So at work Nerva accidently called me Tracy. I really hate that name, so I called her Nancy back. This whole thing now turned into a give everyone in the office a "lame old office lady name"... almost like camp names, but not. Well more like not, but hey, that's my story.
Haha... I'm sorta proud of that title... I'm so catchy. This morning was a terrible morning. I was trying to load Jenny's bike into my mom's truck this morning. Not fun. First I try to get the bike into the quad part of the cab. Yah, let's just say it didn't fit and my blood pressure rose. It also didn't help that somehow in all this struggle I managed to make the front tire rub on something so it wouldn't turn anymore. Then I open up the bed of the truck. They have one of those covers that lock right ontop of the bed, so of course, if anything is taller or wider than the top of the bed, it won't fit. So there I am struggling with the damn bike, all while in my pretty pink shirt and business casual shoes and pants. So I finally get it in. Now the topper... as I was pulling out my right mirror hit the side of the garage. I'm already pissed and my mom sticks her head into the garage and yells... "what did you hit?" me, "It was the mirror on the side and it didn't hurt anything so don't give me shit, I'm having a bad morning as it is!"
Then I got to work, and we had to take it out. Theresa asked if I could use the truck to pick up shelving. At least this time she got it out, fixed the tire, and wheeled it into my office.
So this afternoon I go to the bike shop to pick up MY bike. The guy was super nice and taught me how to take off the front tire! Woo hoo... it fits so nicely now in the car. I was all impressed and feeliing like a pro... "hey, do you know how to pop off the front tire of a bike?" Well I felt less special when everyone I asked already knew how. But Heidi seemed impressed.
the rain falls.
the sun sets.
fire is approaching.
the wind blows.
the flower wilts.
your words are encroaching.
Two times this last week I should have inserted my foot into my mouth. The first time wasn't that big of a deal, but for a minute there I thought I was going to get jumped. I felt a little bad, but got over it by the time I was home. Now the second time, a different story. I can't get it out of my head. I feel like a jerk. It really wasn't that big of a deal, but more how it was received is killing me.
So this, and the fact that everyone that I talk to at work is moving to another building soon has really got me down. Dang, I'm just so empty.
Nothing like the sound of a house guest walking up and knocking on your door to get you to clean your room... now all I need is a car guest.
Well tonight the family went to the cheesecake fatory for my sister Jenny's 27th birthday. Everything was very tastey. I am still full and with garlic breath. Over dinner my mom had the hicups and one way of ridding them is asking random questions. So I find out my Grandma Mathis' middle name is Dalene. My mom didn't even know that one. My dad told us that his mom, his sister, her daughter, and his grandmother all had it. Let's back track...
My mom and my sister Nicole - Lee
My aunt (mom's sister), my sister Jenny, and cousin Stacy - Lynn
My uncle (mom's brother), my cousin Keith, and cousin Zack - Alan
Me? - Diane.
So I didn't get a family name. I was half named after my "aunt" Diane who disowned my family when my parents went to her ex hubby/my dad's best friend's wedding. Oh yes, and this was when I was 10. But somehow like a year and a half ago my mom recieved an apology letter, so I guess all is good. I still feel totally jipped, so from now on you can call me...
Tricia Dalene Mathis
I don't even have to change my signature. So not for the first time, or the second, I give you... "What's in a name, Part III"
Tricia:
You are an overly sensitive person, often falling into a savior-martyr role. You are very skeptical and have more than your share of bad luck. You enjoy a challenge. You can take thought-directed actions. You are relatively demonstrative in your affections. You enjoy being stroked verbally and physically. You are clever, inventive, imaginative and youthful. You enjoy socializing. You need to learn to give and receive love for love's sake. You have a need to be assured of affection. You have much enthusiasm with a driving attitude toward achievement in life.
Dalene:
Your world, good or bad, revolves around your family. You are determined and loyal, and your word is your bond. You have a need to be up front. You have a diplomatic flair to your nature. Equality and fairness are important to you. You can be quite inventive and quite curious. You can handle details well. You have a methodical mind. You need to learn to be expressive. You are a person who cannot tolerate being misunderstood.
