WE HAVE MADE IT THROUGH WEEK 2

7:29 AM: Maybe I should wait till I'm actually done with my shift before I start celebrating, but I did drive through Sbux to congratulate myself on two whole weeks in this new gig. Feeling pretty confident that I'm able to handle whatever new thing that comes along. There will be more new things, plenty more, but so far, I seem to be juggling everything. 

9:49: Things are so chill. Solving the problems. Straightening the curves, flattening the hills - someday the mountain might get me, but the law never will. 

10:56: Maybe this lemon thumbprint cookie from the college bakery will soothe my frazzled nerves. It's not work-related. 

11:56: Getting excited for our trip to a sneakrety-sneakret spot tomorrow. Wish we could take the kayaks. 

Summer Rush

...is mostly over for the week (next Monday will be rush part 2). Dan was available for helping on Monday, thanks to Monica giving him the day off from training, but yesterday and today he's back on it. So far I'm keeping my head above water. Thankfully summer rush is a tiny, tiny version of fall rush. It's just enough of a taste of what's coming that I'm pretty sure I'll be able to manage, and I'm seeing where the holes in my knowledge are, with enough time to pick up new info and skills. 

So I'm pretty happy at the moment. The timing has been perfect for taking on this new role. I'm very grateful. 

In other news: I'm TIRED, and I have a thorn in my right thumb that I picked up from pruning blackberry vines last Friday and it HURTS whenever I bump it against something. And I have no sewing kit in my backpack! What are the odds? I'm usually overprepared for everything! 

10:45: Kyle went home - business is that slow. This is good info for next summer. Mike is cashiering and Ryan is at ISP, managing the appointments and packaging orders at the same time. I'm keeping up with whatever the computer throws at me. 

11:15: Amy brought in a new crop of applications to look at and score (eventually, after Dan teaches me how - I just received my permissions Monday). I immediately alphabetized them and highlighted each name, because I love being that way about it.

11:30: R came by after her workout to pick up the car keys, so she can grocery shop later. She visited with B and Akim and I. Fun to see her. 

12:15 PM: Lunch and texting with Hubby - J's PO let Hubby know that J has now been fitted with a new GPS device. He was, to quote the PO, "not happy about it", which fills my heart with glee. We're not telling my siblings, who were under the impression that he's been on GPS this whole time. 

1:09 PM: Bought a damn sewing kit. Let the thorn removal commence.

1:17 PM: We are now thorn-free, with a minimum of bloodshed, and the sewing kit is now at home in my desk drawer. Woot

3:24 The afternoon's activities included a meeting with Monica about an upcoming fall event (I need to do something about starting some kind of work-inclusive calendar), some last minute paperwork and computer stuff, and the usual goofing off. Dan gave a bit more insight into the timing of my most-likely new permanent position and what his role will be, shift-wise. Glad we'll still get to hang out and joke around. 

Cruel. Cruel Summer.

 I guess, more like, cruel new job, keeping me from summer idyll.

Life is a series of giving one thing up to get something different. The money will be nice. 

Day Three

 10:17 AM: ...and all's wellllllllll. Orders were pulled by Dan, Kayla K, Leilani and I; have been processed by me; and packaged by Kayla K (we have two Kaylas, but the other Kayla is in Florida for the next three months - we miss her). No account requests have come through yet. 

The students are mostly in a good mood, with one notable exception: a "known quantity" came through and demanded to donate her textbooks. Kayla sweetly requested that this lady take them to the library, but apparently the library is closed, because about ten minutes later, the lady came through the line and rudely plopped her bag of books on our counter, proclaiming "THEY'RE CLOSED", then stalked off. 

I'm proud of the way my skin has grown thicker through this job. Once I became aware that some people are just nuts and can't or won't control their impulses, and NOTHING they do is intentional or personal to me*, I've had a nice easy time dealing with these folks. Like in the movie Elf, when Will Ferrell happens upon an angry raccoon and exclaims "Look at you!", I'm able to glance at them, see their behavior, and be entertained by it instead of letting it get to me. I'm happy.

Otherwise, the morning has been extremely pleasant and chill. Dan's training continues. Heidi had surgery this morning and hopefully it went well. 

