Sounding better

I just got a call back from Answers in Genesis.  I'm to go in for a second interview tomorrow at 16:00.  It will be squeezed in between my two jobs, but the guy I just talked to did mention that training would start soon and that they would want to get me in (assuming they make me an offer).  I think I'll leave a note for my manager at bigg's tonight letting him know that I'm seriously looking for work and may be leaving there soon.  My other job I'll wait to talk to them as I want to wait until I have something definite.  I'm just not sure about timing and the traditional two week notice.  Technically I don't have to give it with a temp job, and I may have to go that route--but I'm not sure.  I'm not even sure I'll get a good offer at this point, so I just need to wait and see.

~Matt

--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

Oh My!

I was woken up early this morning, about thirty minutes early in fact. There were perhaps ten to twenty minutes of thunder quite audible in my apartment around 05:30 this morning.

There wasn't much rain on my way into work, but I thought that perhaps it would be raining when I left, so I dug around in my car for an umbrella. I found it, but then forgot it on my seat. Naturally it was raining when I left so my coat (I don't have a true rain-jacket, :() got a bit wet as I walked the long walk out to my car. The picture is one I took from the driver's seat of my van before I started the windshield wipers up on my way out of the parking lot.

It was coming down pretty hard for part of the time on the way home. I hope it doesn't start up again while I'm at bigg's. Lightning will keep me from doing carts--but I doubt it will keep up until ten, meaning I'll just have less time to pull them in.

~Matt

Snow Day

Yes, today was a snow day. Yesterday I was late getting into work because my driveway wasn't plowed by my landlord when I needed to leave for work. I tried to get out, but only managed to get my van stuck. Then I did manage to get unstuck, but only to get back into my garage--not up to the street. Today the roads were a bit dicey and so I called in to say I wouldn't be coming in. I don't plan to do it again unless a snow emergency prevents me from driving, but it was a relaxing day. Here are a few pictures from the neighborhood.

The first is a tree down the street from my sister's place. All of the trees are covered in ice--which is beautiful, yes. However, I'm not so much in favour of all of the other things that are covered in ice (like power lines and grocery carts).

Next you can see the "gum balls" from the tree in my sister's front yard. I think this close-up turned out rather well. I still need to read the book for the camera--but at least I have the macro setting figured out!

I do like shots of everyday objects that have been changed--hence the third shot of an old playhouse. You can really see how the branches were all covered in sheathes of ice and icicles. The pine trees had it much worse due to their flexible branches and abundance of needles.

I did manage to stay warm. I bundled up somewhat as I do when out with carts at bigg's. Here is a shot of me. I've not been outside in the sunlight so long that my glasses turn for quite a while and I'd honestly forgotten that I owned Transitions lenses! You wouldn't believe (especially if you're Sunny Mark) how warm I can be out working in the freezing cold. The rain doesn't even bother me any more because of the new waterproof gloves(now fully tested!) my dad sent me. Thanks again Dad!!

Next you can see one of the bushes in front of my sister's place. This again is indicative of most of the bushes that I could see--covered with ice, and perhaps a bit of ice-covered snow if any had managed to accumulate prior to the freeze.

Finally below you can see what awaited me as I drove up to bigg's last night. Every horizontal surface that I could see was covered by icicles. Unfortunately many of them (actually nearly all to those that haven't been broken off) were still around today. This is causing problems for Duke Energy, who can't fix things fast enough, even with several hundred workers coming in from other Duke-powered states to help out. Right ow several thousand people are still without power. I do have more pictures, not not enough time to go through them.

~Matt

PS Check out my Picasa web albums. I just added a couple of good snow images--I might have to start a separate category for these--and a fun one of a candle. I do like how the close-up turned out on the cart corral icicles. If only I had actual free time during the day I would take more of these pictures. Unfortunately I don't have that time. Though one of these days I'm really considering leaving getting a substitute for Titanic one day so that I can have a weekend where I do not have to get up earlier than I want to once!
PPS

From Objective Bac...

PPPS

From Objective Bac...

Eventful, eh?

