...or As the Pool Filters...
Okay, I'm really wiped out tonight, but I''ll try to get on tomorrow and write a scene from the soap opera that is my life. Seriously, today we had a lifeguard pull a shank on someone. Or offer a shank to someone. The report hasn't come in yet, but seriously, at no point in lifeguarding is there EVER a need to have a blade in your fanny pack.
The word "fanny" should indicate that no sharp object will ever go in there. Seriously. And yet one today, who was earing party pay, which is 12 bucks an hour, to lifeguard for 5 hours, pulled out a knife and offered it to a patron, either in a threatening manner toward the patron, which would be a pretty negative customer service behavior, or to share it with the patron, which would be generous, but also inappropriate.
I can't do my actual job for all these strange behaviors which are cropping up this year. It's INSANE.
But the jokes we make in the office after this kind of crap are pretty funny, I must admit.
I mean yesterday I had to handle an incident where a family decided to "swim at your own risk," in a neighborhood where that doesn't actually happen. We guard their pools, and they are locked, or supposed to be locked, whenever we don't have guards there. So somehow, the family got into the pool after school/work yesterday, and went for a swim. The water was lovely. The had a grand time. And then they tried to leave.
Only to find the gate was now locked.
Apparently it wasn't before.
And they were locked in. But not to worry, because some local kids saw them there and used a pokemon trading card to unlock the gate.
A trading card, people.
Meanwhile I'm trying to get swim lessons scheduled, and train 100+ lifeguards every weekend, all without going postal about the admin assistant I inherited.
Who believes that filing isn't very important, and "if you don't like the way I file, you'll have to do it yourself."
Yeah, she's a peach. A peach who's about to be unemployed.
But again, fodder for jokes, as we now "group" our filing by letters, rather than alphabetizing them. She did some filing work over in residential, where the filing cabinet has the letters A & B in one cabinet. C & D in another, etc. So those files... got grouped into A & B in one stack, and then on from there. Barnes comes before Andrews, and so forth and so on.
Maybe I should shank her with my trusty Pokemon trading card tomorrow?
Can you make a shiv out of a trading card...?
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Saturday, May 2, 2009
My shopping list
The past few days haven't been normal. I've been busy as heck at work, but I've also been getting it done, and kicking butt along the way, so it's okay. It has led to some strange errands at strange times though. Whether for work for for home I've bought some odd stuff.
I'm thinking it's a pretty good list, actually. It compared to the ones I used to make in Iraq. I'd tell my staff something like "I"m going to need three cases of paper towels, a wading pool full of popcorn, and all the jello we can get our hands on," and then we'd have an event.
This isn't all for an event, but I finally made it over to the gun dealer to pick up the shotgun, for home protection. A shotgun won't do you any good either, without shells. And is it my fault the dealer is a family friend, and sent me home with cases of ammunition for various weapons? Who knew I was the way for him to get his freebies out of the store?
They all rode home just fine in the jeep, next to my pool test kit, because I'm tired of having chemical problems at pools and no way to test them. "Uhm, Keira.... my skin is turning white and bubbling." You're allergic to chlorine, and that level is through the roof, so go take a shower and thank you for not litigating. "Uhm, Keira.... someone just puked in the pool." That'll happen. Let's just see if there's enough chlorine in this one. "Uhm, Keira... the pool is green. Really green." Yeah, I won't even bother testing that one. We'll just change locations of the class for the umpteenth time.
So yeah, a shotgun, lots of ammo, a chemical test kit, a brand spanking new cookie scoop, to make the ultimate in cake balls, and a back seat full of lifeguard uniforms makes for an interesting day. I'd already dropped the chocolates at the house, which when combined with my Mom's trip to the store, gave us something like fifteen pounds of chocolate suitable for melting. I decided today wasn't the day to do any melting though, as I'm whacked out on sudafed from this cold I've caught (shut up, it's not the swine flu) that I'd have probably covered the shotgun shells without thinking about it.
- Nine pounds of chocolate
- 2 boxes of shotgun shells
- 400 fanny packs, in a stylish red color
- 4 more dive bricks, clocking in at 10 pounds each, which they shipped together, for reasons unknown to me
- A couple whisks from Williams "Overpriced" Sonoma
- Let's not forget the shotgun, either. Be scared, I'm a registered gun owner now
- Sudafed - massive amounts of sudafed
I'm thinking it's a pretty good list, actually. It compared to the ones I used to make in Iraq. I'd tell my staff something like "I"m going to need three cases of paper towels, a wading pool full of popcorn, and all the jello we can get our hands on," and then we'd have an event.
This isn't all for an event, but I finally made it over to the gun dealer to pick up the shotgun, for home protection. A shotgun won't do you any good either, without shells. And is it my fault the dealer is a family friend, and sent me home with cases of ammunition for various weapons? Who knew I was the way for him to get his freebies out of the store?
They all rode home just fine in the jeep, next to my pool test kit, because I'm tired of having chemical problems at pools and no way to test them. "Uhm, Keira.... my skin is turning white and bubbling." You're allergic to chlorine, and that level is through the roof, so go take a shower and thank you for not litigating. "Uhm, Keira.... someone just puked in the pool." That'll happen. Let's just see if there's enough chlorine in this one. "Uhm, Keira... the pool is green. Really green." Yeah, I won't even bother testing that one. We'll just change locations of the class for the umpteenth time.
