Open Diary Entries


I'll be better, I swear! June, week 1.

6/23/04

Does everyone have an entry like this at some point in their Open Diary lives?

I haven't written in here for a long time.  Because I fail at everything, and am exhausted.  Most of the time the people who are close to me hear about what's been going on, but then I forget a few people, or I don't want to tell this person about that happening, or whatever . . . in other words, I've just not had the energy or the inclination to write anything lately and that makes me feel like a slacker.

So, I'm going to try and be better at writing in this more often. God knows I like to talk about myself, and since there are people here who theoretically enjoy READING about me, well, that kind of goes together, doesn't it?  I'm going to just blather for a while about what's been happening since I last wrote.  I'll zoom in on important things if I think I wanna tell you.  And then you'll be caught up on my stupid life, after which I will hopefully keep this thing more up to date.

Tuesday, June 1, 2004

Remodel of the kids' section . . . ALMOST DONE.  I've been working on that stupid crap for months.  Or weeks.  Whatever.  Anyway, for reasons beyond my understanding, they decided to move everything in my section and now finally I am nearing completion of the project.  That is an awesome feeling.  I bought Preacher books for Victor.  Also some books for myself, because it is "Employee Appreciation Day," a.k.a. "Employees get 30% off instead of the usual 20% off day," a.k.a. "Frantically buy stuff because you don't want to have to wait until next month to get the full discount so you get stuff without the usual consideration day."  And this is, of course, also known as marketing genius aimed at the company's own work force.  Lovely.  I have a new friend named Max, and I called him for the first time today.  He had warned me that he is usually awkward on the phone and doesn't have anything to say.  That is not a problem with me because, well, I talk too much.  So I talked at him, and we found ourselves having a wonderful philosophical discussion.  He is now going to write essays about what he thinks on "stuff."  I made bread and some cookies while talking on the phone; I also talked to Dieter that night and that was swell as usual.  Dieter is visiting me in July.  Can't wait.

Wednesday, June 2, 2004

So much for finishing the remodel.  A woman came and took a full forty-five minutes of my time looking up literally dozens of titles for her school.  I suppose someone has to deal with such customers, especially since they give us money, but still, did it have to be ME, the only person in the store who has more to do than GOD?  Plus I had lots of other interruptions--mostly customers who can't be bothered to look for shit themselves.  Whatever.  It's my job, but do I have to do so much of it?  I'm only making $7.25 an hour here, folks.  So that's what kinda work ethic you're gonna get outta me.  Oh yeah, I was also attacked by Hello Kitty.  I had to spend like a billion years resetting the section because of all the junk that came in.  It's all basically crap that is going to get torn out of its packaging by little girls who are too young to roam stores unsupervised, and then I will not be able to sell it.  Especially those damn scented erasers.  Whose idea was it to make easy-to-open plastic-cased erasers that can be easily squished out of their perfect square shape by any child who decides to say "oooh, what's this?  *drool*  Is it candy?  Ugh, no.  Good thing I licked this thing that isn't mine before I bought it; now I know I can't eat it and therefore need to put it back in the box all mushed up or just throw it on the floor or something."  I got my Caldecott and Newbery section set, put up an American Girls endcap, and moved my crappy Leap Pad junk.  Then the day ended and I kinda had to quit.

Since of course this is Wednesday, there is the aspect of the day devoted to the experience of Jeaux.  Yes.  He picked me up and took me to Dan's house where we watched bad anime as usual.  We ate at Lou's Pizzeria (is that how you spell that shit?) and I ate a calzone that was bigger than my head and not too happy in my stomach.  When we got home after grocery shopping, we did something historic: We watched the Irresponsible Captain Tylor tape that we borrowed from Mike more than a YEAR ago.  Wow.  Then we made pretzels and cookies for my upcoming picnic.  w00t!

Thursday, June 3, 2004

This was one of the most fun days I've had in a long while.  Probably just because a) I was in the company of very cool people and b) I got to do stuff I don't normally do.  Jeaux disappeared early in the morning because I was due to have a picnic with Stacy and her daughter Samantha.  Yay!  They arrived and we went blueberry picking first, but the clouds kinda came and scared us, we were afraid of getting drenched so we left after getting pretty small buckets.  Wonderful fun, though, picking your own blueberries!

We hung out at my house after shopping for food for the picnic, waiting for the pizza.  Sam messed with my refrigerator magnets while Stacy and I chatted.  Finally the pizza came and the weather cooperated with us so we went to the park for picnicking.  Mostly Sam played on the playground, leaving the boring adults to talk.  It's weird, I remember being a kid and thinking the adults were so silly for coming to the park and then not *playing*, and yet here I am one of them: boring lady types who would rather talk than play on swings.  Though I do enjoy swings.  Yes. 

We brought FAR TOO MUCH FOOD and I got a stomachache because I just wanted to eat everything.  We had pizza, drinks, two kinds of chips, grapes, strawberries, the big soft pretzels I'd made, lemon bread that didn't taste very good, and M&M cookies that I made last night.  Oooh.  God my stomach was killing me.  Especially since I normally just eat 'til I'm not hungry, not 'til I'm FULL.  So we went home after that and I kinda rolled around making uncomfortable noises, but soon enough I felt better and we went to the post office in the rain to mail Victor's package of Preacher books.  Yay.  Then they went home.  I forced them to take food with them.  But that didn't stop me from eating more of it as soon as there was a hint of room in my tummy.  Those pretzels are DAMN good.  Remind me to never make them again unless I have a large group of people to consume them.

After I no longer had company, I answered my phone messages--Bill, who'd been let go at work, wanted to know what sort of picture was being painted about him now that he was gone, so we talked about crap at work.  I also called Phil because he was up for a teaching interview and said he had a grammar question for his résumé.  (I insisted he send it to me, at which point I attacked it with my red pen.)  We talked about the interview and I wished him luck.  I also was setting up . . . my new printer/copier/scanner/fax machine!  My old one got a jam, and then I got it to work for two more prints before it just rejected me completely.  So I don't know . . . it can probably be fixed but I happened to mention its brokenosity to my mother and she responded by randomly sending me this printer thing.  It's kind of a monstrosity but since having it means I can also unplug my scanner, it's worth it.  I got it working and installed and everything is really swell; even though I have no one to fax, I tested the fax machine by faxing a dirty joke to the people at work.  Hahah.

Friday, June 4, 2004

Another day off.  I spent a long time sleeping, which is unusual for me.  Finally I got up and finished off the food I'd made.  Oh yum.  Oh crap.  The power went off while I was working on E2 votes.  I crawled back into bed after deciding that everything I'd wanted to accomplish would require the computer, but then I got bored and just bit the bullet; I opened the blinds for some light (despite the pouring rain blocking most of the sun) and set to writing a chapter of the fifth Ivy book, which has been on hold for months.  I did the appropriate research for the chapter--I hadn't wanted to do that research, and that's why I hadn't written the damn thing--and just did it, continuing to finish the chapter after the lights finally did come back on.  After that I called my mom and talked to her.  Then I did e-mail and junk.  I called Phil and John (it was his birthday yesterday), and then got tired and snoozed.

I go back to work on Saturdays, so they're kinda like my Mondays.  I'll start the next entry to cover Saturday!


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