Friggin' Friday...

Hey y'all. It was a slow week at work, not much going on right now, all of my reports were up to date including a new one that I just started. All of my orders were in the system by 9:30, which is unusual. So, I decided to take summer hours. Besides, I promised my son we would do something fun if I could get out early. I did, so we did. We went to Fast Lane. It's a place that has Lazer Tag, Go Karts, bowling, and video games. It's a good place. Unfortunately the Go Karts didn't start until 4pm, we were there before 1pm. That stunk. So we played some video games, then went to play Lazer Tag. You can't run in there, as it's dark. That's good for me, because of my knee. And all I did was walk and get shot. I got shot 82 times, I swear! It was nuts. Then, I decided to walk and try to stay away from crossfire. There's a ramp in this one, and I went down the ramp. I took a step with my right foot, then a step with my left foot. That was the end of that. My left knee stabbed with pain, and I screamed. I was done. We had to leave after that. Thankfully my knee feels a bit better, but I have to go easy for a couple of days again. That means I probably won't be able to work on my yard this weekend. Not happy about that.

Today is Andy's last official day in our office. He is moving back north to bigger and better opportunities. I am going to miss that man. He came in while I was at my company as a temp. I was there 6 months, and thinking I was out, when he started. Well, I was fortunate enough to stay an additional 6 months, under Andy's tutilage. He had been the best boss I ever had. I respected him, he showed me the same respect, we grew a friendship, but I always knew he was the boss, which is the way it's supposed to be. After I left in Dec 2007, he told me he'd keep me in mind if something came up. I was hopeful, but doubtful. Well, 2 months later he called, and I have been there as an employee of the U since March 2008. Today marked the last day he would be there with me.

The company had a great lunch spread for his goodbye, and I'm sure there would have been stories and such. I honestly could not stay for it. Over the past couple of months, Andy and I have become somewhat "detached" meaning he's been crazy busy trying to do 2 jobs, get himself and his family ready for the transition, so we didn't share much more than a "Hi how are you" in passing in the mornings. I don't want to remember that. I want to remember, and I always WILL remember, the man who brought me in to the company, played basketball in the office with his workers, and was a great friend and boss. Thank you Andy. I wish you and your family the very best!

Back to work...

Well, vacation is over. Today I went back to work. And I discovered something rather important. I suck! LOL just kidding. Actually, I was afraid of what I'd find when I got back, because nobody REALLY knows my categories. I did manage to check my email over the weekend and there were no big issues, which was good. But I also figured they were "holding back" until I got back today. Luckily, no issues. WOOHOO! Normally, this would upset me. I figured that my company revolved around me, and if I ever left, the company would go belly up inside of a month. I'm KIDDING! It made me feel good, because now I know I can go on vacation (which is planned again in August, hopefully) and know that when I get back there won't be any crisis issues. Thank you to Lisa for doing good on my categories :)

Back and tired...

Wife and I had a great time yesterday and today at the casino. The room was really nice. Had a king-sized bed so there was no chance of us kicking each other during the night, not that there was much chance of that. But we needed to pole vault to get ONTO the bed. Damn thing was almost 3 feet off the ground. Had to make a running leap to get on the bed. Good thing I didn't do that when I went back to the room at 2:30 am, or I think I would have gone out the window. Had a great time though. We wound up losing, but not nearly as much as we figured. I was also able to pay for the room with cash instead of using the debit card, and we still came home with money. One word of advice though. Do NOT eat at the buffet there. It sucked!

Played a poker tournament last night while we were there. I was card dead to say the least. Tried playing a few semi-decent hands, which was not easy because the players at my table were very aggressive, so had to be careful with hand selection. Finally, made the announcement that when I get my FIRST pair of the tourney (yes, cards were THAT bad!) I was going all in. Well, blinds were 100/200, someone raised to 900, and I went all in with 1700. He asked me if I had the pair, I smiled and said YEP! He had to call, he was committed. I had QQ, he had A-7 suited. Survived the flop, but A hit the turn. I knew. I can't win with QQ. I would say it was fun, but how much fun can you have when you can't win, let alone play.

Wife and I went up to the room for a bit, then she went to sleep and I went back down. Played a cash game for awhile, and after 4 hours of play, wound up ahead for that time period...a whole $2. Was alot of fun though.

