My Battle witht the Elements and my room

OK. Well, I finally had to get up in the attic, yes the joists and
everything supported me (you lose weight while asleep, I know this for a
fact - it may not be much but it happens), and got that big bunny
hanging up there down. It wasn't heavy at all.

Anywho, I had to get up there in my latest War With the Elements. Again
water decided it would invade my room but from above this time. I had
done a little taping up of the hole as well as some stapling of a
plastic bag to the ceiling, but I had to change that at some point, but
the root of the reason I write this is because I decided once and for
all (and it was the morning so I was feeling pretty brave and pissed off
at the same time - similar to that morning after that one hurricane (see
blog)) I needed to go up there and win another one for me.

It was a hard spot to find. It was practically all the way to the edge
of the roof. Based on what I saw as far as placement of electric wires
(and these were pretty new wires) to determine where the thingy for the
ceiling receptical was for maybe, oh I don't know, like a fan or light,
I judged well where I would place a bucket under the roof but above my
room. I think I found a 2nd leak over my closet - I'll have to check
this out very soon. I didn't know one was there.

This is a Catch and Release system. Basically, it's a slow leak, so
anything that catches the water will release it through evaporation. I
just hope, and it's likely, this will never fill up and does evaporate
pretty well.

Hell of a way to "meet" the neighbors

OK, So tonight around 6:30 pm I'm making dinner. I get mom's plate done
up and I begin making mine, when all of a sudden there's this loud
fire-cracker-like explosion sound that suddenly just happens. So we're
both like "What the hell was that?" and I try to figure out what that
was. Nothing in the kitchen was disturbed or exploded. And while I try
to figure that out for about 30 seconds, I see some guy walking out of
our yard looking at the house, I see him looking at me while I look at
him from the window. And I conclude at the time that for some reason
this guy set off a firecracker or something. Mom says calling the police
won't do much, but I maintain that calling the police at least gets the
complaint logged in somewhere. I call the police, they say over where we
are that's the county sherrif's department or whatever, and they refer
my call over to them. And I get a call from that person. They were very
helpful, explaining that this is just one incident and even though
there's nothing that can be done, they've logged the complaint and if it
happens again then they'll have to check into it.

I mention that I got a videocamera and not afraid to use it, and the guy
advises me something like that could aggravate things, but it could be
helpful but be careful. OK.

Anywho, I get to settling down, eventually getting something to eat
before a friend calls after that. I see the same guy again in our yard.
So I go out on the back porch and ask him if there's something I can do
for him. He says he's been practicing his golf swing and lost a golf
ball. I told him if we find it I'll be glad to return it. Then he
suddenly finds one in our yard out in front of the tree and goes on
about his way. I think he offers a bit of an apology for that.

Not a firecracker, but still an explosive sound. A golf ball hit the
house. Sheesh. Shoulda just come up and apologized rather than just
walking in the yard like he did.

Reaching out and the world reaches back

This is going to read more like a memoir, whatever that is, rather than
the usual 'this is what happened to me today' kind of crap...

I was thinking of ways that I reached out to the world through a letter
or other in some way and how the world replied in some form.

Two times when I was young - There were a series of specials that were
animated. It was some religious thing that featured this boy named Benji
and some of the stuff he did. The specials then had some address you
could write to, and for some reason I did. I wrote a few letters, and
got replies each time. Then I think the last letter I wrote, I asked for
"Benji" to sign it. And you know what? I got one! I still have that
letter. I don't know why I never wrote another letter back. I kinda
figure today there was this place where bunches of people for this
company or whatnot getting letters from kids and answering them. Anywho,
that letter was my proof as a kid that "Benji" was real. I even got a
comic book in the mail (this must have been around 1976) called "Freedom
Is". A lot of the Benji specials were some word and the word 'Is' in the
title. I still have the comic book and the letter 'Benji' signed.

Then I remember writing a letter to a Cleveland TV station over the
cancellation of the 1970s version of the Mickey Mouse Club. Imagine me
watching that! I think that was my reason as a kid at the time for
wanting a "leisure suit" outfit. I even have a photo somewhere of me
wearing it. Anywho, I think the TV station knew the letter I sent was
from a kid, and I got a very nice letter back explaining why they
couldn't show it anymore. I think that was one of few times an adult
respected the opinion of a young person and did a very good job
explaining things. I appreciated that letter a lot. I still have it.

