Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Another good thing, at age 50 McDonald's will sell me a senior coffee.

January 29, 2013

For those of you who do not know how it feels to turn 48, it is kinda rough.  No longer can anyone include me in the demographic group, "mid to late forties".  Now, I am just in my late forties.  This winter is kicking my late forties body.  I am tired and sore.  My brain is fatigued.  When you throw in overnight shifts, 6am shifts, and 6 day work weeks, you get tired.  Add in cold temps and I am ready to retire someplace warm.

However, I am using this morning to plan my attitude adjustment.  This begins by being thankful for a couple things:

1.  The pain from the pinch nerve in my shoulder has subsided to a discomfort.  Since it had escalated last week to a pain I would not wish on my enemies, discomfort should be appreciated.

2.  My brother-in-law Greg had his kidney removed yesterday.  He is doing fine.  He had cancer in the kidney and this was the solution.  Thus, I need to realize that my life's issues pale in comparison to his and thank God for helping Greg through the procedure and upcoming recovery.

3.  My sister, Kathy, commented on my blog.  It was like a celebrity drive by.  Sure she still called me an a-hole, but it was said with love.

4.  CJ and his girlfriend are doing well and really seem to enjoy each other's company.  For those of you looking for a relationship, shouldn't that be the number one priority?

5.  I missed out on a store manager opening.  Thankful?  Absolutely.  It was in Middletown, Ohio which would have been an even longer drive than I am making now.  God has different plans for me, so patience must be my virtue.

6.  I have not gotten the flu and neither have Beth or CJ.  I think we are on the back-end of the flu season, so here's hoping we have missed out.  I see a lot of sick, miserable people every day, so not being one of them is a good thing.

7.  We are at the end of January which takes us closer to the end of Winter.  Spring, and the promise it brings, is my favorite time of the year. 

Okay, I am starting to feel better about the rest of this week.  We have some good plans for the weekend and I am off work.  CJ has already asked his girlfriend to the dance on February 9th, so we don't have to bug him about that.  His grades are good and his DDR skills are wicked awesome.  He has been practicing which keeps him in shape and gives him something to do in the end of year talent show.  Remind me to get a video.

In order to accommodate those looking for a little humor, her is a story to wrap things up. 

Beth works with a woman who grew up as an only child and now has three kids of her own.  (No, grammar police, not baby goats, children)  This woman has been accused of trying too hard to raise her pups as three "only children" as opposed to a flock of kittens.  Not following?  Here is an example from last night.  The mother hen called Beth last night because she has heard the criticism and has embraced it as a possibility.  She knew what she was doing last night was an example and wanted to share the humor in it with Beth.  It was dinner time and she was feeding the goslings.  On the stove she had three pots going, each with a different kind of soup since each calf wanted something different for dinner.  For those of you with multiple ponies, is that what you do?  Probably not.  Just imagine if this mom had more than three chicks to feed.  Good Lord!  She'd have to buy more pots.  Or just some pot. 

Have a great week everyone.  I know I am going to.

Friday, January 18, 2013

He did write the songs that made the whole world cry

January 18, 2013

Happy Birthday Sis!!

I am trying to remember if I have ever used my sister's name on this blog, but I am guessing not.  I try not to use any one's real name for fear that the public will want so badly to meet these people that there will be stalking and such.  My sister's life has been chronicled as being way glamorous on this blog, so her identity is to remain hidden.

So I have tried to remember a good story about my sister, but the best I could decide on, was this one.

There was a time when she and I would be home by ourselves while my parents were at work and my brother was off at college or doing something...can't remember.  So she and I were about 13 and 17ish.  I used to go about the house tormenting her with Bob Seger songs while she blasted Barry Manilow.  No, her being a Maniloonie is not the story.  Should be, but not.

One day she caught me by surprise with a well-timed line.  I was belting out the lyrics, "Call me a rebel, call me what you will..."; and she had the nerve to interrupt with, "Okay, you're an asshole."   !!!

Respect.

Happy Birthday.  I hope your family is spoiling you rotten today.

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

He might have also downloaded Fireworks.

January 16, 2012

I have a couple of quick hits for you today.  I have a pinched nerve in my neck/shoulder area so I need to get to icing, pain relieving, and resting.  Blogging does not equal resting.  Video games?  Probably not resting either.  If you have a good suggestion for the pain relief part, please let me know.

News alert number one:  CJ had his first kiss.  Since this blog is intended to be an account of his/our lives and can serve as a historical reference some day, I am documenting his private matters for public awareness.  It's like a secret public diary.  Therefore, when he is showing his kids all about his first love and life as a teenager, he can know for certain that January 5, 2013 was the day he downloaded Katy Perry's song, I Kissed a Girl, off of Itunes.  I think he liked it.  Yes, he kissed and told, but I think it is okay in this case. 

They are such an adorable couple and I hope to not see that fateful break-up day anytime soon.  It is perfect-innocent dating.  They are both nice kids who enjoy each other's company and are not looking to become players.  Remember those days for yourself?  For some of us, that was kindergarten.  High school was never like that for me.  Not because I was a player in high school, but because I was way awkward in high school.  Thank goodness my father did not have a blog.

The other bit of "news" is really a cute story from last night at The CVS.  A youngster around nine or ten years old came into the store to buy a couple things for his mom who was in the car with the flu.  He needed mechanical pencils and cole slaw.  I helped him find the pencils but was not able to fill his cole slaw request.  I did find it to be an odd combination, but I have heard far stranger.

I recommended Kroger for cole slaw, he purchased his pencils, and left the store.  Seconds later he came back into the store and requested help in finding...LYSOL.  Aaaaah.  That makes more sense.  Cute.

