Erik and I had a blast in Seattle! My nieces are so cute. I haven't figured out how to get the pictures off my new digital, but as soon as I do, they will so be here. We did a lot of site seeing in Downtown Seattle since Benni, lived 10 minutes from it. The weather was beautiful although hot for Seattle. We were hoping to get a reprieve from heat and we brought it with us.
Benni and the twins accompanied us most of the time we were in the city. It was fun maneuvering the big baby stroller everywhere and of course, we couldn't go anywhere without people commenting on the cute identical twin baby girls. Erik thought it would be funny if Benni created little pamphlets she could have on her to hand out to everyone who asked about the twins. They are almost to the giggle stage and are so desperately trying to roll over. They smile up a storm and were fairly none fussy for the many days we were there. Erik and I did a lot of baby sitting and Erik changed his first diaper. He was so cute with his nieces.
We flew in about Wednesday night and drove to his sister's place which was a whole 6 miles from the airport. Thursday, we went to Pike's Place market and I saw them throw fish. The place was huge. We also picked up The City Pass, so we could check out a lot of the museums and the aquarium. We only checked out the market on Thursday though. So many cool shops. Erik and I both love garlic so we bought some whipped garlic and he got some pickled habanero garlic.. they are spicy but good. We picked up so Italian food to take home and cook at this cute Italian deli called De Laurentis. The food was excellent! We even used some of our whipped garlic on the bread and my mouth is watering thinking about it.
Friday, we went to the Science Fiction Museum/Music Experience.. I love Science Fiction and it was a really good display. We headed over to the Pacific Science Center which is more toward kids, but it was still a lot of fun. The bug section was cool. That was the day we went up in the Space Needle as well. The views were breathtaking and it was so clear, I got a great shot of Mount Rainer. Benni was being our tour guide and pointing out all the important areas of Seattle.
Saturday, Benni's husband Joel was off work (he works on the 40th floor of the WaMu building which also house's Seattle's Art Museum which I sadly didn't get to see this trip). He vollunteered to help his friends at this huge art showing in Georgetown called the Artopia, so we stopped and hung out there for a while. Afterwards, we were going to go to the zoo, but ended up back on Alaskan street and had lunch at a Spaghetti Factory and then went to the Aquarium. The seals and sea otters were so cute.
Sunday, Erik and I had made plans to meet some friends we play video games online with (yes we're geeks) at the Pike's Brewery in the Market area. Doug lives in Seattle, and Angela decided to drive up from Olympia to meet us. Erik and I took a cruise of the harbor before we headed up to meet them. Erik was geeky enough to wear a tee shirt from the video game we play City of Heroes. We walked to the restaurants lobby and Doug saw the shirt and started smiling. We hadn't met before. He's a pretty nice guy. Angela was 30 minutes late thanks to Seattle's Gay Pride parade and having difficulties finding parking. She is only 3 months older then me so I was nice meeting another female who plays the game and is my age. We hung out with them for the rest of the afternoon. Doug headed home first and Erik, Angela, and I went for a walk through the Olympic Sculpture garden which had more walking the actually sculptures in it, but it was a beautiful day. We said by to Angela around 6pm and headed back to Benni and Joel's. Benni had called and told us they had gone to a BBQ, but we were pooped so we picked up a frozen pizza and watch Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (I was on a George Carlin kick... he was such an innovator for the comedic world).
We headed up Monday morning and walked into our apartment at 2:30pm. I was so not looking forward to work today and it sucked. I hate missing because no one there can do my job LOL.
Pictures soon to be coming. I took mostly nature shots with lots of pictures of the babies.
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Quiet and Busy
A week without students. It would be nice to have a week without phone calls too. I get to play music at my desk for a change. Pandora.com is a great invention. I just type in an artist I like and it'll play the artists that play a similar style to the artist you input.