Mathis:
You want to be productive and feel useful, and enjoy helping solve problems. You like to be busy and not waste time. You have a need to be up front. You need to learn faith in place of fear. You work hard to achieve material success through your own efforts. You need to learn to give and receive love for love's sake. You have a need to be assured of affection. You try to be prudent. You have good business acumen.
I all of a sudden got really sad... I don't know if it just hit me, or seeing other departments, but my work is basically completely solo. I know I do stuff for the greater good of the company and for our kids, but somehow I still feel empty. I want to be part of a "team." I want to be needed and depended on for my verbal skills and knowledge, not just my sneaky computer talent and design. I'm sure I will be over it by the end of the day... I guess I just want to be a part of a creative process rather than just be the creative process. Man, I bet there are people out there totally hitting themselves because they have to work with idiots and wish they could go solo. It's just lonely, like everything else.
So my friend Hanna and I, whenever we hang out it's always centered around food or drink. Like right now, I'm really full. (We are going to make a valid effort to stop this habit). She mentioned a really good point to me on the phone today. Why is it that after we eat a big lunch we could totally lie down and take a nap, but when we eat a meal at dinner time, it keeps us up at night?
I really hate doctors... why do they always have to make you feel like such an ass. I don't care if you went to school for x amount of years or have x amount of debt or heard that same damn thing x amounts of time.
"I'm an individual, just like everybody else!"
So a tribute...
Way down yander not far away, a jay bird died of a whooping cough. Well he whooped and he whooped and he whooped so hard, that he whooped his head and his tail right off.
Ok, here's the deal, I'm wearing my BRIGHT orange shirt today that I got for $1 while I was in college at some thrift store in Rohnert Park (awwwww, RP). Now it's pretty bright, so my challenge is to see how many people comment on it today. I can say 2 for sure, but I don't know how comfortable we all are in the office yet to comment on clothing. There's about 12 or so on the admin side, and then a ton at the preschool, but we barely make eye contact. I'll update during the day!
Well I just got my first cell phone bill since I uped my phone and my plan. I did super on my minutes and I didn't go over! Yay me! I knew I just had a crappy plan before. I didn't go over my minutes... but whoops, I sorta went over on my texting. I had a charge of $15.90. Yah, I went over my 100 for $4.99 by 159. Let's count boys and girls... that's 259 text messages in a 30 day billing period? I guess that's only about 9 per day... but DAMN! So this evening I went up on my plan to 300 for $9.99. Totally worth not worrying about playing $20 bucks down the line.
AT&T has a pretty cool online billing program. I looked up who I was texting... yah, you know who you are *cough*heidi*cough*. But it also let's me see the current billing cycle too and shows exactly how many minutes I have where and even how many texts I have left on my plan. I was impressed.
Well I uploaded a bunch of pictures this afternoon. There is about three more rolls though from the underwater cameras. Those should be fun to see!
More on my weekend. On Saturday I totally ate it in my tube. I jumped on it and ended up flipping over backwards. My head slammed against the rocks and I scrapped up the back of my neck. I have a nastey bump on my head. But the rest of Saturday went smoothly.
I lost so much stuff! I'm most mad that I lost my sunglasses. It takes me FOREVER to pick them out! Oh well, I did it in the name of being a hero. On Sunday, Crystal ran into a bush and it knocked her off her tube. The current was super strong, but her tube got caught in a bush. I grabbed her for a little bit, but she got pulled away from me. So I grabbed some sticks hanging from the bank. This is where the heroness starts... Everyone else gets pulled down a little further and there's me, now standing in the current with my tube. I'm staring at Crystal's tube about 10 feet from me stuck in the bushes and silly me throws my drink off to the side, let's go of my own tube for them to fish, puts my sunglasses in my suit, and breathes. So I leap into the water like a beautiful dolphin (have to make this somewhat poetic) and then I swam like hell. In the mean time I'm ignoring everyone else saying, "JUST LET GO! FORGET THE TUBE!" Somehow I, the hero, get the tube loose and lost my damn sunglasses. I totally thought that they wouldn't come out. Man, I was wrong. Even through this my brand new, pink bandana was still attached to my neck.
