Yuck.

             I'm in one of my moods this evening. Not a bad one...just kind of bummed out a little. I'm uploading the video from my sister's birthday party back in October and while we had such a BLAST that night, it occurred to me that it was kind of sad that there were a lot of people who weren't there that SHOULD have been, like my parents. Mom and Dad would probably have not been out doing the Twist with us on the dance floor, but they would have enjoyed themselves nonetheless. Mom would have liked Aunt Sandy (her youngest sister) being in town, while Dad would have spent most of his time playing with his grandson Eli (Angie's son).

             It's the really good times that happen that make me kind of pissed that NEITHER of my parents are here anymore. When Dad died, our family was in real turmoil about a few different things. When Mom died, the turmoil was still there only it was compounded by the fact that she was so sick and everyone's lives was filled more with misery than anything else. To be quite honest, the last few years of both of my parent's lives was more conflict than anything.

             There are times that I feel like it's so unfair that Mom & Dad have missed out on so much GOOD that's happened since they've been gone. Angie's life has really taken off...she's finally finished with school and is very happy with her career, husband, and son. My life (while still having its ups and downs) has changed radically from back in the days when they were still around, and my brother Kenny...well, he would be unrecognizeable to my parents now. He's married again with 3 kids....they actually knew Kenny's current wife and really loved her a lot..they would be SO happy that they finally ended up together!

             In a lot of ways, my parents got cheated out of a lot. Yes, they got to see their children grow into adults....Angie was 24 when Dad died, I was 22, and Kenny was 20. But really..even though we were all LEGALLY adults, we were still not REALLY adults back then. None of us had really come into our own at that point in our lives. The 3 of us still pretty much behaved as we had as teenagers...we got along ok with each other, but we didn't really start having good adult relationships until much later. THAT would have impressed my parents the most. That in spite of our rather shabby childhoods, we ended up being close as adults.

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             On a more cheerful note.....

             The refrigerator woes it seems are now over. The frige has now started operating normally again. We'll see if this is a permanent fix, but so far so good. We ended up having to completely defrost the freezer and refrigerator and then plug it back in and PRAY.   

               

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              Tomorrow it's back to work...ugh. I was kind of hoping that the frozen stuff would stick around long enough to at least get me a 2 hour delay in my start time...but alas...it wasn't meant to be. Even though it never got out of the 30s here today, the sun still was able to melt pretty much all evidence of the snow having been here. Only the roofs of some of the houses in the neighborhood have a little snow left. Oh well....

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                By the way....I'm seeing that the link to the snow video I made isn't working very well, so my apologies to those of you who didn't get to see it. I'm still trying to figure out how to upload this stuff into a format for the internet, so bear with me. I'll have it up eventually!


That's all I've got for now....hope everyone has a good week ahead!  
            

It never fails.....
Just when something cool happens, such as North Carolina FINALLY getting measurable snowfall..something crappy happens to offset my good mood! Yes, we got some measurable snow, which is something that happens RARELY around here! So I'm pumped about that of course! It was about an inch or maybe a little less, but it's only going to be about 30 degrees here tomorrow, so it'll stick around for at least a little while...maybe even long enough to get me a late start to work on Monday!

So the crappy thing that happened is that it looks like my refrigerator is dead.
This will be confirmed when the repairman comes out on Tuesday, but since I used to dispatch these repairmen & go over their reports, I'm pretty familiar with the symptoms of a dead frige. What irritates me is that this thing is only five years old...what ever happened to appliances that lasted for 20 years before you even had to THINK about replacing them?? Now MY luck being what it is, I'm sure that the NEXT item to go will be the stove or the dishwasher. More than likely it'll be the dishwasher because I can live without the stove if necessary, but I DESPISE doing dishes by hand. Thankfully, if worse comes to worse and a new refrigerator is required, Chris's mom and dad will take care of that chore with their Home Depot credit card! It's a long story, but the credit card was a 'gift' when the house was bought in case something like this should happen one day!

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Speaking of the snow today....I made a video just for my friends here at Blogstream....and I'm going to attempt to upload it, but I make no guarantees that it's going to work! I'm still getting used to the software that I have to use to upload it, so it may or may not behave as it should! For you newbies that have never seen my stuff on BlogTV, yes...I know I sound like a hick! Here's the link to the video: snow2.sbz

        Well, it's about time! It's finally snowing here in Central North Carolina! Of course, according to the "experts" at our local TV stations, it was supposed to have started earlier this morning...it's 3:15pm now. Oh well....they're RARELY on the mark anyway, but I can take it starting late as long as it sticks around for a while! Once it has covered the ground, I'm going to take Sammy (the ferocious guard poodle) out to play in it...he's only seen snow once or twice in his life, so I'm sure I'll get a kick out of watching his reaction! I would also take Miss Bigglesworth (the cat) out to play in it, but she would freak once her feet got wet! She's such a princess. And yes, of course...yours truly will also play in it for awhile!

