Careers/Jobs/Passions

I have been thinking a lot about jobs lately, and this week even more so because I am looking after kids for a friend of mine who runs a daycare (she had a death in the family). Boy am I tired, it has been a real busy week, and I have forgotten how busy you are when you have little ones in the house.

Anyway, I have done a variety of jobs - public sector, private sector, retail, waitressing and now some contract work. Each job has its benefit and of course its negatives.

Retail work by far is the hardest. When I was in university I got my first real retail experience in a lingerie store. Not a sleezy store, but one that sold support garmets, nighties, panty hose and the like. It was in a local mall and it gave me money to buy books for school, bus passes, clothes etc...

Now working in this type of store has an interesting side effect, every freek, nut and bolt seemed to migrate there and for some reason, migrated to me. I was eighteen and naive, and people would come in and ask me the wildest stuff. For instance, this lady came in one night and said that she wanted crotchless pantyhose, then preceded to open her or her husbands playboy, to show me exactly what she wanted and tell me why (like I really wanted to know). The wild thing was that we actually had them, but I was told we sold them bacause some women were allergic to panty hose and this was their answer to it.

Another night I got a call from a fellow who wanted to wear womens panties. He was inquiring about what size he should wear, the colors we had and styles and if he could try them on in the store (the answer is no of course, it is a ladies store). I was perfectly okay speaking to him on the phone, and then he said the dreaded "I am in the mall talking on a pay phone and I would like to come in and see what you have" and that totally freaked me out. I remember putting my head on the sales counter thinking "Oh God, he is here and now what ?" It was close to closing and I was alone in the store, and to this day I don't know if he saw my little melt down, or if he lost his nerve, because he never came in.

I was also hit on in the store quite a bit. I think men think if you sell lingerie you must be a real maniac in bed and have drawers and drawers of the stuff. Nothing could have been further from the truth, I was a student living at home. I had no money for anything. Also, when my boyfriend's friends found out his girlfriend worked in a lingerie store, they looked at him like he had scored some winning touchdown at the superbowl. It was really wild.

I worked in this store for a year then moved on to a lingerie dept in a large department store and it was just as interesting an experience, the nuts came out just as frequently, they were just a little more subtle about it.

Thought for the day

Money does not make you rich, being loved and loving does

Halloween is .....

Sunshines favorite time of year. In fact, if you ask her what her favorite holiday is in the whole year, she will tell you without hesitation that it is Halloween. She has ALWAYS been like that. Don't think christmas is not popular, it is, and she is totally up for it, but there is something about Halloween, and it is just not getting the candy.

So imagine my stress when it comes to Sunshine and costumes.

The first year she went out, she was a yellow M&M. Now I don't sew, in fact sewing causes me a huge great deal of stress. I am a wing it kind of girl, and it shows in whatever I do. For example, when I cook - I always change the recipe, and whenever I knit from a pattern, I change it, be it the texture of the yarn, the color of the yarn or even some of the pattern if I am so inclined. So since sewing is a most precise discipline, and I am an eyeball kind of girl, it really tests my patience and precision.

So with this in mind, my mom helped make Sunshine's M&M costume. I was so thankful for her help. The next couple of years I got off easy because she was in her princess phase of life and off to the Disney store we went. One year we were soo keen to have her be Snow White because she could have been a living version of her, but she would not budge, Belle she was going to be. Even the Disney store sales people kept telling her she was the perfect snow white, but noooo Belle she was.

Then came the Harry Potter year, and low and behold, I have to sew. I ended up having to make a cape with logo, and with a huge portion of help from my best girlfriend, a Hermione costume was had. Now last year, my mom gave my sunshine a book about fairy costumes for her birthday in March. All year she dreamt of being a Poppy Fairy. Well back to my best friend I went, and a Tulle skirt happened and I made wings (delicate darn things) and I talked her into some fancy shirt she had.

Fast forward to this year. A blue Alien. Yep she wants to be a Blue Alien, not a vampire (could have re-used the cape), not a ghost but a blue alien. So far I have managed to get out of sewing, but I am not out of the woods yet. Plus the costume has to be done for Thursday night because of a party she is going to. Yep, no stress here! I am going to need the chocolate by the time the 31st rolls around.

