Yes I am Outdoorsy...

I think I'll be outdoorsy this weekend! :)

Thursday Thirteen - 13 things not to do in the office...

So Really Please Don't:

1. Talk loud on the phone! You're in a cube farm, learn to speak softly - I don't need to know the details of your prostate exam.
2. Eat chips all day, crunch, crunch, crunch.
3. Sleep - dude I can hear you snoring
4. Fart all the time - seriously BEANO due!
5. Bring left over fish for lunch - the whole office reeks of it now - bad choice!
6. Snort when you laugh (unless you are me then it's okay of course!)
7. Play solitaire at your desk - I'm sure you are on a break but when everyone walking buy can see your screen it just doesn't look good.
8. Work through lunch every single day and then act like some kind of martyr cause you didn't get a lunch - YOUR CHOICE
9. Put that extra bounce in your step just because you know those of whose cubes aren't against the wall get bounced like our cube sits on a trampoline. ASSHAT I know you do this on purpose.
10. Openly search for jobs while at work - at least try to hide it a little?
11. Decorate every inch of your cube with Mickey Mouse figures, stuffed animals, and pictures your kids drew and expect the rest of us to laud your professionalism.
12. Leave your personal grooming supplies in the bathroom (hairspray, lotion, etc) and then leave nasty notes that people are using your stuff. Girls - if you leave it on the counter in a public bathroom it's free game, if you don't want to share take it back to your desk!
13. Put your chinese food containers in your desk trash, this will make the entire office smell like chinese food all day. Have the courtesy to walk your empties to the trash in the kitchen so I don't have to smell General Tso's all day.
    

Today is Dragging... (and I'm feeling bitchy)

I had to get up and go outside because the day to day chatter around me was driving me buggy today. Nerds talking about nerdy things - like if web development is better using Java or Ruby (who cares?). And I had some things to drop in a mailbox so I took them and ran. Down the stairs and out the front door I walked to the mailbox and dropped my things in.

On my way back I ran into a co-worker - a perfectly sweet woman who happens to be about twice the normal weight for someone her height. Why do I mention her weight? She was carrying a large McDonald's bag, had a chocolate shake and took the elevator instead of the stairs. She was going to hold it for me but I said "no thanks". I hate myself for judging her - I certainly despise it when people judge me - and they do. I justify this to myself by saying "I eat McD's a few times a year" and from what I have seen she eats it a few times a week, but still - it's really none of my business.

To continue the bitchiness - another two co-workers were outside smoking by the door. Neither of them has any business doing it. One was taken out in an ambulance a few months ago with her face beet red and her heart racing unable to catch a breath. She spent a week in hospital and when she got out she went right back to her nasty habit. The other has chrons disease and from what I've read it is greatly exacerbated by smoking. Is this my business? Not really - their medical issues aren't driving the health insurance up any more than my husband and his $40,000 a year Tysabri infusions I'd guess.

Just bitchy today. Oh and I just tried to call XM radio to get it turned back on in my car (now that they will give it to me for $60 a year instead of $165) and their phone keeps disconnecting me. I tried calling another number to be sure it wasn't my phone, and it's not.

And last but not least - the software program the web geeks were arguing about the best way to develop is one I use every day - ALL DAY and today it's not working.

If I wasn't car pooling I'd go shopping right now and forget this horrid day.

Lazy Sunday...

I had a busy weekend!

Friday - I came home a bit early and mowed the lawn from6pm until dark and got it all done before more rain showed up. Ate some dinner and was in bed by 11:00 or so.

Saturday - I was up at 5:45am and out of the house by 7:00am to go to a judging assignment, wasn't done and out of there until 7:00pm. Had my mom and dad with me and we stopped at Pizza Hut on the way home for some dinner but my stomach wasn't feeling too well. I had salad off the buffet, 2 chicken wings and then couldn't eat the one piece of pizza I tried as I was feeling nauseas which sucked as we were still an hour from home. Thankfully I did make it home before my insides exploded - then I did feel better thankfully. I took a hot bath to soothe my aching legs and along with some tylenol it did help. I went to bed around 11:30 and slept like a log.

