08 January 2012
It's My Birthday But People Are Nuts
08/01/12 12:30
Let’s see Tuesday was my birthday. I’m 51 now. I celebrated by going back to work. But wait it gets better. That morning one of my co workers printed out a bunch of letters. He walked over to the printer, which is a few feet from my desk. “Dang it.” he said “I put 2011 on all of them.” I looked over and replied, “Don’t feel bad. I still occasionally put 19-something on mine.” He smiled and said “Yeah, but you’re old.”
Oh great, thanks a bunch.
Speaking of ancient history though, this week the University of Oregon won the Rose Bowl, something they haven’t done in around a century. They accomplished this despite having the absolutely worst, most butt-ugly uniforms in all of sports. The uniforms that Sports Illustrated held up as the worst in all College Football. As one commentator said: At least the old Oregon uniforms made them look like football players, not something out of Tron. I figured that Wisconsin might have been missing tackles because they were worried that the Oregon uniforms were made of toxic waste. Regardless though, they are the Champions. The U of O can hold it’s head up high now.
Just change clothes first.
On Wednesday I was reminded once again that people are crazy. For my birthday Marsha got me a Tim Horton’s gift card. It’s really wonderful because every once in a while I’ll stop and get a hot chocolate on my way to work. Well, on Tuesday I stopped and ran inside. There were only a few people in the place and nobody was in line so it took about three minutes for me to get my cocoa and be back in the car heading out on the road. I noticed though, that the line for the drive through snaked all the way around the building. There must have been over a dozen cars in line. Now let’s assume that the drive through can serve customers twice as fast as the inside staff can. There’s no reason to assume that, I’m just being generous. Then at a minute and a half per customer that meant that the car that entered the drive through line just as I walked in would not leave for just shy of 20 minutes. All that wasted time, wasted gas, and frustration for the sake of not getting out of the car and walking 40 feet.
Like I said, people are nuts.
This week Marsha got some extra shifts at the Superstore. Stop and think about this for a minute. They dropped Marsha’s, and everyone else’s, hours over Christmas when the store was busy and the shelves needed restocking. Now that January is here and the number of shoppers is way down, because they’re paying off the bills from shopping at stores that DID have stuff of the shelves, they’ve brought everyone back to their old schedules and in some cases above their normal hours. See why I held them up as being a bunch of MBA dropouts a few weeks ago? They’re nuts. Anyway it’s nice for Marsha to get the extra shifts. Unfortunately they were 11:00pm to 4:00am. This meant that for most of the week she would go to bed about the time I got home from work, get up at 10:00 to get ready and leave for work while I was still asleep. I’d get up, get ready, and depart for work about the time she came home. I didn’t see too much of Marsha this week. No wild parties or anything like that. Mostly in the evenings I went downstairs, and watched movies, My Neighbors the Yamada’s, My Neighbor Totoro, Gods and Generals, and Ponyo. It was fun but really quiet. I did get to make my all time favourite pizza though. Black Olive, Mushroom, Onion, Bell Pepper, Pineapple, and extra cheese. Marsha can’t stand about half of those toppings so I don’t make it often. But as she was asleep there wasn’t much she could do about it. Friday Marsha didn’t have to work but much to my surprise when I got home she was in bed again. Turns out that afternoon she tripped on the stairs and was on the heating pad and popping lots of aspirin so she wouldn’t hurt all over on Saturday. We still were hoping to go out for out for lunch Saturday to celebrate.
Not that out was that great mind you. The weather this week has been absolutely horrendous. We got between 100 and 200mm of rain over just a couple of days. That’s something like 4 to 8 inches for those of you still using the Queens measure. It POURED.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/01/04/bc-weather-ferries-highways.html
Of course this meant that we had to go out every few hours and sweep the accumulated water out of the garage. The fixes we put in a month ago have helped but haven’t resolved the problem. Fortunately, between our two schedules this week, one or the other of us has been up anyway every few hours so we had no problem staying ahead of the flow. At least the garage floor is really clean now.
By Saturday things had settled down a bit. We went out to lunch at Milano’s, a great Italian place. The server was a real character, the food was great and when we commented on the birthday celebration in the next booth she brought us each a birthday sundae with a lit sparkler in it. It was a great surprise and a nice way to end a crazy week.
So what’s on tap for next week? Well, Monday is Marsha’s birthday which we will celebrate by making the first payment on the CIVIC. Oh goody. : |
We’ll keep making plans for spring, figuring out what we want to plant, and how to make the stuff that’s already here healthier. I also am designing something to once and for all stop the flood in the garage, but I have to wait until its warmer and drier to install it. Marsha starts her training for Block next weekend. They're holding the first session right here in Lantzville. This is less likely something they are doing to be nice to Marsha as much as it’s because Costin Hall is cheap. Regardless, she’s looking forward to getting her ‘other job’ going for this year.
Other than that we’re just hunkering down and counting the days. As of right now it’s 73 days until the warm days of spring. Of course it’s 173 in Minnesota and 11:43 in Newfoundland.
