That Wasn't So Bad

Today was my first day off in almost two weeks. I had grand plans. Sleep til noon, cut grass til four. Cook a nice dinner and clean house. The phone call came in at 11:04 AM. Not the wake up call I  wanted.

I would have flat out said no but another server's mom had been hospitalized with a collapsed lung and was being prepped for surgery. Naturally no one else would work for him so I caved. So instead of jumping out of bed and getting every thing done before I had to go in at five...I just stayed in bed and took it easy. Around two I took my book out back to the hammock and read for two hours. A half day off is better than NO day off!

Work wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. After I complained and whined about working on my day off, I fell into the groove. If you  gotta work, make the best of it. I hadn't eaten all day so I took my jar of crunchy peanut butter and a sleeve of saltines with me and pumped up my protein intake.

I got really lucky on a couple of tables and only one fifteen percent tip. I didn't get out early but I got out with enough to cover my needed bank deposit and part of what I need for the down payment for Massey's chorus trip to New York in the Spring. The check for Massey's down payment will still bounce if they deposit it immediately but being the mom of three kids I have found that schools usually take forever to push a check through. First off, there is always a kid that says "I forgot to bring my check today." That  buys me a day. Then after all checks are collected it usually takes the over worked teacher a couple of days to get  it all sent to the office. Then the over worked secretary has to get it all together and send it to the person who makes the deposits. I am hoping that person is over worked as well and since my kids go to a public school I am pretty sure they are. By  this time I have worked four shifts and the money is in my account. My middle name should be Ponzi. The only difference is that I make good on all my debts, some later than others but I always pay. Let's not discuss late charges...but a mommas gotta do what a mommas gotta do.

I'm not proud of my banking skills but I'm not ashamed of them either. The banks and mortgage giants do the same thing with the money I break my back to earn and give to them.   Sometimes they lose it. Difference is when THEY lose it and go belly up...who bails THEM out? I believe that would be MY tax dollars!

Rat Basts!

So it's Labor Day tomorrow...Guess how I will be spending it?

You  got it, I'll be laboring away while all the banks are closed, chuckling to themselves that they got me again if my deposit on Tuesday morning at 7:01 after the bank opens at 7:00 and decides to wait half a day to process my deposit...which they have done before.

You can't fight Big Brother, but you can swing as hard as you can and never stop swinging. I've been swinging for over three years and I still have some fight left in me.

Headed to bed. Waking up tomorrow and doing it all again. My life seems redundant but at least I am alive to realize it.

Til next time...Ponzi COTTON

Once in a Blue Moon

I'm no meteorologist but AM a firm believer in the powers of a full moon. It brings out the crazy in people. Sometimes it's good crazy and sometimes it's bad.

Today it was mostly the bad. My lunch shift at work was like watching paint dry. The dinner shift wasn't much better. It was almost eerie. We were so busy yesterday at lunch and dinner, then tonight it was like all of our customers had fallen off the planet. I got off from my lunch shift and went across the street to throw some money at the Verizon giants and went to put some gas in my little car.

First positive experience of the day. I buy gas at Kroger where I use my discount points but often times it is like a freaking combat zone. People are always impatient or backing out to move to another pump that opens up only to be confronted by  another car that saw the open pump first and  screeched around the lot quicker. I usually try to wait behind a car that is already pumping gas, knowing they have already paid. I did just that today when an older gentleman in a land yacht pulled in next  to me. He rolled his window down and asked if I was waiting to go in front of him? (It all comes down to what side of your car  the gas cap is on.) I told him he was good, I was waiting for the pump next  to him. I love me some ole peeps! He smiled, inched his huge car up  to the pump and said "Thanks!"

He was on one side of the pump and I was on the other. I got out to pump my gas the same time as him. A car alarm started blaring  and he said loudly "Whoops, that's me! Hit the wrong button again."

He was so pleasant it almost made me forget I was paying four bucks a gallon for gas.

Then I picked up  Massey  from school and came home to assume the position for thirty minutes in the bed. Just when my body started to go numb and my mind went blank, Massey popped into the room and said "You need to leave for work."

I went back to work and it was desolute. We waited and waited for  the masses but they never came. But just like that, Karma happened. I had a party of three who asked for me and gave me a thirty percent tip. Forget that table that left me nothing on a thirty five dollar  tab. I got home at a reasonable hour and had forty more bucks than I had when I walked in.

It's Labor Day weekend and it couldn't happen at a worse time for me. Like the soldier I am, I thought, "Okay, go to Kroger and buy some milk. Write a check for $25 over and go in the morning and deposit the twenty five in cash. Make it up over the long holiday weekend and it will all work out."

Crossing my fingers and toes and going into work tomorrow hoping to bank big.

It could happen...it may happen, it BETTER happen!

Til next time...COTTON

It's a good thing I never desired to be a bank teller