Just start it out with, "I like you, but you're an L-O-S-E-R"

I was trying to give advice to a friend, which never goes so well. I have a hard time coming up with good serious advice, mostly because I have no wisdom in that department (and very little wisdom in any other department).

Some things I thought you should note:

1) There are some things that you just shouldn't do alone, like make sugar cookies. This is a multi-person event, and the more people you can sucker into cutting out and frosting cookies, the better. No wonder Shawsy always recruited us!

2) I killed a small furry creature on the way to bible study.

3) When the time falls back an hour, you might end up walking home in the dark. The good news about this is that sometimes you can spot woodland creatures. I saw 4 deer, and I only have an 8 minute walk.

4) Everytime is not a word. Everyone, everything, everywhere -- these are all words. Everytime is not. Apparently, Everytime is, however, a song title, thus proving that song titles don't need to use real words (in case you wanted that proved for some reason).

5) Bowling is fun. I'm putting this in here mostly for myself, so that the next time I might be going bowling, I don't oscillate back and forth between whether it's going to be fun or not. Maybe you just have to be with the right people.

6) Random eyelid twitches are NOT fun. Mine finally stopped today, only to be replaced by contact problems in my other eye, but at least the twitching is gone. I used my eyelid twitch as my Pow (or should I say "thorn") at BS tonight, and they laughed at me. This is the 2nd week my pow/thorn has been laughed at. I'm not sure what that means...

Now on a more serious note, I have something I'd like your input on. Oops, I just ended that sentence with a preposition. Anyway, I have a good friend who recently told me, "I think above all God wants us to be happy." And then at church this Sunday, one of my Sunday school teachers said, "I don't think any part of God's plan for our lives is centered on us being happy." These are two very contradicting statements, and while I'd love to go with the first one, I tend more toward the 2nd as far as reality. What's your take on it? I will post more of my own thoughts later, I think, but I just wanted to throw that out there for anyone who's interested in nibbling on it. Please don't nibble on your monitor; I'm referring to mental nibbling. Food for thought. That sort of thing.

Peace out, bean sprout.

An extra hour and it still wasn't long enough

I think we should try adding extra hours into the weekend on a regular basis. Except instead of this whole "let's change time!" concept, we would just extend the weekend. Next weekend, we won't have to go into work on Monday until 9 instead of 8. And the weekend after, we get out of work at 4 on Friday instead of 5 and then don't go into work until 9 on Monday. And on and on until we've whittled Friday and Monday off the work week completely. Studies show this is a good idea. Well, at least one study... the one I just did with one participant.

Tonight I'm a loser. On Friday night I had a discussion with a friend about people saying they would do something and then bailing out with some excuse or another and how it seems that people often disappoint. And then tonight, I did that exact thing. I was planning on going to watch a movie with some people from my church, and I even had someone draw me a map to their house, and then I didn't go. It's not that I didn't WANT to go... I had just also told someone else I would help him with his C++ homework and he rescheduled until 6:30 and then didn't show up until 7:30 and the movie was at 8 and I couldn't just leave him with no help because I wanted to watch a movie! The really bad part of it is that I don't have anyone's phone number, so I couldn't even call to say I wasn't going to make it. I'm a loser.

On the plus side of things, I got to rake leaves today. It was fun, and hopefully that'll be enough of a raking fix that I won't stare longingly at leaves on my way to work, just wishing I owned a rake. I've been doing that a lot lately.

This whole time change thing, while nice last night when I got to sleep longer, is throwing me off tonight, and I can't stop yawning. And I can't stop making you yawn as you read this because I have nothing interesting to tell you. Do you ever have that feeling of having a lot to say and then realizing that none of it is any good, including the stuff you've already said? I have that feeling a lot when it comes time for me to post here.

The end.

Mind-boggling

Just a quick story that boggles my mind. You know how some days it feels like a different day altogether... a Tuesday may feel like a Wednesday (which stinks when Wednesday gets there and you have to go thru it again) or a Thursday may feel like a Wednesday (which is great because the week is further along than you thought). Just keep that idea in mind as I continue my story.