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          Poor roomie Chris...he's been "sick" the last few days. I put the word sick in quotations because he made a somewhat miraculous recovery this morning when it was time for him to go to work after having come home early twice last week and staying out all day on Thursday. This resulted in his freaking out when the phone bill came. Hmm...maybe the lack of funds to pay bills is the cure for the common cold?
          Actually, he WAS sick...he sounded like shit and had quite a few episodes of my having to call in the HAZMAT teams after his trips to the bathroom...but he's such a baby when he's sick that it's sometimes hard to tell when he's REALLY feeling better or just milking the attention. At any rate, he seems to be on the mend now.

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          Cindy has learned a valuable lesson. There is a young man about 25 years old that she's known since he was a kid...he's a very talented mechanic and had offered to help Cindy out with some repairs that needed to be done on some of the various pieces of equipment that Kevin had (such as: generator, tiller, lawn mower, & table saw)....naturally, Cindy was grateful and accepted his help. She paid him VERY well for the work he did because he's been struggling with finances lately. Shortly after he finished the work, the guy just sort of disappeared.
          Christmas rolls around and the guy comes back. He'd been really busy with some things going on in his personal life, and asked Cindy if she needed any more mechanical repairs done on anything. Cindy tells him that in fact she DOES need to have a few of her vehicles tuned up. She's got a Blazer, a truck, a PT Cruiser, and a Ford Festiva. The truck and the Festiva belonged to Kevin and she wanted to sell them so she offered this guy quite a sum of money to fix them up good enough to sell. Well, he works on the truck & the PT Cruiser and gets those taken care of. Then he vanishes again.
          Shortly after New Year's, the guy comes back around. Cindy asks him when he's going to finish up the mechanical work on the other vehicles. He tells her that he'll get with her in a week to discuss it. TWO weeks rolls by and he finally comes back....complete with a sad story about his woes of late. So Cindy gives him MORE money and then allows him to take her Blazer back to his house to work on it during the week. She tells him, "call me tomorrow and let me know when it's going to be ready..." He agress and then takes off in her Blazer, leaving his girlfriend's car behind at Cindy's house (he doesn't have a car of his own).
          Three days go by and Cindy doesn't hear a WORD from this guy! Last night she tells me that not only does this guy not have a phone, but she's not 100% sure of exactly WHERE he lives!! Luckily, she gets in touch with the guy's father and he tells Cindy that he'll give his sone the message to call her ASAP. That was last night. This morning I get a call from Cindy...she wants me to go with her to find her Blazer...she'd never gotten that phone call last night!! So we take off for parts unknown...(well sort of) and just as we're about 3 miles from her house, here comes her Blazer past us!
          We almost flip over as Cindy does a U turn in the middle of the road...it seems the guy was "on his way to her house to drop off the Blazer"....yeah right. Anyway, we follow this guy back to Cindy's house...check this out....we see him smoke TWO cigarettes in less than a five minute ride...in HER vehicle!! Cindy doesn't smoke by the way...and she HATES the smell of smoke in her vehicle!! Yes, she was QUITE livid! And VERY disappointed! But she did learn a very valuable lesson. I just hate that she got taken advantage of like that. The guy couldn't really offer a valid excuse for his behavior...but suffice it to say that he won't be working on any more of Cindy's vehicles.

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          That's about all I've got for now! I'm going to go fire up the video camera and get some footage of the snow! God knows it's probably the only snow we'll get here for the next few years!!

Well, I WISH that I could be reporting that I enjoyed my free day off from work due to the enormous amount of snow and/or ice that we got here this morning.....BUT.....

There's no such thing as snow in HELL...which is pretty much what North Carolina is most of the time! I'm so mad I'm not even going to talk about it anymore!!

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I *DID* however have a very nice surprise waiting for me when I got home this evening...a trip that wasn't delayed at all by getting stuck behind a salt truck....

I had a birthday card waiting for me! Yes, I know my birthday was last month, but that's beside the point...you see, the person who sent me the card clearly has ESP and was anticipating that today would really suck so there was a delay in mailing it! It really made my day!

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I saw a report on the news this evening.....it appears that Comrade Bush has come to the conclusion that steps need to be taken to strengthen the enconomy of the United States.

Gee, Comrade Bush.......YA THINK??!!

How about you start with doing something about the gas prices?? Yeah yeah...I know...the U.S. has no control over that. Bullshit. Would anyone care to take a stab at what folks in Venezuela are paying for a gallon of the petro?? Hows about FORTY- SEVEN CENTS A GALLON?! Now..someone PLEASE tell me why it is that if there's such a "concern" over the supply of oil in the world that people in South America are paying forty- seven cents a gallon and we are paying over $3 ?? Actually, that question was redundant...it's because we have a Communist Dictator for a President. That's why.

