Sunday, February 28, 2010

TGIMITF!

Thank God I Made It Through Friday!

Last week was not one of my better weeks. I missed almost a half of a week of work due to a bug that got a hold of me hard. I should own some stock in Puffs Plus (thank heavens for that lotion!) but I made it through. I was taking one day at a time to try to make it to the weekend.

Friday finally came and with it came another freakin' blizzard.

I could live the rest of my life without ever getting in another car. I do what I have to do but I don't have to like it. Let me tell you, I am liking it even less in bad weather. I drove white knuckled all the way to work on Friday and that was just during the middle of the blizzard. It continued to snow all day long.

Well, I made it to work, a little late, but I made it. All the way there, I could only think that I was going to have to do it again at the end of the day. Holy crap, how was I going to get home?

Then it hit me. Why do I have to go home? I took a hot pocket to work with me for lunch. There are four boxes of Wheat Thins as well as some Pop Tarts in the snack cupboard (hey, we LIKE our afternoon snacks!), I had three bottles of Diet Pepsi in the fridge and there was more tea than I could possibly drink. I had my book and I had an Internet connection. For real, why would I have to go home? I could just spend the weekend at the office and just be the first one at work on Monday.

Who needs clean underwear or a toothbrush? For real!

My brother, I mean my boss, came through for me. He gave me a ride home Friday so I could have my eyes closed for most of the ride home and just pretend I was anywhere but in a car. Thanks, my brother!

Ron and I grabbed a couple of shovels this afternoon and headed out to break my car out of what I expected was a snow pile. While the snow plow driver did plow the parking lot around my car, once we got my car brushed off, I was able to get out of the spot without shoveling. Bonus!

So, I made it through Friday and now I'm getting ready to start it all over again. I'm finally feeling like a human being so things are definitely looking up!

I can't wait until I start bitching that it's too hot out there!

Sunday, February 21, 2010

So, What's New?

I came down with something Thursday night. I had a horrible night and Friday was no better.

I got up Saturday feeling a little better, but still nothing to write home about. The weather finally had warmed up a little bit, so Ron and I went out to get a little taste of over freezing temperatures. We headed to one of our favorite spots, Lakeview Park.

As you can see from these pictures,


the weather finally felt a lot better than it looked. The sun was shining bright, and while the snow and the frozen lake is still a good reminder that we are still in winter, it was a good day to be outside for a change. We took our little ride and then came home to rest up.

About a month ago, our neighbor sold us a couple of tickets to a benefit dinner being held for a friend of his. The man had passed away from cancer leaving a wife and small children behind. Never ones to say no to a good cause, Ron and I scooped up a couple of tickets and decided last night to at least go for the dinner since we paid for it already.

We went in and walked around a little looking at the prizes for the Chinese auction. Hey, I am a sucker for a good Chinese auction!! Since I've never had a mani-pedi in my life, I put a BUNCH of tickets in on that one! One ticket went into the Harley Davidson lamp with promises from Ron that we wouldn't to display it in the living room, a basket of chocolate, some jewelry (that I never wear!) and assorted other stuff. They had a good array of gifts and I thought I placed my tickets wisely. So far, I haven't heard anything, so I am assuming I didn't win anything. Oh well, it was fun to play!

The tables were all set for eight people. We chose a table that already had a couple seated, who were around our age, maybe a little older. They said that another couple was with them, but we were welcome to join as well. I gotta tell you, we picked a great table! By the end of the night, we had eight people at our table and we had a ball!

The food was fantastic (luckily my stomach calmed down by now and I totally got to enjoy dinner) with some pulled pork, lemon chicken, ravioli with meatballs, Italian wedding soup, rice and beans, pasta salad, tossed salad, scalloped potatoes and I'm sure a bunch of other things I just can't remember now. Everything was truly delicious and made by friends of the family. There are some great cooks in this town!

A DJ was playing and people were up dancing and having a good time. Our ticket into the festivities got you four drinks as well from the bar. I'm telling you, we got our money's worth and I sure hope they made some money off of this benefit. They did a great job putting it together, for sure.

Unfortunately, you know you're old when I finally said to Ron "we need to go, it's getting too loud in here for me!" Yeah, I'm getting old.

We came home, my ears were ringing and I had lost my voice again from trying to talk to the people at our table and be heard about the noise of the DJ. Loud is one thing but this was crazy loud.

Maybe I over did it a bit by going last night, since I feel good for nothing today. So, I am planning a nice lazy day today. I've already thrown a bunch of stuff in the crock pot that we're going to call dinner and I'm staying in my jammies today.

It's been a pretty good weekend. Now a day of rest and we start all over again tomorrow.

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

He Does Have A Mean Streak

If anyone knows Ron, you know he is my exact opposite.

For as over the top, gregarious, loud and obnoxious as I am, Ron is everything but. He is so laid back, so calm, the glass is always half full kinda guy. Like I said, my total opposite. While I am ready to fly off of a handle, he is like whatever. So, that is Ron's temperament, in a nutshell. Most days, he keeps me sane, and probably out of trouble.

A little background. Ron is in the computer service industry. For one of his customers, he's on call 24/7. He's gotten called out of the house in the middle of the night more than once.

The company he works for is based out of California. There are other guys that also have accounts that have 24/7 coverage. So, between five or six guys in the company, nationwide, they take turns being on call for the whole company for after hours calls.