Question of the day
Are you sure you don't like this princess costume hunny? It could fit ya know!

Here I sit and I should be ....

working on my contracts....

Well, I have been, but I would much rather be surfing the web, or swimming, or bowling or ....

Hubby and sunshine have gone out to a local museum since we have company visiting here again this weekend. Yep you gottit, 3 weekends in a row we have had company. I like visitors and all, but I am getting tired of washing sheets and towels for people who come and spend just one night. Do you think it would be rude to put out a sleeping bag ? tee hee

Yesterday we went out to a local farm that goes all out for Halloween. We got to go in a haunted house, a haunted hay ride and did some wild tree mazes. One of the mazes was a mile long, and can take you up to 40 minutes to do, and I think that sounds just about right. We went with a crowd, 5 adults and 5 children and I think that is about the proper ration to keep track of children all under the age of 8. Yep, I dunno who was more tired at the end of the day, the adults or the children. It was a lot of fun and a nice break to get outside and enjoy the sun. Of course now it is going to rain here for the next what feels like forever, but that is ok, I will just close the drapes and put on a fire and work on my contracts :D

Oh well, back to work ....

Thought for the day
Boy it is quiet in the house when no one is here and I should be working

What science fiction/sci fi character are you

Came across this cool site, give it a whirl!

http://www.tk421.net/character/



Here is how I scored:

Judge me by my size, do you? And well you should not - for my ally is the Force. And a powerful ally it is. Life greets it, makes it grow. Its energy surrounds us, and binds us. Luminescent beings are we, not this crude matter! You must feel the Force around you, everywhere.

Ahh, I feel the force within you....

Swooping

While waiting at the bus stop for sunshine this afternoon I was mesmorized by the grackles that were swooping and landing on people's lawn for what seemed like seconds and then they were off again. I enjoyed watching their dance in the rainy weather we are having. I wondered what made them decide whose lawn to land on, what colorful tree to sit on, and who was the ringleader of the flock. They were almost dancing around in the sky with their spotted wings. It is so pretty, like the leaves that are falling from the trees, doing their downward dance to the ground. It seems like Spring is the time for renewal and song, where as fall is the time for just one more last dance in the symphony of colorful trees before everyone takes off for winter.

Maybe that is what Fall is all about, one great last colorful party with everyone before hibernating in our houses for the winter.


Something to ponder

Do we really have to wait until you retire hunny before we can become snow birds?

it is only a matter of time

Before gas prices go up ..... yep, in anticipation that the latest hurrican may track to the gulf, oil is already up a buck. You know that it is only a matter of minutes before it is felt at the pump!

So is everyone ready for Halloween? I was buying candy, but we were eating it all so now I am waiting until it is a little closer to the spooky event before I will make the trip to Walmart to get some more. What is it about the small snack size boxes of candy that makes you think you are not eating any calories? It is only a wafer!

I remember going out as a kid and trick or treating and then coming home with a pillowcase full of candy. My brother, sister and I would sit in the living room and then proceed to barter with each other for our favorite candy. Mom and dad would let us gorge ourselves that night, and send some candy in our lunches for a couple of days when all of a sudden the candy would dissappear. Yes, somebody from the x-files abducted our candy. Finally we got wise to what was going on, and the candy was hidden to be snacked on at a later time. My child is not a big candy eater, so typically I throw out the stuff a month later and sunshine is none the wiser.

Ahhh Halloween, cannot wait!

Question of the day

Whatever happened to the real snack sized candy you got when we were kids?

Thanksgiving Thanks

So Thanksgiving was this past weekend, and my family is in a Turkey stuffed coma. It has been nice being lazy, but getting back into the groove today took a bit of effort.

It was nice having my inlaws here and they told us that this is the fist time in forty years that they have had a Turkey dinner where they did not have to prepare it. I am glad that they told us after the dinner or I would have felt more pressure!

Memories shared were fun, and good times were had by all.

