In about 5 minutes

Anne and I are going to head out to the vet where Sparky is hanging on by a thread and I have to make a decision. Sorry Sparky, it;s not your fault. I love you.

my cat

It's been a heck of a week.

Lots of drama at work and elsewhere.

I'm still reading "The Space Wolf." I like it so far with about 160 pages left to go.

We're on a death watch for Pledges. Anne agreed with me that as soon as we see Pledges staggering, then we're taking him in to have put down. I hope it will be Monday if at all.

Other then that, the job continues to go well. I couldn't believe the price of oil for the end of October: $80 and some change. The economy is getting better.

Also as of last night I might have sprained my left shoulder. Anne put some ointment on my shoulder and it was stiff as I tried to dress myself. What an adventure that was. I tried exercising the shoulder while at work and I think it helped a bit. I'm going to proof this and publish and go to bed.

Anyway gang that's about all for now.

Jim

I got some new photos up on my website. There's a link in the sidebar.

Monday was quiet. I got up about 12:30pm and watched the Dow & oil tumble. I worked on my special project (msp) for awhile and that brought me around to about 2:30pm. I had my shower and got ready, Anne made us a bowl of chilly. I headed into the office and got myself a seat. Super wanted me to sit with the 4 tap shooters I was 1 of 4 in the front 20 not in the back as we usually collect ourselves. I got JT to go get us a Tim’s coffee. I got some bottles and cans and I had a slow start but then things picked up. We began All Star Baseball. By 7pm I had $515 and 3 CC sales. JT’s dialer is good for CC sales. My total for the end of the night was $860 and not one bonus. First $800+ total I had in 5 weeks.

I got my gear and headed out into the mild night air and read for a bit from BRH. I should be at the half way point by the end of the week. It’s really good. I got home, as Anne met me at the door. She was upset with Pledges or for him I should say. What he’s been with me since 1991. Hard to believe I was in my late 30’s at that time. I noticed Pledges was slightly favoring his back paw. I thought and still think it’s just a cramp he’s going through. Hard to believe that was 18 years ago. That’s him in the photo above taken minutes ago.

Hopefully I’ll have him for a few more years yet. But it’s going to be a sad day around here when he goes. With all the things that can go wrong with a cat at his age, I’m grateful I’ve had him for so long. He’s been a good friend.

Last night’s “Monday night Raw” was out of London England. The show started off slow. It picked up a bit with Santino and the match with Triple H and Randy Orton was a real barn burner. On a scale from 1-10, I’d rate Raw a solid 7.

I did a bsl reading and I’m running at a high 11.7! I had that chop and foil wrap potato plus corn on the cob earlier about 11:30pm. When I go to bed about 4am, my bsl should be down about 8.

This week I have the RJS reading to go to and I’m looking forward to it. This time I’m bringing my camera and I’m going to have a proper photo up and running. I missed Rob when he was here for Pure Speculation. Also, I hope to pick up a copy of “Wake” as well.

Anyway gang, that’s all for now

e. Jim

I'm not going to worry about things anymore.

Sleep for me came by really hard overnight. I got up about 5:30am to do some reading. That helped but I couldn’t help but not think about my job and what tomorrow at 5pm will bring. I managed to fall back to sleep though. Anne got up around noon. I tried to catch a half an hour after that but she left for work about 1pm.

I woke up around 1:30pm and fixed myself a coffee. It’s been snowing on and off all afternoon. Not a lot going on right now. I decided to play some Oblivion and I got to an earlier saved game and that got me out of the sewers a lot easier. I “lost” all that gold and hit points. I decided to pick up on the current quest and got a lot further in the quest then ever. Agimir met me in a mausoleum with a friend. They were grave robbing but hey confronted me and I got “killed” I tried going after Agimir again but I was getting beaten up to badly. I tried to steal something and that interrupted the flow of combat. The Imperial Watch threw me in jail. These end of the quest bosses are too tough for me.

