Huge Gap

December 15, 2007 by annadulcekelly.

There’s a huge gap between this blog and the last.  There’s going to be a lot of missing crap in between, but until my PC is plugged in again, nothing I can do about it.  I’m too busy and I hate it.  Like usual, this is a copy and paste blog entry.

11/29

I had a good Thanksgiving.  Surprise, surprise, we had the brats over at the folks’ too.  I don’t know if I told you, their mom moved again, sharing a house with a couple.  So we’re assuming 1 bedroom and the use of the common areas.  Anyway it doesn’t seem like she can have all 3 around at the same time anymore.  First we heard that they were all going up to see her Thanksgiving weekend, then during Thanksgiving dinner, it came out that only princess was going after all.  The boys were told they can come visit some other time.  So I’m guessing maybe her roommates didn’t leave for the weekend or something.  I don’t know how she can have them all with her if the couple’s at home too.  I’m sure that would have been fun for them, hearing the crap the stupids listen to.

I made fish for Thanksgiving.  Of course the stupids didn’t have any.  Dad and Scott did.  I didn’t expect Mom to have any, she doesn’t really eat fish.  Dad liked it and that’s what counted, as far as I was concerned.
 
I have been somewhat under the weather lately and I’m hating how much time I’m spending on work.  Basically all my waking hours on weekends are taken up with work.  This new system is so crummy I have to correct so many things.  And it might get better in one area but then it’ll screw up in another.  Like for instance, up until before Thanksgiving, the weekday stuff has been almost perfect.  Then the weekend after Thanksgiving showed a bit of improvement over the past weekends, but then this week has been hell.  Today I have a lot to fix.  I’m getting tired of it.

Dad hasn’t been feeling well.  Monday he had a fever and he didn’t come in.  Tuesday he did come in but he didn’t look or sound like he should have.  So yesterday and today Scott made him stay home.  I have no problem with Dad not coming in.  I have a problem with Scott thinking he’s taken enough of Dad’s work and I’m just sitting on my ass while he’s working hard.  I get tired of the attitude.  I wonder how Dad even endured all these years.  He’d been losing patience with Scott much faster lately but I don’t blame him.  He’s getting old, he’s helping for free, and he gets crap most days from Scott.  I do too, and I resent that I work so much and he is basically labor, and yet he gets so much more.  When Dad finally quits working for good, Scott will have to show me a better attitude or at least pay me more for enduring what an ass he is sometimes.  He would be so lost without me or Dad and he just doesn’t see it.
 
Well, let’s see…what’s been happening?  Dumbass 3 got really bad grades so he’s somewhat grounded.  He got an F on a Spanish quiz because the girl in front of him turned around and talked to him; they were done but they still had their papers and other people were still taking the quiz.  He got suspended for punching a kid in the face twice; he cut in line in the cafeteria, the kid elbowed him, he pushed the kid, they let it go, then while he was eating the kid kicked him in the back so he punched the kid in the face twice and broke his lip open.  And just a few days ago Scott got a letter about cheating on homework, and we thought it was plagiarism off the internet but he let someone copy his homework and of course the 2 homeworks were too alike.  Dumbass indeed.
 
Princess…she asked Scott for new basketball shoes, she had him pay for expedited shipping.  She told him, when they came, let her know.  So when they did come, he sent her a text message.  Then she said she couldn’t leave right then, but she’d like to have them at practice, so would he please drive them down to school for her?  At this point when he was telling me about it, I said, tell me you didn’t…of course he did.  So he sent her a message telling her to be out front to get them from him.  She said, call me when you get here.  He did, she said go around back to the pool, that’s where I am.  I could’ve told him, and he should have known, if he agrees to jump through one hoop, there’ll be more right after that one.  Such a sucker.
 
And then that sort of thing happened again, with a different ending.  She asked him to make CDs of the games that he’d recorded, and she wanted them that day because her friend’s been waiting for so long.  Never mind that Scott didn’t know that part about the friend wanting to get them a long time ago.  So he did.  Then she wanted him to drive them down to her so she can give it to her friend.  He was trying to nap because she has an away game that would require 2 hours of driving to and from the place.  He said no, come and get it, it’ll be on the landing.  She said her friend’s coming to get it, can he put it in the mailbox for her?  He asked what time the friend planned on being there because we don’t want the mailman to find non-mail items in the mailbox (that’s a federal offense).  She didn’t know what time.  Then she argued about why he couldn’t bring it to her.  He explained he needs to sleep so he can drive down to her game.  She told him not to come to her game.  So he didn’t.  I would have been happy with that ending but then he had to send her a text message back saying, he loves going to her games, he just needed to rest, and he said for her to let him know when he’s invited to watch again.  I couldn’t believe how pathetic he can be.  Geez, it almost sounds like an apology.  Well, he relayed this story to Dad and Dad said he didn’t realize she was so selfish.  Well, these men…if they’d just listen to their wives they’d have a better idea.  I told Scott after she hung up on him, his need for rest doesn’t concern her, so therefore it’s not her problem so therefore she doesn’t need to hear about it.
 
