One point three billion dollars...

So when the powerball was under a hundred million I said, nah, not going to bother.  When it rose over 100 million, I still said nah, not going to bother but nice number.  I could be smart with a couple million bucks.

I would set my kids up for college and I would take care of my mom, I would... well I wouldn't really have much after setting up three kids for college, I just wouldn't, and that's reality.

So when it rose to over 300 million dollars I said, "Okay.  Still not gonna play because I have better things to do with the money but respect.  I'd be a little stupid with my millions after I did the smart thing."

I actually considered buying a ticket when it was over 600 million and I didn't make it off work in time to buy a ticket when it hit over 900 million.

As of this morning, that shit was worth over one point three BILLION dollars which means after taxes you have more than half a billion in your bank account...


A friend of mine, JP asked on Facebook this morning, what would we do if we won?

I'm not even going to pretend.  I'm going to be stupid as hell!  Oh don't get me wrong I would do the smart thing.  I would set my kids up for college, I would set my mom up, and I would even pay off all of my bills.  I definitely won't tell my boss to kiss my ass and that I'm never coming back but I would so tell her boss exactly which parts of my posterior he could kiss for all the promotions that he has walked right in front of my face.  Not his brother though, I like his brother.  1/4 of my bosses looks like Papa John.  And that's kinda funny because I work for Hungry Howie's.  1/4 of my bosses look like Daryl Hall from Hall and Oats (Hall recently, not from the 80's though I imagine in the 80's he might have still looked like him...) And 1/4 of my bosses is just a big ol Teddy bear with no hair and sporting a pair of shorts year round.  Saint Jimmy is awesome.  The one I would tell to kiss my posterior is a really good guy as well but he doesn't believe in me and that would be the ONLY reason I would say what I would say.  Not because he's a bad guy because he's not.  He smart, and nice, and when he cracks a joke that others outside his head can understand, he has a cool sense of humor. BUt he doesn't believe in me so if I win the powerball.... yeah

But I would be soooo stupid.  I would be like Oprah.  You want a car?  You got a car.  You want a house?  you got a house!  You want your electric bill paid?  You got your electric bill paid!  You want that cute puppy your saw in the window?  You got that puppy!  You have a mystery illness you need diagnosed?  I'll send your ass to the mayo clinic!

As for me, I would move to England.  Maybe not Westminster because that's pretty much ALL upper class.  Not that I couldn't afford it, I would be able to but I would rather have a quaint little house not very far from London.  It would have to be on the underground line.  I have been on the roads in London and oh my God!  I would die in five minutes out there.  First off all they drive on the other side of the road.  I'm not going to say the wrong side because to them, we drive on the wrong side but they drive like americans do and that's scary enough!  We drive like maniacs.  They drive like maniacs but on the other side of the road!  The entire time I was in London, I swore I was going to die.  Hell the entire time I was in Paris, I swore I was going to die in traffic.  And they do it on our side of the road!

The freaking Arc Du Triomphe is in the middle of what might be the deadliest traffic circle I have ever seen in my life and you know what?  There are people walking all over that damn thing.  There has to be an underground walkway to that thing because NO ONE is brave/stupid enough to walk through that circle and never once did I see a bus stop in middle of all that mess to let anyone on or pick anyone off.


I'm not sure if I would take my mom.  She says she wouldn't want to go but at the same time that means she gives up the right to call me on the daily and begin every conversation with the words, "You took my grandchildren xxx miles away from me!" (I'm serious, almost every day that I live in California when she lived in NJ, she called me and this was what I got instead of Hello."  I'm sure you can imagine what my face looked like every single phone call....

I was going somewhere with this.

Oh yeah, the lottery.

I can't really say what else I would do.  I mean it's money.  I would help out a few mom and pop shops but mostly I would just life comfortably.  In England.  I have no desire to continue living in America really.  But that's a whole nother blog for a whole nother day.

Muwah!

Cigarettes and death

First off, on the subject of me missing last night's blog, Shut up.

Second I have come to a very stunning conclusion.  Cigarettes do not cause death as the Surgeon General has decided.  No, on the contrary, cigarette's save lives.  They save lives.  Lots of them.