I got a call from Anne’s sister that sent her the birthday money. I Haven’t spoken with this sister yet. Anne called latter and relayed the message back to her but her sister that called lives in NS so they’re a little further time wise away then we are. My wife said it’s really slow for a Sunday. Since this was the first Sunday she ever worked at pizza since she started there in September. She thinks she might get sent home early. I’m still reluctant to tell her about my job situations but at the same time I want to ask her to get me an application for Pizza this evening. I won’t mind working X4 8 hour shifts. Friday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. That way I get Saturday, Wednesday and Thursday off. But if nothing happens to me tomorrow, then situation normal.

If you notice the goofy looking color Facebook photo of me on my website (left sidebar) I’m at my station in the office I work at. We have 41 of those computer stations with equipment that’s over 10 years old. There’s another 21 possibly 31 stations on the other side but only about 5 of them are occupied in the evening. There’s lots of room left but how much source do we have?

Facebook has a new “Homepage.” I noticed that the comments aren’t published immediately like in the “old Facebook.” Maybe I accidentally hid them, I don’t know.

Anne called me on her 8:30pm break and they’re just starting to pick up there now. I dropped the bomb on her that my place of employment is cutting back and how I’ve been holding this up inside for the last 2 days. She said for me not to worry about it because I’m evening and agreed with me how Rob would have called me in right there. I actually feel a bit better about this.

I got Boots with me this evening. Him and I are pulling in guard duty in my home office. You have to be careful when you ty and pet him because he has an instinct to scratch.

Anne said if they do let me go then she’ll get me a Pizza application when she goes to her job on Wednesday. I think I might actually like this better then where I am now. No more Saturday mornings. A cheque directly into my bank account every other Friday. I could use her as a recommendation and we’d get the referral bonus money from them (if they do ) hirer me on that is. My reference might be a bit of a problem because of all the time I’ve taken off. In the last 8.5 years at least one day/week. That’s about 450 missed days in the last 8.5 years. Umm, considering I don’t take smoke breaks or vacation time off and the fact that they ripped me off my vacation pay last December, me and about 4 others as well.

Speaking of Internet related things, I’ve been having issues with my Gmail. I keep getting on the link I’ve used for months a “Windows updater.” This sounds like a virus because it wont let me get into my Gmail from there. I go direct to Google to get it. The other thing I heard on Coast this morning is something called “Wolfram Alpha.” it’s hyped as a killer replacement for Google because it does searching in different ways. Wolfram Alpha apparently launches in May. Something tells me Google has their hand in this somehow.

Anyway, gang that’s all for now.

e. Jim

Looks like another cold one out there

It was another cold one leaving out of here today for work. I bought a diet Coke at the drugstore and went upstairs just as the shift was changing. Rob was giving out some huge bonuses for the staff leaving out of there. I got a modest collection of cans and bottles. Anne was glad to hear from me when I called shortly before kick-off. We ended up doing CBF and that bombed so we did OTH. Seeing as how the game is next Wednesday. 2 CC sales and $100 l/h got $25. I was no where close and 3/5 calls or so were semies. I ended up with 2 CC’s and $285. Nowhere close. I made sure Super put the missing $10 bonus I missed from last time on my cheque from last week.

It was still bitter cold heading across the open parkade to Corona station. I didn’t have my reading glasses so I couldn’t read on the train home. But I called my buddy Charles and he’d call me back. He did as I was watching Raw and Anne went out across the street to the store.
Anne made me a great cheese burger for lunch and I had that and watched an excellent Monday night Raw. On a scale from 1-10, I’d rate this Raw a 9.

I’m off to do some piano practice……2:20pm> Onto my first coffee. We went to bed about 3:30am listening to Coast for half an hour. I couldn’t sleep around 9am so I got up to play Oblivion. I think. I made an error last night on the job having to do with a sale type. The customer bought 2 tickets to OTH for $40 but I couldn’t remember if I out X tickets or XD sponsor. I don’t want to bring this up and draw attention to myself as well. The customer said she’d get her grandson (out of town) the tickets. Hopefully she called and he said “can’t make it, other engagement,” or I did put down X for tickets. Playing Oblivion helped me get it out of my mind.

This afternoon it’s off to work. We got -25C out there. I don’t know if there’s a wind chill. Most likely there is but by Friday it’s supposed to warm up out there. I’m going to try and put Thursday and Friday afternoon in because Anne wants us to definitely go out to the Ramada for her birthday dinner.

