It's Electric

Tomorrow is December 1st and I will be assuming my new job duties officially at work. Although that may be the case, I'm still helping the guy who is taking over my caseload with somethings which will probably last at least for the next two weeks....AT LEAST. It's difficult to simply let a job like mine change hands. There's alot of details to deal with, ones in which the new guy, which has the same first name as me by the way, doesn't know. He's only been on the job for a couple of months. Anyway, I feel like I need to support him for a bit longer, though I've given him most everything to do. Anyway, today it felt the the whole world turned upsidedown and there is so much to get done. Not to mention I am already getting the work for my new position.

Wintery weather is on its way to our area. I think we're going to miss most of it, but it would be nice to wake up to snow. This weekend brings a play and a party for Ragged and I. And, I did learn the Electric Slide, so I'll be tripping the light fantastic on Saturday night.

UPS Can Suck It

Do companies even bother trying to have employees provide good customer service? I think not. My most recent encounter with inhospitable service employees came at the shipping giant UPS. Today, I found a note on the door showing that UPS had attempted to deliver something to our house and of course we weren't home because (hello) we work. So, I drove out to their local office in an attempt to pick it up instead. First of all, there was no parking and no obvious entrance into the place. Secondly, after telling the girl why I was there, she asked if I had called and told anyone that I would be coming. Her tone was laced with annoyance and hostility. I said no,but what I wanted to say is, no, I didn't have 45 mintues to be on the phone while I go through your 800 number and listen to all the possible selections before I actually get to a live person who could assist me. You see UPS doesn't put their local facility's number in the phone book, apparently as not to be bothered with pesky customer calls. Anyway, the woman furiously typed at two computers before announcing that I would "have to come back later". Couldn't she have said, "I'm sorry, your package is currently on a truck and the driver won't be returning until after 7pm. Would you like to come back then or can we hold it for you to pick up some other time?" No, that would have been too much like nice.

I chalked up the experience to one employee having a bad day, so when I returned after 7pm, I was greeted (if you want to call it greeted) by another employee who asked, "Did you call anyone and tell them you were going to pick up the package?" I answered by pointing at the girl I had encountered on my first trip and said I had spoken to her and she had directed me to come back after 7.

The second girl snatched (and I'm not exaggerating) the ticket from my hand and stormed away. While I waited, I watched the first girl deal with another customer who had arrived before me. She shoved the woman's package in her hands and didn't even say thank you or anything. It was maybe the worst display of customer service I've ever seen. The woman looked dumbfounded and we exchanged glances. The UPS employee helping me soon returned with my package and she told me to sign, she gave me my package and never uttered the words "thank yo"u either. I was furious.

No wonder DHL has been able to establish a foothold in the shipping business against giants like Fed Ex and UPS. I've had a less-than-pleasurable experience with Fed Ex as well. My experience with DHL has always been a pleasant one. I once arrived at a drop box as the driver had just completed the pickup and he gladly took my package too. So, if you have a choice, choose DHL. UPS, you know what to do.

Tis the Season

Last night, we went to Ragged's work Christmas party. Next Saturday will be the party for my second job at the exact same location and possibly the same food as we had at Ragged's company's party. I like watching people dance, particularly the older people who have obviously enjoyed dancing together their whole lives. I'm going to learn the Electric Slide so I can get out there on Saturday.

T Minus 1 Month

Thanksgiving is gone and now comes (gulp) Christimas. Ragged ventured out yesterday for the Black Friday madness, but I stayed in and ordered a couple of things online and that was about it. I'm also off to a good start on my Xmas shopping. Ragged is pretty much the only person I don't exactly know what gift(s) I'm getting for her and she doesn't have any ideas about what she wants. I think we're going to go out and browse around and see what we can find. It'd be nice to be finished with shopping before December actually hits.

In the pic, Ike yawns.

Cha-Cha-Cha-Cha-Cha-Changes

When one door closes, another one opens. Well, not really, but in my case it sort of did. You know I funked up any chance I may have had of changing jobs by confusing the company of was interviewing for with a competitor. Well, at least I think I messed up my chances. I haven't heard back from them and they said it would be sometime next week before they started calling applicants back. I probably should withdraw my name from consideration, but I'm interested to see if I get a second interview. I'm certain I wouldn't accept the job even if it was offered, but I just want the ego stroke of being called for a second interview. Anyway, getting to the point, I had the opportunity to change job duties at work. Instead of supervising clients, I'll be preparing documents for the court exclusively. That means I wouldn't have to be bothered with clients other than for a 30 minute interviews. Well, I was offered that job this week and I accepted it with enthusiasm and a feeling of relief followed. Offically, I will start December 1, but I've already started making preparations to make the change. Unfortunately, I'll probably lose my big, private office, but I may have the opportunity to work at home some which sounds fantastic.

In other news, we had to take Sammy back to the vet. He was obviously having difficulty peeing and the vet gave us more antibiotic and recommended we change his food to a much more expensive formula. Urinary tract health isn't cheap folks.

Thankful

Shew. Another year of Thanksgiving fesitivies has come and gone and I survived. Hope everyone had a good day.

A Little Downtime

I spent the entire day yesterday at the house except for a brief trip to Wal Mart, but that doesn't count. It was exactly what I needed. My cold is slowly going away. I still have some coughing and throat soreness, but I can tell it won't be long until I'm back to normal.

We treated the cats for fleas yesterday. When Ike spent the night outside, he picked up some travellers and spread them we think. Today, I have to get some chores completed as I did little to nothing around the house yesterday.

