From the Desk 8/23/2008

This morning I slept in just a little bit until 9:00. I was out driving around enjoying the cool weather when I received a phone call from Christina. When I answered I knew something was wrong as she sounded very upset. She told me that she had a missed call from her mom and when she called her back her mom told her that her grandmother had passed away early that morning. I felt helpless as I know I couldn't do anything to make her feel better, but I offered myself to do anything that her of her family needed. I spent a good portion of the morning praying for comfort for her family. I finally finished the picture disc for Elizabeth's wedding before eating a late lunch. I kind of didn't know what to do with the rest of the day as I was wondering how Christina was and how her family was doing. I managed to update the blog from Friday and then slept a little while watching some of a movie on TV.

I woke up and decided to read some more on the book I had reacquainted myself with earlier in the week. I managed to read a few chapters before my eyelid began twitching and I eventually ceased reading as the twitching made it difficult to concentrate. I ended up eating a light dinner while emailing my schedule for the next few weekends as I will be very busy, but no solely with wedding stuff for a change. I will be helping Leslie/Brian move from various locations to their new home both of the next 2 Saturdays (dragging Hickey in the mix to help me when he visits). I also made an extensive list of albums I would like to eventually download from itunes. (the list is long so I'm pacing myself) I received a call from Christina around 8:00 to let me know that she wanted to come over for a bit and hang out. When she arrived I fixed us some taquitos for dinner (a snack for me) while we watched Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on ABC Family. We watched a couple of episodes of Fresh Prince of Bel Air after that and then I walked Christina to her car and we said goodnight. I ask that all who read this blog please take a moment and pray for Christina and her family to help them through this difficult time. I ask a special prayer for her mom as she is really taking this hard right now.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 119:76 "May your unfailing love be my comfort, according to your promise to your servant."

From the Desk 8/22/2008

This morning looked to be full of last minuted decisions and adjustments as the deadline for an ad submission, a program sponsorship renewal, and a blast email creation had to be done before noon today. Things worked out quite nicely though. I got an answer on the sponsorship level we were committing to and notified my contact of our choice. She faxed me the contract over and I reviewed it, signed it, and faxed it back closing the door on that project. I then worked with Mike to figure out the few details I lacked knowledge on for creating and scheduling a blast email. We are wanting to send out one more big reminder of the last week of the BTS savings that end August 31st. I then worked on resizing the ad for the Atlanta Parent Phone Book and then changing the color settings to a spot color with red and black. It came out looking very nice and I sometimes forget how valuable spot color can be to differentiate yourself from other advertisers that use full color. It was then time for some lunch as the first half of the day had flown by. Stacy and her mom, who was in town visiting from Miami, stopped by to say hello. Mike, Carmen, Tausha, Blair and I ate in the break room and then I returned to my desk.

I went to our online resource and after creating the item in our point of sale system, made a barcode to use on the Breast Cancer donation cards we will have printed and will be sold for a $1 donation. I went out to the floor to make sure my barcode scanned and that the correct information came up in the computer system. I was happy to find Christina at the register to help me test the barcode (also for a chance to say hello and chat for a second). It worked as planned and then I returned to begin re-creating and updating a copy of the testing flyer that we will be using towards the end of the school year. I made the background and product area boxes for both sides, and then began typing in the product details for the items on the front. I made it about half way through before I realized that it was 5:00 and time for the weekend to begin!

I made arrangements with Christina to pick her up at 6:15 to go over to Stacy's for a cookout with her mom, Leslie, Brian, and Ryan. We stopped off at Krogers to pick up some chips and dip and drinks for us. We arrived to find Leslie's son, Ryan, full of energy and watching "Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World's End". We chatted and snacked while Brian cooked the burgers on the grill. We ate when the food was ready and the food was delicious. It was easy to enjoy the food as Ryan provided entertainment to complete the dinner and a show experience. We talked while eating some brownies for dessert, and though they were packed with sugar they were not enough to keep Ryan awake for long after eating. As you can see by the picture here, he was knocked out by 9:00 and we all left shortly after that. Christina and I watched the first part of the new Psych episode on USA before falling asleep as well. We said goodnight and I crashed fast into a deep sleep.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 94:18-19 “When I said, "My foot is slipping," your love, O LORD, supported me. When anxiety was great within me, your consolation brought joy to my soul.”

