Work, New Cat, Temple Pictures, Garden, and Moving.

Work

I've been busy with work lately, which is a good thing.  A man in northern Utah asked me to manage his house for him.  He's moving out of the country.  Then, another man who has eight apartments and lives out-of-state asked me to manage for him too.  So, this month I've spent a lot of time showing vacancies lately, and also responding to maintenance issues at the apartments.  I've actually been busy enough that I haven't been doing any more marketing, although I plan to pick up with that again soon.

Jeff is back to work, too.  He has been for a little while now.  He did get multiple job offers again, but one of the jobs offered higher pay and really good benefits, so he accepted that one.  It's with a company that most people have heard of.  Jeff doesn't really like the job very much, because it's taking a long time for him to actually get started doing programming, and he is bored.  That should improve over time, though.  He keeps finding out about new benefits--we already knew our health care would pretty much be free, but on the first day of work he found out they were going to give him an iPhone--and pay for his service.  (Cool!  Although Jeff is kind of disappointed because he really likes his Droid.)  Then, Jeff offered to work later hours so that he can work some hours with the Australians that are on his team...so the company gave him a credit card and said they will pay for his dinner every day.  Nice!

New Cat

I brought home a new cat.  I was showing the home that I'm managing to some prospective renters and I asked if they had any pets.  (The owner allows up to two, with pet rent.)  They said no--well, they do--they have cats--but they're getting rid of them.  "Oh," I said,  "Are they good at catching mice?"  I explained that we've looked for a mouser before, but people always list cats online saying they would be good at catching mice, or saying they would grow up to be good at catching mice, but I want a cat that already catches mice. 

They said, "Actually, they are!"

So we talked some more about it, and after I showed them the rental home, they invited me back to their house.  I met two of their cats, and decided to take the one who had more of a history of catching mice.  Her name is Kitty, she is 17 years old, and she has long fur that started getting ratty a few months ago.  She is sometimes really friendly and sometimes really aggressive.  Perfect.

So I brought her home, and let her out in the barn, and then I didn't see her again.

Jeff thought I was joking when I told him I'd brought a cat home, but it didn't really matter because she isn't really our pet, she's just [supposed to be] living in the barn and we're feeding her.  We'd talked about getting a barn cat before, so it wasn't completely out of the blue. 

And then, after a few days of Kitty being missing, I was out doing some work in the barn and I heard a meow that wasn't Paley.  I walked around the corner, and (!) there she was!  So I showed Jeff our new cat.  And I fed her.  Paley does not like Kitty.  Kitty is disinterested in Paley.

Temple Pictures

This week my Relief Society (ladies church group) did a "Wonderful Wednesday" activity.  The main project was making temple pictures.  The pictures are beautiful (and popular up here in Utah) but if you just go buy one they usually cost about $200, so although I've wanted one for a while, I haven't bought one.  For the activity they charged us $53, though, and that was totally worth it.

I invited my sister Jessica, and we each did pictures of the temples where we were married.  (Jess did Salt Lake and I did Jordan River.)  It was pretty easy.  Basically, what you do is mount a print onto a board.  Let it dry.  Texture the print.  Let it dry.  Paint your frame.  Let it dry.  Add screws and little metal things to the back of the frame.  Insert the mounted, textured print.  Tighten the screws.  Wait a day and add the bracket thing that lets you hang it.  Then hang it.

Garden

My garden didn't go quite how I planned, mainly because I was unable to get a fence up to protect my garden from goats.  So I never planted my garden.  But, after I abandoned so many healthy plants at my in-laws' house, my father-in-law planted anything that seemed like it might survive.  This resulted in a lot of produce, actually.  We've been picking and eating purple tomatoes when we go over to my in-laws' on game days.  And, I've had a couple of the Rich Sweetness 132 melons.  They're small, but they're pretty delicious.  A couple days ago, my father-in-law tore out all of my garden and harvested what he could.  Frost is coming soon, anyway, and I think he is planning to plant some trees where my garden was growing.  It was nice of him to let my stuff grow at their house.  

Moving

We're only sort of moving.  We've been living in the back portion of our house, and we've had the front part rented out.  The guys living in the front have been there for over two years, but now they're moving.  So we're going to move up to the front!  I think it will probably need new carpet, and a little bit of work done...but we plan to move in the beginning part of November.  I am SO excited to have a kitchen(!) and a bath tub(!) and a bigger office area(!) and a fireplace(!).  Jeff is worried that moving will be a lot of work, and getting organized will take a long time.  It kind of will, but I don't think it will be too bad, because we won't have to pack, or load things up in a truck, or anything like that.  We'll just take things and put them in their new places.  Easiest Move Ever.  Did I mention I'm excited to have a real kitchen?  Because I am.  We finally got an oven back here a few weeks ago, though, and that's already been excellent. 

We're busy and we're happy and these are the things that are going on.

Jack-O-Heifer, New Neighbors, and Work (or lack thereof)

I've been in one of those moods lately where I feel like I don't have anything to blog about.  I guess I actually do, though.  We went hiking near Heber for Labor Day.  And we went to the State Fair.  That was a lot of fun.  I enjoyed the agriculture buildings more than I used to.  It was fun to see the goats that people were showing.  Also, the lady that a bunch of our goats are from was there, so it was fun to finally meet her.  We talked with her for quite a while.

Farm News

Our animals are all doing well.  Turkey is getting big.  I wonder how much he will weigh for Thanksgiving.

Daisy lost one of her front teeth.  Poor little girl!  I suspect one of the goats shoved her too hard.  (They're always trying to establish their pecking order.)  We were wondering, will she have a gap in her smile forever???   Do cows have baby teeth???  I finally looked it up.  Cows do have baby teeth.  (GOOD.)  Daisy will grow a new tooth in about a year and a half.

(I kept trying to get a picture of her goofy new smile and she wouldn't cooperate.  So, maybe later.)


New Neighbors

Did I mention we have new neighbors?  Because we do.

A couple days before our old neighbors moved, we were talking to them, and joking about whether the new people realize we have goats.  Our old neighbors said yes, actually, they were excited about the goats.  (They must not have shown the house at 6:30 am when our goats are noisy, I told Jeff.)

They really are excited about our animals, though.  The neighbors have two kids: Peyton (a boy, 10? years old) and Tristen (a girl, 4? years old).  They are adorable, and friendly, and they like us a lot.  We went over to introduce ourselves right after they moved in, and Jeff told them they're welcome to come over any time to visit our animals.

So, they do.

Seriously, the kids hang out in their backyard (by our fence) waiting for me to come outside.  "PEYTON, PEYTON!  THE LADY IS OUT!"  "CAN WE COME OVER?"  "Sure!"

I let them collect eggs with me one of the first times they came over.  I told them they could each take two.  They thought that was a lot of fun.  Peyton has come up with a schedule.  He thinks it is a good idea for them each to collect two eggs once a week.  That's fine.

