Funny Wednesday

11-4-09

Happy Happy Happy Anniversary Sesame Street!! You were the staple of my existence when I was a little kid. Between you and Fred Rogers, my life was complete when I was able to sit and listen to your happy sings and poignant lessons. I was deeply in love with Grover and Kermit, loved all the little sketches (Peli-Gro!) and just knew that the world was ok because of my hour of tv. I will admit, I am a little disappointed in the direction you took where the second half of your show now concentrates on your annoying little red diva of a Muppet (I always liked that it was an ensemble), but in that first 30 minutes, I have still seen the sparkles of good that guided me as a child. Here’s to the first 40 years, and here’s to another 40 more. Wouldn’t it be grand if my great grandkids could still be learning how to count by a purple vampire?

There is a Baby Loves Disco event on the 14th that I am considering taking the boys to. It is their last of the year, and it is a pajama party. Prizes given to great jammies. Dude, my boys in their frog footies? We will rock that party! Ken has to check his tournament schedule since FLL seems to think that the holidays are an ideal time to schedule extremely time consuming events so that parents have a hard time making plans.

Puppy plus clumsy with a dash of giant boobs is a problem. Luna has this tendency to circle my feet, run between my legs, and generally orbit my lower extremities. The problem with this is when you are trying to walk, it is difficult. Plus, when I look down, there are almost always boob in the way since my boos are significantly larger than the dog. And then, as if that wasn’t bad enough, I am super clumsy. Last night, the long overdue fall occurred. I stepped, which resulted in a puppy squeak since my foot actually landed on her foot. I jumped back, trying to sidestep her. The problem was, she went the same direction. So my foot once again was met with soft fur and a tiny yelp. I stumbled the other way, this time seeing her before I put my foot down. The problem? I had nowhere to put my feet that wouldn’t result in squished puppy. Next thing I knew, I as down. By the way, falling on hardwood, not recommended. I bruised my knees a bit and my wrist hurt from trying to catch my fall. At least Luna was ok. She looked confused. Of course, the best part of this was Dax who was sitting on the couch at the time. He barely looked up from Spongebob, and while still watching his show muttered, “you ok mom?” This was not his first time watching mommy fall down randomly.

We had a rough night. Dax had at least two nightmares. One at like 3:30 in the morning, and then a smaller one at about 5 (which may have just been him still up from the first one). The earlier one was heard by about 20 people. Ok, no not really, but when you are in the middle of a dream, and all of the people in the dream you are with all look around trying to determine what the scream is, it is a little disturbing. The dream people heard the scream twice, and then I came to, right about the time Ken heard it. I still wasn’t sure what it was having been still kind of groggy.

Of course, Dax wasn’t the only member of the sleepless night. Bobby had been sent to bed with no show after he spit water onto Ken. He was pretty upset. I tried to cheer him up when I went to read a story. I had him tell me my phone number, which he had been doing quite well all afternoon. I praised the hell out of him and even made sure to bring Ken in to hear it. Bobby seemed happy enough, and seemed to settle in for sleep.

He then started his normal routine. He comes out to pee, then to poop. We have explained to him that he needs to stay in his room unless he has one of those issues. We also told him that if he comes out for something trivial or yells out for us to say pick up BoBo from the floor, we would come in and confiscate one of his “friends”. Last night, he came out with standard ailment number 1 (number 2 involves not feeling well, number 3 tends to be he is scared), which was that his mouth hurt. This originates, we believe, from a time when he bit his tongue. At the time, it was bloody and we did dote on him for a minute to make sure he was ok. He came out a couple night after that, complaining that it still hurt, which we of course spent a bit of time investigating. Now, the sore has healed but he is too smart for his own good, and he thinks that using said excuse he will get some attention, and he of course can. This time, the attention was negative. I went in and confiscated BoBo. He was devastated. He lasted for about 20 minutes before he frantically yelled out for Ken. Turned out now he was scared. Total bullshit, but what are you going to do? Ken told him to not sleep, but to just listen to the radio, which apparently is the perfect in reverse psychology. I watched for him on the monitor to show when he was close to sleep, and I went back in with BoBo. I told him I had heard he was scared and tucked him in with his beloved bear. He seemed ok.

I don’t know how many times he came into our room, but it seemed like a lot. Mostly he would tip toe into our room, stand next to the bed, and the proceed to yell out. No joke, probably one of the most disturbing ways to wake up. He always just needed to be tucked in. Such a pain in the ass. I wish I could figure out what to do about it. I don’t want to get mad at him, since really, I don’t think he is trying to be a pain. It wasn’t like he wasn’t tired. He seemed sleepy, but more like he just can’t get comfortable. So I think tonight I am going to make sure he has fresh sheets, redo his bed, and get it all nice in there. Maybe even find some kind of aromatherapy or something.

So happy this morning. So my coworker, Esther, is a bit of a diva. Nice lady, but let’s face it, she assumes everything in this world is all about her. So when she came to me yesterday to tell me Fred wasn’t speaking to her, and had not been for a few weeks, I assumed she was full of shit. I also felt that if it was true, I didn’t blame him. She told me about this export customer that has been with us for as long as I can remember. I remember Bertha used to work the account and I knew the guy was a smooth talking salesman who charmed his way out of needing to pay past due while still being able to place new orders. Bertha never tolerated it, but when she left, since he spoke Spanish, his account correspondence sometimes fell on Esther. Esther, charmed by this man, always bent over backwards to get him taken care of. I remember her bringing it to me at some point to release an order (since she isn’t allowed to) and I didn’t want to based on how past due he was. She got all uppity about how Bertha was mean to him. I knew she was full of shit, but shrugged it off since it wasn’t my problem.