There was the time I wrote to TV Guide chiding the review of the movie
Xanadu by Judith Crist. She panned the movie. I wrote with concern of
bad reviews given to some things to the point of people not wanting to
watch something. For some reason I thought Xanadu was a good movie. I
have the vinyl LP from it. This was the early 1980s mind you. Anywho,
Crist replied that while my concerns were valid, it was her job to write
reviews and comment as appropriate. I then noticed some years later she
no longer wrote for TV Guide, and the tone of their reviews have changed
since then.

There was the time MCI called my mom about trying to sell their service
to her. I had heard bad things about MCI, and after she got done telling
them NO but hadn't hung up yet, I got on with a string of epithets
worthy of a truck driver. Keep in mind they called my mom by name, she
had answered the phone and said NO, and the phone book listing is in her
name. A letter from MCI arrived about a week or so later with my name on
it. Talk about harassment and intimidation. I didn't ask for the letter
- and how did they know I lived there, too? I consider that a legally
sue-able situation. I think I tossed that one years ago.

Then there was the time while in 6th grade that I attempted to enter a
TV station's contest to guess the date of the first measurable snowfall
one year. WEWS in Cleveland had this with Don Webster. That was a wierd
year for me. I also had seen a classmate's shirt with the picture of a
horse's butt with the words "Kiss My" above it. Wow! In a 6th grader's
mind, that's the funniest thing I had ever seen. So... I drew a very
nice and wonderful picture of that on the back of the envelope. I
thought it was a masterpiece. I put my prediction of the first
measurable snowfall inside, and mailed it off... I got it back a while
later with a note saying the entry was unacceptable. Buh what??? It's
not like they have to SHOW the freaking entry on the air or anything!
For years after that, I refused to watch WEWS because of that. A shame
they refused the entry, because I was correct. ^_^ The prize was a snow
blower, btw. I think Don Webster also doesn't work at WEWS anymore. I
could be wrong.

And finally... In 1995, I had been taping Sailor Moon off WBNX in Akron,
and sent them a gift of Japanese Flower's Kiss plum candy, thanking them
for showing the series. I got a nice letter back, thanking me for the
candy and that it would be shared amongst the staff at the station, as
well as thanking me for watching WBNX. I still have that letter, too. I
heard from friends that after the first-run of the syndicated episodes,
WBNX took it on themselves to edit some content from the episodes. I had
taped them uncut, more or less.

I remember as a kid trying to get a penpal from Canada through the show
Big Blue Marble. This was before I Knew Anything. I tried writing a
letter to Canada, even mailed it off. Never got a reply. That was before
knowing anything about international postage, so I guess the letter
never got to Canada.

I did it myself!

Getting online tonight at this hour was a pain and a half. Let me
explain...

Ever since we moved in, we've had problems with the phone line staying
clear. At least for the putrid picky modem in my mom's Dell desktop.
WebTV doesn't seem to mind the bits of static very much but it can knock
the Dell offline more than it needs to. I guess the modem should be
replaced by a better one - my younger sister has a Dell that also does
dialup access and they rarely have a problem with it.

Anywho, mom emails Verizon support to have a tech come out and look at
things - essentially to put a new box on the line. He comes out, finds
out there's a box on the line, one that should be there. But then I show
him the little one that's much like the ones they used to use all the
time until some time ago. So he opens that up, starts checking the
wires. He notes there's red and green wires, and then there's one
connection with blue white. He says the blue white pairing is the new
standard for wiring phone lines, but as long as you keep things
straight, using them interchangeably isn't a problem.

So he goes, cuts off the blue-white pair from one wire, splices things,
and goes on his way. The phone line seems to be clear again. Yay. So I
get to doing things on the Dell tonight. Still had at least 3 dropped
carriers, and the usual ISP doesn't respond and "server cannot be found"
thingies which requires hanging up and redialing.

I get done with that, go upstairs to do some email on WebTV, and
suddenly... No dialing sound. I check the wired plug in phone. It's
dead. The blue white pair for upstairs he cut out and there ya go.

So I figure out the blue and green are one connection, the red and white
are the other. Ignore the orange and the white wire with a yellow streak
on it.

Get my wire cutters / strippers, do the necessary cutting, stripping,
and twisting, and with the use of the cordless, I am able to determine
I've reconnected the upstairs plug correctly. I find one of my ceramic
wire twist splice thingies and use it. I will get another soon, but the
line is clear again. seems that the little box was being used, but that
was creating static.

That was about an hour and a half ago. The things I go through to get on
WebTV...

Former boss spotted?

