Another Day

First thing I did when I got to work this morning was to go find Edna and ask, "Where is my friend request???"  She looked indignantly at me and said, "I'll get to it.  I do have a life, you know!"

Unlike me.  Who has no life.  Whatsoever.  Maybe if I did, you'd have blog posts worth reading, but noooooo....

The most excitement I have had today is I am finally starting to see some hummingbirds.  This one seems to have staked a claim to his territory. I think I shall name him Keith.*

This one is challenging Keith to the feeder,

and I'm all like, "Guys, there is another feeder over there!"  They both appear to be black throated hummingbirds, and hopefully there will be more soon.

There I was at my brazing stand, just a brazing away, when Assembly Line Supervisor brought me some rework to braze up.  Why they always bring it to me and not to Brazing Boss's star brazer is beyond me, and I said so to my coworker who stands beside me.

She turned to ALS and said, "You know who Brazing Boss's star brazers are?"  He said no, and she told him.  He gave the most incredible sound of disbelief I've ever heard.  I said, "Yeah, and according to him, we are the worst two brazers over here."

ALS said, "I'd take you both back in a heartbeat."  I replied, "If I could still get my overtime, I'd come back."

Before.  The.  Sun. Sets. Today.

Don't get me wrong.  I love brazing, and what I do.  The very first day I walked in to ADP 24 years, two months, and two days ago, I saw the brazers and knew that was what I wanted to do.  I don't want to give that job up, but the constant badgering, the constant harassment, the constant you're not good enough from Brazing Boss and his thugs is ...  well, I just don't even want to be a brazer any more.

Here's an example.  About a year ago, they switched us to a cheaper, lower quality brazing rod.  Immediately, everyone's leak rates skyrocketed.  Yet, Brazing Boss says it's our technique.  Yeah, like people who've been brazing for 20 - 30 years suddenly developed bad technique -- and that you had just switched rods was a completely unrelated coincidence.

He insists he didn't change the rod, but it's even got a different label on the box.  Don't be trying to gaslight me, little man.  I've been doing this job since you were still eating your own boogers.

Anyway, that's why I asked New Supervisor to move me to a different area.  He said he'd look into it.  The question is, once Brazing Boss has run off all his good brazers, what's he going to have left?  He may think he wants a department full of Star Brazer #1 and Star Brazer #2, but he really doesn't.

OK, enough of that.

I found a new song over the weekend, and it's got to be my new favorite song of all time, ever. Have a listen:



Here is another new one.  Funny, it showed up in my You Tube recommendations 5 minutes after it was uploaded, and six minutes after it was uploaded, it was in my playlist.



By the way, have you figured out which one I'm considering making my new Imaginary Boyfriend?  I'll give you a hint:  his name starts with a J.  That rules out Billy (who isn't in this video) and Toby.  So, it's either Jason, Jeremy, John, John, John, or... um...Jon.

Now, if only imaginary boyfriends cut real grass....



*Several years ago, Cody named one of the hummingbirds at Beverly and James' house Keith.  That was the year after he named the giant spider outside our back door Jeff. 

Monday Miscellany

Well, that weekend went by way too quickly.

I get to work today, and my friend called me over.  She said she lost her old FB log in, so she was going to start a new profile.  She didn't want to add a lot of people, but she said, "I do want to add you.  Please accept my friend request!"

via GIPHY

Awww, I feel so special!

The only problem is now I have to think of something to blog about.  It's been kind of a slow day for blog fodder as nothing really hap -- Oh, wait!  I've got something!

We had a bit of excitement at work, as one of the autobrazers kept catching the slabs on fire.  They're not supposed to burn like that.  Sometimes they do blaze briefly, due to the oils and such on the metals, but it goes out pretty quickly.

This one didn't.  It had huge flames shooting up a couple of feet, and they wouldn't go out.  They had three or four people walking down to the water fountain, filling up bins with water and pouring them over the slab.  It took several trips, but they finally got the fire out. 

Good thing we had so much toxic masculinity there, because silly old me would have gotten the -- you know-- fire extinguisher! 

Probably why I'm not in charge. 

I Must Have Been Tired

I really must have been tired.  Why do I say that?  Because I slept nearly 10 hours last night.  I went to bed shortly after 8:00 PM, and slept until 6-ish this morning.  I woke up, saw the clock, and said, "Dang, I must have needed that sleep."

And what did I do with all that energy I got from all that sleep?  Not much, really.  I did some laundry, wrote a couple of letters, and listened to my new records.  Oh, and good news!  I finally saw a hummingbird! 

I'd hung my feeders out a couple of weeks ago, and have re-filled them a couple of times, but hadn't spotted a bird until today.  Probably because I spend nearly ever waking hour at work.  Be that as it may, they're finally back.  On that topic, I was in the store yesterday, and on impulse bought a new feeder.