So yeah, a shotgun, lots of ammo, a chemical test kit, a brand spanking new cookie scoop, to make the ultimate in cake balls, and a back seat full of lifeguard uniforms makes for an interesting day. I'd already dropped the chocolates at the house, which when combined with my Mom's trip to the store, gave us something like fifteen pounds of chocolate suitable for melting. I decided today wasn't the day to do any melting though, as I'm whacked out on sudafed from this cold I've caught (shut up, it's not the swine flu) that I'd have probably covered the shotgun shells without thinking about it.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Fabulouser and fabulouserrrrrr
Really, you've got to be effing kidding me.
Forty-five minutes to leave my neighborhood this morning.
Forty-five minutes to go less than half a mile, because a traffic signal was out.
And that was just the start of the day.
Let me just say that when the underwire in my bra gave out... that was the high point. I'm walking down the hall and all of the sudden it's like I had a flat tire on the driver's side. Only it wasn't a tire. And thanks to my curves, it wasn't flat so much as off it's axle, out of alignment, in need of rotation and balance, or whatever freaking euphemism you want to apply.
So then I was effing lopsided the remainder of the day.
And I really liked that bra, too. We've had a short relationship with each other, but I thought it was a good one. Apparently it disagreed. Bastard.
Have you ever had to walk around the office lopsided, when you're trying to get up the cojones to fire someone? I mean sure I'm dead to rights to fire this guy because sexual harassment is NEVER tolerated, whether it's male on female, female on male, female on female or male on male. NEVER. But being lopsided pretty much dampened my tyrannical, mamma bear fervor for dealing with the issue immediately. Plus I had to wait until the company lawyers had signed off on it all.
Meanwhile I'm reading the reports about the events as they unfolded, and they involved an overly excitable gay male, who thinks he's a dainty little buttercup of a person, instead of the huge, lumbering bull in a china shop that he is... and some typical, average high school jocks. HIGH school. As in not yet of the age of majority, according to the great state of Texas. Buttercup the Bull decided they'd be sooooooooo much funnnnnnnnn to demonstrate lifeguarding skills with.... and he was wrong. Well, sure, they probably WERE fun, because they're fit and he's fat. They're young and he's not. They're students and he's the instructo.....
BASTARD!
No one, NO ONE, EVERRRRRRRRRRRR gets to make a student feel uncomfortable. Even if the student didn't KNOW what Buttercup the Bull was doing was inappropriate, the other lifeguard instructors DID know, and they lit my phone up like Christmas, the Fourth of July and New Year's Eve combined.
So there I am all lopsided and pissed off, waiting for my boss to get in to the office so we can call the lawyers and get on with the show. I'd had a payroll check cut and everything. Just needed the big boss so I could take care of the little weasel.
Big boss made to the office today at 4 pm.
Bastard.
And then when I'm dealing with all this, my cell phone rings. It's my mom. She's calling to let me know it's raining, and I should look at the weather before I leave the office.
I appreciated the heads' up, but at the same time, the message started out with "I know you're at work and I hate to bother you but this is your mother and father calling...."
Uhm, WHAT?!
Yes, we are having some monstrous, disastrous rain.
Something like 20 inches of rain in the past week and a half.
Yes, I hate driving in the rain.
But really - a phone call that started me off thinking that someone had been in a car accident, or Dad had had another heart attack? That was so not a good way to try and wrap up the day.
I had plenty of time to mull it over, too, as I had another hour and half commute. I spent 3 hours in the car today - wheeeeeeeeeeee!
I think I'll call in drunk soon. Take the day off, hide from everyone and go to the movies for 12 hours. Move to Antigua. Or volunteer to help out with the swine flu epidemic in Mexico City.
Because I really just need y'all to give me some breathing room so I don't turn into the screaming, raving bitch that I am every five seconds. (And just for the record, I don't know what that granola bar is doing in the pantry - perhaps Elvis left it when he visited with his spaceship. Also, I appreciate the offer but it seems like I'm back in kindergarten if my Mommy is packing my lunch, so I'll skip that all the same.)
Forty-five minutes to leave my neighborhood this morning.
Forty-five minutes to go less than half a mile, because a traffic signal was out.
And that was just the start of the day.
Let me just say that when the underwire in my bra gave out... that was the high point. I'm walking down the hall and all of the sudden it's like I had a flat tire on the driver's side. Only it wasn't a tire. And thanks to my curves, it wasn't flat so much as off it's axle, out of alignment, in need of rotation and balance, or whatever freaking euphemism you want to apply.
So then I was effing lopsided the remainder of the day.
And I really liked that bra, too. We've had a short relationship with each other, but I thought it was a good one. Apparently it disagreed. Bastard.
Have you ever had to walk around the office lopsided, when you're trying to get up the cojones to fire someone? I mean sure I'm dead to rights to fire this guy because sexual harassment is NEVER tolerated, whether it's male on female, female on male, female on female or male on male. NEVER. But being lopsided pretty much dampened my tyrannical, mamma bear fervor for dealing with the issue immediately. Plus I had to wait until the company lawyers had signed off on it all.
