TechGirl's Little Blog

I'm having serious issues with Wordpress so I'm switching over to Serendipity as soon as JR gets it all installed and set up for me. It has a plug-in that will automatically update your myspace or livejournal when you update your blog, so I was thinking I might use that for MySpace. I'll still have my blogroll thing on the side and probably my dreamstime icon.

What will be new is that I'm going to have two blogs - a normal one and a "photo-a-day" blog which most likely won't have any text, but links to such places as my gallery on shutterstock, dreamstime, fotolia, and alamy (if they accept me). Also, I'm going to start putting my non-stock photos up for sale through dpchallenge so there'll be a link to that as well. You can check it out when it goes up, if you wish. It's mostly just to see if I can make any money. I'll be using BlogExplosion to up my exposure to the public.

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I'm not sure what went wrong but WordPress is really fucking up and won't let me add pics or links anymore. I'll most likely be changing software soon.

Anyway, updated kitten pics are here: http://www.josieweb.com/jpics/main.php?g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=10294

Here's the announcement from Saturday's contest:

Beavercreek Band & Color Guard wins Grand Champion at the 2006 Troy High School Band Invitational!

• The BHS Band won class AA, and won Best General Effect, Best Marching, Best Color Guard, and Overall Grand Champion at their first contest of the season.

Diane...according to Joe's itinerary, BHS will be at another contest in Tipp City this weekend. You and I should go to one of the contests when both the boys will be there. I know for sure I'm going to a contest in Marietta, OH on Oct 21st, but no idea who'll be there. State is at Welcome Stadium on Nov. 5th. I think i'm gonna try to hit that, too.

So it's really Saturday night, but as far as the work week is concerned, it's Friday. It's been a pretty good night so far.

Last week, if you'd have asked, I would have told you that I thought my time here at Big German Company was going to be short-lived. However, my boss sorta gave me the idea I was wrong.  There is a guy on my team who is the guru of everything…this guy has to be a genius. Whenever there is a major project planned, he is the go-to guy and in control. I’ll call him Bob. I know a lot of Bobs. So, anyway, I got really ill Friday morning and left work early. Later in the day, I was having an email exchange with my boss and he said he hoped I felt better and not only because he was being nice but because Bob had the weekend off and there was a big upgrade planned to our ticketing system and he’d hoped I’d be there to help the team that was performing it. I know, it’s not much, but it was a major compliment to me. And the upgrade did, indeed, go fine. And they did ask for my help and it all went well. Yay.

So, last night was kinda fun. I slept til 8pm when I was awoken by a very wet 2yo yelling that I had to come outside. This was followed by a shirtless wet (yum) husband telling me I had to come outside. I got up, looked out the window, and noticed Gary’s car was there. I got up, got dressed, and went outside to find 4 huge catfish laying on my driveway while my husband stood there with a hatchet. To be honest, I was quite appalled at the murder about to take place. So, I was pretty happy to leave with Gary to go to Meijer to buy some flea bombs and to pick up Jessica from work.

Gary and I went were going to go to Big Lots to see if they had flea bombs because for some reason, he gets a discount there. I told him we may as well go to Meijer because I promised I’d buy him a pair of shoes for his new job. First we went to the mall where Jess works at one of the restaurants. She made me and Gary sandwiches to take home and he and I helped her clean up and get ready to leave. It was kinda fun. Then we three went to Meijer and I bought them some groceries and the shoes he needed. We got back home just in time for me to change clothes and leave for work.

JR IM’d me a little while later and told me that the kids had catfish for dinner and absolutely loved it.

On the way to work, my sister called me really excited and happy. Apparently, there was a big regional marching band competition in Troy and my nephew’s band (my alma mater) took first place in 5 out of 5 categories. She was just ecstatic and very proud. I’m really happy and proud of Joey. I’m going to try to go to one of the next competitions.

Okay…that’s it….later!

Today was kinda fun…I came home from work at 4am feeling awful and nauseous. I slept from about 5am til little Red woke me up around 11am. When we got up, Josie was already up and eating breakfast. We all got dressed and Red and I took Josie to school. At that point, I wasn’t feeling well at all, so Red and I went back home and I laid around on the couch for a little while and played with some pictures. JR went out and got us lunch and I went back to bed again at about 2:30. JR and Red picked up Josie at 3 and I was still awake when they got home so I decided to get up and call my mom to see if she wanted to go shopping. I didn’t really WANT to go cuz I felt like shit, but I needed to go because I needed a new dishwasher since ours died the other day.