This is my car, or rather the current condition of the rear end of my vehicle. The vehicle is over ten years old (it is a 1994 Ford Aerostar that my parents purchased at the very end of the model year) yet not in terrible shape.

Earlier this winter (during the first snow, which I'd forgotten about because it has been so mild since) I did have to replace the starter, but that is about all I've had to do since I purchased the van from my parents.

Last March I was involved in a minor accident, but no structural damage occurred and everything went on as normal. Yesterday was a different story. If you happen to live in northern Kentucky or the Cincinnati area then you'll probably recognize what I'm about to describe--or perhaps you know of something similar where you live. The exit ramp from Hell! No, I'm not exaggerating, this belongs along the route to Sheol.

Both I-75 and I-71 (I almost typed the 75 and the 71 before I remembered that I'm not in California, ;-)) run north/south (odd numbers) through Cincinnati. They actually split right north of the river to take divergent courses through the city, after joining together some twenty or thirty miles south of the river. I-275 is an interstate route that roughly runs around the city.

The exit I use to get to bigg's is the Erlanger exit off I-75/71. Unfortunately as you exit to your right two lanes join this off-ramp area to the further right. One is a straight on-ramp, the other is a merging lane from I-275. Now to actually exit the freeway you need to merge right at least one lane, but preferably two. Most of the traffic coming in from the far right (and always going a good clip) wants to merge to the far left, rather than exiting the freeway. This is bad enough when traffic is light and the lanes essentially need to switch from right to left and left to right. Now mix it up some.

Add in heavy rush hour traffic coming into the exit ramp area from the right and add in a setting sun that has been hitting you in the eyes (despite your lowered sun shield) for the past ten minutes. All of this together is a recipe for disaster.

I was trying to move over to the right so that I could exit and get to bigg's when I realized I wouldn't make it over. Since the car ahead of me was also having difficulties moving the driver had had to come to a stop. I also had to stop behind him, a bit quickly, but still safely. Unfortunately the car behind me did not have such good fortune. He did hit his brakes, but too late to avoid slamming into my bumper.

The impact was at a low speed, and I wasn't physically injured, but he did damage my bumper as you can see above. His car was damaged slightly, but nothing like what happened to my bumper. I'm not sure yet what his insurance will cover--I'm waiting to find out. I need to get the police report sometime near the end of the week (if I have time to go to the police station). Thankfully it isn't structural damage and I could survive without fixing it (I don't have collision insurance for my vehicle because of its age), it just wouldn't look pretty. Unfortunately my trailer hitch (which I haven't used yet--but I have hopes of using if the van holds out for years yet) was jarred out of place. I'm not sure if it is currently safe and/or usable. :(

On a more positive note I have my security badge for work. The Kentucky plant just issued me a contractor's badge--but the Ohio facility is larger and has actual security personnel (or at least one). They insisted on giving me an actual badge. Unfortunately I forgot to comb my hair before the picture, and my glasses were dark. I have Transitions lenses that turn dark in the sun, but before my long walk to the guard shack today I haven't spent enough time outside in the sun for them to go dark in many, many weeks.

~Matt

Backwoods

Last night I was talking to someone I haven't seen for quite a while at bigg's. Eric is in security and now is the manager for that department as well as Carts and Housekeeping. During the course of the meeting he noticed my watch (I wear my old watch there so my nicer one won't get beat up as much) and all the duct tape holding the band together. He asked why it had so much Kentucky Chrome on it.

~Matt

Looking up

Today I did get out of the Museum early, but I had a good time.  It was quite busy, but I was at all the right places and got to be quite helpful and stay busy--an enjoyable day overall.  Right now I'm at my sister's house downloading podcasts.  In a few minutes we're going over to a neighbor's place for dessert.  :-)

Also I wasn't on the schedule for bigg's tomorrow, so I'm not going in.  I was sure they wanted me to work tomorrow, so I'm not sure what changed.  I'm not complaining mind you, I wasn't looking forward to it!  I just hope it wasn't next Sunday they were thinking of without telling me that.