Today was supposed to be very quiet except for the new Chino Center in the other charter doesn't have their occupancy permit approved yet, and they scheduled students for testing thinking it was going to be approved yesterday, so guess who gets to host the 26 testers they scheduled for today? If you guessed my center, you win. Thankfully, I don't have to help them though. They provided Kim, Pomona 1's Center Coordinator. I've met her before and she's really nice to talk and gossip with. It's fun to hear gossip from other charters. I'm not much of a gossiper myself, but it's nice to hear what's going on in the part of the company you usually don't get to see.
Packing up tonight for the trip to Seattle. I'm getting excited. I really want to go buy some new shoes and a couple of new outfits tonight because lets face it, the clothes I currently have suck. I've lost 12 pounds so far this year and I don't feel like I've really shrunk out of my current wardrobe yet. Most of my clothes are comfortablly loose, but for the most part they still fit. I've noticed most of the weightloss in my pants though. My shirts really aren't any looser.
Alright, need to get back to cleaning off my desk. I'll be working later tonight so I can get caught up on my folders so I can leave early tomorrow. Erik and I are taking off at 6:30 from the Long Beach Airport. I'll make sure to take lots of pics and for a change post them on here.
Today was supposed to be very quiet except for the new Chino Center in the other charter doesn't have their occupancy permit approved yet, and they scheduled students for testing thinking it was going to be approved yesterday, so guess who gets to host the 26 testers they scheduled for today? If you guessed my center, you win. Thankfully, I don't have to help them though. They provided Kim, Pomona 1's Center Coordinator. I've met her before and she's really nice to talk and gossip with. It's fun to hear gossip from other charters. I'm not much of a gossiper myself, but it's nice to hear what's going on in the part of the company you usually don't get to see.
Packing up tonight for the trip to Seattle. I'm getting excited. I really want to go buy some new shoes and a couple of new outfits tonight because lets face it, the clothes I currently have suck. I've lost 12 pounds so far this year and I don't feel like I've really shrunk out of my current wardrobe yet. Most of my clothes are comfortablly loose, but for the most part they still fit. I've noticed most of the weightloss in my pants though. My shirts really aren't any looser.
Alright, need to get back to cleaning off my desk. I'll be working later tonight so I can get caught up on my folders so I can leave early tomorrow. Erik and I are taking off at 6:30 from the Long Beach Airport. I'll make sure to take lots of pics and for a change post them on here.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Folders, Folders, and more Folders...
This week, my day begins later than usual and I get to leave a lot earlier then use; However, I'm staring at student files all day long. I usually look forward to audit week at work because I get to hang out with coworkers I don't normally. Then, Audit week begins and I start checking folders for the same things over and over again. Teacher after teacher, file after file. When an hour goes by, your eyes want to cry. It just drags and drags. I've been eating fattening lunchs out this week and tomorrow my work is buying me chipotle. Free Fattening Lunch for the win. We should be done with the folders tomorrow thank god. My eyes will finally stop "bleeding". Enough complaining.. I don't have to be there till 8:30.. get to sleep in a hour.. WOOT!!
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Starting to Calm..
The last two weeks have been mentally draining. They had started great with a visit with my cousin Tanya. Work had been piling up with end of the school year stuff, so I knew I would be stressed from that and boy was I. Then Tuesday June 3rd, my best friend's father dies. It's amazing how quickly things can go from decent and busy to crappy and stressful. And how fast they change. My friend is having to deal with a lot right now. Due to his parents making horrible financial decisions, his mom is going to loose her house. His mom is having eye issues and can't work right now. She's on disability till her eye heals and now she's going to have to move soon. I wish I could help them out, but sadly although Erik and I are doing well financially, we don't really have any extra cash that we can spare right now. Hopefully, something good will come their way.
