Black Friday

So here we are, the “day after”…Black Friday. Did we all survive dinner yesterday without downing some Pepto or popping a button on our britches?? Ugh…I’m still full from yesterday; I did not pig out, but that slice of Death By Chocolate cake for dessert was extremely rich and filling. Dinner was sooo good at my house. And I’m not just saying that because I cooked. Everything turned out wonderful so I am heap big happy about that :0) I don’t have quite as much leftovers as I had figured, but enough to munch on some stuffing, sweet ‘taters and a turkey sandwich for lunch tomorrow.

Speaking of Black Friday, I can not count the number of times this week that I was asked if I was going shopping today. The answer to that is a resounding NOT ON YOUR LIFE, JACK. There is nothing I need that bad to justify standing outside of _____________ store (pick one) at a barely civilized hour to stand in line with 5 bazillion crazed people…outside in the dark and cold to wait for the store to open so I can save a few bucks. Seriously people! Several friends do this ever year and I think they have lost their ever-loving minds. I would much rather get a big ol’ cuppa joe, a muffin or 2, find a good place to sit and just watch all the hysteria unfold. WAAAY more entertaining :0) It’s sort of like going to a bar…it’s lots more fun to watch the drunk(s) than be the drunk.

Enjoy your leftovers and have a great day!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

“The unthankful heart discovers no mercies; but the thankful heart will find, in every hour, some heavenly blessings."
-- Henry Ward Beecher

(I love that quote)

Ah, Thanksgiving. A wonderful day of family, friends and good food; a day to reflect about the birth of our country - the hardships faced by the brave souls who sailed across an ocean to find a place to call their own, to be without religious persecution; the many sacrifices of our forefathers who rose up in the face of the King of England to declare us a nation free of British rule, who fought to secure the rights which were endowed upon us by God; all those who have given of themselves to ensure we remain the land of the free, home of the brave. All of the above, I am exceedingly thankful for. I am thankful for the love of a good man, my darling husband, who would “swim through shark-infested water to bring me a glass of lemonade”; I am thankful for a son who has a heart bigger than Texas, who makes me laugh at least once a day; I am thankful for my oldest daughter, who lets me be part of her life and who I could learn volumes from on how to be happy each and every day; I am thankful for my son-in-law, who loves my daughter deeply and is just a great kid; I am thankful for my youngest daughter, who is able to light up any room with her smile and laughter; I am thankful for my in-laws for welcoming me into their families, for the time they share with us, and for their love. I am thankful for my extraordinary friends for all they share of themselves…their strength, compassion, courage, time and love is heartfelt and much appreciated.

I wish you all a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Vamping

Busybusybusy...busy finishing tidying up the house, busy with work....oh and budget rears it's ugly head again...knew that was coming. Ick.

“Twilight” opened last week, much to the rejoicement of teenage girls (and big girls too) everywhere. For those who don’t know, “Twilight” is the first book in a series of vampire novels written by a lady who could possibly be the next JK Rowling. The buzz about these books has been huge, to say the least…borders on mania. I feel like I am about the last person on the planet to read any of these; I hear ”you haven’t read those?! You gotta read those books!” a lot. I finally broke down and bought “Twilight” over the summer. I’m almost finished (I got side-tracked with several other books along the way, thanks to regular trips to the library). Not quite sure I get what all the hub-bub is about. Don’t get me wrong….it’s been an okay book; but it’s hasn’t sucked me in like Anne Rice’s vampire chronicles did…I could not put those books down! “Twilight”? Not so much. I’ll probably end up reading the next one, just to give it a fair shot. Could be by the time I finish this one I am hooked, who knows.

On another vampire note, “True Blood” wrapped up its first season this past Sunday. I’m bummed. Don’t wanna wait until summer for it to start back up. I don’t know if I mentioned before that this show is based on (yet another) series of vampire books. I think I will pick up the first one…with luck it will be at least as good as the series. Something to help me through my Sookie Stackhouse withdrawls ;0)

Went out for coffee and some browsing last night with my DF, Rose. Had a wonderful time. I always enjoy getting together with her…she’s such an awesome lady. Gabbed over coffee and dessert until our waiter all but dragged us to the door (lol), then wandered over to Bed Bath and Beyond and perused their aisles (sooo much cute stuff!) We don’t get together nearly as much as we should. Got to hear about her grandbabies, all the cute things they are doing; how the girls and their hubbys are doing; work, books, old TV shows (we’re talking “I Love Lucy” and the “Dick Van Dyke Show” kind of old shows), music…all the good stuff that friends yak about together. We’ve been friends for about 9 years, our youngest daughters were buds, our husbands play in the band together; we know so much about each other’s lives and families. She is a great friend and I am very blessed to have her in my life.