It has a slightly larger reservoir, so I won't have to be filling it as often.  So far, the only bird I've seen was feeding at the old feeder.  In a torrential downpour.  But this one will come in handy for Fall migration.  The feeders always seem much busier then.

This was another impulse buy.

Like I don't have enough bird feeders already.  I don't know.  It just caught my eye, and was already filled with seed.

I believe I've mentioned it before, but I'm having a hard time getting excited about my flower beds this year.  I think it's because with the way we work, I don't really have time to take care of them like I should.  They usually turn into a mass of weeds by the end of the summer, and don't look very good.  I'm thinking I might let the beds lie fallow this time around.  I don't know.  I've still got plenty of time to decide.

This was a bit of a surprise -- the verbenas I planted last year are blooming.

And without any effort from me!  I'd thought they were annuals, but they never died back over the winter.  The only thing I've done is, after taking this picture, I pulled up some of those weeds.

The last of the daffodils are blooming, too.

I'm not sure what all those little yellow flowers are, but the bees seem to like them, so I'm going to leave them alone.

I seem to be suffering from a deplorable lack of nosiness, in that I'm always the last person to know anything.  My friend Edna and I were talking about some incident that had occurred in her family last weekend.  She mentioned something about a certain co-worker who lived near her younger son.  I said, "Wait, I thought she lived in such and such house on such and such road."

Edna said, "No, Other Coworker bought her out, and he lives there."

I said, "Wait, Coworker and Other Coworker have split up????"

Edna looked at me as if I'd lost my head and said, "They've been divorced for years."  Seriously?  I'd had no idea they'd even separated.

Edna and I finished our conversation, and I went back to my brazing stand, and said to a couple of other coworkers, "I didn't know Coworker and Other Coworker were divorced."  They both gave me that same look Edna had, and one of them asked, "Where have you been?"

Minding my own business, apparently.

And lastly, a couple of years ago, I started posting hymns on Sundays.  Those posts were wildly popular at first, but that popularity faded over time.  When I went home for Christmas that year, I just stopped posting them, after posting the Christmas Eve hymn. 

Here lately, I've been feeling like I want to bring that back, so here you go.  The first in the new series of Sunday Hymn postings (which will probably include some contemporary music as well as traditional hymns). 

Oodalolly

Oodalolly, golly what a day.

I knew right away what kind of day it was going to be when I got to work, and my very first order had an adapter tube bent wrong.  I mean, the whole order was bent wrong, not just a single tube.  It was a rather large order, too. 

I put them back into the box and took them to my group leader.  I said, "I've got a present for you."  She replied, "I don't want your presents!"

Oh, wait, that was yesterday...

I knew right way what kind of day it was going to be when I awoke after a good night's sleep, refreshed and ready to face the day.  I rolled over to see how much longer before the alarm went off, and it was 11:30.  PM.  Dang. 

I was torn between "yay, I get to sleep some more" and knowing I wouldn't feel nearly that good when the alarm went off at 3:00, and I had to get up for real.  Sure enough, I didn't.  But I got up and muddled through the day anyway.

I got to work, and checking the computer, I discovered it's Brazing Boss's birthday today.  Oh, well.  Who cares?  Sometime later, Stalker decided he was going to make a sign for him, kind of like I had done with New Supervisor.  Only problem was, he couldn't find anyone who would write so much as Happy Birthday on a piece of paper.

Finally, Group Leader did, but then nobody wanted to sign it.  As one of my fellow brazers said, "Brazing Boss isn't one of us."  As another one said, "Well, I don't really like him, but I signed it anyway."   Stalker kept badgering and nagging people until he got about half the department to sign his card-- even though most of them did it reluctantly.  We were all like, "If we'd wanted to make Brazing Boss a card, we'd have done it ourselves."

All that to say, Stalker kept watching me the whole time.  I told my friend, "Look at him.  He keeps watching to see if I go write something nasty on that sign, the way he did on my sign for New Supervisor.  But I'm not going to do it, because I'm better than that.  I'm not going to sign it, but I'm not going to write anything nasty on it, either."

And I didn't.  Stalker was so hoping to catch me in a gotcha moment, but too bad.  I had to disappoint him.  I'm not going to be petty about it.

I also knew what kind of a day it was going to be when Group Leader came to me and said my line was skipping five orders.  FIVE orders.  They didn't have one of the Vitally Important Parts they needed for those orders, but it was a Vitally Important Part they buy from another supplier, not one we make.  So, there was nothing they could do but home some Vitally Important Parts arrived on the Vitally Important Part Truck.  I don't guess they did, because they ended up sending that line home early.

Moving right along...

