Inventory is over, and apparently it went well.  That means my manager gets a really nice bonus and I & my fellow workers get absolute shit.  I'm glad it's over, but I'm tired as hell.  I'm about to go to bed because I worked 10 hours yesterday and had to be in at 7 and work until 4 today.  I need some sleep.  Anyway, there's about 70 movies I want to see that are all new.  Let's see, there's: The Bourne Supremecy, Garden State, The Village, and Catwoman.  I'm only kidding about the last one, and that's only 3 movies I want to see, not 70.  The only reason I would watch the last one is because Kim Smith is in the movie, and she's hot(sorry babe!). 

I keep getting these credit card offers in the mail from Fleet and it's getting really annoying.  I don't need any more debt, thanks.  Oh, the Nets traded Kerry Kittles for a big ol' sack of nothing.  That's kind of funny.  So who's their 2-guard?  Rodney Rogers?  Lucious Harris?  I should talk, because the Sixers new point guard is Kevin Ollie.  And they still have Big Dog and DC on the team.  Why?!  I'm obviously crabby.  It's off to bed I go.

In keeping with the annual tradition(?) of summarizing my vacation on the blog, I will soon detail my week off.  It was a good week overall.  I spent the week with Kim, so that was the best part.  We left last Tuesday and came home yesterday[Sunday].
 
07.20 Tue    I arrived at Kim's house at about 9 am.  We headed to Friendly's to catch some breakfast, which was delectable-pancakes with apples on top.  We hit the atm and then the parkway en route to Delicious Orchards, which is in Colts Neck, and relatively close to my bro & sis-in-law's house in Point Pleasant.  The place is basically a farmer's market, but they have the best breads, cookies, and donuts as well.  The donuts are made with apple cider and they don't taste like grease.  So we made a rather quick stop there because I hate grocery stores.  We stocked up on fruits & veggies for the week and continued south on Route 34 to our destination.  We arrived at about 12 and unpacked a bit.  We decided to eat Mexican food, so we ordered some Burro Burrito, which has damn good tacos.  After devouring our lunch and Goya soda, we changed and went into the pool.  The rest of the afternoon consisted of lounging on inflatable rafts in the pool while the sun dashed in and out of the clouds.  For dinner, I tried grilling some burgers on the Fiesta grill, but 2 of the burgers decided to catch fire and the flames kept shooting sky high.  The food turned out ok, but that ended the grilling right then and there for the week.  Afterwards, I think we watched tv before turning in.

07.21 Wed    We woke up without a clue what to do because Kim's friends, Liz and Christine, were supposed to drop in around 3.  I wanted to go to the beach since it was still early, so we went and it was blazing.  I ended up sweating out all of the lotion I applied and we didn't go in the water because the waves were rough.  Some old guy next to us kept saying how cold the water was and everyone was mumbling about jellyfish.  We thought the water was beautiful, but didn't go in because of the high waves.  We went back to the house after about an hour to go in the pool.  Liz & Christine arrived around 3:30 or so and we stayed in the pool for a while.  We went to dinner at Friday's and came home to watch Pirates of the Caribbean on dvd.

07.22 Thu    The four of us went to the beach on a cooler and breezier day.  We ate at the snack bar by the beach and enjoyed getting obliterated by the waves.  We all took turns falling on our asses and getting sucked back into the sea.  All in all, a very fun time.  We were all tired when we got home, however, and Liz & Christine had to drive home, so we all cleaned off and they went on their way.  Kim & I decided to use our year-old gift certificates to the Loews theater  and catch I, Robot.  We both enjoyed it to my brother's recommendation, and brought home a box of KFC chicken fingers and mashed potatoes to eat with our fresh corn on the cob from the orchard.

07.23 Fri    I intended on visiting the Barnegat lighthouse to catch a glimpse of some good scenery and finally take some pictures, but it was rainy and overcast during the day.  I really wanted to go because I have this bad habit of never taking pictures, but so the trend continued.  We went to the boardwalk since we hadn't gone yet and because I had a bag of quarters to burn at the arcades, but it was terribly crowded with trash and thuggery.  We got in a few minutes of the original Simpsons arcade game and some pinball, but otherwise were afraid of contracting an STD from the crowds.  We played some mini golf and got stuck behind Orca's family of 7 children and 11 total members.  They took their sweet-(fat)ass time even though there were two pairs of people behind them who they could have easily let pass.  Anyway, it began raining, so we finished and I wanted to find Manasquan inlet since I heard it was great for surfing, but the directions I remember hearing said go past Jenkinson's aquarium and you'll run into the inlet.  Unfortunately, I didn't, and didn't feel like looking for it as the rain fell harder.  I think we went to go buy chicken for dinner and watched the Usual Suspects dvd.  Kim made an excellent rosemary chicken dish with the rest of the corn on the cob and rice-a-roni!  Yum.  We attempted to watch Meatballs and Kingpin on dvd, but didn't get thru either of them due to our lack of laughter.

