Day 2: Coffee!

It's like I got a new long distance friend but instead it's my temp agency. Day two of them sending me gifts in the mail. Cool! This time, it was from my relationship manager Laura Carlino at Thompson Tech. A fancy pen, a coffee mug and a Starbucks chargeable gift card with $5 on it. I'm happy for the mug because I was feeling bad having to use styrofoam cups for my tea in the morning. And the pen has a nicer feel to it with its weight and shape than your common ordinary promotional fodder. Thanks, Laura!

I wonder if they will remember me on my birthday, too? ;*D

Day 1: Cookies!

Unbenounced to me, my new temp agency Thompson Tech sent me these custom fortune cookies with their logo emblazoned across the top. Sent them UPS. My son got all excited thinking I ordered gourmet treats over the internet, but I think that's silly when you can bake perfectly delicious and fresh cookies all by yourself.

The fortune is a declarative sentence, "Thompson Tech is proud to be your partner!" Cool, they are proud. My dad used to tell me that a lot. It's a good sign...

Sunday with the Tudors: April 13, 2008

Last week's synopsis: The church was broken and Christmas came and went without much cheer at court. The catholic Chancellor of the king quits and he prepares for his own demise at the hands of the Lutherans. The Queen's jewels are finally collected from The Moor while in the process one of the Queen's virgin ladies in waiting was deflowered by Ann's supposed ex-lover/poet Thomas Wyatt. Ann was given the official title of the Markess of Penbrook and a lifetime allowance in preparation for her wedding. Everyone took a trip to English occupied France to celebrate and Ann finally went all the way with Henry. It is undetermined who may be trying to scare and kill off Ann.

What I think: The french are portrayed as self-serving and greedy, but so is Henry.

This week: Catherine of Aragon stripped of her title as well as any money and servants previously paid for by Henry and their daughter Mary was also reduced from princess to lady; both were forbidden from contacting each other or previous spanish alliances. Cramden is installed as Archbishop and provides the divorce Henry has saught for so long. He also moved his possessions including smuggling his wife in a box into England while his presence stirs the the catholics. A papal dictate by Pope Paul II to condemn the secret marriage of a pregnant Ann and Henry or fear excommunication by the catholic church was rejected by Henry. The Duke of Suffolk gets some wise words from his wife instructing him not to act by himself against Ann while an assination attempt by the Soldiers of Christ which was sanctioned by the Pope at the coronation parade is executed without the desired result. Ann gives her younger sister a role as one of her house servants. Henry is on the prowl since Ann refuses sex with him during the later stage of pregnancy. Ann later gives birth to a daughter while Henry takes another Lady of his court as a mistress. Catherine goes into a deep depression.

What I think: Everything Henry did was for Ann until she displeased him and gave him a daughter. He said they have time to have other children, but it's not a convincing speech. Now it's a whole new ball game just had Catherine predicted (She earlier said, "The King will tire of you...").

From the book of prose 04/13/2008

**Inspiration: My inspiration for this came at 4AM after reading my friends blog which said the Love Me Not's had to postpone their european tour dates in May (esp. France and Spain) in order to focus on their new album to be released shortly.**

[(in the style of the blues song "I'm a Man", but faster and with more drums instead of harmonica and 5 beats ending each line); transformed into The Love Me Nots garage style ultimately!]

Paris can wait
'Cause I've got you now
You're in my sights
In the hot white light

I see your face
The sweetest smile
Those devil eyes
That drive me wild

Cause I've got you now
(repeat as many times as is necessary)

[Coda]

Madrid can hold on
Alittle longer
...
[to be finished at a later time]

(C) MMM Art, Inc., 2008

Credit

I want to thank Walter Ensign for giving me a tiny credit on his movie about the spirit balls that dwell in is basement. You can ask him about it on his MySpace.

Part 1

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Part 2

The Badge

I live in a primarily hispanic neighborhood and I find it an odd thing that ever since I started on my new job and I was issued a security badge, while I wear it walking to and from my car on the city sidewalk, no one will look me in the eye. I wonder why this is.

Am I a threat? Don't they read english? Do they think I'm some kind of official? It's weird.