Now there’s something to hang onto.
It was a beautiful day at the beach
The birds were enjoying the warm sun
People were frolicking on the beach in the pleasant breeze
And the sea itself was calm and glassy smooth
Oh great, thanks a bunch.
Speaking of ancient history though, this week the University of Oregon won the Rose Bowl, something they haven’t done in around a century. They accomplished this despite having the absolutely worst, most butt-ugly uniforms in all of sports. The uniforms that Sports Illustrated held up as the worst in all College Football. As one commentator said: At least the old Oregon uniforms made them look like football players, not something out of Tron. I figured that Wisconsin might have been missing tackles because they were worried that the Oregon uniforms were made of toxic waste. Regardless though, they are the Champions. The U of O can hold it’s head up high now.
Just change clothes first.
On Wednesday I was reminded once again that people are crazy. For my birthday Marsha got me a Tim Horton’s gift card. It’s really wonderful because every once in a while I’ll stop and get a hot chocolate on my way to work. Well, on Tuesday I stopped and ran inside. There were only a few people in the place and nobody was in line so it took about three minutes for me to get my cocoa and be back in the car heading out on the road. I noticed though, that the line for the drive through snaked all the way around the building. There must have been over a dozen cars in line. Now let’s assume that the drive through can serve customers twice as fast as the inside staff can. There’s no reason to assume that, I’m just being generous. Then at a minute and a half per customer that meant that the car that entered the drive through line just as I walked in would not leave for just shy of 20 minutes. All that wasted time, wasted gas, and frustration for the sake of not getting out of the car and walking 40 feet.
Like I said, people are nuts.
This week Marsha got some extra shifts at the Superstore. Stop and think about this for a minute. They dropped Marsha’s, and everyone else’s, hours over Christmas when the store was busy and the shelves needed restocking. Now that January is here and the number of shoppers is way down, because they’re paying off the bills from shopping at stores that DID have stuff of the shelves, they’ve brought everyone back to their old schedules and in some cases above their normal hours. See why I held them up as being a bunch of MBA dropouts a few weeks ago? They’re nuts. Anyway it’s nice for Marsha to get the extra shifts. Unfortunately they were 11:00pm to 4:00am. This meant that for most of the week she would go to bed about the time I got home from work, get up at 10:00 to get ready and leave for work while I was still asleep. I’d get up, get ready, and depart for work about the time she came home. I didn’t see too much of Marsha this week. No wild parties or anything like that. Mostly in the evenings I went downstairs, and watched movies, My Neighbors the Yamada’s, My Neighbor Totoro, Gods and Generals, and Ponyo. It was fun but really quiet. I did get to make my all time favourite pizza though. Black Olive, Mushroom, Onion, Bell Pepper, Pineapple, and extra cheese. Marsha can’t stand about half of those toppings so I don’t make it often. But as she was asleep there wasn’t much she could do about it. Friday Marsha didn’t have to work but much to my surprise when I got home she was in bed again. Turns out that afternoon she tripped on the stairs and was on the heating pad and popping lots of aspirin so she wouldn’t hurt all over on Saturday. We still were hoping to go out for out for lunch Saturday to celebrate.
Not that out was that great mind you. The weather this week has been absolutely horrendous. We got between 100 and 200mm of rain over just a couple of days. That’s something like 4 to 8 inches for those of you still using the Queens measure. It POURED.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/01/04/bc-weather-ferries-highways.html
Of course this meant that we had to go out every few hours and sweep the accumulated water out of the garage. The fixes we put in a month ago have helped but haven’t resolved the problem. Fortunately, between our two schedules this week, one or the other of us has been up anyway every few hours so we had no problem staying ahead of the flow. At least the garage floor is really clean now.
By Saturday things had settled down a bit. We went out to lunch at Milano’s, a great Italian place. The server was a real character, the food was great and when we commented on the birthday celebration in the next booth she brought us each a birthday sundae with a lit sparkler in it. It was a great surprise and a nice way to end a crazy week.
So what’s on tap for next week? Well, Monday is Marsha’s birthday which we will celebrate by making the first payment on the CIVIC. Oh goody. : |
We’ll keep making plans for spring, figuring out what we want to plant, and how to make the stuff that’s already here healthier. I also am designing something to once and for all stop the flood in the garage, but I have to wait until its warmer and drier to install it. Marsha starts her training for Block next weekend. They're holding the first session right here in Lantzville. This is less likely something they are doing to be nice to Marsha as much as it’s because Costin Hall is cheap. Regardless, she’s looking forward to getting her ‘other job’ going for this year.
Other than that we’re just hunkering down and counting the days. As of right now it’s 73 days until the warm days of spring. Of course it’s 173 in Minnesota and 11:43 in Newfoundland.
Now there’s something to hang onto.
It was a beautiful day at the beach
The birds were enjoying the warm sun
People were frolicking on the beach in the pleasant breeze
And the sea itself was calm and glassy smooth