Ahh, the new Star trek movie is coming out in a few months time. I hope it’s good. Sure it’s a prequel and different characters playing the originals although much younger, I wouldn’t say it’s young adult but probably borderline. I’ll most likely see it when it comes to the dollar theater in the fall.

Oil today is down by a bit sitting around $45. Premier Ed was saying yesterday that our credit rating for borrowing is one of the best in any regime in North America. And for that reason the Province is going to borrow for infrastructure projects. He says even with $40 oil were making money.

Oh last night while Anne went to get my chips and glasses she noticed Boots at the corner of our building. He cried seeing her and ran up to her. She said how she opened the front door, he goes through tale up in the air. She opens the stairwell door. Boots goes through following her up the stairs to our apartment door. He’s in my office with me now. The place stinks but I got the fan on and we’re ok.
Anne’s off today but were ok. So far they haven’t cut back any hours on the job. That’s always a good sign. Oh and there's an Oiler game on TV tonight. Good stuff.

Anyway, gang that’s all for now.

e. Jim

Wow, were at +23C

out there and it’s warm in here. I’ve got to have the fan on. Right now I’m working on my first coffee trying to take stock of what I’m going to do after October 1st. So far, nobody at the office is saying anything, which I find surprising. This morning though I had a closer look at the “Do Not Call List” (DNCL) registry rules. I think its more for those telemarketers that are trying to sell a product like tickets, which affects some of our campaigns. In that respect it compromises my job, somewhat but the company I work for is third party. Now I’m not a rules lawyer or an expert on legal jargon but I read from Part 2 of the rules and if your “calling on behalf of” a registered charity then your exempt from the DNCL. So to keep it legal, all I just half to say is something like this: “Jim calling from XL on behalf of registered charity:” If I read that sub-section correctly, then this shouldn't’t apply to us. I asked Anne to take a look at it and she agreed with me. I did the 3:30am cbi thing. I felt better about my job going to bed spending some time with my wife as we listened to a pretty good Coast show about the LHC.

Yesterdays LHC experiment was to test the beam in the tunnel and it works. The question that seems to be asked the most from conversations I’ve heard and been a part of are, “What real world benefits and applications are there as a result of this experiment and others like it?” Well for one thing, I tell people is that the whole concept of the Internet was developed out of Cern. Without the Internet Cern physicists had no means to process and exchange the information they gathered on the scale that was/is needed. Now with the LHC Cern is already working on The Grid, which is the Internet a thousand times more faster then it is right now. Not only that but physicists at Cern using the LHC will have a better tool to use to delve deeper into our understanding of the Universe at a Quantum level. Maybe the LHC when activated at full power will be able to create mini black holes and traversable wormholes. Apparently it wont be for another couple of months yet before the LHC is fully activated. But if they find wormholes at Cern, think about those implications

I took some more cute cat photos and one of my wife. This one is of Sparky watching the fish wondering where the other fish has gone. We lost a budgie bird and a gold fish this summer.

I had a good sleep after that. I got up about 12:15pm and watched the markets. Oil again sitting at $101 and some change. I figure it’s going to go right down to about $50 in February of 09 and after that it’ll climb back up to the $130 level, stay there for a few weeks and drop again. At the moment our Unemployment rate here in Edmonton is sitting at 3.4%, which is pretty good.

I took this photo of Sporty. His eyes are actually blue but he's guarding over my Diet Cola. Anne got a good price for a 12 pack, $1.63 something.

After reading JU, I’m looking forward to “The Icewind Dale” trilogy. The first book in this 1997 Omnibus is “The Crystal shard”, which originally came out in 1988 followed by “Streams of Silver.” and “The Halflings Gem.”, which came out as I was getting into “Adventure gaming supplies” and all these books were flooding onto the shelves of the store. I love the omnibus format. While on the topic of books and stuff, I haven’t yet been able to call Audrey’s and ask Trevor if he could get me a print out of any books I have on order. This will be a “Note to self” reminder. I wish I had a cell phone application that alerts me at any given time and rings, in my own voice at 8pm: “Call Audrey’s, or call blah, blah, blah, etc.” This would be great because I don’t remember what books I ordered and I need to order more from my favorite vendor across the street. Especially more from the “Forgotten Reams” series. Cover flow would be pretty good as well for a book organizer.

