This crazy flip floppy weather is about to do me in. My throat’s tight and my nose feels all dried out and drippy at the same time. 
I don’t have time for this! Christmas is around the corner and my house is not decorated yet!
Following the Star …
My Xanga buddy, Follow Freedom, posted this on his blog earlier. It’s simply lovely and worth checking out, if you follow the tradition of Advent or would like to begin doing so. Enjoy and be blessed!
Wonderful Thanksgiving ….
we had a great day yesterday! We drove up to Spring to my cousin’s house where we ate like piggies, enjoyed each other’s company and watched the tu vs. Texas A&M game. I’m not a big football fan, much preferring a good hockey game, but I enjoyed watching the game with all my Aggie cousins. From what I understand, it was still a respectable showing by the Aggies even though the final score was Longhorns 49/Aggies 39. Eighteen of the Aggies playing last night were FRESHMAN, which essentially means there were a bunch of kids six months out of high school, giving the No. 3 team in the country a fairly tough run for their money. Not too shabby, I’d say. The scoring was back and forth, so the suspense factor was decent and you can’t help but think it’s going to be a team to watch next year. No one likes to see a team get pummeled to death (least ways no one with a heart) and so it was a good game.
I made a carrot cake from scratch — it was supposed to be a “surprise” birthday cake for my guy (whose birthday is December 4), but I wasn’t thinking and set it out with the other desserts. One of my cousins didn’t know that I’d planned for us all to sing “Happy Birthday” to my guy and cut a big slice out of it for her husband before anyone else started getting dessert. Guess that was partially my fault for not keeping it wrapped up until the right time! It was a really good cake though, and I think I will definitely be making it again. It had grated carrots, pineapple, coconut, chopped walnuts, and golden raisins in it. Super yummy!
I also did a cracker and cheese tray – with a bit of a twist – a lady in our area sells homemade jams and jellies at the county fair and she has a Raspberry Chipotle jelly that is just to die for. I spread a generous layer of the jelly over a softened block of cream cheese and served it with Ritz, Club, and Wheat Thin crackers. It was delicious and everyone really enjoyed it.
Today we ran errands – we didn’t do any “Black Friday” shopping to speak of. AJ dropped his Jeep off to have some work done on it. Not quite two years ago he had to have the rear axle replaced and apparently the one the shop put on there was damaged (it was a used part) … he kept meaning to take it back, but the repair was done in another town when he was attending a teachers’ in-service training and well, you know how that goes. Because the replacement axle was not right, his tires were wearing a lot faster than they should have for the amount of driving he does. When he went in to our local auto place (part of the chain that did the work in the other town), the manager of the local place didn’t charge him for this most recent tire because he knew they should not be wearing like that. He also got on the phone with the other place to find out what happened. Well, the gist of it has now become a his word against their word kind of thing because so much time has passed. My guy was pretty peeved because he has been a good customer over the years and because the original “repair” was almost $2,000. Our local shop, who in truth is not responsible for any of this, wanted to do something to resolve the problem. So they worked out a deal – my husband will pay $600 toward another ACCEPTABLE axle, and the local shop will cover the remaining expense and provide the labor to make it good.
After we dropped the Jeep off, we grabbed breakfast at IHOP and stopped in Best Buy to order Jami’s Christmas gift. She has no idea what she is getting and I am going to have to be READY to catch the expression on her face when she opens her gift. She’s been saving her money toward a laptop computer — AJ told her that he would match whatever she saved up. Well, we initially were looking at laptops in the $400 – $500 range. But the fact is, PC’s are a pain in the backside and I have never owned one that I didn’t end up hating the stupid thing and cursing it (in the mildest manner, of course …) I’ve had my Mac for three years and still LOVE it. So we decided to get her a Macbook. The entry level one that we were looking at was sold out, but the next step up was only $200 more, so it wasn’t too bad of a price increase and worth the investment in my opinion, if for no other reason than we won’t be suffering the guaranteed headaches that a Windows-based product is bound to have. I also feel like I can protect her more fully from the garbage “out there” because Mac has such great parental controls on their machines. There will be some serious “rules” that go with having such a great piece of equipment, though. She won’t be hauling the thing around just anywhere she likes – she will definitely have to get clearance from us before taking it for sleepovers or whatever. $1200 on a computer for a 14 year old is a pretty pricey investment, and so I don’t think we are being unreasonable by laying down some ground rules. The thing that gives me peace of mind about the purchase is Best Buy’s 18 months same as cash on purchases over $400. We’ve used this on a couple of purchases and since AJ’s been paying our bills, he is very good at getting things paid off before the interest kicks in. We purchased my washing machine Memorial Day (@ $900) and have until December 2010 to pay it off, but he’s already paid about 1/2 of it down. And he will be collecting the $200 that Jami had saved toward the “cheaper” computer to put toward the Mac. So it’s all good.
Then we hit the paperback bookstore and Hastings to see what we could get for books that we didn’t need cluttering up our shelves any longer. We ended up with a $17 credit at the paperback bookstore, and then my guy got a $14 gift card to Hastings for books he sold back. I got a $17 gift card, and I also managed to get a $10 gift card for my sister for some books that she didn’t want any longer. So that was a good deal all the way around.
He’s off to Galveston to do some work on his dad’s house and Jami is visiting her grandmother until tomorrow. So I guess I’d better get busy and do something else productive, too! Have a wonderful weekend, y’all!