Overall, great getaway, looking forward to doing it again soon!

It's almost here...

VACATION!!! WOOHOO!!! Three days from now, my wife and I will be on the road to a night of gambling, eating, drinking (yes, I may jump off the wagon for this), and some "adult fun". Work is planned out well too, so I won't have to go into the office Wednesday morning. The ice cream promotion I had to write was done last week, all of the orders are in, ready to go, all I have to do is figure out ship withs and that's easy. I do have a frozen promotion to write, but that will only take me about an hour or so. Tuesday at 4:30pm or so, the laptop goes off, the voicemail message gets changed, and I am GONE until Sunday when I have to report back to work. You have NO idea how much I need this. Wife does too.

10 days to go...

Yes, I'm counting down. To what you may ask my loyal follower(s)? VACATION!! From WORK!! I think it's been about a year since I took a vacation from work (with the exception of a day here and there...yeah that's it, about 2). My wife and I are going away. There is a beautiful casino/resort about an hour away, and the room is only $59 for the night. Ann has to work in the morning, probably, but that's ok. Usually you can't check in before 3 or 4pm anyway, and being it isn't far, it works. Anthony will be fine for the night and we are not far, so it is all good. Ann and I haven't been away together alone for a night since...well, our honeymoon I think. And that trip didn't turn out so well, being I broke my collarbone and was good for shit the rest of the trip.

Had 2 ice cream promotions to write this week. I am happy to say I made it through both. The first one was very tricky due to quantity issues to each location I ship to. Had to change quantities on the orders, then go through each set of orders and try to combine orders to save trucks. I feel great about it though, because I managed to save 3 trucks. It doesn't seem like a lot, but when you take into consideration all of the "picking" of the orders (getting the right quantity of each item), getting carriers to come in on time, getting appointments for delivery, and the like, this works well for me. Monday I will build on to less than truckload orders, which is easy. I also had another one that was a "short lead" promo. They wanted it 6 days from when it was written. Wheeeeeeeee. Writing those were very easy, because they write the orders as full trucks. So I'm satisfied.

This week, I'll catch up on "projects" and then next week is only 2 days in. Or so I think. I have 2 more promotions to write, one frozen and one ice cream. This is going to be not so much fun. I have a feeling I'm going to be working 1/2 day on Wednesday to make sure loose ends are tied. Plus somewhere in the next week and a half I am going to be training a few co-workers on how to do a replenishment report. That will be fun. It's actually easy, but I am hopeful that with this training, all of the reports will be formatted exactly the same, so there are no issues with our company or the company we run these reports for. Know what I mean?

Went to the Naturals game last night. They were losing 4-0 early, then made it 4-3, then were winning 6-5, then down 10-7 after 7, so we left. It was already 10pm at that point. We listened in the car on the way home, and of course we made it 10-9 in the 9th inning when I got in the driveway. Ann and Anthony came in the house, and I stayed in the car to listen. We tied it at 10 and I blazed a trail into the house to turn on the radio. We all listened as the Naturals won 11-10 and of course we weren't there :( Ah well, such is life.

Well, that's about it for now. Time to get my Sunday work done.

Boom go the fireworks...

Happy 4th of July America!

Woot Woot! It's July...

Realized I haven't posted anything for my faithful readers to browse through (basically meaning ME) so I decided to post today. Yes, I am at work at the moment, but have a little "down time" so figure better to take advantage now rather than later when all my thoughts revolve around "what's for dinner and am I getting any before I go to sleep tonight?" That's pretty much my evening in a nutshell. I was debating on playing poker tonight, but I am going to the casino on Friday for a slot tournament, so I'll just stick around tonight. Also, hopefully the back lawn is getting mowed today, and I want to be able to enjoy it for a night before it grows back nuts again.

Ann and I are going away for a night in a few weeks. It's only about an hour from home, but it is the first time just her and I are going away in a LONG time. Can't wait.

Other than that, absolutely NOTHING going on. Knee is still cracked, but today I am walking without the assistance of my crutch. Figure may as well start seeing if I can. So far so good, but tonight I will probably pay for it. Such is life.

Happy 4th if I don't talk to any of ya (again, meaning me!)