From the Desk 8/21/2008

This morning I woke up feeling sore from the hike and workout the day before, but overall woke up easily, ready to take on the day. I got to work and began making the last minute adjustments to the cover for the Holiday catalog so we can finally get a complete proof and approve the catalog for press. I also was working on creating the ad that we would place in the Atlanta Parent Phone Book. We normally submit this ad in early July, but somehow we weren't notified of the deadline date so our rep managed to still reserve us a spot if we got the artwork in by 5:00 on Friday. Naturally, I didn't want to wait until the last moment to submit the file as something would go wrong, so I got the ad completed and sent for proofing to Chris, and Stacy. I worked on that until it was close to lunch time. Our lunch destination had been selected at 8:15 this morning when Tausha exclaimed her craving for a Buffalo & Blue Cheese Burger from Taco Mac. It didn't take much persuasion from anyone else to unanimously become to restaurant of the group. I met briefly with Chris about the ad for the Atlanta Parent Phone Book and showed her the changes on the catalog cover. We wrapped up that meeting and then "the family" piled into Blair's car and headed to eat.

We were the only people sitting in the restaurant to eat when we arrived, yet somehow the hostess knew to seat us in the far back corner. (perhaps we are becoming infamous for our lunch gatherings) We all ordered our food and ate while watching replays of several Olympic events on the many TVs hanging near our booth. I received an education and lost respect for the Olympics all in the same sitting. Let me explain. We ended up becoming mesmerized by an even that could only be described as Olympic hula-hooping. This "event" was a dance routine that incorporated the use of a glittery hoop to accentuate the flexible movements of the competitors. The routine was performed to music although the TV's volume was turned down to hear the commentary on the basketball game being shown on the TV next to it. I am thankful for there being no music to accompany the dancing as I am certain there is no song that could convince us to consider this as a real "event". It was followed by Olympic Ribbon Dancing and finally a synchronized team version of ribbon dancing. I know that athletes train for lifetimes to earn the honor of competing in the Olympic games and I have no doubt that these women trained equally as hard, but I'm just not sure that an event that could also be viewed at a elementary school dance recital should be included with the Olympics. But I digress.....

We returned to work and I spent a good majority of the rest of the day filling out a sample of the Marketing Worksheet to demonstrate in the marketing meeting, tweaking the ad for the Phone Book, and sketching out a new design/layout for the Gift Cards page on our website. 5:00 rolled around, after what seemed like an eternity, and I headed home to do my workout for the day. I have modified my routine to run/hike 3 days a week and do my push-ups, sit-ups, stretching routine the other 3 days, leaving Sunday to rest. After completing my workout, and realizing that my abs were more sore than I realized as I was only able to complete half of the routine from Tuesday, I fixed some creamy tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich for dinner. After eating I began reading Jimmy by Robert Whitlow. I had started this book quite a while ago (as evidenced by the coupons used as a bookmark that expired on 4-16-07) but suddenly had the urge to pick it back up. I made it through about 3 chapters before Christina showed up from her class at KSU. We watched "Blue Harvest", a Family Guy spoof of Star Wars, on my computer. I then subjected Christina to viewing the 3 remaining videos I had produced. You may remember them from their huge success in the independent film festivals: "Searching for Lisa Metzer", "Star Wars - A UT Graduate's Tale", and "2005 a Fontana Odyssey". We then ended up watching part of "Dude Where's My Car?" on FX before it got late and Christina had to leave for the night. I walked her to her car and said goodnight, then returned inside to crash on my bed until morning.

Meditation for the day: Romans 8:32 “He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?”