They like to "help" me milk.  "Okay.  So you normally milk at 7:00?  We'll be outside at 6:55.  Wait for us, okay?"  It's pretty cute.  They come out with me, and I've shown them how to milk, so Peyton always wants to do as much of it as I will let him.  He knows to spray the teats, and wipe them with a goat wipe, and then to spray one squirt of milk not in the bucket.  "Let me do it, okay?  I know how."  Sure.  So I'll milk one side, and Peyton milks the other side, at the same time.  He chatters with me all about how fun it is to have nice neighbors, and about how farm work is like chores--except it is fun.  And he talks to me about how farm food is better than food from the store.  Then when we're finished milking, he likes to come inside and help me filter it.

Jeff thought it was really funny the other day because Peyton had suggested that he could help with the farm work and we could share milk and eggs and meat.  So then we were in filtering the milk and he explained a good way for us to do things:  when we filter the milk, if we get two quart jars, he'll take the one with less in it.  Hahaha!  He wanted to take half of our milk.  "Yeahh, probably not every day, but sometimes you can!"  "Oh, I mean, I know not every day."

So he wanted to try raw milk.  I told him he had to ask his parents.  So they both ran back to their house, and their parents discussed it and decided it was fine, and they came back and I let them take a quart of fresh, warm, raw goat milk back home.  (Labeled, of course.)  The next morning, Peyton told me he didn't really like it.  It tastes really different than store milk.  I asked if he had it cold.  "Halfway cold."  "OH, well you should try it when it is cold.  It tastes a lot better cold!"  So later he did, and now he says he doesn't think he likes store milk anymore because raw milk just tastes better.  Good kid.

He told me he can milk for us when we go on vacation.  It's tempting.  He usually milks about 1/2 of one goat all in all, so I don't think he would actually be strong enough to milk all by himself yet, but maybe next year.  It's cute that he enjoys it so much.

They also help with feeding the animals.  Tristen likes to feed Daisy bottles.  They both like feeding the chickens.

The thing about kids is, they're really funny.  Sometimes I wish I could just do farm chores without "help" (because it takes about 2-3 times as long when they come over), but mostly we just really enjoy having them visit.  They say the funniest things.  Peyton was AMAZED by the door to our garage (from the hallway by our front door).  "I can't believe this," he said, just standing there, staring.  "I've always wanted to see one of these.  It's just like I imagined."  "What?" I asked.  "You have an upside down door!"  "Huh.  I guess I do."  "You never noticed???"  "Well, I hadn't really thought about it." 


Jeff's Job

Jeff got a surprise at work recently.  Not this past Thursday but the week before, Jeff's CEO called him into a conference room---and said Jeff would be taking a six-day furlough, starting that Friday.  They put 80% of their employees on unpaid leave, because they were having financial problems.  Basically, they were receiving investor funds and the last installment was two months overdue.  Jeff asked a lot of prying, hard questions, and left work with the impression that the investor had probably walked.  "Take a vacation!" they told him, but Jeff knew after their conversation that he had pretty much been laid off.

So, the six-day break became a six-day intensive job search.  We were disappointed about the furlough because Jeff really loved his job.  He liked the work environment, and he liked what he was working on.  Too bad. 

This past week, Jeff has been to a bunch of interviews, and he got his first job offer.  He has a few more second interviews at the beginning of next week, and he hopes to make a decision about his next job on Tuesday or Wednesday. 

Finally, last night Jeff got a call from the CEO of his company.  We assumed it would be notification that Jeff was laid off, and it basically was.  On the message, the CEO told Jeff that unfortunately they were unable to secure funding, and everyone was going to be on "indefinite furlough" and he understood if Jeff wanted to find a new job, but the CEO hoped that he would still be able to secure funding.

So, I guess that's that.  We are grateful that we are very prepared, and we don't live on the edge; we haven't had to change our spending at all.  So that's a blessing.


Em's Job

I've still been doing a lot of marketing!  My 500 flyers came, and they look SO professional.  I think they turned out really nice.  I sent a bunch last weekend to people who are currently trying to rent their homes.  No response from that yet.  I also talked with a guy who e-mailed me this week about managing his home for him.  I think that one is going to work out.  So, that will be really exciting.

I would love to get busy doing more real estate work and less marketing.  (I think these things just take time.) 

We're gearing up for a couple vacancies--we've gotten notice for two of our properties.  It's kind of bad timing (summer would have been better), but not a big deal. 

I also ordered my second set of postcards for the 273 people.  I think they will arrive on Monday.

I'm participating with the National Association of Residential Property Managers (NARPM), and I love their meetings.  Everyone is very friendly and helpful.


Well, I think that's about it for now!  We're doing well, and we're really happy.

How We're Doing

We've been doing really well lately.

Jeff got a new job. This spring, after 7 out of 9 managers at his old job all quit within a few weeks time, Jeff decided he was ready to move on. He started taking calls from recruiters, and he went to several interviews. Finally, he came home from one of the interviews really excited about the company, and it seemed like a good match. After he got an offer from them he gave notice at the old job...and places he had interviewed with kept presenting him with job offers. On the day before he started his new job there was basically a bidding-war between two companies, which was pretty flattering. He took the job that he had been so excited about.

He's been at the new job for a couple weeks now. He really likes it a lot. He feels like he will be able to make a difference, and he really likes that the team works together so well. So, Jeff is very happy with his new job.

We got a lot of goats! First we got the mama and doeling (which were afraid of people). Then we got Sunday, Claire, and Star. Then, we saw another registered Nubian doe online, giving as much milk as Sunday, and we decided to buy her and sell Sunday. Except, then Jeff thought maybe we should keep Sunday after all, because she gives so much milk. But, we did sell Bucko. And then Caroline kidded! Finally! She had two bucklings. And we were Very Responsible, and we disbudded them (burned the horn buds so that no horns will ever grow). We played with the bucklings and enjoyed them for a couple weeks, and then we sold them. And then a couple days ago I finally sold the mama goat and the doeling.

So, now we're down to:
1. Feta - Our original goat. But she's doomed. I was trying to sell her but she isn't purebred and she has horns, and she hasn't had babies (so she hasn't given milk), so she isn't selling for enough. She is worth more to us as meat.
2. Caroline - we're finally getting milk from her!
3. Sunday - She is listed for sale.
4. Claire - She is SKINNY, still, just like she was when we bought her. We are going to try deworming her and giving her some immune support stuff, and we'll see if that helps her.
5. Star - We tattooed her, and now she is in the process of becoming an official registered goat.
6. Mercedes - My favorite goat, because she is so, so easy to milk.

We are getting a ton, ton, ton of milk. I separate cream about twice a week. Sometimes we make cheese and butter.

I also ordered chicks online, which I already blogged about. They're getting bigger. They're outside now. I've been selling some of those, too.

I think that's all of the farm news.

I also finally joined the Weston A. Price Foundation. Jeff and I have been big fans of it for a while, and I thought it was time to pay up so I will start receiving their quarterly journal, and so that I can participate with people locally who are interested in the same sorts of things. I met the local WAPF chapter leader, and it was a lot of fun to talk all about raw milk and butter, and goats, and good food.

