Living out of a bag

Hello, How are you all doing? I'm doing alright. Starting back on Monday, I've been living up in Shreveport, Louisiana. I'm living at the Clarion Hotel. I'm actually training at one of the Lowe's stores in Shreveport. I'm going through what's called the Administrative Manager Training Program. It's been okay this first week. I'm looking more forward to the coming weeks as we really start to get into the whole administrative role. But I have been living out of two bags in my fancy hotel room. It's got a flat 32 inch plasma screen TV, with a fluffy king sized bed. Every day when I get home from the store, there are two mints placed on my pillow. I do know that I want to get one of those curved shower curtain rods. They use it on a standard sized tub in the room and it gives you so much more space! It's been kind of boring up there. I've been pretty much living in the room and going to eat within a mile radius. But there are a ton of places there. I've been to Olive Garden, Ruby Tuesdays, Longhorn, Monjuni's, TGI Friday's, Pasada's, Buffalo Wild Wings, Joe's Southwest Grill, Chick-Fil-A, and IHOP. And there's even more places all with in this mile radius. I've still got to try a chinese place. I honestly thought I'd be eating more chinese, but with so much to choose from, it's gonna be a little while before I get to that. But I'll go and eat and head back to my room and just chill out. I checked out the best buy and circuit city. But that's as far as I've gone looking around. It's kind of boring with out Dawn here. But I have to go back up on Sunday and be there for the second week. I've got one week down and Five to go. I do enjoy seeing how another store operates and seeing what they do that is effective and what they do that's not. Silent note taking as I watch. I did get to see some of my Leesville guys. They came up for training and weren't told that it was cancelled. WOW! That's a two and a half hour drive. I felt bad for them. We went out for lunch. It was good to see them. I think I even suprised a few people there for them to see me with them and just how close we are as a store and team. I know one person told me that they thought is was cool to see how open and all we were as a team. That was cool. Well, I'll be on my way. I'll try to report again next weekend on all the cool going on's. Later!

ANOTHER EMOTIONAL SONG

I'm just in a mood this week. Here's another that takes me back to the late 80's. The CURE!!! Pictures of You is one of my all time Cure Favorites! It's another "emotional" song that brings back all those feelings. EMO before there was such a thing. But it seemed that more of the Cure's following adpoted the look of Michael Smith. The eyeliner and black clothing and all. I didn't do all that. I just liked the music and the emotion. It's okay to feel emotion... sniff sniff... I'm going to go for a long walk now...

One of my Favorites!!!

This is one of my favorite singers from MY day! MORRISSEY! I love this song. It's one of my favorites! This really takes me back to the late 80's. I really remember how I felt. I love the tribute to James Dean. This one's a more upbeat song. Be sure to check out some of the other songs that pop up afterwards. EVERY DAY IS JUST LIKE SUNDAY is another one of my all time favorites. Morrissey is so way ahead of the curve. This is EMO when it was okay to be all intouch with your feelings. They didn't call it EMO, it was alternative. And even then, that was a broad term for it. Funny note, it used to be said that he would put his hand up infront of his face alot to hide his tears!!! How AWESOME IS THAT!!! Have fun!!!

I'm SICK!!! Pnemonia is awful!!!

I am sick as a dog today. I actually have been sick for a little over a month. But it has culminated into what I now have. I've been working and doing all I can, but it just came to a head today. I went last thursday to the doctor and they gave me some medicine. But it just didn't work. Eight days later and with IKE on our front door, I had to go back to the Doctor. She could tell I was doing awful. Earlier that morning I looked on the net about my sickness. Pnemonia looked like a good guess. And sure enough it was. So now I'm on a nebulizer because my asthma is all out of wack. I can't hold onto any inhaler. It all disapears within a few coughs. They took xrays and even I could see my lungs were full of gunk. So I have all sorts of medicine. They even gave me two shots in my rear! You know that burning one that works miracles. Then on top of all of this, I have to be out of work for three days. I walked in and everyone could see I was all messed up. Randy kept a 10 foot distance from me! I don't blame him. NO ONE WANTS THIS! I gave my doctor's excuse and went home. Problems are all over the place with everyone evacuating the lower parishes of Louisiana. It took a long time to get my meds. Everyone is running all over and lines in stores are crazy.
I knew I was feeling better last week and had really been sick for a long time. I took those meds and I had so much energy! It was amazing to see just how sick I had been. Then it turned into something worse. But now with all of this stuff, I should be able to be better real soon. I hope. I have to. End of next week, I have my administrative management training start. I'll be in Shreveport for 6 weeks. I just got my corporate credit card yesterday! That's crazy! HR gave me my training manual today. I've been waiting a long time to do this. I'm excited.

And with that, I am off to try to eat some dinner. Until next time.

GUSTAV came and went...

And we were shut down...

I don't think you see that too often. This shot above was taken on Monday in the late morning. We had taken most of Sunday and had gotten things ready for the storm. It had been projected to move into our area as a cat 1 or Tropical storm.

