Well, She's Back

As many some a few of you may remember we lost the Worthless Co-Worker in November of last year to true love..... or so she thought any way.

She ran off to Israel with this guy she met on the internet to get married in some type of old fashioned Jewish wedding. (Never mind that neither of them were Jewish.)  They met in person for the first time at Thanksgiving last year and a week later flew off for this wedding extravaganza in Israel.

Apparently they ran out of money and somehow decided that maybe a wedding was a bad idea as well. So back home they came and she moved to New Mexico to live with him. That lasted about three weeks and he threw her out declaring "she was the devil." She then moved in with a friend she met down there, which apparently didn't go so well either.

The only things she owned at the time were her clothes and an old car as she sold all of her worldly goods to run off to Israel to get married. So here she was broke, jobless, and not really too welcome in New Mexico last winter and spring.

In the mean time, we were short handed at work, for a comically long period of time. From November of last year until August of this year as a matter of fact. Oh we were able to get a few people hired but they never lasted more than a few weeks. (One of them lasted a total of 3 days.)

Last May the Worthless Co-Worker had finally managed to save enough money to get back to Wisconsin for one of her sister's wedding, still planning on returning to New Mexico afterwards for some reason. Again, she ran out of money while back here so she had just a suitcase of clothes with her. The bulk of her clothes and car were back in New Mexico.

She moved into another sister's place and took on some type of door-to-door job. (Selling cable/internet packages I believe on a bike for transportation.)

As an aside, this post is taking a long time to type. I think eating chili for breakfast is having something to do with that. At least it's what I'm going to blame it on. I'd like to also tell you that the chili was mighty tasty and a two bowl event. (Yeah, you might not want to hang out with me later today as it works it way through my system, just saying.)

Any way....

In August she finally had enough money to fly to New Mexico to get her car and clothes. She was gone for about a week to do this and lost her door-to-door job. She failed to mention that she was taking this trip to her employer and they terminated her. She thought this was very unfair of them, naturally.

So here it was August, her unemployed, us short handed. A very bad combination. She convinced the boss, and his new boss, how much she had grown up and she was going to be the consumate team player if she were rehired. Both of them bought into this fantasy.

(You know, now that I've had time to think about it, I've been very unfair in blaming the chili for the length of time this post is taking me to type. I think it may be the fact that I've got to go outside of the building to smoke. I'm pretty sure that's the hindering factor here.)

Where was I any way?

Oh.....

So she was hired. She's been nothing but trouble once the 30 day probation period ended in September. We'll definitely get into more details but more groundwork needs layed. Remember, I mentioned the boss has a new boss himself a few paragraphs ago. That plays a factor in all this as well and since this post is long enough as it is (and you have to recall I like cliffhangers as well) the next post will delve into that.

What? Like that's a surprise? Pfft....

I'm Alive: Part Two

As alluded to in my previous post a tornado ruined my day last May. Actually the last 6 months weren't a banner time. I was at work and knew a tornado had touched down and heard about some damage in town, but what I heard about wasn't in the vicinity of where I lived.

As I headed home my dread began to build though. The closer I got to the area I lived, more and more damage was evident. As I turned down the street I lived on there were emergency vehicles everywhere. The closest I could get to my place was two blocks away, but I could see the building. A building with no roof and trees down all over the place.

Amazingly there were no injuries or deaths as there were people in the upper level of the building when the tornado hit. I spent the next couple of days in limbo to the status of my place as it was deemed unsafe to enter the building. Eventually we were allowed in the building to salvage what we could. My losses actually weren't caused by the tornado itself, but by the rain storm that followed.

While I had renter's insurance it was inadequate to cover my losses. Lesson learned the hard way I guess. I never imagined I'd ever need it to tell you the truth. The coverage I had covered about half of what I lost. Sadly, as I talked to other folks who lived in the building, very few of them had any insurance at all.

Oddly enough (and thankfully) my rent was never raised. Actually my rent has never gone up in the 9 plus years I've lived here. The landlord did a super job on the rebuild and the place is very nice. My rent is $165 less per month than any new occupants coming into the building now. I definitely can't complain about that.

I've got all new furniture for the most part, but the place still looks somewhat bare to me. I finally figured out the other day what it was that was making that impression on me. I need more pictures on the walls. Too much blank white spaces, so I've still got some more money to spend over the next few weeks.

Any way.....

It feels good to be home and blogging again. I've got a lot to blabber about, including the infamous Worthless Co-Worker. (Why yes, she's back, and as loony tune as ever.) We'll be getting to that in the near future I assure you.

I'm Alive

Greetings.... to anyone who still wanders in here.

What's a six month absence between friends, huh?

Last May, the 22nd to be exact, a tornado ripped through the homestead here and leveled the place.