From the Desk 8/20/2008

This morning I woke up, had some hot tea and checked emails and such before going into work. When I got to work I began creating the second version of the graphical boxes at the bottom of our website. I really think I like the design I did first better than anything else I can come up with, but I needed to make a couple of other versions to show for variety. Besides, you never know when creativity might strike unexpectedly and something great would be born. I also began making a list of all the supplies that the stores would need to send back to the warehouse here for storage until next Back-to-School. I'm learning that you have to be incredibly specific in instructions to the store managers as to what you want them to do. You can't simply say: "please send back the supplies you were sent for BTS". If I did that, there's no telling what we would receive. Instead I have to list all the items that we sent them and mark each one for them keeping or sending back to us. I was also looking over the material for mine and Chris's meeting with Becky Morris, our rep for the Atlanta Journal Constitution's AJC in Education program. Our meeting began at 10:30 and was over quite quickly. We covered the various sponsorship levels and what each package included, got shown a demo of how the new website functioned and then talked about what our level of commitment was going to be. After the meeting I gave them a brief tour of the store and then returned to my desk for some lunch.

I ended up eating in the workshop room with Stacy, Tausha and Blair as the break room was still occupied by the executives meeting about the warehouse move coming up in a couple of months. We laughed, but had to be more subdued as people on the sales floor could hear us if we got too loud. After lunch I created a PowerPoint presentation to help quickly demonstrate/explain what MapPoint can do for us. I'm not sure if I will even need to use this, but I'd rather have it ready just in case instead of talking briefly about the program, getting a bunch of blank stares and then having nothing else to go on. I also printed out the information I received from Chattanooga Parent magazine as Chris and I will have to sit down in the next few days to set the schedule and figure out costs for what months we want to/can run in next year. I fiddled around with various looks for the website boxes until it was near time to go home. I went to my car and grabbed by backpack with my hiking clothes in it.

I changed and then at 5:00 met Christina in the parking lot by my car. She got in and we drove to hike the trail at Burnt Hickory Rd. It was not overly hot once we got into the shady part of the trail and the humidity was relatively low. We hiked at a quicker pace than usual since I was using this exercise to replace my running for the day. We stopped near the large creek (which due to lack of rain had shrunk to a small stream) to take a couple of pictures. (One of the beauty of nature and one of natural beauty!) We finished the 3.5 mile trail in about an hour and realized we were very hungry. I followed Christina back to her apartment where we picked up a burger from Hardee's for dinner. (I know what you're thinking...the hike was just wasted, but we only ate 1/3 burgers, no fries and had Gatorade to drink so it was probably fairly healthy) We watched Family Guy while we ate and then, through an elaborate process of elimination since neither of us like to make choices, selected The Princess Bride to watch. After the movie was over it was close to 10:00 and I was feeling the effects of my new workout plan so I decided to go home and get in bed a little early tonight. I said goodnight to Christina and then drove home. I went to bed very shortly after walking in the door and don't even remember what was on TV as I drifted off to sleep.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 42:8 "By day the LORD directs his love, at night his song is with me— a prayer to the God of my life."

From the Desk 8/19/2008

Today I began working on a example version of a completed Marketing Worksheet to demonstrate the level of detail and the value of having the information available to everyone in the office can be. I also got my morning coffee and found that we were out of the french vanilla creamer so I had to try the hazelnut kind today. It wasn't as good, but still tasted better than just coffee by itself. I spent some time compiling groups of images together that I had downloaded from my swarm of emails late yesterday from various vendors. Once I grouped the images into a folder I compressed the folder to a size that I could submit via email to the company that is putting together the toy flyer. Once I sent the almost too large file it was time to eat some lunch.