Meanwhile I'm reading the reports about the events as they unfolded, and they involved an overly excitable gay male, who thinks he's a dainty little buttercup of a person, instead of the huge, lumbering bull in a china shop that he is... and some typical, average high school jocks. HIGH school. As in not yet of the age of majority, according to the great state of Texas. Buttercup the Bull decided they'd be sooooooooo much funnnnnnnnn to demonstrate lifeguarding skills with.... and he was wrong. Well, sure, they probably WERE fun, because they're fit and he's fat. They're young and he's not. They're students and he's the instructo.....
BASTARD!
No one, NO ONE, EVERRRRRRRRRRRR gets to make a student feel uncomfortable. Even if the student didn't KNOW what Buttercup the Bull was doing was inappropriate, the other lifeguard instructors DID know, and they lit my phone up like Christmas, the Fourth of July and New Year's Eve combined.
So there I am all lopsided and pissed off, waiting for my boss to get in to the office so we can call the lawyers and get on with the show. I'd had a payroll check cut and everything. Just needed the big boss so I could take care of the little weasel.
Big boss made to the office today at 4 pm.
Bastard.
And then when I'm dealing with all this, my cell phone rings. It's my mom. She's calling to let me know it's raining, and I should look at the weather before I leave the office.
I appreciated the heads' up, but at the same time, the message started out with "I know you're at work and I hate to bother you but this is your mother and father calling...."
Uhm, WHAT?!
Yes, we are having some monstrous, disastrous rain.
Something like 20 inches of rain in the past week and a half.
Yes, I hate driving in the rain.
But really - a phone call that started me off thinking that someone had been in a car accident, or Dad had had another heart attack? That was so not a good way to try and wrap up the day.
I had plenty of time to mull it over, too, as I had another hour and half commute. I spent 3 hours in the car today - wheeeeeeeeeeee!
I think I'll call in drunk soon. Take the day off, hide from everyone and go to the movies for 12 hours. Move to Antigua. Or volunteer to help out with the swine flu epidemic in Mexico City.
Because I really just need y'all to give me some breathing room so I don't turn into the screaming, raving bitch that I am every five seconds. (And just for the record, I don't know what that granola bar is doing in the pantry - perhaps Elvis left it when he visited with his spaceship. Also, I appreciate the offer but it seems like I'm back in kindergarten if my Mommy is packing my lunch, so I'll skip that all the same.)
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Updates
Been busy as heck. No, been busy as hell. Work has kicked my butt all the way to Iraq and back again this week. And then when I thought things were finally settling down... I got kicked to the moon.
So, updates.
The garden:
It's growing and doing it's leafy thing. We pulled off a bunch of yellow beans today, with the help of a bouncing, buoyant Risa Roo, so that the plants would get bigger instead of trying to put off fruit. ...beans... fruit. Whatever. But seriously, it's growing and doing well. Looks like a bumper crop of zucchini is going to come in, which is going to make for some interesting meals around here.
The raccoons:
Last time I wrote, we'd put out a trap for the coons. Baited it with a can of tuna. And promptly caught a cat.
The same night though, Mom heard a ruckus on the porch roof. Or the porch roof rafters. It wasn't my party to hear, since I live on the other side of the house, but I hear tell it was quite the showdown. And the raccoons haven't been heard from since.
So they're either lying really, really low, and running silent like a submarine, or they've moved on to greener pastures. I'm hoping it's the greener pastures thing, because pretty soon someone is going to have to stick their head up into the garage attic and take a look around.
The jeep:
Still has narcolepsy, or some other undiagnosed automotive medical disorder. Seriously, I know a fair amount about cars and the best I can come up with is narcolepsy because the jeep just randomly stalls out with no hint it's coming. I'll be running down the road at 70 miles an hour, full power, full everything, and a tenth of a second later, the jeep has stalled out, no lights, no gauges, no indicators on, so I pop it into neutral and restart it. It always starts. Every time. Of course the same stall can happen at idle at a red light, too, but I really like the challenge of the high speed stall out to keep me guessing.
So here's the skinny:
2000 jeep wrangler, 4.0 liter, sahara edition
111,000 miles on it
I've changed out the crankshaft positioning sensor, the throttle positioning sensor, the fuel pump and the camshaft positioning sensor. I've always had regular maintenance done on it, and aside from a leak at the rear differential, everything is running in top form right now. The check engine light came on last Sunday, and I was thrilled. Turned out to just be a random misfire, which did me no good, because it's not really a spark plug issue. And then the check engine light reset itself and went back off, a day after I had the code read.
So yeah, as I said, it's narcolepsy. She just forgets what she's doing and falls asleep.
Work:
Chaos, mayhem and madness prevail. I'm working Iraq hours right now, for Victory Junction pay. I could work 100 hours a week for the next month and still be 3 months behind. Spring is so much fun. So if you feel like planning swim lessons for about a hundred communities across Houston, or typing up some more in-service training, let me know. You can also plan additional lifeguard classes, if you're feeling really froggy.
