So, today I went to get my car's smog check taken care of. Since it was supposed to be so hot, I made sure to get out of the house early, while it was still cool. Who am I kidding, I always do that stuff early.

I get my car smogged up in Glendora.  There a good place up there that is very reasonable, fast and they give you a really good free car wash. :-).   I lucked-out and they'd opened a half hour early, so I was able to get it done before 9am. Neat!

After getting that taken care of, I had to hit Trader Joes and the grocery store....

When I was going through the check-out, the gal bagging my stuff noticed I had sugar-free Red Bull. She said "Did you hear what they're saying about Red Bull?"  I figured she was talking about the usual health scare stuff, but said "no, what?". She didn't want to say at first, so I had to convince her to tell me. She hesitantly said "Well, what I heard was they put bull sperm in it. Do you think that's true?". She really seemed horrified about it.  I said that I hadn't heard that, nor did I see it listed under the ingredients. I stifled a laugh and assured her that I didn't think it was true, but the best part was when she said "Well, I had one yesterday, I didn't care if they did or not".

I love people!!!

I found out on the way to work this morning that Yvonne Craig and Bud Yorkin have passed away.... Two people who each played a big role in my childhood. I'm sad today.

Man oh man, did I have an epically bad day today. Work was terrible (I mean REALLY terrible...I actually quit my job at one point). Drama, angry discussions, super high emotions, etc. I've had a headache for the majority of the day that none of my prescriptions have put a dent in and now I'm exhausted. I'm going to have a cocktail, take a bubble bath and then go to bed.

By the way- the quitting my job part didn't count, it was to a co-worker, not my boss.

I hope tomorrow is a better day.

Okay, first day back at work after having my forced week off.

While I was making my trek out west to work this morning, I was overcome with a great desire to turn my car around and not come in to the office.  I mean, I REALLY wanted to go back home and tell my bosses that I wasn't going to be in.....ever.  Then I thought about my bills and stuff and decided I should probably continue on my way.

I got to the office early (as usual) and there's an approximately 2-inch thick folder with stuff in it waiting for me.  I sighed and looked at it.  You know, there's nothing like being out of the office and coming back to a ton of work that needs to be sorted through.  Especially stuff I thought was taken care of while I was out.  It's stuff like that that makes me not want to take time off.  At least there weren't a zillion voice-mails, so that's a plus.

While looking through everything I see a note that some papers have gone missing and can I check to see if I have them anywhere.  Now, I KNOW those pages were filed in the appropriate book because I put them there myself.  As I look for another set, I see that 2 sets of other papers are now gone from my desk.  I don't mention this to the gal who told me the others were missing, but WTF???!!!???  I had to spend an hour re-printing and copying pages (some were on letterhead and couldn't be filed as printed, they had to be copies).  We use the 2 sets I discovered missing as the basis for next quarters project, so I needed to re-do them as well.

This really pisses me off.  Each quarter we have a major project and there is a checklist that everyone initials after they have checked to make sure that all the copied sets are there.  That's 3 people who have checked and said "yup, all the copies, including the ones for next quarter are here" and now they're gone?  How?  The thing is, I can't say anything about it because the gal who backs me up is GOLDEN here and I honestly like her a lot and need her around.  It's just weird that things seem to disappear and she's the one who discovers it.  It's happened a couple of times before when she's been here and I arrive late because I had a dentist appointment or something.  I didn't think much of it before, I just sort of figured that I was absent minded and misplaced papers.  This time, no way.

Now I don't know who's doing it and I'm not going to point fingers, but someone is fucking with my papers.  Maybe the gal I replaced or her best friend who used to work here have managed to get into the office and screw with things?  Maybe the woman who backs me up does it so she can "find" things and look good?  I doubt it.  I just don't know.  What I do know is, my papers (that I discovered missing today) were in my desk drawer, in a folder for next quarter's project and they had post-its on them noting what they were and now they're gone.