Mom and I went to HHGregg and she helped me pick out a new dishwasher. I also stopped at Michael’s and picked up some Fall themed props for my photography. I need to pick up some better lighting soon, too.

That reminds me…the other day, my parents washing machine died so she and dad went out and bought a new washer/dryer set. It just happens that our dryer has been acting up and making weird noises lately, so we were very accepting when mom and dad asked us if we knew anyone who wanted their old dryer. So, now we have a new-to-us dryer and a new dishwasher. Yay us.

When I got home from shopping with my mom, Gary called and reminded me that tonight was the night that family was allowed to walk through the haunted house where he works. He had cleared it with his boss that Josie could go through afterwards when the lights were on so it wouldn’t be scary.

I arrived at the haunted house at 9pm when he said they’d be letting family members in. I had Josie wait in the car with JR. At 9:40pm, we still hadn’t been let in and I had to leave for work at 10pm.  Some of the people in line had little kids, so I figured what the hell…I went and got Josie out of the car and took her with me. I made sure she knew that it was all an act and told her not to be scared. We grouped up with another little girl her age and her grandparents and into the haunted house we went. I was really proud of her. She didn’t cry at all, but instead she actually laughed at the monsters and some of the scary situations they put us in. The other little girl cried and cowered against her grandma. At one point, the girl’s grandma was scared to go into the next room and the grandpa said “let Josie go in, she’s not scared of anything”.

Since taking Josie in with me was a last minute decision, I didn’t have time to tell Gary that she’d be there, so he was surprised to see her. We walked into is room where it was dark and there were flashing strobe lights. He came running out in his bloody clothes, mask, and chainsaw and went right for Josie. He hunkered down to her level and ran after her over and over and even grabbed her and she laughed her ass off…and she had no idea it was him. After we left his room, we started walking down a hall and he yelled after her in a big scary voice “Jooooooossiiiieeee” like he was a monster coming for her. It was hilarious!! The next guy we encountered was Freddy Kruger who isolated Josie and I from our group and told her he wasn’t going to let her go. That was great. The next room was where Jess, Gary’s girlfriend, was working. I’m not sure what she was but she was bloody and pale and banging a metal plate against a counter. I went by her and faked a scream, laughed, and walked off. She’s funny as hell, I like her a lot. When we were done with the haunted house, we went out back and Josie got to meet all the monsters and the owner while they all talked about how their first run went.

We left the haunted house at 10:10pm and I sped home. I left for work at 10:20 and the ride to work was just one bad thing after another. I stopped at KFC to get dinner and hopped on I75 where I sat in traffic for at least 15 minutes just to get to the next exit down from mine. I figured I’d get to that exit and take a shortcut I knew. I got off at that exit to find that the road was closed to the shortcut I needed, so back to 75 I went. At this point I was very late and then I found out that my pop had leaked all over the place. I pulled into work 10 minutes past the 10 minute grace period they give us to arrive. I plunked down in my seat and just sat and relaxed. I talked to Diane a bit on AIM, and Bruce and I had our weekly Friday night chat, and talked to JR about the car stereo I want for my birthday and some lights I want for the studio.

Work was busy for a little bit after my friends logged off but I got caught up with no problem and have been sitting here talking to my coworkers and just chilling out.

That’s about it for me. Hopefully tonight will go fast.

Later,

Me

Okay, yeah, it’s been a while since a real update. Just a few things going/have gone on.

For one, Josie started school on Friday. She had a good time, I think. We drove her to school and walked her in so I could give the teacher her paperwork. The only issue we really had was that we told the teacher that we wanted Josie to ride the bus home and she forgot. There we were, camera in hand, standing in our driveway waiting for the bus only to see it fly by our house without stopping. OMG….talk about being freaked out! Apparently, the teacher had called and left vm on JR’s phone and he didn’t hear it ring. He had been outside putting air in my tires with a noisy air compressor. I sped down to the school and picked her up and asked the teacher what happened. The teacher said that with the hustle and bustle of everyone dropping off their kids, it slipped her mind that we had told her to put Jo on the bus. She asked that next time we write a note. Blah.

Work has big a freakin’ nightmare lately…not the work itself but the whole social aspect, if that’s what you can call it. There is this guy here we’ll call Bob. For the sake of just being factual, Bob is a black man…which means nothing now but may further on. Bob is an arrogant, cocky, and narcissistic asshole. I’m going to tell you some things about Bob before I go into the issue at hand.