~Matt

--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

Weekend

I am not looking forward to this weekend.  I agreed to work at bigg's on Sunday from 16:00-22:00 (I told them I didn't want to do a full eight hours).  Sure my paycheck will be a big bigger, but that means I don't get my normal day that is completely off.  I really need to get all of my laundry done.  My last few loads have only been stopgap measures.  I'd really like to do it all and then stay on top of it.

Hopefully I'll be able to leave Titanic a bit earlier tomorrow than I have been, just because otherwise I won't have much free time at all this weekend.  Next weekend they wanted me to work bigg's on Saturday and I said no--I'm already booked at the Museum and I won't give that up for bigg's--especially when they knew I don't work Saturdays and gave the day off to two other people--leaving only two effectives when you really need three to cover an entire day.  I try to be flexible, but I'm not going to go to an extreme especially when it would keep me away from the museum for two weeks.

~Matt

--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

A bit chilly?

I got a weather report from California this weekend.  My sister that lives right near TMC told me that when the temperature got down to 15º their pipes froze!  They didn't have running water until ten something in the morning (after she'd gotten back from a doctor's appointment).  They aren't exactly used to weather quite this cold. It can get below freezing (slightly) at night there (a bit north of LA), but not usually this cold.  I heard from my mom yesterday that thankfully only one pipe burst, and it was out back, not in the house.

Meanwhile in northern Kentucky we've been having a mild rainy winter.  I'm not complaining too much, except being outside with carts tonight at bigg's I'd rather have snow that I can brush off rather than cold rain that will chill me.  *shrugs*  Overall we've had many days in the hight forties fr fifties and few that get below the twenties.

~Matt

--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

Cleaning

I need to clean.  Saturday I was busy with the Museum, movie, and dinner, and yesterday I was either at church or my sister's place.  I really need to find some free time to clean things up and finally get rid of my Christmas decorations.  As much as I enjoyed having me decorations up, I'm ready for them to be gone and packed away until another year.

In this vein I need to find some free time to stop by St. Vincent de Paul and see if they have any useful furniture.  I'm not sure what I could fit into my living room, but I might be able to find something that could work better than something I have now.  Eventually I need to find a desk that is actually big enough for what I need (but that can wait).  Right now I need a bit more book space and some drawers/shelves to put things now stacked or on the floor.  I'm not sure what I'm looking for, but I think I'll know when I find it.

In the middle of this I need to get some sleep.  I haven't been getting enough lately.  I still operate and work at work, but getting up is harder.  I'm finding it way too easy to sleep in and do everything (shower, pack lunch, get dressed) at the very last minute or second.  I would much rather have some time to eat breakfast, wash any dishes, and relax for a few minutes.  It would even be nice to be able to get up early enough that on a few days I could swing by McDonald's for one of their delicious breakfast meals.

In other news (and I know I've mentioned this many other times) I'm really getting tired of bigg's.  I need to closely examine my budget and see if I really need the job.  If I can get by without it and try to find another I'm seriously considering it--or even if I can get by without another.  I would dearly love to have my evenings free.  It would make dinner and cleaning much easier.  Plus I wouldn't feel pressured to squeeze so much into every weekend.  They wanted me to work some weekend days coming up and I pretty much said no (but felt guilty).

On one hand I dislike bigg's enough that I don't want to spoil a completely free day (like Sunday) working there, especially when that is half my weekend.  On the other hand I feel some loyalty to be as flexible as I usually try to be at work.  On the third hand, part of the reason my weekends are so full is that I try to spend time with my sister (I hate being alone at my apartment for hours when they're just across the street).  I think I would do that less exclusively on weekend nights if I had other nights free to spread my time out.

~Matt

--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

One more night

I have only one more night at bigg's this week, and hopefully it won't rain. I have to do carts tonight, which I don't mind having started listening to podcasts, but it will be difficult if it is raining.



~Matt

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Update?

Yeah, I plan to update tonight, but I have to leave for bigg's in a bit.  :(  I really don't want to work tonight after having the day off, but I don't have a choice.  I can only hope it won't be too busy.

