...everytime you eat a steak, a hippie looses his hackey sac...
After setting the time on the computer at the front desk, I realized that I had been sitting here for nearly an hour already and I really haven't done anything, so I have decided to make an update. But first - I must go grab a Dr.Pepper from the vending machine.
Good thing I had extra change in my pocket, I really didn't want to spend my new lucky dollar. This needs clarification, I'm sure. See, I found this wonderful one dollar bill that was colored with yellow and orange marker and I don't know why, but I just really enjoy this. I have gone all weekend without spending this magical one and I am going to try to see how long I can go without spending it on something. (Note: this is the part of my journal entries that I will read later on and really enjoy thinking of my magical one dollar bill)
So really one of the first things on my mind is how amazing my weekend was! I haven't updated in a while, but that's because I took an extended holiday starting pretty much on Thursday.
Thursday started a second round of staff training, but it also meant two other amazing things. About an hour after training let out for the day, Sarah and Ymelda pulled into town from their amazing adventure from Florida! I was really excited to see Sarah because it was the first time since the end of closing that I had seen her. We caught up with each other for a while; I got to hear all about her awesome trip, but we had to get ready. Ready for what you may ask? Oh - only the opening night of Pirates of the Caribean three! A few of the staff and Sarah, Ymelda and myself grabbed some dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings and made our way over to get our seats for the 8:00pm premiere of the Pirates Sequel!
I would put a mini - opinion piece here but there isn't a whole lot more to say other than Pirates was amazing. Great ending to a trilogy! Much better than Deadmans Chest, a little more political than the first two, but great movie with some really fun action. Almost the best, if Curse of the Black Pearl wasn't so classic!
I guess ^that was a mini-opinion piece. woops
The movie didn't let out till 11, and Thursday night ended early because of training the next morning at nine, but I still got to hang out with Sarah which was much needed.
The next day we did a training piece on a customer service model called the "fish" philosophy. Fish is a very interesting model based around the fish mongers at the Seattle fish market. I really got into it for being as cheesy as it was. I would like to think that I have always been really receptive to customer service training; I believe its one of my strong suits. So the day flew by rather smoothly and I don't want to admit it, but I kind of had fun!
(While sitting at the desk - I may have just used some "fish" philosophy with a resident while typing this. How weird!)
With training over, my weekend began! I didn't have to be back on the job till this shift, so I had a nice four day weekend. I kicked off the weekend with a nice trip home to Peoria. My "embryo buddy" Steph was home for the weekend and my mom and Kate were going to go out with her, so Sarah and I decided to join in on the activities and it turned into a crazy night of fun.
We spend a couple hours at this Bar and Grill called Bogies in Peoria that started off as an innocent meal and a drink or two and the next thing you know the band started playing and Mom and Kate were on the dance floor dancing to Brick House. Those two get a little carried away sometimes, but its all in fun. Ben was with us at the dinner gone wrong and the waitress said she wasn't sure how much longer they would let us stay with Ben in tow. Granted it was 11:30 by this time, I think it was a good time for us to go too! So we packed up and headed over to crash my dads band practice at Chris's house. Car one containing Ben, Sarah and Myself arrived safely and listened to the band play for a little bit, but car two arrived with a couple more six packs than expected. After trying to walk through a screen door and watching Kate and Steph do cartwheels, the makeshift party came to a close an hour or two later. Instead of driving back to blo-no that night, Sarah and I decided to stay at the new house.
I love the new house. One of these days you will get more information on the new house, but not today. Remind me to do that later.
Saturday started off with some fun activities while still in Peoria such as getting food at Gebby's and running into a couple of "Campers" and then playing with our imaginarily-adopted Shar Pei's Rufus and Reagan. With a pending road trip to Chicago, Sarah and I decided to split up our driving by heading back to Normal and resting for a while. Our festivities in Chicago that night consisted of basically heading up to Sarah's cousins house, but we couldn't get there before her cousin came home around 8 that night. So with plenty of time to kill we decided to watch "The Fountain."
Mini Review of The Fountain: PLEASE SEE THAT MOVIE! When you do - call me so that we can discuss it. I really need to either see that movie again or debrief with someone so that I can decide if I liked it or not. Amazing, beautiful, heartbreaking, a little confusing, and VERY well done.