Sunday - awake around 8:30. Laying around on the couch surfing until 11 or so. Took a shower. Laid around some more. BBQ'd some chicken drumsticks with Dinosaur BBQ sauce (mmm the best) for lunch. Then around 3:00pm I was so sleepy and I took a NAP! I haven't taken a nap in the longest time - it was fabulous.

Now it's 7pm on Sunday night - the weekend is over. My lazy day has me wanting to do something tonight but alas - hubby is fast asleep on the couch. I think I'll feed the beasties, figure out dinner, maybe do some laundry. The laziness has to end.

Thursday Thirteen - things that are annoying me...

13 things that are annoy the snot out of me:

1. Supposedly smart women who act dumb/ditzy - an account manager at our parent company was on a conference call today and she couldn't spit out a very simple concept in a manner that we could comprehend. Finally I got the gist of what she was saying and had to interpret for the others and she said "Oh yes, that's what I meant" as all the men in the room rolled their eyes and pictured her as a dumb blonde I'm sure. How she got where she is I have no idea.
   
   
2. Crazy internet forwards that tell me every evil thing that has happend in the world since Hitler are due to 17-40 year old muslim extremist men and then go on to say how Revlations (the book of the Bible) says the Antichrist will be a muslim male 17-40 (ummm no it doesn't) and how it also *gasp* talks of a male (17-40 of course) of muslim descent who will lead the world's greatest nation or some such crap. Of course they are talking about Obama. Now I'm not really an Obama supporter but there are certainly enough things to attack in his politics without resorting to calling him a muslim and making up scripture passages to call him the antichrist or something.
   
   
3. Rain every day for a week.
   
   
4. Standing in line at Target over my lunch break - seeing only 2 registers open, people backing up and red shirted people standing around with their thumbs up their asses. Get someone on the registers - what a lousy manager they must have today.
   
   
5. People who don't get references to "Office Space" - excuse me, I believe you have my stapler... come on who doesn't get that? I work in a company of programmers and geeks - it should be a job requirement that they have seen this movie.
   
   
6. Road closures due to flooding adding 20 minutes to my already too long commute (see #3)
   
   
7. Dressing up because there are clients in the office today (that I'm not even meeting with) to find my boss wearing jeans and a polo shirt (and he is meeting with them).
   
   
8. People who slow down to 45mph in a 65mph zone because there is a cop in the median. REALLY?
   
   
9. Having a broken DISHNetwork system, can't connect to one of the satellites for some reason AND having to wait almost 2 weeks for someone to come out to check it after the last time someone was out and didn't fix the problem. Poor Hubby is jonesing for some "Stump the Scwabb" and ESPN is on the satellite we can't connect to.
   
   
10. Gremlins in my computer that do strange things. IT guy who can't fix it. Nuff Said.
    
    
11. Hearing news reports about gas prices declining and not noticing any changes locally. GRRRRRR
    
    
12. Grass that is high enough to count as a hayfield - and far too wet to cut (again see #3)
    
    
13. Coming to the end of a really good book that I wish would go on forever. I just read "The Making of Mia" by Ilana Fox and I loved it - I related so to the heroine and wanted to keep reading about her exploits forever.
    

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Summer will end on August 4th this year...

Why? Because that is the day that my central air conditioning will be installed. Yes, friends I - who live in upstate NY where it really isn't necessary - will have central air installed with my new furnace on August 4th.

This of course means that it will get cold, rainy, wet, and miserable for weeks if not months because I am paying a fortune for cool air in my house mother nature is sure to provide it free of charge.

So I apologize in advance for the rest of your summer sucking. Feel free to blame it on me.

Excuse me ma'am but your insecurity is showing...

I spent most of my life being the insecure girl who hid this by being the class clown, the funny girl, the "leader" even. Because I compensate for my insecurity by acting overly confident and secure most people never guess about the real me inside. Only my close friends know the truth, and even with them I project that secure person most of the time because there is nothing more annoying than a friend who needs constant reassurance that she is worthy of your time.

So I don't act insecure 99% of the time even though I probably feel it about 50% of the time. I'm good at faking it.

