The maiming... I mean, branding

As any of you who read this blog (or are friends with me or any of my family on Facebook) know, I was part of a cattle branding in Colorado on September 11, 2010. Among my many duties that day, amateur photographer ranked right up there. I took advantage of Chuck's incredible camera and ended up taking over 150 photos. Below are the very few that I have decided are the best.

Heading out to round up the cattle

Moving the bucket calf into the small corral before bringing in the rest of the herd

The Windmill Pasture

Getting the branding irons ready

Calf curiosity

Running the herd into the corrals

Where there's smoke... there's also burnt hair and skin

Chuck chatting with Dad after a long day

Number 74, a.k.a. Jersey Boy (if Chuck accepts the name I gave this bull calf... this Longhorn looks more like a very pretty Jersey to me), a.k.a. the calf I branded

Love!

~g

No go

My trip to Colorado is already more than a week past. It's crazy how quickly time passes.

The trip itself went very well. I left straight from work on Wednesday to drive to catch the train in Ottumwa. Had the train been on time, even with leaving work early, I would have barely caught it. Luckily, Amtrak is reliably unreliable.

I was the only person to board the train in Ottumwa. The attendant assigned me my seat, putting me next to a firefighter from Fort Wayne, Indiana. Bryan was a good seat partner. We chatted a bit, watched a movie on my laptop, and when it came time to sleep he didn't mind that one of the more comfortable positions for me was laying my head on his shoulder. Yayy for nice people!

We got into Denver only 45 minutes late (I think that's a new record). Dad and Jody quickly picked me up from the station and took me out first to breakfast and then around the city for which I was interviewing. Jody had to attend some afternoon meetings so Dad and I crashed at the hotel for a bit, where I showered then crawled into bed for a nap. Mid-afternoon we went out for some lunch and met up with Jody.

This is where the trip started to get interesting. Post lunch the original plan was for Dad to head to Chuck's ranch for the night to help with branding prep while Jody and I were going to spend some time on final interview prep before heading to bed early. Only when Dad tried to start Phred he wouldn't start. As 5 pm neared we decided we had to call AAA and get Phred towed to the nearest mechanic. The towing service responded quickly considering the time of day and by quarter to six we were at the shop. Problem was that the shop closed at six, so Phred sat overnight and Dad had to stay with Jody and I.

My interview was bright and early Friday morning. Scheduled for 8:15, we arrived at the city administrative building at 8. By 8:05 I was in the conference room with my interviewers. Sixteen questions and 50 minutes later I walked out knowing I had completely nailed the interview. We went out for a celebratory breakfast before checking out of the hotel. We did a little shopping at the mall before picking up Phred and officially splitting up. Jody headed toward home and Dad and I headed toward the ranch.

Friday evening I got a call telling me that after a day of interviews the field had been narrowed to me and one other candidate. The interviewers could not decide between the two of us so they wanted to meet with each candidate again. I was able to set up a meeting with the city manager for Sunday morning.

Saturday was the longest day that I have had in a long time. We were up at 5:30 and I barely stopped moving until 10 that night. It was an incredibly fun and exhausting day. Pictures to come in another post. I shoved around calves and waived off mamas with giant horns and branded number 74 and vaccinated some of the herd and helped with the horses, among other things.

Sunday morning Dad and I headed to Denver for my meet-and-greet with the city manager. We met for about 45 minutes at a local coffee shop, during which we discussed football and the midwest and, of course, my qualifications and the city. After the meeting Dad and I spent the rest of the day kicking around the Rockies and downtown Denver. That evening I got back on the train to come home.

Once again I was assigned my seat, but unlike the trip out to Colorado, my seat partner was no good. After spending two hours gagging on the combination of stale smoke and unwashed body I asked to be moved. Then I asked again. I finally was allowed to move to another car which afforded me two seats for the rest of the night. The train lost time overnight so I didn't get into Ottumwa until right around noon on Monday morning. From there it was a three hour drive home and just like that my Colorado trip was done.