I went on another record buying bender last week, and the last of them arrived today.  This is the one I wasn't sure I wanted to get or not, but as you can see, I did.

This might sound sacrilegious to some of you, but I'm not that big a Burl Ives fan.  Still, it's got some familiar folk songs on it.

This one wasn't on the list my brother sent me.  I found it purely by random chance, but as soon as I saw it, I remembered it. 

This may sound sacrilegious to some of you, but I like this version of Country Roads even better than what John Denver sang. 

This one here, I didn't remember at all.   But I took a chance on it.  I haven't listened to it yet, but probably will this weekend.

It's apparently all instrumental. 

Last, but certainly not least, this one is obviously not part of the American folk song series, but given my newfound Scottish ancestry, how could I resist?

I've discovered there are a lot more of those records than I'd originally thought.  I may be buying them up for quite some time to come.

One last thing, I'm going to tell off on one of my coworkers.  He had gotten up and gotten ready for work.  He saw that he had a few minutes to spare, so he sat down in his chair -- just for a minute.  When he woke up, he saw that he was late, so he threw on some shoes and flew down the road to the plant.

It was only after he'd gotten there he discovered he had two different shoes on.  Of course, we had to rag on him about it. 

His only response was, "I'm not sitting in that chair again!" 
 

Wednesday, Right?

I'm sure you will all be pleased to know I made it to work with my driver's license, and subsequently ran the after work errand I mentioned yesterday. 

Having Monday off has really messed with my sense of time.  I'm not quite sure what day it is.  I think it's Wednesday, but I'm not completely sure.  But then, they put the weekend schedule up today, so it must be Wednesday, right? 

The bad news is -- or the good news, depending on your perspective -- we are working Friday and Saturday.  They put the notice up and everyone was like....

And I was like,  "You knew it was coming.  Don't act like you've never worked here before." 

More bad news, the Mississippi Parks and Wildlife Department has expanded it's Chronic Wasting Disease management area to include my county.  The article says supplemental feeding is banned in these counties.  Not sure if that includes the little cup full of corn I toss for my deer, but I figure it's better safe than sorry.  My deer seem OK so far, but I wouldn't want any outsiders coming in and spreading the stuff.  And I for sure don't want to get busted by the game wardens.  Not after watching all that Lone Star Law on Hulu.

I really don't have any more to talk about tonight, other than that my Stalker was actually TAKING PICTURES of my work today.  Seriously?  There is something majorly wrong with him. 

Oh, and I got a new T-shirt.

I didn't sleep well last night, so I'm going to hit the hay early. 

Good night.

Work And Waitresses

Halfway across the parking lot this morning,  I felt like something was missing.  I couldn't quite shake the feeling I'd forgotten something.  I went through my mental checks...coffee:  check; lunch:  check; phone:  check; driver's license:  uh oh.

That's what I forgot.  My driver's license, my debit cards, my cash -- everything.  I'd planned on going into town after work, but upon making this discovery, I decided my in town trip could wait.   I did stop and pay the bill that was on my route home, but that's all.  I told my coworker it's been so long since I've been to work, I forgot what I was supposed to bring with me.

Speaking of work, I found out a long time supervisor quit last week.  I mean, he's been working out there longer than I have, and has been a supervisor for the last 20 years.  He said he'd finally gotten fed up.  He was tired of being chewed out over stuff he had no control over.  He'd had enough, and found himself a new job.  I can't say as I blame him.  They do the same thing to us.  They're constantly shrieking about our leak rates, yet when we point out things that lead to increased leaks, they say, "I don't see that as a problem."  Now, they're talking about taking away our brazer pay, because of leaks, yet they won't do anything to solve our problems.  It's like we're constantly having to battle our way upstream, and they're beating us up because we aren't swimming fast enough. 

I'm almost to the point where I'm going to pull up stakes, move back to Texas, and hope I can find something once I get there.   Because I have just about had enough, myself. 

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate my job?

Now, for something more interesting.

A few weeks ago, someone posted on Facebook a video of the Chinese Waitress Cast on.  You've heard me mention it before.  It's become my go to cast on for hats.  Well, someone asked what the cast on had to do with Chinese waitresses.  After a bit of sleuthing, I can now answer that question.

The cast on appeared in the book Cast On, Bind Off, by Cap Sease


The story is, a friend of hers was in Beijing, China, and a waitress there taught her this cast on.  She didn't know the official name of it, so she made one up.  It was literally named after a Chinese waitress.

Pretty cool, huh? 

Long Weekend

My long weekend is just about over.  I'm afraid there really isn't much to tell you about it.  I'd wanted to get up and do something today, but I just didn't. Of course, you know the zoo trip was out of the question after getting that vet bill.  Still, I thought I'd drive up to Southaven or even Batesville and do a little window shopping, but with no money to spend, that lost its appeal.  What I did instead was finish the mowing, split some more firewood, and wash dishes.  That's real exciting, huh? 

