Monday, May 28, 2007

In the Garden

Me and my ladyfriend went to tend her garden this evening. She and her friend, Katie, have been renting a plot in the Community Garden over in Clifton Park for the summer. It's a pretty cool spot. A little bit of rural in the middle of the city.


Jeannie and Katie have a modest plot that looks like this:


I've been training some folks at work for the last few days. People that are going to be managers at different stores. It hasn't been too bad, because I wrote up a little bit of a training guide so that I could get through everything and not forget anything. It's kind of exhausting to train 2 people for 8 hours while attempting to do your job at the same time, and I'm tired tonight.

And I wanted to take a little space here to say RIP to Charles Nelson Reilly. Some of you may know that I'm a fan of the old game show Match Game, and if you're familiar with Match Game at all then you know about Charles Nelson Reilly. I don't really know all that much about CNR other than what I've seen on a corny game show from the 70's, but I really feel some sort of strange sort of admiration for him. Mainly, I think because he always seemed very smart and very comfortable in his own skin. So I probably shouldn't be too sad about the passing of someone I've only seen on TV, but I am.

Here's another picture of the garden, as it was getting dark:

Friday, May 25, 2007

Date Night.

It's been another busy week. Work, and then working on the set on the days off. It has given me quite the sunburn on the back of my neck. But it's just really red, it doesn't hurt.

Tonight me and the Jeanners got ourselves a little date planned. Actually, we just have a plan to go to finner, and we don't know where yet. But considering how our schedules have been lately, I'll take it. She should be getting home from yoga soon.

Looking forward to our impending trip to the Lou. We'll be staying a few nights with my parents, which is a new thing for us (not new for me, I did it for 18 years) but I think it'll be a good thing.

Hmmm. I've been wanting to work on music lately -- tweaking some of Sean's songs, working on some new stuff -- but have had neither the time nor the inspiration. Why do I feel so much busier than I used to be? I don't really think I am, but it sure feels that way...

Some highlights from work from this week include the joy of getting to throughout another mostly-naked homeless man from the bathroom (this guy was much nicer than the first mostly-naked homeless man I encountered, and I told him so) and getting to meet the sister of T. Griffin, a customer who has a slight mental disability who lavishes more praise on me than anyone I have ever met. He also will go from talking to you to talking to himself in the same sentence, with no pauses or changes of inflection, so it can be kind of confusing. An example sentence: "Dan, you're so nice maybe you're his favorite customer, Tom."

Sunday, May 20, 2007

A quick call for help...

Lately, I have had the name "Lee K. Bottoms" in my head. Does anyone know where this name comes from? Something tells me that this name is somehow related to E. Elz. Can anyone confirm or deny this?

Build-a-Thon





Today the Jeanners and I were part of CSC's 'company build day,' where we try to get a bunch of people to come out and work on the set for the summer shows. And it actually went pretty well. We had a good turnout, got started at around 10am and worked until about 7:30. And got a lot done. So I'll probably build some more on my day off on Thursday, but then hopefully won't have to do much more after that.

I kind of got in trouble yesterday at work because of some negative feedback that was given about the way I trained somebody from a different store. I'm not too concerned, but perhaps I shall not slack as much as I like to. I shall now use a carefully dropped f-bomb to say "fuck it."

It felt good to work outside today. I felt very out of practice as far as all the carpentry/building stuff goes, but the weather was nice and the people that were there were all fairly handy so it made for an enjoyable day.

The season finale of LOST is on this Wednesday, and I have to miss it in order to train somebody at work. The VCR will be rollin'.

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Countdown to Summer

This week has been all about enjoying the finer things of spring -- walks and gin and tonics. The Jeanners and I have been taking a nice walk most evenings when she/we get home from work, and then enjoying a tasty G&T apiece.

Other than that, not much to tell. Work has been pretty pointless, but mildly enjoyable. My days off have been pretty uneventful, and I'm getting ready to do some work on the set for the summer shows. We'll have a big build day this Sunday and then I might do some building on Thursday, depending on how things go this weekend.