Firstly, in a dept. of beige cubicles where no one really decorates or keeps anything on their walls except phone lists and the occasional picture of a child, Bob came to us about 3 months ago and immediately hung a huge poster of some big muscular black dude that is supposed to look menacing. Umm…yeah. I know that’s not really a big deal, just something that made him stick out like a sore thumb around here. Secondly, Bob has a recreational activity that he does during the day, so he cannot possibly make it through the night at work without a good 3-4 hrs of sleep at his desk…while snoring…loudly. I’ll mention here that Bob makes a good 10K more than I do and I work my ass off. I know, not pertinent, but you get my point. Thirdly, Bob comes into work talking on his cell phone to what we assume is his girlfriend. Bob talks to girlfriend for a half hour, then puts her on hold while we have our little meeting at the changing of shifts. This is usually between 5 and 10mins long. Then he talks to her again for up to two hours. If he receives a call about work, he asks her to hold on and then goes back. This is where I remind you that he is a: talking to his girlfriend and b: thinks he’s a playa and c: is sitting at his desk for all of this. So, for up to two hours, my coworkers and I are hearing baby this and honey that and those teasing little things you say to your boyfriend/girlfriend in private. The conversation I loved the most was when he said to his girlfriend that he was a network god.

So, the issue at hand started with the sleeping. Since he started working here, he sleeps 3-4 hours a night. Management tried to nip it in the bud at a team meeting addressed to everyone. He fell asleep IN that meeting. Really. I’m not kidding. The sleeping continued and he was addressed by management in person to stop it. Nope. He didn’t stop it. In fact, I think he thought that we thought it was cute or funny or something. Actually, we thought he was a lazy fuck and we were getting annoyed with having to wake him up to take a phone call.

One of the goofy things that some people did just for the fun of it was to take pictures of him sleeping. Well, one night he was snoring loud and was in the funniest position and I decided to take a pic and share a laugh over it later. I had left my phone in the car so I used the Dept. cell phone that has a camera on it. The phone gets passed around to everyone so it wasn’t a big deal. I took a pic, my coworkers and I laughed, and I emailed the pic to my computer and deleted it from the phone. In the morning, one of my coworkers suggested putting it back onto the phone cuz management needed to see that it’s still an issue. I put the pic back onto the phone. During the dayshift, the manager on duty carries the phone. That was last weekend. Wednesday I came into work and my friend told me that he made sure our boss saw the picture. That very night, Bob was caught sleeping by the guard here. And then he was caught again by a major bigwig from another dept. The next morning, Bob was fired.

The issue for me is that I kinda feel guilty that he was fired, and the guys I work with like to tease me about being the one that shot the picture. I know they’re kidding and all and they tell me all the time that Bob did himself in. And my picture by far was not the first.

Then tonight, this black guard (that likes to come and talk to us) came up to visit. This is a guard that has told me that when he does his rounds, that he stops in an empty conference room to take naps. So he comes to visit us and talk and notices that Bob is gone. My coworker said something along the lines that there was a picture of him sleeping that finally did him in. The guard said to us “I can’t believe someone took a picture of him sleeping, that’s cold hearted”. When we didn’t jump up to agree with him, he continued on about how we (the team) should have discussed it with him and tried to help him out. At that point, my cube-mate and I told him that we woke him up almost every night only to have him pass out again, that he was warned in meetings, and then warned in person. He just didn’t GET IT. Guard dude seemed to be very offended and it kind of got an attitude. My cube-mate and I both got the impression that he thinks it was a race issue. Bob was the only black person on my team…a team of me, six white guys, and him. Not really a big team.

I guess it’s not that big of an issue, but I really hate people thinking that I did something on purpose with the intent of getting Bob fired. While, yes, I did think he needed to be fired, the picture was not intended to do harm. The guy who is taking over as my supervisor in a few weeks didn’t even care that I took the pic.

Oh well, that’s it for me right now. I’m about to go home, pack some shit, and hop a Greyhound bus to Toledo… more on that later.

Love ya,

Me

Try shooting a little baby kitty that is disoriented and wants to know where the fuck mommy went. I thought he'd be an easy shoot. Oh hell no. Out of about 15 shots, I got two that are even mediocre.