Fortunately I was at work and missed out on the excitement.

But.....

I was temporarily homeless, bunking with my son and his wife while this place was rebuilt. Most household items were lost/damaged. What I was able to salvage was packed away -- mostly electronics. Everything else had to be replaced.

So now I'm home and very happy to be here.

Hopefully I'll be able to get around to your blogs soon. I just wanted to post this quick little post for now.

Just Shut Up Pakistan

Under normal circumstances a military raid in another country isn't the best option without it being a joint operation, or at least a "heads up" to the country itself.

That's under "normal" circumstances.

Osama bin Laden resided in that Pakistani compound for years. Personally I find it hard to believe there weren't factions in Pakistan who knew, and withheld this information from us. Perhaps it's possible Pakistan didn't know.

Perhaps.

Regardless, their complaints are not falling on deaf ears, but not sympathetic ears from my stand point.

If we find out there was Pakistani government or military involvement in hiding him I for one will not call for the United States to quit sending aid to Pakistan.

No......

I suggest a huge "aid package" be delivered, by bombers.

Remember When....

Remember when you could turn your television off and it didn't draw any electricity?

Or how about making toast in the morning. You popped in the bread, pushed the lever down, the bread toasted, popped up, and the toaster was off.

Or even your microwave?

Now nothing seems to be truly off unless it's unplugged. They have lighted numbers that stay on, or clocks that run continuously, or as in my television the brand name is lit up when the television is turned off.

(Trust me VIZIO, I don't need your name lit up to know what brand you are. You're actually not that impressive of a brand now that I think about it.)

What a waste, and I'm tired of having to unplug, or shut down power strips in an effort to conserve energy. But I'll continue because there is a tangible cost involved. As an experiment I didn't unplug anything, or shut down the power strips to various appliances in March. My electric bill was approximately $12.00 higher, and that's with electric heat, which I'm sure less was used due to February being a colder month than March.

Personally I don't need my microwave to tell me what time it is. I just need the damn thing to heat up whatever slop I've decided to throw down my gullet. I don't need a television to remind me what brand it is, whether on or off, it just needs to provide a viewable screen when I'm actually interested in watching whatever garbage a network is showing.

And my toaster? I'm not blind, so the damn numbers don't need to be lit to see that the toast is under toasted, or burnt. My eyesight and sense of smell are both intact, thank you very much.

I don't even want to get started about the power a shut off, but not powered down computer draws.

This is the type of stuff that keeps me up at night, or at least I blame when I wake up at 4:00 am in the morning. I need to blame something, or someone so today's target is these appliance manufacturers.

But I guess there's always a silver lining, as I'm working a couple of twelve hours days and had I woke up to an alarm I wouldn't have had time to make a blog post. I'm not too sure that balances out the tiredness I'll be experiencing later today though. Damn appliances anyway.

This Place Is A Mess

Well.......

There's a lot of dust in here and I think I hear crickets chirping.

I dunno, maybe I left the door open or one of you did because this place is a mess.

But I'm back, somewhat.

(Yeah, that "somewhat" even makes me nervous.)

But I am back, just not sure of the frequency of posting as of yet.

I wish I could regale you with tales of the rock star life style I've been living the last couple of months but alas, I have no style, nor rock in my life. (Unless you count a rocking chair.)

No, nothing earth shattering happening here. Just lots of work, which of course can provide some blog fodder. I do have one story about an incident which happened last month where I thought I was in trouble but apparently I can't even manage to get myself in trouble properly at work any more. I'll share that soon.

As some of you know we lost the "Worthless Co-Worker at the end of October, of last year. We're still short handed. It's been a comedy of errors trying to get someone hired. We had a guy hired and he lasted 3 1/2 weeks of February. His girlfriend decided to dump him, so he decided he needed new scenery. As in moving to the other side of the state scenery.

We then hired a guy at the end of March, who lasted all of three days.

The boss and his wife had a baby in early April and he took two weeks of family leave which left me as the only person working for that period of time. He's also planning on taking a week of later this month because they have a timeshare deal which expires this year, so if it isn't used they lose out on some money, or something like that. I think the boss has tried to explain it in more detail but I haven't been too receptive in all honesty. I've just been kind of "meh" in regard to it.

I was actually off today. What did I do? I slept in, until just after 10:00 am. I then debated between  going hungry or grocery shopping. Grocery shopping won out. I then debated between running around naked at work tomorrow or doing a mountain of laundry. Laundry won out, as no one, including me, wants to see me sans clothes. I then took a two hour nap, and now I'm blogging. Just call me Mr. Excitement, huh?

Anyway.....

I'm back and I've got to get around to seeing what you guys/gals have been up to. I've missed you. Hopefully you all had a good Easter and here's wishing all you Mom's a great Mother's Day!