This last Monday I started trying to follow the GAPS diet. I've been reading the book about it, and it just makes so much sense. On the GAPS diet you eat no refined sugar (only honey and fruit as sweeteners), no gluten or starchy foods (so, no white flour or potatoes, etc), and no lactose. I'm planning to stay on the GAPS diet for a year and a half, probably. We'll see how it goes. I am not perfect about it, but I think I'm doing pretty well.

In other news, I am still starting my business! I am working on building my property management business. I am developing a website, and putting together mailing lists of people who may be interested in property management (like, people who bought multi-family housing within the last year...because maybe they realized it is more hassle than they want). I hired a handyman to work for us part-time, so that we can offer clients discounted rates on repairs or service. If anyone knows of someone who could use a property manager in Salt Lake county, please let me know!

I think those are some of the main things that have been happening.

I am not a Professional Striper.

It's been another busy week for us.

(Every week is, though, so that's nothing new.)

Last Monday, I striped our parking lot. The lines were really faded, so it seemed like a good idea. The previous owner told us it was one of the best things he ever did, and he said you can call up a company and they'll come out and paint the stripes for like $100.

Here is a "before" picture:


But we only have 7 or 8 stripes, so I was like, "NO PROBLEM! I'll just do it!" Because I have experience with that sort of thing, anyway.*

So I found out that there was striping paint that you could just buy(!)** at Lowie's or HD, to do parking lots. Piece of cake! It's called "Striping Paint"*** because it's for making stripes. And it would seem like stripes would always be for parking lots, but it turns out there are SO MANY USES for striping paint.**** In fact, striping paint is such a big deal that there is a whole secret code for what colors you're supposed to use when you stripe things. [The legend (key?) is on boxes of things, in case you don't know it. One example is, you don't use red paint for painting parking lines.] They also make marking paint, which can be used for stripes. It's more popular for marking gas lines, or power lines, or trees to cut down, though.

So anyway, I really looked into it and I saw online that you can paint stripes with either a striping machine thing, or with a marking wand thing. The difference is, the striping machine (about $100) has four intense (all-terrain! (I think)) wheels, to keep things really straight, and the line you spray can vary in width. The marking wand (about $20) just has a little wheel to keep things as straight as you can draw them.

I decided that I was not a hard-core enough parking-striper to buy a special striping machine. The wand would work for me! So I went and bought my can of striping paint (to cover 250 ft! Wow!), and a wand. I bought some pink plastic DON'T GO HERE! tape, so that I could block off the parking lot and our tenants would remember NOT TO GO THERE.

On Friday I posted a sign on everyone's doors to say:
1. We're re-painting the parking lot stripes on Monday!
2. Please move your cars by 8:30 am and don't plan to park in the lot again until 7 pm! (Because I knew I would probably be there at 9:00 or so, and I wanted to give them a little extra time to be moved. Also, the paint said it would take 8 hours to dry, so I wanted to allow myself an hour or so, just in case it took me longer to paint than I thought it would, plus plenty of time for things to dry.)
3. If you don't move your car, I reserve the right to tow it, at your expense. (To emphasize that it was important, and just in case.) Buuut, please just plan to park somewhere else, pretty please.

It was a great sign! It even had a border and a giant can of paint in the lower corner, just like people would expect.

So on Monday morning, I gathered my striping paint, and my marking wand, and my pink tape, and some masking tape (just in case!) and I headed off to the property.

A car was still parked there, but two of the other tenants who were home had moved their cars to the street. (Good job, guys!) The car was parked on one end, so I decided I would just block it off, and then if I could, I would paint around it. And if not, then I would knock on doors and ask whoever it was to move it. Or maybe paint another day. Towing cars is pretty mean, I think.

So I put up my pink DON'T GO HERE tape, and I stretched it from the fence on one side, allllllll the way across the ends of the parking spaces, down to the mailboxes. I tightened it so that it would remain as taut as it could for being stretched so far with no support in the middle.

I started laying out masking tape, so that I would be able to see my lines really clearly. The existing lines were pretty worn out, so I just wanted to be sure that I did a good job, and kept the lines pretty straight.

I taped up one line and part of a second one, and then I ran out of masking tape.

Oh well! No big deal!

But the tape didn't stick too well (because it's an old parking lot, and the asphalt is gravel in a lot of places now). So I would use my hand to brush the little rocks away, and tape it down where it was coming up. I also brushed the rocks out of the parking line area, because OF COURSE if you paint lines on gravel it's going to look pretty bad pretty quickly.

I was ready to go!

I pulled the marking wand out, and I assembled it, by attaching the wheel. It popped right in! Good!

I read the instructions. Twice. And then I shook the can (vigorously!) for a full two minutes after I could hear the little metal ball inside. I took the cap off of the striping paint, and put the can in the wand, and I think I lined things up right, and I went over to my taped line, and I lined it up straight in the middle of the space to be painted. (You've got to be careful with lining things up when you're using a wand instead of a striping machine, but it's just a sacrifice you have to make.)

I pulled the trigger on the wand, and...


Nothing happened.

I rolled the wand back and forth, and click, click, clicked the trigger.

Nothing.

I picked it up, and looked at it, and I wondered if maybe I hadn't lined it up right. Maybe I had mixed up the thing something was supposed to be parallel with, and it wasn't working right. So I turned the can around, and put it down, and centered it...

And nothing happened when I tried to stripe that time either.

So I looked at how it was working. The little lever needed to hit the top of the paint can, and it seemed like it did, but it just wasn't working. I sprayed the striping paint, to be sure that it wasn't unusually difficult, or clogged, or something. It worked.

Hm.

I called Rust-Oleum to see if we could figure it out together, but they were currently experiencing a high call volume. So I stayed on the line, but I continued trying to get it to work.

After several minutes of it not working, and several minutes of Rust-Oleum queue music, I headed towards Lowe's. Obviously there was either something wrong with my striping paint, or with my wand. Maybe the wand thing that pokes the top of the can wasn't assembled facing the right direction.

Halfway to Lowe's, Rust-Oleum answered. I explained the problem, and explained that I was on my way to the store, to see what was wrong. The Rust-Oleum girl was like, "OH, well, I know exactly what your problem is." I told her, "Oh! Great! You do?"

Her: "Yes. You see, you're using the marking wand with striping paint. That's not gonna work. The tops are shaped differently. That's why it isn't working. That's not gonna work. With the marking wand you've got to use marking paint."

Me: "Ohhhhh, so if I want to use striping paint, I need to use the more expensive machine. See, I'm new to this. I've never done this before, and it's just for our little parking lot. So I just thought stripes were a kind of marking, so they seemed like the same thing to me. [Chuckle.]"

Her: "Yeahhh. ... No, you can use the marking paint, though, and that will work for you."

Me: "Even for parking lots? The lines won't be as good though, will they? I thought the marking paint was for like, marking gas lines and things. Can I still get crisp lines with the marking paint?"

Her (reassuringly): "Oh, yeah. The marking paint works for parking lots too. It won't last quite as long, and it won't be quite as crisp of lines as you would get if you were using striping, but..."