And then today he finally gave in and did her dishes and some of her laundry.  I swear, I think I married a weakling.  Wait…I don’t think…I KNOW.
 
I hate it that it’s so cold now.  It takes so much out of me just to take the dog out.  She doesn’t like it either.  She likes the snow but we haven’t had any yet.
 
I had my birthday last Monday.  I think I should stop remembering when my birthday is.  I was so depressed that morning.  I thought for a while that I was going to get drunk and sleep all day.  But then my family called.  So we talked a little bit.  Then I told Scott I wanted pizza for breakfast.  Sure, he said…and then he forgot it in the oven so it came out semi-burnt.  He did offer to go get a new one but I was hungry and I wasn’t in the mood to wait.  Then later that day I said I wanted cheesecake so he went out…forgot his cell phone, which he needed to ask me which kind I wanted.  He came back with a plain one because he said, that was the only one he had.  So I knew he didn’t go to the store I would have wanted him to go to…that other store would have had choices.  Oh well.  He offered to get a new one in the morning but then again, the plain one was there and there’s no way I can finish it in a day or 2.  And I decided I wasn’t in the mood to go up to the cities to watch Beowulf on IMAX 3D.  I just didn’t feel much like celebrating.
11/30

Scott’s ex…I can think of 2 reasons why she has to share a house with other people.  First she’s vegan…organic food with no dairy products in it whatsoever has got to cost more than normal food.  Second, she doesn’t seem to grasp the idea of buying clothes cheap or buying less.  Now you know where her daughter gets it.  Also, she has that big ass van…which she doesn’t need since she’s not shuttling anyone anywhere besides herself.  And I am thinking she and her daughter have an agreement…I think if the princess ever makes it big or marries rich, that the mother will get a little bit from there…never mind that Scott will probably do all the sacrificing for princess to get where she wants to be.
 
Yes, dumbass 3 is following in the footsteps of dumbass 1.  Even dumbass 1 admits that he was wrong to do those things because now he can’t make dumbass 3 see how stupid these things are.  Dumbass 1, surprisingly, seems to be doing really well and behaving quite well.  I hate to say it but of the 3 right now, he’s the one I can tolerate the most.  I think maybe I’ll get him a gas card for Christmas and the other 2 will get a card saying that I donated to charity in their names.  I’m thinking Books for Africa for dumbass 3 and some scholarship thing for princess, see if they get the reason behind my choices.
 
As for dumbass 3 punching that kid in the face…apparently the other kid didn’t get suspended because he’s a special needs kid.  Nothing obvious outside, it’s just that he has emotional problems and he can’t control himself.  I don’t know really whether he should have been suspended or not.  My thought always has been that special needs kids need to be in a special school, and I never did like the idea of mainstreaming at all.  It might look good on paper but as far as I’m concerned it doesn’t really work.
 
One of the things that dumbass 3 got in trouble with Scott for, as far as grades went, was English.  He made a big stink about not getting along with his original teacher, he got transferred to the class of his choice where he said he would do better…and guess what, he wasn’t doing better.
 
Princess and the shoes…I would have told her that if she wanted them that badly she’d find time to get them.  And that would be the end of that.  But Scott is such a doormat for her it’s unbelievable.
 
Princess still doesn’t know what she wants to pursue in college and yet she won’t do scholarships.  She has a scholarship offer from some good school, in their engineering college, mainly because her math scores were good and well, let’s face it, she’s a female minority.  Some schools would give her a free ride just because she’s a minority.  But no, she would not hear of that.  I will bet Scott’s retirement fund will be exhausted before she graduates, if she ever does graduate.  I think he should have done as some other parents surely do…if their kids qualify for scholarships, they go for it or they find some other way to pay for college.  I know my parents would not have paid for my college education if I were eligible for any scholarship.  Why pay when you can go for free?  Scott just needs to grow a backbone and then maybe he can give her this ultimatum?  He hesitates because he thinks she’ll say she’ll just get student loans…which he doesn’t want her to do, looking back at how he had to pay $5k of his ex’s student loans right after they got married.
 