Diane - I've known Diane since I was 6 months old. Yes, I did say 6 months old. I was born in October and Diane was born the following April. On a warm spring day, my mom walked me in my stroller up the street and from what I've heard, Diane's mom (two doors up and across the street) met her outside so she could see their new baby. Voila! Best friends for life...well, she went to a different elementary school, but joined up with me in Junior High. Our other street friend went to a different school than both of us and met up with us in High School. Anyway, D and I ran with different but overlapping crowds in school, but always in my heart I always have been connected to her at some level. That's a 32 year friendship. Through all kinds of ups and downs, we're still here.

Bev - Met Bevy when I was 11, maybe 10. She was the new kid at the top of our street and she went to my school. My schoolfriend, Kris, was assigned to show her around school and we hooked up on the playground right near the giant USA map painted on the cement. I thought she was pretty cool and invited her to come play with my friends. She and I also ran with different crowds in Junior High. She was uber smart and was in all of those nerd classes. I was A-B average and was in normal kid classes. But I'll be damned if we weren't at lunch together, sitting on the bus together, and hanging out constantly after school. And every weekend, you'd find us at the Dayton Mall watching movies or sitting in the LaZBoy chairs at Lazarus people watching. Bev moved away between Freshman and Sophomore year, just after Junior High was over. Her parents relocated to Kansas. Now, let me tell you....man, we had some good fights. Fights over boys, fights over me making stupid decisions (can anyone say Stace?) and just about everything else you can think of. But it always came back to the friendship. No matter what, we had each others' back and nothing, not even distance, was ever going to change that. I could call her up today and tell her anything, even if it was something I did wrong or am embarrassed over, and she'd listen. She might tell me I'm a fucking idiot, but that's alright. I love her like a sister...and they treat me worse.

Mike - My man, my sweetie, my main bitch. We had a deal if we weren't married to other people by the time we were 40, we'd get hitched. Met Mike in Kindergarten, I think. We went all through elementary school together but didn't get to be friends till around 6th grade. We were best buds all thru Jr. and High School, though we didn't go to the same HS for most of those 3yrs. Did we ever fight? Hell fuckin' yeah. We had such a big one once, that he came over after school got out to apologize (his school got out before mine) and when I drove onto my street and saw his car, I turned around and left. I went to a payphone and called mom and told her to make him go away. I was THAT mad. I have no idea what it was about, but we talked or whatever teenagers do and it was alright. It always was alright and it always has been alright because at the core of everything..fights, disagreements, distance (he lives in missouri now)... at the core of everything is love and respect.

These are just a few of some of the great friends I have...there's also Rachel and Glenn and maybe one or two others.

What am I rambling on about? I lost a friend today. No, they didn't die, they dumped me. My crime? I didn't return borrowed movies in a respectable timeframe. And when I was asked to return them right that very minute, I was at work and couldn't get away. Such a ruckus, such a crime. Oh, yeah, my other crive was that I didn't talk to them enough in the past two weeks. Yep.

Bev...when was the last time I talked to you?? I know I owe you an email from like 2 months ago, too. But you know what, Bev's not going to dump me. She loves me for who I am and she has respect for me as a person.

Rachel - when's the last time we spoke? I think it was when we went to see a movie, what...like 2 months ago? Oh, and you know what....Rachel and her friend were so late, that we had to leave without her and have her meet us at the theatre. Man, I should've been pissed and dumped her ass right then! Fuck that shit. I don't care if Rachel's late. Rachel is always late and that's just a part of who she is and part of what makes her quirky. Honestly, I was more worried that she'd had a car accident than anything else. It also made me wish she carried a cell phone.

Mike - I don't think Mike even reads this thing. Do I care? No. He's probably too busy with other shit, like rehabbing his house. I respect that.

Diane - Well, she's probably a little different cuz we use each other here and there. I proof read her freelance stuff, and she helps me come up with ideas or props for my photography. We chat if we're both online at the same time, and sometimes we visit each other for parties or for me to take pics of things.

After I received the "email of dumpage", I really got to thinking about the real and true friends that I have. I could never in a million years think of saying hateful things to any of my friends. If they grew distant, I'd worry about them and ask what was up rather than get pissed at them for ignoring me. It really put some of my relationships into perspective for me. I love you guys more than anything in the world. You've seen me through a lot of hard shit and seen me through a lot of happy shit, too and vice versa. So many times any one of us could have told the other to fuck off and leave, but we've always stuck it out. Y'all are the greatest.