You Win Some, You Lose Some

Lose: Yesterday I woke up around 7:35-ish in the morning go through my morning routine, forgetting that I wanted to hitch a ride to Target from my Mom. She had already left, but it wasn't a big deal, I wanted to listen to a CD I hadn't heard but just recently rediscovered, so the walk was fine.

I arrive at Target with intention of picking up Crackdown for the Xbox 360 to play the Halo 3 Multiplayer Beta this spring. I walk down the long aisle to the electronics department to see if the game is on the shelves. It isn't, I hunt down the electronics guy who is working, and he tells me that the side stock workers haven't gone through the boxes and so it won't be out until about 12pm. I certainly am not going to hang around Target for four hours for a game I'm not sure I really want.

Win: After hearing the news I walk down an aisle that I don't normally go down to leave the store, but it looked like the staff was having some merchandising meeting that I didn't want to walk through. I look to my left and there is one of those old PC game two-packs. One of those games, Sanitarium, was one I've been wanting for nearly 10 years. Get this; the two-pack is only $2.48!

Lose: I get home, and glance at the system requirements wondering if it will work with Windows XP. It does, I install the game and go to play it; after the first level loads the game freezes and shuts down. It does this a couple more times as I try to launch the game.

Win: Today, I ran over to Target and they had Crackdown.

Lose: After buying it, I look at the case and it's broken.

Win: Mom and I went to Best Buy because I wanted to pick up a couple of DVD's that I meant to get on Sunday.

Lose: They only had V is for Vendetta in stock. I also wanted Heat, but I had to settle for Poseidon.

Win: The also had Crackdown, so I considered picking it up and almost did. Instead, I decided not to get the game and save myself $60. Who knows, I might change my mind later.

Cleaning in Progress

In reaction to my post last night, I decided today would be one of cleaning. Well, maybe not all day, I mean, I have other things I need to accomplish. Nevertheless, I washed my sheets, cleared off a few surfaces, and filed my pay stubs. It may not sound like a lot, but the difference is noticeable.

Tomorrow I'm continuing the project and finish cleaning the odds and ends. Really, how many tubes of ChapStick does one person need? I don't know about you, but I need quite a few. One thing that I really want to do is laundry. I just did some laundry a couple of days ago, but there are some jeans and t-shirts that could use a second wash because of the junk once covering them.

Well, it's the last song on the new Gwen Stefani CD signaling my final moments on the computer. Time to do a quick spell check and post. I'll talk to you all tomorrow.

Sick of Collecting

I'm sick of everything. I'm drowning in the vast quantities of stuff I've accumulated over the years. I feel like I need to purge myself of all my excess, like DVD's and video games. One of these days I would like to go through my entire collection of belongings and make a list of things I'd like to keep and things I'd like to sell.

I would first go through my DVD's. I have an enormous collection of DVD's and a lot of them I haven't even opened, much less seen. It would be difficult, because I like watching movies so much, that to give any up is heartbreaking. My ideal collection would consist of no more than 100 of my favorite movies and television shows (an entire series would count as one).

Video games are next. This would be a little easier because the NES would be the first to go. I never play it and all my 152 games are just sitting in my closet collecting dust. However, after the NES things would get a bit hairy because we move into hallowed territory with the SNES, considered by many the greatest gaming console of all time. I have most of the classics like Final Fantasy III (FFVI), Chrono Trigger, The Legend of Zelda a Link to the Past, and various others. I hope that many of these would be offered as downloads on Nintendo's Virtual Console, although I would hate to have to re-buy them all.

In my head, I look at my room and it is sparse. The only furniture is one desk with a computer, a bed, a dresser a book shelf and a phat 46-52" plasma/LCD TV adorning my wall hooked up to an awesome 7.1 surround sound system. That isn't too much to ask. Right?

Bold Woman, Bold Decision

A customer came to my register today and told me she was moving to the Virgin Islands to be a yoga instructor and wedding planner. She also said bold women make bold decisions. I think it is obvious that this was one bold woman. It inspired me; I wanna be a bold woman too! Not really, but I would love to make as bold decisions, to leave everything I know and move to some exotic location to start a new life.

I think I would rather leave everything I know and visit an exotic location for a week or two, then return home. I can't imagine anyone wanting to live in the Virgin Islands. It's hot there and there are hordes of fat, sweaty tourists half clothed and always ready for a party. It doesn't sound like fun at all.