Paying Jobs
My Xanga friend, Old Hat, posted an entry called “Paying Jobs” recently. Here’s my list of “paying jobs” that I’ve held over the years:
1. Babysitting
2. Jewelry store gal – first job out of high school, I worked for a small town jewelry store as a clerk. My responsibilities consisted of cleaning the glass cases of finger prints, showing possible selections to customers, cleaning jewelry, and working the engraving machine on Father’s Day. I engraved money clips, lighters, the backs of watches, and such. The store also sold the usual gift items like crystal, porcelain knick knacks, and such. I got my mom a crystal box for her birthday, not realizing it was actually a cigarette box. I felt so silly, but she kept it anyway.
3. Drugstore clerk – I went to work for the drugstore that our family had done business with since I was a baby – the jewelry store job was kind of stressful because the man who owned the store was very difficult to work for. My dad actually had to go get my last paycheck when I gave my notice because the jeweler was so ugly about my quitting. The two years I worked at the drugstore were really good, though. I typed prescription labels, set out the medications for the pharmacists to fill the bottles, kept inventory, worked the cash register (an old manual one with big black keys that made a delightful “kaching” sound when you slammed the bottom drawer shut) … I worked here for two years while I attended junior college.
4. Copy Center tech – When I went off to Sam Houston State, I worked in the copy center at the Newton Gresham Library. I kept the machines full of paper and toner, cleared paper jams, that kind of thing. Not terribly challenging, but it did give me a little pocket money.
After graduating from college in ’86, I had an incredibly useful degree – a B.A. in English with an emphasis in technical writing. My minor was in History … it’s funny when I look back at it, because the degree doesn’t seem all that useful, but it actually meshed rather well with the work that I did over the years (as you will see).
5. Circulation Supervisor – First job out of college was the Circulation Supervisor at Texas A&M in Galveston. Ran the circulation desk and became known as “Conan the Librarian” because I blocked the records of all the graduating seniors until they either returned their overdue books or paid for them. A&M did not charge late fees on library books at that time and so there was no motivation to return books. I managed to retrieve about 2/3 of the missing books and the rest were paid for. (No graduating seniors were permanently harmed by my action – they all graduated on time.)
6. Rare Book and Archives Assistant – Moved over to UTMB’s Moody Medical Library (also in Galveston). I worked on organizing the archival papers of different professors of the medical school, as well as different medical organizations. In addition, I researched and wrote annotations for different exhibits featuring different things like the books we had on Phrenology and a collection of medieval illuminations … while I didn’t head up the project, I assisted with an exhibit of da Vinci’s anatomical drawings, and that was quite interesting! Gave tours of the rare book collection and assisted researchers with the collection.
7. Legal Secretary – While the aforementioned gigs were very interesting, they didn’t pay enough to finance independence. Almost twenty five and still living at home, I was ready to get on with life! So I went to work for a large law firm in Houston. Over the 8 years I worked there, I worked in the attorney employment office (pretty cool – helping wine and dine the smartest law students from around the country), the international law department, the corporate department, the real estate department, and then finally landed in the intellectual property department. That was a blast – helping prepare applications for fascinating inventions, clever trademarks, and also helping my attorneys defend those properties. (That technical writing stuff from college finally came in handy here.)
8. Stay at Home Mom – A year after my daughter was born, we moved to Huntsville, Texas and I left the law firm. I’ve been a stay at home mom ever since, except for the following things that I’ve done from home, between my family responsibilities:
9. Secretary – I did assorted secretarial chores for a property management fellow. Did the billing for a storage property he managed, as well as the random typed letter, etc.
10. Scrapbooking Consultant – For five years I was a Creative Memories consultant – teaching people how to organize their photos (that archival experience above came in handy, eh?) My writing experience strengthened my mission to emphasis the importance of journaling, as well as preserving the photos. Because if you don’t know who the person in the photo is, or where they are, you might as well just throw the photo away!
11. Secretary (again) – I had a friend who opened a law firm specializing in bankruptcy and I did some secretarial work for her from my home for a while. Then she got an offer to work for a large firm and decided to take the job. So my secretarial days finally came to an end.
12. Small Business Owner – I now have a business selling custom blinds and plantation shutters. I’ve been doing this for ten years this coming December. It’s a good job, but I am ready to do something different. I’ll let you know what that is, if I ever decide to do it!
Saw a t-shirt today and it made me laugh …
“So how’s that Hopey Changey thing workin’ out for ya?”
Sad …
I am trying to remember something I wrote several years ago. For a long time, it was the little header under my Xanga title “Chisel and Stone” … then I changed it to the bit about the Rosetta Stone and apparently I did not save my original phrase. A friend and I were discussing quotes and how beautifully turned the English language can be by a true wordsmith. I had written this little one sentence bit about the moon one evening when I walked outside … comparing it to a thin Mercury dime, and the bare branches of the pecan tree to black lace against a navy velvet sky, and I really liked the way I phrased it … for the life of me, I can’t remember exactly how I worded it and I can’t find it anywhere on my computer.
So far, so good …
I got caught up on my sales tax returns … which is a good thing.
I worked on some homeschool yearbook stuff … which is a good thing.
I’m about to go to the grocery to buy ingredients to make a pineapple cream cheese pie to take to a luau tomorrow … which is a good thing.
And I am going to write my nephew a letter – he’s in army boot camp at Fort Knox right now … which is another good thing.
Finished the book on Harry Truman’s Excellent Adventure. It was very good.
Currently reading a book on the Constitution. It’s really not as dry as it sounds. That’s a good thing, too.
Still Here –
I made a to-do list yesterday evening and I’m hoping to get great and mighty things accomplished today! Finishing my second cup of coffee (1/2 caf, so not quite as bad as it sounds) and going to change out the laundry. Then on to the paperwork that needs doing and the schoolwork that needs supervising. Have a blessed day!
A Scribbler & A Shutterbug 