Saturday, I rented the new Aquaman movie.  Now, first thing I must say is that I'm not a big fan of DC movies -- not since the original Superman with Christopher Reeve, and the original Batman with Michael Keaton.  I did kind of like Batman Begins, but The Dark Knight, and The Dark Knight Rises, eh, not so much. 

I had high hopes for Aquaman, because of Jason Momoa.  Someone once said, "Only Jason Momoa could make Aquaman not suck," and truthfully, he was the best part of the movie.  Oh, it wasn't terrible.  It was an, "I'm glad I rented it, but I don't think I'll buy it" kind of movie.   It could have been great.  Instead, it just sort of flirted with greatness, but didn't quite get there. 

For example -- and I should probably give you a spoiler alert, even though the spoilers I'm about to drop were so blatantly obvious and predictable, they aren't really spoilers at all -- in the cave, when he turns away from the two women to go after the trident.  That moment could have packed a lot more punch.  Instead, it fell a bit flat.  What should have been momentous, left me feeling like, "is that all?"  Same way when he retrieved the trident.  That could have been -- should have been -- an intensely powerful scene, birth of a hero and all, but again, it fell flat. 

The other thing I didn't like was that the battle scenes just seemed to drag on and on.  In fact, the whole movie seemed to be one fight after another, with just enough of a plot to connect them.  The best scene of all was the mid credit scene.  Now, that left me wide eyed and saying, "Wow!"  All that to say, this is one that won't be added to my collection. 

The rest of my weekend was spent watching Lone Star Law.  For some reason, Hulu has skipped me all the way up to season 4.  I'm going to have to go back and watch seasons 1 - 3.  I've seen a few season 1 episodes, but then the "Watch Next Episode" option took me all the way to season 4.  Not that that's important, but still. 

In the midst of all that watching -- and the accompanying homesickness it brought on -- I finished a hat. 

And I started another. 

This one is just plain stockinette.  The plain ones knit up so much faster. 

If I seem a bit down tonight, it's because I have to go back to work tomorrow, and I'm not looking forward to it.  Have I ever mentioned how much I hate my job?  I hate it even more, now that I've got a stalker harassing me. 

Maybe I need to go on and put that milk bucket under that bull. 

Bad News And Better News

The bad news is, when I got up this morning, my finger -- the one that had gotten tangled up in the dogs' leashes -- was swollen and very stiff.

Here is my other hand for comparison. 

Both of my hands were a bit swollen from the heat, but you can still see the ring finger on my left hand is more swollen than the rest.

The good news is, for one, it was on my left hand, and I'm right handed.  The better news is, as the day went on, the swelling went down a bit and the stiffness eased enough that I was able to knit quite a bit on my new hat.

This is the hurricane hat pattern.  It's my other go-to pattern -- besides the plain stockinette, that is.  The yarn is some Red Heart my friend Peggy sent me. I think the colorway is Delft Blue, but I'm not 100% sure on that, since I tossed the ball band.

We had some weather come through this afternoon.  It wasn't as bad as they were predicting, at least not here it wasn't. 

Before it got here, I stepped outside and snapped a photo of the clouds.  Because I'm all weather geeky like that.  While I was out there, I also took this picture of my neighbor's oak tree. 

Those aren't leaves, y'all.  Those are pollen tassels.  That's why everything is yellow these days.  Then, I took this picture. 

These are the little flowers I was telling you about yesterday, the ones the bees were all over.  It's Creeping Charlie, sometimes called Ground Ivy.  It's all over the place behind the fence, and is tough to kill.  I hate to put poison on it anyway, because of the bees. 

Finally, yesterday at the vet, there was an assistant in the back doing something with a little dog.  She was just a talking to the dog, when all of the sudden, we heard her say, "Awww, you peed on my leg!"

All three of us -- me, the vet, and the veterinary assistant -- busted out laughing.  I wanted to say something smart, but couldn't stop laughing long enough. 

Vet Trip

Thanks to this long weekend, I finally got the dogs into the vet for their rabies and heartworm shots.  Pretty routine stuff.  As you can see, Rylea is handling it like an old pro, and Jesse is his usual nervous, neurotic self.

Ohmygosh, ohmygosh, ohmygosh here he comes!!!

In addition to the usual stuff, Jesse had a bubble thing come up on his lip recently that I wanted the vet to look at.  You can see it here circled in red.

