Attack of the killer flowers
Ok now don't get me wrong, I love my job, I really do. But today was the most boring, pointless and complete waste of my time I've ever experienced. The only good thing about it was the fact that I got paid for my time.
Today was the free day at the Botanical Gardens, yippie. Most of you who know me can probably guess my excitement about getting to spend a couple hours in the afternoon on a Sunday staring at plants and butterflies, yeah. There were only 3 people signed up for today's activity so it was just me. Okay no big deal. I got there at 11:30 like I was told to and sat in my car waiting for the clients to show up. About 11:50 the first one did (and it looked like she was going to be the only one who did). We waited until a little after 12:00 which was when it was scheduled on the calendar. (Her mom was planning to just go ahead and take her home because it looked like it was just going to be the 2 of us but I told her that I didn't mind if she was the only one and the others would probably be showing up within a few minutes.)
So we went inside and I signed the guest book. (Because it was the first Sunday of the month it was free, which my guess is that's why it was scheduled for today). Then we went into the "Tropical Rainforest Room," it was okay and I actually recoginized some of the plants from living in Honduras so that was a little bit neat I guess. So we wandered around there for I'm guessing 10-15 minutes and then went outside to see the plants (or lack there of) they had.
Because it's winter and still fairly cold the little pond they had was completely frozen over and all the plants except the cati were basically dead. So after a few minutes we went back inside. Now I'm guessing it was around 40* outside, and then we went into a room that was 88* (according to the guide) and I'm guessing around 120% humidity my glasses fogged up within about 2 milliseconds of us walking back inside. As we were heading back into the gift shop, we ran into the other 2 that had signed up. So I took all 3 of them to see the butterflies. We saw 3, and no I'm not kidding there were only 3 butterflies visible. I explained to them the life cycle of a butterfly, and then the guide showed them the poster and explained it in a little more detail. Then unexpectly the mother of one of them shows up looking for her daughter and my sup. I showed her where her daugther was (which was right behind me) and explained because there were only 3 signed up that I was the staff present.
So mommy takes her daughter and they go through by themselves, whatever. Because I now had 2 and one had already seen the plants I asked if she wanted to go look at them again. She declined so I left her in the gift shop and went through the plant room with the other one and explained the stuff that I had explained before. (about the different plants and the turtles that the had)
Afterwards I came back out and asked the people at the register if there was anything else to see. They told me about the "Children's Castle" on the other side of the parking lot so I asked them if they wanted to go over there. Only one did, so the 2 of us walked over there while the other one sat on the bench and waited for us. When we went back over the vistor's center there really wasn't anything else for us to do (if you haven't been there there's really not much to see, especially in the winter). I looked at cell phone (which functions as my watch) and saw that it wasn't even 1 p.m. yet. The activity was scheduled until 2, and to be honest I didn't really know what else to do. They didn't really want to go wandering through the plants/butterflies again so I asked if they wanted to call their rides to come get them early. (Luckily today I didn't have to worry about providing transportation) So I waited for their rides to get there and then left about 1:30. Because I didn't really want to come home, I decided to head over to the library and try getting some writing done.
I checked out a couple books on writing the other day and the one I'm reading through right now has some "writing assignments" at the end of each chapter so I've been working on those. (well most of them, some aren't really fesible so I don't mess with them) The good news is that it seems to be helping me get the writing bug back a little bit, although still not really ready to tackle my YA novel I'm hoping some of the work I've done in the last couple days might spark a decent enough idea to develop into a short story. We'll see.
But the point of this rambling mess is honestly just to say:
If you ever get a wild hair up your ass to invite me to go look at flowers/butterflies, let it pass. This afternoon was by far the most boring afternoon I've spent in I don't know how long. Granted probably shouldn't tell my sup that but I'm pretty sure she'll figure it out on her own.
Hmmm I wonder could I right about a story about plants that get upset and decide to attack their namesakes???
Today was the free day at the Botanical Gardens, yippie. Most of you who know me can probably guess my excitement about getting to spend a couple hours in the afternoon on a Sunday staring at plants and butterflies, yeah. There were only 3 people signed up for today's activity so it was just me. Okay no big deal. I got there at 11:30 like I was told to and sat in my car waiting for the clients to show up. About 11:50 the first one did (and it looked like she was going to be the only one who did). We waited until a little after 12:00 which was when it was scheduled on the calendar. (Her mom was planning to just go ahead and take her home because it looked like it was just going to be the 2 of us but I told her that I didn't mind if she was the only one and the others would probably be showing up within a few minutes.)
So we went inside and I signed the guest book. (Because it was the first Sunday of the month it was free, which my guess is that's why it was scheduled for today). Then we went into the "Tropical Rainforest Room," it was okay and I actually recoginized some of the plants from living in Honduras so that was a little bit neat I guess. So we wandered around there for I'm guessing 10-15 minutes and then went outside to see the plants (or lack there of) they had.
Because it's winter and still fairly cold the little pond they had was completely frozen over and all the plants except the cati were basically dead. So after a few minutes we went back inside. Now I'm guessing it was around 40* outside, and then we went into a room that was 88* (according to the guide) and I'm guessing around 120% humidity my glasses fogged up within about 2 milliseconds of us walking back inside. As we were heading back into the gift shop, we ran into the other 2 that had signed up. So I took all 3 of them to see the butterflies. We saw 3, and no I'm not kidding there were only 3 butterflies visible. I explained to them the life cycle of a butterfly, and then the guide showed them the poster and explained it in a little more detail. Then unexpectly the mother of one of them shows up looking for her daughter and my sup. I showed her where her daugther was (which was right behind me) and explained because there were only 3 signed up that I was the staff present.
So mommy takes her daughter and they go through by themselves, whatever. Because I now had 2 and one had already seen the plants I asked if she wanted to go look at them again. She declined so I left her in the gift shop and went through the plant room with the other one and explained the stuff that I had explained before. (about the different plants and the turtles that the had)
Afterwards I came back out and asked the people at the register if there was anything else to see. They told me about the "Children's Castle" on the other side of the parking lot so I asked them if they wanted to go over there. Only one did, so the 2 of us walked over there while the other one sat on the bench and waited for us. When we went back over the vistor's center there really wasn't anything else for us to do (if you haven't been there there's really not much to see, especially in the winter). I looked at cell phone (which functions as my watch) and saw that it wasn't even 1 p.m. yet. The activity was scheduled until 2, and to be honest I didn't really know what else to do. They didn't really want to go wandering through the plants/butterflies again so I asked if they wanted to call their rides to come get them early. (Luckily today I didn't have to worry about providing transportation) So I waited for their rides to get there and then left about 1:30. Because I didn't really want to come home, I decided to head over to the library and try getting some writing done.
I checked out a couple books on writing the other day and the one I'm reading through right now has some "writing assignments" at the end of each chapter so I've been working on those. (well most of them, some aren't really fesible so I don't mess with them) The good news is that it seems to be helping me get the writing bug back a little bit, although still not really ready to tackle my YA novel I'm hoping some of the work I've done in the last couple days might spark a decent enough idea to develop into a short story. We'll see.
But the point of this rambling mess is honestly just to say:
If you ever get a wild hair up your ass to invite me to go look at flowers/butterflies, let it pass. This afternoon was by far the most boring afternoon I've spent in I don't know how long. Granted probably shouldn't tell my sup that but I'm pretty sure she'll figure it out on her own.
Hmmm I wonder could I right about a story about plants that get upset and decide to attack their namesakes???