After the drive to Sarah's cousin's suburb, we pretty much just passed out once we got there. There was another time that Sarah and I hung out with her and we always have a lot of fun up there. The purpose of heading up there was to attend Sarah's cousin's (who I will address now as Nancy since I have used "Sarah's cousin" several times) son's (Caiden) one year old birthday party. Caiden is one of the cutest little kids ever; I had a ton of fun playing with him. He wasn't too sure about me because of my grizzly beard, but by the end of the day he gave me a huge hug when I was leaving. I also had a lot of fun meeting tons of Sarah's family. I only remembered about .004 percent of their names, but it was still a blast.
While at the party, Caidens Grandma started passing out little sheets of paper and asked that everyone write a little something for Caiden so that she could transpose the messages on to fabric and turn it into a giant "memory quote quilt" for Caiden to have to remember his first birthday party. Well the paper got around to me and Sarah urged me to write something, although I felt a little out of place doing so. Finally I just decided to do it; I got up the courage to write what was really on my mind. "Caiden, Here's to one more year of poopin' in your pants and getting away with it." I really hope it makes the quilt, and I could only wish that it makes it towards the center. The thing that would make this story even better but strictly for the humor of the story would be if as soon as the quilt was finished, Sarah and I decided to not date anymore. I would never wish that upon us - but you have to admit, it would be a lot cooler to have a quote like that from some random ex boyfriend than your creepy uncle.
After Caiden's party Sarah and I headed into "the city" to go see Lynn play at the Beat Kitchen in Chicago. The show was really cool. I love going to new venues and seeing new bands. There were two acts that when up before Lynn got up there, the first guy was really good and I wish I could remember his name so that I could look him up on MySpace, the second guy didn't hold my attention well enough to keep me entertained. Lynn was amazing per usual and she told a hilarious story that I think I should share in here so that I can remember it forever. (This is a true story too, which really just makes it 100 times better)
There is this girl whose first job ever was house sitting for a family who had a dog. Her first day of going to the house, she found the family dog dead. She felt really bad and decided to call the family on vacation. The family apologized and said that they should have warned her that the dog was getting really old and sick and probably was going to die; they just thought that it would survive the vacation. They said to just take the body to the vet's and they would keep it until the family got home. The only problem that the girl ran into was at the time; she was only 14 and had no way to get to the vets. She decided to take the "L" but felt uncomfortable just draggin' a dead dog on with her so she found a small suit case with a bunch of Hawaii stickers on it and packed the dog up and jumped on the "L." While on the train, some guy came up and started talking to her and asked her if she had just got home from Hawaii. Not wanting to creep the man out or get caught with a corpse in a bag, she made up this elaborate lie about her "vacation" to Hawaii because the man kept asking her questions. Right as the train came to a stop; the guy snatched the suit case and ran off of the train leaving the girl behind. Everyone on the train kept saying, "Little girl, that man just stole your suit case," and all she could do was laugh.
Every time I think of that story I just laugh at all of the levels of irony there. Don't worry either - the family of the dog thought it was hilarious too.
The next day was Monday and after getting some great food from Arlington Heights, Sarah and I were supposed to meet up with my cousin Michelle to see this Irish band called Gaelic Storm at this Memorial Day Irish festival. We were a running a little late but only came in a couple songs into their set, but its ok because Michelle didn't even get there till the last couple of songs. The band was GREAT! It was a five piece who played some Irish folk songs and some of their own as well as a couple of really good instrumentals. I guess the big deal with these guys is that they are the band from the steerage party scene from Titanic. They were super energetic and very very entertaining! Apparently Michelle got to hang out with the band the night before after a gig that they did because she met them somehow and has proceeded to get everyone in my family addicted to their music. I can't wait to see them again! With such an exhausting weekend, we pretty much just went back to Sarah's parent's house and passed out.
Tuesday was laid back compared to the rest of the weekend. We just went out and did a little shopping at a couple thrift stores and Barns and Nobel. The greatest part of the day was eating at this place called California Pizza Kitchen! It was amazing! They have a ton of unique pizza combinations, and we tried the "Jamaican Jerk Chicken" pizza with two tall glasses of peach lemonade. Yes, it was to die for!
That was pretty much my weekend. It was a ton of fun and it was great hanging out with Sarah so much after not seeing her for a while. The good news is that her family switched cellular plans so now that I am back here and she is not in Florida anymore, we can talk for FREE whenever we want - so hopefully I wont miss her as much this time.