This morning on my way to work, I was thinking about a bit of wisdom that used to come up in Schmor's acting classes: 'pursue what you resist.' I always thought it was a good piece of advice, something to keep you moving and growing. I guess the problem that I'm running into these days is that I'm resisting a lot of things, in a lot of different directions. I'm resisting staying here in Baltimore for another five years, working at the B&N job which is easy and comfortable but not challenging, and I'm also resisting picking up and starting over somewhere. And so on. Lots of things like that. So which way to go? What to pursue?

That's what I was thinking about when I drove into work this morning. I never quite fully woke up today. I think it's because I was awakened before my alarm went off by sunlight coming into our bedroom window.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

I Always Feel Like Somebody's Watching Me --Rockwell

Well, I wonder how Seanyboy's two opening gigs for Colin Hay went. Somebody left a comment on his Myspace site that they heard he sounded great, so that's a good sign.

Happy Mother's Day to all the Moms and Moms-To-Be out there. I sure do miss my mommy and daddy today. I'll be glad to see them in a few weeks.

So since the cameras have been installed at work, I have been experiencing a strange phenomenon. Now that I am theoretically being watched for all of the 40 hours per week that I am at work, I have been having the sensation that I am being watched at other places, i.e. at home, in my car, etc. Pretty much everywhere I go, it always takes me a minute to remember that I'm not on camera and that I'm not being recorded. Similarly, because at work we have the capability to go back and watch stuff from last week, I forget that not everything that happens around me is being recorded, and I cannot go back and watch things at will. For example, I cannot go back and watch a recording of myself typing this blog, cause there's no cameras here. But after spending so much time at work, my mind sort of starts to forget that. It's weird. It's not something that I expected to happen. I wonder if this is going to get better or worse once I get used to the cameras being there?

Tonight as Jeannie and I made dinner (felafels) we listened to a mix she had made from our music library. It was damned good.

New guy at work started on Saturday. He did pretty well. We'll see how it goes...

Thursday, May 10, 2007

Milestones

Today is Bono's 47th birthday. It's also my brother-in-law Tom's 44th birthday. It's also the 2nd birthday of this blog.

In the last 2 years, I've done 314 posts, which comes out to a post every 2.3248407 days. Which ain't a bad average, really.

LOST was, indeed, a pretty good episode, although it raised just as many questions as it answered...

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

A bust.

I've been looking forward to this day off for awhile now, and I must admit, it was a bit of a let down. It all started when the arm on my glasses broke as I was taking them off to get in the shower, so I spent a good part of my morning running around looking for a place to get them repaired. Then spent most of the afternoon doing nothing much, and then silly P. Kilpatrick forgot about our dinner date, and now I'm down to the last thing I was looking forward to, LOST, which had better be a good one.

On the good news front: Jeanners got the day off tomorrow so we can hang out. That's pretty sweet, and will turn a day of chores and errands into a day of fun.

At work yesterday, I was shown how to review video from the new cameras. It's pretty cool. It's all digital, and you can zoom in on stuff and it kinda makes you feel like you're working on Law and Order. Anyway, it should be pretty helpful in spotting the shoplifters. Maybe it will help me get some good sleep.

Friday, May 04, 2007

Dull Boy

Well, so much for my resolution to post more frequently and more interestingly. However, I have really been working my ass off for awhile. Right now I'm in the middle of working 13 days in a row. Usually I start to get a little cranky after 3 or 4 days in a row, but I think I'm doing ok. Although I still have 4 days left to go. Then 2 days off on Wednesday and Thursday. Wo--Hoo!

Already have plans for burgers with P. Kilpatrick at some point next week, so that should be fun as I haven't seen him in awhile and he's been busy with wedding plans and rehearsing HENRY V.

Let's see, what else? If the weather keeps getting nicer I'm gonna have to start considering making some runs to the beach on my days off. I like to go swimmin' with the dolphins.

Also can't wait for our trip to the Lou at the end of the month. It will be good to see the families, hopefully some friends, and do some relaxing and not thinking about the B&N. I think about the B&N way too much.

Oooh, I almost forgot. They installed cameras today at the B&N, so now I can catch some of those shoplifters I have regular recurring fucking nightmares about. Look out, Mr. Jerk! Unfortunately, that also means that Big Brother will have concrete evidence of my, shall we say 'somewhat relaxed' managerial ethic. Oh well.