Today is Thursday, also known to many... some... few... a handful as orange day. I remembered to wear orange today, scoffed at those who didn't remember, and went on my merry way. Then, after a team dinner, I came home to change out of my nice work clothes into my comfy clothes. As I was picking out my shirt, these are the actual thoughts that went through my head: "Hmmm, I could wear that orange t-shirt with a little bit of blue in it which would match my blue sweatpants, but, no, I'll save that t-shirt for orange day and wear a different color today." <---- Did you just see that? Total brain disconnect in between taking off my BRIGHT ORANGE SWEATER and choosing a t-shirt. It only hit me an hour later when I again realized it was orange day and I was sitting there wearing a bright green tshirt without a speck of orange. I don't even have orange toenails these days to count on for my default orange.

Going back to the original thought, I would blame the brain disconnect on thinking it was Wednesday, except obviously this morning I knew it was Thursday and truthfully most of the day felt like a Friday. What it all boils down to is that I then found $20.

I'm addicted to Mac Crack Attack... sounds like a drug

I hear it's been 4 days since I last posted. Guess I might as well stop paying that monkey to post for me since he hasn't been doing his job. Or maybe that's a hint that a banana a week just doesn't go as far as it used to.

There are about a bazillion (or at least 3) things I wanted to do tonight, and playing "Mac Crack Attack" wasn't one of them. Before I go farther (further?), let me explain what Mac Crack Attack is. I hear it's similar to bejeweled or bedazzled or something, but as I haven't ever played those games or at least it's been a long time since I played them, I know nothing about them. All I know is that Mac Crack Attack is about lining up colored squares to have 3 in a row and getting lots of points before it says "You win!" or "Game over! (LOSER)." I don't think it says LOSER like that, but that's about how it makes you feel. Maybe I'm investing a little bit too much emotion in this game. Anyway, the point of this story is that I wanted to play some guitar or make banana bread or post on this blog (whoa, I'm doing one of the three things!), and instead I came home from BS, parked my butt in a chair, and busted out the Mac Crack Attack. Luckily it started doing the SPOD (Spinning Pizza of Death) or I'd still be playing as we speak.

On Saturday I went shopping. Not major shopping, but I was drawn to Steve and Barry's as I often am because of the cheapness. It was disappointing to find that it's not quite as cheap as it used to be (a lot of $9.98 instead of $6.98, but I guess I'll have to deal with that). I was drawn to the hoodies like white is drawn to rice. Maybe a different simile would be better here -- like a moth to flame. Either way, I had to peel myself off of the racks of sweatshirts and look for some more useful... like sweat pants. Ok, ok, they're not that much better/different than sweatshirts, but I had my mind set on them and found a nice comfy looking pair. Of course when you're in Steve and Barry's, you should probably make a sweep of the whole store before you leave just in case there's that random item you NEED to buy that's hidden back in one of the corners. I always make final sweeps like this, through the women's section and the men's section, and lo and behold, this time I found something! In the men's section. I don't know about you, but a lot of times things in the women's section make me want to barf because they are hideous or too skimpy or hideously skimpy or just plain gross. Because of this, I often like things better in the men's section, like some sweet board shorts from Old Navy or my big poofy vest or... this pale yellow sweater I found at Steve and Barry's. Let me just say this -- it doesn't even look like a guy's sweater. I mean, maybe, but it's pale yellow, and well, I figured it could pass as a girl's sweater, and I pretty much didn't care one way or the other. I liked it, and I was going to buy it.

Long story even longer -- I wore it to church on Sunday and ended up turning around after a drink at the drinking fountain to find a guy wearing the exact same sweater. And then people gave me weird looks for laughing to myself.

Speaking of churches, I might be done church shopping. You know how people always say "The church is not a building; it's the people" (or at least that one a capella song says that, except in a cooler way), well, it's true! Crazy thought, I know. Let's just say that Sunrise Baptist has some pretty sweet people. Not that the other churches that I've gone to haven't had sweet people, but how else do you explain really liking a church that has music I wouldn't necessarily choose and a small, young sunday school class? It's because of the people! And God, of course. Suffice it to say that everyone has been uber friendly, and I've already gotten 3 invitations to lunch in the 4 times that I've gone to the church. Or maybe 4... I don't remember if someone invited me that first week. Maybe church is about the food...

