First off...Happy New Year!! Ha Ha (This feels really weird writing this after going on a blog hiatus for the last 3 months!) Work has been crazy, which has limited my free time, days off, and general lack of intrest in blogging! (More on that later!) So New Years day I decided to make some of my favorite holiday cookies Peanut Butter Blossoms I enjoyed a nice quiet day at home knowing that it would be one of my last free moments for months.
Now let the fun begin... Monday January 3rd! (All mail was not currently in the picture when I snpped this) but we had 29 trays of mail delivered! 15,000+ pieces of mail that we are responsible for sorting, prepping, scanning, and matching the customer up in our computer database to fill the order. Hence the start of Mandatory Overtime :( While the paychecks are nice in the beginning...the hours worked and lack of days off start to wreck havoc on your body. OT consisted of between 6-20hrs extra to be worked in a weeks time! The longest week I put in was was 60hrs long and 13days in a row without a day off! (yeah my back loved me after sitting for 10+hrs a day!)
One week later Monday January 10th we received our first major snowfall of the season. The weathermen predicted between 5-8" and we ended up getting about 7". Now being a former Minnesotan with 4 wheel drive...this is no problem for me. But KC has a different approach to snow removal than I am used to. They usually just put some sand and salt down hoping it will melt the snow away, and not actually plowing it (and they have a serious lack of plows anyways!) Well needless to say this caused a lot of problems.. schools cancelled, not being able to get out, cars burried etc....oh well...I have OT I have to get done :)
2 days later I finally get a day off!! Woo Hoo! I am beyond exhausted at this point I came home from work, had dinner and proceed to take a bed nap...bad idea! 12 hrs later at 8AM I wake up! (Fully clothed! I'm talking socks, undergarments, sweatshirt....my husband tried to wake me up to go to bed and I didn't even budge!) I am feeling completely refreshed though. I make a chiropractor appointment after the murder I have been putting my back through and I feel like a new woman.
This is our mailroom board where we write our daily mail drop totals on as you can see we have been getting hit really hard because everyone is out of the "donut hole" and they can start to satisfy their deductibles again.. so everyone is going to the doctor and mailing in scripts! The week of January 17th MLK day fell...we normally get a mail drop on some of the "off" holidays (ones where certain businesses are open but you don't get mail!) but we didn't this time! Exciting!! a 4 day weekend since "mandatory OT" has been cancelled. But voluntary remains!
Houses are on the agenda! Pat and I have been out looking at houses for about a month or so and have probably seen 15 at this point with only 3 being strong contenders. In the 3 days coming we managed to see another 18! Man are my legs sore from climbing all of those stairs! But we have another contender that has moved up high on our list.
Another snowstorm producing 4-7" is due to hit tomorrow 1/19 and a mandatory 12 hrs of ot has been issued. BLAH! So needless to say I am treking out in a snowstorm on my day off to go into work. Another week goes by with more OT but there is a light at the end of the tunnel...it is supposed to be 52 degrees here..HEAT WAVE! Goodbye Snow!!
1/29 My Weather Bug on my phone sends me an alert to freezing drizzle, heavy blowing snow and 6-10" of snow by Wed morning 2/2! With the threat of bad weather looming OT has been TRIPLED!!! From 8 hrs to 24 hrs just like that!! Beyond livid!!! As is my company ended up putting workers up in nearby hotels because they didn't want them travelling home to far in the treacherous weather or better yet, not making it into work the next morning! (but yet they triple OT?!) Huh??
Hello February!! According to the Weather channel this is only the 2nd time since 1982 that KC has issued a Blizzard Warning! We are in for something major...I can just feel it.
Back up a day...this was leaving work on 1/31 We had rain all day which froze over as the temp dropped resulting in a full layer of ice all over my car! Thank God for de frost (and me going out on my lunch break to remove most of the water and ice that had already formed!) I can deal with the snow but the ice scares the hell out of me! Thankfully the sanding/salting trucks were out in full force and no major problems occured on my commute home.