Now I'm not much of a smoker; asthma prevents me from really testing my limits because I seriously don't want another lecture from another doctor on how I should give up altogether to breathe better.  Trust me when I tell you that many many MANY people are alive today because I was able to take a puff a cig.

I started in high school.  Here and there, it depended on who I was hanging out with.  Most of my friends were on the straight and narrow and the thought of a cigarette... ew!  Like even! But every now and then I might snatch a few minutes with someone that used a bathroom pass to sit in the stairways and puff close to the door.  Okay, Heather.  I smoked with Heather.  One or two others after she left Ocean but pretty sure that's where it started.

And in a world where I often felt like the token black in the room, cigarettes helped A LOT.  No one was going to die in high school.  But a lot of people were spared the ever hurtful  barrage of venom dripping tirades whirling through my head.

College was very little different.  Band people smoked.  College kids smoked.  Black college kids smoked black and milds.  Don't ask me what's in one because I really don't  want to lie to you.  More than a few times Mr. Grey was spared the poison in my head because I was able to find a cigarette.  Randy hated it.  And while he was giving me sex I stopped because let's face it.  Replace anger with orgasms and who needs nicotine?? Seriously.  I will take nicotine after orgasms but truthfully it's been so long since the orgasm that I'll stick with the nicotine.  Now when he went away to join the ever expanding cast of Dumbasses in a tin can a.k.a the Navy, (Ever witnessed a cult that had matching uniforms and a health plan?  Their mascot is an old man with a serious what not to wear problem.) I once again picked up my lovely little white friend but I also picked up his much larger brother, the bottle.  Yes I drank in high school, hell I drank in middle school and as far back as one year old.  I lived in Germany.  They MAKE beer for children.  But in college the pain of what I thought was my very first real boyfriend (turns out he was a not very friendly fuck friend) going away to make a man out of himself (It didn't work) was  significantly  less if I had a cup of very bad liquid in one hand and a 'cancer' stick in the other.  Also, after the summer before my ill fated sophomore year, the pain of realizing that I had passed on a possibly very good,  albeit very short, man in favor of Randy was dulled considerably with this method.  

And then I got pregnant.  And I'm not stupid, I know you don't smoke when you're pregnant.  You don't  smoke, you don't drink.   Also I had to move back home with my mother who had no idea that I did either and I worked at Value City.  It was not one of those really happy pregnancies.  I was angry.  Angry at Randy for knocking me up.  Angry at myself for letting it happen, angry at my mom because she never let me forget for one day that my life was more or less over, angry at the job that put an angry little cuss like me in charge of customer service simply because my mom could do it.  I was further angry at Randy's mother who's wedding toast THE NIGHT OF MY 'WEDDING' TO RANDY was, "Well, I guess I gotta keep you now."  As in she legally couldn't get rid of me.  Angry that I was once again in New fucking Jersey.  Angry that I didn't follow through on the very nice church that offered to get me into community college, set me up with housing, and find me a job with the only codicils being that I continued my  education, I continued going to church, and I keep my child.  (hindsight is a real bitch!)  All because I listened when they told me that we don't have unwed mothers in my family and that I needed to fix my mistake and marry him even though when he asked and I accepted WHEN I WAS NOT PREGNANT, he  reneged saying he only proposed because he was missing me.

Hi!  You were looking for one of the royal princesses of the fair land of Dumbass???  Right here.

After I had the boy, I could barely wait to get a cigarette in my hot little fingers again, but I didn't count on one thing.  We lived with a bunch of nosy assholes.  No one said a word in Dahlgren about it because I took long walks.  Long ones.  The corner store sold loose cigarettes and I discovered that if I went to take the trash out and hit there, by the time I circled back around to our apartment, I was done.  If I bought a coke at the same time you could neither smell or taste it on me, not that Randy didn much tasting.  When we moved to Newport News, we had his godfather living with us.  I was told it was to help me out with the baby but first off the man was so damn dirty he washed his underwear in the sink where I washed food and dishes WHEN WE HAD A WASHING MACHINE. When he got a piece of money he went and got beer and he turned violent but lest I say something to anyone about the fact that this grown man used to hit me when he got intoxicated.  Oh no, then he turned the story and said that he didn't hit me, he just knocked my cigarette out of my hand and I took it too personally.

