Sunday, August 19, 2007

Confusion and Cell Phones Can Lead To Love

Ok, Heidi, Laurie, and now Melanie have inspired me (aka ‘I’m totally copying them’) to write about how Craig and I met, so here goes… 
   I had just quit my job at ‘K-Mart’ to go on a two week family vacation to Canada. The store manager had changed and was in the midst of revamping the staff, with a lot of positions being done away with, mine being one of those, so I would have been jobless in a few weeks anyways, not a big loss. When we got back, I immediately went to apply at ‘Convergys’ (a call center handling billing, accounts and activations for a major cell phone company) at the urging of several family members who said it was a great place to work with lots of fun people. During my interview, while doing my typing test, the interviewer left the room as I began to type (the computer I was taking the typing test on monitored my speed). When he came back he saw my words per minute were well within the parameters, and I had no misspellings or giant mistakes. Had he stayed, he would have discovered that in reality, I DO NOT touch type, I’m just very, very fast at hunt and peck. No one ever seemed to have a problem with this though, so I figured it was fate that he left the room at just the right time. Either that or total boredom after interviewing the bazillionth person that day. So after a quick chat about my phone and social skills, I got the job. Two weeks later my training class started. The very first day as we introduced oursleves, I remember Craig stood up, and part of his introduction was talking about his band. He was sitting between two girls and talking with them (I later learned he didn’t know them until that day), and my first impression was that he was a total player, very good looking, and I intended to steer clear of him (although since I pegged him as a lothario, I was sure he would be the one steering clear of me since I was a single mom). There were also two people in the class I became very fast friends with, starting on the first day, and they were Katie and Ryan. Ryan lived only a few blocks from my house, so I often got a ride to and from work with him, and Katie was a very cute and fun girl, and we liked to hang out together quite a bit. Craig later told me he thought I was dating Ryan because he and I had been hanging out a lot.
   A few days into training, when several of us in the class, myself included, told the instructor we were struggling with a particular part of the training, he asked for volunteers that would be willing to help some of us to understand the concept. Craig was one of the volunteers, and the instructor paired us up. It didn’t take him long to help me sort the whole cell phone thing-a-ma-bob out that was confusing me, and we began chatting in the interim. I was still under the impression he was a guitar playing, bad boy, love em’ and leave em’ player, party boy, and that he was probably 21, if that. I was very surprised to learn how nice he really was, and that not only was he not 21, but his birthday was the next day, and he was turing 28 (In fact it was Sept. 28th, his magical birthday!) We ended up talking quite a bit that day, during break and everything. I learned he too had been married before, was currently divorced, and I was impressed with the way he talked about it all. I even went on to tell him that I too was divorced, and I was surprised at the way he took the news that I had two small children as well. You need to understand this….I didn’t normally talk about my children with my co-workers/guys. I had quite a few bad experiences with guys thinking that as a single mom I was an easy target for their “moves”, so I had learned to keep that part of my life quiet unless I felt it was relevant, and it worked out a lot better for me. I had even had several guys seem mildly interested in me, then when they found out I had children, they suddenly got VERY INTERESTED, which immediately sent up a red flag (um, pervert!). Although I took A LOT OF CRAP for it from some people, it had nothing to do with deception on my part, just lots of creepy guys. Seriously, you have no idea!
   That same day Craig gave me and my cousin (she was in my training class too) a ride home in his Jeep and I remember she made some comment about how she thought his Jeep wasn’t as nice inside as she thought it would be, I guess she thought it would have a ton of bells and whistles or something. I just don’t think she realized Craig wasn’t a “pretty boy” and he liked his vehicles more on the rugged side, something he could get out there and have fun 4-wheeling in the mountains with and not worry about it. His Jeep was really nice, just not brand new. I just wanted to kick her since insulting his vehicle seemed like a crummy payback for the ride he was so kindly giving us home. Especially since it was totally out of his way, he lived just across the street from Convergys and we lived quite a bit farther away. But Craig didn’t seem to care what she thought, ignored her comment, and ended up offering to come and pick me up for the dinner party some of us in the class had planned for later that night. Our training class was very friendly with one another, and we ended up very quickly deciding that parties, dinners and outings together would be a lot of fun, and we were quite a tight knit group even after our training ended. For some reason, Craig was usually the one to pick me up and take me home anytime there was a gathering, and we were asked quite a bit for a while if we were dating, which we were not, we really were just friends. I also was under the impression he was seriously dating anthother girl named Alecia, so I figured he was off limits, and anyways, I was having a great time just hanging out with him and everyone else. And as a group we really did a lot togethere after work. It was a really fun time, and I met some very nice and incredibly fun people.

Thursday, August 9, 2007

More Fire Drills Please

My children are currently playing “Fire Drill” where they pretend there is a fire and then they try to warn everyone so they can all get out in time. Sounds noisy right? Wrong. For some crazy reason, unknown to me, they are whispering “fire fire” so quietly, no one would ever hear them, let alone if we were all sleeping. We’re all gonna die.

Wednesday, August 1, 2007

3 months old already?

Finley (also known as- Finn, Finster, Fin-wee, Finney, Finners, and Finnegan), is 3 months old. It has gone by so fast, I am astounded, has that much time really passed? He is such a sweet and good natured baby, I feel absolutely spoiled to know he’s really mine. Finley loves to smile, and has a grin at the ready for any moment he might catch your eye. And he is so alert and aware, he has to know just what is going on, and with so many brothers and sisters, there is always a commotion somwhere for some form of entertainment for him. He is a constant blur of motion and activity with all of the leg kicking and arm flailing, he is very active, and so strong. He loves to wiggle himself into postition so he can slide right off of his bouncy seat and onto the floor, very quietly, and then when I catch him, he gives me a little monkey grin and looks very pleased with himself, and does it all over again as soon as I slide him back on (my bouncy is an older metal frame model, reclined, and low to the ground, so he can’t get hurt….unless I put the bouncy on a countertop and walk away…Ahhhh!!!!). He loves to be in the middle of the mania, so if I’m in the kitchen Finn wants to hang out in there too, he can’t stand to miss out on any fun. And every night, each one of the children insists on kissing him before they go to bed, some more gentle than others. Bedtime just isn’t complete witout this nightly ritual. Finn has seamlessly joined our family, with his happy little smile, bright, inquisitive blue eyes, and adorable red hair, we can’t remember what we did without him, he is the finishing touch, and the perfect ending to the baby-days at our house.