And finally I couldn't resist taking this photo of Anne as she's walking up to the bus bench towards me.

This afternoon, Anne and I go into work. She’s going to try Pizza one more time and see if she can go back to work for her other job Friday. Pizza doesn’t sound that bad actually. Sure they might be a lot of work involved in it and it certainly isn’t easy money but there are bonuses. Most of their calls are from people that have already placed an order before and want to renew the same order. But occasionally and this happens, Billy says- “I had Pizza at my Uncles place and I forget what sauce they used.” Then you’ve got to do some research and that takes time. They don’t have any quotas but their big stickler is time. They would prefer the order to be completed within 30 seconds and if you make 3 mistakes in a 4 hour shift, they send you home. I mean lets face it most people no matter how fast or good they are will make mistakes the first time out until they learn the system. But once all the bugs have been worked out most people there Anne says say the job is pretty easy. They were telling her that the average dialer gets about 200 calls in a 4 hour shift. At 50 calls an hour and if most of those are repeat orders.

Anne’s going to be going in tonight and I get my pay cheque and then it’s off to the bank. I get my $20 bucks and maybe I’ll meet Anne on the train coming home. Nothing much going on after that.

Anyway Bloggers, that‘s all for now

e. Jim

I had a routine

bus/train ride into work this afternoon. It was a nice Sunny day out there and my bus came by to take me to Clairview Station. I had $5 bucks with me and I bought a bottle of diet Coke and a lotto 6/49 quick pick with the plus. The draw is for $22 Million. I seldom ever buy a lottery ticket but in this case, I decided “what the heck.” if I win, I’ll be blogging from a pool in Hawaii, yeah right.

I took this photo February 23rd earlier this year. Pledges is my first cat and he's 17 years. Silky the one reclining is 11.

Rob was looking at the stats on the monitor looking at close rates. This is the amount of calls/sales. He said he got some heat from Vancouver saying that my close rate was way to high last night at 21% He wasn’t upset with me or anything but brought it to my attention. So I thought about how I could tweak my pitch for a greater success rate. I added a couple of things and even though I started out slow. I got a complement card from Barbara from the back 20. She’s a nice 16 year old kid. I ended up by break with $435 by break. I borrowed a $1.15 from John MC D for some chocolate raisins. I’ll give it back to him tomorrow. I should have brought the other $5. No credit card sales in the first half. In the 2nd half Anne called late and I had a brief chat with her. I ended up with 1 credit card sale, actually 4 in all. Plus another $1,040 night. All in all, I had a pretty decent night.

I managed to get my pay cheque as well and I got $291 including my bonuses. I get $90 out of that. Plus the $5 COH makes it for $94. I got the train home with a seat by myself and some cans and bottles home. We were playing complement cards. Every credit card sale we could give someone we knew only on the other system. I received one comp card and I gave out 4. I didn’t win and neither did anyone else I gave them to.

Anne came home just now needed a $20 from our rent money. She gave me $80 and went to the Superstore to change a $20. That’s good. I caught the bus at Clairview for home along the short end this evening.

I found out more info on White Smoke and it’s an online service. I checked out the forums and lots of people are complaining about using it. Based upon this, I decided against ordering it. It’s not really a grammar checker and that’s what I was looking for. Someone mentioned in the forum about Style Writer. I checked the website out and it does the same thing as WS but a bit better. At least SW is a physical piece of software but they want $199 for it. Yikes. Then I got the idea to check out a Bit Torrent version and sure enough it listed but to utilize this Bit Torrent site I need a credit card. A 3 day trial is something like $5 bucks. I can get a pre loaded credit card today from Money Mart for $10 and try this out. The rest I can download some stories from Amazon’s Anthology builder J was talking about the other day. I’m still paying for SW but this way is a lot cheaper and more affordable for me. If it doesn’t work then I’m only out $25 bucks but I could end up getting SW.

Anyway Bloggers, that’s all for now.

e. Jim