Thinking about it, I can't say for sure where I would like to live if I had the chance to leave Oregon. I love Oregon, the climate's great most of the year and everything I'm interested in is just a stone throw away. If I had the chance though, I would like a try at living in England, Japan, Switzerland and Alaska. That is of course assuming that I would have Internet access and FedEx and UPS were able to deliver. The only thing that's keeping me from doing that is television programming.

A Fresh Coat

I spent the bulk of the day cleaning. In the next few days, another manager or group of managers from other stores will judge our store on its cleanliness. This is always a tough time for the team because we clean and clean and clean; yet it almost never makes a difference, because we can only be as clean as our customers and the age of the store allow us.

So, as I said in the beginning I spent most of my time cleaning. The first thing I do in the morning is clean the bathrooms. I think I've mentioned that this is usually my favorite time at work, because it allows me to have a few quiet moments before associates and managers start laying down demands. I make that sound worse than it is. After I clean the bathrooms, it is nearly time to open and my second task is to wipe down all the carts.

This is not a task I do daily, come to think of it; I don't think I've ever actually done it before. I know I've attempted to dry carts for customers, but I never cleaned them. So I take out the Sani-Spritz Spray II, spritz the carts and start wiping them down. Not the most glamorous of jobs, but it did keep me busy. One of the tools I like to use when cleaning are latex gloves. This was the crux of the experience, because every time a customer was ready to pay, I had to take off the gloves and ring the customer through. After helping the customers, I put on a fresh new pair of gloves. I got both tired and good at putting on latex gloves. Sadly, it's always been a slight dream to be able to put on gloves as seamlessly as they do in medical drams like ER, and even The X-Files as I have seen Scully do a thousand times before.

After I returned from break, I was instructed to do my favorite task of all time, paint. That's right ladies and gentlemen, the painting wasn't done yet. This time I had to paint the doors. Immediately I began to panic like last time. I don't think I did a good job last time, and this time I let my general manager know it. She didn't seem to mind, but I could see my blatant lack of experience shine through. Those poor doors went through a lot.

I had three doors to paint. The first door took the longest because it was absolutely filthy. The second door was easier and more interesting. Let me tell you about the second door. There was tape all over it; some of the tape was fresh while other pieces were painted over. I used a scraper to take off most of the tape. Afterwards, I grabbed a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser to try to get the goop that was left behind. The thing about the Magic Eraser is it will take paint off walls, but what happened next was a complete surprise.

I washed the door with the magic eraser and got most of the sticky goop off. I realized I still had some pieces of tape on the door, so I grabbed the scraper and went to scrape of the tape. I put the scraper to the door and pushed up and down came a long strip of paint. I kept scraping up and more of the paint came off the door. Soon I had most of the paint on the floor in these long strips. It was the most satisfying moment of the day.

All the while two managers were trying to scrape off this horrible green paint off the third door with little success. I won't go into the details, but suffice to say, it was like watching Laurel and Hardy scrape paint. After I finished the second door, I moved onto the last one. This one needed the most work of all and I just didn't have the time to fix it. One of the managers said he would work on sanding down the divots so I could get it painted tomorrow. I can't wait.

A Wink and a Nod

My right eye is twitching. It's been twitching for the last several days and it is driving me crazy. There are two reasons why this is happening to me, first, the lack of sleep. I have not been sleeping very much because of being so busy. I get up relatively early in the morning and I don't get to bed until rather late. During the late night hours, I am most creative, so I need to harness as many of those as I can.

The second reason is eyestrain. I spend many hours in front of a computer screen. I'm going to blame this and another blog I am trying to get started. In fact, I started it yesterday but I'm waiting until I have more posts before it's "launched" in a couple of days.

Naturally, a twitching eye can be a little embarrassing in public. I can be talking to someone and my eye can begin to twitch resulting in a wink. Thankfully, no one has called me out on it, and probably no one has noticed my spastic winks. However, I'm waiting for the moment when someone reads more into it than an involuntary spasm. I hope that I will be able to put an end to it on Monday when I can sleep in. Until then, if you see me winking at you, it's not what you think and just let it go.

Water Cooler Moment

In Oregon, we have soft water, which means our water has a low mineral content. This enables us to get a nice frothy lather when we use soap and toothpaste. Conversely, Southern California has hard water, so getting a good lather is difficult. What does this all have to do with my post? Actually, very little, but it's still all within the same family of discussion.