Seize the day!

Tom Turkey is Coming!

What’s up ya’ll?? Everyone ready for the big feast? I think I’ve got it under control…aside from a couple things I need to grab today in the way of groceries. I was sort of hoping for the beautiful weather we’ve had to carry over into Thursday so we could maybe go over to the park and play some football but alas, it is not to be. I’ll settle for decent weather for my DIL, oldest and her hubby to drive down in.

So here we are back at Monday. Kind of like “lather, rinse, repeat”, isn’t it? (lol) Had a good but busy weekend. Spent most of it cleaning…sacrificed 2 nails to Mr Clean…argh. But I scrubbed EVERYTHING in sight..all the walls, the floors, even the dogs! Yes, not even the pooches could escape the cleaning frenzy. Needed to do the “big clean” before winter…its been put off long enough. Just carpet shampooing left and I am done :0)

Kinda short today...got a late start writing this, just flat ran out of time. Have a great day!

It's Over

And we have a winner!…..the union. My facility voted yesterday on whether or not to unionize…and it passed overwhelmingly. My company – well, my particular facility has been in business for nearly 80 years. It was owned by the same family until about, oh I’d say 3 years ago, when they sold controlling interest to a large national corporation, who in turn sold us to an even larger international corporation. And until this last company bought us, we have pretty much been one big happy family…was everything perfect and peachy-keen? No, of course not. There were problems here and there with various things, but they always were resolved in-house. Our management team has always gone out of their way to try everything they could to keep us “fat and sassy”, if you will. Now because of the way the international company has done things since they took us over, people are upset. They haven’t given management a sporting chance at trying to fix the things they could, and not realized that some of the changes made are irreversible. I will admit, the new kids on the block took some perks from us - like the perfect attendace award (a big chunk of moolah), our employee golf tournament – and fired a bunch of people right out of the gate, neither of which exactly endeared them to our employees. None of those things will be reinstated just because we are now a union plant. As for the big “raises” the union pushers told everyone we’d get…not going to happen. If the company wanted to give us raises, they’d do it already. Our insurance costs are going to increase dramatically. The supervisors no longer will have the ability to work with an employee who, for example, is late due to bad weather or needs to trade a regularly scheduled day off for a non-work day….they will have to go strictly by the rule book. All the good things we can do and have done here will be negated by the union coming in. It stinks, I hate it and I am beyond upset about becoming a union plant. Unions reward bad behavior and punish the good. It goes against everything this country was founded on, believes in and stands for. Once upon a time, unions were a good thing; that day has long passed.

Bond, Budget and Pushers

Greetings and salutations from sunny Jamaica! Yeah, don’t I wish (LOL). Sitting on a beach, enjoying the sun, listening to the sound of the waves rolling up on shore, watching the surfers, with a nice big glass of iced tea sounds soooo heavenly right now!

It’s been hectic this past 5 or 6 days…weekend was good however. Swim team had a big ol’ meet all day Saturday. I volunteered to help with the team lunch, feeding not only our guys and gals, but all the officials and the other coaches. We fed over 100 people! Whew! Our kids took first place; the Guppy took 1st and 4th in his 2 events…so proud :0) He shaved a couple tenths off his best time for the 100 free - way to go!! My DH and I went to the new James Bond movie at the early matinee Sunday. I know the critics have been trashing it, calling it the “Bond Ultimatum” or whatever, but after viewing the movie….I don’t think we watched the same film! I have no clue what movie they watched, but it wasn’t “Quantum of Solace”. It was action packed, good story, interesting new characters; I don’t get what was not to like, but okay…whatever. A word of advice: the action starts immediately…hold on to your hats! Oh and had a great preview of the new “Fast and the Furious”….yeah, baby!!! Two words….Vin Diesel :0) It’s got all the original cast members, the preview looked awesome!!! Can not wait to see it!!!