Today I started having a mini-meltdown inside (good at hiding remember). My husband sent me an email to call him when I got a chance. So I did, and his phone went right to voice mail. I kept trying for an hour and a half. It. Went. Straight. To. Voicemail. I started to freak inside. Who was he talking to? Why was he on the phone for such a long period of time. Was he talking to a woman? Was he flirting with her?

My rational mind said - it's work related - he's with a user or a vendor and it's no big deal. I kept working between dialing his number every 5 minutes to have it go straight to voice mail. I hung up. Didn't leave even one frantic message. Thankfully my rational mind was right (it usually is), he was on the line with a vendor regarding their virus software and it actually took that long to fix his problem. He called me back as soon as he hung up.

I feel like such a moron for letting something like this get to me for even a minute much less an hour and a half. I wish I could feel secure 99% of the time instead of just faking it half the time. At 38 I don't hold out a lot of hope for major changes in this area though.

*sigh*

TGIF

It's been a long, long, long week for me. I'm ready for the weekend. In fact I'd rather be sitting here right now:
Swinging and enjoying this lovely morning. There is a nice breeze on my porch, those purple flowers smell pretty, the swing is in the shade in the AM so I could even use my laptop easily.

Yes I'd much rather be there than here - which is exactly where I am right now! :-(
8 more hours! Let the weekend begin!

I can't think of a Thursday Thirteen...

So I'm going to ramble and see how many things I get:

1. I can't believe today is only Thursday. I don't want to do another day this week.
   
   
2. Saturday is my nephew's birthday - he will be five! He is having his first kid party and I agreed to take his baby brother (9 months old) so mom and dad could focus on the kids and the party. There is an adult party at 4pm - BBQ for the grandparents, aunts and uncles, should be fun. I still haven't gotten him a gift. Any ideas for a great gift for a 5 year old boy that is ALL BOY?
   
   
3. I am a judge for a certain species of livestock that I'll not name here cause it's a small world and I'd rather not draw too many people who know me here. Anyway I have gotten emergency phone calls to replace another judge this weekend and next who was in a terrible car accident last Friday night on his way to a show in NJ. He is in the ICU and if he survives he has months of intensive therapy to get him back on his feet. It makes me sad - he is my parents age, the nicest guy, he and his wife have no children by choice. Thinking of his wife all alone sitting by his bedside hoping he lives is so sad to me. I fear that kind of situation myself. By taking on these shows for ICU judge I make some extra unplanned money but I hate how I'm making it.
   
   
4. Work is picking up - things are getting busy. RBT is sufficiently humbled and was moved into a cube where everyone walking down the hall can see his screen - no more slacking off for RBT! Thank GOD I am not in such a position.
   
   
5. Car pooling is working out better than I ever imagined. We are alternating days now and it's saving me a ton. Only filling up the tank once a week now - WooHoo. And carpool companion's wife is now set up and approved to have Tysabri at the local hospital - thanks to my hubby getting it pushed through, it was a real help to them.
   
   
6. Hubby seems to have quit smoking for real - he still seems to have the occasional cig - mostly socially like at the lake with friends last weekend. But he can go for days or weeks without one too. I'm proud of him.
   
   
7. I bought hubby a gift to celebrate his success with quitting. It was delivered to the house today. I wish I had it delivered here to work cause he will get home before I do and I told him I had a present coming. Also told him to NOT open the Amazon box until I got home so will drive him nuts for about 2 hours! LOL I got him a new ipod Classic 80 gig to replace his 30 gig ipod Video that hasn't been working well and has crappy battery life. With this new one we will be a 4 ipod household. LOL I need to figure out what to do with the old ones. I think I'll take the video back and use it as a portable hard drive instead. He will be surprised and hopefully happy.
   
   
8. I have a ton of pictures on my camera that I should dump. I also should take all the photos stored from years of digital picture taking off my hard drive and upload them to Picaso. I'm sure my family would enjoy sharing them.
   
   
9. I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel here trying to find 13 things, so I think I'll stop. The Thursday Nine doesn't quite cut it but it's all I got folks.
   

