Playing catch up

School: For the most part I like it. My prof is great. He has two different MBA's and a law degree. He leads the class discussion well and I love the subject matter. I enjoy the class discussions more now that it is not just myself and two others talking. The draw back is my classmates don't talk to me. When I pass them at break they turn away slightly. Not much, but enough to discourage me from joining the conversation. I'm hoping the fall will be better.

Birthday: Very good. My boyfriend and I met some friends at my favorite wine bar on the night of my birthday. The next day a really good friend and I went on a weekend cruise. It was my first cruise and I really liked it. I had to pretend that I was on a spaceship in order to fall asleep at night. It also helped to do that when we hit rough water.

Work: Overwhelming. I know enough now to get stuff done, I just can't seem to do so. It drives me nuts and I don't know where to start. My co-workers are better now that the character who used to help me is gone. Without his continually antagonizing ways the department gets along as a whole much better. It has meant a lot more cooperation between everyone so we're doing much more cross training than before. Mostly I like that the tension in the department has dropped and its really nice.

Home life: I've found a new place to live. Right now I have the best roommate I've ever had. The only problem is she is engaged and her fiance owns our home. That means that when the get married he is going to be living here. So, I will be moving July 4th weekend to a place much closer to work. I will be renting a daylight basement with a walk in closet and a full bathroom. It is close enough to work that I'll be able to walk there. Better yet, I'll be able to walk to church.

Favorite Tour guide: Make me laugh all the time. We went to the Ballard Locks again yesterday. The sun was out and it was gorgeous out. I finally managed to tickle him by twirling a blade of grass against his skin. He took my toy away from me and tickled me back. It was a lot of fun. We sat and talked for hours enjoying the sunshine and each other's company. Then we went to a friend's house for a bbq. Dinner was filled with more laughing and really good food.

Best for last: My younger sister is on her way to the hospital to have her baby!

Sometimes the best we can do is breathe and reboot. SJP

Easily entertained

A huge part of what I do is "clean" product lines. Cleaning involves making sure each item is in the system only once, has the correct price listed, and most importantly has a unique identifier. Normally the identifier is a catalog number assigned by the vendor, but if I'm lucky its a 12 digit code called a UPC. Most of my lines have had some sort of attention in the last three years, so while difficult there is not a "bang head on keyboard" level of frustration.

I can handle duplications very easily. I just merge the items into a single code. Pricing being off doesn't phase me. Most of the time I'm cleaning the line because the price is going to be changed by the vendor soon anyway. However, a catalog number or UPC is needed. Outside of product lines that have a handful of items, I can't get around it.

Today it was my vendor NWC's turn. I do not like NWC for a number of reasons. The main reason is that no one has gone through and "cleaned" this product line, ever. NWC has over 1000 items active in my system, and has over 4000 items on the pricing spreadsheet they sent me. Of all of the items in my system less than a quarter have an identifier, and there are more duplicates than I want to think about.

While this would be a very good reason to bang my head on my keyboard I decided to take a better approach. I decided to play what I like to call "The Delete Game." To start, I download all of the items in my computer system that I buy from one vendor. Next I sort out the ones that still have the codes from the old system as these are most likely to be obsolete. (Even if they aren't I still have to remove the old code so it is a two for one.) Then, one by one, I enter the item into the system and hit Alt+Del.

Best case, the system tells me to confirm that I want to delete the item by entering DELETE. For reasons hard to explain I find it fun when I get to enter DELETE. Today I got to delete 60% of the items I looked at. This means I'm winning. From the looks of things I'm going to keep winning. I could be upset by all of the bad data, or I could be happy that I don't have to find codes for as many items. I'm going with the latter.

First day of school

My first day of school was on Thursday. To celebrate my favorite tour guide took me to lunch. He also gave me a brand new lunch box. It is shiny black and has a skull and cross bones on it. The skull also has an eye patch. I love it. Reminds me of the gold eye patch with sequins I got my tour guide as a gag gift. Class itself was good and my classmates seem interesting. I'm not sure what I think of either just yet.

