A game I play

Part of my responsibility for this 2nd job o' mine is to be the greeter. Simple enough, but it can get a bit old. Sure, you can find me shakin my groove thang if a good song comes on, and certainly I switch up my Hi Theres, and Welcomes, and Have a Good Ones now and then, but I'm still standing at a door for 8 hours saying hello and goodbye. 

But the good thing about living near the capital of this great nation of ours is I get to see a good deal of diversity. Much more spicy and interesting than the white bread of Ohio, "The Heart of It All." Because of this I've come up with a game to play to pass the time as I greet people. It's called "Gay or European." I think you can figure out the objective. 

Turkey Day TV

My parents bought a 50 inch plasma television this year, in time for the Women's World Cup and Penn State football season. At first I made fun of them for being excessive, but it is incredible. You can see the sweat, the divots, each step of the marching bands. And it's great for prime time TV too. Seeing the Heroes fly through the air, or the exotic animals and beautiful scenery on Survivor. Pretty great. 

But woooooweeee! The National Dog Show on high def?! That is somethin' else! I don't think I'll be able to watch a dog show on anything else from now on. 

80% full

A few months ago after receiving a text message, my phone notified me that my inbox was"80% Full!" I soon learned that after each subsequent text, my phone would give me the same obnoxious message. So I decided to delete.

It was weird reliving my life from 6 months ago via received text messages. Cute messages from the boy I liked, dated and screwed things up with, coordination with out-of-town visitors, drunken professions of love from roommates...ha...love you too Frank. It was really something special.

But I could only delete so many in one sitting. I found it was quite time consuming. That inbox can hold a lot of messages. I only deleted about 2 weeks to a month's worth of text messages initially, so a month or so later, I got the same annoying "80% Full!" message again. And I have since relived and deleted the past, and refilled the inbox with the present. I'll probably have to rinse and repeat in about a month. Can't wait to see what the future (or past) holds.

She works hard for the money

I started a second job. I don't know why. Well, actually, I do know why, but we'll see if it was a good decision, or if it just drives me to sleep deprived insanity. I worked at Apple Retail two years ago and I left when I got my salary-with-benefits-9-5 job. That proved to be good move, since I tore my ACL 3 months later and needed surgery. Gotta love that medical insurance.

But ever since I left Apple my friends have been telling me to come back. I always blew off the idea, but then a super good friend became one of the managers at the store where I used to work. Then I decided I would go grad school next fall, and started wondering how I would pay for it. AND THEN Apple created the fun new Concierge position (stay tuned to a commercial near you to see what I will be doing). Just saying "Hi" to people, pointing them in the right direction, and not actually selling anything?! Sign me up!!

So now I'm going to be making money that I don't necessarily need...or at least I don't really need *right now.* The plan is that I WILL NOT spend any of this money and just put it directly into a savings account. Any recommendations on a particular type of account? One with a rockin interest rate? I think I might just go into a bank and tell them to use small words and explain my savings options. Seems like there should be body guards who beat up the bankers when they are just trying to screw you over and take your money...because I'm not going to realize it if they are.

time again for the long johns

My roommates and I moved into our current place of living on February 24 of this year, a sunny but brisk Saturday. After the snow storm that came the following day, we quickly learned that our house was damn cold. Or at least, the half of the house where Matt and I were going to be living was damn cold. When we turned on the emergency heat, it got a smidge warmer, but we also learned that doing so would jack up the electric bill.

We called the landlords about it, because, well, we didn't want to die. They came to investigate and told us that when the house was built, whoever built it left out the insulation of the ducts. So the air was being heated, but as soon as it was being sent through the house, it lost all the warmth. Landlord's conclusion? It's not our fault, and turn off your porch light if you are worried about a high electric bill. WHAAA?! But I'm wearing 3 sweatshirts, 2 pairs of sweatpants, and 4 blankets when I sleep!! Instead of having a house warming party, we had a Warm-Our-House-Please-We-Need-Body-Heat-to-Survive Party.

Then the landlords came back and "added insulation." But by this time it was April, and the temperature increased. So we never really knew if what they did fixed the problem.

So last night we determined that it didn't. It's getting a bit more chilly out, so we had the heat on all day. The temperature outside reached 60 degrees, yet it was 55 in our house last night. Matt and I were exasperatingly discussing the situation, through our teeth chatters. We determined that even though we were hating life for 2 months when we first moved in, it did eventually warm up. But now that the temperature has finally cooled down this year, we still have 4 months of cold misery before our lease is up...

Some snippets from our conversation:

Matt: "Don't be surprised if you wake up and I'm curled up next to you."

Bri: "I shouldn't have been complaining about the 90 degree weather last week."
Matt: "Yeah, now it's coming back and biting you in the ass."
Bri: "It's FROST-biting me in the ass!"

Matt: "This is the kind of cold where you fall asleep and you don't wake back up."

I made sure he woke up this morning...

'My Whole Life's Been a Story'

I make podcasts at work!! #2 is up! We're really proud of this one. And we have a fancy new image for the podcasts. Hooray!

NCFY Podcasts

let's try this again

i used to blog on myspace, though i hated the word blog. i still hate the word blog, so i thought it would be appropriate for me to switch from myspace to a site that actually has the word blog in it.

i'm back and bloggier than ever.