With regards to work, the next two weeks will be a cake walk. We finally heard this week that my center will not be closing and moving after all. There's a lot of politics in regards to Charter Schools and the superintendent of the district we're chartered through does not like change. Instead of seeing us as there as a partner to help the students, he sees and treats us like competition. They tried to incorporate some wording into an agreement where they would have say and be able to tour our sites. The heads of my company didn't want to set any presidents in any within any of their charters to have the district to have that much control. We are our own company that stands by the states guildlines. So we said no. We were going to give them more money and other stipulations as well, but they want more control and we weren't willing to do that since we are not a district school. We had planned on opening two other centers and moving my center to a different charter. My center is staying open, and the location that would have been the new chino is still going to open and be in the other charter so now there will be another Options for Youth center in my area but in a differnt district. My teachers are worried in regards to student load. I'm not too worried and know we'll be able to keep them at their student load. I just go with the flow. At least my drive will stay the same. So that stress is off my back.
The other thing happening at work was getting the students starting in the summer orientated so they can start the first week of July. I got enough students to fill all the spots, and then Wednesday, I find out the night school I filled up back in March if ending since the new chino is opening. Now, the night school started so that when the new Chino opened those students would just move from our location and start over there. However, the night school teachers without being told to do so, gave their students the option of staying at ours. My boss did not tell them to do this and was also under the impression that those students would be moving to the new location. So now I have about 12 students I didn't account for and that I don't have an appointment for them. I'll get it straightened out eventually. Next week, we audit folders and the week after that I'll be getting paid for 6 days and only working 3. It will be a kosher next couple of weeks for sure.
On friday, I was drug to see the new Hulk movie and was pleasantly surprised. I lilked it. It was a heck of a lot better then the previous one with Eric Bana (although Eric Bana is nice to look at) the story did suck.
With regards to work, the next two weeks will be a cake walk. We finally heard this week that my center will not be closing and moving after all. There's a lot of politics in regards to Charter Schools and the superintendent of the district we're chartered through does not like change. Instead of seeing us as there as a partner to help the students, he sees and treats us like competition. They tried to incorporate some wording into an agreement where they would have say and be able to tour our sites. The heads of my company didn't want to set any presidents in any within any of their charters to have the district to have that much control. We are our own company that stands by the states guildlines. So we said no. We were going to give them more money and other stipulations as well, but they want more control and we weren't willing to do that since we are not a district school. We had planned on opening two other centers and moving my center to a different charter. My center is staying open, and the location that would have been the new chino is still going to open and be in the other charter so now there will be another Options for Youth center in my area but in a differnt district. My teachers are worried in regards to student load. I'm not too worried and know we'll be able to keep them at their student load. I just go with the flow. At least my drive will stay the same. So that stress is off my back.
The other thing happening at work was getting the students starting in the summer orientated so they can start the first week of July. I got enough students to fill all the spots, and then Wednesday, I find out the night school I filled up back in March if ending since the new chino is opening. Now, the night school started so that when the new Chino opened those students would just move from our location and start over there. However, the night school teachers without being told to do so, gave their students the option of staying at ours. My boss did not tell them to do this and was also under the impression that those students would be moving to the new location. So now I have about 12 students I didn't account for and that I don't have an appointment for them. I'll get it straightened out eventually. Next week, we audit folders and the week after that I'll be getting paid for 6 days and only working 3. It will be a kosher next couple of weeks for sure.
On friday, I was drug to see the new Hulk movie and was pleasantly surprised. I lilked it. It was a heck of a lot better then the previous one with Eric Bana (although Eric Bana is nice to look at) the story did suck.
Monday, June 9, 2008
Crazy weekend
Thursday morning was really the last day I did any really work. At my work, we had graduation that evening and I'm on the committee so I had to attend and then on Friday we had a picnic at a local park. I woke up feeling a little sick in my sinusis. I was like great. I was only just sick the month before and that one last 2 weeks. I can't seem to stay on my health and fitness regime. It feels almost like the exact same illiness too. I so wanted to sleep while at the BBQ, but I did end up having a lot of fun. We played kick ball and my team almost won. Our last inning, I get up to kick. I hadn't been doing to well up to this point. My other times up to bat, I got catch outs. So I'm the first up and I'm not to confident. I go up to the kick the ball and I just kick as hard as I can. I make it to first base and they yell for me to keep going. I end up on 2nd. The next batter kicks it and gets it right between the base I need to go and the base I'm on. I run but it's hopeless. I run too fast and end up loosing my balance sliding past the base I need. I didn't get hurt but it was a hard fall and funny at the same time.
