ALL CAPS, lower case

One online match sent me a message in all caps, except for her email address. She went right to email stage due to her trial membership running out soon. This is in direct contrast to my writing style, using lowercase whenever I can. Sadly I don't think it will go anywhere, as I checked where she is online, and it's 60 miles away. I prefer matches being 30 miles away or less. Should have checked it before accepting the match, most of the time I do that.
   I stayed an hour past my normal leave time today at work to see that I was caught up before being out on Friday for a mentoring event. It was a high-volume day of special requests, but I wanted to prove I could do them on my own. It meant I was home just in time for prime-time TV. Wanted to watch both of the Charlie Brown Thanksgiving specials but 'Big Bang Theory' was on opposite the first one so I switched over after 'Theory' was done.
    I did some more shredding of catalog pages from a while back, I had been ordering some history books but the club no longer sends out catalogs. There were some pages worth reading- describing the books- even if I didn't buy the book, others were reminders of books on my list. Still, I haven't ordered a book from there since March. Though the recent purchases reminded me of ones on my list, especially since one was mentioned in a book I just bought, about being a similar theme. Thinning out the envelope does make it easier to find the ones I really wanted. I've piled up some bonus points due to my previous orders, would like to see if I can use any of them.

Droid Troubles

I liked the line 'trouble with your droids?' from one of the Star Wars movies- Empire Strikes Back. I've said it before when machines broke down at work. It happened at the end of the workday, few people around to do much about it. So I moved to another copier and emailed people to keep them in the loop about it, toner bottle was full and I don't know how to handle that.
    Checked my cellphone messages after work on the bus, and there was one about a book I ordered from Garrison Keillor's store last week, already in. Hadn't finished reading the one I bought last week, about 'The Simpsons' show. This one is called 'Idiot America', I think I will like it as well. I'm trying to get into the habit of checking my phone after work, at times I don't check daily and it's because I get a low number of messages.
   Read with interest about the recipients of the presidential Medal of Freedom, there was an email about former St. Louis Cardinals player Stan Musial being honored. It is described as a lifetime achievement award, unfortunately like many other awards sometimes it's given posthumously. This was true for Jackie Robinson, awarded more than a decade after he died. Musial will be turning 90 soon, and I found out from the Wikipedia article he has had presidential honors before. He retired at the end of the 1963 season, and served as President Lyndon Johnson's physical fitness advisor for a few years. Then he was the Cardinal general manager for one season, 1967, when the club won the World Series.
  I was pleased that a colleague asked me if I was a history major, he must have heard me mention it to others. He sent me a link to Gutenberg for online books, and spoke of a biography of President Abraham Lincoln written in the 1880s. I know his law partner William Herndon was a biographer, but this one has a different author.

Gift Cards

I had ordered 2 gift cards last week through my employer's reward system, they arrived today. It was the Kohl's card, and the Red Lobster card. But that's not all. The card I won as a prize from the 'company wing-ding' this month arrived as well, for a grocery store. So it was a bumper crop of cards today. I put them in the envelope where all the others are, saves space.
    Looks like the first date is on for Saturday, offered her a Chinese restaurant nearby. Enjoyed seeing one of my friends at the comedy club tonight, he said he would be competing in a comedy contest out of state this week. It feels good to have made friends from going to open-mic nights, though I wish I saw more people I know more often. I was informed how one of them lost his job in the past few months, guess he would have less money to be in bars. I liked seeing his 'entourage' as well.
   A notable event today was taking a call at my cubicle. Nothing unusual there, except I decided to go underneath since I didn't want to have anyone hear me speak my social security number. It would have been a funny story if anyone had walked by during that time and asked what was going on. When I had done this before my then-boss thought something was horribly wrong, since all one could see was my legs and feet coming out from under the cube. I stayed there until the end of the call, it is kind of comfortable when on your back.

Bagels

There were bagels at work, celebrating something but I don't recall what. Since I had a light lunch due to the high workload, doing special requests, it did me well to have 2 bagels. It got a little sticky since I was using some jelly as the spread, then ate them while pulling files. Made it through the day just fine, which I liked. Nothing left over for the next day.
  Sent a picture to one online match, said she couldn't see any pictures as a trial member. Since there was a low battery on my digital camera I was unable to find out-without some serious guessing- which one was the one with my dad. So I sent the first one on the CD, with some friends from school. There was plenty of messages exchanged with one match this weekend, inquired about having dinner soon but still waiting to hear from her about it. Made it to the comedy club as well, had hoped to see more friends there but I did see one, and said I would like to do another comedy duet soon.

Fitness Center

I made it to the fitness center today, first time in a while, maybe the first since I started the blog. It's free since it's through my employer. I like going on a Sunday, free parking and I have the place to myself. Decided to go to a different grocery store after it, since it's cheaper than the one in my neighborhood. Used the second of the Taco Bell coupons, at halftime of a football game I was watching today. So there's 18 left! Sundays are nice, usually very little that needs to be done. Reminds me of a Bangles song 'Manic Monday'. "wish it were a Sunday, that's my funday my I don't have to run day."
   When looking up my hometown of Newton, Iowa on youtube I was surprised to find 2 things- fights at the VFW, and a news story about actor John Ratzenberger appearing 3 years ago in Iowa advocating against outsourcing. Too little, too late for the Maytag plant, it was just a week before it was closed. Yes, this was Cliff on "Cheers".
   It was nice making it back to the comedy club tonight. There may be some promising matches from online dating, hard to tell at this point. I think the activity is due to the free communication period, but take it how you can get it.
  

Facebook movie

I saw the Facebook movie, 'Social Network', tonight after much of the snow had fallen. I liked how references were made to Napster in it, how that site changed music much like Facebook changed networking. This is true, as I don't listen to CDs much anymore, since I can find plenty of songs on Youtube. I decided that seeing the movie served more than just the purpose of seeing a movie that I had wanted to see. It also gave me more time to figure out the snow emergency routes here, about what streets and sides of the street you can park on to avoid getting ticketed and towed. It just meant looking for the signs, easier to do on foot of course. So I parked my car in a nearby lot and walked around to get a good look at the signs. And yes, I did make seeing the movie a status update on my Facebook page, seemed appropriate on many levels.

Taco Bell Coupons

This summer I won some Taco Bell coupons through a contest on TV, the 'word of the day' on syndicated reruns of 'The Office'. There are 20, at first I was going to turn them over to my boss and let her decide who gets them, since it said 'lunch for 20 people in your office'. But I got no response, so I figured I was on my own with it. Tonight was the first time I had used them, may want to use some more this weekend since I only have until the end of June to use them. I know why they weren't used for a while, they were in my desk drawer at the office. No locations close to work. This is one of many times where I switch having things between the office and home.
   I thought about going to see the Facebook movie tonight but didn't get around early enough, since it's Friday I decided to read the paper. I get it once a week for the sports standings and the movie times. Also got caught up on record-keeping and paper-shredding. It also included writing out a check for the utility bill. Guess the movie will have to wait another day.
   It was a fairly ho-hum day at work, at the end of the day it meant getting caught up on some paperwork- like insurance benefit elections-  since I would have more free time this week than the next.