motivation

Strange how motivation only presents itself when faced with the impending deadline. I only really clean my house when I know company (like my mother-in-law or my obssesive compulsive sister) is coming, otherwise my house is simply tolerable. I only mention this because I am currently taking a very short break from one of these motivational moments.

I hate that I am such a procrastinator. I could have cleaned all weekend, but why? Company wasn't arriving until Tuesday, I had plenty of time. Now it is Tuesday, obsessive compulsive sister is due any moment, and my bathrooms are growing something unidentifiable. (Thought to self, maybe I'll just have them stay in the brand new trailer sitting beside the house. It is perfectly clean. But no, that would be rude, or would it?) Instead I'll race around frantically picking things up, scrubbing any little fingerprint, and shouting orders at the kids and husband to hurry up and don't forget this and go do that. Then, finally I will be done just in time.

Why do I even care what people think of my domestic abilities, that isn't who I am. I am a lab tech who gets really great grades in college and I'm excellent at making sure everybody is where they need to be when they need to be there, so what does it matter if I hate cleaning house? Do you ever read in obituaries that this person was an excellent housekeeper? NO!

difficult questions

Ever tried to answer this question presented to me yesterday by my eight year old daughter....Mommy, what does dog breeding mean?

lessons to learn from children

Yesterday my little girl crashed on her bike and skinned her knee. Ahh so sad. She had let go of the handle bar to wave (at a boy) with her right had and lost control. My oldest promptly came home and informed me of the situation. Since I neither heard screaming nor saw profuse amounts of blood I chalked it up to scrapes and bruises of childhood. That is until the injured child arrived home and said her knee hurt.

You see, immediately following the incident the children rushed the injured one to a neighbors house where they hosed off the loose dirt and applied a smallish size bandaid. Nearly twenty minutes later the injured child returned home and asked mommy to make it better. I observed numerous scratches accross her knee with a small bandaid in the center. I carefully peeled away the bandaid to reveal a two inch long by about a half in deep gaping wound. To my astonishment she didn't mind how big the hole in her knee was she simply knew it was uncomfortable.

A whole lot of trauma and a few stitches later she is fine, but not sleeping all that restful. Hence my awakedness at 6 am.

In the end we should all learn a few lessons.

1. don't let go with your good hand to wave a cute boy.
2. kids are generally resilliant...until mom freaks out.
3. never make a small deal out of something that really needs to be made a big deal of.

Co-workers who suck

We all have them, the co-worker who we would love to see fired. Of course everybody feels this way about this person, but due to some extenuating circumstance (she's the boss's niece, or he's the boss's son-in-law, etc.) they will never, ever, not in a bizzilion years, no matter how badly they screw up, will they ever be fired.

Now, I've worked a few (ok, a lot of) places and in each place I've had the joy of having such a co-worker. However, not until my current job have I ever had such passionate feelings of hate for the person. Let's just cut to the chase. This person, lets call her Michelle, is an ignoramus.

Scene Set-Up....I work in the health care field, in a hospital where a mistake could cost a person his/her life. Michelle has a bachelors degree, God bless her, in Physical Education. She spent the early part of her career as a high school P.E. teacher. That is, until she was fired from that job for having inappropriate relationships with her female students. (I know ewwww). She then spent the better part of a year searching for local employment (small town, not much for an out of work P.E. teacher who likes young girls). After failing at various odd jobs somebody at the hospital (ok her church leader who is also the hospital administrator) offered her work in the lab. He insisted she had repented of her sins and was on the track to righteousness, she just needed a little help getting back on her feet (don't get me started on the church crap). So here she is.

Now, I have been going to school for three years on my way to my own bachelors degree .A year ago I earned an associates degree in Laboratory Science. I was offered a job in the local hospital laboratory, and I was thrilled to say the least. I started making good money, even for an associate. Then, this angelic little child molester started picking my brain for every little bit of knowledge I obtain at school. At first I happily gave it (hey, I'm a nice gal no matter what anybody says) until I realized I was feeding her information I learned my first semester of college. Here was a woman who didn't know what any first year lab science major knew, and she was working in the lab, generating patient reports, and the real kicker is she's making about three dollars an hour more than me because of that damn bachelors degree. I promptly quit feeding the knowledge and began scheming her destruction. A year of scheming later I am still making three dollars an hour less than her and she is still using me. GRRRRRR. Only now instead of picking my brain she figures since I'm a better lab tech she'll let me do all the work.

All this information has a point I promise.

Tonight my son has a baseball game which I promised I would attend. I was suppose to be off work at 6 o'clock and the game was at 7 o'clock. Perfect, I could even run a little over 6 and still be safe. We don't leave work until all patient samples are resulted. As Michelle sits in the corner of the lab talking on her cell phone (again with the cell phone talking to God knows who) I am hurriedly trying to finish up for the day, all the while encouraging her to help me. Eventually I finish, at 8:15. Damn it I missed the ball game. Try explaining this story to a six year old whose life revolves around sports. Not easy. My one salvation is that in a year I will be finished with school and make more than her and with any luck I will be offered a supervisor position which will give me the authority to fire her.

well behaved

I rarely notice how well behaved my children are until I am around other peoples children and notice how poorly behaved other kids are. Generally in the privacy of my own home I yell, curse at and discipline my children way more than is necessary....leading to the notion that my children must misbehave often. My experience today made me feel much better about the ranting I endure at home.

Today I took the kids to McDonalds for lunch and to my surprise they ate their food prior to playing with the kids meal toy and running off to the jungle gym. (I suppose all the times I've forced them to sit and eat against their will is now paying off). Meanwhile a young boy, about my sons age, is running around, sitting at other people's tables, interrupting conversations of people he didn't know and tormenting the toddlers on the jungle gym. The guardian of this young boy is sitting talking loudly on her cell phone, which brings up a pet peeve I'll have to discuss in a later post, to God knows who. (I'm sure it was a very important conversation, don't get me wrong, I just have a difficult time putting up with people who refuse put up with their own children). I wanted to reach out, grab the child and sit his ass down next to my children and explain to him the importance of manners. I controlled my urges, against my better judgment, and thanked my kids profusely for being so well behaved. I even gave them money to buy an ice cream.

I realize my choice of restaurants wasn't 5 star, but if a child can behave themselves in a fast food joint they are likely to behave anywhere (school, shopping, grandma's, etc.) Putting a parents mind greatly at ease.

All this has a point I promise.

People! Control your children. Yes even in McDonalds. The general public deserves peace and sanity as much as you. On the other hand, you could simply feed the child benadryl. This does wonders for behavior.

first time

Thanks Sis for showing me what blogging is. I can always count on you to introduce me to new and interesting things.

Work has been slow this week. I'm thinking it must be the calm before the storm. We haven't seen a messy trauma for quite a while so I'm sure there is one just around the bend.

Kids are out of school now and in the way most of the time. I hate coming up with things to keep them entertained. Today I gave the girls benadryl just so I could get some rest.