6-14-11 Tuesday (Spiders Mow Lawns Too)

I stopped by the house today.  I was lucky enough that no workers were present which meant that I could tour the house!  Yay!  With stairs and all I was able to walk around upstairs.  Now… finally… I’m getting real excited. 

I took a bunch of photos and then decided to film a walk through video.

As I finished filming the first floor, the superintendent, Roger, pulled up to the house so I resumed filming after he left.

Here’s some still photos:

2011-06-14 011Above: Trey ceiling in master.

2011-06-14 002Above/Below: Ready for shingles!2011-06-14 003

2011-06-14 004Above: Garage

2011-06-14 006Above: Kitchen + back door.

2011-06-14 007Above: Stairs!  We have stairs!

Today was my first day of training.  The trainer I was doomed to have taught.  The thing with her is that she’s emotionless.  She reads from the text book and asks “volunteers”  to read various passages from our workbooks.  The other problem is that she’s probably never done our jobs or used the the new system live herself so she wasn’t able to answer questions that weren’t in the book.  She kept a list of things we’d have to ask someone else about.  Perhaps because I’m interested in learning the new system, oddly, I didn’t space out.

We have a system we use called the “------- Library”.  It’s a reference system we use to look up policies and procedures.  It’s our work bible of sorts.  If I have to hear that woman say “Li-berry” one more time I’m gonna scream.  It’s Li-brar-y.  [lahy-brer-ee, -bruh-ree, -bree]

A good thing is that they had an experienced banker, Josh, come in and help explain some of the features.  He’s been on the system using the pilot version for months now.  Since he’s also used the old system, he was perfect to explain the differences.  He’s also a funny person.  Here’s a photo of him I swiped from his Facebook page:

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He wore a Spiderman mask while he mowed the lawn just for the shock and awe value.  He said people would stop their car, back up, roll the window down and snap a photo.  This makes him awesome.

6-13-11 Monday (Coupon Karma)

A few weeks ago my employer gave out ginormous thermal mugs.  Just fill out this form and pick one up.

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So… these papers were laying all over the place.  There’s 10,000 employees in my building (so I’m told).  What a waste.  Let’s save plastic bottles, screw the trees.  Maybe some signs should have been posted at the entrances and allow for an employee to print out the form if needed?  Perhaps 2 per page?  I dunno.  The overall idea, purpose of this was awesome!  With a little discount, this should cut down on waste.  It would be nice to hear a “report” a few months later as to how this saved money or the amount of trash.  I assume they track their Styrofoam cup purchases.  Additionally, giving this out to each new hire will keep this campaign going.

Speaking of new hires, I’ve heard that the new hires who are being interviewed by the recruiter are still being told their schedule will be 8-6.  (I blogged about this here).  Sometime later this week, sources will be coming in for an interview and I’ll find out what they’re being told by supervisors rather than recruiters. 

Last week, our department held a contest for best themed summer decorated team areas.  I suggested a Hawaiian Luau theme figuring that with our $30 budget, a lot can be had for that at Dollar Tree.  Someone beat us to the punch and started decorating before we could even get motivated enough to shop for the stuff.  My boss picked out “It’s 5 o’clock Somewhere” as the new theme.  Although I don’t have any photos of it, it basically turned out to be margarita cups, umbrella straws, flip flops and the like.  A team next to me did:

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Christmas in July as it was called.  They went all out however it was far over the $30 allowance although we’re guessing most of the stuff was brought in from people’s homes.  Behind all of this was the winning theme which I think was the Hawaiian theme I suggested.  It too seemed to have a lot more decorations than $30 could buy.  All jealousy aside, it was definitely a team spirit builder and I’m sure that’s what it was intended for.  While I do pick on my company for some things, I do certainly recognize the cool stuff they do.