Lowes decided to use the lumber and put it up on most of the glass in the front.

And with everyone to the south being evacuated before the storm got here, most of the business were out of gas and out of food. McDonalds and Wendy's were both closed. There was really only one place that didn't shut down and I'm sure they had a HUGE day...

Yummy!
But, the storm ended up coming through and though it was alittle rough, we didn't lose power, we had plenty of food, we even had sandbags just in case the water got too high. But the storm seemed to do more damage to the east of us than here. We were very lucky. But with more storms out there in the water, we still have a long way to go before the Season is over. I'm gonna go get another taco. Bye!!!

(Here's something you don't see everyday)

November 14, 2007

November 14th, 2007. Garth Brooks had announced that he would be coming out of Retirement to do a show for Wal-Mart. It was to celebrate both his new 2 disc best of collection and to thank Wal-Mart for being his biggest distributor of his music. Well, one show sold out in like 15 minutes. So he decided to add another, and another and soon had NINE shows lined up for Kansas City.

They decided to do this in Kansas City, rather than Fayettville, Arkansas (Home of Wal-Mart.)

Kansas City had just built the Brand New SPRINT CENTER! I think they did this because of several comments and complaints from other artists that refused to come to play at the Kemper Arena, which was really the only place they could play for the Kansas City area. U2 had actually stated that they would not be returning to KC if they had to play at Kemper again. So we missed out on their last tour! I have missed seeing them since 93!!! Still to this day I have not seen them!! That's another story.

Anyway, The Sprint Center is AWESOME!!! There are six story escalators that hang in mid air the whole way!!! That was crazy! But it's a huge venue and Garth's people decided to use it. I think it had opened in time just for this concert! I can say, having been to both Kemper and Here, it's a 1000% improvement!

I was able to park in the Kansas City star Newspaper parking lot which was only a block away. So I walked up to the building and they already had all the Garth Swag out and started selling it. So I got Dawn some stuff. Got me a hat and was able to walk back to my car and put it away. I didn't have to carry it with me. I Did think it was funny too that when I purchased my stuff there was hardly anyone infront and I got everything I wanted with no problem. I tried to get something after the show and it was all gone. And when I got back from my car the front was filled with concertgoers!

I was able to get a ticket for the sold out show from someone on the net. It was risky but for $30 more than the actual selling price, I was fortunate. It was going to be in the top but it was close to the stage. Some people were selling a $30 ticket for outrageous prices. But I found a good guy from SMSU trying to sell his ticket. I didn't know anything about this concert until I tried to call my friend Josh to see how he was doing and when he answered his phone, I could only hear people screaming. He was at one of the earlier shows! I then started looking for tickets. And found this one. They also were planning on showing this in theaters Live across the country!

So the show started promptly at 8pm. And it was TRUE GARTH greatness. If you ever get a chance, watch the GAC ONE NIGHT, ONE CITY, ONE MAN concert (or named something like that.) That was the show I was at!!! I wish they would put that out on DVD! I watch it and totally remember all sorts of stuff.

THE SETLIST
The Fever; Two of a Kind (Workin’ On a Full House); Rodeo; Good Ride Cowboy; The Thunder Rolls; Shameless; We Shall Be Free; Unanswered Prayers; The River; Papa Loved Mama; The Beaches of Cheyenne; Callin’ Baton Rouge; More Than A Memory; Friends in Low Places; The Dance. Encore: Ain’t Goin’ Down (Til The Sun Comes Up); That Summer; Much Too Young (To Feel This Damned Old); Two Pina Coladas; medley (“Fire and Rain,” “Turn the Page,” “Unwound,” “The Fireman,” “Amarillo By Morning,” “Piano Man,” “American Pie”).

This last picture is one of my Favorites. It's one of those shots that you do and you don't realize what you have in the picture. I think it sums up the whole experience. A bunch of cowboys and gals having a great old time! And one Lone Indian in the mix! hehe. I really enjoyed the show. Got all sorts of pictures and things from it. I just said to myself, that this was the last concert I would go to by myself. I had fun but it would have been way better had Dawn been with me. And this was a bittersweet time as well. This would be the last visit to Missouri to see my Father alive. He passed away a few months after this last visit. I got to spend some time with him and Mom. They were very excited for me to see this concert.

ALRIGHT!!! 79 Days to go Until COLDPLAY!!!!

Why in the world did they have to go and sell these tickets WAY back in JUNE!? I swear that I'm gonna forget it by the time it gets here. I was scared for a second the other day. I am going to go into another manager training session in September, and it was thought to run for 8 weeks. Which would have run into the date for the Coldplay concert. But then I looked at it again and it's only a six week session. So It'll be over after the first week in November. Whew... That would have been a good lot of money wasted.
Well, 79 days isn't all that too long. But one note, supposedly that is also when the NEW U2 is coming out!!! NOVEMBER 18th!!! That's going to be a fun day!