Well, I think it's time to play just 1 more game of Mac Crack Attack. Just one.

24 hour anti-job flu bug

It turns out that today I didn't hate my job, so I'm chalking it all up to a 24 hour anti-job flu bug that has now passed, which means everything will always be rosy. Ok, ok, so that's a nice fantasy, and maybe rosy is a strong word, but things are better. I blame it on God. Wait, I mean good blame. Maybe "attribute it to God" is a better way to phrase it. Guess how I was just going to spell 'phrase'... fraze. I think I should have left it that way just for fun. Because apparently these days misspelling words is how I have fun. I hope that's not true.

I had a chocolate chocolate chip muffin today at work. No, I did not accidentally type the word chocolate twice -- it was one of those chocolate muffins with chocolate chips in it. In other words, I had a cupcake for breakfast and called it a muffin to make myself feel better. The cafeteria called it a muffin first, so I blame them. But going back to the original story, this was the first time Carrie and I made a trip to the cafeteria, not for lunch. Or the caf or the cafe. The guys go a lot, but Carrie and I don't ever go and Carrie finally decided it was time to go, with her husband Jon, and they invited me along, and I was just finishing up a call and the idea of a muffin sounded really good after having only a banana for breakfast because I was bored with cereal and too lazy to make anything else and bananas are extra easy foods to just grab and eat. I made that sentence really long on purpose. Because I can.

In other news, Waffles like to eat or at least chew on styrofoam. He's not MY cat. Wait, he is my cat. Silly pickle.

Jagged fingernails need to be cut off and thrown into the fire

What day is it today? Wednesday? Hmmm... it either feels like a Tuesday or a Thursday, not a Wednesday. Are you sure it really is Wednesday? Who determined that today, October 18, 2006, would be a Wednesday? I just realized that I had a whole conversation in my head on the way to work today about it being Wednesday and how the second half of Wednesdays are always the best because you know the week is more than half over, and you're on your way to the weekend. I still don't think it's enough to balance out the awfulness of Wednesday mornings, when you realize that you haven't gotten enough sleep for the past few nights but you still have to get up and go to work where you're going to have to stay awake and try to help people who think that you caused all their problems in the first place, including problems they're having getting their car to start or some other nonsense like this that has nothing to do with the fact that you called them to fix their Outlook profile. Therefore, Saturdays are still probably the best days of the week since Wednesday contradicts itself halfway through.

Now back to reality. I've recently decided I have a love/hate relationship with my job. Can you have a relationship with your job? Whether you can or not, what I'm saying is that sometimes I really like my job, and other times, I really really don't like my job. I don't want to give you all the details, but let's just say I don't like goals, I don't like training, I don't like meetings, I don't like angry clients, I don't like phones, and I don't like unecessary pressure to do my work. Thank you. I did get to lie on the floor under my desk on Tuesday, though. That was all kinds of fun. And in real life, I'd probably be dead right now. We had a dangerous intruder... wait, violent intruder drill on Tuesday. Yesterday, I guess. As part of this drill, we were required to hide somewhere, and the recommended location for those of us in cubicles was under our desk with items like wastebaskets and chairs placed strategically in front of ourselves. So that's where I found myself yesterday afternoon, with the "violent intruder" waving at me when she stopped by to make sure we were all doing the drill. I think waving in a drill must equate to killing in real life. I'm dead.

And I'm almost up past my bedtime. This cannot happen. G'nite.

The solution to all life's problems

More like the solution to my long post problem. I decided that in order to fake you all out and make you think that I'm writing shorter posts these days, I would just make the posts wider. Yes, that's right. So they're wider and shorter looking now, while in reality they're still the same length as they always were.

Now you're wondering why I'm telling you this because now that you're aware, you won't be fooled (at least not as easily ;-)). The truth is that I just realized where I could change the width of my page and it made sense because my posts were rather skinny. And beside that, now I can have 10 random pictures at the top instead of 8 (including one with my current roomie since she was feeling left out although she'll probably tell me she hates that picture of her).

And then you and everyone you know found $10. The end.