I had brought some food to eat, though I wasn't sure that it was enough to fill me up until dinner. So...I had Stacy pick me up some food from La Nipalito's when her, Blair and Tausha got some take out. They came back and met Carmen and I in the break room for our Mexican feast. We ate and laughed trying not to focus on the fact that time seemed to be passing too quickly. I glanced at the clock and saw that it was around noon which is when I was supposed to meet with Chris and our rep from Atlanta Parent Magazine. I gathered up my stuff, threw away the trash and headed back to my desk. I sat down for about a minute then Chris came and got me to join the meeting in Vickie's office. I met Julia, who thoroughly outlined what we had done with them last year, the increase in cost for this year (which was minimal) and some new offerings they had to present. We talked about the growth of the publication as they are celebrating their 25th year this October. We talked about my journey to get down here and what I do most days as I am the person Julia will contact in the future to get artwork and communicate changes. The meeting was very informative and lasted right at an hour, which in my mind is a good length to say what needs to be said, have some light-hearted non-work talk and wrap everything up nicely. The rest of the afternoon was spent adjusting and eventually replacing the bow and ribbon the front cover of the toy catalog for a more realistic 3-D looking version. I think we now have finalized all the product to appear on the cover, the layout of the product and the finished design. Now I have to find hi-res images of the products to send to the catalog company so they can send us a finished proof of the entire catalog for approval. I wrapped up work on image searching and headed home around 5:00.

Once home I changed clothes and went to the fitness room to run. I managed to squeak out 25 minutes of light jogging before feeling the effects of my non-hiking inactivity lately. I then returned to the apartment where I continued my workout with incline and decline push-ups, sit-ups and stretches. After feeling accomplished for the day, I ate some Special K fruit and yogurt for dinner. I then tried my hand at Wii Golf and ended up playing pretty well. I made par on a round of 9-holes. I grabbed a quick shower before Christina came over. She told me about her one class that she had today and then we went to Sonic to get a treat. We both had the Fried Ice Cream Cinnamon Blast and it was just as good as it sounds. We sat in the car enjoying our dessert while listening to Mark Lowry's Twenty-Stories Tall comedy skits. Once we finished licking the inside of the cups to get out every last bit of the tasty treat, we drove back to th apartment. We channel surfed briefly before settling on "Jaws". (her pick even though I like the movie myself) We watched until we got too tired to keep watching and then we said goodnight and I went to sleep.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 16:8 “I have set the LORD always before me. Because he is at my right hand, I will not be shaken.”

From the Desk 8/18/2008

This morning I woke up feeling rather tired, considering the amount of sleep I gained over the weekend and turning in early last night. Perhaps my body knew it was Monday morning and decided to inflict the typical mood of Mondays upon my morning. I got to work and was pleasantly surprised to have no voicemails and no new emails. I decided to spend the morning working on refining the donation cards for our Breast Cancer promotion and sending out requests for quotes on printing and trimming the cards down to size. I received a quick reply from Printing Impressions and took the rough version of the card and the estimate into Vickie's office to make some decisions. Once the quote was presented we decided to reduce the card down to a one-sided card to save on printing costs. We also altered the front graphics a bit to allow more room for people to write the names of their loved ones on the card. I sent a re-adjusted request for a quote and hopefully we will see a significant drop in the price. My next project I began was the creation of a "Marketing Worksheet" that we will use in all future marketing projects. From a sales flyer or special catalog to a one sheet bag stuffer, we will use this new form as a way to keep track of who is involved with each project and what the deadline are and the cost of the project. The goal is to use this tool to increase the lead time on projects so that we are planning for something a minimum of 3 months in advance. It took longer than expected to create this sheet as I began working on it around 10:00 and finished around 12:30.