Just when I said we haven’t had any snow yet…now we do.  Maybe 1/2 inch.  Not much.  I didn’t even know that it snowed last night until Dad came to pick me up.  This should make it fun for us, going up to the cities this morning for some training with that new software we’re using.  Today everything was fine, so therefore I have time to email you.  I still haven’t figured out what to do with my room.  I think I know where I want things to be, it’s just that the room looks like that old game where you have 15 squares with numbers and a blank space and you have to move the numbers one by one to get them in order.
12/08

You know what, I’m apparently not the only one impressed by the changes in dumbass 1.  Dad, on our way to work one day, told me how surprised he is at how much dumbass 1 has changed.  He agrees that he’s grown up quite a bit.  I guess moving out really taught him some lessons.  I don’t think that he’s changed his opinion of me though.  For as long as his siblings don’t like me I don’t really see him seeing me in a different light.  I don’t really care.  As long as he’s out of the house and stays out, I’m relatively happy.

Scott and I were talking about money one time.  He thinks that princess’ inheritance is her college education and her wedding…that’s an awful lot.  And the boys will get the house.  Dumbass 1 wants to buy the house from Scott.  At least he’s considerate enough to think that maybe Scott will need the money.  Scott though, has forgotten that I have a stake in the house too.  He better make my life comfortable somewhere down the road.  And dumbass 1 would be good to keep his word about buying the house from Scott.  I don’t really think we’re talking fair market value here, I think it’s more like his share of it, but you know what, money is money.  If he could come up with that amount by the time we’re ready to leave here, good.

I think maybe sometime this year I told you Scott got mad at princess and said something about not paying for another trip abroad.  Well, scratch that.  I knew it was going to happen and it did.  She wants to go to Costa Rica on spring break, and well, she is going.  It’s going to cost at least $1650 and we apparently have to host some Costa Rican child for 10 days around 4th of July.  I told Scott I’m not hosting a foreign kid.  It’s not that I don’t like the idea, I’m more concerned about the kid.  If the kid’s way of life is not quite up to what we have, when he/she goes back home, there is a chance that he/she will hate the way things are at home and wish their family was more like ours financially.  I would hate for any kid to resent what their parents can afford because they got a taste of something different.  Apparently Scott talked to a parent of a kid who’s going for the second time and that parent said they didn’t host any kid the first time around.  I still think Scott is a wuss.  He always will be.  I think that’ll be part of my Christmas letter.  I don’t think he has any idea what a turnoff that is to me.  I sort of thought he’d put more logic to work, but I guess when it comes to princess, logic doesn’t apply.

Last Saturday afternoon princess assembled some papers for us.  Scott was surprised because she normally doesn’t ask if he needs help.  Well, he thought maybe it’s to thank him for filling her tank up earlier that day.  I guess that shows how little he knows her.  Today he told me to cut a check for her for that work.  So much for that being a thank you.  Ungrateful bitch.  I’m ruining her Christmas for sure, and I don’t care one iota.

Let’s see, what’s happened to me so far?  We had a training session up in the cities last week, for the new software at work.  They had it for 3 days and they could only take in 8 or 9 people at a time because it’s in some computer training room.  I went on the last day.  I think it’s a big mistake that they got a whole mix of experience level in one session.  The lady next to me was a big whiner and not much of a computer user.  For some it was easy to get into the new program by accessing their work computer remotely.  But there were people like me who installed it on a different computer entirely.  I did remember how to set it up though so I had my screen up and running.  Others saw it and I had to pass around a note on how I did it.  And then the guy doing the training (via GoToMeeting.com for visuals, on a projector up front, and conference call for audio) asked for a volunteer so he can have someone’s screen up on GoToMeeting.  I didn’t volunteer but he knew I was in the group so he took over my screen.  And since we can’t be both logged in at the same time, I had to log off.  So basically I just sat there for over 2 hours twiddling my thumbs.  And what was annoying with the mixed experience level was that in all those 2+ hours I maybe learned 1 or 2 things that I could have learned in a couple of minutes.  So already I was feeling like a geek, and I was thinking, these people must have noticed that the guy knew me more than he knew them, so I must be a geek.  Our contact had to point out as we were leaving the room that I was constantly reporting errors to the guy to help them fix stuff.  I think that solidified my geek status.  And also, I think part of other people’s problems is that they haven’t really tried using the thing.  I do agree with them that we should have gotten training right off the bat, but I got an hour Q&A on the computer and over the phone soon after we got the program with that same guy and I assume everyone else did too.  So they should at least know the basics.