~Matt

--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

Electronics

Apparently they aren't very profitable these days. The bigg's store where I work (Florence, KY) is shutting down its electronics department effective the end of January. A few components (accessories) will remain, but all DVDs (save perhaps new releases), CDs (same caveat as DVDs), and game systems will go. Apparently the store makes more money on a X-Box 360 controller than it does on the system that costs ten times as much to purchase.

I can certainly understand this in business terms, though it is somewhat unfortunate for those trying to do "one stop shopping." Of course other departments have already been downsized or eliminated over the years, so you'll mainly get groceries and other items at the bigg's Hypermarket. One item really stood out. One recent DVD release was purchased by the store for $19.50 and sold for $19.99 leaving a profit margin of $0.49!! One stolen DVD could wipe out the profit from almost forty more.

~Matt

0º

That is the projected wind chill for today.  Brrr...  Thankfully I'm working inside all day, even if a bit late up at the museum.  A last minute event runs until 23:00.  Last night was a different story.  All I was missing was long underwear--I either need to buy some, or borrow some long term from my brother-in-law.

I had two pairs of socks (one pair thick), boots rated as insulated, pants, T-shirt, uniform button shirt, long sleeved uniform pullover, heavy winter jacket, small gloves (nearly skintight cloth), thick gloves.  Then I had my ball cap on my head, wrapped my six foot Pashmina (Christmas present last year from my sister and brother-in-law--he bought it in Turkey) around to cover my mouth, and pulled a knit cap over the top to further protect my ears.  Except for my legs I was actually warm and could function as I pulled carts in.  I'm glad nobody called my work phone as I could hardly have answered it.  I did have a problem with my glasses fogging up though, so I tried to keep wiping them off or looking over them blurringly.  It wasn't great fun, but it wasn't as bad as I'd expected either.

~Matt
--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

50º

Well I finally turned my heat on yesterday.  With temperatures back down to 20º and showing no signs of warming up too much in the near future I decided it was finally time to bite the bullet.  However, I've only set the thermostat to 50º.  If I'm going to be around for a few hours (such as this evening when I'm not at bigg's, yeah!) I will probably turn it up a bit.  However, when I'm only around to sleep and for a couple of hours before that it is pointless to keep the place toasty.

Additionally I don't like sleeping in a warm room.  It should be cold (or at least cool) in a bedroom in winter.  I'm sure that Mark won't want to visit anytime soon, but I suppose that if he did I would turn the heat up so he wouldn't turn into a human popsicle.

But more about bigg's.  Apparently because I need Friday off to work and event at the museum they only need me to work three days this week.  I'm not going to complain.  Yes, my paycheck will be a tad lower, but on the other hand I've put in many extra hours at the museum for this two-week pay period.  Last week I had 27 hours.  That isn't bad when I planned on just 8 per week!  :-)

~Matt

--
"A room without books is as a body without a soul." -Cicero

Back to work

Well today I go back to work--we'll see how it goes. For my part I'm still resolved to leave as soon as possible, ;-). I'll still work as hard as ever, and do my best to ensure no futher misunderstandings occur. I also need to return my benefits package information saying that I don't want benefits. I don't know how long I'll keep the job, but probably not long enough to have benefits. See, by law you are supposed to take several breaks throughout your day--e.g. in an eight hour day you take two fifteen minute paid breaks and a half-hour lunch (unless your employer said to take more...) Well they neglected to tell me at bigg's that if I take that lunch I will not meet the 40 hour per week average required to acquire benefits in three months. You can only do that if you skip your full lunch--as apparently many people do. I prefer that break, that half-hour of sanity in the middle of my day, so I always take it. Grr...just another bad thing about the whole place.

I've turned in an application at McDonalds to apply to be a manager--my nephew who works there thinks I can get the job. I'm hoping! Even if it doesn't pay more it should be a better job and look much better on my resume. I have several other applications pending on-line, and I should be calling my brother tomorrow night to talk career and job-hunting advice. I was supposed to call him the last two nights, but Tuesday I was at McDonald's applying and last night my event ran longer than expected. *sigh* Hopefully nothing will happen tomorrow night--I'm off and have no events scheduled, so I should be fine (unless Murphy strikes again!).