A few days ago, I believe I spotted my former boss in a car with his
wife in the parking lot, and after having noticed me, were talking about
something, and had grins on their faces. His wife was driving a silver
car of some model, and left the parking lot and went south on Route 44.
He's got some nerve showing his face around there, and even bigger nerve
having a grin on his face, more or less seeing me get a rack of carts to
bring back into the store. The abuse he put me through trying to get me
to quit...

I also know certain family members read this blog, and for them - STOP
READING THIS BEFORE I AM FORCED TO MAKE THIS BLOG PRIVATE. This is NONE
of your concern - you have no right to tell me what I can and cannot put
here, so there. Bug off!

Pretty good day today

Had the day off from work and so I had arranged to run around with Mr.
Myers who also had the day off. We accomplished a lot of stuff.

Been looking for the Tamagochi (tah mah goh chi) Version 3, but the
local TRU doesn't have them in yet.

Myers wanted to check out the Salvation Army megastore that opened up
recently, but found little there. Then we went over to Belden Village
mall for some blank DVD media - I managed to get 2 more TDK stacks of 4X
+R media at $5 each, and an experimental and similarly rated K
Hypermedia (25 disk stack) at the same rate. They work! My recorder
doesn't like the Aldi brand Tevions I got, DVD-R at 8X, and it has
recorded successfully on 8X disks before.

Got some polyester knit fabric to begin work on some outer lining for my
new pants. I got 3 new pairs of pants / trousers (whatever) at Men's
Wearhouse a couple of weeks ago. Only thing is, even though I have the
major problem of wool fabric pants is the crotch - the fabric rubs
against itself on the outside and subsequently wears out. They at the
store offered "crotch lining", but I was to be charged only $7 not the
usual $10 because my sister was going to hem them up herself. However,
when I got to picking up what I bought, the lady noted they hadn't
charged me the full price and asked if they had called me about that.
No, in fact, they hadn't, so she went right ahead and "corrected" the
oversight, and charged me another $9. I feel deceived over the whole
thing and I'm going to get my $9 back. Anywho, the crotch lining doesn't
protect the fabric on the outside. I don't know why they think this will
help.

Eventually, we get over to Hartville Flea Market. Great place. I think
Trader Woody is getting full of himself a bit. Some prices were way too
high. The 2004 expired Total cereal with Protein should be tossed out.
Somehow he even bought out one "competitor" outside selling stuff. What
this guy has is what some people do - go to one of these distribution
places for grocery stores where they get merchandice returns from
stores. The food products likely have some cosmetic dings or dents, but
the product inside is still good. You buy so many boxes at whatever
price and you end up with whatever is in there. Myers knew one place
called Moonwind Salvage run by an Amish family, but that closed up. They
did this as well, and sometimes you could get a heck of a deal there.
Anyway, I liked Trader Woody's because of the occasional deal on meal
kits. I'm careful to buy the dry stuff that's sealed up. Sometimes we
find this stuff at other flea markets. We check the dates. I never will
buy salad dressing ever again that way. oooh boy, just trust me on that
one.

I also had my V.2 Tamagotchi off pause all day, so I got to see him sing
at 1pm, watch a rabbit push a huge egg around at 2 pm (possibly an
indicator Easter is coming), do the Extreme Close Up at 3 pm, sing some
more at 4 pm. Around 6 pm he was taking a bath, and right now he's
brushing his teeth. Bandai engineers put more thought into the program
for this incarnation of their virtual pet toy. I even discovered I'd
been using the Friends list incorrectly - and found the names of all 6
'go-chis I've connected to so far! Version 3 Tamagotchis are also
wireless, so I wonder what they can do. ^_^

The start of something good I hope

Well, Register Training happened. ^_^

I also managed to impress the heck out of people that first week, and
since I seem to be treated better while I wear the white shirt and tie,
I'm going to wear it more often.

I also was able to run register, Express lane, for 1 hour that night,
the first night of training. I am able to demonstrate a high level of
competence and pleasantness (sic) to people as I ring up their
purchases. In fact, I find that time goes much faster as a cashier than
bagging stuff.

The Kia cost me $265 to do an overhaul of the rear end. Parts for Kia
cars aren't easy to find nor are they cheap. Now I should look into
getting the front end aligned. That's $265 I'll never see again, even if
it was well-spent. I so much want to go to Japan while a friend is over
there for his Japanese-government paid Monbushou fellowship grant, and
possibly visit a few penpals.

tonikaku, register training got me reclassified as a Part Time Cashier.
My hours for working for a raise also start over. (damn), but I should
have had one as a clerk anyway, and I asked about that. But I haven't
been on the cashier schedule yet, and I'm going to ask about that, too.
I want to claim hours as a cashier, dammit.

