Air Pollution and Weather = Outrageous

I just read this on www.msnbc.com - I knew going into reading this that my suspicions were correct and I just had to laugh.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30476335/

Scroll down towards the bottom, and see what city ranks number one in the "worst" category. No shock there.

And my other daily outrage for the day - the weather.

Yesterday I was in Baltimore, shorts and a t-shirt, sweating profusely and watching the Angels beat the Orioles (yay!). On a side note, I caught a foul ball at the game. My 5 seconds of being live, on camera fame. It was 90 degrees yesterday.

Today, 24 hours later, I'm wearing a long sleeve shirt, bundled up in a jacket and carrying an umbrella. Its 50 degrees today.

Why? Granted I don't like sweating buckets, but I do love warm weather. Why was DC blessed with gorgeous weather for just a few days only to be doused with rain, doom and gloom for the next week?

Scary

Well I finally have something that is more than outrageous. A man(term used loosely) picks up a AX and starts chopping up a plant while telling the mother of his children " first a plant, next your head" Yes he is in jail, but his parents have lots of money and think he is a good guy who just needs help.This one scared me. He has a background of guns and anger etc. I just don't want to pick up the paper and see her name in it. She is also scared and agreed to go into hiding when he gets out of jail. But she also seemed hopeless as if she expects the worse to happen. Because she has a emergency protective order and he is in serious trouble she does have a very good advocate (not a volunteer) assigned to her.

Stupid Home Depot/Toilet Seat Update

So I finally go there to exchange the broken & USED toilet seat.  I tell her my long story. 

"Let me ask my manager".  I wait.

"Sorry, we're not going to be able to return it cause it's a bio-hazard"

somehow at this point, Muna came to me and possessed my body.

"Oh, NO, This is not my fault and I WILL NOT BE LEAVING THIS STORE WITHOUT A NEW TOILET!!!"  "It isn't my fault that someone returned a used toilet seat and YOU GUYS put it back on the shelf!"

"hold on a minute."  she leaves again and some other chick comes over and says the same crap.

So I yell at her too.. and eventually get my way. I go back and get another seat, take it to the front, exchange it and leave. 

I get home and Chris says, "That's the wrong size"..  WHAT!!!!!  THE!!!!! HELL!!!!! 

So we had to go back AGAIN last night. This time I took Chris and I had to give more hell because she never gave me a receipt..  I just want to be  done with this stupid seat. 

So we won again, got a store credit and bought a seat that is also a training seat for Alex only to get home, install it and it's too small for Chris..  Sorry honey. I'm over it and it's going to have to stay for awhile. 

Funny part of stupid girl. When she was putting in the description about why it was broken, she asked me, "so the hedges are broken?" I said, "hinges" and she  typed in "hedges" Stupid girl.. When was the last time anyone saw hedges on a toilet seat????? 

For someone so smart....

My current outrage is that a darling little two year old insists on being barefoot. Then she insists on walking halfway down the driveway until she sees an ant and then lets out a horrendous scream, freezes and continuous screaming, as if being eaten alive, until I come and carry her back up to the house. Twenty minuets after I had placed her shoes back onto her feet she walks to the end of the porch promptly removes her shoes and repeats the above. Twenty min later......
Yeah who needs a gym when you are walking half way up and down the driveway with a 32 pound two year old twenty times a day.
Oh and Lacey if you think that Alex calling you mom was bad, from some anonymous influence Emma has been answering me, "NO MAMA NO"

The Price Is High

So this is outrageous. But it's also OUTRAGEOUS!! Like you know, the good kind!

I told my sister that I would fly her out to visit over the summer. This was her birthday gift. Even two or more months in advance it's still expensive. Whoever is spreading lies about flight prices coming down ought to stop.

Yeah, it costs roughly 50 bucks more for me to fly to AUSTRALIA than it does for my sister to come out west.

So OZ is on sale from August 2nd to December 12 or something like that. A great place to go for spring! And flights are $265 each way. Wow, a whopping $530 RT. Qantas. Amazing.

Things that cost more than $530:

My Rent

A Good Plasma TV

Oral Surgery (Wisdom Tooth Removal).

Any decent computer, laptop or desktop.