Great Weekend

Started out Friday night with a rep from Sears Home Improvements here to give us a quote on a new furnace and central air conditioning. It came in $2,000 less than the quote from the local place that was currently servicing our furnace and providing our oil. We are switching to a propane system that is 96% efficient versus the max efficiency on an oil furnace is 86%. We signed up on Friday night and then by the time the guy left it was 9pm and we were starving and I was in no mood to cook so we ordered out from a local italian place and I got to have yummy chicken penne a'la vodka!

Saturday we slept in a little (8am or so) and got up - I finished mowing the lawn and then did a load of laundry before taking a shower. Hubby got his shower in and we got ready to go to my friend E's camp. I put on my cute new tankini and matching sarong - yay, hubby crazily dressed in jeans and socks and sneaks - he refuses to do shorts for some bizarre reason. LOL The cleaning lady arrived right as we were ready to leave so I said hi and gave her a few instructions and then we headed out to the beach taking Xavier with us. We sat and talked for awhile once we got there and then hubby and friend G watched TV and chatted in the camper while E and I went down to the beach to sun ourselves (I was covered with SPF30 so not really getting any) and watch her son play in the surf. Then back to the camp for a cookout of bratts and cheddarwurst, kielbasa and kraut, caesar salad and baked beans. We stayed until after 9pm enjoying the company, the fire, the s'mores (I only had one but it was tasty) and fresh strawberries. Got in bed around midnight after a day of fresh air! It was great!

This morning we slept until nearly 10am! And then laid around a bit longer. We had lunch and headed to check out some new entry doors at Lowes and Home Depot comparing prices and figuring out which ones we want to get. Then off to the movies to finally catch the new Indiana Jones flick which wasn't half bad if a bit predictable in places. Came home and had a light dinner and have been vegging watching TV. About to head to bed.

Best part - working from home tomorrow so no need to crawl out of bet ad 6am - can get up around 7:30 or so, take a shower and get working long before my usual start time of 8:30 so I can also cut out a bit early! Taking my mom and dad out to dinner tomorrow night as Saturday was their 40th wedding anniversary.

Haven't had a weekend this relaxing and fun for awhile - either on the go or just to busy to enjoy.

More shameful gloating at the misfortune at others

In a meeting today regarding RBT's former client the new Account Manager had asked RBT to come into the meeting even though the VP (my boss) had not invited him. He just wanted to talk to new AM and me. So after we had a brief convo with RBT my boss says I want you two and points to me and new AM only on the call this afternoon. Then after we all walk out he calls just the two of us back in his office and asks us to close the door. Tells new AM that under no circumstances is RBT to be on that call and that we are working hard to make up for poor service on this account and in fact we will be doing this next reporting project at no additional charge.

RBT screwed this up so badly that we are doing work for free (normal charge for this would have been $5500) to keep from losing a half million dollar account! I want to know how he managed to get transferred and demoted instead of FIRED which is what would happen to most people who fuck up that royally.

Anyway more gleeful jubilation on my part and since I can't exactly gloat around the office, well I will gloat to all you lovely readers.

TT - 13 Things you can't do when your neck is out of whack

Today's Thursday Thirteen is all about me! And how miserable I am since pulling a muscle in my neck and shoulder. So here are Thirteen Things I can't do because my neck is torturing me:

1. Sit comfortably in a chair
2. Turn your head to the right or left
3. Look down at your feet - this one makes me want to scream in pain
4. Shower effectively - hello porcupine legs
5. Dry and style your hair
   
6. Put on Make-up
   
7. Get dressed - pullover shirt was difficult to manage but I got it on
8. Drive a car - hope no one is coming cause I can't really look to the right
9. Walk down stairs - take it slow, don't miss a step
10. Look or act normal in a meeting when you are turning your whole body instead of your neck
11. Enjoy ANYTHING
    
12. Talk on the phone and write or type - trying to hold phone with shoulder - uh not going to happen
13. Smell Good - not because of the shower but because I smell like BenGay! WHAT? it helps!
    

Curiouser and Curiouser

I have read a few articles on problems with the smoking cessation drug Chantix causing suicidal thoughts, today I did a bit more research and found this site: Chantix Side Effects and was amazed to see it can also cause Jekyll and Hyde like behavior. Interesting - my husband is taking Chantix (2 weeks without a cig now) and Friday night my husband was acting like a raving lunatic which is out of character even for him, and now he is acting like a lovesick puppy which is also out of character.

