That Just Happened

That's right. I scored a 200 in bowling. After scoring two games in the 80s. And it's legitimate. Not one person bowled for me to help me out.

Let me back up and give a little history of my bowling skills. During college I participated in the Big Brother's Big Sister's Bowl for Kids Sake Challenge. It's a fundraiser event for the organization where each participant collects pledges before bowling. The donor can choose to give a flat amount or a per pin pledge. I tended to get mostly per pin pledges, and maybe that's because people knew just how bad I was at bowling. That remains unknown. Anyway, since it's a fundraiser, the organization realized they would need to set a minimum if they wanted to raise substantial money, so they automatically bump you up to 100 if you score below that. Let me just say I consistently needed the help. I could never score a 100 by my own accord, so I would get bumped up to the minimum in order to make my pledge collections worth anything.

As is evident by my first two games this particular night, I have not improved much. However, something happened and I clearly found my groove (I think it was the Christmas socks; I'll explain in a second). I don't mean to brag, but did you notice I only had one open frame the entire game. And even in that frame I only missed 2 pins! That's pretty outstanding, if I do say so myself, especially when you consider who bowled it! Of course I had to have them print my score so I could remember this bit of history. Because it's sure to never happen again.

So about the socks. Apparently this bowling party was a Christmas sweater party, but someone forgot to tell me that detail. So I show up and am the only one without a sweater. If you know me at all, it is not like me to miss out on an opportunity to dress up or have some fun, so I was a little bummed when I realized this. But then - good news - as I was putting on my bowling shoes I realized I just happened to be wearing gaudy Christmas socks. Lucky me! So naturally, I rolled up my jean bottoms just enough for my Christmas socks to show and for myself to look like Steve Urkel. If you're wondering why the magic didn't kick in until the third game, it's because I didn't roll the pants until part way through the second game. But I think that was definitely the key. Whatever it was, it was fun!

I'm Back!

Sorry if you've been missing me; I've been sans internet at home for the past month and I just don't find the desire to stay later at work just to use the internet.

While I love the internet and realize how essential technology is to society today, I would be perfectly happy if I never had to deal with tech issues ever again. It seems they always choose to pop up at the absolute worst time at work, and then I have to call IT, wait for them to come to my office (which is 30 minutes from them), and figure out what to do with myself in the meantime when I really need a computer to do my work. Even worse though, is the tech issues I face at home, without the support of an IT team.

Last night I battled the internet for a solid 3.5 hours. I just got it installed in my apartment yesterday, but I didn't have it activated because I decided I was going to buy a wireless adapter for my desktop rather than run a cable through the entire apartment. So last night at 9:30 I got home from shopping, wireless adapter in hand. Then I had to completely disconnect my desktop in my room and set it up out in the living room where the modem is. Then I connected the ethernet cable directly from the modem to my computer to activate the internet. Of course that didn't work as it was supposed to so I had to call Comcast at 10pm. They got my internet working which was amazing to finally have back, I can't lie. At that point I was supposed to disconnect my internet, unplug the modem, hook everything up to the wireless router, and turn everything back on 1 piece of equipment at a time (all in a very specific order), in order to have the internet running through the router. I was terrified this wouldn't go to plan and I would again be without internet after just getting it back, so I delayed this for about an hour and checked e-mail, Facebook, and chatted with a dear friend. When I was finally ready I re-connected everything to the router and the internet still worked perfectly with the cable running from the router to the desktop. Now that I was sure the router was working, I tried to set up my wireless adapter. I followed the installation steps on the CD and got it hooked up, only I had no idea how to choose a network, where to set up the network, etc. I thought I had created a network like 4 different times, but every time, nothing worked! After about 45 minutes I finally uninstalled the wireless adapter and backed up to working with the router. I put in that installation CD (which I did not do before), and was instantly walked through creating my network that I would use with the adapter. It was all making sense now. So after that step was complete, I put in the installation CD for the adapter and re-installed that. Everything worked beautifully at that point, so I turned off my computer and went through the process of moving it back to my room. Of course once I was connected in my room again, the adapter wasn't working. It would work for about a minute, but then it would start scanning for networks and a message was telling me there was no connection. I figured I was too far from the modem (although my apartment is only 923 sq feet). I reconnected things, uninstalled and re-installed the adapter 2 more times, did everything I could think of, then finally gave up and fell asleep at 1:30am.