Oh well - that's my time at the desk. I am going to get going and finish working on a couple of things. Thanks for tuning in!
Love
Your_favorite_map-collector.
Good thing I had extra change in my pocket, I really didn't want to spend my new lucky dollar. This needs clarification, I'm sure. See, I found this wonderful one dollar bill that was colored with yellow and orange marker and I don't know why, but I just really enjoy this. I have gone all weekend without spending this magical one and I am going to try to see how long I can go without spending it on something. (Note: this is the part of my journal entries that I will read later on and really enjoy thinking of my magical one dollar bill)
So really one of the first things on my mind is how amazing my weekend was! I haven't updated in a while, but that's because I took an extended holiday starting pretty much on Thursday.
Thursday started a second round of staff training, but it also meant two other amazing things. About an hour after training let out for the day, Sarah and Ymelda pulled into town from their amazing adventure from Florida! I was really excited to see Sarah because it was the first time since the end of closing that I had seen her. We caught up with each other for a while; I got to hear all about her awesome trip, but we had to get ready. Ready for what you may ask? Oh - only the opening night of Pirates of the Caribean three! A few of the staff and Sarah, Ymelda and myself grabbed some dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings and made our way over to get our seats for the 8:00pm premiere of the Pirates Sequel!
I would put a mini - opinion piece here but there isn't a whole lot more to say other than Pirates was amazing. Great ending to a trilogy! Much better than Deadmans Chest, a little more political than the first two, but great movie with some really fun action. Almost the best, if Curse of the Black Pearl wasn't so classic!
I guess ^that was a mini-opinion piece. woops
The movie didn't let out till 11, and Thursday night ended early because of training the next morning at nine, but I still got to hang out with Sarah which was much needed.
The next day we did a training piece on a customer service model called the "fish" philosophy. Fish is a very interesting model based around the fish mongers at the Seattle fish market. I really got into it for being as cheesy as it was. I would like to think that I have always been really receptive to customer service training; I believe its one of my strong suits. So the day flew by rather smoothly and I don't want to admit it, but I kind of had fun!
(While sitting at the desk - I may have just used some "fish" philosophy with a resident while typing this. How weird!)
With training over, my weekend began! I didn't have to be back on the job till this shift, so I had a nice four day weekend. I kicked off the weekend with a nice trip home to Peoria. My "embryo buddy" Steph was home for the weekend and my mom and Kate were going to go out with her, so Sarah and I decided to join in on the activities and it turned into a crazy night of fun.
We spend a couple hours at this Bar and Grill called Bogies in Peoria that started off as an innocent meal and a drink or two and the next thing you know the band started playing and Mom and Kate were on the dance floor dancing to Brick House. Those two get a little carried away sometimes, but its all in fun. Ben was with us at the dinner gone wrong and the waitress said she wasn't sure how much longer they would let us stay with Ben in tow. Granted it was 11:30 by this time, I think it was a good time for us to go too! So we packed up and headed over to crash my dads band practice at Chris's house. Car one containing Ben, Sarah and Myself arrived safely and listened to the band play for a little bit, but car two arrived with a couple more six packs than expected. After trying to walk through a screen door and watching Kate and Steph do cartwheels, the makeshift party came to a close an hour or two later. Instead of driving back to blo-no that night, Sarah and I decided to stay at the new house.
I love the new house. One of these days you will get more information on the new house, but not today. Remind me to do that later.
Saturday started off with some fun activities while still in Peoria such as getting food at Gebby's and running into a couple of "Campers" and then playing with our imaginarily-adopted Shar Pei's Rufus and Reagan. With a pending road trip to Chicago, Sarah and I decided to split up our driving by heading back to Normal and resting for a while. Our festivities in Chicago that night consisted of basically heading up to Sarah's cousins house, but we couldn't get there before her cousin came home around 8 that night. So with plenty of time to kill we decided to watch "The Fountain."
Mini Review of The Fountain: PLEASE SEE THAT MOVIE! When you do - call me so that we can discuss it. I really need to either see that movie again or debrief with someone so that I can decide if I liked it or not. Amazing, beautiful, heartbreaking, a little confusing, and VERY well done.
