The turkey saga continues

As my department was driving to Freckles Frozen Custard, the destination of our "emergency meeting,"the topic of the mysteriously disappearing turkeys arose. We all threw out our ideas of how the attacking vulchers were "removed from the property," when one of my co-workers got all excited.

Apparently, Channel 6 had nothing better to report on this past week, and as my co-worker was channel surfing during the 6:00 news hour, she stumbled upon--our turkeys!! There they were on TV pecking the crap out of the windows of a retirement home about a half mile from my work. It was obviously still mating season as they made that God-awful screech while pecking uncontrollably at that poor elderly couple's residence. There was so much commotion going on with these oversized birds that the elderly couple was probably scared to leave their home. What a tragedy.

How the heck did Channel 6 know where to find them?

I still want to know how they got there.

I just wanted some gasoline...

While driving to work this morning, I realized that I needed to get gas in my car before driving home, so I went to QT during my lunch. I stood outside in the highstrung wind, pumping my car full of gas, and nearly choked as I watched the price rise quickly from $20 to $25, when it finally clicked at $28.07. I decided that .93 wouldn't make that much difference, so I went ahead and topped it off at $29!--For a Cavalier!!

I was so wrapped up in mentally griping about the overrated-slash-in-the-throat price I just paid for gas that I didn't really take the time to pay attention to anything other than what I would eat for lunch. I grabbed a hotdog from the spinning machine and mumbled to myself that at least they hadn't robbed us on the price of hotdogs--yet. I grabbed a banana and a drink and headed to the cash register to pay. As I turned and headed out the door, I finally noticed the long line of construction workers sitting on the curb eating their lunches--staring at me and whispering amongst themselves. "Just keep walking--don't make eye contact," I told myself as I headed out the door. It was then that one of them jumped up and opened the door for me, and as I walked through the door he mumbled "Ow, bo-ni-ta." Then as I passed, made vulgar gestures to his buddies. Gross. Me. Out.

I was so mortified, all I wanted to do was blink my eyes and be outta there! Did he really think that I did not see him do that or that I don't understand Spanish? How tacky...

In all his disgustingness, I forgot to say thank you to him for opening the door for me. But all I could think about was quickly disappearing.

Note to self: Never get gas during lunch time again.

Happy Easter!

Children crack me up. Children hunting Easter eggs crack me up even more. After church yesterday morning, we had an Easter egg hunt for kids 12 and younger. To make things fair, all of the kids 3 and younger got to go out first to hunt eggs, then after a few minutes they turned the older ones loose. As I stood inside with the older kids grunting and groaning that the smaller kids would get all the eggs first, I started laughing inside. Like a 2 year old child who still barely understands the concept of hunting eggs, let alone that the process should be done quickly to ensure getting more eggs, is going to get all the eggs before the older, rambunctious kids plow them over in hopes to get some good candy.

Finally the older rugrats were released. You would have thought that there was a fire behind them pushing them out just by seeing how fast they flew out the door. They started tearing after the plastic and hardboiled eggs like their lives depended on it...well, I guess for some, their only source of chocolate for the next two weeks was dependent on how quickly they stocked up.

As I watched them, I was amazed--some of them weren't just picking up the Easter eggs and putting them in their baskets...they were removing the candy from the eggs and tossing the plastic eggs back on the ground! This worked out just as well, I suppose, because the smaller kids, who really could care less about the chocolate, went right behind them picking up the eggs and dropping them in their baskets. In less than 5 minutes, it seemed, all the eggs had been found and the kids were back inside sorting through their baskets of goodies.

It made me smile as I watched them, as it reminded me of the simple pleasures of being young enough to enjoy a simple Easter egg hunt.

An eventful evening

It's officially spring time, and in Oklahoma that means crazy, unpredictable weather. Yesterday marked the first sunshine filled day in a week around here, so as you can imagine, I was thrilled. I even wore a very springy skirt and shirt to celebrate the much anticipated beautiful weather.

Last night I was sitting in the bedroom watching some TV while Mike was in the dining room working on one of his songs on the computer. Suddenly out of no where it sounds like someone is jumping on our roof. I quickly muted the TV and realized, that no, it wasn't someone jumping on our roof, but was actually huge chunks of hail beating down on our house. "Is that hail?!," I screamed as I ran into the dining room as Mike was jumping up to look behind our dark green sheet, which is our substitute curtain, outside to see pellets of hail falling to the ground. I quickly remembered that my car was sitting outside in the driveway because Mike had been working on a project in my space in the garage. Mike and I frantically fumbled around trying to get the stuff out of my space and find my keys.