Me: "Right...that's understandable."

Her: "But. Yeah, you can still get that crisp line you're looking for."

Me: "Ohhh, okay. Well, I guess I'll do that, then. That should work. I'm still driving to the store, so I'll just plan to get that instead, and now I don't need to figure out what's wrong. [Chuckle.] Thanks."

Her: "Okay. And don't get mad at the people working at the hardware store for it, because that's what you bought.." [Or something like that.]

Me: [Confused.] "What? Oh. ... No. I'm not a mean customer like that. I'm just going to get the marking paint instead. ... All right. Thanks for your help. Have a good day."

Her: "You too. Goodbye."

I wasn't like, angry on the call, so I don't know why she told me to not get mad at the hardware store. But, whatever, it was nice to know what the problem was.

So I got to Lowe's and I went in, and I grabbed a can of (white) marking paint, and some masking tape (just in case), and I hustled back to the parking lot.

I could see that the top of the paint was totally different, just like she had mentioned. I shook that paint for a couple minutes, got it centered on my taped up line, and started spraying.

And it sprayed!

But...it made such a skinny (and semi-transparent!) line that I had to go back and forth, back and forth to get to the sides, and to make it opaque enough. I taped up the second line the rest of the way, and I started spraying that line. And then, I ran out of marking paint.

After 1 1/2 lines!

[Please note: most of the white in the picture is masking tape.]

Good grief.

So I could see that marking paint was not going to work for me. It didn't look very good. The lines were not crisp at all (except for what the masking tape did), and they weren't very solid, and I went through the stuff SO fast. It wasn't even all that windy! And I had brushed the gravel away!

I drove to Home Depot and got myself a paint-striper. I bought another can of striping paint, too, just in case.

And I drove back, shook the can (vigorously!) for two minutes, and put it in the machine. It worked! I ended up needing to brush away gravel on all of the stripes, and that was a pain, but our parking lot is re-striped!*****


So, I'm pretty happy with how that all went. Now that we own a marking wand and a striping machine, plus I used three cans of paint (1 marking, 2 striping), the job cost us about $150 plus 3 hours of time (instead of $100 and no time). So, it was not the most profitable decision, at least for the short-term. But now I know what's up--I know the difference between marking and striping. And if anyone wants me to paint parking lines for them, I have the tools!

(It kind of makes me want to set up a race. Because I could maybe find temporary marking paint, and then it would be just like what they use for 5Ks and stuff. Not sure what I would raise money for, if I had a race. But I should probably think about that, since, of course, the only thing people really need in order to have a race is a marking wand, right?)


SPOILER FOR MY NEXT POST:
When I finished at about noon, I hurried home to take Chalcy outside, and then I hurried over to J's parents' house, because J's dad had volunteered to fix sprinklers with me.



* One time, (in California) I was walking over to the grocery store from the little Italian restaurant where I worked, and there was a guy re-painting the STOP letters on the asphalt, in the parking lot. I'd never seen anyone do that before! So I stopped and asked him about it. He was using a (big!) stencil and some paint, and rolling it out. It was pretty simple, he said. He offered to let me do one of the letters, and I DID. I thought it was kind of cool. So, I have a lot of experience with this sort of thing, actually, you know?
** As long as you are 18 or older.
*** (which I always confuse with "Stripping Paint" so it looks more risque than it actually is, but what would "stripping paint" even be used for anyway? Usually stripping is removing, not adding, so like, for removing paint from walls, I think you use a stripping solvent or something. I don't know.)
**** Like painting aisles. Or basketball courts. Etc.
***** Except for the one paint line by the car, because I ran out of paint right then anyway. (And the store was all out. And I was tired of doing that project, because I thought it would take like an hour, and it was already almost noon.)

Life Update

School

School is starting again today. I had two classes this morning, and I have one more tonight, and two more tomorrow. This semester I am taking:

- English 5730: Studies Early American Literature - This class seems like it will be a lot of work. The professor seems very demanding, but seems to be a pretty nice guy. I've heard good things about him. When I went in to see a counselor for my graduation papers, she told me that if I go in for his office hours he'll love me to death, and I think that's probably true. This class will be a lot of reading early American documents (like the Constitution, or Pioneers, and Rip Van Winkle, which he says is the most under-read important novel). It's about new Americans defining Americanness. Cool.

- Philosophy 1250: Reasoning & Rational Decision Making - I'm not just crazy about this class. It meets my QB math requirement, so it is basically a class instead of "Statistics". It also seemed like a good idea because I'm about to take the LSAT. Here's the only problem: It's taught by a grad student. Why are 80% of all grad students so pompous?! Seriously, my impression of this guy so far is that he thinks he is a god and everyone should bend to his whims. DO NOT BE LATE. It is reasonable to expect people to be on time, but SRSLY, if I have another class that ends 15 minutes before, which I do, and that class goes over, which it does, you're really going to count all of my assignments late if I am not in my seat when the class officially starts? Give me a break. He is also a brat about e-mail. He will not e-mail about grades unless you are using your official university e-mail address. Does anyone even know their password for that? [No.] And what, are my parents going to pretend they're me and find his e-mail address to e-mail him or something? Really?

- English 3702: Intro to Literary History 2 - I think this is going to be a lame class, because the Literary History classes are all miserable and used to be required but are not any more. (But they still double count for requirements.) HOWEVER! It is taught by an amazing professor who knows her stuff and prepares like crazy and makes classes awesome. It will probably become my favorite class this semester, just like the Darwin class that I thought I would hate and actually loved, which she taught last semester.
- English 5885: Adolescent Literature - Very highly recommended professor. At graduation counseling, the lady said this class would be a riot. THANKFULLY, this class is not about the Holocaust like my Children's Lit class was, and includes Catcher in the Rye, which I haven't read since high school but remember liking back then.

- English 5110: Folklore Genres - This class has a big project attached to it, which is writing the life story of an old person. I am really looking forward to it. I can either interview a grandparent or other relative, or the professor will match us up with hospice care people. NEAT.

So that's what I have going on. I am also still preparing for the LSAT, so I have prep classes for that on Monday and Thursday nights.

Work

I quit my job so that I will have time to actually do my homework this semester. And so that I will have much more time to study for the LSAT. (It was really weird. My boss said they had 65 applications for my job. Holy smokes! And they even lowered the pay rate with budget cuts... She interviewed seven applicants and hired a guy last Thursday. I'm going to miss my coworkers since they were sort of my only friends.) I think I am also going to quit volunteering in Preservations, because: 1) I just feel too busy. 2) It doesn't feel very altruistic, so it isn't as rewarding as I had hoped. 3) They treat me like an actual employee and kind of glare when I announce that I will be missing days, but really, who has time to volunteer 10 hours every week? 4) The block of time that I was volunteering before is not free time for me anymore.

So I feel kind of like a quitter, but it's okay because it's really just a re-balancing of my schedule and life and priorities, and all that. And that's good and healthy.