Yesterday evening, I had 10 minutes to take a shower before dinner was ready. I aggressively took on this challenge and hopped into the shower. Usually I can quickly attain a nice soapy lather due to the soft Oregon water. This time however, it was difficult. When I attempt the quick shower, looking back it's always difficult to lather-up. Why?

I thought about this while showering and wondered what causes this phenomenon. Could it be that the body must absorb enough water for the soap to effectively lather? Does the body need to reach a certain temperature to react to the soaps chemical structure? Would using a liquid soap over a bar of soap remedy this? All these questions cascaded through my mind.

I then began breaking down what my process is when showering. The first thing I do when I step into the shower is an initial rinse off. This ensures that my body is wet and I can maintain the soapy lather. As you might of guessed, I do a lot of thinking in the shower, so I never rush to begin the actual washing. During this time, the water heats up considerably and I am more than adequately drenched before beginning.

When I take the quick shower, this process is dramatically shortened. I do the initial wet-down, before I do the lather-up, but because of the time constraint, I don't do an as thorough job within the wet-down stage. This leaves me to believe that the body needs to absorb enough water to begin lathering the soap. Yet, the water hasn't warmed to its highest temperature. I seem to remember a time when I took a stone cold shower during a summer month before we had air conditioning, and the soap didn't react.

So, what is it? Why didn't I get the lather? Is it the water temperature, or is it the body's water absorption level?

My Day

My day began like most of my days, waking up 90 minutes before I leave for work, immediately saying to myself how much I don't want to go. I promptly amend that statement by saying to myself, "I don't want to be at work today." I don't mind going to work, it's the being there that's hard. However, I just needed to get through the next nine hours and I am without a job for the following three days. Yes, for the entire month of January I decided I was going to take control of my schedule by requesting Tuesdays off.

After watching another hysterical episode of Psych, it was time to get ready. I had on a red shirt that I don't normally like to wear because it's a very large medium, so it looks big on me. Since I like to layer my shirts, I was going to put on another shirt over the red one. I looked in my hamper of clean clothes and noticed a nice blue one. Because I recently began a rather unhealthy obsession with the Superman movies, I immediately snatched the blue shirt out of the hamper and pulled it over the red. I felt like Superman, faster than a speeding bullet and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. It did not prepare me for what I was about to do at work.

A couple of years ago, I was asked by the general manager to paint some walls in the backroom. I first had to prime and then paint one of the walls this horrifying blue and a couple of others red. I did a terrible job, in part because I'm not an experienced painter and the drywall sucked up the paint like a dry sponge. Fast-forward, a couple years later I'm sitting in the office when the current General Manager asks what I wanted to do today. I give her my usual, "anything is fine", secretly hoping she doesn't banish me to the registers. She responds by asking me if I wanted to Spackle and paint a few walls in the backroom.

Panic started to set in because I remembered the debacle that occurred last time I attempted such a feat. Regardless, I agreed without hesitation because it would get me off the sales floor for the day and I certainly didn't want to deal with "Saturday customers". She found me the small container of Spackle, the Spackle knife and I began applying it to the wall. It was a nightmare.

There were thousands of little holes in the wall from all the tacks we used to post announcements. When I began, the wall was blue, by the time I finished spackling it had turned to a pale pink. I put on so much Spackle I thought my hand was going to fall off. The last time I spackled anything was when we first moved into the house 16 years ago. I felt like a poser, reading the instructions and not having a clue what they meant, but pretending to work the knife like a pro. Thankfully, I watched more than my fair share of Bob Ross creating snow on the happy little trees that lived in the forest.

Once I faked my way through spackling, it was time to sand it all down. I only realized I needed to sand it because my friend and professional painter, Marsha came by and said, "You're gonna need to sand it down." To which I responded, "That's next," with a confident authority. I'm certain I would have been able to find that next step as my Trading Spaces training was beginning to shine through. I found some sand paper and began sanding all the rough edges of the Spackle. Darin, another employee said we had a sanders block, or whatever he called it. He found it and gave it to me which made the job go my a lot faster.

The dust went everywhere. I didn't put anything down on the floor because I was going to sweep it up anyway and what's a little fine dust. The dust got over everything; even in places I didn't think it would. I got some canned air and blew dust off the time clock and mirror, then swept most of it up. The rest would have to be picked up by the mop that I would use at the end.

The dreaded painting was next. I hate painting because it's such a production, having to first clean the tray and roller that was sitting out with dried white paint covering the things. Next, I made a makeshift drop cloth out of a large trash bag and then painting around the edges and finally rolling out the paint. To my credit, this time it went a lot better and my end result was much better than I expected. Although I was proud of my results, the nagging feeling that my GM expected better of me was something I couldn't shake. To her credit, she didn't indicate to me that she felt that way.