So here is a small list of things I am Thankful for in no particular order:

That everyone we love is healthy and happy
That we have food on our table and a roof over our head
That our parents are alive and that sunshine gets to know and love them
Sunshines giggle
My hubby


Today's query

Exactly HOW many more days of Turkey do you think we have left to eat?

So I want to ....

bake an apple pie. The only thing is we have no apples. We were going to pick some today, but it is raining so that has put the kibosh on our apple picking.


Hmm, apple pie. Mom makes an awesome apple pie and blueberry pie. Here is today's memory - my mom's blueberry pie is a source for great discussion at home. When we were younger, mom would put some kind of thickner in it so that it would not leak all over your plate and be drippy. Then there was a bit of a revolt in the family because my grand mother would always have runny blueberry pie and my dad wanted pie just like his moms. He even enlisted his siblings to pester my mom about it, so now we have runny blueberry pie.

So now whenever I have blueberry pie, it has to be runny. An homage to my grandmother!


thought for the day

it is a good day to be a duck!

Time to ......

spend time in the kitchen.

Okay, thanksgiving is this weekend (I am Canadian Eh!), so family is descending tomorrow and I am baking in preperation. I am using new and old recipes. While I am baking with the old recipes I think of the family member/friend who gave it to me.

Who am I thinking of?

The first thing I baked this week was chocolate chip cookies - my mom's recipe. My mom's chocolate chip cookies were famous growing up. Everybody in school wanted them, they were the best bartering tool at lunch time. My brother, sister and I knew that we could trade and get anything in exchange for those cookies. We quite often traded them because we knew there were more at home waiting for us. Another memory I have of those cookies is when my mom came to visit us and she baked cookies with sunshine when she was 3. My mom on our kitchen floor stirring cookies, with sunshine dipping her hands in to the batter to help herself to eat is a precious memory I will always treasure.

So I put it out there to you all, what is your person food memory?


Motivator for the day

How many more hours until they get here?

Beauty

So by now everyone has seen those ads for Dove and the campaign for real beauty. Beautiful ads and I applaud them for finally using real women.

But I sit here wondering why we don't applaud every wrinkle, stretch mark and grey hair that we have. My hubby and I have been discussing an article he read about how women are marketed to and that all the creams - no matter how cheap or expensive - do not work. That you cannot stop the passage of time. That you are going to wrinkles no matter what you do. Yet, here I am, applying lotion to my face hoping to do just that, stop the passage of time from showing. I like to kid myself and say that it is because I have really dry skin, and I am not interested in getting rid of wrinkles, but really who am I kidding. Are we being marketed to? For sure we are. Are we more wrinkly than our mothers that went before us? Hard to say, I don't think so, but I guess there is some arguments that our environment is more toxic, thus worse for our skin. Certainly our ancestors had a hard time of it and being exposed to the environment more. Is expensive better than economical? Who knows, I do have both more expensive and cheaper creams in my medicine cabinet. Which ones work better? That is the question.

Goodness knows. I still keep applying it and asking my hubby if I look better and if the creams are helping my skin, and of course he is going to say yes. To him, this is one of those topics that sometimes there is no right answer for, only the answer that I want to hear is the right one. But curious, he did bring up the article.

All I know is that I will keep applying it. I do have dry skin you know. ;-)


Question of the day

Is beauty really skin deep?

What a beautiful day

It feels like summer here, 26 degrees celcius. Swim anyone?

Well late last week, an official report came out that said that we are being gas gouged. Wow, we needed a report to tell us something that we have known for YEARS! I mean come on, the gas goes up the week before a long weekend when everyone will be travelling, and then immediately goes down on Tuesday after. Yet the wild thing is that nothing will come of this report, I guess we should be comforted by the thought that we are really being gouged, that it is not our imagination. Hopefully we will have a warmer winter than last year and it will not be expensive to heat our homes. I worry about people on a fixed income and what they will do if oil continues to climb.

Thought for the day

"Property may be destroyed and money may lose its purchasing power; but, character, health, knowledge and good judgement will always be in demand under all conditions." - Roger Babson