Tuesday, January 15, 2013

The Big Yellow One is the Sun

January 15, 2013

First things first, Happy Birthday to Beth's dad.  His birthday was yesterday.  He contributed the "C" in CJ.  After CJ was born, he became "harlie".  He died several years ago, but I know Beth was thinking of him a lot yesterday and he was looking down over us.

We celebrated his birthday last night by watching some of the shows we had on DVR.  We watch the typical dramas people our age watch like NCIS, The Mentalist, Beckett (Castle), Glee (what?), and Revenge to name a few.  No shortage of excitement around our house.  We usually top off the fun with one or both of us falling asleep on the couch.  The police are rarely called to our house for a noise complaint.

So last night we watched a couple of shows and it started to get late.  I think it was 8:00.  To be fair, I had gotten up at 4:45 and probably woke Beth up whilst I prepped for work, so we had been awake for a goodly many of hours.  Anyway, I noticed that last night was Beth's turn to fall asleep on the couch first.  She will try to tell you that she knows whodunit on The Mentalist, but she really has no idea that Lisbon shot that evil Volker guy. 

As she dozed I searched for live shows to keep me entertained and awake until at least 9:30.  Tough task.  We do have a television in our bedroom, but I don't like to crawl under those covers until the bed is warmed up.  We accomplish this by having an electric blanket under our mattress pad.  I had turned it on around 6:00 so I figured it would be good and toasty under the covers by 9:30.  Nothing says suck fest much like crawling onto some icy sheets.  We don't leave the electric blanket on all night though, for those of you thinking of trying this, because when we have done that we have dreamt about being the filling in a Hot Pocket.  Lava hot in the middle, I'm saying.  CJ would have discovered us well-done on the underside come morning.

So I watched, and was entertained by Big Bang Theory for 30 minutes.  So far so good.  Then I started on 2 Broke Girls.  I have been amused by this show before, and the one actress has nice legs, so I though it might do the trick; but sometimes the crude humor and bad acting are too hard to overcome.  Last night was one of those nights.  So I turned it off and got up to prep for bed.  Beth woke up and was still a bit dozy.  "Third Rock from the Sun over?", she said.  ?!?!  Yes, 12 years ago.

How weird is the human brain?  Or, how weird is it that our couch is a time-machine and I had no idea?  Beth had traveled back to the late 90s.  I just looked it up and saw that the show ran from 1996-2001.  In reality, I would have guessed the show to have aired in the early 1990s, but it was more "recent" than I thought. Still. I don't think Beth has seen it on television lately.  I don't think it airs on Nick at Night. 

What caused her brain to think of that show I wonder?  I don't think she ever even watched it when it did air.  Wow.

Here are a couple quick updates from 2013.  CJ has started playing in a jazz ensemble two Sundays per month.  Stay tuned for performance dates.  He liked the first rehearsal and is playing drum set. 

I do not have my own store yet and am still driving 45 minutes to work, but I do still like my job.  And there are still plenty of sick people to keep CVS in business.  None of us are sick, so hopefully we can stay that way.  I hope life finds all of you well.  January is half over for those of you looking forward to Spring.  We can do this.

Tuesday, January 1, 2013

Happy New Year!

January 1, 2013

I have not posted in a while, but today seemed like the right day to get back to it.  However, I have had to wait for Beth to get off the computer this morning as she has been staring at the screen as if she still believes the Mayans are going to push her over the fiscal cliff.  Not sure what is going on, but if I had to guess, she is obsessing over our taxes.  She does that every January...and February...and March...and October.  Every month except July I think. 

I will be going shopping in a bit when CJ gets home from sleeping over at Christian's house.  He was told to be home at 10:30, but has conveniently forgotten it seems since it is now 10:45.  I will be shopping for an employee at work.  Please say a prayer for him as the house he rents burned yesterday leaving him homeless and without his dog.  All he ended up with were the clothes on his back and some slippers.  Unfortunately, he wears size 13 shoes and 34x34 pants so I don't have any old clothes for him here.  Buying him some new clothes seems like the least I could do.  Sucks when bad things happen.

On a lighter note, the reason I cannot lend him pants is that I wear a size 34x30.  He is much taller than I.  I used to be 5'10" but am now 5'9".  Bummer.  However, my boss is even shorter as he goes about 5'6".  I noticed yesterday while we were working on our truck that his box cutter was much larger than mine.  I told him I read somewhere that box cutter size is inversely correlated to manhood size.  He responded by saying that he has heard that box cutter size is directly correlated with the size of someone's raise.  Bummer again.

Another piece of actual good news is that we are now covered for insurance.  One thing to consider when changing jobs is insurance coverage.  My CVS insurance did not go into affect until the first of the month following my 90 day anniversary.  I started September 10th so we have had to wait until today for coverage.  Thank God we had no need for insurance as we waded through the abyss.  Hopefully, we continue to not need to insurance for anything besides dental checkups, flu shots, and Beth's Valium prescription.  She returns to work tomorrow and may need a refill.

Finally, for those of you wondering, things are still going great for CJ.  He had a good Christmas.  He got accessories he needed for his computer (cooling fan, mouse, Itunes card) and successfully executed his first girlfriend gift exchange.  He may not have enjoyed shopping at Ulta with mom for nail polish, but he did enjoy the fact that his girlfriend liked the present.  She also had a sleepover at her friends house last night.  As her dad brought CJ home to our house on the way to taking his daughter to her friend's house, he asked CJ if he was going to the same party.  CJ told him no since boy/girl sleepovers at their age are not typically condoned.  Her dad surprised him by saying that he did not think they were a bad thing.  Huh?  I am wondering if he also thinks that getting their drink on would be an acceptable plan.  Hopefully not. 

For now, I am going to assume that CJ heard him wrong.  CJ certainly knows better than to ask me if he can have his 14 year-old girlfriend over for a sleepover.  Good grief.