talking and blogging

You Wanna Bet I Don't Have a Gambling Problem?

2005-10-25T10:05:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty sure I have a gambling/betting problem. I can't say no to a bet. I don't frequent casinos, but when someone says the magic words, "You wanna bet!?" I'm taken to another place--a place without rationality, where the prospect of winning something wraps itself around my brain until I can no longer concentrate on other things. Here's a review of my bets in the last couple of months.
1. My co-worker was rehabbing his bathroom in his house. One day I asked him how much longer he had until his bathroom was completely rehabbed. He said one month. I said no way. He said, "you wanna bet?!" A month later he was paying for my lunch at a restaurant in the Soulard neighborhood of St. Louis.
2. While eating my winning lunch, I asked the same co-worker when he thought he'd finish the bathroom. He said a month; I said that's a bet. A month later, he bought my lunch again.
3. One day my some co-workers were discussing how out-of-shape we were and how far we thought we could run without stopping. One co-worker said another co-worker could not run 3 blocks straight. I said he could, and a few days later my co-worker was ran 3 blocks straight in downtown St. Louis. I won $10 and gave half of it to the co-worker who actually did the running.
4. NFL office pool #1 works like this: You pay $20 once. $10 goes to charity and the other $10 goes into the winnings pool. 3730 people entered this pool, resulting in a winning pot of $37,300. To win the money, you must pick one winner each week. It’s harder than it sounds. Last year the Seattle Seahawks were upset by the Arizona Cardinals in the middle of the season, and I was out. This year I put in $40, thus getting 2 picks. In week one, the heavily-favored Carolina Panthers were upset by the recently-made-homeless New Orleans Saints. One pick gone. Luckily, I've picked right so far with my other pick through Week 7. Only ten more weeks left. If I survive the ten weeks, then I split $37,300 with whoever else survived. Last year 10 people made it through 17 weeks.
5. NFL office pool #2 works like this: You pay $5 each week. You a pick a winner for every game and the combined points of the Monday night game (tiebreaker). Whoever picks the most winning teams each week wins a pot around $275 for that week. I've made it to the Monday night game once this year, but lost on points when the Carolina Panthers scored too many points against the Green Bay Packers. I now hate the Carolina Panthers.
6. Powerball. When powerball is at $125 million or higher, I am compelled to play. I buy 5 one-dollar quickpick tickets. As soon as the ticket is in my hand, I know exactly what I'm going to do when I win my $125 million. Over the course of a month, powerball kept growing until it reached $340 million. It was played twice a week and I, of course, bought $5 worth of tickets for each drawing. Some person in Oregon now has my $40.
7. My fiancé and I were talking about directions to some place we had to go in the city. There was a road we had to take, but she thought it was impossible to use, because it was one-way. I argued the road was two-way. She said, "You wanna bet?" I asked, “What are we betting for?” She said if the road is one-way, then I would have to take her to this Mexican restaurant she wanted to go to. I asked her what I would get if the road is two-way. She said that she'd clean my whole kitchen. That's a deal. I had a clean kitchen that night.

Let Me Hold the Scanner

2005-10-11T11:20:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday, my fiancé and I registered for our wedding. We started out at Bed, Bath, and Beyond at 10:00 in the morning. We got to the store and met with a "wedding consultant" who put us into "the system." I love that system. He went over the basics and then he brought out the scanner. The scanner is a little handheld device that scans the barcodes of the products and automatically enters them into our registry. My fiancé and I went around and scanned all the items we wanted. It was like a shopping spree, except you don't get to leave with any merchandise. You don't even get to leave with the scanner. We are thinking of inviting about 100 guests or so to our wedding reception and the wedding consultant suggested that we register for about 2-3 gifts per person. We ended up with 88 items. It seemed like we registered everything we would possibly need after about 70 items, so we just started scanning crazy things like $100 trash cans. The scanner sure was fun, though. I looked over at my fiancé and pleaded, "Can we scan a scanner? I want one for our apartment. I think we NEED one for our apartment." When my fiancé saw that look in my eyes, I think it was time to hand over the scanner. We had other things to worry about, like going to the next store, setting up a wedding registry with their wedding consultant, and how fun their scanner would be to use.

As it turns out, the second store's scanner was not nearly as fun as Bed, Bath, and Beyond's scanner. However, their wedding consultant was hilarious. I don't think she meant to be, but she was--she's a retired school teacher. She just loved to talk, and I loved to listen. She just went on and on. The second store didn't have as many useful items as the first store did, but we did it.

Shopping sprees can be fun, but I don't think they are supposed to last for 6 hours. By the end, I felt tired. I felt out-of-shape. Maybe I just needed to train for this marathon-shopping event. I'm not a distance-shopper. No, in fact, I am a sprinter-type shopper. I'm not made to shop for 6 straight hours. At least I got to hold the scanner.

The Little Engine That Could

2005-10-10T13:00:00.000-07:00

What a crazy week last week. On Tuesday, I got in a car accident. I'm driving in downtown St. Louis and out of no where a car goes through a red light, hits one car and then hits me. $2300 worth of damage, and they (2 teenagers) took off, laughing at me. Thank goodness I had "rental car coverage" on my insurance policy. I'm always tempted to save a few bucks and just cancel that part of the coverage, but I never do. The insurance company got me a rental car while my car is getting fixed.

My insurance paid for a Dodge Magnum, which is a gas-guzzling spaceship--I mean station wagon. It was huge. I could fit 2 of my Honda Civics in it. I drove it for about an hour and took it back. I went 16 miles and used 1/4 of a tank of gas. That must have been about 5 gallons at $3 a gallon. 16 Miles! I took that car back and got myself a Kia Rio. You can fit about 2 Kia Rios in my Honda Civic. It gets about 40 miles per gallon, though. The Rio is purple too. Not Barney purple, but lavender purple. I've never redlined a car before, but I've never taken a Kia Rio out on the highway, either. When I merged onto the highway and accelerated, the Rio revved up so much that I had to pull it over to give the tin can-on-wheels a rest. I swear the rental car company must have bought the car right off the track at Happy Fun-Time Go-Carting. I was wondering what happens to all those soda cans that get recycled. Well, I'm driving it.