After hearing nothing from the city all week I called this past Friday to check on their process. When the HR lady called me back later that day it was to inform me that they had elected to go with the other candidate. I am understandably disappointed but not at all sad that I made the effort to travel to Colorado for the interview. The ego boost of making it to the top two (out of 170) alone was worth the trip. Now I just have to try again.

So endeth the long post about my Colorado trip!

Love!

~g

I heard it through the grapevine

Rather, you may have heard it through the grapevine.

In less than two days I will be on my way to Colorado to interview for a position with a local government near Denver. I will leave Wednesday straight from work and catch a train. After sleeping my way through Nebraska (really, is there any better way to travel across Nebraska than at night and unconscious?) I will arrive in Denver sometime Thursday morning. Jody will pick me up and spend Thursday doing interview prep with me when she's not in meetings for her own job. I will stay with her Thursday night and get up for my interview bright and early Friday morning. The interview is scheduled for 8:15 am Mountain Time and will last a little less than an hour. Friday will then be spent in a state of relief and, hopefully, euphoria. Friday evening, Saturday, and Sunday will be spent with Dad at Chuck's ranch. Sunday night I will get back on the train, once again crossing Nebraska at night, and will get back to Iowa Monday morning. Tuesday I head back to work.

It is going to be a very busy week for me. But what a fun week!

I have been fighting off a cold for a few days. My combination of tea and sleep and water and drugs and chocolate seems to be doing the trick. I think the chocolate is the key.

"All my bags are packed (not really), I'm ready to go (so not ready)".....

Love!

~g

Extra hours

Work these last few weeks has been a bit crazy and has resulted in a lot of extra hours for me. Our store manager has been out on emergency medical leave for nearly two weeks and is expected to be gone for another 3 or 4 weeks. In the meantime myself, our other assistant manager, and the assistants from our sister store are covering all of the shifts and getting some extra decent paychecks.

Last week I heard back from two different jobs I had applied to, requesting first-round interviews. Since these were the first jobs I had heard from in months I was pretty excited. I did a phone interview with one of the jobs last Thursday. Unfortunately I was not selected for an on-site interview, but it was good practice. Tomorrow morning I do a first-round with a local government in Colorado. It will by far be the oddest first interview I have ever done. Myself and the rest of the candidates are going to be emailed the same two short-answer essay questions at the same time and we'll have 45 minutes to respond. I understand the concept of testing our knowledge and ability to respond quickly and professionally but it's still the weirdest first round of interviews I've ever been through. :)

In other news, my car, which I have now owned for one year and 5 days, rolled over 100,000 miles today. That was fun for me, but I am a dork.

I have now gone more than 6 months without drinking any soda. I find it is actually harder now to resist than it was when I first gave it up. I am sure I will push through this phase of abstinence but I am also sure I will be drinking a lot of iced tea and water flavored with Crystal Light packages since plain old water just doesn't seem to be cutting it right now.

Today is the first day I have really felt like fall is coming. I love the late-summer days when things cool down and the air gets a bit more crisp. The Honey Crisp apples will be coming into season soon, which are my favorite after Granny Smith. The sweet corn is done, but Grandma Mabon and I froze nearly 60 quarts again this year. Doing so much in one shot makes for a long day, but come January I am always glad we put in the time and effort.

I think this is the end of my brain dump post.

Love!

~g

Creative Baking

For my birthday I received from my Colorado parents a book on how to creatively decorate cupcakes. Along with the book, I also got an entire kit of cupcake decorating paraphernalia (it is really quite impressive). Tonight I decided to make my first batch of cupcakes. They are triple chocolate fudge with cream cheese frosting and decorations made from the various items that came in my kit.

I have a lot to learn yet, but for just messing around and getting a feel for things I think they came out pretty good!

Love!

~g

Post interrupted

I started a post several weeks ago while I was on vacation and I never finished it. I am going to go ahead and finish and post it now....