On Saturday we stopped into Old Navy with a Groupon Jim had to get $20 in clothes for $10.  An end cap had a sweatshirt on it with a sign that said $10.  At the register it rang up double the price.  Jim told the cashier of the sign who then accompanied Jim to the display.  The sign was for different shirts on the rack but she joyfully gave him the shirt for that price.  Some time yesterday Jim got car bumper dirt on his white Chaps shorts while loading groceries into the trunk.  Last night he threw in all the perma-press stuff into the wash.  This morning I found the new sweatshirt had red all over it from a cheap red t-shirt.  Yet, his white shorts had nothing on them?  Maybe it was because the red t-shirt laid against the sweatshirt and the shorts didn’t?  I saw I had a Shout Color Catcher sample on my laundry products shelf so I threw that in and rewashed the clothes.  The stain is still there.  I’ll be “working” on getting it out over the next few weeks.  Damn it!  It’s Coupon Karma!  She’s a bitch!

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A blue Polo got “hit” too.  Ugh.  Yet those damn white shorts were just fine.

On my way to work I stopped off to buy some Carbona Color Run Remover.  It was clearanced for $1.25 so I bought 2. 

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After work, I rewashed both shirts.  The blue Polo apparently wasn’t colorfast since it removed all the color from the shirt EXCEPT for the blotches it was supposed to remove.  The pink blotches turned blue while the rest of the blue was gone.  Ruined.  The Old Navy shirt kinda  worked.  What was pink was now a different shade of blue and hard to tell.  It might just pass off.  We’ll see.

The house is moving along so quickly now it’s mind boggling!  Jim checked on it’s progress today but per the builder’s request, we are to stay out of it while workers are there.  Our salesperson, Michelle, has reported a couple of errors that she caught that we hadn’t seen yet since we couldn’t enter the site.  The stairs are in, trey ceiling moldings, etc.    I’ll visit it before work tomorrow and see what’s happening.

Speaking of work, I have 2 days of training.

6-12-11 Sunday (Priceless Mistakes)

Jim had a 2 for 1 coupon to Bravo! Cucina Italiana for their brunch.  Jim had the crab cakes thingy and I had the Panini.  We both enjoyed our meals and the uniqueness of them.

Brunch

We ordered beverages… the alcoholic kind.  After all, it was after 12pm.

imageJim’s selection

imageMy selection

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Our mistake was that we ordered these drinks even though the menu had no price listed.  Our second mistake is that we didn’t ask the price.  The Mimosa was 6frickin50 and served in a champagne flute.  It was tiny.  My sangria was served in a wine glass but was still 7frickindollars.  Good thing we only had one.

The verdict, we’d like to enjoy their brunch FOOD again but never again with their alcoholic beverages.  Bite me.

Brunch with alcoholic beverages have become Jim and I’s weekly indulgence.  We’ve become “old gays” and we’re OK with that… really. 

After brunch we went grocery shopping and then came home and relaxed for a while.  Later, Billy and Mike came over.  The plan was to order pizza and play cards which we did sans the card playing.  We got wrapped up in discussions.

6-11-11 Saturday (The Roof, The Roof…)

We had a slow moving day for the most part.  We went out for breakfast/lunch to Mimi’s and had our usual including Mimosa’s.  Surprised huh?

Next we stopped by the house and they were working!  We have a roof… almost!

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The windows for the dining room (2 on the left side) don’t look quite right but since they’ve asked us not to enter the house while being worked on we decided to stop back by later.

We then drove to South Charlotte to ride the CATS light rail (LYNX) into Uptown to attend the Taste of Charlotte festival.  We figured parking might be expensive or hard to come by and we’ve been wanting to ride the light rail for quite a while.  We actually enjoyed the ride in.

The light rail dropped us just a few blocks from the festivities which was 4 blocks worth full of vendors.

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Food is purchased with “coins”.

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We ate:

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and ate…

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and eventually I stopped taking pictures so as to conceal the evidence.

Jim and I split everything we had so we could taste more.  Most of it was quite yummy.

