Sunday, October 02, 2011

Been a long time

Good Morning!

I don't know that many or any people read this anymore, but I suddenly felt like writing something today. It's been 10 months and a lot has changed in my life...

When I last wrote here, I was dramatically underemployed. I had lost my full-time job and was working one day a week to net about $60 for 8-9 hours work.

In late February I started working 3 evenings a week for Johnny's NY Style Pizza as a delivery driver. I know the owners of this restaurant from playing trivia there with some friends over the years and as I have pizza delivery experience from my college days. I was a help in this position because they had never offered delivery in the 12 years they have been open. Things began slowly but have picked up and the delivery business is steadily growing. It's been 7 months and I am still working with them for some extra money and because I find it fun.

In early May I was contacted by a friend from college about a job with her company. I know Suzanne from the Wesley Foundation (United Methodist Campus Ministry at UCF). She knew I needed a full-time job and she needed a driver/merchandiser at her Boar's Head distributorship. I started working there in mid-May, delivering deli meats and cheeses to Kroger and a few independent stores Monday through Friday each week.

My hope was to be able to move up into sales and my progress is going well. I started at a rate $1 higher than my rate at Walgreens. At three months I received an additional $1 per hour raise, and this week I met with the owner of the company to discuss a change in my duties. I will only be driving the truck 2 days a week and the other 3 days I will be just going to stores to merchandise product. I am also receiving another $1/hour raise!

We're just 4 days shy of our 10th wedding anniversary. On Wednesday, Amy and I are going to see Wicked! the Musical for the 2nd time. On Thursday we will head out to spend a few days in TN to celebrate with our now 3 and a half year old daughter, LynnMarie.

The Phillies are in the playoffs for the 5th consecutive year and I got to see them live on Wednesday of this week as they played spoiler to the Atlanta Braves, ending their playoff hopes.

I still follow UCF for my college football enthusiasm. They are 2-2 right now and about to start their C-USA conference play.

Thursday, December 30, 2010

Looking for Work

2010 is not ending nearly as well as I had hoped. After almost 3 and a half years with Walgreens I found myself without employment about three weeks ago. It was not expected, but it is potentially a good thing as I was spinning my wheels there. I enjoyed my work and my customers liked me and I performed well in the areas they seemed to focus on, but the economy hit the company hard and the advancement I anticipated when I first started there never happened, so if this is what it takes to get me into a better job, then this is what it takes.

In the meantime, to try to bring in SOME income, I have started delivering a once-a-week newspaper called "Just Busted." Just Busted takes the mug shots from about 10 North Georgia counties and publishes them along with the names of the accused and the crimes with which they were charged. It does not pay a lot, but it is income and I am responsible only to myself for my work. There is potential to grow the business, but it will take some work as there is another distributor in my area and a lot of retailers do not want to try it even though there is no risk for them, purely profit potential as they only pay for the copies that are not returned, and they keep 45 cents for each copy sold, so if they can sell 11 copies a week, they will earn $250 in pure profit without making any investment other than some counter space.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

Saturday Photo Scavenger Hunt - Cuddly

He's changed a LOT in the 3 years he's been with us!

Monday, January 11, 2010

DVD Time

This weekend we hit the RedBox for two movies. They recently installed one at a Shell gas station within 2 miles of the house which is very convenient as it is outside and available 24/7.

We watched Julie & Julia last night. It's good. Meryl Streep could certainly be up for an award or two for her portrayal of Julia Child. It is a new take on the bio-pic as it blends Child's life in France through her death with the real-life experiences of a want-to-be writer in early 2000's NYC. Amy Adams plays the Julie who is trying to prepare every Child's recipe within 1 year and blogged about it and grew quite a following. Amy said she sees Amy Adams becoming the new Meg Ryan, and with her cuteness and diversity in roles, I could see this. It helps that Nora Ephron (You've Got Mail) was behind this film.

Tonight I (note the singular) watched Inglorious Bastards. All I can really say it is not what I expected. I like Quentin Tarentino's films so I was hopeful, but it was a bit hard to follow due to the speed with which subtitles were displayed and removed. Also, I expected more Brad Pitt and his guys running around killing people as that's what the trailor indicated the movie was about. The saving grace (though limited) was the casting of Diane Kruger who I became infatuated with in the National Treasure movies. Would I own it? No. Would I watch it again if I happened across it on TV, probably.

Friday, January 08, 2010

Snow Atlanta Style

We got about 1/2 of one inch of snow here in Kennesaw. This is typical of Atlanta-area snow. We do have closings of most every metro school system. In our neighborhood we have a lot of hills and my brother told me that when he got home last night (around 10pm) the kids were out sledding. This had some merit because the snow will not last. We won't get above freezing today, but there is some melting happening.
Amy worked last night and has to work again today so we'll see how she does getting out of the neighborhood to get to work tonight. We have a new friend in the neighborhood, this funny-faced stray-looking black cat has been coming up the sidewalk to visit our house. He/she won't come close enough to be pet, and we've seen it across the street seeking shelter in the storm drain. This morning we awoke to 16 degrees with a high of 29 so I hope he has somewhere warm he can go.







Friday, January 01, 2010