Right now I'm just holding steady over at the office. I think I'm getting close to even, and then I have a weekend like this one, with green pools, fighting instructors and sexual harassment. So tomorrow I'll fire someone, because gay or straight, you do NOT get flirty with your students. EVER. And seriously, if you're a big, fat, hyperactive chipmunk, don't think it's cool either, to email a picture of yourself without a shirt on to another instructor. That's just disgusting on about a thousand different levels. I hear I have the picture in my email at the office, too, and I refuse to check it because I don't want to have to bleach my retinas.
Relaxation:
Uhm, I made cake balls.
Cake.
Icing.
Mixed together and shaped into little balls.
Covered in melted chocolate.
Damn, they're good.
And apparently if you're in Dallas, you can charge the moon for them. http://cakeballs.com/
I always thought they were rather pretentious in Dallas. This just confirms it....
And now I really want some super duper thin onion rings. Is 9:30 too late to make them? Really? You sure?
So, updates.
The garden:
It's growing and doing it's leafy thing. We pulled off a bunch of yellow beans today, with the help of a bouncing, buoyant Risa Roo, so that the plants would get bigger instead of trying to put off fruit. ...beans... fruit. Whatever. But seriously, it's growing and doing well. Looks like a bumper crop of zucchini is going to come in, which is going to make for some interesting meals around here.
The raccoons:
Last time I wrote, we'd put out a trap for the coons. Baited it with a can of tuna. And promptly caught a cat.
The same night though, Mom heard a ruckus on the porch roof. Or the porch roof rafters. It wasn't my party to hear, since I live on the other side of the house, but I hear tell it was quite the showdown. And the raccoons haven't been heard from since.
So they're either lying really, really low, and running silent like a submarine, or they've moved on to greener pastures. I'm hoping it's the greener pastures thing, because pretty soon someone is going to have to stick their head up into the garage attic and take a look around.
The jeep:
Still has narcolepsy, or some other undiagnosed automotive medical disorder. Seriously, I know a fair amount about cars and the best I can come up with is narcolepsy because the jeep just randomly stalls out with no hint it's coming. I'll be running down the road at 70 miles an hour, full power, full everything, and a tenth of a second later, the jeep has stalled out, no lights, no gauges, no indicators on, so I pop it into neutral and restart it. It always starts. Every time. Of course the same stall can happen at idle at a red light, too, but I really like the challenge of the high speed stall out to keep me guessing.
So here's the skinny:
2000 jeep wrangler, 4.0 liter, sahara edition
111,000 miles on it
I've changed out the crankshaft positioning sensor, the throttle positioning sensor, the fuel pump and the camshaft positioning sensor. I've always had regular maintenance done on it, and aside from a leak at the rear differential, everything is running in top form right now. The check engine light came on last Sunday, and I was thrilled. Turned out to just be a random misfire, which did me no good, because it's not really a spark plug issue. And then the check engine light reset itself and went back off, a day after I had the code read.
So yeah, as I said, it's narcolepsy. She just forgets what she's doing and falls asleep.
Work:
Chaos, mayhem and madness prevail. I'm working Iraq hours right now, for Victory Junction pay. I could work 100 hours a week for the next month and still be 3 months behind. Spring is so much fun. So if you feel like planning swim lessons for about a hundred communities across Houston, or typing up some more in-service training, let me know. You can also plan additional lifeguard classes, if you're feeling really froggy.
Right now I'm just holding steady over at the office. I think I'm getting close to even, and then I have a weekend like this one, with green pools, fighting instructors and sexual harassment. So tomorrow I'll fire someone, because gay or straight, you do NOT get flirty with your students. EVER. And seriously, if you're a big, fat, hyperactive chipmunk, don't think it's cool either, to email a picture of yourself without a shirt on to another instructor. That's just disgusting on about a thousand different levels. I hear I have the picture in my email at the office, too, and I refuse to check it because I don't want to have to bleach my retinas.
Relaxation:
Uhm, I made cake balls.
Cake.
Icing.
Mixed together and shaped into little balls.
Covered in melted chocolate.
Damn, they're good.
And apparently if you're in Dallas, you can charge the moon for them. http://cakeballs.com/
I always thought they were rather pretentious in Dallas. This just confirms it....
And now I really want some super duper thin onion rings. Is 9:30 too late to make them? Really? You sure?
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Heh.
I've always been very self-sufficient and independent. It's probably one of the big reasons I'm still single. Well, that and the fact that I've run into more than my fair share of men who turned out to be married, engaged or otherwise occupied. But anyway, yeah, I'm very much the do it yourself kind of woman.
I hear tell that can be attractive, at first. And then it gets intimidating as heck. I don't know. I'm not a guy. I don't suffer from penis envy. I just do what I need to do to get through each day. Although I will gladly let someone else do it for me, too, if they are available. Unfortunately, that availability thing doesn't work out so well when the guy you want to date is in Iraq. Or Wyoming. Or anywhere other than the passenger seat of my jeep.
So yesterday I brought home a boat load of paperwork that was time sensitive. I cranked it out and finished things up around midnight. And then I was wound up so I was up until about 1 am. Which meant today stunk. But I also made the conscious decision to come home a couple hours early and relax.
After I took care of a few errands. So my soft deadline of a 2 pm departure turned into my 3 pm hard deadline, and I got back to the north side of town right on schedule. I also noticed that my check engine light had turned itself back off, since the jeep computer reset itself after yet another "random misfire" occurred over the weekend. (The jeep has narcolepsy, in my opinion, which I'm sure to gripe about at some other time.)