After the drive to Sarah's cousin's suburb, we pretty much just passed out once we got there. There was another time that Sarah and I hung out with her and we always have a lot of fun up there. The purpose of heading up there was to attend Sarah's cousin's (who I will address now as Nancy since I have used "Sarah's cousin" several times) son's (Caiden) one year old birthday party. Caiden is one of the cutest little kids ever; I had a ton of fun playing with him. He wasn't too sure about me because of my grizzly beard, but by the end of the day he gave me a huge hug when I was leaving. I also had a lot of fun meeting tons of Sarah's family. I only remembered about .004 percent of their names, but it was still a blast.
While at the party, Caidens Grandma started passing out little sheets of paper and asked that everyone write a little something for Caiden so that she could transpose the messages on to fabric and turn it into a giant "memory quote quilt" for Caiden to have to remember his first birthday party. Well the paper got around to me and Sarah urged me to write something, although I felt a little out of place doing so. Finally I just decided to do it; I got up the courage to write what was really on my mind. "Caiden, Here's to one more year of poopin' in your pants and getting away with it." I really hope it makes the quilt, and I could only wish that it makes it towards the center. The thing that would make this story even better but strictly for the humor of the story would be if as soon as the quilt was finished, Sarah and I decided to not date anymore. I would never wish that upon us - but you have to admit, it would be a lot cooler to have a quote like that from some random ex boyfriend than your creepy uncle.
After Caiden's party Sarah and I headed into "the city" to go see Lynn play at the Beat Kitchen in Chicago. The show was really cool. I love going to new venues and seeing new bands. There were two acts that when up before Lynn got up there, the first guy was really good and I wish I could remember his name so that I could look him up on MySpace, the second guy didn't hold my attention well enough to keep me entertained. Lynn was amazing per usual and she told a hilarious story that I think I should share in here so that I can remember it forever. (This is a true story too, which really just makes it 100 times better)
There is this girl whose first job ever was house sitting for a family who had a dog. Her first day of going to the house, she found the family dog dead. She felt really bad and decided to call the family on vacation. The family apologized and said that they should have warned her that the dog was getting really old and sick and probably was going to die; they just thought that it would survive the vacation. They said to just take the body to the vet's and they would keep it until the family got home. The only problem that the girl ran into was at the time; she was only 14 and had no way to get to the vets. She decided to take the "L" but felt uncomfortable just draggin' a dead dog on with her so she found a small suit case with a bunch of Hawaii stickers on it and packed the dog up and jumped on the "L." While on the train, some guy came up and started talking to her and asked her if she had just got home from Hawaii. Not wanting to creep the man out or get caught with a corpse in a bag, she made up this elaborate lie about her "vacation" to Hawaii because the man kept asking her questions. Right as the train came to a stop; the guy snatched the suit case and ran off of the train leaving the girl behind. Everyone on the train kept saying, "Little girl, that man just stole your suit case," and all she could do was laugh.
Every time I think of that story I just laugh at all of the levels of irony there. Don't worry either - the family of the dog thought it was hilarious too.
The next day was Monday and after getting some great food from Arlington Heights, Sarah and I were supposed to meet up with my cousin Michelle to see this Irish band called Gaelic Storm at this Memorial Day Irish festival. We were a running a little late but only came in a couple songs into their set, but its ok because Michelle didn't even get there till the last couple of songs. The band was GREAT! It was a five piece who played some Irish folk songs and some of their own as well as a couple of really good instrumentals. I guess the big deal with these guys is that they are the band from the steerage party scene from Titanic. They were super energetic and very very entertaining! Apparently Michelle got to hang out with the band the night before after a gig that they did because she met them somehow and has proceeded to get everyone in my family addicted to their music. I can't wait to see them again! With such an exhausting weekend, we pretty much just went back to Sarah's parent's house and passed out.
Tuesday was laid back compared to the rest of the weekend. We just went out and did a little shopping at a couple thrift stores and Barns and Nobel. The greatest part of the day was eating at this place called California Pizza Kitchen! It was amazing! They have a ton of unique pizza combinations, and we tried the "Jamaican Jerk Chicken" pizza with two tall glasses of peach lemonade. Yes, it was to die for!
That was pretty much my weekend. It was a ton of fun and it was great hanging out with Sarah so much after not seeing her for a while. The good news is that her family switched cellular plans so now that I am back here and she is not in Florida anymore, we can talk for FREE whenever we want - so hopefully I wont miss her as much this time.
Oh well - that's my time at the desk. I am going to get going and finish working on a couple of things. Thanks for tuning in!
Love
Your_favorite_map-collector.