At that point I decided to take my lunch. I would have eaten with the family, but I was driven to get this project finished while it was still on my mind. I tried something new for lunch today: Oscar Meyer's Flat bread Creations - Chicken, Bacon, Ranch. It was a round piece of flat bread with chicken, Swiss cheese and a bacon ranch sauce spread on it. You had to heat it for 50 seconds, fold in half, and enjoy! It was good, but not really enough food to justify its $2.99 price in the store. Luckily I had grapes to accompany the dish and together with that and pretzels it made for a relatively healthy meal. When I returned from lunch, I took some screen shots of MapPoint windows to use a s demos in the marketing meeting to demonstrate how zip code information can help us plan better and market more effectively. I also sat down with Chris and we came up with the basic idea for a Fall mail out piece that promotes only a few products but includes an aggressive coupon offer to entice our customers to continue shopping with us even though the school year has begun. We selected some product to go on the flyer and chose a color scheme that instantly leads people to think about Fall. I took that design and began working up a rough version to edit, revise and finalize. I worked on that for most of the rest of the day. Vickie gave me another document to reproduce as an Excel Spreadsheet to send to our vendors for updated information. I didn't get very far on this as I started it at 4:45, but I wanted to lay down the header information before I left.

5:00 arrived and I went home. I checked Facebook and Myspace and then noticed that I had received 13 emails in the time from when I left work to when I got home. They were all from various vendors who had sent images of their products for use in the Holiday Toy catalog. I decided to mark them as School Box emails and would open them tomorrow morning at work. I dusted the apartment and will vacuum tomorrow when I get home. I stopped cleaning to eat some dinner and then ended up playing Guitar Hero III to pass some time. I also talked to Hickey on the phone for quite a while, planning his trip to visit me next weekend. Christina called when she got out of class around 9:15 and said she would be at my apartment in about 10 minutes. She arrived and I wrapped up my conversation with Hickey after a few more minutes of hilarious conversation. Christina told me all about her day and her classes and I shared my email loaded day with her. We watched (flipping back and forth between commercials) Family Guy and Family Matters. Apparently, we were in a family TV kind of mood. Though, the families in each show were about as opposite as day and night (but both made us laugh). After just hanging out for a while, I walked Christina out to her car and we said goodnight. I went back inside to go to sleep. I am determined to run tomorrow whether it be before or after work and to continue that for the next month (every day) to get myself in excellent shape!

Meditation for the day: 1 John 5:12 “He who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have life.”

From the Desk 8/17/2008

I woke up and didn't feel too tired which surprised me seeing as how I only got 6 hours of sleep. I got ready for His Hands and ate some breakfast. I picked up Christina and we drove to His Hands. When the band took the platform and begin playing the worship songs for us to sing to, I thought I recognized the tune. In fact, I actually recognized almost every song they played today. They played "Everything About You" and "Face of Love" by Sanctus Real as well as one of the songs from "How Great Is Our God". The song that was played during the Lord's Supper was a beautiful version of "When I Survey the Wondrous Cross" to the tune of the verses of "Amazing Grace". The message today focused on worries. The scripture was a long one; Matthew 6:25-34 which told us not to worry about food, clothing, or shelter because God feeds the birds and we are much more important to Him than they are. We also watched another God Moment video. They produce these videos that are basically testimonies from members of the church that cover a wide range of experiences. They have now been made available online at His Hands' website. The song we wrapped up with left me feeling alive and just glad that I don't worry about too much, but I can still worry about less if I put my whole trust in Him.

The service let out a little late so I dropped Christina off at work since she had to be there at noon. I went home to get some things done today (and not nap!) that I needed to do. I did some laundry, washed dishes, and pulled CD's over to my computer that I had received in the mail yesterday. I also updated the blog (didn't want to keep my avid readers waiting too long) and took out the trash, which had started to smell from the salmon skin. At 5:30 I made my way over to the Box to pick up Christina. We then met Leslie, Bill, and one of Christina's roommates, Laura, at Ihop for dinner.