Life was good. I was home early, and I ran to the grocery store and picked up cake mix and frosting. Not to make a cake, but instead to make cake balls, which sounds obscene and probably has an obscene amount of calories in them, now that I think about it. Fortunately, they're going over to the troops, if they turn out well. Heck, they're going to the troops even if they don't turn out well, because that's how I roll.
I got home and unloaded the groceries. I dashed up and changed into old shorts and a t-shirt too, because the lady who lives downstairs, otherwise known as my Mom, had finally decided we were ready to tackle the leaking kitchen sink. Go Mom! First I mixed up the cake though, and got that started.
Because I had an agenda. It went like this:
1. Bake cake, let it cool. Crumble, mix with tons of icing. Make cake balls. (I got as far as baking the cake, okay?)
2. Figure out what was wrong with sink. Fix problem. (We found the leak, and I had to call for reinforcements. I'll keep you posted.)
3. Go to Staples and get the USB cable for new printer at work. (Done!) (Bought some other crap I couldn't live without, either.)
4. Go next door to Hobby Lobby and buy the chocolate wafers to make cake balls. And paper lollipop sticks, in case I wanted to make cake pops, too. (Bought 'em. Also bought 3 bags of pillow batting, to restuff the armchair cushion in my room.)
5. Go to Home Depot and get whatever I needed for the sink. (Didn't really need to do that trip now did I?)
6. Go to the car wash lube center and get the oil changed, then get the complimentary full service car wash on the jeep. (It was an option, okay?)
That was the agenda. It morphed the minute I walked out of Hobby Lobby, because there was a woman a bit younger than me staring at the right front tire of her car. I tossed my purchases into the jeep and approached her to see if she needed help. The hood was down and the trunk was open, so it was either a call the auto club moment or change a tire moment. I needed a shower afterward, so you can guess what I did about 5:45 tonight.
And I was done by 6.
Hah!
As Kim held up the trunk carpet liner, I pulled out her donut. Then we took out the jack. I loosed the lug nuts, jacked up the car, and swapped the tire out. Right as we were lowering the jack, two guys walked out of the store and approached us warily. Granted I understand that, because I'm the whitest white person I know, all slobbed out in home repair clothes. And there's a dainty, beautiful black woman squatting next to me as we worked, who was in office clothes. It was probably a very unusual site to begin with.
And then there's the fact that women in our society do not want to be approached by strange men, even if they are stuck with car problems in a parking lot. It's just not a comforting feeling. So the older guy of the pair ambled up, about ten yards away, and asked if we needed help. I told him we were almost done, and thanked him.
Then he stood back and watched. "It sure is fun to watch two women change a tire! It's not something you see every day!"
No, no I bet it's not.
Then I came home and scrubbed up a bit. Tumped the cake over onto a cookie sheet to continue cooling. Ate some spring rolls. Went upstairs and restuffed my armchair cushion. Chatted online with a friend for a couple minutes. Then broke down, took a shower, started some laundry and then messed with cake some more.
It was a pretty typical day.
I hear tell that can be attractive, at first. And then it gets intimidating as heck. I don't know. I'm not a guy. I don't suffer from penis envy. I just do what I need to do to get through each day. Although I will gladly let someone else do it for me, too, if they are available. Unfortunately, that availability thing doesn't work out so well when the guy you want to date is in Iraq. Or Wyoming. Or anywhere other than the passenger seat of my jeep.
So yesterday I brought home a boat load of paperwork that was time sensitive. I cranked it out and finished things up around midnight. And then I was wound up so I was up until about 1 am. Which meant today stunk. But I also made the conscious decision to come home a couple hours early and relax.
After I took care of a few errands. So my soft deadline of a 2 pm departure turned into my 3 pm hard deadline, and I got back to the north side of town right on schedule. I also noticed that my check engine light had turned itself back off, since the jeep computer reset itself after yet another "random misfire" occurred over the weekend. (The jeep has narcolepsy, in my opinion, which I'm sure to gripe about at some other time.)
Life was good. I was home early, and I ran to the grocery store and picked up cake mix and frosting. Not to make a cake, but instead to make cake balls, which sounds obscene and probably has an obscene amount of calories in them, now that I think about it. Fortunately, they're going over to the troops, if they turn out well. Heck, they're going to the troops even if they don't turn out well, because that's how I roll.
I got home and unloaded the groceries. I dashed up and changed into old shorts and a t-shirt too, because the lady who lives downstairs, otherwise known as my Mom, had finally decided we were ready to tackle the leaking kitchen sink. Go Mom! First I mixed up the cake though, and got that started.
Because I had an agenda. It went like this:
1. Bake cake, let it cool. Crumble, mix with tons of icing. Make cake balls. (I got as far as baking the cake, okay?)
2. Figure out what was wrong with sink. Fix problem. (We found the leak, and I had to call for reinforcements. I'll keep you posted.)
3. Go to Staples and get the USB cable for new printer at work. (Done!) (Bought some other crap I couldn't live without, either.)