The vet numbed Jesse's lip up and cut the thing off.  He said it was a tumor, and was most likely benign.  We discussed having it sent off and tested to see if it was malignant or not, but I decided not to.  The vet said chemotherapy for dogs is expensive, stressful, and will at best give them only 6-8 more months.  I said we're not going to put him through all that just for a few months.  I'll just keep an eye on him, and if something comes up down the road, we'll deal with it then. 

Jesse doesn't seem too bothered, but he wouldn't eat his supper.   If he doesn't eat his breakfast in the morning, I might run up to the dollar store on the corner and get him some canned food.  It'll be easier for him to eat if his lip is still sore.   

Once the vet trip was done, and I'd brought the dogs home, I said to myself, "Self, since you're already up and dressed, you might as well get the shopping done."  So I did, but it wasn't very exciting.  I wandered through the garden center to see what they had, and it wasn't much.  No Zinnias at all.  I've probably mentioned it before, but I'm having trouble getting excited about my flower beds this year.  I don't know what I'm going to do with them.  They usually end up being a mess of weeds anyway.

Speaking of weeds, I saw my next door neighbor, and told her Tomato Man had asked to plant tomatoes again.  She said, "He's got some gall, I tell you!"  Then she said he'd made her hoe them once last year.  I'd come home from work one day and saw that the weeds had been cut back.  I thought he'd done it, but no, he'd made the rickety old lady on the other side hoe them.  She only did it once.  She told him if she'd wanted to take care of tomatoes, she'd have planted them herself.  I told her he'd tried to get me to water them, but I wouldn't. 

The last major thing I did today was to mow.  I'm trying to get ahead of the weeds this year.  I still have to do behind the fence, but I think I'll raise the mower bed some, because I've seen bees on some of the wildflowers back there.  I'm not sure what it is.  It's a tiny blue flower that stays low to the ground.  Whatever it is, I'm going to leave it alone for a while.  It's supposed to rain tomorrow, so I may put off finishing up the mowing until Monday, since I can't go to the zoo after paying the vet bill. 

In knitting knews -- heh, see what I did there?-- I cast on a new hat last night. 

I probably shouldn't be showing you my Irish DNA, but there it is, and I'm not taking the picture over. 

Back to the hat.  I used the Chinese Waitress cast on again.  It may become my go-to cast on for hats.  It's way stretchy, even more than the Twisted German cast on, and gives a nice, neat edge.  Knitting is going kind of slow, though, because my finger got twisted in the dog's leash this morning, and is pretty sore.  I don't think it's broken.  It isn't swollen at all, and it bends just fine.  It's just really tender, like a bad bruise. 

It'll slow me down, but it won't stop me. 

Glory Hallelujah!

Glory hallelujah!  My stalker wasn't at work today!  It was so nice not to have to deal with his constant staring and harassment. I felt like I could actually get some work done.

Oh,  and remember how I told you he was standing over me, checking every single header I brazed yesterday?  Well, my friend told me after I left, he didn't check but probably two headers from the whole department the entire afternoon.  Tell me I wasn't being targeted now!  It's OK, though, because several of the brazers have thanked me for speaking up about that particular problem.  It won't do any good, because they're not interested in solving problems, but still...

Anyway, some of the other brazers have told me they can't stand him being over there, either.  They don't like him standing over them, and they're tired of his childish pranks.  He'll walk by and turn someone's gas off, or unplug a striker, and this one girl he keeps tying her tip to the hanger.  Then we have to stop working to fix what he messed up.  You know it's bad when even the lazy people are complaining!  "All he wants to do is play all day, and we're over here trying to work!"

The worst part is, he gets paid a whole lot more than we do, and all he does is annoy people and get in the way.

OK, moving right along...

I put out a request on Facebook for recommendations on a keyboard.  I'm still debating on getting one at all, but I want to have some information to consider while I decide.  I can't help but think about that perfectly good guitar just gathering dust in Cody's room.  Yes, it's mine.  About 20 years ago, I thought I wanted to learn to play the guitar.  After buying a book and spending a few months learning to play, I discovered I didn't have the passion for it I thought I did.  Once Cody started kindergarten, I don't think I've played it at all.

Then there is Cody's violin.  A few years ago, he decided he wanted to take it up after watching some Vivaldi videos on YouTube.  That year, we all gave him money for Christmas so he could get one.  He bought the violin, but hasn't really done anything with it.  About a year ago, I thought I'd give it a whirl.  That lasted all of two days.

I'm thinking it might be different with the piano.  I'd taken lessons for a year when I was a kid, and really enjoyed playing.  However, my mother got mad at me, because I kept forgetting what day my lessons were on. I'd walk home from school, while she'd be sitting in the car behind the school,  waiting to take me to my piano lesson.

I think she thought I was being stubborn and defiant, but I wasn't.  My mind was just elsewhere. 