This morning I tried uninstalling and reinstalling the adapter one more time, and low-and-behold, it's working! Hence my ability to post this entry. Anyway, the moral of this story: I hate technology!! At least when it's not working like it's supposed to.

I'm off to church now. Have a great day.

The Joy of Cooking

Tonight I enjoyed a delicious dinner of pesto pin-wheel pasta (say that 5 times fast!) with asparagus tips. The pesto was even home-made (by my roommate) which made it that much tastier. Anyway, as I was eating my dinner I literally thought to myself how lucky I am to not have any food allergies so that I may have the freedom to eat all of the wonderful things in this world. I specifically had this thought as I ate a pine nut in the pesto. So many people these days are allergic to nuts I don't know how you could eat a nut and not have that thought. I mean, don't you all think that every time you enjoy a crunchy, salty nut? Alright, I don't either, but I feel like I should. It seems it's a privilege! Sorry for the tangent...back to my story.

I continued to eat my bowl of pasta, finding myself excited as I came to another large pine nut. I joyfully took that bite, only to find this nut had a spicy kick to it. A quick moment later that spiciness turned to a very pungent garlic flavor. That's right folks; I ate a chunk of a garlic clove. And might I add, I do not recommend ever eating a garlic clove. Not only does it not taste good, but it doesn't do your breath any favors either. On that note, I'd recommend avoiding pesto all together on a first date...or any date for that matter.

Needless to say, I avoided the rest of the pine nuts in the pesto out of fear it may be another un-processed garlic clove. What can I say...it's all part of the joy of tasty home-made food!

You Know What Today Is!

April Fool's Day!!!

Did you play any tricks on anyone?!

I'd love to hear them.

I got one harmless joke played on me, but my all-time favorite has to be when I was skiing in Colorado and the lifties (slang for the people who operate and monitor the ski lifts) were writing fake information on the message boards. A lot of ski resorts have message boards at each lift that people can leave notes on if necessary. For instance, if a group gets separated they can leave a note for the "lost" person to call them or meet them at a certain place (back when cell phones weren't the norm). Some resorts put trivia questions on these boards to entertain people in line when there are no other pertinent messages. But I'm getting off track. This particular April 1st my family and I were skiing, and as we were waiting in line we saw the message board read, "Elk Migration - watch for elk!" We were sooo excited that we might see some elk!! After a couple of runs without seeing any elk we were getting pretty bummed that we were missing them all. ... But then we realized that elk don't migrate. And then we realized that it was April Fool's Day. Joke's on us! A few runs later when we came back to this same lift a different message was on the board. This time it read, "Bikini contest at so-and-so Lodge - 2 pm!" (I don't remember the name of the location. This was a while ago...just work with me.) Of course by this time we knew all of these messages were April Fool's Day jokes, so we just continued to ski. But man - that place cleared out quick!! The rest of the afternoon we had that whole side of the mountain to ourselves. It was great!

Hope you had a fun day!

Fit For the Gods

It is said that the people who first came upon what is now called The Garden of the Gods, in Colorado Springs, had the following thoughts:

One man, observing the surrounding beauty, thought the area would one day make a wonderful beer garden. A second man, in reply, said it was a place fit for the gods. Thus the name - Garden of the Gods.

My dad and I (and one of his friends from church) recently visited the park on the final day of their week-long "man trip" to Colorado (two other church friends were with them most of the week). Luckily, I had the whole week off (I don't start my job until tomorrow) so I was able to spend quite a lot of time with them. Not only did we visit The Garden of the Gods, but we also took a day trip to Leadville, CO, a historic mining town and also the highest city in the United States of America -- at 10,200 ft above sea level -- on the days we weren't hitting the snowy slopes. I must say, the mountain views from Leadville are pretty spectacular; they include the two tallest mountains in Colorado, Mt. Massive (14,421 ft) and Mt. Elbert (14443 ft). Mt. Elbert is actually the tallest mountain in the Rocky Mountains of North America, and is the second tallest mountain in the lower 48 states, after Mt. Whitney in California, which is 62 ft taller. All this to say, it's big... and beautiful. Really, if you ask me, all of Colorado is a place fit for the gods.

And if I knew how to get pictures off my phone I would have pictures of the snowy Rocky Mountains in all their beauty and glory, but I don't. So all you get to see are the pictures from The Garden of the Gods.

It Pays to be Honest

But this time it did the exact opposite, literally. At least I'll be able to sleep with a peaceful mind tonight.

