Where are their panties? or "Just Say No to Crack"

I have seen way too many women's cracks in the work place. The girl in HR routinely shows about 4" of crack while sitting. I walked by the president's office to see his admin. reaching over his desk to place something and saw her crack. (For the record, he was not in the office.) The woman in contracting frequently has crack visible when I walk up to her desk.

A. Where are their underwear? If I can see 4" of crack, how much farther down are her panties?

B. For God's sake, buy longer shirts! Your shirt should, at a bare minimum, meet the top of your pants while sitting. Get out of the children's section of Wal-Mart!

For my part, I will now announce in a semi loud voice, "Nice Crack" to any person, male or female, that exhibits any butt cleveage in the work place. If we all take a stand on this issue, maybe, just maybe, we can save a future generations eye sight. (cause I know I get a little more blind every time I see your ass crack!)

Mad Dash to Sunday's Finish Line

The final Spring Break weekend was fast and furious. Got up and hit the gym, came home and showered, took Big Princess to get a corrective haircut, came home and did my own hair because I didn’t trust the woman that did Big Princess’. Then we all packed it up and went to Real Live Preacher’s house for our family date. As usual, RLP’s family had no idea where the other member’s of the family either were or when they were due back. That’s ok, I forgot the location of our date and while trying to look it up on the internet at RLP’s house found out I’d been calling it something other than it’s real name.

After finally getting our act together we headed out sans RLP, who would have to catch up to us after he finished a wedding. Somehow I still managed to screw up the directions and we drove around a few minutes before Mrs. RLP called information and figured out where we were going. We finally found Incredible Pizza Co. and the parking lot was packed to the gills. I cautiously wondered how many people this place could hold. I soon found out.

We had to wait in line for about 30 min. until some people cleared out. They were over their capacity of 1,050 people.

It was ok pizza buffet, the cinnamon rolls were fabulous, the entertainment overpriced. They have indoor go-karts, bumper cars, miniature golf, 3-D movie/rides, in addition to the kiddie Vegas games (as I like to call them). The one that amazed me was a humungous crane that picked up giant stuffed animals. The arms on this crane instead of the usual 6” were longer than my arms.

Then after a full belly and empty wallet, Big Princess went to work, little princess was dropped off at a slumber party and Big Daddy wanted to go home. I, on the other hand, went to test drive a new car and haggle with salesmen. I picked up beer on the way home, got Big Daddy and headed to a friend’s house. Next thing I know its 10 pm and I’d been on the go, non-stop since about 7:30 am.

Sunday? Much the same.

I almost peed my pants... laughing.

Big Daddy drives a truck.

Hey, we live in Texas and Texas State Law Chapter 291 Section 2 Article 21.538 states that one member from each family must drive a truck.

Couple years ago, Big Daddy locked himself outta said truck.

Coulda called me to fetch him his spare key but he didn't.

Smarter fellas mighta got that window fixed after the first good rain.

Not my man.

So I'm headed home yesterday, just a daydreaming and thinking about what's for dinner. I pull up to the driveway and lo and behold.....

a squirrel come flying out the broken back window of my man's truck.

Shoe Junkies

I looked back into my history and I couldn’t find where I had told the first part of the story so I’ll just tell it again.

It was late summer and Big Princess and I went to lunch and then I played hooky from work. My bosses were otherwise tied up outside the office and wouldn’t miss me if I took an extra long lunch. We headed to the big, fancy, tourist mall that has 3 story tall cowboy boots in front of it. We were headed back to my office when my boss called. I quickly pulled into the nearest parking lot to take the call. He said I should play hooky from work and take the afternoon off. “Well, if you think that’s a good idea… I guess I can find something to do.”

After hanging up and giving a little cheer, we both noticed a sign—Shoe Sale 50% Off. Say no more, we’re in.

We wander up and down isles looking and trying on shoes when suddenly I find silver cowboy boots but only ankle high. OMG, I love them. With 50% off they are only $15. I am giddy with joy. No, wait! They have them in GOLD too! For $30 I can have 2 pair, one silver and one gold.

Big Princess finds a pair of shoes she must have as well. (I don’t remember what hers looked like but they were probably Vans tennis shoes or had a skull and cross bone theme to them.) We head to the check out and Big Princess pays first with cash. Now, I never carry cash, so I give the women my debit card. She first rings up the sale on the cash register and then turns to the debit machine.

OK, from here on out is when things go south.

The women swipes my card and the machine asks her to enter the tax amount. I tell her that the machines never ask for the tax amount. She goes on and on and on about how she usually works at the other store and she just doesn’t know how things are done at this store. She calls her old store and asks them to figure the tax for her…. But she gives them the total off the cash register receipt that already has the tax added to the total. After she hangs up, I try to explain why the amount she was trying to compute was wrong. She doesn’t understand (to tell the truth, she seemed a wee bit slow and very excitable) and gets out a little hand calculator and starts punching numbers. She doesn’t know how to use the calculator and says “dis thang ain’t workin”. Now, Big Princess grabs a pen and tries to show the woman on paper how to do the math. No go.