When Mike gets out of my car, he is holding his arm screaming at the stinkin hail. He took his hand away to discover that a piece of hail had pelted his arm so hard it had scraped the skin off. It wasn't gushing blood or anything, but I could tell it definetly hurt him. We fussed for a few seconds about how big the hail was and how bad his arm hurt, then we each resumed to our own stations watching TV and playing on the computer.

What an adventure. To go from 70 degrees to pieces of hail that quickly just goes to show you can never predict Oklahoma weather.

Mispell the word misspell...

There are only a few things that I hate more than screwing up at work...one of those is screwing up at work and being called on it by my boss. I sent out an email yesterday to some very important people in our company (President, former President, Chairman, you get the idea). I read the email and reread the email about 50 times before sending it out to make sure there were no mistakes. There is nothing more annoying than an email full of grammatical errors. And of course the pressure of having to send it to these Big Wigs anyway was enough stress. You can see where this is going...

After analyzing that stinkin email til I was blue in the face I hesitantly hit the "send" button. After about five minutes, I got a reply from my boss that plainly said, "Next time spell check." That was it! What the?!?! I brought up the sent email and read it again...and again. Then I found it, "Cheif Geophysicist." DOH! All the torturous jingles of my elementary teachers started bombarding my thoughts, "I before E, except after C." How could I have missed that one? It made me sad. I was bummed the rest of the day...so much so that I'm still thinking about it enough to write my blog about it today. It wouldn't have been so bad, except receiving that email from my boss felt like I had run out in the road and got struck by a moving vehicle with spikes on the end that had jammed into my heart. The really sad thing is that my boss probably hasn't thought another thing about it.

Why do I stress myself out like this?! I need to learn to let the small things go...

P.S. I fully admit to grammatical errors in my blog, so the need to further analyze my entries is a waste of time... (I know a couple of you that would feel the need to point them out to me now that I have made an entry about it). :)

Paybacks are momma bears...or turkeys

After receiving numerous complaints by various residents of the company building, it has been announced that the notorious turkeys infamous for attacking random passerbys at a moment's notice have been removed from the property. It has not, however, been disclosed exactly HOW they have been removed. But removed nonetheless. . .

Basketball what?

Instead of saying something witty about the big St. Paddy's Day, I regress to talking about the next hottest topic today...the start of the NCAA! Now I will tell you upfront that I know NOTHING about professional basketball (or any sport for that matter), so any attempts at sounding "athletically intelligent" in this entry are entirely coincidental.

Several of the folks in my office staff of 45 are die-hard basketball fans. The topic of conversation that constantly floated around the office yesterday was something about brackets and teams. For all I knew, brackets were something that you had when you wore braces...not something you filled out in an attempt to strategize over who will win the basketball championship. I quickly learned to keep my mouth shut and just listen to everyone else chatter, so as not to show off my intelligence...or lack thereof.

An email was sent around yesterday to everyone that those that wanted to participate in a tournament, contributing 5 bucks a person to the ongoing pot, had to submit their brackets online by 11:00 today. I had no idea what it meant to "fill out a bracket" and I don't normally gamble, but I thought it would be fun and how enjoyable would it be if I actually won--me, who knows NOTHING about the sport. :)

Since I know nothing about the teams, I thought it would be fun to rank them based on my favorite colors...or even how much I liked their mascots. When I realized the amount of time it would take for me to research the colors and mascots of every team was more than I had, I used my next best resource...my brother in law! :) I filled out one by myself, and surprisingly, I had the same order that he did!

So, I filled it out online this morning. Now we wait. And watch. My boss has scheduled an important "Research and Development Committee" meeting at the nearest sports grill. After "researching" the entire building, it was decided that there was no TV with adequate reception. Hence the reason for moving the committee meeting to the nearest sports grill.

Maybe after its all over, I will at least know the different colors of some of the teams, and possibly a few mascots. Hey, that's more than I know now. :)

Spring fever....er cold

Being outside in the beautiful weather this past weekend, I started getting that small burst of excitement that spring has nearly arrived. Of course being in Oklahoma, one should never let that burst of excitement get the best of them until at least the middle or end of April. For all we know it could snow next week.