So many people on the front end are so happy to see me get that
training. A few people have even told me if I need to claim hours from
them, I can. Those are people with less seniority than I, and they know
that. I hope when I work with one or 2 of the coordinators, they'll put
me on register the entire time. I even got to run register for one 8
hour shift a couple of Thursdays ago. I've told people I ran register at
Fisher's Big Wheel years ago, and my performance is proving that in
spades.

Also been helping that one girl with her system, and the last problem I
need to figure out are the sudden restarts for no reason. A friend has
given me a lot to check out, so perhaps I've got some ammunition to
solve it for good.

My middle niece got the 3 dolls for the US release of Ojamajo Doremi
(well, they were a gift from my and my mom, her grandmother) for her
birthday and she's been taking good care of them. I'm glad because when
I am able to give her Japanese anime toys like that, and she really
takes care of them, it makes me feel good because then the giving of the
gift was worth it. It also gives us something to share.

I hope I can find more original Ojamajo Doremi DVDs with English subs.
That english dub is absolutely horrible.

There were some girls in checkout this past week who recognized my Mew
Lettuce pin on my name badge. I tried to fill them in on stuff about
Tokyo Mew Mew, and I changed the pins to having Mint and Ichigo on there
in their Cafe Mew Mew waitress outfits. (I don't have pins of them in
their Mew fighter outfits yet.) And I've been able to connect my
Tamagotchi (tah mah goh chi) Connection to other "Go-chi"s, while also
teaching kids how to say the Japanese name right.

Shopping in anticipation of good things?

Vell, it looks like cashier training may very well happened. It wouldn't
have I guess unless one good friend had intervened.

With the recent lack of cashier quitting or getting fired at the store,
they had to do something to replenish this valuable commodity. Oh yes.
Let's take stock in what's happened so far...

1. Brother of one cashier / coordinator quit in November.

2. Just after the holidays, one mean girl and her troll friend got each
other suspended, with that ending up one fired permanently, the other
returned for 2 weeks before quitting at last.

3. One girl just quit suddenly.

4. One guy who got hired just after the promise for me and one guy for
cashier training got hired, trained, and then abruptly got fired or
something. Only a few weeks out of that one.

5. 2 more girls are leaving, well, actually one completely - the other
will be available nights.

6. 2 other minors - one quit, the other will be out until after soccer
is over.

That's about 8 cashiers they need to replace. How do they replace them?

Why, hire 4 others! Gee, if my friend hadn't been there in the
conversation about those 4 being hired, this crap of a promise might
have gone unfulfilled yet again. So me and one, maybe 2 others, will get
register training this coming week. I have this friend as my "kibosh"
alert. I've kept this plan under wraps, because I don't want someone to
put a kibosh on things, as he's been rumored to do.

Anywho, I wrote that to write this:

My younger sister and I went forth into the world of merchandising and
such to find new clothes for this purported promise of register
training. (I think pretty much it's going to happen, because more than a
few people have mentioned it to me and I've been trying to keep it
quiet.)

We stopped at one store, got 3 shirts. Did some checking at a few other
stores. Right after the shirts, we checked the Goodwill in Alliance. Or
rather one of the Goodwills in Alliance. I don't recall if there's more
than one, but we know where one is. As we went around in there to find
something (and we didn't), I did manage to run into a former co-worker
from that hell hole of a restaurant, namely Long John Silver's, run by
PFC, and managed by those miscreants of mistaken illectual identity, Ron
Risher and Bill Gibson, not to be mistaken for William Gibson, science
fiction author. It appears that 2 years after I left, they cooked up
some story claiming the chain got an 800 number call claiming she swore
at some woman and her child. So she got called in, they read the riot
act, and summarily fired her. She remembers the day this lie refers to,
and told me nothing like that ever happened.

If there was ever a strong case for suing due to Appearance
Discrimination, she's got one. She told me they're trying to get rid of
Rena, but in her case that's about not wanting to pay an older worker
who's been there a while and therefore an expensive employee to keep
paying. Both of these women have a good case of discrimination to sue
over. Appearance Discrimination cases, luckily, are very easy to win.
^_^

Please note, that this sort of crap goes on in non-union shops such as
fast food restaurants all the time. It would frost YUM's gears to
unionize their workers at all their brans (A&W, LJS, Taco Smell, KFC,
and Pizza Butt) and stop this sort of abuse that caused unions to come
into being in the first place. It's a shame that Dan Phallen has to be
the ultimate guy who runs a place like that. I've met him, he's a decent
guy - he wouldn't be in his position if he was a tyrant, and he's not.
But the other people working for him, like Joe Feeney and Ron Risher,
(might as well throw Mr. Gibson in that pile) are assholes and deserve
punishment. I'd fire their collective asses and send them out on same.