The lady next to me was pretty typical of the group, I guess.  She said she had a Mon-Fri customer that was showing up as a 7-day customer, or maybe it was the other way around.  She wanted that fixed.  Now, we were all told to email them everytime there is a problem but it sounded like she wanted it fixed right then.  And then I leaned over and told her, there is a way for you to fix it.  And she went, I shouldn’t have to.  I shut up.  I agree, it’s not really our work, but if you know how to fix it, why wouldn’t you?  It’s not that we’re expected to fix things.  I do because I don’t like to wait and I figured, the guys that came up with the software had bigger problems to fix.  They had program code to redo, all I have to do is start or stop customers.  I can understand other people’s tendency to complain about these things.  But it’s still a work in progress and if they’d been doing what I’d been doing, maybe more problems would have been found and fixed by now.  It’s like what I told the carriers when I distributed a note about the new system, I said I can understand that they might have some complaints about it but they need to keep in mind that they only have their own route/s to deal with and I have everything to deal with, so I didn’t really want to hear it.  No one’s complained so far, and no one’s been nasty to me either.

Then this week we had another training thing, this time in the comfort of our own homes/offices.  Still GoToMeeting for visuals and conference call for audio, but we got on GoToMeeting ourselves and called in ourselves.  There went another 2 hours and $13 cell phone minutes I’m never getting back, LOL.  And then I learned that while I spent most my weekends working on the errors and reports and such, there was only one other person that was submitting reports everyday.  Of all 20+ agents, only 2 people actually taking the time.  I am so very annoyed.  There was another lady that from the get-go, sounded computer-savvy, but I was surprised to learn she hadn’t been using the program everyday and she hadn’t been submitting reports.  In a way that was just so very irritating, but then I tell myself, down the road I’ll be rid of the problems they’ll run into.  They’ll be having addresses on the wrong route, having the wrong people stopped or started or whatever, and I’ll be sitting pretty.  Oh, and of course, the guy running the show had to borrow my screen again, so all I can do was watch.

People just frustrate me so much a lot of times.  I think if I ever hit it big in the lottery, I’ll go off and live on my own, maybe with the dog if Scott will let me, and he can just come see me on weekends or something.  He annoys me most of all.  I really need to write that letter.  He’s just so clueless as to how nasty he is sometimes and how inconsistent that it just diminishes my respect for him so much.

Well, this weekend, I had less of a mess to deal with, and I didn’t really have to fix anything actually, just sent in my report.  I’m usually not done till late Sunday.  So I’m thinking things should be fine pretty soon.  The guy did say that they’ll be gradually taking us off the old system in 1 or 2 weeks.  At least I know I’m not going to be so lost when that happens.

Princess is a gimp right now.  Apparently her leg was hurting after volleyball, and she didn’t do anything about it.  She has a stress fracture and has to sit out of the basketball games for at least 2 weeks.  She’s on crutches too.  This morning she was on the local AM radio station, being interviewed along with the coach and her co-captain.  Of course she said “like” and “sort of” a lot.  And then they were asked about college plans.  The other girl knew where she was going, what her major was going to be and that she was going to play basketball in college.  I’m thinking sports scholarship.  Princess’ answers to the same question?  I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know.  That didn’t sound good.  LOL, I love it.
12/14

The ice storm missed us.  It went south of us, like Iowa and Chicago.  I’m glad too, because there’s still a lot of snow on the ground that hasn’t melted away.  I really don’t want a layer of ice over that.  We have so many routes coming open it’s not funny.  Winter is not the best time to try and recruit carriers.  Nobody wants to be out in this weather in the early morning and then maybe go in the ditch and be stuck there for a couple of hours.  We have 2 open routes right now on the weekday and 1 on the weekend.  Then after Christmas we’ll have 2 more weekday routes open.  I don’t know how we’re going to manage.

Let’s see, what would I say on princess’ card for Christmas?  I’ll probably say something like this:
 
“This year, thanks to you, the Jackie Robinson Foundation has a little more money to put towards scholarships.  You might already know that JRF provides financial aid to students of color.  I decided that my money would be well-spent helping send to college someone who is:
 
– realistic enough to know that most other people don’t get the same opportunities they get, so therefore they should grab whatever outside help comes their way,
– grateful and considerate enough towards the parent who has given so much time, effort and money thus far, to do all they can to keep their parent from using up their retirement savings to send just one of their kids to college,
– confident enough to know they deserve to be helped, and
– diligent enough to keep up the great performance to encourage people to keep on helping them.
 
People take for granted what they have and forget that a lot of times what they have is a result of someone else’s personal sacrifices.  This Christmas I thought we’d both honor and reward those who do not take their blessings so lightly.  Merry Christmas!”