Brandon Michael Powell

Nancy had her baby! And he's so cute! Why are babies so cute? I need to go visit Nancy.

Waffles has a toilet paper fettish

I have no original thoughts today. I keep trying to figure out what I'm going to type, and keep reverting back to the song lyrics of the current song on the radio. The title of this post was almost "dead man lying on the carpet can't find a heartbeat" -- which is a cool song, by the way, by Jars of Clay. Well, that's not the name of the song, but it's somewhere in the lyrics for it.

This week went by fast and slow and everything in between. Overall I'd say it was nice to not get up at 3:30 anymore, and that made everything else seem better, including working overtime every single day. But stress levels seem to be at an all time high (except for today) around our team at work. It must have something to do with this crazy rollout and the fact that we're responsible for 40,000+ people smoothly switching from their old computers to their new computers. Let's just say that "smoothly" doesn't seem to be describing the process right now, based on the number of cases in our queues these days. When I first started working at Dow, we could get our queues pretty empty. In fact, probably for a few weeks it was unusual if there were any cases in the queue at the end of the day. Of course everyone had their own cases in their own bins, but there weren't any new cases that people hadn't at least called on.

Now for some contrast, when I left the office today, I believe there were around 20 cases in the Europe queue (which is almost unheard of) and probably around 50 or 60 in the NA queue. These are all cases that no one has even looked at! Other than to dispatch to the correct time zone, of course. Poor people who need computer help. In some ways I feel sorry for them, and in other ways I don't. Often my pity goes away after talking to a particularly frustrating client or someone who complains a lot or someone is so incredibly computer illiterate that they shouldn't even be allowed to use a computer. Don't worry, I'm not insulting anyone reading this blog because you were all at least computer literate enough to get here, which is more than I could say for some clients.

My favorite client of today was this crazy lady who has bothered me for weeks about a VPN problem that's related to her home router. We don't support home routers. Being the nice person that I am (ok, most of you realize I'm not really that nice), I actually TRIED to support her home router a little... I helped find a Users guide for setting up VPN passthrough and I even submitted a question to Linksys tech support for her so she could try their suggestion. And then I just kept closing her case until she finally gave up on bugging me, and I figured that was the last time I'd ever hear from her. And then today happened. It was approximately 4:56. I was planning on leaving right at 5, but then my phone rang, and I figured it was someone I had been trying to contact earlier and knew that sometimes it's best to just answer and get it over with than let it ring and play phone tag for the next week. So I picked up the phone. Bad mistake. It was the crazy lady. Except at least this time she wasn't bothering me about VPN; instead someone from the GSD had tried to "help" her with some personal folders in Outlook and ended up botching the job (surprise surprise) and she knew that I could help her. I could have told her to open a case, but again, being the "nice" person that I am, I decided to help. So I fixed her problem, said have a good weekend, and she said, "You, too, and I hope you don't have to stay too late tonight." I almost (and maybe should have) responded, "I'd be home already if you hadn't called!" but instead held my tongue, made some lame comment about going home soon, and said good bye.

Fun times.

And that is a slice of my life. ;-)

Whoa, I haven't even used any of my orange straws! And Waffles has really long toenails, or claws, or whatever you want to call those sharp things

That's a long title. I hope that doesn't mean this will be a long post. My last (real) one was SO LONG. I bored even myself, and I'm not that easily bored. Actually, that's one of my pet peeves with people -- when people get bored all the time. Just stop being bored; it's that simple. Really. I'm not kidding. You may have heard the saying, "Only boring people get bored." It's TRUE. Don't even try to deny it. I mean, c'mon. Even if there's absolutely nothing to do (although I find that almost impossible to believe) or if you're stuck somewhere (class for instance), you can still daydream -- there's all kinds of stuff you can do in your daydreams.

Whew, glad I could get that off my chest. Now on to the fun stuff. What fun stuff you ask? Good question. I actually just lied to you because there is no fun stuff. My blog has turned from randomness to funniness because it's randomness to longness and don't-make-me-read-anymore-ness. Do you realize that some people blog as their job? How am I supposed to compete with that? I can't handle this pressure. Especially when I get distracted so easily.