Even after she stopped my lessons, I'd still play from time to time, all the way up until I left for college.  I haven't played in years, but when I started watching Piano Guys videos a few years ago, I kind of was inspired to try again.

Well, I'll have quite a while to think about it, because it'll take me a bit of a minute to save up enough to get a decent keyboard anyway.  Especially since I want a full size 88 key model that will transfer easily to a regular piano.

One last thing, be careful out there, guys.  The pollening has begun.

Well, Dang It!

It's official.  They put the announcement up yesterday.  We are having Friday and Monday off so they can update the computer system.

It's going to be a mess at work until this is all done, because we have to have everything out of the computer before they can do the update.  That means all orders in the schedule must be complete, and all component orders must be out of the system, as well.  I'm figuring tomorrow, they're either going to send us home early, or work us absolutely to death.  I told my coworker if I'd known ahead of time, that they were going to do this, I'd have put my half day of vacation in tomorrow instead of today.  But they don't want to tell you anything until the last minute. 

So, I had a half day of vacation for today.  I left at lunch, then my friend messaged me and said New Supervisor is quitting already.  Dang!  Every time we get a good one, ADP runs him off. I don't blame him, though.  I wish I could quit, too.  One day, though, and maybe sooner than later. 

I think Brazing Boss is trying to get me fired anyway, because I spoke up at a brazing meeting yesterday, and he apparently didn't like what I had to say.  Today he sent Stalker to stand over me all morning.  He stood right behind my stand, and every time I brazed a header and put it into my bin, he'd run over and snatch it up.  He'd then examine it -- as if under a microscope -- hoping to find something he could write me up for.  He was trying to intimidate me, but I don't intimidate that easily.

Let's move on to more pleasant topics.

I finally made it in to Tractor Supply and picked up two bags of deer corn -- two, so I won't have to g back for a couple of weeks.  While I was wandering around the store, I found the baby chicks.  I was so tempted to get some, but I've got too many mouths to feed as it is.  Maybe one day, but now isn't the time.

After that, I came home, and you would be proud of me.  I made a phone call.  I scheduled the dogs for their heartworm and rabies shots.  I spent the rest of the afternoon doing things around the house, like washing dishes, but you don't want to hear about that, do you?   

The only exciting thing I did was to finally finish this hat.

I started the camo strip sooner this time, so I think it balances better.

I guess that's about it for today.  I'll just leave you with one more of my National Geographic songs. 



Oh, one last thing before I go, I'm sorely tempted to buy myself an electronic keyboard and learn to play the piano.  I took lessons for a year as a kind, but haven't really fooled with it since.  Watching old Piano Guys videos made me want to take it up again, but I don't really have room for a full size piano. 

The only thing is, I'm not so sure I'll stick with it enough to make such an investment worth it.  Eh.  I'll have to consider it a bit more before making a decision.

Can You Believe It?

There I was, sitting in my chair, watching a DVRed episode of Survivor when my doorbell rang.  I must admit, my first thought was, "Ugh, I hope it's not more Jehovah's Witnesses" as I went to answer.  It wasn't JWs.  It was worse.

It was Tomato Man.

Now, for those of you new to the blog, or those of you who have memories like mine, the story of The Tomato Man is as follows.  One day last spring, the man who owns the house next door -- he doesn't live there, he owns it and rents it out-- came to me and asked if he could grow tomatoes in a little corner of my yard.  I gladly gave my permission, on the condition that he take care of them.

I was very specific about that.  "You gonna take care of them?"  "Oh, yes, ma'am.  I'll take care of them."  Just so we were clear about it.

A few weeks later, he tilled up the land and planted a couple dozen tomato plants and some cantaloupe.  A week or two after he'd planted his tomatoes, he came to my door and asked, "Do my tomato plants look a little dry to you?"  I replied that I didn't know, and he looked startled, "You mean you haven't been out there to check on them?"  I told him no, and he asked me if I would go out and water them a couple of times a week.

I said, "The deal was that you take care of them."

Well, to make a long story short, he abandoned the tomato patch, and it ended up being a clogged up mess of weeds

that didn't produce any edible tomatoes,

and took me three days to clean up that fall.  I had to get out and with my gardening shears and clippers and cut the worst of it down to remove the tomato cages.

Then I had to use the weedeater to knock the rest of it down enough that I could mow that spot.

Now that you have the back story, let me get back to today.  Tomato Man shows back up at my door and asks if he can plant tomatoes there again this year.  Can you believe that?  He didn't take care of them last year, and wants to plant more!  I told him no.  I also told him to get his tomato cages out of my yard, and he wants to act all mad at me.  To that I say, you can get glad in the same britches you got mad in.

Then he told me I needed to get my plot surveyed so he'll know where the property lines are.  Um, also no.  If you want to know, you can get someone out here to survey it.