I have to wonder - is it the Chantix? Maybe he doesn't need a higher dose of his mood altering drug? Maybe he just needs to get off the Chantix Crazy Train?

I think I'll keep a close eye on him for more crazy personality swings before I say anything. I definitely don't think he's acting at all suicidal BUT he has been acting somewhat strange for sure.

God Bless my Mother-in-Law!

Ever since she had a talk with her youngest son about his behavior on Friday night her son has been sweet, loving, attentive, affectionate. He has bent over backwards to please me, he has panted after me like a dog in heat. I don't know exactly what she said but it seems to be working.

I believe the gist of it was "Tricia loves you and does everything for you, what would your life be without her? And you think it's okay to talk to her that way? You think you are like your father? You're wrong because he NEVER spoke to me like that, he treated me with respect ALWAYS." At least from the bits she told me I am imagining something like that.

Whatever it is, it worked. For now. And hubby is still a former smoker which is amazing to me.

I'm all a Twitter...

So I have been intrigued by Twitter for awhile having noticed the feed on the side bar of Sheildmaiden96's page. I like that I can send quick updates from my cell phone too (yay text messaging). So if any of you Twitter and want to stalk, I mean follow me the link is here: http://twitter.com/TriciaR

We'll see if I still find it intriguing in a few days/weeks. :)

So we're back...

The trip was okay - long drive on Thursday. Friday we went to his sister's house and the biological mom was there, surprisingly it was pleasant and polite. Unfortunately seeing her must have really put him more on edge than I thought because he turned into stark raving asshole later that day in front of the rest of his family and just turned on me. I normally will not fight back with an audience but he went too far and so I stood up for myself and then stormed off telling him to *shut the fuck up* and his mom, sister and brother-in-law all then lit into him and stuck up for me! (I have the best in-laws) I went to bed because I was exhausted and didn't want to deal with any more that night. His mom told him to come in and make things right - instead he came in and made things worse, even used the "D" word to which I replied - "good, I don't NEED you, I'm here because I want to be but if you keep this up I won't want to be anymore since all you are is more work!"

We "made-up" in the morning but his family was still really upset about how he acted and his mom had a few more talks with him about his behavior. The next day at our nieces graduation his mom told her cousin about his behavior because she works in a neurologists office and deals with MS patients daily. The cousin came to me and told me it's time to up his "mood altering" drugs and that I should call the doctor and request this. But that wouldn't fly - I may talk to him about that before his next appointment as I do think he might need a higher dose now that he's adapted.

The rest of the weekend he sucked up - royally sucked up - so he knows his behavior was atrocious. He even suggested we stop at the outlet mall on the way home so I could buy new shoes? I think the heat was getting to him. I took him up on it and got 2 very cute pair of sandals at the Bass Shoe Outlet for 60% off! WooHoo! Before we left his sister's husband told me in front of him that if he started acting up again I should hit him upside the head, that fear is almost as good as respect! LOL

Back to work and TIRED, but overall things aren't too bad in my little corner of the world.

And we're off...

Well as soon as I get a shower, finish packing and hubby manages to get out of bed. :) We will be on the road no later than 8am heading for OHIO. Hoping tomorrow goes smoothly, not looking forward to camping in an empty house and sleeping on the floor/air mattress. But it should be a good trip. Hoping that spending 3 nights and days with the chain smokers doesn't set back hubby's quitting - he's heading for a week with no cig right now.

I won't be around to blog, or read blogs, or surf the internet for 4 whole days - Happy 4th everyone since I won't see you.

RBT strikes again

He was asked to do a simple report to test some processing that he was working on and he blew it out of proportion into this huge project and the processing if it is said HUGE project falls on me to manage. But it is not a huge project, it is just simple processing that he can do himself and he blew this WAY out of proportion. So I now have senior managers and my boss the VP involved when it totally was not necessary.

Luckily the one who looks bad in all of this? Why RBT of course! Kharma Train - Woo Woo! ;-)