Speaking of good and healthy, I am not. I'm sick today. And yesterday. I have a cold. The grad student said that the University is making accommodations for people with the H1N1 virus (he called it the "piggy sniffles"), which made me wonder if I have that. All of the symptoms are normal being-sick symptoms, so who knows, but I doubt that I do because I'm not vomiting or having diarrhea or anything like that, and I'm not enough of a hypochondriac to actually be concerned about that.

The Race

I am also sore, sore, sore, because my body is broken from running a half marathon this weekend. I ran the Hobble Creek 1/2 Marathon on Saturday. It was an adventure for a lot of reasons. The first reason is, even though I have been driving for a few months now, I have never driven anywhere near Provo. I one-time drove to J's new house in South Jordan, but I insisted upon taking State Street. Sooo, when J decided his move would be the same day as my 1/2 marathon, I realized I would have to drive to Mapleton alone. So far! I decided I would take State Street, since I had heard it goes all the way from Salt Lake to Provo.

Uhhh, it doesn't. I got to the end of State Street and took some road to like, Bangerter, to like Alpine Highway, to somewhere. I ended up in Bluffdale and Saratoga Springs, and eventually Lehi, and then I was okay. But I swear, with all the detours I totally went to like, every city between Salt Lake and Provo. I don't know how long it took. I had to change lanes a lot of times, which makes me nervous. I made it to Jessica's house safely, though. And then I had to take the freeway at like 5am on Saturday to get out to Mapleton. And the exit I needed was supposed to be closed, but it wasn't, so I took it. BUT THEN! The streets after the exit were closed! So I drove all around hoping that I would somehow find State Street and going in the direction I thought it was, until the street I was following ended. Uh oh. But I saw a few people who seemed to be going the same way and I followed them, and made a little loop and somehow ended up on State Street. And somehow got there.

And the race was fine. EXCEPT! Know how after I hiked the Grand Canyon in one day in May my left knee hurt for like 3 weeks? And then it finally got better but I could only use elliptical machines for awhile and then finally I could use the treadmill again? At mile eight, my left knee started hurting again. Badly. I found a way to kind of run by swinging my left leg instead of running on it, but it was lame. (hah. Literally.) I mostly walked the last five miles. So instead of improving my time this race, I was a few minutes slower than I was in the SLC 1/2 marathon. Too bad! At the end a few people (separately!) thanked me and told me I had been their pace girl and that I had kept them going. I told them they were mine, too, which was true. When you run, a lot of times you're running with the same people, so you push yourself to get ahead of whoever you keep passing, or to get ahead of the next person in front of you. Everyone inspires everyone else. And when people pass you they call out, "Good job! You're doing great, just keep going!" and they encourage you. It's pretty neat.

I was not last, but there were not a lot of people to finish after me. The race registration closed in two days, and who registers within the first two days of registration for a race?! Hard core people. So I was for sure one of the least-fit, least-trained, least-slim, least-fast people. But that was okay, because I was there. And I finished. And running 13.1 miles on a Saturday morning is much more awesome and healthy than not running. So I feel good about it. I don't think I will be ready for my full marathon next month, though. My cardiovascular system was fine, but my knee had a lot of problems, and if it's been 3 months since the hike, I don't know that 1 more month will make a big enough difference. We'll see.

Relationship

J and I have been dating for about six months now. It's still going really well. I am very happy. After we were dating exclusively, he asked that I please drive his other car, because he was driving a lot. And since he is quite allergic to Paley, and since my house is tiny, and since I don't have air conditioning, it made sense for us to spend more time at his house than mine, but that meant he would drive from his house to my house to his house, and then drive from his house to my house to his house again to take me home. And he was already paying to insure the other car, he told me, so me not driving it was costing him.

I didn't mind taking TRAX and was really afraid of driving because of my accident in...2002? So I was not crazy about driving at all. Plus driving is expensive. He said he would pay for my gas and insurance, and any repairs, etc. So I started driving when we would go places. Sometimes. And he was patient and confident in me. I was really nervous. But I became comfortable driving between our houses, which made dating me more pleasant, I think. I started driving his white car every day. And then one day I Stopped for Gas! Which was an exciting new challenge. And another day I Switched Lanes! And one day I Went to Walmart! And now I've been driving every day for a few months and I am pleased, because I knew I needed to start driving again eventually, and I can't think of a more ideal set of circumstances for re-learning to drive than the ones that I've had. So that's been good. I took the freeway back from my race this weekend. Go, me!

J moved this weekend. He bought a house in South Jordan, which I absolutely love. It's kind of ugly. Actually, it's the ugliest house in the neighborhood. But he got a smashing deal on it (he paid $30k less than it appraised for!) and it really is in a great area. It's a neat house. It's divided into two separate living areas (with a shared laundry room in between), so he's renting out the front (which is bigger and nicer), and he will live in the back. It is on half an acre, ag-zoned. It has a pasture that is already fenced off [perfect for goats!], and barns [we put the chickens in part of one!], and a big open backyard [perfect for gardening!], and mature fruit trees, which delight me. It has apricots (we ate like a billion of them and fed like a billion soft ones to our birds), plums (they're next), pears (!!!!!), and apples. The trees need to be pruned so so badly. There is also a ton of storage space. The garage is huge (it has a basketball court in it), it has two storage rooms built into it, plus an above space that is almost like another living area except that it has no water to it, and another area above that that is like a little secret clubhouse for kids, or something. It is an attic area, where the ceiling slants, but it has hardwood floors, and a desk built in, and windows that overlook the yard. It has a bed up there, which I don't know how they got it up there because the hole to climb up to the room is tiny. The neighbor kids said they used to spend the night up there. Fun!

So far we have painted the front kitchen (which was hot pink) and we've done a bunch of yard work. (Actually, J's dad has done a TON of yard work.) We've been getting the front unit ready to rent. I lowered the price on our ad yesterday and J has gotten 4 more calls about it in the past day, so I think it's probably about the right price now and I think it will probably rent soon. (I want to paint the barn, because it looks way run-down, which I think makes the whole property look more run-down, but whatever. We'll get to it.) I think so far we've shown the house to like...4 or 5? people? We had one applicant, but they were just way too risky, so it didn't work out. So this should be good.

Since J and I spend every day together and South Jordan = a lot of driving for me, his wonderful parents have offered to let me stay at their house whenever I want. It is 6 blocks away from J's new house, so it's really convenient for, say, Friday and Saturday nights. We are talking about driving up to Salt Lake in the mornings, and then I would stay there even more. I have my own bedroom and bathroom which are new and gorgeous, and I have drawers and a walk-in closet, and my own nice kitchen, as many cherry tomatoes and fresh garden vegetables as I can eat, etc. (Last night they served us fresh watermelon. It was yellow inside! It tasted delicious.)

The only trouble is, poor Paley can't move in with J or his parents, so she will become an outside cat at J's new house. I'm sure she will love, love, love living there, because the CHICKENS! are outside and they are SO MUCH FUN to watch. And there are grasshoppers! And rodents! And other fun things to catch. But I know she will be sad when I am inside and she can't come in. At least for a little while. The barn will keep her dry and warm, though, so she should be okay. For now she's still at my little apartment by the U of U, but she misses me since I only come home to sleep.