Work, however, has not been full of shiney happy people as of late. The department heads have been working on next year’s budget since last Tuesday. Certainly a task I do not envy. Mostly because we’ve gotta have it done by Wednesday! (Yeah, those lovely persons at HQ gave us 8 whole days to do our entire budget for next year. Generous of them, wasn’t it) My poor boss is about fit to be tied. And after doing budget for our office for my boss, I sympathize even more….ugh. By the time I finished compiling the data I was responsible for (6 months worth) to give to my boss I had so many figures in my head I think my pupils turned into dollar signs! If I never have to look at another piece of “greenbar” paper again it will be entirely too soon. And that would be tomorrow. I have to go over our costs for last week for my weekly Wednesday report. Ick. But for all my grousing, I am very pleased that I am trusted enough to help with my department’s budget. Kind of a big deal…at least to me. And then there's the union stuff....one of the labor unions is trying to unionize our facility (we are the only one in our company's US division that is not). This started about...oh, I'd say 4 months ago. And has gotten ugly to the point where one of the "pushers" in our facility has been threatening other employees if they did not vote for the union. The union has brought a flock of thugs up from Texas who have created traffic jams handing out flyers at the end of the work days, show up at our employee's doors, call them on the phone. They lie like rugs...how can you tell they're lying?? Their lips are moving. These "pushers" have promised our people pretty much everything under the sun (you know, like our politicians do) and yet my company has to play by the rules and are restricted in what they can say and do in their efforts to keep the union out. It's rediculous. Vote is tomorrow...we've got the goverment NLRA folks here to conduct it and to escort our employees up to vote so there is no intimidation on the way to the polling booth. Kind of late for that one but better late than never, right? Should be interesting. I will be glad when it is over. Just so it will be over and things can get back to...well, normal, or whatever the new "normal" will be if they get in.

Hope your week is off to a rip roarin’ great start! Enjoy your day!

Thank You Veterans

First off, let me say a big huge "thank you" to all the veterans and soldiers who have and are currently serving our great country. We all owe you such a tremendous debit of gratitude that words just can't express. So thank you and God bless.

Must be something in the water today…everyone here at work is CRAN-KY!! I know wherefrom my crankiness springs – I found out about 6 this morning that my dear son (bless his little pea brain) left his TEAM SUIT in the hotel the team stayed at over the weekend for their meet. He managed to bring back everything he took except for the one thing he could not leave. Yes, I called the hotel. Their head housekeeper is off today and tomorrow, so they will have to wait for the manager to come in (God only knows when that will be), find a few minutes in his/her schedule to go to where ever it is they keep the stuff left in the rooms and look for his suit. Then they will call me and let me know. Late this afternoon. Or this evening. Or sometime tomorrow. IF they have the suit, they will fax me a form to fill out with card info so they can then ship it to us. If they DON’T have it, I may lose my freaking mind. You see, he has a competition on Saturday. If the hotel does not have his suit, I then have to fork out yet another $60 for a replacement suit, which of course the local swim shop have in stock in every size BUT his and will have to order. That will take a week to get here. ((SIGH)) It’s always something……

Gotta give a big “ATTA GIRL!!” to my friend, Darla…she has worked very hard at breaking thru the plateau she’s been at for the last few months and finally busted on thru that bad boy!!! (I see a great new pair of cute little Gap jeans in her very near future!) And anyone who has tried to lose weight and just could not seem to get the scale to go anywhere after a certain point knows how stinking hard it is to break a weight plateau. Brutal. So kudos to her!!!

Trying to get my ducks in a row for Thanksgiving dinner. I think I have the “menu” all mapped out, but I am waffling on whether or not I’m overdoing it. I want to make sure that there is plenty of everything, but not so much left over that I can’t get the refrigerator door shut. There will be 6 of us total (4 guys and 2 gals) and I’ve got 2 breads (white and whole wheat), mashed and sweet ‘taters, salad, corn, stuffing, turkey, chocolate cream pie (won’t last an hour after dinner), pumpkin pie and an apple pie. Wow. May be a bit too much….I had planned on sending a big thing of leftovers home with my DIL so he can munch afterward, but that still may leave more food than I want to deal with. Hmm. Have to give it a good think…..

Have a great day......hug a soldier!!!

Wanderings.....

I have just one word for you: Moochie’s. Moooochie’s…mmm-mm! Saturday my DH and I headed out to have lunch at a little hole-in-the-wall “Ma and Pa” deli called Moochie’s. We had seen this place on “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” about a month ago and after watching them make their signature mouthwatering authentic (the lady who owns the joint is a Philadelphia native) Philly Cheesesteak sandwiches, along with killer meatball subs, it was agreed that we would indeed have to sample their wares. We had actually been planning to go on this particular weekend while my son was away at a swim meet in order to kill 2 birds with one stone – lunch and some Christmas shopping. So off we went. I had been super good on my diet the last week or 2 just so I could splurge on a Moochie’s…really clamped down on the ol’ calories, exercised joyfully. I am here to tell you that it was worth every stinking calorie I forfeited, every droplet of sweat. One of the best sandwiches…really. Together with a small side of macaroni salad (not your everyday mac salad, either) and very small bread pudding that was to die for, I conclude that I am exceedingly grateful that Moochie’s is not local. Otherwise the temptation to have a cheesesteak would be just too much. Everything is made fresh daily, made to order. They do a variety of hot and cold sandwiches, along with several entrees like lasagna, chicken cacciatore, and eggplant parmigiana (which you can get to take home and bake later) and several yummy salads. I will warn you now about the huge 3-layer chocolate cake sitting in a glass dome on the counter… it comes by the slice and looks sinful enough you’d have to go to confession after eating it :0) Anyway, enough about Moochie’s. We then wandered around several places in search of inspiration for Christmas gifts for friends and family. We had a few flashes of brilliance, leading to a couple purchases. There was a kiosk in one mall that was just games and puzzles. There I found some gift ideas…one of which were these nifty mystery puzzles. Each puzzle comes with a story which you read, then you put together a large puzzle that holds clues to solving the “crime”. Unique concept, looked like fun; think I may get one for someone I know (no names…he or she may be reading this!). Dillard’s was having a massive sale. Certainly one of those times I wish I had a ton of $$$...I saw oodles of things I liked, both as gifts for others and for myself. They had a china setting that was gorgeous, not to mention some Waterford crystal stemware that was awesome. ((sigh))