I need to come up with some goals for my job... by Tuesday. Or probably tomorrow so I can email them to my boss before I meet with him. I have no goals. I hate making goals. I am not a goal-oriented person. Frustration is boiling in my veins at the thought of goals. Don't you think the feeling of something actually bubbling in your veins would be crazy? Yeah, it would be. That's fo shizzle.

Oh yeah, about my life:
1) 3:30am will never again be the time I get up in the morning... EVER. Or at least not until I have to do it again someday for some random reason.
2) Life lesson learned: waking up at 3:30am everyday does not make me a martyr; I should not act like one.
3) I miss my "home" churches -- both Lighthouse AOG and New Life. Can't they move to Midland?
4) I like my new green shirt. It's nice and bright and... green.

Those are all the important details of my life this past week. Well, not really. But yeah, I'm trying to keep it short. And my toe hurts from stubbing it on a hard wooden chair. And Waffles is sleeping right now, just so he can wake me up in the wee hours of the morning. I'm sure of it. He's plotting it in his dreams as we speak. Well, as I speak. Type. whatever.

Bye, ya'll.

Sometimes I wish I were powered by energizer batteries

Just a quick shout out to let you know I'm still alive. I feel like I haven't had the chance to talk to some people online as much because I have an uber early bedtime (and although I never make it to bed on time, I'm usually off doing something else that prevents me from talking to you online).

Anyway, the 4:30am to 1:30pm shift is almost done. Only one more day! :-) Yippee! YAY!!! I'm excited.

Ok, g'nite.

No woodals, but a darn good time

I don't know what my last blog was about, and I'm not online to check. Oh yeah, I've been ranting about people who want me to drink. Well, this post is going to be an actual update instead of a rant (although I'm not guaranteeing that I won't rant about anything in this post…)

My week seemed pretty busy this week, and by Thursday night, I was already wishing it was the weekend. Monday night we had our first girls bible study with Cru. I drove myself over to SVSU without getting lost, even found the library, and the library lobby. I think there were 8 of us there, including the 2 leaders, Caitlin and Heather. They're both going into teaching, so it's gotta be good, right? :-) Actually, I think it's going to be better than I originally thought. In fact, I went to the first meeting with a bad attitude and came out of it with a good one, which is a good sign. We're going to study the book "Captivating" by John Eldredge (I think) and his wife. It's specifically for women, which usually scares me (and this time is no exception), but I think sometimes it's good to get stretched out of my comfort zone, even if it means bonding with other girls over a book designed for girlyness. Girliness. Hmmm, neither one is a real word apparently.

Tuesday was a crazy day. I had stayed at work until about 6 on Monday, and I was ready to leave on time on Tuesday, especially since I was supposed to do the cooking for the 8 extra people we were having over for dinner. Unfortunately, before I was about to pack my bag around 5:15, my boss walked over and informed us that no one should plan on leaving anytime soon because there was a security patch that needed to be put onto all the workstations and we had to test it. More unfortunately was the fact that the process hadn't even been started at this point, and my only job would be to test, so basically this meant I had to sit around for an hour or 2, try to do some other work, and wait until I could do a 2 second test, sign it off, and leave.

Around 6, there was no sign of much progress, and I was getting antsy. My boss was on the phone, but I decided that as soon as he got off, I would ask if I could test from home. Sometime in this whole ordeal, I called Sarah and said she might have to do the cooking, but at least I had cut up the chicken and onions. She didn't sound too enthusiastic about that prospect. By 6:15 my boss was off the phone, and surprisingly enough he not only said I could test from home, but he also said it was a good idea because I'd be able to test it over a VPN connection. I rushed home as fast as my 2 little legs could carry me (which isn't very fast because I didn't feel like running). Yay for fajitas that don't take too long to make and for a roommate and friends who were willing to help out with the bean dip and setting the table. Dinner was good, but note to self (and all of you reading this): corn tortillas don't make good fajita holders… they're a little cracky. Cracky is also not a word.