I followed these steps for the other two walls I needed to paint and touch-up. I got tired of washing rollers, brushes and trays. I expressed this to Marsha and she said that I should have lined the paint tray with a trash bag, then poured in the new color, that way I would only need to clean the tray once. OMG!!! That was the most brilliant freaking idea I had ever heard! The next time I paint anything, I'm doing that. Instead, I'm going to start by lining the tray with a trash bag, so I wouldn't have to clean the tray at all.

It was a very long day of paint fumes and Spackle dust and I was ready to go home. I took my last 15-minute break 15 minutes before I had to leave. Paul, a manager that constantly joked that I missed some spots and I walked over to Starbucks to get a Supervisor some coffee. I bought a Raspberry Green Tea Blended Crème, which was pretty good even though I don't normally like the flavor of raspberries. While waiting for my beverage, I heard them announce a Hazelnut Green Tea Blended Crème and I got excited. I'm totally going to get that next time.

By the time we got back, it was time for me to clock out. Thank goodness, I don't think I could have handled another minute there without going crazy. Even though it was a rough day, it was a million times better than having to deal with customers. Come to think of it, anything is better than that.

"Winter Blast"

It's snowing outside. I took this picture of what it was like outside earlier this morning. The news stations are all excited calling this snowfall a snowstorm. Since we don't get a lot of snow like other parts of the country, news channels consider any snowfall a chance to wheel out Storm Watch 2007 and have their reporters out in the field informing the public of all the dangerous road conditions.

What I love most is that Storm Watch is very climate specific. Take for instance Los Angeles that will have round the clock reporting when a little rain falls. Here in Oregon, it rains all the time, so unless there is massive flooding a little rain gets nothing more than a comment in passing.

To see just how bad it is out there, check out this video of drivers sliding down a hill bouncing off cars and poles like a pinball machine. You may consider this first-rate stupidity, as many of these drivers were warned not to drive down that particular hill. It's on days like today where the most stubborn make their appearance. Why can't people just stay home?

Sandwich of the Year!

Look what I had for lunch today! It is the biggest sandwich I have ever made, thanks to the very large pieces of bread I used. I made this egg bread myself. It was the subject of my controversial post, "Bread is Life". The bread turned out fantastic, although it didn't quite look or taste like I had originally envisioned it; however, the texture was a bit chewier. Each slice of the bread was as thick as two slices of the grocery store ilk one would buy.

On it I had to put more spicy brown mustard than I normally would due to the large slices of bread. Additionally, I also had to really beef up the amount of turkey because I didn't want the fixin's to be completely enveloped by the bread. There really is a fine balance when it comes to sandwich making. Too much of one thing can overpower the flavor of the sandwich. In order to avoid having my turkey sandwich taste like a bread sandwich, I needed to take care that my turkey distribution on the sandwich was high enough. You will also notice I put sprouts on it as my vegetable. In terms of turkey sandwiches, there isn't a lot of variety. Some might ad tomatoes, avocados, maybe some lettuce and bacon. Since I'm too lazy to cut these fruits and vegetables up, let alone look for them, I decided to leave them off.

So how did it taste? Let me just say, there was a lot of bread . . . a lot. My mouth wasn't wide enough until I got past the crust. There was more sandwich than I thought I could eat in the beginning, about three quarters of the way through, I felt I was getting full, but I persevered and crossed the finish line. I felt like I achieved something, eating one slice of this bread is difficult, but eating two with sandwich fixin's, makes me believe I should be in some competitive eating event.

Bread is Life

I would have posted this yesterday, but the wounds were too fresh for me to relive and so tonight, I bring you a story of disaster. I came home from work at 4pm yesterday, took off my two sweatshirts, turned on Oprah in the kitchen and began gathering the ingredients for egg bread. I make bread using a bread maker that was purchased during my time at HomePlace, America's Bankrupt Home Decor SuperStore. I just recently began doing this after a few year break, but seeing that bread maker sitting in the corner made me long for the smell and taste of fresh, home baked bread.

There are three essential parts of the bread machine, you have the machine, the pan and a paddle that mixes and kneads the dough at the appropriate time. I begin dumping the ingredients in the order it states in the recipe book, all the while sobbing uncontrollably during a segment of Oprah. I was so tired after coming home that it took me nearly a half hour to assemble all the ingredients and get the pan in the bread maker to begin baking. I leave the kitchen and take my shower.