11:25 AM: GOOD LORD. Everything exploded there for a minute. People have been coming in with wacky questions and situations that are taking forever and a whole team of professionals to unravel. And how did I already forget the combination to the safe?? Thank goodness, it finally came back to me. 

12:51 PM: Back from lunch. Hubby texted to say that J is in Portland and Vancouver today. I texted M and R to make sure the curtains are closed and the door is locked. I doubt he'd be stupid enough to try to come to our house, but we just don't know with him. Work is going fine, otherwise. 

*This would have been excellent knowledge to have when I was a child

Working Title Here

 7:45 AM: Yeah, I don't know what to title these anymore. I think it'll be more of a work diary for a minute. It feels good to put my thoughts down somewhere and be able to type instead of write. 

9:56 AM: Keeping all the balls in the air is weird, yet here I am doing it, somehow. I just did my first "text employee and ask if they can work an extra shift" text. Having access to everyone's info is also weird. The word of the day so far is "weird".

11:08 AM: Just. Wow. It's coming at me every single minute. Sitting down feels like the wrong choice, but so does standing up. 

11:37 AM: When is lunch? I visited Bellamy and it made me happy. 

12:16: Lunch. Starting to feel like that scene from The Firm, where Mitch keeps having random folks throw more crap on his desk. 

2:43 PM: Oh yeah, I have a blog. Holy heck, I'm hip deep in account setups. Hopefully, at some point, I will be quicker at doing this. 

TODAY IS THE FIRST DAY OF THE REST OF YOUR LIFE

 7:45 AM: It's also my first day in my new interim Cashier 4 role. Should I be more freaked out? Time will tell.

11:20: I had to walk myself through using the fax machine without Dan, who is being trained by Liz. The fax happened (finally) and the customer received his confirmation page, so apparently I do know how to fax. Can I teach other people to do it? This is the question. I finally had to re-enact the entire process and write it all down, step by step. 

I'm also keeping an eyeball on the WES list, so I can add new accounts for students, and my email, which is doing a soft explode of new topics to sort through and absorb. Gratefully, I can still cashier. 

11:53 AM: Someone from another department on campus emailed and asked me to "open" her accounts. I had to ask Heidi what this meant. I had already completed the task, just had no idea what this person was asking. The vocabulary everyone uses is yet one more thing I'll be learning.

12:30: Lunch. Note to me: don't buy those croissant sandwiches from Winco deli - they taste like refrigerator. 

1:35: Feeling completely overwhelmed by everything, but I'll survive. I have good people around me who won't let me fail. 

2:52: Found out I'll be working until 3:30 every day, this week and next week, instead of 3:00. What the hell, it's 30 more minutes, and more money. Increased my amounts and percentages! Shhh.

Weekly Reports

I'm thinking of doing something to keep track of my progress in various areas of life, to keep myself accountable for staying productive instead of *ahem* messing about with my phone. Kind of a life-stealer, that thing. 

I love my bullet journal but it's running out of room, so I may do something here. 

LATER

Things I did over the last few days that were not phone- or doom-scrolling-related:

1) Yesterday, Hubby and I were driving around doing errands, and ended up driving by, and then touring, a house for sale in our neighborhood. It has 500 more square feet than ours, and we liked it pretty well (I liked it more than Hubby), but we found that the extra square footage is all used up in the bedrooms, and there's a living room but no family room - not a good fit for us.

Still, we're now planning to look for something new around here. We contacted our real estate agent, and I looked at storage units that we can start moving unnecessary stuff into. I have really begun to love our property, but I can't see us staying there with M and the granddaughters living with us. We'd have to remodel, or move. 

2) I attended a meeting with a political group that has existed for a long time, but with our current political situation, has never seemed more relevant. We've entered what I call the Flight 93 portion of the program, where (on 9/11/2001) the WTC towers and the Pentagon have been struck, and now people are on the phone with their loved ones on Flight 93 to warn them of what's coming. 

After the first few shocking weeks of T's second administration, people are waking up, taking action, and fighting back. I'm honored to be one of them. 

We met to write postcards to voters in another state, to encourage them to vote for the more progressive candidate running for office in their area. It felt GOOD to gather with these local folks - I plan to join them again in the future.