Wednesday was Cru, after dinner at Travis and Tara's. Dinner was delicious by the way. They made homemade pizza dough and we each got to design our own little pizzas. It was sweet. And tasty. Sarah and I went over to SVSU a little early so that she could work on homework with Jen, except that by the time we got there, it was too late to really do anything, so we got to see a few of Jared's pics from Bolivia (pretty sweet!) and decided to walk over to Founder's Hall because "not getting physical activity is like smoking a pack of cigarettes" (or so Jen claims). Cru was pretty good, although I found myself zoning a little during it. I think I need to get more sleep or something. Afterwards I somehow got roped into singing on the worship team next week just because I once said I liked the song "Grace like rain" and would be willing to help sing it if they needed me. Oops.

Thursday was another late time at work, but I don't know why. When I finally got home, Sarah wasn't there, so I had some food, and then experienced a RNE (Random Neighbor Encounter). There's a nice older lady who lives across the hall from Sarah and I. I've talked to her before (although I don’t even know her name), but we don't see each other very often. I was just playing with Waffles a little before I headed out the door for TNT (Thursday Night Thing – that one is a real abbreviation, not just made up on the spot like RNE), and all of a sudden there was a knock on my door. I figured it was the 10 year old (or 11 & 13 or however old they really are) girls who come by sometimes for M&Ms, but opened the door to find my neighbor. I felt a little rude because I only cracked the door, but if it was too wide open, I knew Waffles would run out. It turns out she needed some quarters to do laundry. I only had 4 because I hadn't been collecting them for my own laundry like I should have been, but I felt bad because she needed to get some laundry done and thought she had maybe left her quarters in her car, which wasn't around at the time. So I volunteered to drive and get her some quarters. As I drove off with her money ($6, of which she told me to keep $1.50 for gas), I thought, "Hmmm, I wonder why she trusts me…" I mean it's not like $6 is a lot of money, but what if I never came back with it? That would stink. Anyway, I got all the quarters and came back and gave her all $6 and when she asked if I had gotten my share, I just responded, "I'm all set." It's not like I could take money from an old lady just because I got some quarters for her! I think I'd have to be heartless. But yeah, that was my RNE for the week, and I think I need to have them more often.

And then all of a sudden, it was Friday (oh yeah, after TNT and cleaning the living room and stuff…). Friday's are the best. I even got out of work on time! Craziness. Josh, Christine, and Brian came and picked me up (and all my stuff, which teaches me I really really really need to learn how to pack lightly), and we went out to Bennigan's so I could use my coupon things before they expired. It was a fun dinner even though we had to wait a while. Then I fell asleep on the drive home – it's a good way to make it go by faster. We got home just in time to see the end of "The Man Who Knew Too Little" (great movie by the way, borrow it from me if you haven’t seen it), then after some talking we watched RV. I thought it was funny even if it was pretty cheesy.

Saturday was Woodbee day! I woke up bright and early (yeah right… that doesn't work so well after staying up until 2) and hoped I had missed out on getting chairs and tables from the church and loading them into our van. Unfortunately (after some sweet time with God, looking at Matthew 9) my dad lured me out of my room with the promise of chocolate chip banana bread. Well, there really was chocolate chip banana bread and some zucchini bread, but there were also chairs and tables that needed to be loaded into the van still to go out to the Woodbee. So much for my hiding tactics. I always knew food would be my downfall. Dad says he was about to mention ice cream next if the choc chip banana bread hadn't done the trick. I think he knows me too well.

The day didn't look so good for the Woodbee. It was already gray and rainy/misty and not real warm, but everything was still a go, so we went. And it was fun. Even if the weather was gray and cold. The rain pretty much held off (isn't it cool when God is cooler than the weathermen?), and we got to get through all of the usual events. My favorite event is probably lunch, which was delicious as usual. All in all, I came home with no woodals (wooden medals = woodals) even though I came in 1st for the scavenger hunt (thank you, Steve Cupery). I did come home with about 700 pictures, I think. So I'm a little trigger happy… what can I say? I didn't want to miss something. :-)

Well, as a word doc with 1.25" left and right margins, 1" top & bottom margins, and 12 pt times new roman font, this post is already making its way onto three pages (ok, so it's already halfway down the third page), so I'm going to call it quits. Thanks for reading, have a great day, and don't forget, "If they don't find you handsome, they'll sure find you handy."