4. Go next door to Hobby Lobby and buy the chocolate wafers to make cake balls. And paper lollipop sticks, in case I wanted to make cake pops, too. (Bought 'em. Also bought 3 bags of pillow batting, to restuff the armchair cushion in my room.)
5. Go to Home Depot and get whatever I needed for the sink. (Didn't really need to do that trip now did I?)
6. Go to the car wash lube center and get the oil changed, then get the complimentary full service car wash on the jeep. (It was an option, okay?)
That was the agenda. It morphed the minute I walked out of Hobby Lobby, because there was a woman a bit younger than me staring at the right front tire of her car. I tossed my purchases into the jeep and approached her to see if she needed help. The hood was down and the trunk was open, so it was either a call the auto club moment or change a tire moment. I needed a shower afterward, so you can guess what I did about 5:45 tonight.
And I was done by 6.
Hah!
As Kim held up the trunk carpet liner, I pulled out her donut. Then we took out the jack. I loosed the lug nuts, jacked up the car, and swapped the tire out. Right as we were lowering the jack, two guys walked out of the store and approached us warily. Granted I understand that, because I'm the whitest white person I know, all slobbed out in home repair clothes. And there's a dainty, beautiful black woman squatting next to me as we worked, who was in office clothes. It was probably a very unusual site to begin with.
And then there's the fact that women in our society do not want to be approached by strange men, even if they are stuck with car problems in a parking lot. It's just not a comforting feeling. So the older guy of the pair ambled up, about ten yards away, and asked if we needed help. I told him we were almost done, and thanked him.
Then he stood back and watched. "It sure is fun to watch two women change a tire! It's not something you see every day!"
No, no I bet it's not.
Then I came home and scrubbed up a bit. Tumped the cake over onto a cookie sheet to continue cooling. Ate some spring rolls. Went upstairs and restuffed my armchair cushion. Chatted online with a friend for a couple minutes. Then broke down, took a shower, started some laundry and then messed with cake some more.
It was a pretty typical day.
You're Kidding
Really, you've got to be kidding. Seriously. The crackerjack reporting team over at Live Science gifted the AP wire with an article today that has to be a joke. It has to be.
Because really?
You're telling me that people don't understand rainy weather forecasts?
If it's not a joke, it's going on the list of ways to piss me off.
Seriously, the guy with the bad hairstyle and the out of fashion tie stands in front of a green screen and looks sideways. He waves his hands like a magician over the green screen and tells us what the weather is going to do for the next couple days. Sure, it's a best guess, and that's pretty tricky, but that isn't where the problem comes in, apparently.
No, it's that people don't understand what it means when there is "a 20% chance of rain from now until September." Sure, that's a Houston specific forecast, because we're subtropical here and get a lot of rain. All at once.
But really, when the skinny guy in the bad tie refuses to make eye contact with the camera because he's so busy reading his computer monitor off screen and trying to get his hand motions to match up to the right location as he scans the teleprompter too. Wait, I lost track of what I was saying...
Okay, yeah. When the weathercaster says there is a 20% chance of rain for the day, there seems to be confusion among the masses. Does it mean it's going to rain over 20% of the viewing area? Does it mean it's going to rain for 20% of the time? Does it mean I should take 20% of an umbrella or a rain jacket?
No. No it doesn't.
And you're idiots if you think it does.
No really, you're idiots. It had to be said. I'm sorry if it seemed harsh, but it's true.
And the guys at Live Science spent a good 3 pages of my computer screen to tell me just how to interpret the weather forecast, in case I'm one of those idiots, too.
I'm not. And none of you better be, either.
If there's a 20% chance of rain, and you live in an area where you get those wicked fun daily afternoon storms, you should take your umbrella or wear fast drying natural fibers when you're running around at 3 o'clock. If you live in an area that never gets rain, chances are good you won't, but you might.
Because on other days, when the weather conditions have been just the same, you've gotten rain 20% of the time. And when the forecast says there's an 80% chance of rain. Yeah, it's actually rained 80% of the time on days with matching conditions. So that means that on a nice April day, after a cool front has come through the city and dumped 9 inches of rain in 24 hours, and then the weather dried up and cleared up, warming into the mid-80's for a day, that on day 3, when there is a 50% chance of rain....
It means you're probably going to get wet, but what you do behind your bedroom door is up to you.
And as for the rain, well, there's a 50/50 chance it will rain, but it might not.
So do what every sane person does.
Put an umbrella in the car and then forget it's there, so you can stare out into the parking lot wishing you had it with you when it does rain.
Seriously.
Because really?
You're telling me that people don't understand rainy weather forecasts?
If it's not a joke, it's going on the list of ways to piss me off.
Seriously, the guy with the bad hairstyle and the out of fashion tie stands in front of a green screen and looks sideways. He waves his hands like a magician over the green screen and tells us what the weather is going to do for the next couple days. Sure, it's a best guess, and that's pretty tricky, but that isn't where the problem comes in, apparently.
No, it's that people don't understand what it means when there is "a 20% chance of rain from now until September." Sure, that's a Houston specific forecast, because we're subtropical here and get a lot of rain. All at once.
But really, when the skinny guy in the bad tie refuses to make eye contact with the camera because he's so busy reading his computer monitor off screen and trying to get his hand motions to match up to the right location as he scans the teleprompter too. Wait, I lost track of what I was saying...