3) Hubby and I have been doing more "dating". We went to dinner at a brew pub Friday night, and to breakfast at one of our favorite local spots yesterday, and we're planning a quick beach getaway for tomorrow night and Wednesday. We'll be celebrating our 33rd wedding anniversary on Friday, 2/28. 

4) I spent some quality time reorganizing my sewing area in the basement (part of the reason for #1, above - it's like a slide puzzle down there). There's so much clutter, furniture, books, bookcases... yikes. But I made some good progress. Now I just need a new TV for playing DVDs and videotapes - RIP our 30-year-old TV - and I'll be in business. 

5) Genealogy up the wazoo. I've been working on a document about where my ancestors were for each U.S. census, and last night, as always happens while working on that project, I stumbled across numerous unrelated nuggets of information. Yesterday's included three stints in jail (two of them were the husbands of one of Grandma D's first cousins; one was my aunt Elizabeth, sister of Great Grandpa D - I think hers was Prohibition-related, which is just a dumb reason to incarcerate someone - but I did find out she was exactly five feet tall). 

It got to be a little bit much - why do people do things? my poor cousin - and I finally had to put it away when I found that another cousin passed away from a heart attack in his 30s, and his wife unfortunately followed him two months later with self-inflicted asphyxiation in her car/garage. Just too much at that point. 

6) Breakfast in Oregon City with my sweet friend, Beth - there's never enough time with her.

7) Created a monthly rotating dinner menu - no big deal but it'll help us decide what to shop for.

8) Dishes and laundry, of course. 

Vegas Day 1

Flight from PDX to LAS (Alaska Air) was impeccable - we even arrived twenty minutes early. We took a cab from LAS to our hotel, dropped off our bags, and ate lunch at one of the hotel restaurants. The food was so tasty.

The Coworkers Surprised Me

 I arrived at work to find Clay the Custodian mopping. "Happy Birthday," he grinned. "Wanna know how I know it's your birthday?"

He pointed to the plastic birthday banner I brought from home for Dan's birthday earlier this month, stretched across our office "door" between a file cabinet and the cashiers' binder. 

Very cute. Dan and Heidi are celebrating early since I won't be here Saturday, and with our upcoming trip, I won't be working again till February. 

They're all so darling. This is my most favorite job EVERRRRRR. 

If I ever figure out how to upload pictures again, I'll throw some in. 

Don't Be a Crappy Boss

I spent this entire autumn dealing with a crappy decision a certain manager made, which ultimately caused all of the store's non-permanent employees to have to reapply, re-interview, and be re-hired for their jobs. "Stress" doesn't begin to cover what I've been feeling. My job interview happened last week and I spent the rest of the day in bed, feeling like garbage. I wouldn't wish this on anyone. 

And apparently, it was all avoidable, as she was warned in plenty of time that this was coming if she didn't act soon, but the manager in question sat on her hands instead. As a result, not only did we endure this asinine situation, but all the people who APPLIED AND WERE INTERVIEWED FOR OUR JOBS endured a huge waste of their time and energy. And, since (as our supervisors planned) we were all hired back, these folks all got their hopes up for nothing. Just crappy as heck. 

I thought the business owner of Briar was terrible (she was), but I guess if I'm comparing the two situations, I lived that stress every day that I worked there - I had a designated "go be alone and cry" space - and here, it's only been that bad for the last couple of months, and now the end is in sight. 

Life is pretty damn good otherwise. We're getting ready for Christmas and enjoying the activities of the season, along with trying to clear out our clutter (a constant) and do all the usual daily stuff. 

Mormony, More Problems*

 *Dan is to blame for this one. I think it's hilarious so I'm writing it down here. 

The Shithead Won

Time to move to another country. It's on all of our minds this morning - choices are being discussed via the family group text thread. I used to laugh at people who threatened to leave the States after an election didn't go their way, but this is different. This election outcome constitutes a very credible threat to my loved ones. 

It's bad enough that he's such a piece of garbage, but the people who voted for him are predominantly on my shit list. I don't know him personally, but I know some of his voters, and it makes me sick that they would so casually vote for a fascist who WANTS TO HURT MY KIDS and other LGBTQ+ folks. These people either don't know us, or do know us and don't care and voted for him anyway. I don't want to know these people anymore. 

