Finally Fall

So it took until the middle of October but Fall is finally in the air here in Orlando. In other words, it's not in the mid nineties every day. Oh it still gets the the upper eighties and once in a while the low nineties but sure feels much cooler.

This is what it was like the end of the first week in October...

Having made it through an entire year living here, quickly decided my favorite season is October to April. In late January you have to wear a sweater about three or four days, then can put it away for another year.

In Georgia, the nineties are still hot in summer but with this brutal Florida sun beating down on you, the nineties feel like a hundred and ten, even in October.


In other news...

In three days I will have been working at my new place for one year, which means I will be eligible for benefits. I'm on the fence about it. I already work five shifts a week and am totally down with that. My airport shifts were much longer and after five shifts always clocked out extremely close to going over forty hours. I work five shifts now which is about twenty five hours a week, perfect for an ole nag like me, especially since I've been working forty hours a week for the past ten years. Forty hours a week as a server feels like an almost sixty hour work week sitting behind a desk. I am constantly moving at a quick pace, never stopping or sitting, carrying heavy trays and dishes and the entire job is physical and extremely strenuous. I used to keep a step counter (pedometer) in my apron and usually walked over three miles per shift.

So to be eligible for insurance for me and Massey, I will have to work an extra shift each week to meet the thirty hour minimum needed.

I don't wanna work an extra shift. I'd lose what little of my mind I have left. Don't get me wrong, I like my job. If I worked every single shift with the dream team of  my favorite co workers, I could do it in a heartbeat, but I don't make the schedule (mine or theirs).

Most of the people I work with are in their twenties, some even in their teens and more than a few simply don't get it yet. They let you do the work because they know you will. They know you will compensate for them standing around talking while you get the shift set up for success. They know you will run their food, get the items their tables ask you for or stop to help their customers when they are looking around like "Where in the hell is my server?"

The thing most younger servers don't realize is that a restaurant either looks 'Good together or bad together'.

It's exhausting to me, especially after almost forty years of serving.

If I have to work that extra shift every week, it might make me hate my job. I'll have insurance for myself and Massey but will be a drain on me.

The entire reason we don't go on Tim's insurance is that it would simply just be too much out of his paycheck, which is our main source of income.

So here's my thinking.

I'll wait and see what the plan at work offers and how much it will cost me. Tim is going to check as well and see what it would cost to add Massey and me to his plan. He has pretty good insurance, with BC/BS. He can't do it until we buy our house in April but April will be here before you know it. If I have to, I'll bite the bullet and work an extra shift every week and go with the insurance at work for six months. Then once we get our loan for the new house, will just take twenty bucks in tips from every shift I work and transfer it to his account to defray the cost of us being on his plan and being deducted from his paycheck.

I'm not a lazy person but am pretty tired of working full time. I worked six days a week for more years than I care to remember. When the kids were little, I worked for the school system for seven years so they could attend the school. I still worked at LongHorn Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights after working days at the school Monday through Friday, so basically  worked seven days a week for seven years.

Not a lot of fun, but it got the job done.

I need to keep reminding myself how very close we are and how very far we have come.

Now I just sound like I am whining, and maybe I am.

Actually I am.

But that's okay too sometimes.

I prefer to think of it as "venting."

That's pretty much what my blog is all about anyway.

Webster's defines vent as "A means of escape or release from confinement; an outlet."

Sometimes, most of the time, pretty much all of the time, I feel better after having expressed my feelings in writing, whether it be on a keyboard or with a pen on paper.

Webster's also defines writing as "Something written, esp. : Meaningful letters or characters that constitute readable matter."

Yep, that's my bag and I dig it.

I wrote a blog recently about my favorite manager at work leaving.

I went into work several days later and she said "Kelly, could you come here for a minute before clocking in?"

I thought I had done something wrong and was "kinda scare't" as we say in the south. I walked over to her when she held out her arms, then tightly hugged me. She told me she blubbered like a baby while reading my blog about her leaving and just wanted me to know how much meeting and working with me has meant to her.

How crazy is that?

She said she just googled my name and my blog popped up. All my managers know I have a blog but certainly never expected one of them to read it, but she did.

As of today I have had over 201,760 views on my blog, from ten different countries.

Here's the thing. Put some positivity out there into the universe. Put your problems, feelings and how you are working to solve them out there too. Put your heart out there, put yourself out there.

I do  want something, I want to be a success at life. I want to help others be a success at life. I simply want the world to realize that love achieves and hate decimates.

For all my whining and your bearing (yes, googled and is the correct term) with me, I thank you all for following my well over half century journey and know is the downhill slide for me.

It's  crunch time, and time to make it count.

When I first met Tim in 1988, he was all into REM, a local band from Athens, Georgia.

Religion is defined as "Belief and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe."

I'll never lose my religion.

Till next time...COTTON