Once I finished my shower, I sat at my computer and began writing the post directly below this one entitled, "Shake It Like A . . ." My mom comes home, an hour later she walks into my room and tells me the bad news, I had forgotten to put the paddle into the bread pan. Disappointment flooded my consciousness and I walked into the kitchen to see what was going on. I lifted the lid and all the ingredients were sitting as they did 2 hours before in the same heap. The pan wasn't even hot! Nothing had happened! We were both disappointed it was way to late to begin another loaf as it takes about 3 hours to bake.

That wasn't all the bad news I received that evening. Apparently, when I started the dishwasher that morning, a spoon fell through the hole in the silverware basket keeping the water jet from rotating and cleaning the dishes. Some of the dishes were clean, but all the silverware had to be run through the dishwasher again as well as a few plates. This news may not have been life altering, but I just didn't feel like hearing that something else had gone wrong.

Today was much better. I was able to remember the paddle, so this evening we were able to have the bread we longed for last night. Plus, I had sloppy joes for dinner, and that's always a good thing.

Shake It Like A . . .

Since I started officially blogging a few years ago, I began looking for things to blog about in my daily life. Sometimes there are big events, like concerts or holidays, then there are those small moments that may seem insignificant to someone else, but to me I find interesting.

I had a great example of one of those insignificant moments today. I spent the greater part of my last 4 hours at work in the fitting room, a job I've come to enjoy because people tend to leave you alone. About 30 minutes before I was off, a woman and her daughter come in and I open a room for the daughter and then go back to my post where I see the woman drinking her Jamba Juice and holding her daughter's cup while she tried on clothes.

The silence was awkward until she cut it with a bit of idle small talk, then once again we were in silence. I'm looking at the fitting room door in front of me, reading for about the millionth time the poster cling we have advertising the Old Navy Card, when out of the corner of my eye I see the woman shaking her cup back and forth.

I thought this was the most intriguing thing I saw today. Everyone does this! Everyone, when coming upon the completion of a shake or smoothie, will give it a little shake back and forth to fill in any air pockets that may have developed while drinking. They will repeat this until they sucked up every last drop of their shake or smoothie. Who started this trend? Did someone need to start it, or are we programmed to give our Styrofoam or plastic cups a quick jolt when all we are sucking up is cold air? I think this is a bit of interesting human behavior.

About Who? About Me?

I keep reading about how to increase my blog traffic. One of the primary ways is including an "About" page giving some insight into who I am and what my blog is all about. They also say adding a picture will supposedly gain me some credibility, as people like to see about whom they are reading.

This is all very interesting and I suppose I could add a picture of myself, but why do I need an about page on a blog that is all about me? My whole blog is an about page! What could I possibly say that I haven't already covered in a previous post? Should I provide you with my name? Age? Gender? Maybe my location? If you haven't already figured it out, you likely know my name and gender as I don't know many women named Jason. If you didn't, well, you do now.

However, the idea of über-personalizing my page with a severe amount of personal information is an intriguing one. I am a very complex person with personal policies that I would love to make public, not only for your enjoyment, but also to keep them straight in my own mind.

I suppose the question is do I care if I increase my traffic. Not really, this blog was never meant to be for anyone but me. I'm certainly not making money from it as you can see from the lack of annoying Adsense links and banners littering the site. Do I like it when people visit and read what I have written? Sure! I certainly cater to whoever might be reading it by trying to make my posts as interesting as possible. Too many times I have come across painfully boring blogs and I undoubtedly don't want to be a member of that webring. To remedy that, I attempt, if the posts warrants, at being clever, charming and amusing as much as possible. Only you can tell me if I succeed.

Three-Ring Churchus

Church today was chock-full of funny little scenarios and events that I thought I would share with you. First, as Mom and I filed into our row, Chuck a very nice older gentleman came over to hand us the "worship folder". I caught a glimpse of his nametag, and for the first time I realized his last name. I'm not sure if he always put his last name on it, but on this particular day, it stood out. I looked over to my Mom and asked, "Is Chuck's last name Hull?" She nodded and I said, "So his name is Chuck Hull." We both chuckled.