Today I worked a double shift at Chili's. That's from 10:30 am to about 9:00 pm with only a 30 minute break in between shifts. I guess towards the end of that I was starting to get a little scatter-brained because at one point I "blacked-out." Here's what happened.

Let me start by saying that when someone pays for their meal there are a few ways it can be completed. If credit card is used, I run the card, return the receipt, and then close the check after the tip is written and receipt signed. If cash is used, I change out the money using my own "bank" of money that I bring each shift, return the change, and simply close out the check, which means the bill has been accounted for and I have the money. They then tip using cash, if anything. I usually wait to close the bill until I have collected their tip (even though I can close it right away) just because that is when I would close the bill if credit card is used, and that helps to keep everything the same and in line in my mind.

So tonight a customer paid in cash, I changed it out, and then waited to close their bill until I collected the tip. Well they stayed around for a little bit just chatting, and by the time they left and I went to close their bill I had apparently completely forgotten what happened because I went to close their check and I couldn't. It said they still owed me money for their bill. I racked my brain trying to remember how they paid for their meal and I kept remembering them paying by credit card. (At this point two things should have tipped me off that they paid in cash, a) I had cash for a tip, and b) there was no credit card number in the payment area. But I felt positive they used a card and remember, this was a long day for me. My brain was seemingly elsewhere.) After a minor mental freak-out, I went to my manager and told her that I was missing a payment for these people, but I didn't know how that happened (they didn't seem like the kind to dine-and-dash). I asked her if that meant I would have to pay for their meal out of my tips, and she said that she would just "comp" the customers meal (that is Chili's policy, I guess). I told her not to do it right away because I wanted go through my book and pockets again to make sure I hadn't missed the payment somewhere (as in a large amount of cash I wouldn't normally have).

Of course then things started to get busy, and you can't start a new check at the same table if the check from the previous guest hasn't been closed out, so she "comped" the meal and the night went on. At the end of the night after checking out with the manager I went to count my tips and clock-out. As I was counting my tips though I realized I had much more than was reasonable to have made in one Sunday night -- forty dollars more. It was at this point that I realized the mysterious missing payment must have been paid for in cash and I simply forgot to close the check. Now I had two options: leave with a hefty amount of tips or tell my manager what I imagined happened. Naturally, I told her. (This is where honesty literally didn't pay.) After the embarrassment of explaining myself, she told me to keep it! I was shocked, but even then I didn't feel right about keeping the money. I mean $40 isn't much to a huge chain restaurant, but I still would have felt guilty having the restaurant "comp" the meal only to let me keep the payment for it because I had had a senior moment (no offense). In the end, I asked her if she could just keep it and put it in the safe so at least the company had the money for the food they "comped," and that's what she did. Then she said, "Just be more careful next time."

Really?! Not even a thank you? I mean I didn't expect her to get down on her knees and praise me. After all, I had made a mistake and I should be more careful, but I still thought she would at least say thanks or something for my honesty and for taking responsibility for my mistake. (I don't think most of the other servers would have told her, and not because they're bad people but because many of them talk about how broke they are and forty extra bucks would be helpful. Then again, they probably wouldn't have made the mistake in the first place.) So even in a non-literal sense it didn't pay to be honest tonight. I think any one of the other managers would have recognized my honesty and acknowledged it, but not this one. Oh well, I guess I can't win them all.



Footnote: As I retold this story here, it seems completely obvious all along that the customer paid by cash, but somehow that just didn't cross my mind at the time. Maybe I was afraid of the possibility that they actually hadn't paid, and if I closed their check by cash that would mean I would lose a lot if not all my tips paying for their meal. That fear must have blinded me from the obvious truth. Anyway, I feel okay about it all because in the end Chili's got the money that was rightfully theirs.

D.M.V.

I've decided that DMV should stand for Difficult. Miserable. Very unpleasant.

I don't know about you, but I absolutely hate visiting the DMV. No matter where you are, no matter how big or small the surrounding town is, it is an awful experience. Today I had the unfortunate task of renewing my plates and registration, and I didn't know exactly how to do it online, so I went into to the dreaded DMV - dun dun dunn. The first place I went to wasn't busy - surprisingly - and I got helped very quickly. The bad news was that I was at a DMV in the wrong county, so I had to go to a different DMV to get everything taken care of. The gave me the address to the correct location, but couldn't tell me how to get there. At this point I call Donnie who very patiently looked up directions and told them to me over the phone. They were the most ridiculous directions I've ever gotten!! I should mention that this is not Donnie's fault, just the computer's. This is why I don't like GPS machines, but that's a different story.