Fred has since inherited the Export accounts. He doesn’t speak the Spanish, so he often has Esther help translate. Esther isn’t a collector, so really, she isn’t allowed to 100% handle the account. Fred had told her that since she knew the guy, that she could handle much of the collections efforts, but that ultimately, the account was his and that orders or other things would come down to a decision from him.

The customer was here a couple weeks ago. He was even at Esther’s desk. She chatted it up with him and made arrangements for large order to go out without payment first. This man has about $5K due a year ago, and really, all of his orders need to go out paid up front. Esther made the agreement and sent him back out to the warehouse to get his equipment. She went over to Fred to have the order released. He then tells her no. He tells her how they had already discussed that this customer needs to pay cash in advance and that no new orders can go out unless they are on a credit card. She got all huffy and then tells him she is going to go over his head to the boss. Mind you, Esther’s boss is Fred. So she storms off to his office. Fred follows and the discussion is that the boss agreed with Fred. Esther was livid. She has made a scene, telling Fred essentially in front of much of the department that he was full of poo, and now, she had nothing. So since that day, Esther claimed Fred had not spoken to her. I figured this was her perception, and knew that I could ask Fred when she wasn’t here.

Fred came over to my desk this morning, giving me the morning report, and so I stopped him and asked if he minded if I asked a random, slightly high school like question. He laughed and told me sure. So I asked him if he wasn’t talking to Esther. To which he chuckled and confirmed that in fact, he wasn’t. I almost died laughing. So he proceeded to tell me his side, similar to what Esther had told me, but filled with more behind the scenes. Turns out, Fred isn’t speaking to her if it is anything other than work related. He is keeping it to a bare minimum of contact only because he feels she owes him an apology for how rude and unprofessional she was acting. I agree with him, but wow, it cracked me up at how frank he was about the whole thing. What Esther doesn’t know is how much this annoyed the boss. The boss and Fred had a meeting about that, and other dept stuff (which yes, made me nervous, but it sounds like I am still on great terms with everyone) and the boss felt like Esther’s behavior on things has been bad. This does not look good for her in the long run. Although it doesn’t sound like there are any layoffs scheduled anytime in the near future (apparently the new head of the company is even feeling like they let too many people go), it does mean if they need to trim some fat, her position is not secure.

I am wearing my new scarf today but I am concerned it looks funny. Not sure how to wear scarves yet. I need practice. Right now it is being used at a shall only because my arms are cold. I also didn’t get my normal visit from MaryAnn, my morning ego boost where she tells me I look cute or something. So I am feeling nervous about it. I have to go pee soon, so I will venture out into the world to see what people say.

Ok, now the boss just told me he really liked my scarf. That’s right, ladies and gentlemen, a dude said something. This scores points and I feel all pretty again. If only a gay guy would tell me it rocked, then I would be in heaven!

I have been playing the suck up card at work. Nothing specific, just a lot more cheery in general. Yes, the boss has irritated me to no end recently, but I figure if I still mostly stay positive, things will be better over all.

Ok, I just read the wiki page on Twilight. The stories themselves were broken down quickly, and I can safely say they don’t interest me too much. But I find the whole thing fascinating. Critics keep comparing it all to Harry Potter, which I am choosing to assume means just the fans reaction. But really, they are not similar at all. Especially since the author herself calls the books more romance than anything. I was most intrigued when quoted was Stephen King saying that the difference between the Twilight author and J K Rowling was that Jo can actually write made me laugh out loud. He is pretty outspoken against bad writers. I love that about him. Yet still, I wonder if perhaps I should read the first book just to see. I hate to judge it on its cover. I have been told that isn’t allowed with books. I know, I have at least read a little more about it, and I recognize the movies are helping the negative viewpoint on the books. Jenni said she liked it, but wasn’t obsessed or anything. Conner said they were fine, and enjoyable if you knew it wasn’t literary greatness. One of the criticisms seems to be character development, so maybe if I go into it not expecting something deep, I might look past the flaws and enjoy.

Ken has his weekly trip out to the evil Ralphs today. It is the location that clearly is the portal to hell. I had been there the one time and I just got chills down my spine. I don’t know what it was, but it was just wrong. Ken thinks I am on crack. Every week, I tell him to enjoy his evil Rakphs sushi, and he points out it isn’t evil. So today, I mentioned he didn’t need to get milk and he pointed out that I based on my issues with the store, I have been drinking milk from the devil’s teat. This is rather unsettling, and so it may explain why I was icky all weekend and perhaps it explains my cranky mood. LOL!

I have decided to stick my nose somewhere it technically does need to be but in reality, I could have waited. It is a work thing that sure, it isn’t my account, but since I know the programmers well, and I will technically do the invoice stuff when this is set up, I might as well get involved from the bottom instead of it all being thrown in my lap later. So this morning I have been going through gobs of stuff, sending emails to folks to act like I am in charge. Fun!