So, I need to start selling stuff, I guess, or at the very least, stop buying stuff. Prior to this week, we were doing some light prepping, so we'll continue to do that along with putting in a garden (the volunteer pumpkin in the front garden bed doesn't count; we need actual food) and start doing all that urban homesteading stuff, since we won't be able to trust the food supply chain (Shithead promised to do away with food safety regulations). We'll be working on getting our passports and paperwork together; saving up money, doing whatever we have to, in order to escape, or move, or whatever we end up doing.

One thing I can unequivocally say is that I'm done with Trumpers. May they all rot in hell for killing our beautiful USA. If he follows through on his plans, we'll be the next Hungary. 

In the words of Lt. Dan, God Damn Bless America. 

Election Day 2024

 We all voted for Vice President Kamala Harris. It's a cool day for me - it's R's first presidential election, and all five of the kids voted. I'm very proud of my civic duty-oriented children. Yesterday, B bought an all-weather US flag to fly for the occasion - our previous flag was only for sunny weather. 

Everyone is anxious about the election. To ward off any workday yuck, Dan and I decided to throw together a potluck. I baked a chocolate cake last night and frosted it with The Frosting this morning. Dan bought doughnuts from the college bakery (delicious) and Heidi baked peanut butter cookies (YUM - normally they're no big deal to me, but hers are slightly saltier than any others I've had and I'm loving them). 

I had a hard time getting to sleep last night, so I'm quite zombie-fied today, and staring down the barrel of a 2:00 ending time. YIKES. Can I make it till then? Only my coffee cup knows for sure. I only fell asleep two or three times during my lunch break. 

Soccer in Centralia Tiger Stadium

Watching our girlie R play

The quizzical spectators

SOCCER on a gloppy morning

 So gloppy. So sloppy. Such is soccer in Puyallup. 

We Love Our Kamala

"Those who came before us, the patriots at Normandy and Selma, Seneca Falls and Stonewall, on farmlands and factory floors: they did not struggle, sacrifice, and lay down their lives only to see us cede our fundamental freedoms. They didn't do that only to see us submit our will to another petty tyrant."

Happy 4th Birthday to Little C!

 

Celebrating our sweet girlie Little C today. She's such a funny, fun, SWEET, beautiful little girl. We love her so much. 

In other news: Unfortunately, and in a shocking turn of events, ballot boxes in Vancouver, at Fishers Landing, and in Portland, were lit on fire early this morning. The ballots were destroyed. 

People are freaks now. 

My blood is boiling

In yesterday's mail, we received a transphobic flyer from the goons at the Washington State Republican Party. Are these fools not aware that they are sending hate mail to people who are trans? Probably not, and if they know, they don't care.

The guy sent it to M, under her deadname. NOT AT MY HOUSE.

I looked up the goon in question - his name rhymes with Flo Spent - and found his campaign headquarters' mailing address, as well as the mailing address of the WA Republican Party HQ. The flyer pictured a young girl in high school, a wrestler on the school wrestling team, who was (according to this flyer) completely flipping out that a "boy" may join her in the locker room and do who knows what to her.

As a mom of two trans folks, I was understandably livid, but also wished to remain anonymous, so I cut up the flyer into strips, drew stupid pirate face markings on the pictures of the girl, and included a note with a few choice F words to the goon. In it I included the hope that they would enjoy the "jigsaw puzzle" (the cut up flyer), and would be able to put it back together. Because they're all stupid, and they're all heartless, and they all suck donkey butt.

Dear transphobes, don't try that shit again with me. 

On Walkabout

Mid October Post

 Yeah, it's a lame but honest title.

Life is good. We're so busy that I hardly have time to catch my breath, feels like. We've entered birthday season (M on 9/30, Hubby and Little R on 10/16, and Little C's will be 10/28), which ushers in holiday season. R's soccer season has been full of ups and downs, and is keeping us traveling on most weekends. It's been quite a full couple of months. 

I'm doing okay, mostly. I really want to declutter the house but it's usually so overwhelming that I have a hard time getting started. Still figuring that challenge out.

Otherwise, things are going well.