We were seated and immediately creeped out by our overly friendly waiter, Ben. He seemed like the type of guy who plays World of War Craft for hours on end everyday. It took most of us no time at all to decide what we wanted to eat. I had been craving the Stuffed French Toast combo for about 2 days (ever since Christina invited me to go eat with them at Ihop), and Christina and Laura always get Stuffed French Toast. Ben came back to take our order and winced when Laura ordered her meal. They were out of the Stuffed French Toast, thereby altering half the tables choices. We quickly scrambled and made decisions. Laura and I substituted the Vive La French Toast meal, where Christina opted for the Country Fried Steak combo with strawberry pancakes.
We laughed and ate, though once the food arrived it got quiet and the laughin ceased until we were done eating. We parted ways and I took Christina back to my apartment to watch Club Dread, a comedy/horror movie. It always makes me laugh and Christina seemed to enjoy it too. After the movie was over we watched part of an episode of Mythbusters in which they were attempting to tenderize meat with explosives. It looked like fun, even if the science stuff got in the way. I noticed that both of us were yawning with increasing frequency so I decided it would be best for me to drive her home a little earlier than usual so we could both get needed sleep. Afterall, Christina's first day of classes for the Fall semester is tomorrow. So I drove her home and said goodnight then returned to my apartment where I went to sleep much earlier than usual. That's probably a good thing though.

Meditation for the day: Matthew 6:25-34 "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?"

"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own."

From the Desk 8/16/2008

This morning I woke up and laid in bed until 11:45 when I finally forced myself to get up. It was relaxing just laying there watching TV and I didn't want to get up and do anything. I got up and showered, then answered some emails and checked to see if any good concerts were coming to town soon. There were a couple I would like to go see, but due to the cost of the tickets they would have to be missed. I watched some TV while eating a late lunch and then apparently wasn't done sleeping as I dozed off and on for about 2 hours.

I woke up for good around 4:00 and packed up the Wii system, controllers and games to take to Carmen's for the party tonight. I also received a text from Stacy letting me know that she wasn't going to make it tonight, but wishing us fun anyway. I left to head to Carmen's around 6:15 and along my way I saw them working on a new restaurant going up about 300 yards down from my apartments across from shopping center with Taco Mac. It was the new location for Ruth Criss Steakhouse and is supposed to open sometime in the late Fall. I was impressed by the size of the crane they were using and was curious as to how tall this restaurant was going to be. I made it to Carmen's just after 6:30 and I was the first of the group to arrive. I got a brief re-introduction to her husband, Mark, and her two daughters, Sarah and Matti. I was quickly labeled by Matti as, that guy that went to UT (with an accompanying lowering and shaking of the head in sympathy), but we got past that and she still played games with us throughout the night. Little did I know that other than Christina, no one else that was invited and said they were coming showed up. Tausha called and said she couldn't make it, Leslie and Brian called and weren't going to make it and Blair called later with the same news. It was a bit frustrating to plan something then have everyone back out the night of the party. I have decided that perhaps I won't plan anymore parties as when I do only 2-3 people show up. I'll leave the planning to others and hopefully when they plan get-togethers people will show up. It didn't keep us from having a good time though. Carmen had invited a couple from down the street to join us and we played Rock Band from 7:30 1:00am. Christina arrived around 10:00pm and we quickly got her acquainted with the bass guitar and drums on Rock Band. I had already rotated to cover every instrument at some point or another. I was most proficient on vocals and bass, but also scored very high on the drums and lead guitar. We took a short break from playing to watch Michael Phelps and the USA Men's Swim Team capture the gold in the 4 person relay race. It awarded Michael Phelps his 8th Olympic Medal of the games, which is the most by any one person in a single Olympics. He reached 2 milestones in this Olympics as not only did he win more in one Olympics than anyone else, but he also has won more gold medals in his career than any one athlete (14 Gold Medals). It was a moment that made you pause and feel a sense of pride for the country we live in and proud to be an American. After that we played a little more Rock Band until we realized that we were all very tired. We all said goodbye and I headed home after walking Christina to her car. (She didn't have far to drive as Carmen's neighborhood is located across from the entrance to Christina's apartments) I got home and crashed quickly into my bed to catch as much sleep as I could before picking Christina up for His Hands in the morning.

Meditation for the day: Psalm 13:5 " But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation"