kept saying just to bring me things. As I was telling one woman where to put something in the truck (it was all already mapped out in my mind) she said to me, "Oh, you're going to micro manage where I put things in the truck?" Passive aggressive much? I responded with "Yes."

At 1:15 I had to leave that fun (the second round of packing up the truck of the heavy furniture) and head into the office to do some paperwork for Ahmed. He's not going to be in on Monday and he had a few things I needed to take care of before then. Around 2:30 he ran me downtown to the store so I can close for Rita. She has a niece's birthday party today. Her sister just told her what time it was (and it ended up not being an evening party, as she'd thought it would be). So I am closing for her and working 3-6.

When I am done here I hop on a bus to our shop on Hawthorne, where I left my car. I get the car, go home, relax for a minute before we go to a birthday party. I honestly don't know how I'm still going at this point.

The real sucky thing is, I don't have off tomorrow. I have to go open the kids store with our newbie and stay until ?

I don't think I am going to have a day off until the weekend, depending on when I set up the template appointment with the counter people.

I just really want to tap out of this day though, call it quits. But I won't. Not until I pass out in my bed tonight.

Wanna change days with me?

a rant

I have heard from friends that they like the direction my "voice" has gone when writing here. I used to be much more negative? Anyway, I'm going to revert for just a moment because if I don't get this out it will eat away at me and that's no good.

We at work are switching DSL providers. When the sales rep was here I was being booted off the wireless in the office. We had a lengthy conversation about it. It ended with her saying, "well, that won't be a problem when we make the switch."

Fast forward selector:

Today, the tech came out to do the switch. Well, it seems as though they do NOT have modems that are wireless, we have to provide our own wireless router. Now, I wish the rep would have TOLD me that I'd have to go out and buy one myself because you know what, I WOULD HAVE prior to today had I flipping known.

Instead, we have to go buy one, set up a new time for the tech to come back out and I refuse to make it at 8:00 AM again because you know when he showed? 8:30! That honestly is about half of my annoyance.

You see, the phone lines all converge into a building at the end of the block (the guy owns the whole block). So we have to be able to get into the toy store to access the phone lines to make the switch. The manager told me last week she'd be here at 8:00 today to let us in. Was she? NO. Not that it ended up mattering in the end. But still! What happened to doing the things you say you are going to do?!?!?

And now, I am going to drink my iced latte, listen to some soothing music and work on an ad that is due Friday.

Oh, and KC called this morning to ask if we could open the store as she had a rough night last night. Charles is my hero and said he'd take care of it. I should have bought him coffee this morning, but he said he was going to get his downtown (where we both agree, the coffee is better).

Yes, latte is calling.

how do i know she missed me?

I got home yesterday from a trip to Vegas for work. It was a great time, albeit tiring. Much was accomplished and money came home with me. Granted it was the same amount I took, but I still look at that as a win. :)

We walked miles upon miles. My feet were not happy, until I got a free pair of my favorite brand of shoes, El Naturalista. Man o Man! So much happier. Of course my shins already hurt and my calf muscles were aching from all the walking the previous days. I will never make the mistake of not taking my favorite pair of boots again. Never.

Josie has pretty much been by my side since I got home. Licking me every chance she gets. I keep telling her to go back to bed (lucky dog) so I can eat my bagel in peace. She goes to the bedroom, but isn't long there...wait, is she jumping into bed?! Hallelujah! A moment to myself.

I missed her too (them all, really) but the neediness thing is a bit much in the morning. Especially when one hasn't had her morning coffee. Speaking of coffee...normally the other buyer and I are hurting for good coffee in Vegas. Staryucks is everywhere. But I don't drink Yucks. Chas discovered a place at the Venetian that served Illy coffee. Yum! I attempted to be coffee free this trip, since I was still getting over my stomach thing, and I did fairly well. I only had one latte in the morning and that wasn't even every morning.

Of course I get home and am out of coffee. UGH, kill me.

love is in the air

There are times I want to sing from rooftops just how much I love Kevin. Of course there are times I want to take him up there and shove him off, but this isn't about those times.

At work we're going through this major change. Our original web provider (read since 1999) went under. We found a new provider who has made it amazingly easy to switch. They've imported everything so that we (read I) don't have to go through the hassle of uploading every single item again.

