Doug is making an appointment for me to get the old peepers checked. I'll crap if I need glasses. I so didn't budget for that with the HCRA/DCRA thing we do here. Oh well. I can fill the prescription after January 1, 2002 if necessary, when the new year and new balance start.
Got feedback on the latest editions of the Grandma pages. All good. Everyone loves Grandma! She'll be going to Atlantic City at Thanksgiving. Oh boy howdy, that'll be some funny shit. ME AND MY DERANGED SISTER RUNNING AROUND TOGETHER ... oh, that'll be too much! Stay tooned for more seriously stupid crap from the sistahs.
Geoff recently started playing with an imaginary friend named "Corey." He's got an actual friend named Corey at school, and I think he brings "Corey" home with him so they can just keep playing. This has been in the last week or so, and it sort of was freaking me out.
Not because I don't think Corey is a good idea. I love the Corey thing. All the reading I've done states that really highly imaginative kids have imaginary friends that they play with to act roles out with and enjoy interactions with... I'm cool with the concept of Corey.
I was freaked out because I don't know what MY interaction with "Corey" is supposed to be. So, do I invite Corey to do stuff when I ask Geoff or do I wait for Corey to be invited by Geoff? Do I yell at Corey or talk to him, address him at all???
I also feel that perhaps I am not paying enough attention to Geoff, so he needs to play with an imaginary friend. Lord knows his big sister is no fun, she kicks his little butt often, or, he plays very aggressively with her and fights when she won't let him drive the playtime. Then he ends up pinching or scratching her... and it gets mighty ugly. So I was thinking that perhaps the poor little matey is just not getting enough good, fun interaction at home. I did some reading and looked some crap up on the web but couldn't find any guidance for parents.
Both of my kids have always been good at story making, character play, but this is the first real embodiment of an invisible playmate. Geoff used to weave these insane and complicated stories of two guys named "Tom and Hike" who would go on all sorts of adventures, usually resulting in bodily injury of some sort and a hospital stay. But Corey's been with us for a few weeks now. Corey is who gets blamed when Geoff does something bad, even when he's caught red handed. We've sat him down and explained that Corey is make believe, and Geoffrey is real, and when something happens that it's Geoffrey who will be punished. And he is slowly starting to accept that.
The cool thing about Corey is that it keeps Geoff busy. When I'm doing dishes or something, making dinner, Geoff will get his hotwheels out and he and Corey will race... he's really into racing. And he'll shoot the cars across the kitchen, one in each hand, and he cheers for himself and for Corey.
So Corey isn't so bad.
There are actually a hoard of imaginary friends. Usually the come out at bedtime, and I have to tuck them all in. Corey sleeps on the floor next to Geoff. Lesson sits on the book case. Stephen sleeps on the floor at the foot of the bed, and there's someone I'm forgetting. But I have to tell them ALL a goodnight story.
He's got me wrapped around his 4.5 yr old pinkie. I'm now just wondering how long Corey et al should live in my house before I start to worry...
Geoff has new nicknames for everyone. Jessica used to be "Jessica Juice," now she's "Classy." Uh, I'm laughing just typing that because she is anything BUT classy most of the time. And he says it so sultry. "Hey, Classy," like a 70s ladies man or something. The dog is now "Chocolate," not Kinger. I'm "Grandma," HA, and Doug is "Grampa." We're not too happy with those. And he, himself, is "Basin."
Not sure where Basin came from. But when you see Geoff next, call him Basin. He'll love it.
I got a salary increase. I'm still below what is considered market value ($56,000 is the low end of "market value" according to salary surveys) but it makes no difference to me. Two years ago at this time I was making $33,000 a year to work my big fat ASS off in a stress filled environment that was leaving me with anxiety attacks at night as I was trying to go to sleep. In October of 1999 I got yet another letter from the President of the College letting me know that I was great but just not eligible for a salary increase. She got one every year, the bitch, but I got bupkis. So I resolved to quit.
I didn't start interviewing until February, had three offers in March, quit and came here. Best move ever. I got hired at $40,000 which I thought was the greatest thing ever, then got laid off, but picked up on waivers for another position within the company (thank you Kerry) and have been here since. I have increased my salary from 33,000 to 55,800 in 2 years. It probably won't ever get much higher, but I'm so happy to have a job. So happy to have a short commute. So happy to have cool co-workers (even if some of them are a little catty) and so happy to not be working at the college.
I also am so happy because my skillset has grown SO much since I left. I've grown so much in my knowledge and my abilities that I couldn't be happier unless I actually knew everything, which will never happen. I never had the chance to learn anything when I was working at the college because I was constantly fighting fires and working hard and maintaining, that I couldn't learn ASP or PHP or DHTML or find out how to make a server side includes page, or anything. This is so much nicer.
I'm doing half the amount of work for almost twice the money.
Yowsah.
One of my coworkers, LLP, is from China and she asked me what are some good funny movies that she should watch so she could "get" why I am so funny. We had been discussing "Office Space," which from a Human Resources perspective is just drop dead hilarious ("Looks like you've been missing a lot of work lately, Peter..." "I wouldn't say I've been missing it, Bob.") so I gave her a list. I told her to rent one movie a week, and then come in and we'd talk about it, if she didn't get it. I also said that some of them aren't funny per se, but have funny parts. So LLP is going to rent:
"A Christmas Story," "Raising Arizona," "Blazing Saddles," "Young Frankenstein," "The Princess Bride," "Office Space," "Better Off Dead," "The Jerk," "Parenthood," "Brazil," and "Ferris Buehler's Day Off" ... I figure this is a good start.
I also explained to her that there is a lot more to figuring me out than these movies. There's Monty Python, all together very important. There's the entire series of "MASH" episodes. There are movies that you have to watch because they defined my age group, like it or not, like "Breakfast Club" and "Risky Business," which I don't necessarily think are good movies, but impact my age group. Define a lot for the time in the 80s that they came out. So I'll start her on the above, see how she does.
I'll let you know. And should you have suggestions for LLP, email me.
Okay, that's it from here. I registered with a log to get my site rated and loved by the masses. I'm hoping to increase some traffic here. Part of me craves an audience, part of me dreads it because someone out there will find what I have to say offensive, or hypocritical (see previous entries). I guess that's what you open yourself up to when you start keeping a web journal.
Finally finished all of Scott Anderson's journals. Whew. Wish I was as creative with language as he is. Anyway. enough.
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