Besides mothers and father all over the world, who has ever been able to knock that precious cigarette out of someone's hand and live to tell the story?  Exactly, my point.  If Rich had knocked the cig out of my hand he'd've been dead.  The truth, he was right there with me on the stoop smoking.  But he was family and I was just the wife so who do you think Randy believed??  He got off and I got yelled at by the mighty mighty husband for smoking and he knew how to get me because he claimed I was a bad mother for doing it.  "What kind of mother smokes??"

Uhm... yours.  Marijuana to be exact.  Several times a day.  While small children were in the house.

So I stopped smoking.  We started fighting and I started eating.  And somehow he we okay with this.  He'd go out to sea, his house would be taken care of, his godfather would be fed, the people living in our house were fed, he would come home, we'd have sex, we'd get in a massive fight, I would eat, he would leave for another deployment and the whole shebang would start all over again.

Somewhere in there we had two more kids, I moved back in with my mom, we moved to a different part of Virginia and I pretended for all who wanted to watch the show that shit was okay.  I was married, I had my kids, I was happy.

I spent YEARS wanting a cigarette.

Moved to California where he could further exert his manliness and make everyone think that we had one of those awesome marriages.  Serena was the only one that understood me at first because her marriage was shit.  We stood on our respective back porches passing cigarettes and coke.  Well she gave me a cigarette, we each had a coke, and passed the vodka back and forth.

Then she went away.  But it was okay because I got Carrie!  Yea for Carrie!  If my life was dysfunctional it was totally okay because she could top mine any given day, she drank, she smoked, she didn't much care if I snagged her cigarette once in awhile and we drank and best of all... our husbands shared a love of things electronic.  It was great!  They babysat each other like all the time.  Leaving us to be mom and women.

But like all good things in life, the navy said we must move back to Dahlgren.  

But again, life looked at me and said, "It's okay, I took you from the land of love and the people who understood you and brought you to hell, but I'm giving you Patty and Chelly."  And cats.  Lots of cats.

But marriage was just one thing I couldn't stand any longer so I had to leave the land of boozy Fridays and Phase 10.

And return to New Fucking Jersey.

I smoke, I drank and I did it alone.  I did have a bitof fun.  There were friends in there but I never really let any of them know that pretty much every night after I put my kids to bed, I cried.  Cried hard.  Because my life was shit.

I made the choice to move to NC.  i was going to start over in the country.  But Mom moved down here with me and my pipe dream of moving to the country that wasn't exactly the country because there would be a city and a Patty nearby turned into living in the city.  Or the burbs at least.

I just want to wiggle my toes in grass.  I just want to sit on a hill and watch the sun go down.  Or come up, I'm flexible.

Most importantly I wanted to find a guy that wanted to do the same.

"I'm moving to Raleigh."  Four words.  From the ex.  Life... void.
"I'm moving to New Mexico." Five words. From the ex.  Life reinstated.
"So what should we do today?" Six words.  From the mother.  Life voided.
"I'm moving back to North Carolina.  To Charlotte." Eight words.  From the ex.  Life null void and reassigned.

Countless gallons of alcohol and countless cigarettes later we are arrive at today.

No man.  No grass between my tootsies.  The man that lives near the grass my tootsies long for, doesn't want me. My tootsies never see the light of day because they stay crammed in my work shoes.  My boss's boss, doesn't appreciate me at all.  My boss, yes, her boss, not at all.

I just want my grass.

Until I get my grass however, I keep a pack of cigarettes in my car.  And when the stupid people come at me, or my mom, or my ex, I smoke.  And I don't cuss them out, or threaten them.

So Smoking doesn't kill.  Smoking saves lives.  On the regular.

The  surgeon General has probably never had a stressful day in their lives.

So I have this addiction....

To pretty underwear.

There's this saying that if you get a girl home and things get hot and heavy and you get her clothes off... if her bra and her panties match, you weren't the one to decide that you were going to have sex that night.

At this point in my quest to be the owner of all the pretty underwear and bras, I look like I  decided  to have sex every night of the week.  Like, if a guy got me down to my  skivvies  I would hope that he wouldn't think that was an automatic indication that I'm cool with going all the way.  You know like we are making out and the shirt come off cool and then he somehow gets in my pants (I really have no clue how this comes about because the last time I was at that point my brain was jumping up and down shouting "Yippie!" that absolutely NO thought was happening.  No observing of the course of events just feeling.) and he  sees  that the rug matches the curtains (Yes, I KNOW that is not the actual meaning for that) and figures "Oh hey well it's been decided.  We're getting laid!"