Yes. I'm in bitch mode about this news report. I hate stupidity, especially when it affects my life.

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Ok, I'm out of bitch mode now.

GOOD NEWS!! I found my new belt that was lost!! As it turns out, there was no vicious belt stealing crook roaming the streets of my little subdivision...in fact, it may have POSSIBLY been MY fault that the belt was lost in the first place. Although I'm still not going to admit that until I'm POSITIVE. Why take full blame for something that may NOT have been ALL my fault?? I mean, there COULD have been someone that broke into my house, stole the belt, and then felt guilty about it. Right? Maybe?

Well. It COULD have happened that way!

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I found out something interesting yesterday......

One of my colleagues was looking up the meanings of everyone's name....

My first name, which I shall not divulge because I *HATE* it means: "strong ruler"
My middle name, which you all know, means: "cowsheds"

What in the HELL is a "cowshed"??!!

Anyway...my desk is right smack in the middle of FIVE women (whom I call hens because they cluck all day long)....so it has been decreed that I am now official ruler.....

...........of the barnyard.

I'm not POSITIVE, but have I just been called a rooster?

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Ok..that's all I've got for now!

            I usually try to give my entries a title that has something to do with the topic for the day added with what day it is....for instance: "Tuesday Tidbits", "Thursday Trials", "Funky Friday", etc. Then it occurred to me that there's nothing that goes good with Wednesday! Oh sure, I've done "Humpday Happenings", but there were a lot of folks who didn't realize that hump day is Wednesday..so it looked like I was referring to something ENTIRELY different! Oddly enough, that post had the highest number of readers that day! So that's why I came up with "Wednesday Wobbles"....

             Yeah, I was really reaching for an opening paragraph, huh?

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             Anyway.....today wasn't too awfully bad. I got a lot of work done, though I'm STILL not where I want to be as far as my production is concerned. It's so frustrating!! At least I do have some regular help now, so that is going to make a HUGE difference in getting things accomplished! I did have a couple of interesting things happen though...

             I called this hospital administrator and ended up having to leave a message for her to call me back to schedule her equipment for maintenance. It was the first time I've had to schedule for this hospital and the type of equipment, so I called the field technician who works on it and he tells me not to worry about doing the scheduling because he's going to take care of it himself. So a little while later I take my morning break and come back to find a voicemail waiting for me...it was the lady I'd left the message for...she was NOT happy! She says, "you need to call me...we need to TALK." You know that tone of voice that your mom or dad used to get just before you got nailed for doing something wrong? Well, that was this lady's tone of voice. The very LAST thing that I wanted to deal with was some bitchy customer...so since the technician is going to handle the order, I just decided not to call this woman back! Yeah yeah...I'm a chicken shit!


             The other thing that happened was something that's actually been repeating itself since last week. This guy from one of the hospitals that I schedule for calls me on my private line (I give it out to customers when I set a schedule) late last week and starts telling me that his equipment keeps shutting down on him. He was talking so fast that it was a good 3 minutes before I could tell him that I don't service the machines, I just do their preventive maintenance scheduling. So he asks me to connect him up with the tech...so I did. I figured (HOPED!) that would be the last I'd hear from him.

             Wrong. He's called me TWICE this week already with the same questions...and then when I tell him I don't know, he asks to speak with the tech! GRRRRRRR!!! Why can't he just call the 800 number instead??!!

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             The mad dash to the grocery stores is ON here in Central North Carolina!! It seems that there is a chance that there may be an opportunity for some "light" freezing rain, sleet, and snow tomorrow morning! The county that I live in has already delayed school until 10am Thursday! When there is even the SLIGHTEST possibility of frozen precipitation in the forecast, everyone goes nuts! Of course, given the fact that our weather is VERY unpredictable I can't blame them too much. Back in January of 2000 we were told for a few days that there was an "OUTSIDE" chance of some "flurries"....and we got TWO FEET of snow overnight!!   The mad dash to the store aside, this type of situation also brings back the Civil War...i.e. the Yankee transplants and the "locals"...each says that the other can't drive in icy conditions. The truth be known, NO ONE can drive very well on ICE!! Personally, I just keep my ass at home when we have bad weather because I don't want to be the knucklehead that is shown on the local news sliding into a ditch or smashing into another car!

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               I got my new glasses today!! They are SO much lighter than my old pair...AND not only that, but I can SEE!! I hadn't realized how bad my old pair had gotten until I put the new ones on!

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                There was a robbery at my house last night. Someone came in and stole a pair of my jeans and my brand new belt!! Of course I'm just kidding...but I bought this belt just last week and already it has vanished into thin air!! I searched this WHOLE house this morning and then again this evening and it's NOWHERE to be found!! Chris told me that he'd seen the belt in a pair of jeans on my bed....but neither the jeans OR the belt was there! I feel SO violated!!

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               That's all I've got for now!!