Okay, yeah. When the weathercaster says there is a 20% chance of rain for the day, there seems to be confusion among the masses. Does it mean it's going to rain over 20% of the viewing area? Does it mean it's going to rain for 20% of the time? Does it mean I should take 20% of an umbrella or a rain jacket?
No. No it doesn't.
And you're idiots if you think it does.
No really, you're idiots. It had to be said. I'm sorry if it seemed harsh, but it's true.
And the guys at Live Science spent a good 3 pages of my computer screen to tell me just how to interpret the weather forecast, in case I'm one of those idiots, too.
I'm not. And none of you better be, either.
If there's a 20% chance of rain, and you live in an area where you get those wicked fun daily afternoon storms, you should take your umbrella or wear fast drying natural fibers when you're running around at 3 o'clock. If you live in an area that never gets rain, chances are good you won't, but you might.
Because on other days, when the weather conditions have been just the same, you've gotten rain 20% of the time. And when the forecast says there's an 80% chance of rain. Yeah, it's actually rained 80% of the time on days with matching conditions. So that means that on a nice April day, after a cool front has come through the city and dumped 9 inches of rain in 24 hours, and then the weather dried up and cleared up, warming into the mid-80's for a day, that on day 3, when there is a 50% chance of rain....
It means you're probably going to get wet, but what you do behind your bedroom door is up to you.
And as for the rain, well, there's a 50/50 chance it will rain, but it might not.
So do what every sane person does.
Put an umbrella in the car and then forget it's there, so you can stare out into the parking lot wishing you had it with you when it does rain.
Seriously.
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Fabulous
Let's review my day, just for fun. No, actually, let's start with yesterday afternoon. Because that was such a joy.
For those of you who aren't local, Houston is a big freaking city. I'm not saying it's fat. I'm saying it's big. It covers some real estate. Some serious territory. My normal commute to and from work each day totals 73 miles, since I live in the equivalent of south Dallas and work in the equivalent of New Mexico. It's a high speed drive, which is a good thing, otherwise, it'd be unbearable. As it is, it's barely tolerable.
Then there are the bonus trips I have to make now and then to pick up equipment, drop off a key, or go meet an instructor. Yesterday was one of those days. I had lifeguard classes starting in 5 different locations throughout the city. And I had to pick up a key in Maine. Okay, it wasn't Maine, but it might as well have been. Because the trip that should have taken about fifty minutes took me two hours... and fifty minutes. That's right. I had my butt planted in the jeep seat for one hundred and seventy minutes. To cover 41 miles. Hell, I tell you. Hell.
Because it was raining so hard there shouldn't be a frog alive in Houston any longer. Not one speck of dust. Not one bit of trash. It all should be in the Gulf of Mexico by now, it rained that hard. And it sucked.
Anyway, the storms ended yesterday evening, right after I made it to my exit on the freeway.
Today started about the same way. Overcast but no rain while I was picking up donuts and kolaches for my lifeguard instructors. Then I headed over to the pool they were going to be at, and it started sprinkling. Then it drizzled a bit, while the students started arriving. Meanwhile I didn't have any instructors yet, but a half dozen phone calls found almost all of them. And more kids showed up.
Meanwhile, 3 other sites are calling in with problems from their lifeguard classes. Students in the wrong spots. Students in the right spots on the wrong days. And oh, yeah, it's raining like hell. And some missing instructors at another location. They got lost.
So I'm still at the first place and the instructors are getting the tv set up. It's a simple process. Only when we plug it in, the damned thing has a picture exactly 1 inch tall by 25 or so inches across. Fine if you're a smurf, but not so good for humans. So it's off to Wal-Mart I go. In the now strengthening rain.
Did you know the rat bastards at Wal-Mart stock about 10 of the 50 or so models they have on display? Sure, they show you an "old fashioned" tube television set that comes in a 26 inch model. But you can't buy it. You can't buy any tube tv at all, unless you want a little 14 incher for your kid's bedroom. I don't have a kid. I needed a tv that 27 students could actually see. So I had to buy a flat screen high definition LCD tv. Do you have any idea how fragile those things actually are? Because I'm about to find out, since we move the tv's to a new location for teaching about every 2 weeks. Five hundred bucks that is sure to be broken in a year. Or less.
So the class is calling me frantic to know where I am with their tv. Uhm, trying to buy it? And the other classes are calling me with problems too. Seriously, I used up the entire battery on my cell phone in an hour and a half.
Oh, and I dropped my wallet in the parking lot, so now there's a grease stain on it. And a matching one on the seat of the jeep where it ended up. My poor baby jeep. I'd pretty much say that everything that could have gone wrong between 8 am and 10 am did. And I was ready to cry.
I came home for a brief break, and some dry shoes.
Then I went back out to the location that was starting after lunch.
When I got there last night, one of the pools was green. Took care of that then, too. And today, the instructors were on point. They were all kinds of ready to teach CPR. And then they started unpacking the equipment the RED CROSS had rented to us. Rented fully prepared. And it wasn't prepared. No manikin faces. No manikin lungs. Crap. Crap. Crap crap crap.