My Birthday

Last week was my birthday. I turned 26. Jess and Mitch celebrated with me the weekend before, and Jess wrote me a nice blog post. J and I went to Red Lobster for dinner. He gave me a little hymn book (in English! Which I have wanted forever but never want to spend the money on.) and socks (which I have needed more of forever but never want to spend the money on.) So that was nice. I like useful presents. (Jess also gave me useful presents. She gave me plates, silverware, pans, and kitchen stuff. Plus six Sees Butterscotch Squares, which I ATE, which I had been in the mood for for a long time since no Sees is near me.)

Hm. What else? I don't know. This is a pretty long post and I need to get some LSAT study in before my next class, so I think I'll stop here. (And hopefully update more often so that my posts are not as long.)

Body World 3, part 2

At the end of the Body Worlds exhibit, there was a big room that was more interactive that the rest of the exhibit (which is not interactive at all.)

It had real plastinate stuff that you could touch, and real cross sections that you could pick up.

And then there were two parts where people could write stuff. The first part was "What's the most important part of your body? Why?" and people could write their favorite part on little wooden tiles painted blue, green, or grey. A lot of the tiles had things that had nothing to do with bodies.





Or, my favorite of the body parts: "The water in it. Most people Like water, so that means they already like 60% of my Body!" Awesome.

And then there was a Body Secrets section. My coworker had told me about this. He said there were body secrets, and people could write whatever they wanted. He said it's like PostSecret, and it's mostly interesting except for a few inappropriate ones. When I first came out of the exhibit, there were guest books. And some people had written good, normal stuff, and other people had written inappropriate stuff, so I kind of raised an eyebrow and was like "...this isn't like PostSecret. It's a guestbook." I thought it was kind of funny that the generation younger than me doesn't know what guestbooks are anymore; they just know PostSecret. And then when I kept walking, I saw that there actually was an official section called Body Secrets.

"Private confessions. Untold stories. Embarrassing habits. Personal thoughts. Post your anonymous body secret." And you know, it seemed a little weird, but in a society where PostSecret is cool, if that's a way to reach out to that generation and get them all excited about bodies and anatomy, on their level and on their own terms, then I guess that's good.

By the time I got to this part, I'd had my fun and was running less early than I wanted to be for work, so I just took pictures of a few that seemed kind of interesting.






A lot of the secrets had comments written on them, also PostSecret style. I thought that was kind of interesting, because what is the likelihood that someone will come back to check out their secret again, at a museum exhibit. I think not very likely. But I decided that it still could be worthwhile because maybe someone else with the same secret would read the encouragement intended for the original author, and the other person would feel encouraged as well. Other times people wrote rude things, which usually got scribbled out.

It seemed like there were sections where someone would "confess" that they thought they were fat and suddenly everyone else confessed the same thing. Like half of all the angsty 16 year old girls. This was one that I kind of liked. I guess to me, being obsessed with thinking you're fat or whatever is kind of selfish, but doing something about it and encouraging others can be a secret or not, and is not selfish, so I thought it was more worthy of photography.




Kinda interesting.

The End.

New Job

In my last blog post, I mentioned that I had a job interview today.

I went. It was about what I expected. (Did you guys know I'm good at interviewing for jobs? Because I am.)

And they offered me the job!

I never really know how much to say about work on my blog. SO, basically, I'm working at my school library. In one of the departments. I think it's going to be a lot of fun. And it's going to work so so much better with my school schedule than Ancestry did. (Which is to say, I can SLEEP now!) And I don't have to take public transportation to get there.

I start on Monday. Today I exchanged my student ID for an employee magic door-opener card.

Just a couple other random thoughts--

I thoroughly enjoy people dressing up for work on Halloween. The guy who made my new student ID was a vampire! At first I only noticed his fangs and suit, but then partway through our exchange, I realized he had red eyes. Neat. Also, there was a gypsy serving food at one of the restaurants on campus.

On that same note, there are some quality Halloween episodes of things that are worth watching. The Office and Making Fiends come to mind.

And one last thing, and this is sad: as I was reading the NYT during lunch today, I read a story about MiShawna Moore and Sanders-Clyde Elementary. Basically, the lady was like Mother Teresa at the school. When families didn't have anymore food stamps, they came to her, she helped people with their electricity bills, and bought a bunch of turkeys for Thanksgiving and food baskets, etc. I guess the school really became like, a community center. And the school was like all these poor black kids. And after they got all this attention, they started thriving. All these kids that couldn't read became proficient readers, and stuff. And the school became an inspiration. MiShawna Moore won a bunch of awards. And people were saying anyone, if they're given the right attention, can succeed. EXCEPT, oh wait, turns out they can't. They started monitoring the testing at the school and then the principal takes off, really randomly. And scores drop from 84.6 percent to 44.4 percent on the third grade science test. And kids who are transferring to other schools, like, just because, are not thriving anymore. And when they go back to look at old tests, each kid has like 7 erasure marks to correct answers, when usually the average for that sort of thing is one per kid. And the saddest thing of all is, everyone had hope, but it turned out to be in nothing. Because the kids still can't read.

I don't really know what to think about that.

I did think it was an interesting story, though.

I've kind of started coming up with names for them.

I've had the kitties for like six weeks, and I haven't named them.

I call them:

The girl one. = The gray and cream long-haired calico girl one.

The gray one. = The long haired gray one that poops on everything.

The white one. = The white boy.

The orange ones. = The two boys that are both orange.

Except, the orange ones don't look alike anymore. One is darker, and his tail has a dark tip. He has short hair. The other one has medium-long hair, and he's lighter, and his tail has a light tip.

Also, the orange ones get into different kinds of mischief now. And the dark orange one has decided we're BFF. So he keeps sitting in my lap and falling asleep, which is darling.

I've started thinking of names for them, though, which is a Bad Idea, because everyone knows that once you name them you start to get attached. Even though I don't like them, I sort of already am. Because I keep serving them. I feed them, I pick up their poop, I pet them, I talk to them, I come home to them. Everyone who's served a mission knows the way to love someone you don't love is to serve them.

I really want to call the fluffy light orange kitty Punkin. He's so round and orange! Wouldn't that be cute? It would, huh. The same way that babies born around Christmas are sometimes named Holly or Noel. And girls born on Valentine's day are sometimes called Valentina. And boys born on the Fourth of July should be named Sam.

And I had thought of another really good orange kitty name for the other one, but I forget it now. (It's better that way.)

And if I wanted to keep the theme, I could name the white one Spook. Cute. Just like how parents name their kids Julie and Jared and Jordan and Jennifer so that they all start with J's. Except instead of a letter theme, it's a season one. But he doesn't really seem like a Spook or ghost cat anyway. Maybe because of his orange tips.

Anyway, I'll keep calling them by their colors instead of naming them. Even though I feel like I'm in the 1950's because there's a white boy and a black girl. And a colored girl.

Oh well.