I should have listened to my own advice. I was so excited that it actually reached over 80 on Saturday, that I thought the likeliness of it being below 60 yesterday and today was nil. So I got up yesterday morning, looked out the window to see the sun shining brightly, went to my closet and pulled out one of my spring outfits and a cute pair of sandals to match. I went into the garage and started my car. It wasn't until I arrived at work and opened the door to get out of my car that I realized what a tragic mistake I had made. It was not 60...it was not even close to 60...somewhere around 35 I am sure. All the way into work I started cursing myself for jumping the gun on spring in Oklahoma. What was I thinking?! Next time I will look at the temperature gauge outside my door BEFORE I leave the house in a skirt and sandals in 30 degree temperatures.

Do you have a village on your hood?

I was driving back to the office my from my dentist apointment this afternoon, just beboppin to the tunes on my radio, minding my own business, when I looked in my rear-view mirror and started cracking up laughing. Behind me was a van--on the hood of this van was a painting of a birdhouse with all sorts of birds flying around, which looked like the works of a preschool year aged child. Not only had they ruined a perfectly good paint job on their vehicle, but somehow they managed to glue (or paste, or I can only imagine what else) about a hundred different statues of animals, people, buildings, you name it on top of their hood! There was a little village standing on the top of this woman's van hood! As the woman preceded to pass me, I must admit that I hit my breaks so that I could get a better view of this woman's display of life on her van. I laughed out loud, then thought to myself, "Only in Oklahoma would people be crazy enough to actually glue stick figures of children's toys onto the top of their hood."

Dietary restrictions?

I never thought I would see the day come where I would give up my Saturdays voluntarily to further my career. Not only am I giving up every other Saturday from February to April to sit in a classroom all day, I am driving 2 hours to get to this class. A co-worker and I have done this twice already--tomorrow marks the third adventure to Norman. Picture this: the class starts at 8:30 a.m., and since we are coming from two hours away, that would put my alarm going off right about 5 a.m. :( No. Fun. If nothing else, the courses have been good refreshers from my college degree and will give me continuing education units to go towards sitting for the big certification on down the road.

As the time quickly approaches for another trip down there, I am haunted by the memories of our last journey down there. Prior to traveling down there, the instructor of that days course had emailed everyone to let them know that since it would be a course on catering, lunch would be provided for that day. If anyone had any dietary needs, they needed to let her know. I'm not allergic to anything, and I'm certainly not a vegetarian, so I didn't reply with any. YAY! I don't have to spend money for lunch. :) After the lecturing portion of the course, we all walk over to another building and are seated in a banquet room where the Director of Catering joins us and begins explaining the presentation that is getting ready to take place. We were getting ready to be served a 5 course meal.

Now, traditionally, I enjoy the whole "business/formal" setting for meals. I like to get dressed up and be waited on for dinner, so I was excited about the 5 course meal. Plus, I was starving! The first thing they brought out was Bleu Cheese soup with crouton sticks--it was okay, but I'm not a big fan of Bleu Cheese--I'm a fairly plain Jane meat and potatoes kind of girl. . .but we still had 4 courses left, so I wasn't too disappointed. :)

Second, they brought out a tomato based kiche dipped in and served on avacado. I don't like tomatoes, and I certainly don't like avacado--blech. But I took a bite just to say I tried it and patiently waited for them to bring out whatever was next.

Immediately when the trays started coming through the door I knew what they were brining--I could smell it and literally wanted to throw up...seafood! I HATE seafood. The presentation was beautiful, but I breathed through my mouth and tried not to gag as they set the margarita glass filled with mashed potatoes and cut up lobster in front of me. By this point, I am losing my appetite, and praying that the entree would be something I could pronounce. Lucky for me most of the people at my table were just as picky of eaters as me.

At last, they started bringing out the entree...to my dismay--pecan crusted halibut!! Come on people! I already said I HATE seafood. Note to self: when asked of dietary restrictions from now on, tell them NO SEAFOOD!!!! When the Director of Catering started noticing that more than half of the people weren't eating their entrees she said, "What's the problem here? You guys were given the menu, so why aren't you eating?" Hold the phone...we were NEVER given the menu b/c I sure as heck would have brought my lunch or told them I was a veggetarian as to sit through this meal. We all told her we had not received the menu. I leaned over to my co-worker and said, "Surely they can't screw up dessert..."

