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In my office, I have a large plastic ladybug that holds my door open.  I have had this bug for a long time and it has followed me and held open many a door at several different jobs.  I keep it, because it has a funny memory behind it and some sentimental value.  So when I go to a new job, the bug comes with me.  A long time ago, when I was going to school at Old Dominion University, I lived in an apartment by myself - an expensive apartment, so I bartended at night at the local Bennigans restaurant.  When I was done with school and my days were free, my mom’s best friend called me one day and asked if I could do her a favor and come work part time at the construction company she worked for.  They had just had two people quit and were in need of immediate help until they could hire some people permanently, so I said yes.

Temporary became not so temporary after a while and I basically was working two jobs.  At the construction company, I was working in the service department.  This particular company built gas stations and had a department that serviced pumps when they were down.  During my time there, I became pretty good friends with one of the technicians - the one that always thought he was a funny guy (probably why we got along so well).  One of my tasks at this job was to go through all the parts that the technicians brought in from the previous days repairs and check them to see if they were still under warranty, so I had a table set up next to my desk for the guys to put all the boxes of parts - these were usually all computer parts, as gas pumps are computerized, so it was stacks of fried motherboards, etc. 

One morning I came in and there was a box on my desk.  I figured it was a bad part that one of the guys brought in and chucked it to the side until I was ready to deal with it and went and got my coffee.  When I came back and got settled in I could hear this strange noise - a scratching noise.  I looked around and noticed it was coming from the box that had been put on my desk earlier.  The scratching noise got louder and louder.  I grabbed the box and opened it to see what was in it and low and behold it was the biggest, nastiest stag beetle I have ever seen in my life (about the size of my hand) - it looked exactly like this:

I FREAKED OUT and screamed throwing it across the room.  Everyone else in the room then started freaking out and yelling at me asking why the hell I would have thrown it - umm because it could have eaten me alive - that’s why!!!  We had to call into the other building to find a male to come and catch and remove the big beetle.  Apparently, my funny tech buddy found it at a site and thought it would be funny to catch it, put it in a box he knew I would open and leave it for my on my desk - he was an ass like that!

Later, I left that company and went to work for another construction company, one that paid me enough that I could quit the bartending too.  On my first day at the new company, my buddy showed up and dropped off the plastic bug wrapped in a nice box as a job-warming gift and so that I would always remember him.  It was real nice on my first day for the receptionist to buzz into my office and say “Hey Misty, some guy just dropped off a bug in a box for you…” - WHAT???  Needless to say, that bug has been with me for a long time now.

I TOTALLY did not think I would be getting anything for Valentine’s Day - I am SO happy I was wrong!!! Behold my Valentine’s flowers and candy from Todd.

Hope that everyone is having a great Valentine’s Day.  Mine has been okay, although there really is nothing romantic or exciting about sitting at your desk at work compiling 12 months worth of historical weather data from the NOAA website to prove to the Owner/Architect of a new hotel that is being built that a particular General Contractor is justified in asking that 68 additional days be added to his contract because of inclement weather.

Jealous?  Yeah I thought so!

I know a lot of you don’t have small children, but I do, so you’ll have to deal with a toddler post.  Do any of you watch Thomas the Tank Engine?  We are not HUGE fans of it, but it does come on Sprout at night while we are settling in, so Ashton usually watches it.  Every night I say to myself that the narrator’s voice sounds really familiar.  Well I finally paid attention to the credits - it’s George Carlin!!!

Now don’t get me wrong, I love George Carlin, in fact I took Todd to see him live for one of our first real dates and we had a blast - BUT…who thought that he would be a good narrator for Thomas the Tank Engine?  Who was sitting around the table brainstorming this one?  Well, he has to have a unique voice and he has to be able to offend someone at the drop of a hat, oh and drugs, make sure he has used A LOT of drugs in his life.  I think it is hilarious that they picked him for the job.  You know who it was before that?  Ringo Starr - another shining example.

You would think that with all this high dollar talent the show would at least be worth a shit and Thomas would not be such a whiney bitch!!!  No such luck!!!