So, how’s that?  Scott won’t like it, I know, but you know what, I don’t care.  She’s a selfish bitch and I doubt she’d even be offended by that.  Her skull would be too damn thick.  Dumbass 3’s card will be about the same, except it’s going to focus more on people here taking their education for granted, etc, etc…and probably something like, if I gave him $20, he probably wouldn’t buy a book that’ll help him with his classes, so therefore I’m buying books for African children.  Dumbass 1 has been really good so I’m thinking I’ll get him a gas card.  Oh, what a change, for him to be the only one to get something he could use.  I have to see though if they have something that’s just for gas, not for other items in the store.  I know he buys his smokes at the gas station, and well, if I can make it so it’s just for gas, I will.
 
Yeah, dumbass 1 has pretty much amazed everyone.  Mom and Dad, and Scott too.  I think he’d done more growing up this past year than all the other time I’d been here before he moved out.
 
Yes, Scott thinks his kids need an inheritance.  Why, I don’t know…probably because he’s a doormat and he’ll gladly hand everything over to them if they treated him halfway decent.  He wants to waste his IRA, fine by me.  We got our last statement with what we have.  I have about $6k, he has about $60k.  But his money is in moderate risk stuff and I took the safer way.  I said, well, I guess I can afford a grass hut back home and candlelight at night.  He said he would help.  Yeah, that’s if he keeps his word and keeps whatever he gets from Mom and Dad for us.  But I don’t see that happening.  If they ever go before princess gets married, you know some of it will go to princess’ grand wedding.  I wouldn’t trust him with money if my life depended on it.  I had to stop payment into my IRA though, because I seriously need to pay off my credit card.  I’d been good…hadn’t been going crazy shopping online.
 
Oh, I have to tell you about something, I am so tickled about it.  One time in the car,  he was going on and on about this Costa Rica trip princess is apparently positively going on in the spring.  I knew it, I knew it, I knew it.  I knew he would do a 180.  So, I just said, you must have been really mad at her when you said you weren’t going to pay for another trip.  He did not speak for at least 5 minutes after I said that.  Shut him up real good.
 
And then the ex sent him a text message asking for his date of birth…right after princess asked.  It’s for ex’s passport.  She is actually planning to go on a Carribean cruise.  And then of course she has grand plans of taking her kids to Europe in late 2009 or early 2010.  I will bet my IRA that’s not going to happen.  It’s just one of those things that sounds good when you think you’ll have the money by then but she won’t.  So Scott sent her a text message back, said he heard a rumor she was going to help out with the Costa Rica trip, and to let him know if that’s true.  Mom told him that, after having to sit next to the ex during one of princess’ games.  Apparently ex said that.  No reply so far.  I’m guessing she won’t do more than give some pocket money.
 
Our car is almost dead.  The transmission went out yesterday.  It was acting up towards the end of the route.  Scott is training someone on the country route today, and he’s doing it in princess’ car.  He doesn’t like it but he has no choice.  Our RAV4 is just the right height for reaching the tubes.  We’re looking at getting another used RAV4.  He’s lucky Dad is willing to give us about $11k for another car.  Scott’s looking at trading in the old RAV4 (after the transmission is fixed for over $2200) and the van, then maybe we’ll get a used RAV4 with not much mileage on it…so we can beat the hell out of it delivering papers out in the country. 

Hmmm, amazing, no training session this week.  I guess there isn’t anything new they can try to teach at the moment.  And that last one, there were only 8 of us, I think.  A lot of the agents made this Google group for communicating with each other.  They kind of suck.  So much talk about helping each other out and sending out instructions on how to do stuff and nothing’s happened yet.  Oh well.  The emails I get from that group mostly has to do with less important stuff like gloves and caps and carrier bags.  We don’t use the bags, and the newspaper has been giving us gloves and caps…although the last batch was for our great performance on Thanksgiving, so I assume not everyone got them.
 
In a way I am just as relieved there is no training session this week.  I don’t have much tolerance for much slower learners.  I do think that they should help the slower ones but not on my time.  I shouldn’t have to sit through a 2-hour thing to learn 1 or 2 things just so one other person can actually finally start to learn using the stuff.  It’s the same person who didn’t want to fix a problem I offered to show her how to fix.  I mean, I didn’t have to do the stuff.  I just figured this will make it easier for me in the long run.  They’re supposedly going to slowly wean us off the old system sometime soon.  And when they do, I don’t want to still have a lot of issues on my hand.  So I’m hoping that those who have been just sitting on their hands will have major headaches in the future…while I sit back and relax.  Man, they better still have that $1000 incentive, at least for those who learned the system faster.  I will raise hell if all my efforts to help earns me nothing at all.

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