After the picnic, I drive home, pick up Erik and we drive up to Victorville. We plan on seeing Don't Mess with the Zohan that night with Fred and Judy. I'm hoping my friend Emily can make it as well. We end up seeing the 10pm showing and although it is funny, it's a way over the top as usual for a Sandler pic. Some will like it some won't. I'm more toward the like it side.
Saturday, we head over to Fred's for the wake. It was a somber mood and I'm glad we got to be there for a little over an hour before heading back down the hill for Medieval times and Tanya's 30th birthday party. Erik and I were going to stop on the way and get her a gift, but we forgot. We had a great time and Erik really like it. He'd never been there before. After the show, we call up Heath and head over to there place for their House warming BBQ. Got to see some old friends and see some kids that used to be shorter then me that are now a head taller then me. We left and headed home at about 8. I was feeling horrible by this time. And crashed just after 9pm.
Sunday, I just spend the day catching up around the apartment and trying to play my video game. my illness was getting worse though and started to move into my lungs. Today, I thought for sure I would leave work early, but I've been doing ok. Just feels like I have cotton in my lungs, so hopefully this illness won't last 2 weeks like last months and that I don't get sick again for a while. Some years I hardly get sick and others are well, it seems like every month. This is one over those years. My 3rd time this year.
After the picnic, I drive home, pick up Erik and we drive up to Victorville. We plan on seeing Don't Mess with the Zohan that night with Fred and Judy. I'm hoping my friend Emily can make it as well. We end up seeing the 10pm showing and although it is funny, it's a way over the top as usual for a Sandler pic. Some will like it some won't. I'm more toward the like it side.
Saturday, we head over to Fred's for the wake. It was a somber mood and I'm glad we got to be there for a little over an hour before heading back down the hill for Medieval times and Tanya's 30th birthday party. Erik and I were going to stop on the way and get her a gift, but we forgot. We had a great time and Erik really like it. He'd never been there before. After the show, we call up Heath and head over to there place for their House warming BBQ. Got to see some old friends and see some kids that used to be shorter then me that are now a head taller then me. We left and headed home at about 8. I was feeling horrible by this time. And crashed just after 9pm.
Sunday, I just spend the day catching up around the apartment and trying to play my video game. my illness was getting worse though and started to move into my lungs. Today, I thought for sure I would leave work early, but I've been doing ok. Just feels like I have cotton in my lungs, so hopefully this illness won't last 2 weeks like last months and that I don't get sick again for a while. Some years I hardly get sick and others are well, it seems like every month. This is one over those years. My 3rd time this year.
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
Devastated
My best friend calls me tonight. His dad is in the hospital and his heart stopped. His blood pressure has been below 90 all day and his heart finally stopped. They got it going after 15 minutes, but they don't expect him to survive the night. Freddy tells me that he doesn't need me there that there is nothing i can do, but it's hard to sit here. I'm torn over my wanting to be there for my friend and my obligations to my job. I'm on the grad committee and I'm required to be there for rehearsal which is tomorrow at 5pm and graduation which is on Thursday. I want to be there for Freddy, but he tells me not to come. So I will do my work obligations and come up on Friday. I hate that I can't tell my work no. I think I can get out of rehearsal tomorrow and come up. I think I'll try that. I want to be there for my friend. His dad was only 56 years old.
It's been 4 years since I lost my last friend to a car accident on his way home from his Prom. 18, graduating, and looking forward to life. If he was around today, he'd be 22. I wonder sometimes how he would have matured. He was a fun kid.
My 2 most devastating losses happend in 1997 when Grandma passed and in 1999 when I lost my best female friend also to a car accident. I had to find out from a newspaper. I don't think I've ever cried so much over a person before when Georgia died. I talk about her a lot even today because I don't ever want to forget her. If it wasn't for her, I probably wouldn't be married to the great guy I am.
