From the Desk 6/26/2008

This morning I woke up feeling very rested and ready to work on the video before work. I was able to get a little bit accomplished, but I didn't have high hopes since it takes several minutes to just get the file open and ready to edit. I left for work and noticed that the Exxon station I passed along the way had actually had a price drop in gas. (That's right....the price of gas went down!) I made a mental note to go buy gas on my lunch break before they either raised the price or ran out of gas. I got to work and was doing some various status updates with mailings, cover art work, etc. when Chris called me. She had gotten back in town and we set a meeting for after lunch to create a checklist for sending supplies to the stores for the BTS sale (July 14 - August 31).

I decided to go home on my lunch break and get just a bit more work done on the video if I could. I was able to make it through the wedding party entrance, the first dance, and the blessing before I had to return to work. I remembered to stop off and buy gas (for $3.92 per gallon...things are definitely wrong if I'm excited about this price) on my way back to the Box. Chris arrived shortly after and we made our plan. We also went to the marketing corner of the warehouse to see if any of the new things we ordered had come in yet. We found the new lanyard, which turned out great, the new shelf label holders for the BTS sale signs, and two rugs with The School Box logo on them. We took the clips to the sales floor to make sure they would work, and they are far better than the sticky holders we used to use. We also took the 2 rugs and replaced the old, faded, and very dirty rugs that greeted customers as they entered and exited the store. They looked great and I have a feeling that we will be ordering more for several other stores. The rest of the day was spent trying to expand my horizons by replacing parts/repairing the shrink wrapping machine. It was slow going as the directions were not very thorough, but I made it work.

I left work and went to Super Target to do some grocery shopping (since Christina was coming over after she got off at 7 and I had no food to feed her with). Traffic was kind of crazy getting there, but Target was unusually uncrowded. I bought my groceries and managed to stay under $100.00 this time, but not by much. I returned to the apartment and put everything away. By the time I had gotten that done it was close to 7:00. I decided to sift through some of my old notes from my advertising research class at UT to see if I could uncover an easier way to obtain the information I needed to plot on a map for David to gain insight into our new store locations. I had emailed Dr. Ron Taylor (advertising department head) earlier in the day to ask for guidance and he was most helpful in suggesting the service PRIZM. I spent some time making notes and searching for answers until Christina arrived. I realized that I hadn't eaten and that she most likely hungry by then so I cooked some 4 cheese tortellini shells with Bertolli's pasta sauce and some garlic bread. It was delicious, especially since I hadn't planned on cooking, but it was nice to cook for someone again. After we ate we played Wii Sports for a while until we determined that I was good at baseball and ok at tennis, and Christina was magnificent at bowling (while I continue to struggle in that area). I walked Christina to her car and then went back inside to try and work for a little bit on the video. I managed to squeeze about 45 minutes f work out before I lost focus and becam extremely tired. I went to bed with the lyrics of a Coldplay song in my head: "God Put a Smile On Your Face" (its a really good song).

Meditation for the day: Matthew 16:25 “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it.”