It started innocently enough.  I was transitioning out of sports bras and trying to find something girly.   I wear a uniform at work that makes me look like everyone else (at least that's the point they tell me cause I damn sure don't look like anyone else) so I wanted to look pretty under it.  And OMG!  Thanks the the lovely sales at Lane Bryant and the Avenue and those very evil people giving me an ever increasing line of credit, my collection has quickly become an obsession.  Counting the bra I am currently wearing... I have 25. (Not nearly enough in my opinion.) and so many pairs of undies that the collection has officially rolled over into TWO dresser drawers.

And I don't want help with this obsession.  My mom took over my \Avenue card which honestly is okay by me because I don't much like their bras.  I really only use the Avenue for pretty underwear and my jeans when I decide I need a new pair once a year.  But oh boy!  My Lane Bryant!!  Love love LOVE!!!

I guess the most awesome thing about this is, I don't do it for anyone but myself.  I don't actually care if a boy sees me in my matching skivvies.  They're to make me feel pretty.  Not for him to notice.

Sigh.  Have the big girls awards ceremony tonight.  Hope she wins!  Toodles.  May or may not see you later.  Either way, my blog for the day is official!  

Hairspray... as desecrated by the students of my daughter's middle school.

So I asked for tonight off because Olivia was in a school play... err. musical.. uhm... yeah

I didn't have high hopes because it's a middle schoo production and Charlotte middle schools pretend on a regular basis that they're broke as a joke.

But man, I didn't expect it to be THAT bad.

The girl who played Tracy Turnblad.  She was an okay singer. BUt I have the STRONG STRONG feeling that she got the part because she was well... a big girl.

Most of the cast didn't come close to knowing their lines.  Mind you Tracy was 90% more on point than anyone else who had more than five lines.  For that she gets mad props.

They seemed to mix the old movie, with the new movie, with the broadway play and the result was something that made a DIEHARD Hairspray fanatic like me want to cry.

Of course my baby was awesome.  Yes.  Yes I did just become that mom for a second.

It was bad y'all.

When Olivia came home early in the year saying that they were doing Hairspray, I was like well there are only like four roles she can play, Motormouth Mama Maybelle, LIttle Inez, or one of the dreamettes or whatever those girls were called.  There was the off but likely chance that she could also be random black dancer #2.  Olivia asked me why were those the only roles she could play and I looked at my child like I didn't give birth to and raise her.  Liek she was high and lost her mind.

Uhm, I replied... Because you're black...

To which she asked what that had to do with anything.

To those of you that have not for some reason unknown to anyone but God not seen any version of Hairspray, let me break it down to you.  It's a play/musical about race relations in the 60's in Baltimore.  As in Black and whites and segregation. So being that my child is black and she most definitely is black... there were only four or so roles she could play.

Now imagine my shock when she came home and said she'd gotten the part of Prudy Pingleton.

Let's recap shall we??

<---- 1988="" in="" p="" prudy="">
Prudy in 2007--->















What about this says "Let's give this role to a little black girl"??

I will tell you exactly what says that.  My child goes to a school where whites are the minority.  Blacks had primarily ALL of the roles both black and white.  Those that weren't black were Latino or in the case of Penny Pingleton (technically my daughter's daughter) Asian.

The only white child in the ENTIRE musical was in the chorus.

The Chorus.  As in couldn't get a role in a musical that was about blacks and whites in the 60's.

But I went.  And I clapped.  I grimaced, I talked smack about it, but I supported the babies.  With all my heart.  They did their best but next year see if I don't try to volunteer to help out and see if next years play isn't way better if I can.  No more of this practicing one day a week BS.  Nah sweetie we will practice from september to June twice a week and when we go on the stage will be more than a riser and people will talk about how decent it was if not even good.