Insomnia

I am a person who sleeps from 6-7 hours a day and then I'm wide awake and fully functional about two hours after that. It's just me. So when I passed out on the couch last night sometime shortly after 9PM while watching astronaut tragedies of NASA on my local PBS station, I wasn't planning on waking up at 3:30AM this morning, but I did.

My cat decided that I needed extra special attention so I was basically mauled once my eyes were open. Then, I heard my son stirring in order to let the other cat out onto the patio. I hate this. Not the fact that the cats goes out onto the patio, but the fact that it's at some ungodly hour and then it wakes me up too damn early because the cat will launch itself to claw upon the screen door that's attached to my bedroom's sliding glass door and rattle it to wake me up so I can let it in. And since I only sleep 6-7 hour anyway, I need undisturbed sleep. Who's easier to train to stop this action? The cat or my son? I don't know at this point, but I do know it's got to stop.

More, more more

So each day I've been on this new job, I have had to attend a conference call meeting to discuss operation issues we are having. The most pressing operational issue seems to be the lack of computer equipment by my colleagues. I don't know if it was the fear of God or what that allowed myself to obtain my own personal computer as well as one from my consulting firm, but come to find out that now the client would like to provide one as well. I had to laugh.

My desk will now have four computers on top of it. Mine, the owners, the consulting firms, and the client. And I have one DSL line, which is kind of a dilemma in and of itself. I was thinking of getting a router or an access point - something that would prevent me from having to switch the connection from computer to computer each time I need to do something, but I don't know. I bought an access point for my home network so that I could use my laptop wirelessly, but I don't think I want to do that kind of set-up at work. I feel though it's kind of a vote of confidence if the client wants to install their own laptops because I get the feeling I'm going to be at this location for awhile.

I'm just trying to picture in my head how to set this up and what to do about the lack of real estate on top of my desk. It's not like I'm sitting and word processing all day long. I need space to examine loans, too. What to do.

The Drive

Californians are known for their car culture. They like nice cars and they drive them all over creation.

This morning I left my house at 6:05AM knowing full well that I would have atleast a ninety minute to two hour commute to my new job, located at Countrywide Bank/ReconTrust (their name-du jour they decide to use) located all the way in the beautiful Ventura County city of Simi Valley. While trying to occupy my mind in the car with assorted radio shows, one can only listen to NPR for so long and then it begins to become repetative... I often think that it's kind of pointless to be driving all these different kinds of assorted cars/trucks/vans/buses along the freeway. I myself drive a moderately priced small SUV which gets about 20 or so mpg. I found myself today following a Mercedes Benz C320 Kompressor this morning for a long stretch of my trip and noticed that his or her left rear brake light was out. It's a part that at most costs $5.00 but on this vehicle traveling immediately before me, there it was... a fix-it ticket waiting to happen with no patrol officers in sight - thankfully. Because any time they show up the traffic slows down to the legal speed limit and then I have no hope of getting to work any sooner than 8:00AM. I get my oil changed every other month like clockwork and they are nice enough to always check my brake lights, so I've personally never had to deal with this issue. A lot of times, it's just a bad connection that needs to be tightened up, but still - how long is this person in thier +$50k car going to be driving around town before this is fixed?

I remember seeing on a science show how they are developing computer controled linked up cars so that people don't have to be wholy responsible for the speed at which they travel nor the distance from the car infront of them and behind them. I think this is an excellent idea for the AM traveler to prevent all those horrid accidents.

Four days later...

It's Thursday and it's been about four days since I wrote my last significant blog because I started my new job as a contractor on Monday, March 31st.

The job, thankfully, is nothing I have not done before and is in line with my prior work experience within the mortgage industry, so it makes me happy to be able to continue in the industry and not have to throw away a 14 year career. The hours are sometimes long but I already know that comes with the territory of being a manager and the supervisor and co-workers are a great group of people which makes those long days much more bearable.

My Senior Managers were super nice and took me and the supervisor out to lunch on the first day and dinner on the last day they were both in town before they had to travel back to their home offices.

My new bedtime Monday through Thursday is at 10:00PM so I better to bed... zzz