Birthdays, beagles and catching up

Okay, where does the time go???? I've neglected my blogs shamefully, and today I am remedying that. I updated my cooking blog a bit, with some of my tried and true fish cooking techniques. I've pretty much decided that "elaborate" and "fish" do not go together, unless there is a sushi chef in there somewhere, and I am NOT talking about that guy behind the counter at my local Kroger. Which I only trust for the occasional California roll, being from the midwest and inheirently suspicious of large grocery chain "sushi". If I am eating raw tuna, I want to know it hasn't been sitting fully prepped in a case for several hours.

I had a birthday a couple weeks ago, which mostly passed quietly. I'd taken the day off from work since my birthday fell on a Wednesday and Tuesday is my day off. I headed northward to visit with Dad and Dogzilla. Dad took me to dinner at the Green Diamond Pub in Barberton. It's not too pricey and it passes for finer dining in Barberton, so it was very nice. I had a Sam Adams draft and a nice chicken marsala. Dogzilla's "gift" to me was to sleep in until about 5:30 on Wednesday morning. The weather was on the cooler side, so we walked a bit further than usual. I guess the old boy was feeling a little bit frisky and his arthritis pill was working so that his bad back leg wasn't hurting too much. Of course, he forgot himself once or twice when running into Dad's air-conditioned bedroom and leapt on the bed all by himself. It just confirms that I spoil him by lifting him into bed. Oh well, 40 lb. beagle deadlifts are not all that bad.

Work has been busy, which is good. We seem to be hiring more people and, more importantly, SCHEDULING them. It makes a difference. Cashiers have been divided into teams that mean something, unlike in the past where there was no feeling of "owning" your team. I came up with a very simple chart (it's actually a simple table in Word) to track my team's progress on a couple of things, so that I can address people who need to improve performance a bit and reward those who are making real progress and contributing to my team's successes. Anyhow, my boss was terribly impressed and so was our store manager. My fellow cashier supervisors have even adopted the format. This is all good, especially coming on the heels of a very successful weekend up front. I opened this weekend, and it seemed like we were on a good roll heading into the evening for the closer on the credit front when I was leaving. We made our credit goals both days, which looks good for the two of us! Again, this is a good thing.

As usual, I have been neglecting housework in favor of reading, cooking and playing computer games! Must do some laundry today, though. Even as a single person, you need to do up sheets and towels! Have to get in a few supplies and do up dishes, too. And vaccum. At least I have that Orek that Dad gave me. He got a new vaccum, so I got his old Orek. It still amazes me that I have TWO vaccums and a couple sizes of hand vaccums when I don't actually like vaccuming at all. Seriously, if I ever hit the lottery, I am getting someone to come vaccum regularly.

That about sums up my life of late.