Lipo :)

So doesn't this sound more appealing?

Toilet Seats & Weddings

Here's my first outrage: 

About 10 months ago I bought a toilet seat that I decided I didn't really need. I kept it anyway and stored it in the garage. So a week ago, someone (probably Alex) broke the toilet seat and it cracked in half. AH HA, I've got once. Yeah, now I don't have to spend that $25 again, I've got one in the garage. So after 3-4 days of reminding my husband to change it, I got it from the garage, put it in his hands and lovingly asked him to change it.  :)  He says, "we have a problem".  "what problem?"  "It's broken and it's been used."  How do we know it's been used you ask???  I'm sure you can  figure that out.. Gross!  So, now I have a potential fight with either Lowes or Home Depot (can't remember, so it may be two fights), a broken seat and something to outrage about.

2nd outrage: 

Is more of a statement than an outrage. Chris told me I couldn't go into details. But I should get a badge of honor for all the crap I put up with from Cranky people at weddings. And let me just say that it's hardly ever the bride. They are wonderful.. Most of the time it's the mom, but even in this case the mom was a gem.  No, there are still others that can put me in a funk and I have to just smile.. Ugh..  Let's just say I have to pray a lot while I work. 

My DAILY outrage

My daily outrage and it really is a daily outrage, is the complete lack of flushers in my household. There really is very few steps to going to the bathroom but for some reason my blessed loved ones frequently forget to flush.
It would not be such an outrage if it were only pee but yeah, and it would not be such an outrage if it were only the children but yeah.
Come on, I take a lot of time and energy in bringing food into the house and making meals for everyone but I can honestly do without (for the rest of my life) the aftermath of having to witness just how well I keep everyone fed.

Cell phones, stupid complaints, and seriously oblivious people

Last night was a bad night at work. There were a few things that happened that were quite outrageous.

Ok, first of all, going along with the theme of Mom's and Leslie's posts, people seriously need to learn when cells are appropriate, and when they're not. I had a table of 6 who were ordering their food. They weren't actually ready, but one woman insisted on "ordering" then instead of letting me get drink refills for another table while they figured out what to order. So I finally get everyone's order except for that one woman. She orders a salad. I ask her what kind of dressing she'd like when her phone rings. She answers. While I'm standing there holding everyone's menus and trying to get her order she has a conversation with someone from work about some paperwork that so and so didn't get done in time. Finally another woman notices me standing there looking quick flabbergasted that this woman is actually doing this and pokes her, so she says "Oh hold on a second, I'm trying to order my dinner and the waitress is waiting," looks up at me, says "blue cheese" and gets right back on the phone. How do you not realize that that's incredibly rude? I was in the middle of asking her a question!! grrs.

Ok so then an hour or so later I drop off a check at a table and they give me coupons for $5 off that actually expired on Halloween, but we go ahead and honor them anyway cuz we're nice like that. They leave and I pick up their credit card slips. On one was written "This price is outrageous! Totally not worth it AT ALL!!! I'm never coming back again! Call me if you need to talk *phone number*" I saw that and couldn't help but laugh. It might as well have said "Call me and give me something for free." For the record, after we took off the $5 her bill came to $47, and included 2 pizzas, 2 desserts (with ice cream added to both), 2 drinks, and a salad. Tell me a restaurant where you can get that for under $50.

So THEN it's like 9:30 and I have no tables and we close in 30 mins. For some reason they don't phase me (being "phased" means you stop taking tables and do some sidework in the kitchen and then go home). Then I get double sat. Fine, at least I'm making money, right? Except that then one of the tables ends up staying until after 11 (even though they knew we closed at 10) ordering cappacinos and long island iced teas, so the bartender couldn't do his sidework. They were there for so long in fact, that when they finally left I had hit 6 hours and 4 minutes in my shift, and had to clock out for a 30 minute break just so I could actually clock out and go home. And, of course, they tipped me a whole $6 on their $40 check. 15% is fine enough when you're an easy table during actual buisness hours, but when you make me stay there for an extra HOUR AND A HALF you had damn well tip me more than that.

Ok I'm done venting.