Once the corporate office shuts down at 5:00 pm Pacific time, their calls roll over to their answering service. If a call comes in, the answering service will route it to the person on call to triage the call. When Ron has been on corporate on call, Ron has been known to talk someone through a repair right over the phone. Other times, he will just schedule their local rep to be on site during business hours. And, for certain customers that need immediate assistance, he will push the call up the ladder with his company to get the appropriate person out of bed and on to the road.

When the corporate office turns the phones over to the answering service at 5:00 pm California time which is 8:00 pm Ohio time, you can almost set your clock on the week that Ron is on corporate on call that a phone call will come in from the answering service every night just to remind Ron that he is on call for the overnight hours. Yeah, no kidding, he got the memo.

I mean c'mon. Maybe a phone call on the night that you start on call just to remind you in case you didn't look at the schedule, but every night for a week??

The last on call week Ron had he was feeling a little punk one night. Shortly after dinner, he just went to bed. I was sitting in the office upstairs just before 8:00 when I actually thought about going into the bedroom and confiscating his phone so it wouldn't wake him up when it rang at 8:00. But, i didn't. Right on time, the phone rang, Ron answered it and just went off on the poor operator! I heard him yelling from out here!

How dare they call him so late! Didn't they realize that not everyone lives in California? He is in Ohio for crying out loud and it is LATE here! Now, remember, it was only 8:00 pm here! But, being woken out of a sound sleep, poor Ron was in the middle of his night. The operator must have thought he was nuts, but he apologized and hung up.

When Ron shook the cobwebs out of his head a little later that night, he realized what time it was even though his body felt it was the middle of the night. A case of regret washed over him and he just felt terrible.

He notified his corporate office about what happened, so if they got a complaint on him, he told corporate he deserved it. He was just not feeling well and he was out of it.

So, what happened for our mild tempered guy? The answering service changed their ways!! When he is on call now, they call him at 6:00 pm OUR time! They are not even on the clock yet in California, but they call him at 6:00 to remind him that he's on call.

Yeah, he doesn't get riled very often, but when he does, you remember it!! And you listen! I wanna grow up to be like him!

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Here I Am!

Remember, my world has changed considerable lately! Being back to work finally, I am having a little trouble keeping up with everything and one of the things that has fallen through the cracks is blogging.

I will try to do better, but no guarantees!

For real, how do people do it? Up and at 'em to work every day, then come home and keep up with a house and still keep in touch with all the family and friends. Dang, it's hard working for a living! I don't know how I used to do it before, especially with all of the travel on top of that. I keep telling myself I'm just out of practice and that it will come easier. Yeah, I'm ready for that easier part. Any day now.

So, what have we been up to? I do have a few happenings in my life that I thought were blog worthy. Here is one of them to try to get me back to real time.

A few weekends ago, our part of Ohio got dumped on. Phil was smart enough to get out of Dodge and go visit Erie for a week, right before the snow hit. That left Ron and I here. Personally, it wouldn't have bothered me in the least to be snowed in at the house for awhile. We had just been to the grocery store the night before so we were stocked on real food and snacks. We also had stocked up on beer and tequila so honestly, what did we need to leave the house for? Ron being the practical one reminded me that he is always on call and has to be ready to be somewhere within two hours so it might be a good idea to get dug out. Phht, I said. I didn't have to be anywhere in two hours! But, I was a trooper and decided to help him in spite of my reluctance. What a mistake.

We do have our riding lawn mower that has the plow attachment, but this snow was so deep and so heavy, there was only so much that poor plow could do. Plus, the plow was in the garage, which meant we had to get my car out of the garage to get the plow out. With a three foot drift in front of the garage, there was some serious shoveling to be done before we could even think about using the plow.

Ron started at the garage and I went down the driveway about 10 feet. We both started to shovel until we met in the middle. Finally, making enough room to back my car out and get the plow out, Ron jumped on the plow and got started while I kept up with the shovel working on the small stuff like our front porch. When he was almost done, we decided it was about time that I learned how to plow some snow. Just like cutting the grass, there were a few screams from me along with my fair share of giggles while I was driving. This time though, the snow drifts were so high, I think the neighbors didn't get a good line of sight to enjoy a good show. I was a little freer this time with my hooting and hollering!

Even with wheel weights and snow chains on the plow, I got the plow stuck a few times trying to push snow farther back to make room for more snow. Ron told me to use my own weight, and jump up and down on the seat to work myself out. If nothing else, I follow directions well! I bounced up and down for all I was worth. Yes, the neighbors really missed a good show!

It took us all afternoon, but we finally had the driveway dug out and Ron was able to get his van out of his parking spot. What a mess. Of course, since my acupuncture, I'm feeling better, so I totally over did it. My shoulders hurt so freakin' bad that I couldn't lift my arms at all for over a week. Even trying to raise a cup of coffee to my mouth was too much. It was a miserable week. But, I had to do what I had to do.

I know this is Ohio and I know this is winter time and I know my dream home is in Montana, but I'm telling you, I'm done with snow this year. I am struggling with the dichotomy of wanting to be in Montana and wanting to be done with snow!

So here is my return to blogging after a short absence. A story like everyone else has a story about too damn much snow. But, I do have more stories in me about more than just snow. I just need to make myself sit here and type them out.

I got a doozy coming up about Ron! Stay tuned!