I guess what I'm saying is no matter how bad it might be always go out and support the babies.  They mean well.  They really do and at the end of the day when they stand up to take their bow and see you clapping because unlike their damn daddy who couldn't even request tonight off work or their Stepmother who'd rather take your brother and go to a function at Elevation freaking wanna be a church but it's really a tv viewing every Sunday instead of supporting the "Stepdaughter that they love so much" you were there and they will love you just a little more for it.

Support the babies man.  Just support them.

Goodnight bloggers!  Love you!

Blog January 5, 2016

So yeah,  remember when I said the would be some ridiculously short blogs? This is one of them.  I'm so tired that my hair hurts and it has nothing to do with the fact that I tried to hot comb my hair tonight and might have singed a little off.

So blog blog blog blog.

Goodnight.

Yawn....

So... uhm...

Four days into the new year and I've already fallen down on my resolution....  That is actually a new high for me.  I usually stick with something for at least a week before I default back to my normal.

But to be fair, Mystery Case Files came out with a new game.

A NEW GAME!!!

I can tell by the crickets that you aren't as excited about that as I am.

Or was last night.

The shit is hard.

So the girls got back home last night.  I asked R to have them back to my house by seven so that they could do their chores and shower and go to bed on time.  Wanna know what time he bought them back?  A quarter to nine.  Bedtime is at nine.  They didn't get to bed until after ten.  Guess who had cranky kids this morning?

So I asked R to take Kay to her dentist appointment.  She was getting the last three or four of her twelve cavity horrorfest drilled.  He said to get her there and he would be there no later than 8:10 to sit in the waiting room for her and take her on to school since I needed to be at work by like 830 across town.  At 8:35 he called and asked if I could leave his number with the people at the desk because he was stuck in traffic.  Smile Starters doesn't work that way.  A parent must be in the lobby at all times in case they need you.  So no I couldn't leave his number and go.  Plus all her stuff was there.  He finally shows up at ten minutes to nine.  By now, I'm cold (the waiting room at smile starters is ALWAYS cold.  Even in the summer, it's friggin winter in there.  In the winter I swear I'm going to be frozen to my seat.)  So he gets there and I figure I'm already late so why try to face what is going to be a very long day without coffee?  Coffee is essential for making Dette calm enough not to cuss out the stupid customer, slap the rude ones and strangle chatty coworkers. So yeah added the extra five minutes on because hell in for a penny in for a pound, you know?  I was already going to spend the day playing catch up.  I always do when I get there late (Which is why I get there as early as possible... meaning anytime after five am because DD doesn't open till 5)  Get to work.  Have 40 minutes to sheet out and open the store.  I got this.  I'm super Dette.  No really I am because dammit I did it.

But then I looked over at the oven area and saw the mountain of Deep dish pans.  It is a general rule that if there are more than 12 pans you make deep dish dough.  Fill the pans and put the rest on trays to be sheeted later.

By the time I finished making all the balls (Shut up) I needed for the pans I had enough dough left for Lauren to make a junior pizza.

32 pans.  32 doggone pans.  Had to do that first and not concentrate on anything else because if you take your attention from Deep dish procedures for even a minute, that minute turns into ten and those ten turn into an hour and before you know it, you have lost an entire batch of deep dish dough because that crap rises so stupidly fast that you have about enough time to oil the pans before you have to start sheeting. So that took me until like one thirty and then stupid me started on her regular dough not looking at the time.  Because at 2 pm, I'm supposed to drop everything and do evening sheet outs. (I don't get to see the front of the store much when I open...)  Didn't finish that batc of dough until almost three so got started on the sheet outs while helping J do the Planet fitness order.

Aside:  Planet fitness orders over 130 dollars worth of pizza from us on the first monday of each month.  I have no problem with this.  Well I kinda do.  My moral compas kinda points due north most of the time so I don't see why a GYM orders PIZZA.  I actually asked a lady that works there once.  She was honest, I will give her that, but her explanation was that people eat the pizza and feel so guilty that they hop on the machines and work out.

Fucking brilliant.  Devious as hell, but fucking brilliant.

Shorter segway, I didn't get back to the rest of my dough until after five when the closing shift leader got there.  This is not an uncommon occurrence in Howies these days.  In fact I wasn't in trouble for it but it annoyed the piss out of me because I generally have my dough done before the evening sheet outs.  I get this single mindedness thing going and dough just gets done.  Today however, my brain was like, "Nope, don't talk to me, you didn't finish your cup of coffee, I'm not playing fair today, go fuck yourself."

