My little niece is a fighter. She's on a C-Pap machine. That's a good thing. It means she's not on a respirator. She's breathing on her own. My brother said she'll get to kicking her chicken legs good at times. lol. My dad said she was kicking so well the other day that they thought she was going to roll over. She's tiny, but she's got fight. That's a good thing too. She's gonna need it being a member of this family. lol. My mom said her arms and legs are long. So she's gonna be tall. She's a tiny miracle. They say she'll have to stay in the NICU until her due date, at least, which was in April.
My mind has not been on writing, though at times, my heart has been. Even now, I'm stumped for what to say in my own journal. I was off yesterday, and I opted for cleaning around the house while listening to music, grocery shopping, and cooking a fabulous dinner last night. I wanted to write, but it just didn't happen. I'm sorry. Today I return to work. I'm hoping it will be a slow day, and we'll get to leave work early. It's Sunday, and it's been raining here. So I'm hoping that keeps people away. *crossing fingers* I know some people might say that people would make the day go by faster. I have this ability to find something to do, and in doing that, I can make the day go by faster and accomplish things I want to do instead of waiting of half wits who don't know what they want. Most of the people I wait on don't even know what a paint sheen is. If you're reading this, and you don't know what a paint sheen is, or which sheen you would want if you painted your home, look it up before you go to buy paint. I beg you. Granted I didn't know what they all were before I started working there. There are more than flat, and they each are different. So please check into it before you buy paint. Try to figure up the square footage or at least have measurements. I can figure up your square footage from measurements. Don't just say, "It's a small room," or "The walls are like from here to there." NO! Please also have an idea of what color you want to. Don't ask them to help you pick a color. It's your home. Honestly I could care less what color you put on your walls, and I'm not an interior designer. We don't take classes in that. You pick it out. Yes, these are actually things that bug me. I had a man ask me this week what was the difference between white primer and grey primer. Yes. Think about that. I had a guy looking at the primer, and he says to me, "Ya'll don't have it." That's it. Nothing else. I looked at him and said, "what?" When he told me what he was looking for, I was able to take it to it. We did have it. This is what I deal with people. A woman brings a container to me. It's blue colored with white writing on it that says, "Brush Cleaner". She asked me if that was what her husband needed to clean his brushes with. Now granted he might want something else if he's using oil paint, but from what she asked I nodded and told her yes. Since I never saw her again, or heard a complaint, I'm guessing he was using latex. I do love my job. What most people don't realize is that I'm not just standing behind the counter waiting on them to show up. I actually have things I want to, or have to, accomplish. So I'm being torn in two directions. I have to take care of you, but I have this other stuff I either want to or have to do. Every single day I work I have these closing procedures that must be done. Some of them take me away from the department totally. That's because the product I have to stock is scattered along the front of the store. Please, please, please, please if you go into a Home Depot do not assume because an associate is wearing an orange apron they know everything about the entire store. They don't. We get training classes on the department we work. That's a given. Then, if we want to, or they want us to, we get classes on other departments when we have time. If we're able, we learn about other departments when we can. We are not put on the sales floor knowing everything. I've watched all the classes for the garden department and paint. I've worked both departments. So I can help in those departments. I'm learning a little bit about the light bulbs. No. Light bulbs aren't as simple as the ones in your house. I get people looking for those long bulbs. I have never heard of a T8 bulb until I worked here. So I'm learning where the flood light bulbs, the appliances bulbs, and heat bulbs are. Please don't as me about breakers. You're on your own there. As far as flooring goes, I know you walk on it and clean it. That's it. I don't have time to take the classes. I'm taking safety classes when they put them up, and closing my department, and handling the safety committee stuff once a month, and making sure the overheads are straight. On one aisle alone I have 14 of those, I think, and I have three aisles. I've got all the closing tasks to do. Tired yet? Some nights I help out with the freight that comes in. Fridays we get paint shipments in that have to be put up. Friday nights we get a truck. Normally there is freight to be put up during the weekend. That's my goal, to have all the freight for my department out of receiving by Monday. Don't forget now. There are customers in between all of this. I climb up the stairs, move a box, bring down two, wait on two customers, go back up move another box, back down for another customer, go back up, move two boxes, label them, bring down two, pack the merchandise from the boxes I've brought down, wait on another customer, move the steps, go back up, grab one box, wait on another customer. Get the picture? That can be my days. Now some days I'm lucky enough to have someone working with me. They only call me when there are two customers because they can't handle that! Yes, that bugs me. I wait on four people at a time. This is what I do. If it's slow, then I'm up and down the stairs straightening things and packing out what can go out. I do this for 8 hours a day, and then come home. That's my job. So I'm worn out, and so tired of stupid questions by the time I get home. Mentally most nights I don't have the capacity to be on this site when I get home even though I want to. The running joke is, is that I'm not a DH (department head). I call the waste company when we have special waste to be picked up. I set up the last appointment for the IT guy to come and service our paint shakers. I handled the last three orders with one of our best pro customers. Honestly anybody could have done that last one. I think he's gotten over 30 5 gallon buckets of paint. I've shaken them all. I've put in two orders for this guy that were over 1,000 each. He bought....a street. His words. A street! He's redoing 4 houses on it. I wanna call him daddy. lol. I do love my job, but it drains me. When the physical energy is down, so too is the creative. Then when I get a day off, I still can't seem to find time to write. So please don't think I'm not interested. I'm just busy, worn out, both. lol. I know things will change someday. I can remember a time where if I had something to do for a few days, I was so happy. I'd say, "ohhh. I'm gonna be busy." I felt great. Now it's everyday that is like that. If I were to write down what I do on a calendar, I would barely have any days where I didn't do something. Don't get me wrong. I like it. I just feel like I'm losing part of who I am in the middle of it. *sigh* Just keep giving me time. That's all I ask. Have a good day BMR.