We were supposed to go live yesterday. It wasn't working. The new provider has been there 110% sending me emails and answering questions without much delay.

This morning I sat down to reroute out site. Yeah, cuz I know exactly what I'm doing, right?

Kev to the rescue. It's up and running and will be even better than before! The joy of Kev, he didn't even think twice about coming to my aide. He simply put down the bag of cereal, came over clicked a few places and BOOM it's up.

---------------------

oh yeah, we woke up to NO PEEP in Josie's bedding! I did come home yesterday to peep on our bed, but last night Jill came over and made peep pads for us. I fed her and gave her beer. She must really A. love our dog and B. love us. I could not have asked for a more amazing friend. Jill, I love you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. We'll see how the bed pad works today! :)

tis the season, i suppose

I had a guy in last night. He gave me the sob story of some guy stealing his wallet while he was at the atm getting money for his cab ride to work.

It would have sounded okay, except two things:

1. the guy said he had a $5.00 bill in his wallet, had gotten out $60.00 and was going to give him the 5 when he snatched the wallet away (the same wallet the 5 was in). He then told me he had hte 5 still. Ummm, wasn't that IN the wallet that was just snatched?

2. he was taking a cab from downtown out to Hillsboro. Yeah, that's just kind of dumb when the Max (train) takes you where he was heading.

So no, I did not give him money for his alleged cab ride out there.

Today I had some rather smelly guy come in, ask for some tape, and proceeded to wrap the packing tape around his lighter. I am always polite. Until they start being rude. Shook the guy's hand. He starts trying to dig his fingernails into my hand. I snatch it away (careful to not break any skin on his dirty nails) and tell him that's enough, he can leave.

I had a customer in the store who said I was nicer than what she'd be. She'd have told him to take the tape and leave. Or not have given him the tape. I dunno, I didn't figure he'd attempt to scratch me.

He kept asking when we were closing, etc. I told him later on. Not giving him specifics.

Tis the season for the wackadoodles to come out.

i breathe in, i breathe out

As I go through each day I remind myself. Breathe. It's something we all do without really thinking about. Breathe in the day. Breathe out the day.

When I get annoyed (work crap), I remind myself, "I breathe in, I breathe out" and it all seems to be put into perspective.

Training has commenced, once again. The trainees are doing fine (well, I am working with one of them for the first time today, but she actually has experience selling the things we do so I expect goodness). It's the currents that are a bit mind boggling. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by their attitudes, job sit surfing, resume writing (all while on the clock). Yeah, we'll be chatting with a few of them soon...although if they find that next job, we won't have to. Although after writing that, I am surprised. I mean, we offer pretty good pay for working in a retail setting. Our boss is fair and kind. The job itself, not that hard. It can actually be a lot of fun, too!

Common sense is something that seems to elude some people. My common sense tells me if I am unhappy someplace I work to look for work, but don't do it while I'm being paid by my current employer (no, I am not looking for a new gig, I LOVE my job...). It also tells me if there are things sitting in the store room that have been there for weeks, put them away. Simple, right? Yeah, I think some people just. don't. get it.

So during training, I have told one of the women (will tell the other today) that common sense is a thing of beauty. We love people who say they are self motivated and really, truly ARE. Nothing annoys me more than someone saying in an interview that they can work on their own, finding things to do if they aren't told what to do, and then they don't. They sit there, they surf the web, they ignore customers.

I breathe in, I breathe out.

the word of the day

We got to the house by about 7:15 tonight. Not enough time to paint two coats in the living room, but enough to paint the first coat and tape off the bedroom. We're going to head over tomorrow after we're off work and paint the second coat in the living room and the first coat in the bedroom. This gives us time Tuesday night to paint the second coat in the bedroom in preparation for moving in on Wednesday.

I must say, it's hard to come back to our first little gem each night since Friday. Kev wants to take sleeping bags tomorrow, but I can tell you...that ain't gonna happen! I needs to sleep in a bed. Especially before having to unload and "reload" a store these next two days.

What is that, you ask? Well, we are closing one of our stores at work tomorrow around 2:00. We will be unloading all the clog racks so that the racks can be removed and the store can be painted. Tuesday we are closed all day so we can install the new clog racks and load them back up with clogs.