It was hot out, but not Florida hot and I was thankful for that.  I think I had a layer of sweat on my head but managed not to drip all over.  That’s a good thing in my book.

Here’s a bunch of other photos.  If you don’t care, scroll down a bunch to get to the completed roof photos of the house:

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2011-06-11 014Above: This photo was intended for a few specific readers who I also have a friendship with on Facebook.  Several posts ago, friends spotted the portapotty in front of the new house and comments were tossed around about being a guest bathroom.  I took the above photo in mind to play off that with creative captions like “Jim checks out alternative guest bath options”.  It just didn’t happen.

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Good times!  We spent $40!  Ugh.

Lastly we stopped back by the house again and the roof was complete:

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We haven’t been able to explore the upstairs yet since there’s no ladder or stairs for us.

6-10-11 Friday (A Sour Story)

Happy I-have-a-second-story-Friday!

2011-06-10 005Above: The “stairwell” less the stairs.

2011-06-10 001Above/below: The second story!2011-06-10 002

 

2011-06-10 003Above: A view through the living room double window to the backward.

2011-06-10 004Above: Back door between the living room and kitchen.

Originally Jim and I were going to be on vacation this past week but when uncertainties arose about his job, I cancelled my days off except for this Saturday.  I had decided at some point last week to re-request Friday off and perhaps we’d have a 3 day weekend somewhere instead.  I was never approved for today, I was waitlisted.  At a call center, I’m competing, bidding, or scheduled according to call volume with that of a ton of other call center locations across the country.   Fortunately, it’s still easy to take off even if it wasn’t approved and management is OK with that since there are systems in place to make sure it’s not abused.

Last night I couldn’t decide if I should still take today off.  Jim had to work so what’s the point?  Well, maybe I’ll just do some stuff around the house.  Maybe I’ll pack a few boxes.  Maybe I’ll just go in for some of the day and leave early.  My to-do list grew and staying home began looking less appealing.  I calculated out my remaining PTO (Personal Time Off) hours.  I went into work.

My plan was to leave early… how early was yet to be determined.  It was kind of relaxing to be at work and feel as though I could leave when I wanted.  Naturally, that’s always an option as long as I have PTO time available but this time it felt different.  It felt like I had some strange power over life or something.  It’s hard to explain.  Jim emailed me and suggested dinner and a movie.  I was scheduled till 9, planned to leave at 7 but he suggested I leave at 6.  OK!

Jim cashed in a restaurant.com certificate to Frankie and Louies.  For an appetizer we enjoyed the crab nachos.  For dinner, Jim had the fillet mignon which wasn’t really that.  It wasn’t bacon wrapped so it can’t be called that.  He ordered it medium and it was very rare.  He sent it back.  It was cooked better the second time around but had no flavor… at all.  I know that fillet’s are the most tender cuts but also the most flavorless.  I think they missed the mark on this.  The online menu showed they had a stuffed fillet and that’s what Jim thought he was ordering.  Hell, the online menu is very different and didn’t even have the porkchops I ordered which were quite tasty.  Jim liked the mashed potatoes and I did not.  I hated them.  We think it was made with sour cream and I don’t like sour cream.  I don’t think the menu indicated them that way.  The sautéed spinach was very good but in an overly small proportion.  The ambiance?  Cute swamp/Cajon theme completed with live caged snakes, hedgehogs, lizards, bearded dragon, etc.  The noise level was unfriendly.  The dining room wasn’t filled to capacity and had a terrible echo.  Bare floors will do that I guess.  So many items on the menu looked yummy so we’d probably return and try other things.  I might even order the porkchops again and ask for a different side.

We then went to see a movie.  X-Men: First Class.  I’ve heard that the movie doesn’t follow the comic books.  My only X-Men knowledge is from that of X-Men cartoons and video games and I don’t think any of it dealt with the beginnings so it was fine with me.  The unfortunate part is that we got stuck front row.

Date night was great!