~Matt

Short Work

Just before dinner I recieved a call from work. Apparently one of my co-workers never showed up for his shift. I'm off today, but they wanted to know if I would come in for two hours tonight. I thought about it for a moment, and realizing that I wasn't doing anything much (and I'll be working 9-5 the rest of the week) I said yes. As a bonus, because they don't want to pay overtime, they'll let me go two hours early on Thursday.

Today we all (including my parents who are visiting) went down to Lexington to watch my nephew Ryan play his last soccer game of the season. It was quite hot (up to 90 F) and muggy, but an interesting time nonetheless. On the way back we stopped at bigg's and purchased more corn. Last night I bought ten ears for $1.00, and the prices were still good today so my sister, mom, and I all went in. We cooked up some today and will probably have the rest tomorrow night. They aren't the biggest ears, but for the price I can't complain--plus they did taste good!

Right now I'm waiting for my clothes to come out of the dryer. I was planning to wash them tonight, tossing them in the dryer before I headed to bed if necessary--but that wouldn't work going in. All of my work clothes were dirty. So I threw in a load as soon as I said I'd come in, and I think I'll have just enough time for them to dry before I need to put them on.

~Matt

Long Overdue

But at least there aren't any fines for late blog posts, eh? Not like the library, but I don't get free books for blogging so perhaps the library is better after all :-) When you read the Superheroes and Villians episode LIV you should notice a reference to this period (or unperiod?) of my blogging. ;-)

Well I have several items of note, I'll start with the most recent first. My birthday was this Tuesday. I've now been residing on this terrestrial ball for twenty-four years! *sigh* I feel old (I know I'm not objectively old, I just feel like I am), I'm sure 25 will feel quite strange.

Along with that comes news of a couple birthday presents. The first is pictured to the right and below. When I moved out I left my mom with some of my favourite shirts that I didn't really have any reason to wear any more. After all I've been out of high school for six years this June, why would I want to wear a senior shirt from my high school anymore? Especially when it is on the other side of the country. Well my mom and dad went the extra mile and made me this quilt/bedspread for this birthday. Wow, I was quite surprised when I opened the package. I hadn't expected anything like this! Included are all of my school shirts--from my elementary schools, junior high, high school (including Academic Decathalon, PE, and my senior class shirt!), as well as several of my favourite Habitat animal shirts and a couple others. (I just realized that many not know about Habitat shirts. Their factory used to be located in Colorado--before they moved to Mexico--and we would buy "damaged shirts there." Usually there was little wrong with them, but the prices were great. Their shirts feature all kinds of wild animals and they usually make shirts for companies like Bush Gardens and other similar venues. All of the animals you can see on the quilt/bedspread are from Habitat shirts) You can also notice that she took smaller logos from the shirts and put them between the other squares, 'tis wonderful!

Oh, and the second picture is a bit messy because I just threw it on my bed for a picture, no thoughts being directed towards neatness at that particular moment.

The second "present" also comes from California. Last year my youngest older sister informed the family that she was pregnant. This is Erin, the one I lived near during college. Well her due date was early March, so of course I hoped for her baby to be born on my birthday. One of my nephews here was born on March 10th and I always tease my eldest sister Laurie about "waiting four more days." Well I now share a birthday with my 18th nephew! :-)

Now strawberries. Strawberries are my favourite food. I cannot get enough of them! This was fine growing up in California with stands literally just down the road. We always had plenty during the season and my parents would fix strawberry shortcake and strawberry pie. Mmmmm...delicious! Well moving to Kentucky has made finding decent strawberries difficult. Nowhere grows strawberries like Southern California, nowhere! Working in bigg's as I have I pass by the produce department every day, so I finally had to buy a box of strawberries for myself. These are huge California berries (I didn't take this picture until I had eaten most of them) that while not as good as those purchased from the stand weren't bad at all.

To make sure that my precious berries wouldn't get eaten by the rest of the family I labeled them very plainly: "Touch and Die! ~Matt" Of course then my sister had to leave her own note: "Not only did I touch them--I thoroughly licked and drooled on them : )" She is an evil person isn't she?