So yeah, I'm exhausted working on being spent and heading towards incapacitation.

a good stiff drink

Last night I am beginning to do some laundry when my phone rings. It's the annoying ring. You know, the one that indicates it is someone from work?

One of our employees telling me she can no longer work for us. Effective immediately. Um, she was scheduled to work TODAY. I understand she's got health issues. I don't doubt that she's not been feeling great, however wouldn't you think she could work the following day? She called me at 7:20. Many hours after her shift ended yesterday.

So we are dealing with that fire. We've, thankfully, hired two more people. They both start training tomorrow. One with me, the other at another location. I ended up going in a bit today (which both of the newbies noted was supposed to be my day off). I'm tired. I'm going to be working 6 day weeks for the next month or so. Thankfully, my boss knows that we work hard for him (Chas and myself) and I don't think this is going un-noted in his mind.

Somebody kill me. OR get someone to buy my house because THAT is the one thing that could really give me a boost right now.

manjam. really?

Got a resume this morning from someone with the surname Manjam. Yeah, after reading the things he's done, hoax. Has to be. I mean his objective is: "intensify and diversify my goal-driven procedures for actuating my definitive internal paradigm"

I have to say that on his list of jobs my favorite is:

"Nigiri Wrangler" which duties included "slicer, dicer, ricer" all as bullets.

However, I think it was the "personal physician to the President of Uganda" that really put it over the top.

If it's not a hoax, he may need to rethink his approach. If it is, he may want to rethink his mission in life. However it did give me a laugh. I can't want to show Chas.

bah

I was told yesterday by an employee that she was quiting. No big deal, we can handle it. We understand...she's going back to school after she gets back from a fabulous European vacation. Today, I get told by a different employee that she, too, is quiting. Excuse my language Mom and Dad...but fuck me!

It was a day we were going to go get keys from someone, telling her that her time with us was coming to an end. Yeah, scratch that idea real quick...bah!!! I don't know when I will ever really have a "normal" schedule again. I've posted listings for three positions on craigslist. We've gotten three applicants already respond. I've got two interviews set up, the third failed to respond to my last email. Since we only posted two yesterday and one just today I feel pretty good about getting three responses thus far.

It will be interesting, how this all plays out. At least it happened after we got back from Vegas, right?

I've got an hour and a half left before heading to my friend's birthday party. I will be drinking wine tonight. I've already told Kevin this. Thankfully I am not working the floor tomorrow, but we are having an all staff meeting that I must attend. Hell, I'm leading part of it.

Give me strength, for everything in my life right now.

back

St. Joe is hanging out on our kitchen counter as I type. I got him when I was in Vegas. I will bury him tomorrow (my day off). It is interesting because the little leaflet that came with him says there are different beliefs when it comes to St. Joe. Bury him facing the house, facing away, upside down, in the East corner, or simply have him in the house. The most important thing, it reads, is to believe he will help you sell your home. :) That makes me smile. Kev says THAT is where he has a problem...the believing. I know I've said in the past that I'm not a superstitious person and here I am burying St. Joseph to help sell my home...it just makes me smile. I'll take any help I can right now.

I know that selling a house can take a long time. I'm okay with this. However, since we have found a home that we want very badly, it is making me anxious and nauseated.

But now onto my first day back from Vegas. Found a dead body in the store. Not a human, but not as small as a mouse...a rat. We got a call when we were standing in the lobby of the MGM before heading to the airport yesterday. Jessica informed us that there was rat activity, chewed napkins, poop, etc. She'd not seen the rat (which I told her we should name Roy). No, that was left for me.

I was coming around the counter to put some shoes back in the store room. I happened to look down at the floor and what should I see under a rack of shoes, Roy. Skin crawled. I freaked out, pulled in the sign saying we were open, turned the sign on the door to "shut" and called Ahmed. He came and was my knight in shining armor. I am hoping Roy (who we realized should have been named Rosetta) was a loner. But often times you don't have that luxury.

So today I will go into the store and work and just not think about it...instead I'll work on kids orders for spring/summer 08, read a bit of the first Harry Potter (I'm starting from the beginning now), and sell tons of clogs!