She hands me a receipt with the incorrect total and asks me to sign it. I refuse since she double charged me for the tax. She calls the owner on the phone and explains what’s going on. After she hangs up she tells me that the owner said to just sign it and he would correct the total that evening. I refused and asked her to reverse the charge. She said she wasn’t allowed to do anything but ring up sales.

OK, I’ve now been trying to check out for 30 minutes. I’ve been calm up to now but Big Princess sees I’m starting to loose my cool. Meanwhile customers are backing up, waiting to check out. I start to complain loudly to anyone within hearing distance. The woman calls the owner back and at the end of that call she says he will come to the store in a few minutes, 10 minutes to be exact. So I tell her I will be back and Big Princess and I go to the car to wait.

We return in 15 minutes and the owner still isn’t there. We wait another 5 minutes and I tell her to call him and find out where he is. Now the guy won’t answer his phone. The woman calls him like 7 times and she says, “oh, now he’s mad at me and he won’t answer.”

It takes the guy another 20 minutes to show up. The cashier tries to explain what she did but he sternly tells her to go to the back of the store and wait for him. He quickly credits my account and rings me up correctly. He hands me copies of all 3 transactions. As I examine the receipts I see why the woman had problems with the debit machine asking her to enter the tax… she must have hit the wrong button and actually did a credit. So now I have 2 credits, and 1 charge.

By now I have been asked at least 15 times, do I still want the shoes. The owner explains that he is going to have to double charge me just to get back to zero and then charge me for the shoes. He makes the final mistake of asking again, do I want the shoes?

“Hell no! I want out of your damn store.”

So I end up spending two hours at the store and walk out with nothing but a screaming headache and wanting to beat someone.

Fast forward to today……………………………………………………………….

Big Princess is home for Spring Break and I’m finally caught up enough to take a couple hours off. We decide to do our favorite thing, shoe shop. We are both looking for a specific shoe. We hit 2 stores and Big Princess finally finds what she wants, even though it’s a little more expensive than she wanted to pay. We just so happen to be not far from Satan’s Shoe Store (as I like to call it). Big Princess is like, “Are you kidding me. You’re really considering going back?”

“Hey, why not. It might be funny to see if they totally freak out when we walk in.” We pull in and low and behold, they are still having a 50% Store Closing Sale more than six months since we were last here. To give them credit, they did have much less inventory. We wandered around and noticed that the woman from last time wasn’t there. We didn’t see anything we absolutely had to have, even at 50% off. They had the silver boots but in a ½ size too small. I walk around to Big Princess’ size shoes and she holds up my silver half cowboy boot but in one size too big. I kind of frown that its too big. Then Big Princess goes, “Its only $7!!! For that price you can afford some thick socks.”

I try them on and because of the pointy toe they aren’t that big and thick socks will definitely make them fit. I take them to the front and, of course, pay in cash.

I Survived

I take criticism personally, even constructive criticism. That’s not to say that I don’t want to hear it, just that it stings to have someone remember a time I wasn’t at 100 percent or that I might be lacking in some way.

Usually it’s the presentation of criticism that hurts the most. I don’t think many people know how to give feedback in a non-attacking kind-of-way. And the longer it takes to give or receive said feedback only makes it harder.

Hey, I don’t think I’m perfect and I always want to do better but there’s something about that annual performance review that starts the heart to pounding and the stomach turning. I always try to anticipate what flaws might be pointed out and come up with my rebuke or plan of change. The worst is when you are asked to fill out your own review and bring it to the meeting to compare with your boss’s version of your performance. Do you rate your self high, hoping to bring in a little bit more raise to the paycheck? Or do you rate yourself low, hoping your boss will pump you up with words of praise? Then there’s the dreaded “what if we are so far off from each other that we both wonder who we’re talking about?”

I’d almost rather get a papsmear than my annual review.

And who can remember how anyone performed for the past year. I can barely remember what I had for dinner yesterday, let alone why I didn’t complete a project on-time 9 months ago. These things are usually based on the last month or two’s performance. I’ve heard chatter from co-workers about how they can knock off the early mornings and late evenings as soon as the performance reviews are over this month.

I have been buried in projects to the point of insanity for several months now and producing results like crazy so I wasn’t too worried about my review today. Then with only hours to go, my boss discovers that I have somehow sent 3 permits to the government without their accompanying checks. It might have been better if I had discovered it, but on the other hand, it could have been worse if the government discovered it. I was horrified. I’ve been so busy I couldn’t remember sending the permits, let alone why I didn’t include the checks. I scrambled to correct the permits. I thought to myself, “there goes your review.”

Well its over now, at least until next year.

It was fine, just as most things we worry ourselves over are. My boss likes me and the job I’m doing, although I do have a tendency to be bossy and/or pushy.