You have to pee!

2005-09-29T12:00:00.000-07:00

My dog needs therapy. She's a chow-golden retriever mix and is about 50 years old. She's actually 12 years old, but she must feel older. I got her 4 years ago at the Humane Society and she's been stoic the whole time I've know her. She does not play, and actually hardly ever moves. I thought if a dog has chow and golden retriever in it, then it would be a hyper dog that barks at every leaf blowing in the wind. Not my dog. She's never once barked. She's not deaf, but does have selective hearing. SHE selects. She's not mute, because she can make noises. Her snoring keeps me up at night. She's not a pot smoker, because she doesn't get the munchies. I have to encourage her to eat. Her confidence needs building up just to eat; otherwise, she would forget to eat. There have been times when I've been in a rush to get to work and have forgotten to feed her and she makes NO attempt at reminding me. Doesn't this dog WANT to survive?

When people come over that she hasn't met, she makes no attempt to investigate their presence like other domesticated animals would. If a burglar was to break-in, she'd just sit on the couch look up, then go back to sleep. "Go ahead Mr. Burglar, take whatever you want."

My dog does not move from the couch unless I physically pick her up and place her on the floor. Then she'll just stand there looking at me. "My bad. I'm sorry to disturb YOU so that YOU can go relieve yourself on somebody's unsuspecting grass." Nature does not call to this dog. Unless I physically made the dog go relieve herself, I don't think she ever would speak up. Her poor bladder would burst because she was too lazy to jump off the couch and come over to me. It's MY job to remind her that she needs to pee.

I know she's happy being my dog, though, because I don't think her previous owners bothered to remind her that she does, in fact, pee.

My Neighbor, the Car Thief

2005-09-28T09:54:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I was walking my dog and saw the police gathering evidence from a pickup truck parked in the street. Members of the evidence team were taking pictures of the truck from all angles. I'm sure I had just missed the dusting for fingerprints. I went up to a neighbor standing outside and asked what happened? He said the truck was stolen and the car thief lived at the house that he then pointed to. This was GOOD news. Not because crime was solved. Not because the thief was caught. Definitely not because the owner would get his car back which now had one rather large dent in the front end. No. The good news is that the car thief lives in my neighborhood.

It seems reasonable to think that having a car thief living in your neighborhood is, in itself, a security feature. A car thief is NOT going to steal cars in his own neighborhood. It just doesn't happen that way. Can you imagine? You go out to pick up your paper in the morning and there's your next door neighbor driving YOUR 2002 Toyota Camry with YOUR license plates, a now-shattered driver's-side window, and broken steering column? Would you just stand there holding your coffee, and wave? Where would he park his-new/your-old car? In his garage? And life just goes on. You call the cops who come out with their evidence van and take pictures of your car. Your neighbor, who had the decency of welcoming you to the neighborhood, goes to jail. I hope he's not on the neighborhood watch team.

How many car thieves are there out there? They probably network just like anybody else does in their profession. They know where each other lives. They have to. A car thief is not going to risk accidentally stealing another car thief's car. No way. If I was a car thief and someone stole my car, I think I would network, find out who took the car, find his address and steal my car back. I would then steal his own car, and then steal any cars he steals. If I was a car thief.

I'm sure my neighbor, the car thief, actually has my back. I'm sure if my car was to get stolen-- not by him, but by somebody else-- he would steal my car back and then steal the guy's car, as well. I got his back. When he goes on vacation, I'll get his mail and pick up his newspaper. That's what neighbors do. We have each other's backs. It looks like my neighbor actually will have an extended "vacation", but no worries. I'll have his mail and newspapers for him.

Me Vs. Shoplifters, Part One

2005-09-26T08:16:00.000-07:00

I had to spend this weekend working at my second job. I work for a retail company and my essential job is to catch shoplifters. Also, if a crisis was to occur, I guess I would be involved in controlling/preventing as much damage and injury as possible. I like my job, as I have limited supervision, do not have to say the words, "how many I help you?" all day, and can wear whatever I want, including jeans, t-shirts, and my Nikes. Plus I got stories, lots of stories that make human behavior seem so strange, random, and amusing.

It has been almost 6 weeks or so since I've caught a shoplifter. I'm just not seeing any good signs out there that usually indicate a potential thief. Catching a shoplifter is 80% luck and 20% skill. Locating them is the luck, catching them after you've located them is the skill. You have to be quick. Quick in running around the store and quick in analyzing the body language of customers. I constantly look at and analyze EVERYONE in the whole store, in half-seconds. Most honest customers act completely alike. Maybe 99%. From the 1% that don't act alike, maybe 1 in 500 are shoplifters. Then, I have to be in the right place at the right time. If all goes well, then I can't lose them as they drift through the store, trying NOT to be noticed. If the shoplifter sees me looking at them two times, then they will usually get spooked and dump the merchandise. Back to analyzing customers' body language.

my first blog

2005-09-23T13:56:00.000-07:00

I'm guessing the first blog is important. Do I want this to be like a diary where random strangers can look at it or is it just a new way to communicate to my friends and family? I'm thinking strangers. I'm thinking i should make it kind of annoymous, as well. Saying that, let me talk a little about myself. I have a master's degree in sociology, I work for the government full-time and for a retail store part-time. I am engaged. I consider myself very average. I like sports (mostly football), domestic beer, and working out. I will post more later...