Yah, the bandana didn't last much longer. I lost that somewhere by the exit. Some how I lost my flips too. You think I would NEED shoes to leave. So I'm in the market for some new flips and some sunglasses.
That night I made some peachy keens for everyone. Man, totally hit the spot and they loved them! Now Wes can't make fun of my "Girl Scout food." I'm thinking about trying some armpit fudge next time, but I'm not really a big fan of the stuff. I just want them to be amazed how you can stick some cheese with some other stuff all in your armpit and eat it and like it.
Today we drove home. Traffic wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I finally took out my digital camera to take some Monkey shots. I'm a slacker! It was a good group to go on a road trip with. I would do a repeat of Saturday in a heart beat.
Hmmmm... I don't even know where to begin with this weekend... I think I will let the pictures pretty much talk for themselves when I post them. We floated down the river over here in Bishop twice. Once yesterday and then again today. The last time I floated was with my sister Nicole, my dad's best friend's wife Jean, Jean's friend, and me. We were up in Calastoga on the Russian River wtih our little "champers."
This trip it's me, Crystal, her BF, brother Wes, roommate Steph, and roommate Joe. We are all staying at her dad's house with him and his gf. I swear, it's just like 90210. On the way up we had to take two cars, so we had a boy car and a girl car, and us girls even got mooned. Oh yah, the maturity level went WAY up!
Anyway... man... wow... I'm so speachless. I'm sure I can find some words if you ask me one on one, but I'm not airring all that out here for the strangers I STILL have hitting my site looking for Darren James. But life is like a box of chocolates... you never know what you're going to get.
Well I went to camp Monday night to Tuesday morning. It was so weird to be up there, yet at the same time I almost felt like I never left. Well, that's not entirely true since I kept running into strangers. Anyway, I had a really good time up there. I got to see all my cute kids that are up there... Giraffe, Frogger, Jabberwocky, Otter, and Flipper. I finally gave them my Frisbee is my Hero shirts. :o) It was so fun to see them wearing them around camp on Tuesday.
Let's see... briefly, the highlights... waking up Frogger on the dock at promise beach, finding Tex and Flipper in Wanish at 11:00pm (WAY late in the camp world), tugging on Jabbs to wake up at 12:08am on her birthday "go crawl into your hole and die!", hiding from the mysterious and hyper ad staff, "sleeping" at the flagpole with Rocket and watching the stars disappear into the morning, catching up with all the D-R-A-M-A, my talk with Bubbs, doing Frogger's hair, having a water nalgene fight with Giraffe, talking with my Popples, throwing the birthday Jabbs into the pool, getting thrown into the pool, spending time in the ark beating Jabbs with a balloon, just beating on Frogger any chance I got, seeing Scooter's new hair-do, catching up with Otter, eating enchalatas with Adidas and Punky, chasing a bi-polar girl down Pasole hill with Freddi, taking the death shortcut down Pasole hill (crap! I don't have health insurance, CRAP!! I'm not covered under worker's comp!), all the talks in the Biffy, and my drive home where I had to pull over and walk around to wake up after having an hour of sleep the night before.
Ok, so I guess that wasn't so brief. I haven't quite decided if I'm glad that I'm not up there or not. I miss it terribly. It's just so good to see the staff and feel worry free from the outside world. The people up there are each so individual and special. I think that's what breaks my heart the most. I never want to miss out on anything. I stall until the last possible minute because I think if I leave, I'll somehow be forgotten. Inside I know that those that matter to me and me to them, I'll never be forgotten and what we have will always be special, but there's a little voice inside me whispering words of fear that this chapter and those in it are coming to a close.
Ashleigh (Pools) and I once talked about how much we missed each other and how there will never be another time to just hang out for mass quanities of time. Camp gives you that chance to connect and hopefully through that connection you can develop a base that will hold strong to pull you through the distance and the time that separates us. I love you each in a very special and individual way. As my wise kid Jabbs once told me... "I think that camp brings out most of the best of people... all my good side goes to camp, and my bad side stays home."