I feel better. :)

Susannah

Why adults shouldn't have cell phones

I catch an early metro (before 7 a.m.) to work everyday and I catch a convenient bus to my home in the evening. There is a girl on the bus who is always on her cell phone every afternoon. Blah blah blah she is on her phone from the moment she gets on the bus until the moment she gets off her stop. And if she's not on the phone when she gets on, she calls someone she "hasn't talked to in awhile and wants to catch up." Like I really want to hear your conversations every day!

And on the metro, there are many folks who talk on their phones, but use the speaker feature (that mobile to mobile thing where its like a walkey talkey). OMG - hello!!!!! That is the most annoying thing in the world. That little beep, then the loud voice on the speaker. And they aren't even talking about anything important.

My daily outrage for the day.

Why first graders shouldn't have cell phones

If you read my first post you know that I have a prejudice against giving small children cell phones.  Today another brick in my wall of prejudice was cemented...a first grader came up to me while I was on recess duty and told me she couldn't walk, run, jump or skip.  So, don't do any of those things, I responded.  

But my mom told me to call her, can I go to the office?

Why don't you go sit on the bench and rest for awhile instead?

She gives me a long look and doesn't move.

Ok, how about you go play on the swings, they don't involve walking, running, jumping or skipping.

She sulkily 'skips' off to the swings.  

The next thing I know, the secretary is on the playground.  Looking for the disabled girl.  Her mother is in the office to pick her up.  How did she know that her little darling was in need of a rescue from the evil playground?  The first grader had a cell phone in her pocket and she called her mother from the playground!

The Price of a Problematic Printer

"The Fabulous" Lacey Newkirk: Hey, the big printer is fixed!

Chris Newkirk: Really? Great. How much did it cost?

FLN: [sigh] A hundred dollars.

CN: ...

CN: What was wrong with it?

FLN: You'll never guess.

CN: ...

FLN: Paper jam.

CN: We just paid $100 to fix a printer that's been broken for over a year and all that was wrong was a stupid paper jam!?

FLN: I love you.

Upon further reflection, we actually paid much more than $100. We've been using stupid ink jet cartridges for the past year instead of the much cheaper (print per page, that is) laser toner.

And all that was wrong was a paper jam.

And I'm supposedly a "professional computer guy".

If the CompTIA people hear about this, they're going to revoke my A+ certification.

Titles

So my outrage today is that Alex is calling me "mom"  not "mama" like he has for the last year in a half.. Now all of a sudden (completely Emma's fault) he's all grown up and calling me "mom".  What's next, "mother" "Lacey"????    I won't stand for it!!   Did also mention that it's mostly in his tone..  Ugh!   but it is very cute. :) 

Is this a voodoo sign?

Aiden says everyone is going to be freaked out...I looked out the window and this is what I saw.  WT..?  Yes, it is a dead bird hanging from a string from a bloody wing.  Aiden is waiting for Grandpa to come home and put a band aid on it.  What happened to the birdie anyway, he says.  

Now he is going to type something.

 ryu67u68858966968iouyuooiykpkopitouiyoioip

With friends like these...

Almost every day Dustin and Amanda go off and do something together, without inviting me. I don't particularly mind, I'm not all that close to them. But on Monday, when Amanda was absent, Dustin said that we should go hang out at Border's during our three hour break between classes today. So today we're all getting our stuff together, Amanda tells us that she's going to a tutoring session for math (which neither Dustin or I need) and we leave for Border's. She's now super pissed off at both of us for doing something without her. WTF? I hate hypocritical people.

Rumors of spring

Who started the rumor that spring weather was pleasant, warm and sunny and lovely to be outside, planting flowers and skipping through the grass?  I had to wear two coats on yard duty this afternoon.  And now the wind is blowing, oh, I don't know, about a hundred miles an hour, and it is oh, I don't know about 30 degrees outside and it is supposed to maybe snow.  

Ok, I know that everyone has a cell phone these days, why even Scott has one now.  But when a mother sends a third grade sibling in to tell me that her son, in my class, is allowed to have a cell phone, in case he has a "sucky" day and needs to call his mother, it pisses me off.  Come tell me yourself, you cowardly mother!  I will not negotiate with a third grader.