Is it so important that we regulate the coming of sundown by screwing up every clock in America twice yearly. My computer, bedroom alarm clock and my cell phone make the change automatically.
So … in my office, bedroom and in my pocket, it is 4:20pm. In my kitchen and car it is 3:20pm. I think I like my kitchen and car time better as it makes more sense to me in my addled state of grogginess over losing an hour of sleep. To boot, the kids were all visiting this weekend and I stayed up watching movies until much later than planned so I lost even more sleep.
Oh Daylight Savings … what do you want from me?? Just as I get adjusted to the quality of light in the mornings and the time to begin mixing the sunset margaritas for the beach you switch it all up.
POR QUE!!!!!! (is that right? I don’t speak Spanish .. or write it for that matter)
Why can’t it always be 5pm? Why am I not sitting at a beach bar sipping cocktails? What does this have to do with time changes? I dunno … I think I am just exhausted …. from time changes.
Can’t wait to “Fall Back”.
At the RGA meetings this week we asked people what was the worst job they had in their younger days and what was their best. I had one that I considered my worst and in some ways it taught me more than any other job I had … so does that make it my best?
When I was in college, one summer, I took a job to make money for the following semester. I lied, like all students do, and told the interviewer that I was looking for full time employment not just some summer job. No college for me, told them … my pants, of course, on fire big time.
The job was at a cookie factory (true story). You older cats may remember the Lucille Ball episode where Lucy and Ethel packed candy at the factory. It was something like that. I stood at the end of a big conveyor belt and cookies came down, pretty fast I might add, and my illustrious job was to pack them in boxes for shipping. 8am – 5pm with a 45 minute lunch break and a 15 minute, get away from the impossible noise, break. You know the drill.
I lasted until August and about two weeks before the fall term, on a Friday at lunch, I bolted with my check in hand. I needed a couple of weeks to hang with my friends at the beach. I needed a break before school started. I had worked all summer in that loud factory with … factory people!
What did I learn?
I learned the following:
I wanted to do more with my life than work in a factory and was lucky to be in a great school getting an education and securing a future I wanted to live.
I learned that there were people who were not so lucky, some not so smart, some just not fortunate but they were hard workers and the factory was clean and decent and they felt lucky to have a job that didn’t completely suck so I learned a little humility.
I learned to respect hard work and people who do that work every day and need the job, so they don’t walk out in the middle of a shift and hit the beach like I did.
But the most important thing I learned was this:
The conveyor is going to keep sending the cookies down the belt at you at a steady and sometimes overwhelming speed and no matter what happens, you have to try your best to get the cookies in the box. Someone is waiting for them. Someone is expecting them. Someone needs the boxes of cookies to sell at their store to put food on their tables at night and hell … people just want the cookies.
Never quit putting them in the boxes.
I have started a networking organization with two lovely people and it is going like wildfire. It seems that everyone wants to promote their business but not everyone knows the best way to go about it.
Meeting people face to face and getting to know them really helps. I don’t want to refer someone that I don’t know to someone else to do business with. “Yes, I know a plumber. He has never done any work for me and I don’t know a thing about him personally, but sure, give him a call.” Make any sense to do that?
I have a great mechanic. I use him because my good friend Stef told me about him years ago and she knew the quality of this mans work. I know Stef and know that she knows quality and value.
Game On! That’s how it works.
So … Check out the website www.RGAnetwork. If you have a business in Tampa Bay, come to a meeting. We’ll have fun. You’ll learn stuff and meet people who you will come to know and trust.
Then you can say … “Hey! I know a guy!” …. and mean it.
I have been a bad, bad blogger. I had every intention to blog daily but good intentions don’t always work out.
So … I will promise to try to come here as often as possible and type odd remnants of ideas from my addled brain for any poor fool who wants to read them. Is that you? Do you qualify?
Are you a theater buff? foodie? anarchist? All of the above?
Keep watching … cause I’m back … and badder than ever.
I am cold! I am sitting at my desk in my office wearing my hoodie, sweats and warm socks. It’s about 59 degrees today here in sunny Florida. My friends Deb and Jeff and the kids are off on the Pirate Ship tour boat that leaves out of Clearwater beach every day. They wanted me to join them.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! No Freakin’ way. It’s cold in here, with the heat on, in my jacket, with the hood up …IN MY WOOOLY SOCKS FOR GODSAKE!
