Valerie Kalene

Aunt Valerie: “What did you guys win at the carnival at school?”

Dylan:  “A whooshi cushion.”

Aunt Valerie: “A what?”

Collin:  “He meant, a whoopie cushion.”

Dylan:  “That’s what I said, a whooshi cushion!”

For my job I have to read a disclosure if I enroll the customer into a specific program, and it typically takes me 2 minutes to read the entire thing.  Tonight, after having read said disclosure, the customer proceeds to inform me that I have a “fantastic voice” and asked if I had ever considered doing any type of voice over work.  Yes, I have thought about it, but having no idea how to get into that type of work, I have never pursued it.  The customer continues to tell me how fantastic my voice is and that he knows voice because he has won 4 grammys and that I should seriously consider looking into doing voice over work.  Granted, I have been told numerous times that I have a great phone voice, but you would have thought my vocal cords were lined with gold the way this guy was carrying on.   I was beat red by the time he finished talking.  Not because he was being inappropriate, but because I was embarrassed at how much he went on about it.  After the call was finished I googled him and come to find out, he actually has won 4 grammys and has a new album released.  Can I add that to my resume?  Maybe under skills?  “Impressing Grammy award winning artists with voice?” 

Start with a cage containing five monkeys.  Inside the cage, hang a banana on a string and place a set of stairs under it.  Before long, a monkey will go to the stairs and start to climb towards the banana.  As soon as he touches the stairs, spray all the other monkeys with cold water.After a while, another monkey makes an attempt with the same result – all the other monkeys are sprayed with cold water.  Pretty soon, when another monkey tries to climb the stairs, the other monkeys will try to prevent it.Now, put away the cold water.  Remove one monkey from the cage and replace it with a new one.  The new monkey sees the banana and wants to climb the stairs.  To his surprise and horror, all of the other monkeys attack him.  After another attempt and attack, he knows that if he tries to climb the stairs, he will be assaulted.Next, remove another of the original five monkeys and replace it with a new one.  The newcomer goes to the stairs and is attacked.  The previous newcomer takes part in the punishment with enthusiasm!  Likewise, replace a third original monkey with a new one, then the fourth, and then the fifth.Every time the newest monkey takes to the stairs, he is attacked.  Most of the monkeys that are beating him have no idea why they were not permitted to climb the stairs or why they are participating in the beating of the newest monkey.  After replacing all of the original monkeys, none of the remaining monkeys have ever been sprayed with cold water.  Never the less, no monkey ever again approaches the stairs to try for the banana.  Why not?  Because as far  as they know, that’s the way it’s always been done around here.

it’s back to school I go.  This semester I am taking Basic Math II (M, T, W, & Fri 3:20-4:10p), Effective Oral Communication (M & W 5:10-6:25p), and Intro to Philosophy (T & Th 5:10-6:25p).  It should be an interesting semester.   After all the worry over the math class last semester I have decided to not even fret over any of the classes.  I ended up with an A in that class, which I am very proud of.  Math has just never come easy for me.  This semester it is all about algebra.  I am sure I will do just as well. 

I have applied for two seperate positions at the job place.  One for Auditor in the Transportation Dept. and the other for Lead Supervisor in the same dept.  As slow as things move around here, it may be summer before they get around to doing any interviews, but in the mean time, I am keeping my fingers crossed for something!  I’m not sure I can hang on much longer as merely a customer service representative.  It’s to robotic, and there are way too many idoits that want to blame their mistakes on anyone else but themselves.  So, if you are reading this, maybe you can send me some positive juju and keep your fingers crossed for me!  I appreciate it! 

I absolutely love Autumn.  It is my favorite season, by far.  All the colors and smells.  The leaves on my neighbors tree turned this amazing color of yellow this year that is breathtaking.  Normally I don’t feel comfortable taking pictures of my neighbors houses or yards because I feel like I am invading their privacy, but I had to take a photo of this.  I hope it turns out perfect.  (No, I don’t have a digital camera - lame, I know)

Suggestion for today:  The electric razor that the barber uses to give buzz cuts; not good for shaving your legs! 

Happy Gobble Gobble Everyone!   