Anywho, now that I've gotten past that rant...

My sister and I proceeded up towards Belden Village. Saw a new Salvation
Army store have its grand opening, but clothing salvation was not to be
had there. So... over to Target. And Kohl's. At some point, we even went
in to Joann Fabrics. I bought a zipper repair kit to replace the worn
out slider on my jacket, and it works nicely for the first time since I
bought the thing.

The zipper was from my old "Member's Only" jacket which I had for a long
time. How long? It was the last piece of clothing my grandparents bought
for me prior to 1995. At some point the original zipper wore out, so I
replaced it myself. Then the jacket proceeded to wear out, so I replaced
it, and the new jacket had a crappy vinyl zipper that didn't work at all
like a new zipper should. So I transplanted the metal zipper from the
old jacket, then the slide proceeded to not work anymore. Being as old
as it was, it had worn down and the teeth no longer meshed. Easily
fixed. Now to finish restoring my Lum patch and put her back in a place
of glory. ^.^

tonikaku... We ended up arriving at the Men's Wearhouse (sp) on the
Strip. They had 2 pairs, in my size, for $19.99!! "Sold!" I exclaimed,
to the delight and laught of one of the salespeople. ^_^ I ended up
buying 3 pairs, the 3rd being $39.99. They looked great, fit great. I
thought I had lost a lot more than we measured me for, so I guess I will
have to work harder to be able to afford cheap mass produced clothing
from Tanzania, made for people with insanely shorter legs than I have.

I almost bought a Sima GoDVD unit at Best Buy (a store that amazingly
was completely out of $15 DVD sets of Magic Knight Rayearth Season 1),
but I want a better deal than $99. I know they can be had for $60. I
really need it since I got some old tapes that could use some video
fixing magic, and I don't have a couple thou for a Markertek processing
amp. I wish I had that for my trip to Japan. Dang. I don't think that's
going to happen and nobody cares.

Anywho, we got me fixed up, now to get the Kia fixed up.

ja ne nyo deshi punyoun na no da...

Koko deshi nyo!

Today we officially moved IN.

I went to get groceries and came back with some panic in regard to the
sludge that keeps building up in my oil in the engine of the truck, so
my bro in law flushed it out with something NAPA has, and it'll have to
be done again. It's got better oil flow than before, but still not as
good as it should be. I will never use Schaefer's Mauly oil again.

It'll take a while as we sort through the boxes of stuff. I hope we can
get Apartment B rented out because then I'd be a Building Manager and my
older sister, who asked that I do this while she's in Floriday, would
give me a break on the rent. I'm going to ask $200, and as she adds more
properties if she's actually going to do that, $100 each additional
unit. Heh. Either a break in the rent or a salary. ^_^

I imagine I'll be eBaying a lot of stuff that I really don't need, like
3 Texas Instruments TI 99/4A computers or the software cartridges I'll
never use. I might keep the games. I have a VIC-20 and Omega Race, which
is the best version made for any such system.

I hope to make a killing, depending on how much people want these. It
was about 15 or so years ago that one college I went to actually had
decked out TI 99/4A systems, meaning they had disc drives and that whole
expansion box. They were in one learning center. (shrug)

About ready to actually 'be' here...

According to the contractor, the pipes for Apt. 1 are done. The well got
4 gallons of bleach dumped in it to cholorinate it. 4 gallons!?

The uhaul place charged me only $78. I feel I should get that money
back.

"Early February" training isn't going to happen, at least as things look
right now. Another promise come and gone. I want my damn raise. I wonder
what management's lame excuse will be this time. One of the other guys
who was also to get the same training as I made some noise about it.
Someone said the lady who makes out the schedule messed up. I'll say she
messed it up!!!

There's one girl where I work who finally got DSL working on her
computer, but it's got a problem when it starts up. I did some looking
and figured out what to look for thanks to one friend, but I have no
idea if I'll get a chance to look at it. I left her a note at work to
ask her to call me when it would be a good time and day to visit - but
since I've not gotten a call, she may not have gotten the note, or she
did and her folks don't want me to visit (in spite of how many times her
mom has said hi to me - how does she know my name at all?), or they
think there's nothing wrong with it. Which there is, and I don't know
why her sister hasn't fixed it.

Anywho, we're about to move in and be here for real this week. While
it's about time, I'm not looking forward to it.