Meanwhile, back on the boat, the family from Virginia who escaped 14 inches of snow by bailing out of the Roanaoke Airport after waiting over 24 hours for the airport guys to shovel off the runways and warm up the planes, are riding on a big red pirate boat on the water in the sunny Gulf of Mexico … probably wooooo hoooooing.
I am a wimp. I am not in denial about this. I hate to be cold. This is why I left my home state of Jersey and moved to Florida which, though devoid of culture, overall intelligence and people under the age of 75 ….. is warm … usually. Yesterday, when I took my friends to the beach, there were surfers. I admit that for once, there was also surf which could be why these brain trusts were out there in wet suits instead of in a nice warm bar drinking hot rum beverages. In New Jersey, guys surf in cold weather too. Like 35 degree weather. I used to go to the boardwalk and sit in a bar and drink the aforementioned hot rum beverages, watch them and laugh my ass off. They would come out of the water with their heads , hands and feet, being the only thing not covered in skin tight rubber. Everything but the rubber was a lovely shade of beet.
So … it’s all relative. If the sun is shining and the waves are waving, surfers all over the world will go out in the freezing water (again relative according to region) and surf. People like me will sit in our hoodies drinking warm things and cursing the cold.
The good news is that this is Florida. If you don’t like the weather, wait a few minutes. By Wednesday it will be 78 degrees again and I will be walking on the beach on Christmas eve with my beautiful wife. I will be the one in the cut off s and flip flops.
I can hold out!
We had a wonderful brunch today that many of our friends attended. Beth made omelettes to order and we had crepes with fruit and the whipped cream I made fresh this morning. Good food, good conversations and your basic holiday cheer. It was great! … except.
I threw this brunch so that my friends (now my family) could meet my old pal Debby and her family. Guess where Deb is from … Roanoke VA. That’s right! The place that is currently under 2 ft of snow. She called me on Saturday afternoon to tell me that they were still in the Roanoke airport where they had spent the night at the airports Sheraton awaiting the clearing of the runways and rescheduling of the flights. The guest of honor for our brunch was holed up in Virginia with two young sons and her husband pacing and praying … As Toni would say … OY!!
About 8pm on Saturday I got a call …”We’re in Orlando”. We’ll see you tomorrow … about noon. GREAT!!!! Except …..
The brunch was set for 10 ish for all of my local friends. Whadda ya gonna do? So everyone from the theater company came between 10 and 10:30. most everyone left between 11:30 and noon and Deb and family arrived at 12:30 having missed every light on the way and gotten stuck, to boot, behind some weird holiday motorcycle parade for about a half an hour.
Jason and Bev were still here … so they got to meet two of our best friends and there was still some food left …. so that was good.
More importantly I got to spend the rest of the afternoon with my dear old friend and her charming family. Her husband Jeff had us all in stitches … funny, funny guy. Her kids are terrific! I took them out and showed off our amazing “Honeymoon Island Beach” (Jeff decided then and there to stay here and not return to Virginia) and had a great chance to catch up after a 15 year absence in one anothers lives.
God bless Facebook!!! reconnecting old friends everywhere! Sometimes … like this time … that really works out well.
Ok! So I am completely not ready! Then I am never ready for Christmas. I have never bought presents much prior to December 15th (who am I kidding? more like the 22 0r 23)
This year we are hosting a holiday brunch at our house. My good friend Deb and her family are visiting our area this coming weekend and I thought, “Why not invite everyone in the theater company to eat brunch and meet my pal?” Oh the shopping and cooking and cleaning I will do … AHHH!
I am nuts!!! But the good news is that my wife is on the same crazy page as I am. Tomorrow I will hit the Costco – God Bless Them – and buy lots of stuff for the brunch and some for the Christmas dinner, which at this point will be an all day extravaganza of food and wine. Hurray!
As for gifts, we have cookies piling up on the tables and counters at the house as my a-for-mentioned crazy wife continues to bake …. and bake … and bake !! The tins are ready for loading and that, my friends, is what everyone will be getting ….cookies. Except Beth.
Beth will be getting some cool little gifts and the one thing she has asked for.
Time.
God has given us lots more of this and we are very, very grateful.