I promised I would get A through rush.  Rush seemed to rush right on past Howie's tonight because by a quarter to seven it was so slow I think the clock was moving backwards.  I ran.  Ran far and fast.

So right now Charlotte is in the brink of a cold snap.  And by snap I mean a beefy jock wound up a towel and snapp our naked asses in the locker room.  It's so damn cold it hurts!!!  I usually love winter.  It's the one time I really don't have to take my allergy meds and two inhalers because everything is dying.  There's no damn dust.  This week, I have had to use my rescue inhaler because the air is so cold that when I get it into my lungs it's so cold it burns.

No shit... today the snot froze in my nose.  I am not kidding.  I stood outside to talk to my mom for about ten minutes.  The snot froze in my nose.  And when I went to blow it, not realizing that it was frozen and not just crusty (I have a snotty nose it's winter, if that's all I get I;m okay with this) it broke and tore skin from the inside of my nose.  Causing a nosebleed.  Once again my brain said, "You didn't finish your coffee, this is what you deserve."

So I am going to bed.  Early for me but there you have it.  My nose is still bleeding.  My feet hurt and this morning I discovered that if I take off my shoes while sheeting out the morning pizzas, I can't see the top of the sheeter because I'm just that short.  Yeah...

Goodnight.   I'm going to cuddle under my blankies!

Why did I resolute to do this every night again??

Oh yeah, new year new me... wait.  Nope that's not it.  There was a reason.  I know I had one.  It might have been with my butthurt feelings thinking that one day I'll look back and say that I was wise or something...

Knowing me, I'll look back and think.. "Was I drunk?"

Tonight, the answer would be yes.  I'm not even going to lie.

My intention tonight was to come home and tear into the bucket of hot wings I got from Wal-Mart and have a milkshake so that my mouth wouldn't be burning.  But I put a little too much Kahlua in my shake (Is there really such a thing as too much) and four wings in and I was full.  Throw them bad boys back in the fridge.  I wish I could say that I'll try again another night but my girls come back tomorrow so all leftovers are fair game.  We live on a "Eat it or lose it" kinda vibe.

Sorta like the Hunger Games, except I'm usually the first tribute to starve to death....

I had a direction I was going in tonight.

No I didn't.  I thought I did but I don't.

So yeah.  Jan, 2nd blog.

Weight: Not even looking
Money: If I could spend the money I draw, I'd be rich
Sanity: Uhm... what?
Chicken Wings this year: 8
Hours worked this year: 16/7 of 44
Hours slept this year: 8
Dates this year: Zilch

New year.... new me

...bullshit.

I'm going to be the same opinionated,  bossy bitch I was at 12:01 that I was at 11:59.

The only difference is,  now you will know it.

It's not so much a resolution as a basic saying is going to happen. 

I'm tired of being the one that everyone gripes to but no one listens to. I'm tired of people taking my good days and bringing me down because if they can't be happy then no one will.  I'm tired of my bad days not being all mine.  If I'm having a bad day,  freaking listen to me and console me don't tell me about your day which had to be ten times worse.

I'm thinking about getting my wrists tattooed this year.  One side will say,  "always remember who you are." Not sure yet what the other wrist will say but I want them on the insides if my wrists so that every time I look down at my hands,  I see it and remember it.

It's time I stopped trying to make everyone else's world a shiny happy place and start making my own world less gray.

It's time I start thinking about me.  My kids are going to be grown and out of the house soon and what will I do with myself then?  Go party?  Go hang out all night at friends houses drinking?  Work myself to death every night until all I can do is drop my body on the mattress and hope I wake up on time to do it all again tomorrow?

I always said that when my mom passed away,  I was going to pull up stakes in North Carolina and go where I want to go,  which up until last year was California.  Now honestly,  that's England. I don't have to live in London.  I had always kept to the saying that the only things that can make me stay here were a job that I couldn't leave our a marriage.  I can make pizza and count cash and do customer service anywhere.  Well maybe not count cash anywhere because the cash registers in Europe confused the hell out of me. And it's not like I'm getting married anytime soon.  The guy that I have been in love with FOR YEARS wouldn't know that I'm on the same planet as him if you showed him a live video of me dancing.  No other guys seem interested in more than the occasional screw.  So exactly what an I holding my breath for?