The shitty thing is, I'm known for keeping everything, paper-wise.  It's a C.Y.A. thing.  With the way my bosses are, I don't want them ever blaming me for doing something they didn't want done that I only did because they told me to and then forgot.  So I keep all my drafts and working copies for an entire quarter before I shred them.  They think it's silly and unnecessary and takes-up too much room (which it does).  The gal who comes in for me thinks I lose things in it as it's not as neat and clean as she would like (she's a neat freak), but I can usually pull out anything I'm looking for pretty quickly.

I'm not going to say anything to anyone about it, but I think I'm going to re-think how I file the papers after we finish October's project.

Maybe I SHOULD have stayed home today after all..........

My bosses decided that I had to take some vacation time, so I took this week off.  Those of you that know me are very much aware of how much I dislike summer and the heat that comes with it, so yeah, August is the PERFECT time to force me to take vacation.  They probably made me take time off so they can get a new manager. I bet they spent the week interviewing people to replace me anyway.  I'll come back to a pink slip!  I should sound sad, right?

Nah, with my luck, they still love me and want me to work there forever.  I really should update my resume though. I'll do that when I'm done with this.

Since I had the time, I decided to drive up and see my parents for a few days. The 8-hour drive seems to get easier each time I do it. My car may disagree though, especially during the mountainous part of it.

I left here around 7am and got up there around 3pm on Saturday and got home around 2pm yesterday. I'm exhausted and have no desire to get behind the wheel of a car in the near future, but I had a really good time. My folks are doing well. It was relaxing to go up there and to not "have" to do anything, apart from help my parents with some electrics-based stuff.

My dad is funny.  I was checking the Netflix on his Roku and he was pointing out that he doesn't watch it much anymore because of the "Recommended Viewing"  lists that show-up when he logs-in. Apparently, he REALLY doesn't like to be told what he should watch, LOL.  He said "fuck them" a few times.  Ha! I need to see if I can go online and try to get rid of them for him.

Speaking of my dad, he showed me the area on the car that intakes air from the outside and circulates it through the filter to the inside of the car. While he didn't notice the smell that my super-nose smells, he said that if I spray Lysol into that area, it should kill the smell. We tried Febreeze and it worked for a little bit. I think it's weird that the intake is in the area where the windshield and the hood meet. I thought it would be under the hood! I probably won't use Lysol though, nasty smell and too many chemicals. He said a friend used vinegar and water (a douche for your car!) and it worked for them. I'll probably try that before I put smelly chemical-ly Lysol in there.

I feel bad that their cat is really sick. I think he's around 18 now and his illness has progressed pretty far. He's also really thin and is having some mobility problems. Poor baby.  Both parents are taking it pretty hard.

I probably gained about 20lbs in the 5 days I was up there! Every night was a different, delicious dinner, the best being when my dad barbecued strip steaks. One of the things I've missed since they moved is my dad's barbecue. He's a master at it! I was lucky enough when I was growing-up  to have him teach me his secrets, but I don't have a barbecue to use them!

When I got home, I had a very pissed-off cat waiting for me.  He's STILL yelling!!   He's also really fat! I thought cats only ate when they were hungry?  Not my fat-assed cat!! He over ate just to prove a point that he can't be left alone. Clever move, but he still can't go with me on the next trip.

I'm going to tonight's Dead Authors (second to last monthly show) and I'm really looking forward to it. Luckily my friend is driving up, after she visits a friend, so she's picking me up so I don't have to drive.

Other than that, it's a quiet weekend ahead. Just a couple of trips to the grocery store and Trader Joe's early tomorrow.  I think CicLAvia is sometime this weekend.  If the street closures are what they usually close, I don't think I'll be moving my car!

UPDATE: I just had both of my friends cancel for tonight.  They didn't even know the other one was going and I got a text from each of them 1 minute apart. I'm bummed. It's too late to try and get other people to go. One of the friends has cancelled many times, so I think I'm done buying tickets for people.