In other news, in my last post I said I didn't, but I actually did accomplish some stuff today:

- I registered for another 5k, which is this Saturday. Fun! And I went running today.

- I picked up my College Republicans shirt, which, frankly, disappoints me. It says on the front "Your Professor Doesn't Have To Know" and it's an ugly font, and each word is capitalized (why?), and I understand that some people get really picked on by their professors for being Republican, but wearing a shirt that says that makes me feel like I'm keeping a bad secret, which I don't think my party affiliation is. It just seems like my shirt is making some kind of an excuse to go get drunk on a school trip or something. But yay. Another free shirt. Although I wish they'd chosen the other idea they'd told us about, which was like GO RED (or some other verb)! BLEED RED (we have a big blood drive, which nobody takes seriously, but which everyone sees advertised like crazy), VOTE RED. (AWESOME.) Oh well.

- Right after I finish typing this, I'm going to watch the last episode of the first season of Heroes, which is obviously also an accomplishment.

- AND! Tomorrow I have an interview for a job! And that's exciting, since I am presently unemployed.

The End.

What is your email address?

I just had an interesting call at work.

The man told me he wanted to upgrade his subscription from a trial to a membership that included more. Okay, I said, what was his email address

"bmheh 1945 AT ...dotcodotuk"

"What?" I asked.

"bevin1945 AT ...dotcodotuk"

"Sorry," I said, "I've got bevin1945 at .co.uk, but what comes before .co.uk?"

"NOW I'LL TELL IT TO YOU, AND YOU LISTEN! IT'S BEVIN. 1945. THE BIG A. DOT CO, DOT UK."

"Okay, there needs to be something before .co.uk, though. For some people it's btinternet, or sky, or aol. It's your service provider..."

"Mine's just at dot co dot uk!"

"Well, there needs to be something else between the at and dot co dot uk. Could it be..."

"I CAN'T MAKE ONE UP!"

He was really annoyed with me for not accepting that his email address was @.co.uk.

"Well, do you know if your username that you're using is bevin1945?" (A lot of times the system makes up a username from the beginning of the email address.)

"WHAT?!"

And then I found it.

The email address? Yahoo.

It reminds me of the time someone was mad because they were emailing us and we weren't replying.

"What email address did you write to," I asked.

"I sent it to www.yourcompany.co.uk"

...okay.

People are still good (reprise)

A couple days ago I took a call at work from a man who had some free time set up and suddenly had something he really wanted to research, but he was having problems accessing the site. He told me he is 84 years old, and not very good with computers.

I had him start up his computer, and we went through the whole process of helping him find our site. It took about 15 minutes to get him in, but the call was really fantastic.

He mentioned at the beginning that his wife had died two years ago, and he had stopped doing research then. As he turned his computer on, he signed on. His computer password was his late wife’s name. It was really clear that even though she had been gone for two years, he was really grieving. He missed her so much. “You know, not many people are married fifty-four years and still madly in love with their wife,” he told me. It was really obvious how devoted he had been to her; his world revolved around her.

Aside from the deep underlying grief, the man was really funny. He said he’s 84 years old and not very good with computers. “I should be in the circus!” he said as he was explaining how funny he must look as he was trying to use the Internet while he talked to me. He had to hold the phone to one ear, because he was nearly deaf in the other ear and wears a hearing aid. (It buzzes if the phone is next to the hearing aid, he explained.) His computer was a laptop, so he had the computer on his lap, and was not very good at typing but was trying to work the computer with his hand that wasn’t holding the phone to the specific ear. It was all a balancing act.

It was funny how he described it, too, so I was laughing, and I could tell that he was amused by the situation too. Jokingly he said, “Stop laughing! They’ll have you on tape!” (There is a message at the beginning of the call saying that calls may be monitored or recorded.) I told him “You’ve got to stop making me laugh!” and we continued laughing as whatever page we were waiting for loaded on his computer. “Probably so,” he said, a little bit more serious. “But life’s for smiling, isn’t it.”

We talked a little bit more during the call, about how he was a pilot in World War II, and about some other things. (One other funny thing that I noticed: he was talking about his computer and said a mild swear, and he said “Excuse my Chinese.” I’ve only ever heard people say “Excuse my French” to downplay swearing. I wonder if calling it Chinese is more common in the UK since they’re right next to France? It could have been just him, or just me, but I thought that was interesting.)

At the end of the call he said, “Everyone has problems, you know, and they’re best kept to themselves. But if you can make someone smile, you’ve…you’ve done well.”

I’ve thought a lot about that, and I like it. Especially from him.

People are still good.

"No More Starving Artists"

I love my job at Ancestry.

We have something really cool happening at work. It's our most recent charity project. We're doing a canned food drive. But we're not doing the lame kind of canned food drive, where there are a couple boxes and a few people bring things in because they feel like they should.

We're having a competition. But we're not having a competition to see who can collect the most, either.

No way, our company is far more creative than that.

Our company has been divided into six teams, and each team has a leader. The company is giving each team a certain amount of money, which they are to spend on canned foods... to build GIANT SCULPTURES! How fantastic is that?

We can use tape and stuff that's easy to take apart, but the scupltures have to be free-standing. No framework or anything like that. No perishable foods are allowed. No damaging the cans or their labels. They have to fit within a 10' by 10' square, and cannot be taller than five feet. For ideas, they suggested we visit http://www.canstruction.org .

Each sculpture needs a title, a description, and a list of all of the foods that are included, and how many cans.

They especially encourage us to use peanut butter, canned tuna, powdered milk, canned beans and chili, canned stews and soups, 100% fruit juice, and canned fruits and vegetables. The food bank wants those things the most.

I'm way excited to see how the sculptures turn out.

OBVIOUSLY, English is Different in the UK

I’ve noticed something funny about British speech that doesn’t really carry over into American English. People in the UK use the word “obviously” different than we do here.

In the United States, we use ‘obviously’ to mean “anyone can immediately tell”. For example, “Her hair is really obviously green.” It doesn’t matter if you know her or not, it’s REALLY green, and anyone can tell. Or, “obviously it’s a bad idea to run a red light.” Running a red light is dangerous, and everyone knows this. “Obviously, she made chicken for dinner.” It’s not beef tonight, it’s chicken, and I can smell it.

In the UK, people very often use ‘obviously’ to mean “It has become clear to me now.” “Obviously, I was at the hospital, and that’s why I forgot to cancel my account.” It becomes clear to me now that I forgot to cancel, because oh, right, of course, I was at the hospital. “Obviously, I entered my card for my mum, and she’s forgotten to cancel it.” “I hadn’t realized my mum forgot to cancel it, and you certainly would have had no way of knowing, but it’s become clear to me now.” “I’ve come to the end of my free time, so obviously I want to cancel.” None of these things are obvious to me at all (as someone who does not know them personally), nor do the people expect me to know. Interesting.

It’s kind of funny, because obviously, I’ve started to use ‘obviously’ when I talk to them. (See, that wouldn’t be obvious to you, the reader, at all.) And nobody ever says “That’s not obvious at all!” It’s just fine because it’s kind of like an interjection.