Our story is this, my first semester in Junior college I didn't know what i wanted to do or be. I was interested in computers. Georgia and I both took an introductory computer class. We said hello occasionally and that was about it. The next semester we ended up in another class together.. Object Oriented Programming boy was that class boring. We both hated it, but we stuck with it. She got me to go to a local club which I'd never been too. We became regulars there and I started meeting other people. Through her I met my short term boyfriend Jeremy. He only last 2 months. Through him I met Sierra and through Sierra I met Erik. It all stemmed from Georgia. I only had her in my life for about 1 and a half years, but that short time gave me a lifetime of memories. The saddest part for me after she died October 20, 1999 was I realized that I didn't have any pictures of the fun times we shared. I did end up scanning pictures of her from her senior year book. One of my closest friends now went to school with her. For a few years after that, I was a picture fiend. I need to get back into taking more pictures. I don't want any regrets over remembering someone just from my memories. I like a visual record as well.
You're in my thoughts and Prayers Fred Marcus. You will be missed!
It's been 4 years since I lost my last friend to a car accident on his way home from his Prom. 18, graduating, and looking forward to life. If he was around today, he'd be 22. I wonder sometimes how he would have matured. He was a fun kid.
My 2 most devastating losses happend in 1997 when Grandma passed and in 1999 when I lost my best female friend also to a car accident. I had to find out from a newspaper. I don't think I've ever cried so much over a person before when Georgia died. I talk about her a lot even today because I don't ever want to forget her. If it wasn't for her, I probably wouldn't be married to the great guy I am.
Our story is this, my first semester in Junior college I didn't know what i wanted to do or be. I was interested in computers. Georgia and I both took an introductory computer class. We said hello occasionally and that was about it. The next semester we ended up in another class together.. Object Oriented Programming boy was that class boring. We both hated it, but we stuck with it. She got me to go to a local club which I'd never been too. We became regulars there and I started meeting other people. Through her I met my short term boyfriend Jeremy. He only last 2 months. Through him I met Sierra and through Sierra I met Erik. It all stemmed from Georgia. I only had her in my life for about 1 and a half years, but that short time gave me a lifetime of memories. The saddest part for me after she died October 20, 1999 was I realized that I didn't have any pictures of the fun times we shared. I did end up scanning pictures of her from her senior year book. One of my closest friends now went to school with her. For a few years after that, I was a picture fiend. I need to get back into taking more pictures. I don't want any regrets over remembering someone just from my memories. I like a visual record as well.
You're in my thoughts and Prayers Fred Marcus. You will be missed!
Another week goes by
Where did the last week go? I'm trying to remember what I did and it's practically a blur. There were a couple of highlights. I had to represent my center at our Graduation BBQ friday and the pie eating contest was hysterical. Only about 12 students showed, but the ones who did had a blast and there was a ton of food. I ended up taking home a Cherry Pie. Sadly the staff out numbered the students, but many of us were acting like we were the students. 
Enjoy the pie eating contest.. one teacher competited against the students.
Adding pictures and Videos where you want is a bit difficult here isn't it.
I had a lazy Saturday getting errands done around the apartment and then on Sunday, I visited my cousin Tanya and hung out with her while she did her chores. Boy do they have a lot of animals. We grillled then about 6:30ish, I headed home. I so did not want to wake up for work on Monday.
Originally, Erik and I were going to have a movie party on Saturday, but our friends are having a BBQ we forgot about and another thing came up as well. So our movie party is postponed till June 21st.
Work has been chaos as usual. We don't know when our location will be closing and we'll be starting at our new locations. Our students don't even know we're closing and that they will have to go to the new Chino (which hasn't opened yet and we don't know when). We're told to treat them as if nothing is changing. But it would be nice to have advance notice instead of last minute. Our graduation is Thursday. We get an email yesterday letting us know to close that afternoon and Friday we have to attend a softball game.. and it's mandatory, so we're closing the centers. It would be nice to know these sorts of things in advance so I don't schedule testers or orientations for when we're usually open. Love last minute decisions.
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