After the singing ended, we sat down and Mom opened up her "worship folder" to take a look at all the fun and interesting things that are going on. Upon the opening of the folder, the sermon notes fall. If it were anyone else and not Mom or I for that matter, the notes would have just fallen to the floor without incident. Instead, the notes fall and just before hitting the floor, swoops out flying under the chair in front of her and glides to a stop one row up. Mom and I look at each other with panic and embarrassment in our face. The gentleman in the row, gets up out of his seat, bends down and picks up the paper then hands it back to my mom.

Once the announcements were read by the new jeans wearing Pastor of Community Connections and Men's Ministries, he instructed us all to stand up and greet those around us. This is the worst part of going to church in my opinion, but like a good Christian, I stood and began greeting and shaking hands. I shook one hand, then another, finally coming to a gentleman named Ho. Since we all wear nametags, I commonly will say, "Hi [Person's Name]!" This time I had to stop before I broke into song.

Finally, this week was Communion a ceremony that I have come to dread since my hysterical laughing incident several months ago. A couple of times, I've assisted in handing out the "body" and the "blood" and loved how structured the ceremony was. There was a group of people that would come out with a plate full of "body" and "blood" and they would follow a pattern by handing a plate to every other row. The whole thing would typically go smoothly. This time the pastor at the front asked if a dozen or so people would volunteer to hand out communion and ensure everyone was served. A bunch of people got up and headed to the back to grab a plate. What proceeded was a nightmare. It was an unorganized mess of people literally running around the church to grab the plate from the other end of the row. It seemed that everyone was working the left side of the church, while only a few were attending to the right. For something that was supposed to be a solemn moment of communion with God, it turned into a three-ring circus of people swinging from the rafters.

It was probably one of the more entertaining Church experiences I've had in awhile. I just hope they don't do this to communion again, because it was distracting and completely detracted from its meaning.

Sugar Shack

I have taken it upon myself to rid my house of all sweets left over from the holidays, by consuming them in a short amount of time. For the past few days I feel like I have eaten nothing but cookies and candy, and I'm growing literally sick and tired of it. I went into work early this morning and for lunch had some soup, then came home and gorged on leftover candy and some fudge. To begin, I'm not a huge fan of the fudge because it is this tiny cube of condensed sugar and chocolate. In other words very little goes a very long-long way.

Now I'm sitting her typing this up, my body is all jacked up on sugar and my mind is ready to crash. To be honest, I'm not even seeing letters race across the screen as I type, all I see are puppy dogs and rainbows. If this is what it means to be high on drugs, I certainly don't want anything you fools are selling.

I can't wait to find out what we are having for dinner since this is the only meal I will eat today that has some substance. On my walk home from work, I did think about stopping by Panda Express and picking up lunch but decided against it because I knew I had "work" to do. In addition, I didn't want to spend the $6 for a Styrofoam plate of crap; by crap, I mean greasy fast food.

Thankfully, this ordeal is almost over. I have some dark chocolate that needs to be eaten and some Fererro Rochers to break into than I'm done. I certainly won't eat it all tonight, but it will be nice to finish it off within the next couple of days.

See You Later

As much as retail sucks, there are those moments of glimmering enjoyment that cannot be recreated in an office setting. Most of those moments include customers and their sometimes-unabashed honesty when angry about something. Some customers will begin yelling and screaming at you as if you are the problem and not them, others will passive aggressively under their breath tell you they are never going to shop there again. We had one such customer today.

Unfortunately, she wasn't my customer but I was able to listen in on the entire conversation as I staffed the register next to her. The customer wanted to return a puffy-vest; she did not have her receipt but used a credit card to purchase the item. She also had in her possession a gift receipt. The cashier looked up her transaction using the customer's credit card and proceeded to complete the return. The customer found out through the course of the transaction that she would be receiving approximately $18 for the vest. She was sure she paid more for it and continued to argue with the cashier, who silently continued with the transaction. The customer began and continued to say repeatedly that she wasn't going to shop at Old Navy anymore and that she didn't shop at other stores for the same reason. This was in hope to get a reaction from us which none of us gave her.

Now, while I could go on about how the customer treated the employee and the supervisor that came around, I want to talk about another aspect of the argument. She clearly stated that she wasn't going to shop at Old Navy anymore. Can I hold her to that? I imagine me asking her to step to the side so I could take her picture to ensure that she doesn't accidentally come in and buy something. I know that would never happen, but I'm almost positive I could get away with saying something like, "I'm sorry your last transaction here is a negative one, but think of all the money you would save by not shopping here!" I would accompany this with my disarming charm and friendly smile.