I've been told he's lazy, and pretty much worthless as a human being who takes advantage of nice people.  Guess what?  I'm not a nice person.  He burned me once.  It won't happen again.

One of my friends used to rent his house.  You know, the one next door.  She told me they wanted to buy it from him, but he had a long list of things he wanted them to fix at their own expense before he'd sell it to them.  Um, again, no.  They bought a different house.

He sulked off back to his car and drove away without a backward glance.  Hopefully, that will be the end of my dealings with Tomato Man.

Now for some bad news.  Wal-mart no longer carries any kind of weight management dog food at our local store. They've also stopped carrying deer corn for the season.  I guess I'm going to have to make a trip down to Tractor Supply.  Which isn't that big a deal, as it's just down the road a piece from Wal-mart.

And finally, my stalker was back to his old tricks today.  Staring at me.  All day.  Stalking up and down the aisle behind me -- as if he were trying to either catch my attention or intimidate me.  He didn't do either.  I told my friend the other day, it's gotten to the point I'm almost afraid to even look up any more.  He's the kind who takes incidental eye contact as equivalent to a marriage proposal.  Actually, there are a few men out there who take incidental eye contact as equivalent to a marriage proposal.  I hate being rude, but that's the only way to deal with people like that.  Anyway, I just ignored him, and spent the day daydreaming about Port Isaac's Fisherman's Friends.

And by daydreaming about Port Isaac's Fisherman's Friends, I mean watching their videos in my head.  I can do that you know.  The song of choice for today was this one.



By the way, one of those men is definitely an introvert.  I told you, we Innies have a nose for our own. I'm debating about whether I should make him my new imaginary boyfriend, or just keep him in the imaginary friend zone.


I'll let you know how it goes.

Almost Lost My Job

Well, folks, I almost lost my job today.  And the way that happened is as follows:

I got to work bright and early -- well, not so bright, as the sun wasn't up yet -- and began my day.  I walked over to the computer to print out the day's schedule, and while I was there, clicked through to the company home page, because I like to see who has a birthday that day.  Today just happens to be New Supervisor's birthday.  Hmmm, I thought.  I ought to make him a card or something.

I got a piece of paper out of the printer and had Group Leader (because she has nice handwriting) write Happy Birthday [New Supervisor] on it.  Then I got all the sub-brazers and parts stagers to sign it, and I taped it up on the stanchion.  Then we waited.

At the moment, New Supervisor is working a split shift.  He comes in at noon, and stays until 10:00 PM, so I knew it would be a bit of a minute before he got there.   

While we were waiting for time to pass, my Stalker -- you know, the guy I mentioned yesterday who stares at me all day, the one who stares so much he makes the person standing next to me feel uncomfortable -- came over and said, "You ought to write [something nasty and extremely inappropriate] on there." 

I said, "No!  I'm not writing that stupid mess on there."  Stalker said, "Well, that's what me and [So-and-So] and them call him."   I replied, "This sign isn't from you and [So-and-So] and them.  It's from us, and I'm not writing it on there." 

Sometime later, I had to step away from my stand for a moment.  When I came back, Coworker said, "He wrote it on there.  I told him not to, but he did it anyway."

I.  Was.  Livid. 

I very nearly went into full on Berserker mode.  That's the point where I nearly lost my job.  It's been a long, long time since I wanted to beat the crap out of someone so badly.  Here I was, wanting to make a nice, thoughtful, classy gesture, he has to go writing that nasty mess on it. Then, to make matters worse, Stalker tries to play the victim, and acts like he can't understand why we all got so mad over it. 

I let him know in no uncertain terms we did not appreciate him doing that.  I said, "Two different people told you not to write that on there.  Why on earth would you think it was OK do to it anyway?" 

Later on, he came over an apologized, saying, "I'm sorry I hurt your feelings." 

I said, "It's not about my feelings!  Here I am trying to do something nice and thoughtful for someone, and you had to go and ruin it!"  He said, "Well, that's what me and [other workers] call him."  I replied, "Then you should have made your own sign and got [other workers] to sign it.  This one was from us, and you had no right to write anything on it, much less that!" 

I went over and fixed the sign by drawing flowers with a marker over the nasty thing Stalker had written, but I was still furious.  One of the tap fitting brazers came over and said, "Who drew flowers on it?"  I told her I had, and my coworker who stands right next to me explained why.  Tap Fitter gave me an "are you serious?" look, then shook her said and said, "He's just jealous." 

Coworker and I looked at each other and said, "See?  We called it.  Even other people are noticing, not just us."  Stalker has been jealous of New Supervisor ever since he got there, because we actually like New Supervisor.  Nobody really likes Stalker.  Probably because he's such a sphincter. 