After class I met my tour guide for a late dinner. He wanted to take a first day of school picture so after dinner we grabbed my book and my new lunch box and walked to a local square. We took a couple photos and I have to say they were cute.

There were also a couple local musicians in the square practising. One was playing an accordion, and the song reminded me of being in Paris. It had rained earlier making the pavement shine and the blossoms in the trees sparkle. I set my belongings down and we danced until the musicians eventually wandered towards their gig, playing the song as they walked away. It was perfect, and I can't think of a better way to start grad school.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

Today at work my boss suggested we sing Christmas carols. When I heard this I pulled out my ear pods and turned around to look at the crazy man. That's when I spotted cold, white, wet stuff falling out the window behind him. Yup. Its spring and snowing in Seattle. I may have lived through a winter here, but I still think snow is something you should visit- not the other way around.

Random moments

I had to post this picture of chickens. They are in the front yard of a house just a few houses down from the townhouse where my community group meets. The townhouse is not out in the country, it is in the middle of the city. This struck me as funny, and I didn’t think anyone would believe me, so I took a picture.
For date night a couple weeks ago we went to one of my favorite restaurants, The High Life, and then to a movie. Once we were seated my favorite tour guide told me that at first the theater owners couldn’t decide what to call their company. Eventually they named it Elttaes, which is Seattle spelled backwards. After the movie we started to walk a few blocks to his car. Halfway there he picked me up and carried me for a bit. What can I say? My guy is romantic and shares my love of trivia.
My orientation for class is Saturday. Once I’ve completed it I can sign up for the Pre-Calc course I want to take. I’m hoping to get it and Business Calc over with as soon as possible. As much as I’m dreading taking any kind of math course again I am looking forward to starting school. Partly in order to make friends, partly to enjoy being in class again.
The best for last: A few months ago I was visiting my family. As usual we were had a family dinner and afterwards my sister said she had presents for everyone. There didn’t seem to be a special reason but I didn’t really think anything of it. She then handed a children’s book to each of my parents. My mom got Katie No Pockets, which is her favorite. While she was flipping through the pages my dad softly called her name and told her to read the inscription on the first page. After she did my older sister and I got books as well. Mine is one of my favorites, Corduroy. In it she had written “For G, To read to your new niece or nephew.”
I couldn’t believe it. My younger sister is pregnant with her first baby! Since she’s discussing it on her blogs, I’m guessing it’s safe to talk about it on mine. She and her husband are very happy and are going to be great parents. They recently found out that they are having a boy, and I can’t wait to hold my brand new nephew. They won’t tell me what his name is yet, and I’m enjoying looking forward to being introduced to him all at once.

A departure from the norm

I don't often talk about my faith. To me it is an intensely personal thing and is the absolute core of who I am. Not everyone gets to be that intimate with me. I will share what I believe to a certain extent, but what I pray about, what I struggle with, and my questions on how faith applies to the practical are for those closest to me. That said, this is something I want to share.

I don't know how long its been since I've been moved by a sermon. I have heard interesting sermons, and have liked some quotes, but not much more than that. Then I read a book called "The Velvet Elvis" and was blown away. For the first time in a long time I heard a new perspective on scripture. It is an incredible book and a fairly easy read. It reminded me that I used to have a heart for God and how strong my faith once was. I realized that I had been starving myself spiritually and a huge part of my unhappiness was a lack of actively living a Christian life.

When I moved to Seattle I was given a list of churches people recommended. One was called Mars Hill, and at the time I thought it was connected to the guy that wrote "The Velvet Elvis." Turns out its not, and the pastor has issues with that author, but this church is what I needed. I highly recommend checking out the sermons posted on line. The current series on misconceptions has been incredible, and very thought provoking for me. This is the first time that I have found a "lecture" outside of college that made me hungry for more information. What I really loved about it though was that for the first time a pastor gave a sermon directly aimed at singles. Most churches I've been to pretty much ignore the fact that there are people like me who are struggling with how to be a Christian adult and do things like date. It was amazing.