Watched a good movie Friday night called “Shooter” with Mark Walhberg. TONS of suspense, great plot and of course, Marky Mark sans his Funky Bunch (for those children of the 80’s who remember his brief singing career). He has turned out to be a decent actor. I have liked him in everything I have seen him in…he has been good even if the movie wasn’t. I also got around to watching the last 007 movie, “Casino Royale”. I have long been resistant to watching this film. Not gonna watch it and you can’t make me. I don’t particularly care for Daniel Craig, the guy who is the new Bond. But. The movie was good. Better than I was expecting. HE was better than I expected. Liked the storyline a lot. Had some good one-liners (the bit in the casino about “that last hand nearly killed me” was a riot!) Made me anxious to see the new one that starts on Friday!!

Hope everyone enjoyed a nice weekend and are having a good start to the week. Keep smiling :0)

Feeding the Fish

Why do people ask stupid questions? Why, why, WHY?! I’ll give you an example that just happened. Man walks into my office…looks in my boss’ office…no boss. He turns and looks at me and says, “Not in here, huh?” I look this person in the eye and reply, “No, he is out in the plant someplace.” The guy says, “He’s just not in the office then.” Unless my boss is hiding under his desk or behind my coat on the coat rack, NO!! He’s not in here!!! What part about no one sitting at the desk and my telling you he is in the plant threw you off there, big guy?? Seriously!!! Fire up a brain cell – I know there must be one in there that’s functional - and think. That whole shpeal that Bill Engvall does about “here’s your sign” is just sooo right on the money. People say just the most God-awful stupid things! And I can complain about this because I know I am one of these people from time to time…I’ve certainly had my share of “DOH!!” moments where the words were out of my mouth before my brain could stop them. I just have a low tolerance for stupidity (especially mine!)

Have y’all heard about the monster blizzard that has hit the Dakotas and parts thereabout? Holy snowballs, Batman!!!! Some places got 49” of snow in the last day or so. That’s just over 4 FEET of snow!!! And they’re expecting more today!! Good grief!!!! I can’t imagine…..and I’m thankful it’s not ME shoveling all that. Yet. We get our turn for snow next week. Monday. At least that’s what the weather guys are saying, and we all know how accurate they are.

The guppy is on his way with the swim team to a big meet several hours south of here. He’s super excited about the trip and should do very well in his events. I’m not sure if he’s more excited about missing a day of school or the actual meet ;0) I probably packed him enough food for the bus ride down and snacks for the next 24 hours to feed a small armada…can’t help it….overzealous mom mode kicked in. I just want to make sure he has plenty of fuel (not junk food!) to keep him going inbetween meals and events since he’s not traveling with us and we don’t have a lot of access to him during the meet. Anyone with a teenage boy knows they eat like a horse anyway…throw in the intense physical activity on top of that and you’ve got a ravenous kid on your hands. My job as a swim mom is to make sure my guppy is properly nutriented so he can kick some swimming butt! :0)

You all have a great weekend and I’ll see ya on the flipside :0)

Get out there!

It's short and sweet today...I just have one thing to say:

GO VOTE!!!!

((sigh))

Can you believe it's NOVEMBER?!? Jeez, where did October go? Just a quick post to say I'm still alive...somewhere....planning Thanksgiving dinner....contemplating paint colors (yes, the kitchen/dining room)....so bear with me. Since my company cracked down last week on the 'net usage and emails, I haven't had time to get on the computer at home. I usually post at work while waiting for reports to print so that really threw me a curveball. Anyway, bear with me until I can get a new groove going with the home computer.

Enjoy your day!!