Ragged rented a couple of movies, but the teenie bopper at the video store left the magnetic closures on them, so we couldn't watch them. I guess we'll be schlepping out to have him free the movies from their cases, though I'm not sure we'll have time to watch them tonight.

In the above pic, Cooper naps.

Deer Me

I didn't think Friday would ever get here. TGIF. I'm going to revolt if anyone tries to get me to leave the house until Monday. Hope everyone has a good weekend. God bless the deer.

Do You Want Some Cheese With That Whine

It seems like my blog posts are mostly used to vent about the seemingly daily crap I deal with. Well, this entry is no different. I believe yesterday was perhaps the hardest day I've had to endure since I can remember. First of all, I have been sick with a cold for about a week now and the day before yesterday was the worst day of it. That night, I didn't sleep more than 3 hours. The following day (yesterday), I was still pretty sick, sleep deprived, and I was required to participate in controlled forced training at work. We spent the day doing restrictive moves and take downs on one another. It would have been fun if, as I've already said, I wasn't sick and running on little sleep. After that, I had to take a test for my real estate class. My instructor dropped the test off at my work, so I had a few minutes to scribble down some answers before going to drug test and then to sit through a night class. I'm not sure I've ever spent more of a miserible day. Did I mention I threw up during the day too. I'm telling you it was sheer torture.

Today we got certified in CPR which also doesn't sound like such a bad day to spend the better part of a day, other than my thighs are so sore from yesterday's training, it took a great effort to kneel down and stand up again. Going up and down stairs and standing up from a sitting position are also mucho painful.

To end on a positive note, and the good news, is that tomorrow is Friday and next week is a short week and I only have 2 more real estate classes to go.

Red Faced

Today I embarassed myself pretty good. Perhaps the only other time I've felt this humiliated was when my cell phone accidentally called Ragged's cell phone and when she arrived home with a message on her machine from me singing The Best of My Love. You may be asking yourself, what could be more embarassing than that, well, during my interview today I was asked what I knew about the company. I proceeded to rattle off some details all of which were about the company's competitor. I had printed out information from the internet about the wrong company! The guy corrected me and I apologized, but I'm certain he thought I was an idiot and I left more than enough evidence to prove it. He laughed it off and continued with the interview, but I'm pretty sure I won't get that second interview. I'm blaming the confusion on my being under the weather instead of innate stupidity, but I'm not sure I'm buying it either.

Crazy, But It Feels Alright

I had a long weekend but it sure didn't feel like it. The last two days I've had a sore throat and have felt sick to my stomach, which I believe is due to sinus drainage...or a cold, I haven't decided. At any rate, tomorrow starts the work week. We recently got a new case management system at work which eventually will integrate every piece of software we use as well as all the job processes we routinely do, but right now it is a total disaster. It isn't just a matter of learning the system, all the kinks haven't been worked out yet, so we are filtering out problems as we go, all the while work continues to stack up that doesn't care if the system is working or not. The deadlines are still coming and work that took 20 minutes is taking 3 hours. It makes a stressful job way more so. I'm hoping that when I get back to work tomorrow, they will have smoothed out alot of the problems, so I can dive into work.

Tuesday is my interview for a potential new job. I'm not feeling confident that the position will meet my financial needs, but it will certainly give me a change of scenery which I desperately need and it will give me an opportunity for advancement I don't necessarily have at present. The last position I interviewed for, I drove myself and several others crazy trying to decide whether or not to take it. I'm going to focus on staying calm this time.

In addition, I had to write a paper while we were gone to San Antonio and I have a test this Wednesday in my real estate class. I feel completely unprepared for it and I lack motivation to do proper studying, not to mention I've been a little under the weather the past couple of days. I'm not looking forward to this week.

Back from the Lonestar State

We're back from San Antonio and the usual tornado of life has begun again. Ragged will have a busy two days but luckily I'll be off on Friday for a holiday. I'm trying to do some laundry before I go to work. We are having training at night tonight, so I have the morning off. Here are some more pictures from our trip. Enjoy.

San Antonio (Saint Anthony)

We are in our second day in San Antonio and we spent the day exploring as Ragged will start her conference tomorrow and not have alot of time to do any site seeing. Here are some pics from our journeying.

Remember the Alamo

Well, we were almost down to 4 cats due to Ike's little stunt last night. Ike has gotten out at least twice before, but we've been lucky enough to catch him getting out and it has been during the daytime. Eli got out once and it wasn't easy to wrangle him in. Izzy has gone out onto the porch several times as well as Cooper, but we've never had a problem getting them back inside. Izzy used to get out and jump off the porch over at Ragged's other house and we would go screaming out the door to catch her. The best way to approach the situation is calmly, but we were young cat parents at the time, and Ragged lived next to a busy street, so we were a bit neurotic. Anway, back to Ike, poor Ragged was beside herself after finding Ike in the garage. I was secretly glad it wasn't me, because I would never have been able to forgive myself if something happened to him. He has no claws and no idea how take care of himself out in the "the wild". You would have thought we would have noticed Ike wasn't taking up half of the bed at night. Come to think of it, I did sleep well last night which should have been a sign.

Tomorrow we leave for our trip. We don't fly out until Saturday morning, but we are going to spend the night closer to the airport since our flight leaves so early. I feel overwhelmed, but things always come together in the end. Most of the stuff can't be done until the last minute, so I'll feel much better when I've checked the majority of stuff off my list.

In case you've been waiting, McRib is back at McDonalds. I've started a tally of how many I've eaten in the border of my blog. See you when we get back. We're hoping to have internet access while we're there, so we can post pics and keep you posted about what we're doing. Our hotel is 2 blocks from The Alamo. Commercialism is rampant.