2/1: Snowmageddon blizzard in full force! We got got about 14" of snow total! This was crazy fun watching from the comforts of my own couch! Later in the day we decided to trek out to the mailbox (which by no means is close) just to get out in it and have some fun! Being true Minnesotans we had a blast! Stepping down the stairs was a complete guessing game, only to step into a huge snowdrift that had formed up to my calf, cars being burried for days after our apartment complex plowed the lot and put all the snow up against the car fenders, snow hitting me in the face hard from the 40mph wind gusts we were having, breaking our shovel after trying to unbury our cars just to go to work the next am, and schools cancelled for days because of winds, cold temps, and buses not being able to pass through.
February 5th: Happy Birthday to me! I arrive at work to find my new lead had left me a balloon boquet on my desk! How sweet! I am now ending my 20's and quickly approaching 30! No major bday plans...because I have to work so birthday dinner has been put on hold for now. The next week we ended up combining my birthday with Valentine's day dinner at J Alexanders a favorite restaurant of ours!
The 2nd week in February I went for another much needed adjustment, and the bipolar weather went from being as cold as -10 one night to being 60 degrees in a week! Something I still am having a hard time grasping since I have moved! It has also caused me an onset of headaches from the drastic swing in weather. But the snow is melting and the sun is shining so I can't complain!
February 13th: After checking out this beauty 2 weeks ago...we decided to put in an offer... how scary! Are we really doing this? Is this for sure the right house? (after seeing about 40 houses now!) After filling out all of the necessary paperwork we sit and wait! More to come later...:)
The next day on Valentine's Day we found out this house has become a short sale and that we needed a new set of paper work to fill out! But otherwise our offer had been accepted and agreed upon by the previous owners and now we were just waiting on the bank to hear something back. Boy for this being a short sale..we sure are moving things along quickly! Our realtor told us we would probably find more out by the next day! So the next morning on FB I post "Excited...Nervous...Anxious...Eager" leading everyone to believe that I am pregnant!! :) Little do they know it's just a house! So after a call from our realtor which got me extremely excited he told me that it is now in the banks hands and that we would hopefully hear something in the next 3+ weeks or so :( So the waiting game begins! (And now we are on week 4 with no news still!)
So over the next few weeks I am still keeping busy with OT and trying to be patient waiting for good news and every Monday when the realtor calls I think "this is it" But only to find out he still "hasn't heard anything, and all is quiet on the homefront" Waiting is hard...and it has kind of lost it's "sparkle and excitement" but if it is meant to be it will happen! We have almost 3.5 months until our lease runs up anyways so we are technically in no hurry.
The weather is still bipolar...raining, sleeting, snowing then back to something else but another light is at the end of the tunnel...On 2/25 after almost 3 months of mandatory OT they have finally cancelled it!! I am so thankful! I know it could only be temporary but I have high hopes now that our daily mail has slowed enough to where we have caught up. Work is still sitting in another que that we don't have access to but it's not our problem since we are not pharmacists making the good money.
So now we are onto March...it has become way to nice to be inside now and the big window that I sit in front of is not helping!! :) I have also become addicted to
Scentsy products. My lead Trena sells the flameless candles that come in over 80 scents! More will come about this in another post as I am very excited about this product.
And for the difficult...my grandma passed away on Saturday March 5th. This was my dad's mom, and his only living parent left. She was 85 years old and after being hospitalized earlier in the week after a terrible fall she developed pneumonia and passed quickly after being sedated and put into comfort care. I felt horrible being 500 miles away from my dad during this terrible time and it just breaks my heart listening to him get choked up and cry over the phone. He has had a lot to deal with being her main care provider (other then her assisted living facility) over the years from doing her meds, to grocery shopping and taking her to her doctors appts just to name a few. And now this past week he has been dealing with arrangements, cleaning out her apt, Social Security, banks, paperwork, legalities, etc.... all during his busiest time of the year (and when you run your own business no one else can take care of the work for you!)
And now to the present day...I finally had the time to catch up on my blogging and here it is...after a morning of getting my hair cut and colored, picking up my Scentsy order that was delivered at work, printing some photos, wearing flip flops for the first time, the sun is shining with it being 77 degrees tomorrow and wearing jeans at work until further notice...I say it was a good day! (Now if I could only hear some good news about becoming a homeowner!)