I am meeting with a community group from the church for the first time on Monday. I am hoping I will fit in and be able to make friends with other Christians. I want to have a place to call home again, and people that I know have the same core beliefs as me. It is something I have missed, and I'm not sure how I've gotten along without it. Then again maybe I didn't. Life got pretty bad, and I had to move two states away to start over. Maybe a church family can help me to live the life I want, and help me figure out how to become more like someone I can respect.

Here's hoping.

Somewhere Betwen Raising Hell and Amazing Grace

A lot has happened since I last posted. The most entertaining is that today the Denny's in Ballard was been declared a historic landmark. I'm not kidding. Ballard is my favorite neighborhood due to things like this. It’s a quirky area that still sports "Free Ballard" shirt, bumper stickers, and posters. A few weeks ago I went to a wine bar there with my boyfriend and a few friends. We each ordered different wines and sampled each other's choice. We also split a cheese platter and chacutrie. It felt like I was back in Paris.
I also had two really good friends come and visit me. The first was a friend that I've known since I was 13. We got sushi for dinner and it was great to actually have someone around that enjoys the stuff. Afterwards we went to my friend's house to hang out. My boyfriend arrived just after we did. Before the front door opened he had caught my attention, walked up to us, and picked up my friend (literally) and turned her upside down. He has a wicked sense of humor. Luckily she found this hilarious and the two of them got along.
The second friend is the person who inspired me to move to Seattle. She is also a great cook and gave me a couple of cooking lessons while she was here. We went to Pike Place Market for our supplies and had fun poking around the stalls. I discovered a couple of hidden alleys that have really great shops. Everything there is produced locally and is cheaper than going to the grocery store. To an extent the market is a tourist destination, but a lot of locals use it for their weekly shopping. As much fun as shopping was the best part was having girlfriends around again. I love my life here, but I miss having girlfriends closer than on the other end of the phone.
One of the best things to happen recently is that I finally found a church to call home. For the first time in years I found a church where I feel comfortable. I don't believe blindly, and this church encourages questions. It’s also the first time that I've heard a new approach to verses I've heard all my life. They also have small groups, somewhat like a bible study group, for different age groups. I've contacted one of them and hopefully it will be a way to make Christian friends.
In other news work is getting better. I’m learning now in leaps and bounds and I’m making headway. The mountain of work doesn’t seem to decrease any, but that’s okay. I’m just happy that I can function somewhat on my own. Sadly the old guy that I used to work with has decided that because I’m now getting trained by someone he profoundly dislikes that I have gone to the dark side. When he told me this I laughed and told him, “of course I did, they have cookies.” He didn't find that as funny as I did. Mostly because he thought he was missing out on actual cookies.
As for Valentines it was great, but the week started off pretty bad. My boyfriend had been having headaches for weeks. When he finally went into the doctor the doctor became concerned it could be a blood vessel causing the problem. A couple appointments and an MRI later it was discovered that it was a nerve that got infected. He was put on a round of steroids and everything is fine now. The unfortunate result of all this is that he was unable to go on a business trip.
Since he was in town he had to be point man for those that did go and told me that he would have to work late. He called me about eight that night. He told me that he had just got home and asked if I wanted to do a late dinner. I said yes and he asked that I call him when I was leaving. A few min later I grabbed by coat, set the alarm, and then opened my front door with my phone in hand. Sitting in front of my door was a bouquet of flower, a box of chocolates, and a chocolate espresso bar. He was standing around the corner and grinning.
We went to dinner at a local place and he was chatty through the whole thing. This is a guy that has been nicknamed “Silent Bob” by my friend from college. He was also bouncing in his seat and fiddling with everything. When I took the last piece of silverware away from him he finally told me that the side effect of his meds was abundant energy. I laughed and then offered to take him for a walk. After a long tour of the area we ended up at a two story book store. So while the week started off rocky, the holiday for me consisted of roses, chocolate, dinner, wine, and books. I couldn’t have asked for a better night.