So … We will be spending time this year. Not so much money which is kind of a waste. Don’t you think? We will be spending time with our friends who love us and who we love. People who were there for us at the worst and continue to be so at the better. Time in our home and with our remaining, sweet dog who is healthy and well and full of love and piss and vinegar.
But most of all … time with each other. Blessed are those who have love … Because they have everything.
I am a member of several networking groups. We meet at breakfast or lunch or happy hours and pass around our cards and fliers for upcoming events and classes we are offering or special offers our companies are providing. Most of the time we are each given about 30 seconds to about 2 minutes to do a “commercial” telling everyone in the room about our business and why they should buy our products, use our services or become team members of our multi level businesses.
It’s all about making connections. It’s all about striving to generate new business and make lasting business contacts, friendships and family ties.
BULLSHIT!! – it’s all about the food! especially the free food. Networkers can eat like longshoreman after putting in a hard day at the docks. They eat like actors and musicians and drink like teachers and doctors at a convention … that is if it’s free food and, God willing, free booze. Little, tiny wasted, women can suck up more spring rolls, chicken wings, potstickers, cheese wedges and fried appetizers of a variety of natures than should be humanly possible.
BUT … when it’s not free … not so much!
I run a Friday networking group and I went with a smart decision in order to avoid the embarrassment of having people come to the meeting, sit there with nothing but a free water in front of them and take up space on the restaurant (which they hate). My meeting is at a Chinese restaurant, a very good one, where you get an entire meal for under $6. We are well attended.
It’s not free but it’s the next best thing … it’s cheap.
So … I am off to a networking meeting tonight … great apps and buy one get one drinks. Wooo the frick … hooooo!! If I could only bring in a little cooler, Beth would not have to cook tonight. It takes a lot more than free food to get my wife to a networking meeting!!!!
I had to make a quick dinner for Beth and I tonight and thought I would pass along a little tip.
Lisa – listen up – it’s a way to make that freakin’ Ragu Sauce you eat …. edible.
Take any decent jarred sauce (even ragu – if they still make that stuff) and start like this. In a saucepan melt a tablespoon or so of butter, add a little minced garlic. If you don’t have this go out and get it. You are not allowed to continue cooking without this in the fridge. Add a little olive oil (same applies as with the garlic). Stir together with a little garlic salt and whatever dried Italian seasonings you have around – just a little of that. Add about 2 ounces of Vodka, more to taste if you like and about 2-3 ounces of milk, any kind even half and half. Throw in salt and pepper to taste, toss over some wheat pasta which is much better for you than regular pasta and tastes twice and good.
Done ….enjoy!!!
Christmas used to mean my big Italian family, snow, cold crisp air, trips into the city to see the tree light in Rockefeller Center surrounded by skaters and crowds, carolling with my friends, lots of hot chocolate, parties and many, many layers of clothes.
It’s different now. I have no parents or grand parents. I have new friends and can’t get north to see the old ones. It doesn’t snow and it rarely gets cold enough for hot chocolate, or more “layers” than a sweater or Henley over my tee shirt. Yesterday I wore cut off jeans and my beach shoes with no socks.
It’s colder today because it’s raining and we can’t carol downtown for the old fashioned Christmas event because we got rained out. By the weekend we will probably be able to hit the beach for a walk or sunset in just shorts and maybe a light jacket.
I miss my family. I am the only one left standing and that’s hard. But the thing is … I have a family. I have Beth, the most amazing wife anyone could have and we still have little Taylor, the world’s cutest dog. Our friends are many and great. They love and support us and surround us. Mary and Ray and Marie will eat Christmas dinner here and who knows who else will show up to eat Beth’s cookies, breads and cakes (the woman is a baking machine).
New years eve and day we will gather together, eat, drink and laugh. Everyone will stuff themselves with my collards so we all have good luck through the next year (so far – it’s worked).
Tonight, it’s raining. Beth is getting going on the batter for the millions of cookies she will make. The Christmas music is playing on the IPod. I will crack a good bottle of Pinot Noir, enjoy dinner and cuddle on the couch with my little family. I am hundreds of miles from home. Yet, I am home. I have my family and while it’s different than the Christmases of old – it’s not better, it’s not worse. It just is … and I am very lucky that it is!
|
|