slow down. you move to fast.

it has been a minute since i have actually written something about work on here, aside from ya know being the commander in chief and all. now that darwin is back for longer than a 10 minute period, i can finally breathe for a second. i think i forgot to breathe for those two weeks that he was gone. just holding my breath until i was about to explode. i came damn near close to that explosion i will say. i staved it off, but phew, it was a close one.

now that things are relatively back to normal and by that i mean i am leaving next week for vacation, and it cannot come fast enough. atlanta, is silly hot. you begin to think you are melting the moment you step outside. it is absolutely disgusting and not a pretty look at all. AT.ALL.

so now i sit here typing this and multi-tasking like a champ. currently this is what i am doing:

-researching - CNG, california architects, sustainable design/architecture/building

-car shopping - groan.

-phone answering - in the least possible sense

-updating facebook/work blog

-vigilante money obtaining - borders upon stalking....

-perpetual cleaning of the office

-crafting ideas

-realizing that i am starving - that waffle at 745 this morning just ain't cutting it

it's a glamorous life i lead folks. g.l.a.m.o.r.o.u.s.

wouldn't change it for the world. i will say as much as i run the ins and outs of mississippi wood trader, when darwin is around, it seems to flow much smoother. it astounds me sometimes the level of incompetence some people have, right up until darwin calls them. i know i sound like i am 12. i know that. i know i am girl. i am WELL aware of that. but sometimes, really just once, i want someone to listen to what i say and realize that i do in fact know what i am talking about.

i relayed all this information to darwin and he said he was going to coach me in the ways of talking to customers. (let's hope it goes smoother than teaching me to drive a stick shift in the warehouse...). he told me i need to slow down. SLOW DOWN? me, ha. i don't know how to slow down. and he is one to talk i might add. but i am trying to get better about slowing down.

another mantra to add to 2011. slow down. stay calm. breathe. those are things i don't do very well. that and sleep. but that is neither here nor there. why sleep when there are 24 useable hours in a day? ha, i would love to be able to sleep longer that 4-6 hours a day. not a night, a day. who has two thumbs and is a huge fan of naps? this kid.

as the mantras keep stacking up, i am noticing a theme. they all correlate with each other, and i should take note of that. you can't do one without partially using another. but that would require me to slow down...sensing a pattern yet? you can bet the farm on that one.

so all in all i am doing better about not freaking out about the little stuff. it was touch and go there for a hot minute, with the whole car stolen charade. but i've slowly moved back on track and refocused my energy. wish me luck with that one.

oh if you perhaps would want to purchase a caterpillar forklift, i know where you can obtain one....

ciao.

p.s. i don't recommend googling california architects. they make you realize you are missing out living in a landlocked city. missing out hardcore....

back in the saddle again.

"Finish every day and be done with it. You have done what you could; some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense."

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

oh ralph, words have never been more true. now if i could just find a way to actually follow said words....

flustered.

with darwin being gone for a week, i am back in the commander in chief saddle. i feel like i am at a rodeo riding a bull and holding on for dear life. by about 10:15 this morning, i was already flustered with today.

this past week was not my week to say the least:

-almost cried at work - ALMOST

-screwed up an order

-had my car stolen

-had my purse stolen

-had my rock climbing gear stolen

-had my camera stolen

-had my sunglasses stolen

-had my house broken into while i was there

needless to say, things have been rough.

BUT i am okay, and i am work currently playing commander in chief like i mentioned before. so that means that i get to put out all the fires. makes for an exciting monday. i am thinking that maybe i should just rename myself empress and do whatever i feel like doing. anyone in on that plan?

things i would do then:

-put in a zipline at work

-put in some sort of foam pit

-swimming pool

-monster trucks - i feel like it would be entertaining

-no fridays (we've already enacted that)

-no customer whining day. that would be fantastic

-everything would be done via e-mail. - well on our way for that....

-water balloon fight day/with a side of supersoakers...

-no cell phone day (week and or month)

i could get used to being empress...

ciao.

oh if you happen to find any or all these items: car, hobo wallet, rock climbing gear, ray-bans: please return them to me and in return you get to punch the culprit in the face for your awesomeness and the safe return of said items.

big girls don't cry. or do they?

girls aren't allowed to cry at work are they?

yep. didn't think so.

going to make this a long and treacherous day.

big girls don't cry. or do they? this one just might.

yay tuesday.

dancing hippos.

i know i've said this before, BUT i really really think we should abolish mondays. they are the absolute pits. they are always a disaster. never fails. monday comes along and wham, instant day ruiner. i do however have this theory that even if you eliminate monday from existence, some other day becomes monday. i've tested it. whatever day starts your "workweek" is monday, and it will about 76% of the time be terrible. it may not be terrible in the sense that lots of things go wrong (but they probably will), but it's almost a game of constant catch up. people want their stuff delivered early, or they want nothing to do with their order anymore, they needed their stuff the day they ordered it....you get the idea.

i also want to know if customers think we have the ability to just pull things out of thin air, because we most definitely do not. i can't just produce kiln dried, cut to spec, lumber. it's just ain't happening folks. ain't happening. plain and simple....i can barely keep up with what we do have in stock, much less keep up with finished lumber. which is precisely why we don't keep a great amount of finished lumber around. because invariably we will stock 6" material and people will want 5". instead of wasting a bunch of lumber and money, we keep rough cut material in the shop and cut it to order. makes for a much easier day. well, most days at least.

i understand the demand for getting orders done on time. i can promise you i really understand. there is no need to tell me. i get that people drag their feet right up to the last second and then they need faster than humanly possible. so i put a halt to that real quick and tell them the realistic time when something might be ready...MIGHT being the operative term there. a big ole fat might. i cannot make guarantees about scheduling. we've done it before and it always comes back to bite us in the butt. so we give you a ball park and then keep you updated along the way. it's MUUUUCH easier that way...

