Vacation to Mississippi draws to a close.  A big shout out and thanks to Fin and Bethany for showing exceedingly wonderful hospitality and generosity for alowing me the privilege of staying in their home wiht my newest beloved dog, Addler. IL acquired Addler froma loving family about 5 to 6 weeks ago, he was an outside only dog.  For having only been with me for the short  time he has, I think he is doing a very good job of adapting and getting used to my ways of doing things.  His behavior on this trip was mostly very well behaved.  He hada  few lapses, but nothing too serious.

Anyway, it was nice, once again, to get away from the entire geographical region that encompasses all the memories of Valerie, her kids and everything else that went on there.  Not that I spend much time dwelling on that anyway, but getting away from there is good for the soul and heart.
I still have no sense of direction as to what to do next, I'm sorta waiting on word from work about pay raise and/or promotion, which would be an automatic pay raise.  I'm not necessariy holding out hopes to high, for it's been quite a while since I made the initial request and the GM had completely forgotten about it.  Which, frankly pissed me off at first.

Make a decision either way and give it to me.  But now, they are hoping to get the fired driver back on the payroll.  If they can do that, they won't care whether I stay or go.  He was the one released when he failed a drug test and came back positive for THC.  That's what's in marijuana that mmakes you high.  Automatic termination in our company, corporate policy.  He showed up last week with some paperwork in hand.  I didn't know our company allowed re=hire after that kind of termination, but apparently he believes so.  I am not interested in things reverting back to the way they were when he was there.  I got along well with the dude, no doubt, but he was doing things that weren't really all that great.  It was clsoing time at 4 to him, sit aorund for an hour until 5 and do nothing.

Anyway, I also got to meet Tammy - a long time internet friend started wayyyy back when when a blogging site called Journalspace existed and a bunch of us got to know each other.  Even after it crashed and went away forever, I was able to keep informed on the thigns she was doing and her kids and everything that was going on in her life.  It was pretty cool, really to finaly get to see her and catch up on old times.  She gave a standing invitation to come down and visit them and go out on their boat on the ocean for some sea fishing.  It just totally escaped me how relatively close Florida is to Mississippi even though I have driven I-10 countless times, but nothing recently.

There is a window of opportunity right now unlike any other anyone has seen in quite a long time to take a road trip for the extremely low price of fuel.  I saw it for $1.54 per gallon heading out of Mississippi today.  That opportunity is just how much longer will gas prices be this low? A month? 3 months? A year? I saw a story saying htat gas prices will likely not go back up significantly for at least 2 years.  But, "they" were completely wrong about forecasts of 5, 6 and even 7 dollar per gallon fuel that we would be experiencing right now if they had been right.  Regardless, even though I'm not the biggest fan of driving anymore, anything under a day's drive is fair game as far as I'm concerned.

Well, another 2 or so more hours and this trip will be done, be at home, Addler get to play with his friends.  I'm pretty glad that I still have 4 more days off after today before going back to work.  As for other things, I have almost convinced myself at this point that giving Nathan that 4 wheeler is not such a great idea.  I can imagine how I will feel giving away a grand worth of machinery to a person I can't even write letters to, much less text or message online.  How many people would give away something like that to someone they know but can't even have a short discussion with?  Probably not many.  Not a single person I have brought this subject up to has stated that it would be a good idea to give him teh thing, either.  So, I am going to write her after I get back and situated and let her know I am going to make plans to come and get it.  I probably won't feel too good about the 'getting it' part, but after I get it home I will be good with it.  I have no place to  use them, actually, but they are worth money and I can sell them either for or near what I paid for them. Speaking of which, the next door neighbor's son got sideswiped by a vehicle last week. No, the kid should not have been driving it on the street, at the same time, hit and run is a pretty serious offense.  I don't know what happened to the kid, his dad is a Sheriff, lol, but the driver of that vehicle frequently comes speeding through there - 45 at least in a 25 zone.  That individual lost their license because of it.

Anyway, my next vehicle is very likely going to be a truck so I may just keep them until I can haul them to the nearest place with riding trails.

Well enough for this entry.

Just a quick entry.
I had opportunity to sit down with my current manager
(versus the new one coming in whenever that is going to officially take place)
and have a "discussion".  I'm not going to sit around work and have all of these
issues unfolding before my eyes and not have anything to say about it.  First off is the
temperament - that's what I called it and though that is normally an adjective to describe
the state of a dog's or other animal's ability to get along with who or whatever - I thought
the word very fitting for the dude coming in.

Because that guy has a short fuse (this was told to me twice in the last few days by a few
people), gets angry easily, has a mouth and will yell at workers.  He AIN'T yelling at me,
not without consequences.  My manager replied saying yes, and we are talking to him about
that.  He used to be a heavy drinker but no more and he has calmed down quite a lot since
the days of his anger fits.

That did very little to reassure me and I brought up the fact that every time I say hi to the man,
he completely and utterly ignores me, and yes, he definitely hears me.  Turns his head, stares
at me and moves on.  My manager to a look on his face.  Well, he's going to HAVE to be good
with EVERYONE, he states and I can only hope that I at least got it in the mix that this guy is
a potential problem so don't be shocked if it comes back to them after these changes are officially
implemented that this kind of behavior has started to occur.

Several people indicated they would not work for him - but usually that is all talk and no action.
Especially a couple of them that would have no other job prospects if they were to try and leave.
I have a MUCH different situation, I could easily find a new job today - that would be just anyhing
I could find type of job of course, if I wanted to.  Finding a better job would take more time as I
would have to search them all out in this area and find the good ones and apply.

The second thing was the money situation.  I brought that up to him again and he said he was going
to lunch today with the general manager and he would talk to him about it.  I want to get this done
and over with - one way or the other - before the "new" manager takes over. He then went into asking
me what my goals are with the company?  Would you like to take the warehouse manager';s position when Tony retires? Of course.

Well time's up. More later when I find out more info.