Okay, the job. Well they hired me telling me that I would be doing carts mainly and that housekeeping would come eventually--I shouldn't worry about such duties right now. Well of course it was housekeeping duties that I started off doing--then came carts, ;-). Now I do both fairly regularly, but they each have their ups and downs.

Carts is outside which can be good in nice weather, though it is more physical. But on the plus side I get quarters! The carts at bigg's connect to each other via small chains. To unhook a cart to use you need to place a quarter in the device on the handlebar. Once you return your cart and lock it into place your quarter pops out. It is a great way to encourage people to return carts to the cart corrals. Plus it keeps carts together when we cart people have to bring them in. Well sometimes people don't retrieve their quarters--and in that case we cart people get to keep them! My best day so far is $8.00!! My lowest was $.025 because I only retrieved one cart that day--every other day has been at least one dollar. Currently I have $45.25 in quarters in a jar. I'm considering saving until the jar is full and then I'll splurge on something, or many somethings! :-)


The other side of my duties is housekeeping. Once an hour I have to walk to about twenty places around the store and scan barcodes. Basically this ensures that I'm visually inspecting the floors of the stoor at least once an hour. In between the "logs" (as these scans are called) I go out and clean up reported spills, I clean the bathrooms, and I go out and help to bring in carts so as to retain my sanity and not just stand around bored. Sometimes I give myself a mission to find some product so that I can beter familarize myself with the store. The bad part of this job is that the store floors are quite hard (harder than the asphalt and concrete outside) and my feet are always sore after a shift indoors. I need to get new reliably waterproof boots anyway. I might make sure to get some gel insoles at the same time to help me out!



Now for some webcomic news. As you may not know I read an ever increasing number of webcomics. Yes, I definately have taste and there are many that I've tried that I'll never touch again. But I also have a good sized bookmark folder waiting for me to sort through, and if I like the comic, I want to go through and read all of the archives. I recently found three awesome strips by the same author. Nip and Tuck is about a pair of fox brothers. They're rednecks, but wonderfully sensible and conservative! Tales of the Questor is normally only published once a week I belive, but it is a larger full colour spread. It is an epic fantasy tale that often leaves me thinking that the author is a genius because he catches and plugs many potential plot holes before they can begin to leak! I've finished reading all of Nip and Tuck but I'm not quite yet done with Questor. Now another reason I'm enjoying it is because of the spiritual implications. I haven't figured out if it is true fantasy, sci-fi, or allegory--whatever it is it is awesome. Finally you have Under the Lemon Tree/Goblin Hollow (I'm not sure which is the real name). I've only started going through this one--but a while back it crossed over with another strip I read. It features Ben the bear and all the physical manifestations of his subconscious. It looks like great fun.

Please go and check these wonderful webcomics out, and if you can help the artist out by buying something. I'm very definately adding these to my list of comics I want (nay need! ;-)) to buy in book form.

Well thanks everyone for bugging me. I've been somewhat worn out for the past few weeks with many 14:00-22:00 and 15:00-23:00 shifts. Plus once I put something off like the work part of this post that action becomes habit and hard to break. ;-)

~Matt

PS Thanks to Wikipedia for the shopping cart image. The article alco contains a reference to the kind of carts that we use at bigg's:

Sometimes the customer has to pay a small deposit by inserting a coin, which is returned if and when the customer returns the cart to a designated cart parking point. Some retailers sell "trolley tokens" as an alternative to coins, often for charity. The mechanism can often be unlocked by inserting a keyinto the slot to open the lock.

We don't sell tokens, but they give them to the cart control employees so we don't have to use our own quarters to unlock and lock carts.

bigg's

I'm now employed. bigg's is a local grocery chain and I've gained employment there. 'Tis full time, which will be great, and the pay isn't that bad. The only bad part is the department--carts control and housekeeping. I'll treat it like any other job and do my best, but this wasn't what I imagined doing when I set out to find work! ;-) For now I'm going to work and build up my savings. I'll keep my eyes out for an office or other higher paying full time position as well.

Perhaps I should have posted this earlier, but for some reason I didn't. I figured it was time now as I have to be at my orientation/training in an hour. :-)

~Matt