Two Days In A Row

My off days are usually never in a row but somehow ended up that way this week. A girl could get used to this.

I think my manager who does the schedule felt sorry for me this past week. He scheduled me for seven shifts and two of them were doubles. To add insult to injury both double shifts were after I was scheduled to close the night before. The first double wasn't so hard although both shifts turned out to be complete duds.

I closed on Wednesday night and didn't get off until well after midnight. I had to be back the next morning and went in at eleven. I got off after midnight and while I made more money than I ever have, was totally exhausted and my feet were screaming. They still hurt when they touched the floor the next morning.

On Friday night I (nicely) told my manager I was simply too old to work double shifts anymore and certainly not two in one week. He apologized for having to do it, just needed extra servers that one week.

The USTA opened a huge facility here in Orlando (five minutes from Chroma) recently and has made for great business at the restaurant, located directly next door (literally steps away) to the Marriott where most of the players stay.

People come from all over the world to play in tournaments here. I've waited on people from literally everywhere; from all across the United States, New Zealand, Germany, England, Italy and even Australia.

They also held the ground breaking ceremony on Monday for the shopping and retail district being built directly in front of our restaurant. There will also be a movie theater, bowling alley and a few more restaurants and specialty shops.

In a couple of years it's going to be one huge Cash Cow for everyone involved, which luckily includes me.

I've already doubled my income in less than a years' time and look forward to making "Airport" money again, without the hassle of working at an airport.





Once again, am glad I listened to my brother, who told me to apply for the job with Chroma after my job transfer fell through last year when we moved to Orlando.

He's a pretty sharp guy with an even sharper wit. He makes me seem dull.

And look how much he loves me!!!

Totally kidding.

He does  give me quite a bit of grief and always makes fun of my horrible southern drawl. Especially the way I pronounce my husbands' name with two syllables. "Tea-um."

This journey Tea-um and I have been through has turned out to be quite the blessing, mostly and mainly because of these two.

They always had my back when I was a little kid and they've always had my back as a (still little) adult.

When life overwhelms you, sometimes it helps to take a step back and look around. You'll discover blessings you never thought about having before and learn to be more grateful for them.

My problems this past week were two hard double shifts which as we say in the south, wore me slap out.

My blessings were the redunkulous amount of money I made, with my only problem being sore feet.

 For the first time in over a year, am finally paying all my bills early again and socking money away into savings. Granted Tim pays most all the bills, I only pay the Verizon bill (which ain't cheap) and my car note. I buy most of the groceries and staples but Tim also buys some groceries too. We're a work in progress but is a total 'Team Cotton' effort.

I'm slowly gaining weight again and feels good to be tipping the scales at three digits without having to have rocks in both pockets.

I still miss our old home, but feel better knowing that my nephew and his wife are taking excellent care of and hopefully enjoying it.


We are twenty weeks away from moving out of our tiny rental and into our new permanent home.

It's served us well and have a pretty great landlord. Still seems crazy to me how much more rent is than mortgage. We had a fifteen year loan on our pretty big house in Newnan for $1500. We're paying $1235 to rent a tiny cracker box here in Orlando.

On a side note, hung another one of my mother in laws' paintings today on the wall in our tiny living room.

She always said this was her vision of what God would look like. Now He's watching over us as well.



So life has turned out pretty good for us after all. We're making strides and moving ahead. Our previous problems are behind us, and while we'll certainly have problems in front of us in the future, at least know we can make it...through any thing, and will.

A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do.

And I will.

I will crush life, just watch me.

So we moved to the Sunshine State.

Here comes the sun!

That's alright.

Till next time...COTTON