By the time I finally find the place, I realize there is a much easier way to get there - again, not important to the story except to add emphasis to how annoyed I was getting. As I'm parking I can already tell that there will be a much longer wait at this location because it was in a busier part of town and it was in a huge building. So I go in and sure enough -- people everywhere! I take a number (65 and they were on 46) and head to the back wall to stand and wait my turn. As I'm walking back to stand out of the way, I notice a line towards the far end of the room which seems to be leading to a desk with an overhead sign that reads, 'Renewals.' So I asked a man waiting in that line if this was indeed a line for renewals, and he said it was (good thing I didn't just sit down and wait - I would have been there much longer). Then, after about 15 minutes of waiting, it is my turn, and I go to get my stuff taken care of. Not so fast! The kind lady behind the counter and wall of plexiglass asks me if I've gotten my emissions test done yet. Of course I hadn't! That would have been too easy. So after all that driving around (on an empty tank of gas I might add) and waiting in line I got nothing accomplished. I thought the whole experience was going to not turn out to be awful (save all the driving), and I would have gotten everything taken care of relatively quickly, in DMV time. Why couldn't the lady at the first DMV have told me about the emissions test and advised me not to waste my time waiting in line when nothing could be done anyway? Ugggh. It was a frustrating couple of hours to say the least. But I did learn in the process that my plates are actually good until the end of February, and even March if I take into account the one month grace period. I may not take advantage of that though, on the likely chance that I forget when the grace period ends, and thus am rewarded with a late fee. That's probably the whole point of the grace period - dang government trying to steal our money. Anyway, I guess I have a month to get everything straightened out and taken care of. I can't wait until the day I get to go back to the DMV.

At Last!

I finally got a job! I'm going to be a server at Chili's. I know it's nothing special, and I probably won't get many shifts per week; but at least it's something. Hopefully I'll be able to get a full-time job working for a bank, and between the two jobs I'll be able to make decent money. The coolest part about this though, is how I got the job at Chili's...

As you know, it's about impossible right now to get a job doing anything. The economy sucks, plain and simple. So after walking in to a bunch of restaurants and applying on the spot, I still hadn't had any luck in getting an interview, let alone a job. On I trudged, into Buffalo Wild Wings. I figured I could make good money there considering it's the only one in the area, and people just love eating wings and drinking beer while watching sports. (My thoughts were later confirmed by the manager - servers make about $700 a week!) Anyway, I began filling out an application, and while doing so, was told that the manager would be out to talk to me in a minute. He finally made an appearance and after some small talk and looking over my resume he told me he didn't have any positions open, go figure. However, while he was looking at my 'honors and activities' section of my resume, he said, "You're smart too! I don't even know you and I'm proud of you." I thanked him and we continued to chat, and finally he said something to the effect of: Well I don't have any positions open, but I wish I did. I just gave a job to one of our bartender's sons and he doesn't even really need a job. You know what, hang out here and let me go make a couple of calls. I know the manager at Chili's and maybe he can help you out.

At this point, I decided to not mention that I had just been to the Chili's he was talking about the day before and they told me they were only hiring cooks. I just let him go make the call. When he came back, he told me that he had talked to the manager at Chili's and told me the jist of their conversation, "I told him you're very well educated, pretty, and you just seem like a good girl. He told me to send you over there, he'll talk with you and then take it from there. When you get there, just tell him I sent you." He also gave me some tips about the Chili's manager's personality and what to do to impress him. I thanked him and headed over to Chili's.

Once there, I had to go through all the formalities: fill out an application and complete a standard test. If I passed, they would call me in for an interview. Later that same day, they called me to set up my interview. Yesterday I went in and interviewed, and about an hour after returning home, I got the call with a job offer. (They really don't need me, they were basically doing this because the BWW's manager called and spoke with them. Maybe someone will leave soon and I'll get more shifts than they currently think I will.)

Regardless of the number of shifts I get each week, I have a job. And I owe a huge thanks to the manager at Buffalo Wild Wings. I've always known that having connections is the way to land a job, especially now, but being new to the area I didn't have many connections. Thank God this man who didn't even know me was kind enough to take an interest in me and my situation. If not for him, I'm sure I'd still be searching. I need to make sure to send him a thank you this week!