And I'm going to stop asking myself what is wrong with me.  There is nothing wrong with me.  Except that not one of my friends know who I am.  They think I'm an easy going push over. They think that I'm not mature enough.  They think that I'm going to freak out over the smallest little thing and let things blow way out of proportion.  They think that they can just idly pass me over for things that I deserve and that I'm going to smile and say it's okay. Because that's what I've done in the past. I bucked up and smiled, said it was ok,  then went home and cried and never let them see how much they hurt me.

You hurt me,  I will let you know. And then I will be through with you.  I spent 2015 looking back and making sure no one was left in the dust like I was the spearhead for no child left behind.  This year, if you fall behind I hope you don't choke on my dust too much.

I think that if I make a new years resolution, it will be this: I will blog every night before I go to bed.  Some blogs will be obscenely short while some may be obscenely long.  I will stick to one point,  I will not name names,  I will not defame anyone nor will I get overly personal.  This blog is for me and if you don't like it,  I'm not standing over you making you read.  Be a goddam adult and so coming to me whining about how I hurt your feelings when you obviously didn't give a damn about mine which is probably the reason you ended up in my blog in the first damn place.

Ring a ding ding. Let 2016 sing with me saying to the world that this is who I am and if you don't like it,  kindly exit through the door on the left. I have a daily cap on how much bullshit I can take and I'm sorry for you but if that limit is reached, you will be sol.

Let the year of Claudette begin.

Crazy Customers...

So we have this woman that comes into work that privately we call "Crazy Kim".  We call her this for a couple of reasons:

1. She dresses like she's Ghetto Beyonce on the run from the paparazzi.  Everytime.  Over sized shirt and ripped jeans with big sunglasses and a big coat.

2. She gets the same thing EVERY TIME but she claims that it's for her boss.  Well sort of.  The first time it was for her boss.  Then it was for her pregnant boss.  Now it's for her boss's kids.  This Boss went from not pregnant to pregnant to having kids that are able to eat an 8 inch turkey club calzone ON THEIR OWN in the space of like a year.

3. She claims her boss is a germaphobe who will come in and throw the food at us if we don't use gloves anytime we come near her food.

I totally understand germaphobic people but our ovens are 455 degrees.  As far as prep is concerned, we wash our hands and anything that might have been on our hands is burned off during the 7 minutes it's in the oven and we ALWAYS put on gloves to put lettuce and tomato on the sandwiches, but it's not enough for her.  We have to wear gloves to get it out of the oven, we have to wear gloves to carry it to the make line to get the lettuce and tomato and we have to wear gloves while boxing it, putting it in a bag and handing it to her.

Normally she is pretty chill and we crack jokes about her and keep trucking but today she was a little off her game.  I don't know, maybe she went somewhere where they refused to cater to her scrub your skin until it squeaks and then put on a fresh pair of gloves every time you come near my food requests but she was in rare form today...

First off I might need to add the disclaimer that I opened the store this morning so I was there at 8 and that I decided to skip my usual Starbucks and do today without my serious caffeine. (Seriously, I think I'm getting an ulcer and not just in my wallet) So I was approaching tired, I had already written up two employees this morning and fielded two angry customers and the ever tiring L before she came in...

I personally decided to stay away from her since I wasn't really feeling the whole quirky thing today.  I knew right off that it was going to annoy me more than amuse me today so I didn't even throw my hat in the ring.  Ivan handled her.  I went to take the pizzas for the three orders before hers out of the oven.  She sees me at the cut table and starts banging on the counter screaming at me to wear gloves.

AGAIN, I was uncaffeinated.  I looked at her and said "I'm not even near your food yet." and walked away.  Understandably, she didn't like that.  So when F was going to put the lettuce and tomato on them (I put them on the paper and wrapped them... screw the gloves.  We have shrinky dink gloves and that oven is 455 degrees have you ever tried to remove quick melt plastic from skin?? It's not fun...)  F had just washed her hands because she'd come from the lavatory.  But Crazy Kim didn't see that so when F went to put on the gloves, she started screaming at her.  F however was on a phone call on her bluetooth so she didn't realize that Crazy was screaming.  She saw me motion her back to the sink and because she respects me as a supervisor, she didn't say anything as she went back to rewash her hands.  Sometimes I love F. BUt the fact was that she was screaming at us over gloves.