Finally, New Supervisor comes in -- and walks right past the sign twice.  I even called him over to explain a certain equipment failure we were experiencing, so he was standing right in front of the sign, but still didn't see it.  We were hoping he'd notice on his own, but in the end, somebody had to point it out to him.  He turned so red, I almost felt bad about doing it.  But he took a picture, so I think he appreciated the gesture. 

After it was all said and done, I said to my coworker, "Well, if there's anything good to come out of this, at least [Stalker] stopped staring at me -- well, for now anyway." 

It didn't last long.  By the end of the day, he was right back into full on stalker mode. 

Ugh, and I've still got one more day to get through. 

Thor's Day Once Again

Yes, it appears Loki has returned to wreak his usual Thor's Day havoc on the plant.   I won't go into all the gory details, but it was rough.  It just beats the heck out of me why they can't find someone who can get the tubing department organized.  It's absolutely ridiculous that they wait until the line goes down before starting to work on the parts I need to braze their order up. 

Then, add to that an equipment malfunction that had us down nearly an hour and you've got one tuckered brazer here.  But at least I know I can still braze like the wind when I need to, as the line exceeded it's production schedule, even with all the problems. 

One of my coworkers decided she was going to play a little game today.  She was going to keep track of how many times she caught another coworker staring at me.  I told her it'd be once -- but for ten hours straight.  She said she was still going to count, so every time she looked up and saw him staring, she'd say "One" or whatever the next number was.  She lost track somewhere in the 40s.  She said, "And that's just when I was looking!"  I told her it's like killing cockroaches.  For every one you kill, there are a hundred still in the walls. 

She said it was getting on her nerves seeing him always looking at me.  I said, "How do you think I feel?"  But what can be done about it? 

She told me yesterday, the guy had tied another brazer's tip to its hanger while she was in the bathroom.  Some time after that, I went to the bathroom, and he came over to do the same thing to mine.  She told him, "[Coworker], do you want your [behind] whipped?"  He said, "I'd better leave that one alone." 

After my rough day at work, I came home to find a pick me up in the form of a letter from a dear friend.  It really brightened my day.  That reminds me, I'm thinking of investing in a wax stamp with the shape of Texas on it.  So far, I haven't found one, so I'm going to have to look into getting one custom made, with Texas and one with the Navy Seal on it.  Not SEALs as in special forces, but the emblem seal type of thing.  Then, I think I'll be done collecting them.

No, I won't.  There are still too many Christmas designs on Amazon that I like and want to get.

I apologize for the relative dullness of this post.  I'm so tired my eyes are burning.  Or that may just be the pollen.  Either way, I'm going to go make myself a cup of chamomile tea and read my letter.  In bed.

Goodnight.

More Overtime!

They put up the announcement this afternoon.  Yep, we're working Friday and Saturday this weekend.   I was kind of surprised at how many of my coworkers were saying, "Saturday?  We're working Saturday?  Why are we working Saturday?"  like they've never worked at ADP before.

Funny thing is, as soon as they posted the notice on the bulletin board, my first thought was, "Oh, boy, I want to tell Edna!"  Or Edner, as she's sometimes known.  As I was gleefully skipping down the aisle to deliver the bad news, the thought occurred to me, "I must have a death wish or something!"  Edna does not like working overtime.  At all.

Rumor going around the plant is that they're going to shut down for two days next weekend to update the computer systems.  I haven't seen it in writing yet, though.  Every couple of years, the plant does a survey thing, and lack of communication is always one of the biggest faults listed.  They don't seem to get what we're saying when we score that so low.  THIS IS WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT!  Why act like it's such a big secret?  Why not just go ahead and post it?

The plant half a mile up the road lets their people know things months in advance.  Ours keeps us in the dark until the last minute.  They have gotten better about posting the weekend schedule.  Last year, there were a couple of weeks they didn't put it up until 3:45 Thursday afternoon.  So far, this year, they've gotten it up by 1-ish or so on Wednesdays.

I might be fired by next weekend, anyway, because of the answers I put on my safety survey.  I know they're supposed to be anonymous, but they always know who writes what.  Still, there really isn't anything they can do, because then that would be retaliation for one, and two, they're supposed to be anonymous.

They don't ask your name, but they do ask what department you work in, and there is a space to put your department number (if applicable).  My department doesn't have a number, so I put NCC-1701E.

I seriously doubt the safety person will get that.  She doesn't seem the geeky type.  For those of you out there who also don't get it, here's a hint:

What can I say?  I gotta be me.


Your PSA for the day:

It is never a good idea to walk around your work place loudly singing "A d*** good flogging wouldn't do us any harm"  no matter much you think some of your coworkers could use a d*** good flogging. 




Do you want some gum?*

*Inside joke I may explain later -- or I may not.