In the US, ‘obviously’ often confirms a common understanding between people talking, and in the UK, the understanding is not implied or expected, and ‘obviously’ is frequently a simple transition in conversation.

[Also, many, many men call me “my love” the same way many Italians call random people beautiful (“Hello, beautiful!”), and the same way that old American ladies call people “sweetie.” “My love” sounds less diminutive, though.]

New Music! (To me.)

Suppose you order something out of stupidity. You forget to cancel something that renews. You click the wrong button. Whatever. And then you think that an easy to get out of having to pay is by contesting it with your credit card company. Well, you can do that, and they can try to process a chargeback, but you really did order it (we have your name correct and your address correct, and your email address, and your cellphone number etc etc etc) and so you lose anyway. To be nice, some card companies will call to check into things before they process a chargeback. It's cheaper for us and for the card company, and for you the consumer. And the card company will ask if we're willing to set up a refund for you, since you didn't mean to order it, and usually we are, and things are ok even though you're not the brightest.

So for my job, I every few weeks or so will speak to someone from a card company. And usually they talk to me about it, and have our customer on hold, and they switch between talking to them and me, and then connect the two of us. Fine.

Today I talked to someone from American Express. And while they had me on hold for a little bit, I heard a song that I really liked. So I Googled the part that I remembered, "someday you're going to realise" "right up" and found it! It's "Fill My Little World" by "The Feeling", which is a British band from Sussex. I didn't think I had ever heard of them until I listened to one of their other songs, "Sewn," which was massively popular. And I did know that one.

So now today, I am just loving "The Feeling". Fun. Hooray for British hold music as a way for me to discover music.

Another Story Involving Police

Today I worked at my mall job. Partway through the day, a couple of girls from our store went to get soda. They had to go to the food court, because one of the places offers 'mall drinks', which are the huge size of cups, for $1 instead of like $3 or whatever large mall sodas cost.

They were gone for quite a while, and when they came back, they came from the wrong direction. We asked about it and they said there were a bunch of police out in front of our store (well, to the side a little). They said we should go peek. They were really curious about it.

I went out and walked around the whole scene and came back to report. There was a blond lady sitting on a mall bench, and one police guy was standing kind of near her. There was a group of police talking with a guy in a polo shirt, and another policeman with a Hispanic man. The incident stretched around half of a cellphone sales kiosk in the middle of the walkway.

What could it be, we wondered. Maybe sexual harassment, one of my coworkers thought.

We saw one of the policemen start questioning the lady. A little while later, they all left. They walked all kind of in a line, with the Hispanic guy in front, wearing handcuffs.

And like that, the situation dissolved. My coworkers kept wondering aloud what it was all about. On a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is not curious at all and 1o is extremely curious, I think I was probably at about a 2.5, and my coworkers were at about a 7.5 or an 8.) My coworker suggested I go out and ask the guy in the phone kiosk. And so I did.

What had happened was, the guy tried to steal shoes from a popular athletic shoe store in the mall. There had been someone following him, though, so they caught him. He was taken to jail for it. And get this: the blond lady was his girlfriend?/wife? and she's pregnant with his kid. Due-in-five-days pregnant with his kid. And he's in jail now.

So here's the moral of the story, kids: don't steal. Especially if your girlfriend is about to have a baby. Because that's just sad. If you can't afford shoes, buy some at DI. Or steal them from somewhere that isn't in a mall. (Have I written about how I feel about malls in that regard? I don't think so. I'll have to do that sometime.)

Also, this week I gave notice that I'll be finishing my work at the mall. This month marks one year of mall-working thrill and I think I've had my fun. I'm just too busy for it these days. I have three shifts left as of today.

Mall Job Entertainment

I've been sorting papers this evening. I tend to save wayyy more stuff than I need to. (But! What if I need the receipt for my hairspray that I bought in London almost a year ago and have since thrown away because it was crappy and cost less than a dollar for the whole can??)

Anyhow, I did find something kind of funny. (Actually, I've found several funny things, but this is one that I think I meant to post about a while ago.)

Back before the flood at the mall, when in our old location and business was hopping, there used to always be at least a few of us working at once. It was sometimes kind of boring, and I came up with a game. I was planning on playing it solitaire-style, but my coworkers wanted to participate too.

The way it worked was, I made a list of things to watch for. (It was kind of like a situation scavenger hunt crossed with the game Phase 10.) Once you saw the first thing, you initialed it, and then you could start watching for the second thing. Whoever observed all ten items first won.

Here's the list:

1. Someone who speaks Spanish. [Super easy.]
2. Someone whose shoes match their outfit really well. [And the shoes had to match more than just their purse.]
3. Two girls trying on sunglasses.
4. "This is so cute."
5. Full price item on the sale rack. [The sale rack is near the fitting rooms, so people sometimes hang their stuff that they don't want there. It's really annoying, because we try to pull out the stuff that's full price, and all of the sale items have SALE stickers on their tags, but sometimes we miss stuff and then people are mad at us when they discover at the register that the cute new thing they fell in love with isn't really half price.]
6. Someone wearing glasses who wants to get into a dressing room.
7. Someone who asks what the exchange policy is. [It is posted EVERYWHERE, and we tell every single person who buys something.]
8. Someone who asks where something is from on a mannequin.
9. Someone who asks to get down an aqua jacket. [This was a tricky one. It required someone to ask us to use a pole to get down a specific thing.]
10. Someone who asks us to hold 'till Monday. [We only hold things until closing...]

In which the progatonist gets to know her hot UPS guy better on Valentine's Day.

Something kind of funny and disappointing just happened this morning.

See, I've been working at my mall job for almost a year now. Eleven months, actually.

I had an early meeting at my real job, so on the way home, I stopped by the mall to hang out with my manager. I adore her. She and I would be friends in real life except that we're both always intensely busy.

Anyway, the UPS guy brought a huge delivery today. He needed me to write a couple checks and he wondered if we had a cashier's check for another delivery which he had let us know about yesterday. (I didn't know anything about it, and my manager had gone Valentinesing, so I told him sorry, we didn't have it.)

He left. My manager came back. I told her about the cashier's check and she called the owner, who said that we actually did have the cashier's check. So my manager went to look for the UPS guy at his truck, and while she was gone, I totally saw Apollo go past the front of our store with his half-empty cart. I stopped him and let him know that oh, wait, it turned out we actually did have it. He said he'd bring the box back.

While we were waiting for him to bring the box back, my manager talked about him shamelessly. It's really no secret that our UPS guy is hot. He has an amazing smile. (Who doesn't have a hot UPS guy?) And then my manager said something about us calling him Apollo because of that. Wait. So his name isn't really Apollo? I've worked there for almost a year and we've always called him Apollo. Too bad. I asked her what his real name was and she didn't know. WHAT. Turns out, she'd seen him every day for two years, and she didn't know his name.

So when he came back, we asked his name. He has a totally normal guy name.

As he left, my manager looked over at me solemnly and said "I liked Apollo better." "Me too," I agreed.

I totally always thought his real name was Apollo. Disappointing!