Oh the dessert...a "beautiful display of the chef's favorite...a souffle with liquor sauce poured over it!" I'd never tried a souffle, so I thought I'd give it a shot. I hated it. It tasted like egg whites (considering that is what its made from) . I was completely disappointed. . . and starving!

So while everyone else headed back to class, my co-worker and I snuck out and went to Sonic for lunch. I had never appreciated that grilled cheese sandwich and fries in all of my life! That free meal was a nightmare!

Who thought turkeys could be so mean?

As I have previously mentioned, my work building sits on what appears to be a geophysical park. Along with the numerous ducks that swim in the pond and walk across the parking lot in front of you at the most inopportune times, and the squirrels that obviously don't always look both ways when crossing the road out of the parking lot, we have 3 humongous, very loud and obnoxious turkeys. The turkeys just sort of showed up one day...no one really knows where they come from. Sometimes they disappear for several days, then reappear making that horrific gobbling noise, strutting around letting everyone know they are back.

This morning, they came back...with an attitude. I got out of my car this morning and headed for the door, and there they were strutting in front of the glass doors, pacing like a tiger in captivity at the zoo. As I started for the door on the other side, they started chasing me! It was apparent that they wanted to get to that door before I did. We went back and forth from door to door for a couple of minutes, as I was becoming more impatient and ready to throw something at these blasted turkeys (and I am not normally a violent person towards animals, although my past few posts might prove otherwise--it's not intentional). After a couple of minutes another man who works in the building starts walking up--luckily one I had never seen, and hopefully never will again...he and I both started playing cat and mouse with the turkeys as we tried to sneak into the building as the turkeys chased after us screeching with every step. The guy with me got pretty close to the door but as he reached for the handle, the stinkin turkey tried to snap at him. The man, of course, jumped back surrendering to the turkey. This went on for a few more minutes until another man came to our rescue with a bag full of bread or seed or something. Luckily, he lured the beasts away long enough for us to slither through the door. When the turkeys realized they had been deceived they ran back to the door and started banging on it with their gobblers. The man and I stood there and laughed and pointed at them for a few seconds like grade school children, then turned for the elevator.

We smiled at one another on the ride up in the elevator as we knew that we were champions for outwitting three brutally mean turkeys.

I hope they aren't still there when I go out for lunch today...

Memories like an elephant

While my sister and I have pretty much nothing in common in the way of looks, we share a lot of the same personality traits and often find ourselves thinking and talking the same things. One of the most unique things about us is that we have the strangest sense of recollection about the most unusual things.

I remember what Jason was wearing the day he broke up with me in 3rd grade, not what he actually used as an excuse to not be with me anymore. My sister remembers strange things like the brand of watch one of her friend's dad wore after only seeing him once. Or what we had to eat for breakfast the first day of Kindergarten. Or how many times the light was consecutively green on a trip across town 12 years ago.

Who remembers this kind of stuff? And why did we get cursed remembering such trivial things? Who cares that Jessica only drinks skim milk 4 days out of the week or that Matt got detention 17 times in the 7th grade?

Maybe someday our exceptional knowledge about things of the past will come in handy...

Road kill

Working in a building dedicated to geophysical resources, the property that our building sits on is absolutely beautiful. We have a couple of ponds with ducks that swim around, grass the color of four leaf clovers all year round, and of course I can't forget to mention the small "Squirrel crossing" signs at each bridge.

As I was leaving the parking lot for lunch today, I noticed that someone had not been paying attention to the squirrel signs and had plum run over a little squirrel...either that or the squirrel just killed over. In any case, its little feet were sticking straight up to the sky. To my amazement, a couple of our "animal activists" were jogging during lunch and took the time to stop by the squirrel, pick him up and move him out of the road. Oh.my.disgusting. Dead squirrel--now on the side of the road instead of directly in the middle. Note to self: do not shake hands with these people today. An evilish grin came over my face as I started to roll down my window and say, "How nice of you to catch my supper for me." I thought better of it and continued on. After all, I have to work with these people.

I used to believe...

Stumbling upon this site got me thinking about all the different ways I was tormented as a child...all the silly things that I actually believed--all because someone told me so, or because I just didn't know any better.