In case you were wondering, the customer I spoke of before went home to get her original receipt and came back. She was wrong and the store was right so she was very apologetic about her attitude and thanked us for being so nice about the situation. I suppose we'll let her come back if she still wants to.

Resolutions

Let's talk resolutions. During one time or another throughout our lives, we've resolved to change something about ourselves for the better. Sometimes we succeed, most of the time we fail, but in the end it was fun trying. Now we have entered a new year, 2007, an opportunity to let ourselves down once again because we didn't exercise quite as much as we hoped, or those 20 lbs. we planned to drop ended up being 30. Luckily for me, I never made fitness goals as part of New Years Resolutions, instead I make realistic goals. So let's look at what my resolutions were last year and how I did on them.

1. Pay off my credit cards! While I never pay a dime of interest, I still don't want all this debt. So, this year I am going to pay off my debt and cut up all but one credit card. Naturally in order to keep my excellent credit rating, I won't be closing any accounts.

I did pretty well on this one. I must admit that when I made this resolution, I had nearly paid off all my debt, so accomplishing it was an easy task. Then I got an Xbox 360 and that added some debt to my Best Buy card. Thankfully that is nearly paid off, which means I will once again be debt free.

2. Update this website daily. Over the past month or so, I have been neglecting this website. This was mostly due to sheer lack of time. Now that life is slowing down, I am going to be vigorously updating this site.

I thought I would be able to do this, but when you have nothing to talk about, it makes little sense in posting something. You obviously come here to read about the interesting goings-on in my life, if nothing is going on, then there shouldn't be anything for you to read.

3. Update DisneyFunClub.com weekly. I really want to get my trip reports finished.

This was doomed from the start. I'm still trying to find the time to update this blog. I mean, my last post was in September of 2005. What's difficult is I don't run in these circles very often, so I would have to start involving myself with Disney more often.

4. Start 3 new websites.

I got two launched, the third I dropped because there was little sense in launching it. I won't tell you what it was going to be because I wouldn't want to disappoint you. The only problem with this was that these sites were not updated regularly. To my credit, nowhere in this resolution did I say I would update them at all.

5. Begin podcasting.

Do you see any podcasts anywhere on this site? Or any of my other sites? No. I don't know, the idea of podcasting has rather waned on me a bit. Due primarily to the fact that podcasting as evolved into video podcasting. While that would be easier for me to implement, I don't know what it is I would share.

I think I did well with my resolutions. But what am I going to do this year? Nothing . . . well, not nothing, but I don't think I'm going to make formal resolutions this year; if I come across something that I want to change, than I will resolve to change it. Until then, I'm just going to live my life.

New Years Eve Day

Yesterday started out fantastic as we made our weekly trip to Best Buy where they had a selection of TV on DVD boxed sets on sale. I picked up the complete series (3 seasons) of Chris Carter's Millennium, starring Lance Henrickson. I also bought the first season of Bones and the second season of Dead Like Me. Each of the sets cost a mere $19.99; a great price and one I couldn't pass up. However, I did see they were selling every season of the X-Files for $19.99 each, which to someone who paid more than twice and in some cases four times that price, made me a little sick.

Once we arrived back home from our shopping excursion, we had a little time to waste before going to my grandparent's house for a New Years Eve celebration. Mom made some French Toast from the bread I made, and we sat and watched Big Day, a show ABC seems to racing to end. From there, we went our separate ways and did our own thing.

Two o'clock came and we made our way to my grandparent's house. We talked about the trouble my Grandfather was having with this contraption they bought at Linen's and Things that allows you to burn you audio tapes and vinyl to CD. When we first heard about it on the day after Thanksgiving, we thought it would be an awesome way to preserve old media. As it turns out, after a solid week of decent results, the whole thing crapped out on them. Now there is some debate on whether they should just return it, or exchange it for another one.

Once we exhausted the subject of the L-n-T contraption, the subject changed to Pokémon and other games my Grandfather was playing. I then showed him the game I was currently playing, Elite Beat Agents. He thought it was a cool concept, and after showing him a quick demo of it, my Aunt and Samantha arrived. Almost immediately, the group divided and my Grandfather, Samantha and I went into another room to play video games, as the ladies sat at the table and did their thing.

We all congregated back to the dining room for food and conversation, then played Disney Trivial Pursuit. My mom and I are huge Disney fans and we know a lot about the parks, but when it comes to Disney movies, while we enjoy watching them, we aren't experts so playing these games is always difficult for us. Personally, I will watch a movie a dozen or so times and still not remember all the details that are required to play such a game. However, once I'm reminded, I can recall the section of the movie with immense clarity. This ability I have is useless in a game that requires you to know the movie to begin with.