College orientation sucks!  I’m sure for a kid fresh out of high school it can be interesting as well as intimidating and perhaps a bit overwhelming, but for someone who is 30 one years old it just plain sucks!  As I am checking in, the councelor asks me how many English classes I took at my previous college.  2.  How many math classes?  1-1.  I dropped out and didn’t finish the class.  O.k so now I have to take an entrance exam.  I tell the woman to just put me in the most remedial math class there is, because that is exactly what any math test I take is going to tell them to do.  She laughs and says not to worry, I’m not the only one that feels that way.  No, it’s not a feeling.  I am POSITIVE that I will be in the most remedial class possible.  I had to take the test anyway, which I fully expected.  What I didn’t  expect was to be reading complete jibberish on the moniter.  The very first question that comes up is something like 2(2-4) /4(3-6).   Now add square roots to half those number and that’s still not even close to what it looked like.  I absolutely had no clue.  It’s been 7 years since I have any math classes and like I said, I dropped the class.  Somehow I managed to get a whopping 26%.  Needless to say - I scheduled to take math for dummies.  Yeah, and it’s not even a math that will count to anything… just a math class to get me to the next math class to get me to the next math class that might count, but we aren’t sure yet.  That’s what I get for not finishing the first time around and screwing around so much over the past 13 years.  So anyone who is in college - a word of advice - DON’T SCREW AROUND - IT’S NOT WORTH IT! 

For anyone who doesn’t know… I work 3rd shift.  I work a 10.5 hour shift 4 days a week, which can be exhausting, but well worth the extended weekends off.  So this past week we have been having terrible thunderstorms in the area.  With the rain, and the humidity it has been miserably hot during the day, so the air conditioner has been running quite a lot.  To my surprise, I get home Thursday morning and air in the house felt rather warm.  I checked the thermostate and found that it was set to 71, but was 78 in the house.  Thankfully we have a service thru the gas company that provides service for these type of situation so I called them straight away and they had someone call me back.  There was another storm getting ready to roll thru the area, so they didn’t want to send anyone out because of not being able to work outside.  That was fine as long as someone could be out Friday morning first thing.  So this morning I get a call at 8:10 and the woman tells me that the guy is on his way and should be there in 20 minutes.  Great!  At 8:50 the guy shows up and starts working.  At around 9:30 the maintance guy tells me that it appears as though lightening struck the air conditioning unit outside the house, which fried both motors, the compressor, the electrical lines, and the emergancy disconnect box.  I couldn’t hardly believe it.  Lightening striking that close to the house.  Frightening to say the least.  At 9:50 another guy from the a/c company shows up to write up the estimate to get a new a/c unit installed.  Meanwhile, I call the insurance co. to find out what I have to do to get it repaired, and find out that we have a $500 deductible, which I was not aware of.  I start to panic just a little.  (I am extremely addicted to my a/c!!)   Finally, at around 10:30 I have an estimate for $2100.00.  The insurance claims unit calls me later in the afternoon to request a copy of the etimate, which I can fax over, however there won’t be anyone available over the weekend to process the fax, so I have to wait till Monday before they can even start reviewing the information to make a determination if they are going to cover it or not.  (Side note: I seriously need to buy my own fax machine!!)  Hopefully it’s not too miserably hot this weekend.  Poor Jessie was panting so much this afternoon before I left for work.  The maintance guy, Kevin, from Carl’s Heating and A/C impressed me though.  Would you believe he actually turned off all the lights in the basement when he left.  I have never had a worker in the house that turned the lights off after he was done before.  I know it sounds stupid, but little things like that are the things that I remember. 

“Aunt Valrie - if you put two gay fish together, will they eat each other?”

“Ummm…they are called beta fish…and yes, if you put them together, they will eat each other.”

It’s a beautiful day in Northeast Ohio as Mom and I drive home from a day of shopping.  We are sitting at a light and a classic Cadillac (much like this one ) comes thru the intersection. Mom comments on how sharp it was. I, being the smart ass that I am, simply say, “throw a life presever on it and push it in the lake, because all it is, is a boat.” Mom bursts out in laughter and almost starts choking, as if I have actually said something worth busting a gut over. Simple moments like that make me thankful.

Overheard while watching boys play with their monster trucks:

Dylan (who is 4)  says to Collin (who is 6):  “I’m just your friend, I’m not your buddy.”