I can remember always being hungry as a child for something to snack on (okay, so that still holds true today)...my mom would give me something to eat, then poke me on the stomach and procede to tell me that I must have a tape worm inside that was always hungry. Imagine my horror when I was sitting in science class in elementary and the teacher started lecturing on tape worms!

I also didn't understand the concept of writing a check for something. I didn't realize you had to actually have money in the account in order to write them. Whenever I really wanted something and my parents would tell me they didn't have the money, I would just tell them to write a check. I guess I was always too concerned with actually getting the thing I was asking for that I didn't stop to think that if anyone could write a check for whatever they wanted, we wouldn't have been driving a Rabbit and I wouldn't have been wearing "hand me downs."

It's funny the things that children will believe just because they are so trustworthy or don't know any better...kind of scary too.

Diary of a dog, diary of a cat

I have sat down to write something in my blog about a dozen times in the last week, and have somehow mangaged to get distracted every time...I apologize for such a delay. In any case, I stumbled upon the dog's diary this morning, and to my surprise, I found the cat's not too much later...

Fido...
8am - Oh Boy! Dog food! My favorite!
9am - Oh Boy! A car ride! My favorite!
10am - Oh Boy! A walk! My favorite!
11am - Oh Boy! A car ride! My favorite!
Noon Oh Boy! The kids! My favorite!
1pm - Oh Boy! The yard! My favorite!
3pm - Oh Boy! The kids! My favorite!
4pm - Oh Boy! Dog food! My favorite!
5pm - Oh Boy! Mom! My favorite!
7pm - Oh Boy! Playing ball! My favorite!
9pm - Oh Boy! Sleeping in master's bed! My favorite!

Whiskers...
Day 183 of my captivity... My captors continue to taunt me with bizarre little dangling objects. They dine lavishly on fresh meat, while I am forced to eat dry cereal. The only thing that keeps me going is the hope of escape, and the mild satisfaction I get from ruining the occasional piece of furniture.
Tomorrow I may eat another house plant. Today my attempt to kill my captors by weaving around their feet while they were walking almost succeeded -- must try this at the top of the stairs. In an attempt to disgust and repulse these vile oppressors, I once again induced myself
to vomit on their favorite chair -- must try this on their bed.
Decapitated a mouse and brought them the headless body, in an attempt to make them aware of what I am capable of, and to try to strike fear into their hearts. They only cooed and condescended about what a good little cat I was. Hmmm, not working according to plan. There was some sort of gathering of their accomplices. I was placed in solitary throughout the event. However, I could hear the noise and smell the food.
More importantly I overheard that my confinement was due to MY power of "allergies." Must learn what this is and how to use it to my advantage. I am convinced the other captives are flunkies and maybe snitches. The dog is routinely released and seems more than happy to
return. He is obviously a half-wit. The bird on the other hand has got to be an informant, and speaks with them regularly. I am certain he reports my every move. Due to his current placement in the metal room, his safety is assured. But I can wait, it is only a matter of
time...

A trip survived

Having just come home from a business trip to Houston, I have come to the conclusion that I would never survive living there. While I am a city girl and prefer being around the people and chaos, I have to admit the driving of the Houstonians would be my termination. As my co-worker and I rode in the front seat of a taxi van and I witnessed this driver moving from lane to lane without so much as looking over his shoulder for traffic, I knew my only option to survive this drive to our hotel would be to shut my eyes and start praying. Before I knew it I had clutched so hard onto the seat, when I removed my hands from the bench you could still see the imprints of my hands. Occassionaly I would catch myself pressing my foot all the way into the floor with the hopes it would slow the driver down. To my disappointment, it didn't. If it wasn't going to be the driving that was the death of me, it would certainly be the cost from the airport to the hotel. My eyes grew larger and larger as I kept them on the tabulator and it continued to rise 30 cents every few feet. For once I was thankful I was not paying for this tab. The driver had a limited English vocabulary, so I got a little nervous when we passed what I thought was our exit. He seemed a little offended when I questioned him about passing the exit, but he assured me he knew where he was going, so I sat back in my seat and tried to keep my stomach from getting naseauted. A smile came upon my face as I saw our hotel just a few feet ahead--we had made it to our destination alive. :)

As we got out of the van and entered the hotel, I breathed a sigh of relief and silently thanked God that this meeting was not in New York City.