Like I said, I don't know if she went somewhere and the refused to cater to her whims and she was taking it out on us but she's just about read the end of the patience of the staff of Hungry Howie's Sugar Creek.  We take a lot but there's only so much we take.  I think I might talk up the university store and suggest she go there...

Insert evil laughter here...

I'm tired... so tired...

Seriously... Can I stop being an adult now??  Please?  I just want to crawl in my bed with my pretty pajamas on and just stay there.  Color in bed, have my mommy bring me lunch and dinner in bed and not have to move all day.

And the sad thing is that I don't mean that in my funny haha always sunny in Claudetteland kind of way.  I am totally serious.  I'm tired.

I'm tired of being the one that everyone comes to when they need something.  Like seriously everyone.  If you need it, ask Dette, she most likely has it and even if she doesn't have it, she'll find a way to get it even if it puts her account negative, her gas tank in the red and her sanity in the trashcan.  She'll do it.  She'll drop everything and do what you need.

I'm tired of listening.  Tell Dette.  Dette will listen.  She may say uh huh and yeah and Mmm a few times making you think that she's half ignoring you and therefore letting you vent on and on and on but trust me, she hears you.  And her brain is working overtime trying to figure out a way to fix it for you.  Or help you fix it.  Or find someone that can help you fix it.  She hears you and she's wracking her brain trying to help you.  She has a million other things that actually concern her to think about but there's not time for that because she has to fix it for you.  Because you're her mother/friend/brother/cousin/dog's babysitter's groomer.  You matter.  You matter more to her than you know so she has to help you.  Because you matter.

I'm tired of taking fifteen steps forward and getting knocked back twelve.  NOt quite behind where I started but still so close I can see where I started from.  I got a raise at work.  Awesome right?  No.  Not awesome because along with my most fantabulous raise, I got less help that I've been getting.

I admit it, I'm on Food stamps and section 8.  But because I got a job that is paying me decent money, they have cut my food stamps.  Again.  First I was at six hundred eighty.  Then they cut it by $80.  Then I got the job and they cut it to $387.  Then $363. Today... today I found out that they've cut me to $266.  My section 8 has raised my rent.  I' not saying how much online but it's not a pretty number and it was an unexpected jump.  I came home yesterday and found out that my Gas had been shut off so we're taking cold showers.

But my kids need school supplies.  My kids need food.  I have pared my bills down to the bare minimum and still I can't get ahead.  My paycheck has been going to fill in the blanks for the Gas (Which apparently I failed at since they shut the crap off) Electric, and rent because the child support caseworker that was assigned to my case can't seem to actually do her job and get my child support reviewed.  I have been getting three hundred for five years.  A lady came into the store the other night and she had the same child support card I have and we got into a brief conversation about it.  I told her what I get and she told me that she makes $1500 plus on her kids.  First off she annoyed me because no lady, you don't make that money.  The man or men that you laid down with is supporting his kids.  But still... Mine is based on temp jobs that my ex was doing years ago.  He now has a $32/hour a job and she swears she can't find his jobs company in the database.  It's the FAA.  The Federal Air Administration.  Out of Washington D.C.  But she can't find it.

I'm tired.  I'm tired of being unexplainably head over heels for a guy that doesn't see me as a human being much less a woman.  I'm tired of listening to everyone tell me about their sex lives while I'm over here trying to get some and coming up woefully short.  And I do mean short because I took a chance and put myself out there and the guy... he was smaller than my pinky and couldn't get it up.  He used his fingers like a jackhammer and by the time he was done, I was in so much pain that moving for the following week took extreme concentration.

I know I've said this before, but people out there who are in relationships and have single friends... WE DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT YOUR SEX LIVES!!!!  AT ALL!!! Chances are we are so wildly jealous of you that we would knock you into unconsciousness and mount your guy to fix our problem in a heartbeat.  I personally don't have any friends that I would knock out to steal their men. But still.

I'm tired.

I'm so tired.

I just want to sit down and not adult for awhile.