So I was back in the jeep. And driving from Maine to New Mexico and back to Maine. Only now the rain was coming down so hard, so fast, and so much that the weather reports said we received 6 and a half inches in an hour. I was driving in it. People couldn't exit the freeway because there was 3 feet of water waiting for them on the feeder roads. No place to go for them, but luckily my route was clear, if treacherous, the whole way.
And while I was driving, my phone rang again. Turns out that another tv at another location died. And it was another trip to Wal Mart, and another five hundred bucks spent. It's been a damned expensive day.
I burned through a tank of gas in 24 hours and I wasn't on a road trip.
I spent 2 hours on the phone refereeing between lifeguard instructors.
I alternated between soaking wet and mildly damp for the past 24 hours.
And then, right at the end of the day, as I was finally driving home... the effing sun came out, like it had never rained at all.
Life kicked my butt today. Tomorrow looks to be more of the same.
I'm going to take a nap, since it's cheaper than taking up drinking. Ugh.
For those of you who aren't local, Houston is a big freaking city. I'm not saying it's fat. I'm saying it's big. It covers some real estate. Some serious territory. My normal commute to and from work each day totals 73 miles, since I live in the equivalent of south Dallas and work in the equivalent of New Mexico. It's a high speed drive, which is a good thing, otherwise, it'd be unbearable. As it is, it's barely tolerable.
Then there are the bonus trips I have to make now and then to pick up equipment, drop off a key, or go meet an instructor. Yesterday was one of those days. I had lifeguard classes starting in 5 different locations throughout the city. And I had to pick up a key in Maine. Okay, it wasn't Maine, but it might as well have been. Because the trip that should have taken about fifty minutes took me two hours... and fifty minutes. That's right. I had my butt planted in the jeep seat for one hundred and seventy minutes. To cover 41 miles. Hell, I tell you. Hell.
Because it was raining so hard there shouldn't be a frog alive in Houston any longer. Not one speck of dust. Not one bit of trash. It all should be in the Gulf of Mexico by now, it rained that hard. And it sucked.
Anyway, the storms ended yesterday evening, right after I made it to my exit on the freeway.
Today started about the same way. Overcast but no rain while I was picking up donuts and kolaches for my lifeguard instructors. Then I headed over to the pool they were going to be at, and it started sprinkling. Then it drizzled a bit, while the students started arriving. Meanwhile I didn't have any instructors yet, but a half dozen phone calls found almost all of them. And more kids showed up.
Meanwhile, 3 other sites are calling in with problems from their lifeguard classes. Students in the wrong spots. Students in the right spots on the wrong days. And oh, yeah, it's raining like hell. And some missing instructors at another location. They got lost.
So I'm still at the first place and the instructors are getting the tv set up. It's a simple process. Only when we plug it in, the damned thing has a picture exactly 1 inch tall by 25 or so inches across. Fine if you're a smurf, but not so good for humans. So it's off to Wal-Mart I go. In the now strengthening rain.
Did you know the rat bastards at Wal-Mart stock about 10 of the 50 or so models they have on display? Sure, they show you an "old fashioned" tube television set that comes in a 26 inch model. But you can't buy it. You can't buy any tube tv at all, unless you want a little 14 incher for your kid's bedroom. I don't have a kid. I needed a tv that 27 students could actually see. So I had to buy a flat screen high definition LCD tv. Do you have any idea how fragile those things actually are? Because I'm about to find out, since we move the tv's to a new location for teaching about every 2 weeks. Five hundred bucks that is sure to be broken in a year. Or less.
So the class is calling me frantic to know where I am with their tv. Uhm, trying to buy it? And the other classes are calling me with problems too. Seriously, I used up the entire battery on my cell phone in an hour and a half.
Oh, and I dropped my wallet in the parking lot, so now there's a grease stain on it. And a matching one on the seat of the jeep where it ended up. My poor baby jeep. I'd pretty much say that everything that could have gone wrong between 8 am and 10 am did. And I was ready to cry.
I came home for a brief break, and some dry shoes.
Then I went back out to the location that was starting after lunch.
When I got there last night, one of the pools was green. Took care of that then, too. And today, the instructors were on point. They were all kinds of ready to teach CPR. And then they started unpacking the equipment the RED CROSS had rented to us. Rented fully prepared. And it wasn't prepared. No manikin faces. No manikin lungs. Crap. Crap. Crap crap crap.
So I was back in the jeep. And driving from Maine to New Mexico and back to Maine. Only now the rain was coming down so hard, so fast, and so much that the weather reports said we received 6 and a half inches in an hour. I was driving in it. People couldn't exit the freeway because there was 3 feet of water waiting for them on the feeder roads. No place to go for them, but luckily my route was clear, if treacherous, the whole way.
And while I was driving, my phone rang again. Turns out that another tv at another location died. And it was another trip to Wal Mart, and another five hundred bucks spent. It's been a damned expensive day.
I burned through a tank of gas in 24 hours and I wasn't on a road trip.
I spent 2 hours on the phone refereeing between lifeguard instructors.
I alternated between soaking wet and mildly damp for the past 24 hours.
And then, right at the end of the day, as I was finally driving home... the effing sun came out, like it had never rained at all.
Life kicked my butt today. Tomorrow looks to be more of the same.
I'm going to take a nap, since it's cheaper than taking up drinking. Ugh.
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