07.24 Sat    Today was really our last day because we planned on leaving early Sunday to beat traffic home.  I wanted to jump in the pool one last time, but it was in the upper 60s and cloudy until late afternoon, so that didn't happen.  We ended up doing some laundry and cleaning up.  We got ready for the 311 show at the PNC Arts Center  that nite.  We left around 5:30 or so to get some dinner beforehand, but just weren't hungry, so we decided to get to the place and eat there.  We arrived around 6 and parked light years away and walked to the arts center thru whores, drunks, and guys who thought they looked like Spicoli from Fast Times.  The rain was going to hold off at least, and it wasn't too hot.  The show started at 6:35 with Medeski, Martin, & Wood, who were pretty good I thought, and the limited crowd that was seated and not tailgating thought so too.  The Roots came on next, and more people filtered in to see them.  They were awesome musicians, and played for a good hour.  311 came on about 9:10 and played for 2 hours!  They were as good as the last time we saw them.  They sound good live and are pretty personable with the crowd.  The only negative was the abundance of pot smoke in our faces and the couple seated in front of us who insisted on turning around and staring every minute at us or whoever moved in the row we were in.  There was also a couple behind us who were making out or "fucking snuggling" as Kim put it so amusingly the entire show.  It was pretty sickening.  After the long walk back to the car, we got out relatively smoothly and brought massive headaches home with us. 

07.25 Sun    We finished packing and fed the fish and drove to get gas and breakfast sandwiches at Dunkin Donuts before driving for the parkway north.  We left around 12:15 and got back to the home about an hour later.  Disappointed to be home, but happy we missed traffic that would have built up as the day moved on. 

Today sucks as it's back to work.  Our inventory is this week and I could care less, even though it's supposed to be my responsibility.  I'm looking for a new job, since I realize the teaching thing is just going to kill my slowly.  I need to find myself and figure out what to do.  The only thing I know now is that the current place of employment is not where I want to be at the end of August.  I applied online last nite to a few hotels, which I thought would be more interesting and I might have a chance to work my way up.  In addition, I also investigated the postal service since my grandfather was a postman forever, but they don't have any current openings anywhere near here.  If you have any ideas for me, let me know, please.

If you haven't read my last post, then please read the final paragraph I wrote, and then I'll tell you I called Howell again today.  Let's just leave it at that.  Leave for "vacation" tomorrow, and that's about all I care about right now.  When I get back, I will contemplate leaving this area and finding a new job, because obviously teaching is a big fat joke right now.  I can deal with getting rejected for a job because I've been thru it for 2 years now, but when someone promises a real chance at getting a job, and doesn't have the balls to call you, and you have to find out for yourself that the jobs suddenly aren't available, it's absolute bullshit.

Salutations to you, blog.  It's been a while, and yet I still have nothing to write about.  Well, ok, I do I guess.  It's officially our vacation.  That's right, no work until next Monday.  Going to Point Pleasant from Tuesday thru Sunday.  Should be fun, even though the weather forecast is not so good right now.  There's plenty of stuff to do-beach, pool, boardwalk, movies, arcade, six flags, aquarium, barnegat lighthouse, driving down route 35.  If it rains a lot, then it stinks, but at least there's some stuff to do down there.  Next Saturday is the 311 concert at the arts center, and I'm psyched for that.  I think that might be the first concert I'm seeing there since third eye blind.  Remember that, Kev?  How many drinks did we have before ordering tickets?  Anyway, don't know what to do this weekend, however.  Nice today, but not tomorrow.  Maybe it's a good weekend for a movie, walk in the park, packing I guess would be helpful, too. 
 
Just finished mowing the lawn, and boy, was that a mistake!  The ground was still wet from showers yesterday, and all the grass that was cut ended up sticking to my legs.  I felt like I had the legs of the incredible hulk, except they weren't muscular, and my pants weren't tattered, and I was wearing shoes.  Apparently, my picture can no longer be used over on the right side of the blog for some reason.  I guess freeservers wants me to pay for their website tools just to post my pictures on it.  That's not gonna happen.
 
Still haven't heard from Howell about my second interview, and that isn't cool.  I'm gonna call again on Monday, but I hope they don't pull some crap about there being no jobs suddenly.  Hate retail.  Cannot go on anymore.

Happy July 4th, or Independence Day as it's been formerly known. I'm not one of those history appreciating folks, but it seems every year, the term Independence Day is used less, except when they air the movie of the same name on Fox tonite. But that doesn't count because Bill Pullman makes an awful president anyway. So the day goes, where everyone barbeques and drinks. Nighttime comes and some jackass neighbor insists on shooting fireworks onto your house/car/hair because he's too drunk to properly aim them away. As I was discussing with Kim, there's something that kills me about fireworks. I don't hate them, but I don't love them. I don't enjoy getting bitten by mosquitos while watching probably the worst display in America(Bloomfield), and I can't tolerate watching them on tv[honestly, I'd rather watch reruns of Match Game on the gameshow network]. I guess it would be fascinating if you owned a boat and were on the ocean or the Hudson while they were shooting. Anyway, enjoy your Independence Day for whatever reason. I'm going to enjoy mine since I'm independent from work today.

I have yet to welcome July with a blog, so here's one. Tomorrow's the 4th, and not much planned for the weekend. Tonight I'm actually taking my mom out for her mother's day dinner. What, you ask...Mother's day in July? Well, I had promised her a dinner as her mother's day gift, but we never had a chance to go out until now I guess. I'm currently watching tennis. Maria Sharapova vs. Serena Williams. Sharapova is serving for the set, and I really hope she wins. {Pauses to watch} Wow! She won. I've never seen a 17-year old woman hit a tennis ball so hard. That's cool...Tomorrow's probably a bbq of some sort at my house, but nothing major. Just the small family I believe.