After my Aunt, Grandmother and I wiped the floor with our opponents in a very close game, we moved on to a game I generally despise, Outburst! I am a highly competitive person and I hate the way I feel when I compete, so I make every effort to not compete in anything. Outburst! is one of those games that can split families apart, except this time it was better because I had already won in DTP so the feeling of competition subsided.

Once we finished the games and dessert, we all left and headed home. When Mom and I arrived home, we picked out Thank You for Smoking to watch. It is a hilarious movie about a spin-doctor for big tobacco. It's one of those movies, no matter how you feel about the subject of big tobacco, you find yourself rooting for the "bad guy". I highly recommend you see it if you have the chance.

The rest of my evening had me working on the blog for A God in Training and then I felt too sick from exhaustion and the massive amount of food I consumed to continue. So, I lied in bed and watched a little TV until I fell asleep.

Winter Wonderland

Every winter my mom and I, as well as my Aunt Sandy and a random selection of her children go to Portland International Raceway to view Winter Wonderland, a holiday lights spectacular. This year we were surprised to see my cousin Matthew, who moved out of state last year, come and join us. They all arrive at our house and we hang out for a second while we hear a recounting of Matthew and Daniels arrival in Oregon and the subsequent drama that ensued.

After a few minutes Charlie leaves to go bowling while the rest of us present, Mom, Aunt Sandy, Samantha, Matthew and I get into Aunt Sandy's car and begin our journey . . . except we have to go back and get a gas receipt in order to use a coupon my Mom acquired. Alright, now we are on our way. The drive goes quickly as Matthew and I discuss everything from HDTV's, digital camcorders and movies. Apparently, Casino Royale is an excellent film.

We travel the estimated 15.4 miles to PIR and get into the line of cars waiting to enjoy the majestic beauty that is Winter Wonderland. We get to the front of the line and begin our journey through arches, the twelve days of Christmas and various other holiday and non-holiday related light displays. All the while, we were stuck behind a terribly slow SUV who is practically moving backwards. It isn't a problem though, you have to go slow and save for a tense moment in which my Aunt nearly took down an entire display of lights with her car, it was pleasant.

Afterwards we headed to Arby's for dinner where we ate, drank and talked about . . . well, I can't say exactly what we talked about. I do remember a conversation in which my Aunt said that she can make her wood stove sound like Chewbacca, an event I'm looking forward to experiencing first hand. I also recall a discussion about what Die Fledermause, a German operetta by Johan Strauss II, meant translated into English. We later learned it means The Flying-mouse.

Once we finished dinner, we started back to our house. Here, Samantha and I worked on her iPod, getting music ripped, encoded and transferred while the rest of the group talked out in the living room. Some time passed and then it became a quest to remember the name of a cousin's other son. We headed to the Internet and wasn't able to remember so we moved on to baby name books my Mom uses for her Sims characters. After some looking around in the books, laughing hysterically at a section on how to make names, my Aunt blurted it out. A sense of relief filled the room and it marked the end of the evening.

Highly Disappointing TV's

A few weeks ago, I was ready to buy an HDTV. Best Buy had great financing, no interest until 2010 and I got my Best Buy card credit limit increased for the occasion. Although I couldn't buy the TV I wanted (1080p) with the limit I received, I could get a very respectable HDTV (720p - 1080i) instead.

We walk into our local Best Buy and walk over to the HDTV’s. I looked around for awhile ready to make the leap and take home a 46+" slice of heaven. After seeing the displays, I felt under whelmed and disappointed. This was the supposed leap in picture? Were any of the TVs considered high-def? I wondered if Best Buy was displaying HD content, because everything I was looking at indicated quite the opposite.

The disappointment was hard to handle, this was not what I wanted and not what I expected. I was told in the many articles I read about the subject that what was displayed were not real world examples. Supposedly what I was seeing was better than what I was to expect at home, because they configure their settings to be brighter and bolder than normal. If what I was seeing was disappointing, then when I got home, I would be downright depressed.

Needless to say, I left without an HDTV. I decided that I would do more research on the subject and learn everything there is to know before I set out to buy one. I'm the type of person that wants to buy higher-end in the attempt to avoid spending more money in the end replacing with cheaper models. So, I'll wait a couple of more months and see the prices drop and then make another attempt.