i also wish my boss would stop just disappearing. like right now for instance. no idea where he is. not even a vague clue. makes for a fun afternoon. we both left at the same time and i thought we were going to be arriving back at the same time...clearly i was mistaken.

oh mondays....

ciao.

p.s. i've decided to give this twitter nonsense a try. verdict is still out. it and facebook updates are beginning to take over some peoples worlds...i don't want to be one of those.

commander in chief.

i realize it has been a hot minute since my last post, but no i did not get taken in the rapture. i am still here, never fear. i will always be here. i currently am playing commander in chief at work. it is becoming pretty routine for me these days. one thing i will say that is beginning to drive me insane is when you ask someone to do something and it gets overlooked for whatever reason.

just to give you a bit of insight into my day: i have to handle most everything technical and darwin does more of the hands on. i as well do the hands on, but i have to make sure and keep the company legal, out of jail, etc. etc. etc. so some days i am on the phone with customer service explaining to them that no i am not the account holder, but they most certainly want to deal with me rather than the account holder...usually i can bully my way, but sometimes...

such as darwin's health insurance. they cancelled it, because they forgot to log a payment. and i was pissed, because there was no warning, just a letter stating it had been cancelled. SPECTACULAR. i call them and explain to the poor operator girl that she better straighten this out. she says and i quote "well, mrs. crawford, since you aren't on the account i cannot do anything further without speaking to mr. crawford..." a. i am not mrs. crawford. b. if i was mrs. crawford and i gave you all the necessary information to prove i was calling on behalf of mr. crawford, what on earth does it matter. c. i can promise you, you do not want me to go get "mr. crawford." she insisted on speaking to mr. crawford....didn't end well for her. led to talking to supervisors and darwin adding me to the account so that i call and "chew out the peons." (his words, not mine). fantastic...i love chewing people out.

another fun one that i have been dealing with is the bank. i can deposit money, write checks (and have darwin sign them), manage our money, pay our taxes, and so on, BUT i cannot do anything that involves taking money or talking to anyone about something that has gone wrong because i am not a signer on the account. totally fine by me, it's darwin's company. except when quickbooks decides to ruin my day. it has a nasty habit of ruining things for me. if it didn't tell me how to pay taxes, we would be a straight cash business with no quickbooks - that's how much i hate it. well it decided to electronically pay our federal taxes after i clicked it not to. apparently that just means it doesn't file the paperwork, but it doesn't inform you of that. i go on my merry way paying taxes and printing all the checks. then wham i get an email from quickbooks 2 days later saying the electronic payment has been processed. SAY WHAT! easiest way to ruin my thursday.

i call quickbooks. that poor man. i yelled at him and almost cried. i am not proud of the things i said, but he sent me over the edge when he said there was nothing quickbooks could do. here was my answer to that - so, you are telling me that you can take money away from me without my knowledge, but you have no way of returning it to me? that makes perfect sense. i really appreciate your absolute lack of help in this situation. it gives me great faith in quickbooks. really really does. - he apologized and this was my consolation prize - well when the check goes through and you've double paid i can help you sort that out when you pay your taxes for the next quarter. - oh gee that's just fanfuckingtastic.

i go to the bank to see how i can possibly repair this so darwin doesn't kill me. he tells me to do whatever i need to do, but he cannot and will not go down to the bank to straighten it out because it will not be a pretty sight...none of my usual bankers are there who know me and could help me out. so this woman tells me that i can't actually do anything because i am not a signer on the account....grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. she gives me a number for darwin to call to get the whole mess straightened out. so he gets it straightened out finally. but the irs was not happy about receiving a check that had a stop payment put on it....ooops.

moral of the story. if you are in charge of running someone's life, make sure you are the signer on all things important...

ciao.

rapture is upon us folks...

whoever said the customer is always right clearly didn't own a small business or work for a small business....darwin has a tendency to push the "fuck it" button (excuse my english) and i have a tendency to root for the customer. then along comes that one customer to prove darwin right. some people should not be allowed to communicate. just straight up no more talking.

ordering something and then complaining about what you ordered is one of my pet peeves. i hate when people get something and then proceed to talk about how much they hate it. WHY DID YOU GET IT THEN??! i understand ordering something and it not being what you thought. BUT picking it out and learning the ins and outs of it and then paying for it...what on earth do you have to complain about? what do you mean it's not what we talked about? IT'S EXACTLY LIKE WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT. it's not what you had in mind? whhhhhy did you pick it then? you could have come to us and said, i want this, and we gladly would have recreated "this" for you. we do it all the time....

silly. absolutely silly.

when these things happen, darwin tends to explode and write a letter that i then have to read and re-write. he lets his anger get the best of him and out pops this letter that is fine to write to get your anger out, but you certainly don't ever, ever, ever, ever send it. that's where i step in and mark out what is inappropriate and edit it towards the diplomatic approach. the kill them with kindness if you will. he never likes my letters, but he does agree that they are much more diplomatic to send out. he would prefer his to go out and i tell him that is adorable and ain't happenin'.

oh on a side note...why does the government send letters that clearly show them in the wrong? i just have to print out a bunch of paperwork to fill out and show them that they clearly are in the wrong. now that is just wasteful AND annoying. i really like the late payment letter. the back of it says when payment is due and then when payment is received...ours is usually a good 5 days before payment is due, and they proceed to tell us it's late...malarkey. based on their own paperwork we aren't late. BUT it does mean that i get to use the word 'ergo' in a sentence, and i really enjoy that word. that and genesis...that one i don't get to use as often.

happy friday and day before the rapture or something...oh and the picture, 2 reasons: bruce willis and armageddon is fantastic (rapture and all...)

ciao.