I am (was) on vacation!!!! In Michigan!!! Thanks to some schedule finagling at work and Mom needing to burn some vacation time so that she can accrue more, I found myself with 5 days off and no plans. Mom looked at what would be in a 12-hour driving radius from us and then narrowed that search down to places we hadn't already been. Our choices came down to Michigan or Arkansas. We chose to go with the cooler, less buggy destination.

We left yesterday morning (Thursday, July 29) and drove to Chicago, where we stopped and had dinner with a good friend of mine. We stayed a bit longer in Chicago than we had planned, which meant getting back on the expressway right around rush hour. We decided to get on the Chicago Skywalk (a toll road) and that ended up being a fantastic decision. We were out of Chicago and into Indiana inside of half an hour. We crossed into Michigan and the Eastern Time Zone an hour and ten minutes after getting in the car in Chicago. We made amazing time!

Last night (again, Thursday, July 29) we stayed at a KOA near Covert, MI. It was a fairly new KOA with very nice amenities, but it did have some pretty glaring issues. One of the most annoying things was the lack of screen door on our kamping kabin. Our cabin was insanely warm when we got there, but with no screen door and lots of bugs we couldn't leave the door open to move out the warm air.

Our solution was to head up to the main lodge and sit out on the deck. We asked that the citronella torches be lit and we had a citronella candle on our table. Both are good preventative measures for mosquitoes but I was not thinking about my feet and the fact that I was wearing flip flops. 14 bites later..... well... that was the not fun part of the trip.

Friday, July 30th found us in the car, working our way up the West coastline of Michigan. Our first stop was in South Haven, where we found a great bakery on main street and both indulged in strawberry cream cheese things for breakfast. I'm not totally sure how to describe it, other than to say it was an almond log or roll or something, except it was filled with a cream cheese mixture. Whatever it was, it was fantastic. We sat at a two-person table in front of the bakery to eat our breakfast and watch the happenings on the street. Both Mom and I got a brownie to go as well. Mine was rocky road. I ate it for breakfast the following morning. :)

A good portion of Friday was spent exploring towns and, if I liked the feel of a place, stopping by city hall to leave a resume with the city manager. Really, I gave the resumes to the city manager's secretaries, but that was expected. While I didn't really expect anything to come of me dropping off a resume with any of the cities I did, it was a way to get my name out there. The longer I am looking for a position the more creative I am getting.

With all of the exploring and all of the stopping and leisurely driving, we did not make it up to the top of Michigan until after 9 pm. We had KOA reservations just over the Mackinac Straits, in the Upper Peninsula. Reaching our KOA meant driving over the Straits on a 4.5 mile long bridge. I love heights. I love water. I most decidedly do not love man-made heights over water. I spent the drive over the bridge breathing slowly and deeply and clenching my hands.

The morning of the 31st we got up a bit later than planned and spent a bit longer than planned getting ready for the day. Both Mom and I have wanted to visit Mackinac Island for years so we spent all day Saturday doing just that. While the island is a bit of a tourist trap it was still a fun experience.

We got back to our KOA in the late afternoon. We spent a few hours resting then Mom went and got us a pastie for dinner. By the time Saturday evening rolled around my feet were full-on itchy and uncomfortable, which made me pretty blah-feeling and not much fun to be around. Mom dealt with it nicely, though. I discovered the wonders of calamine lotion and large doses of Benadryl in relation to dealing with mosquito bites.

Sunday we rose fairly early, getting everything packed up. Starting our drive home was as easy as turning right out of the KOA drive. We following the same two-lane highway all the way across the extreme lower portion of the Upper Peninsula, stopping only once or twice for restrooms and food. We got to central Wisconsin in the middle of the afternoon and had a decision to make. We could have easily continued on and made it all the way home, but it would mean a 12-hour day in the car. Or we could find a place to stop for the day and relax. We chose to stop. We got our first and only hotel room of the trip, had pizza delivered to the room, and spent the evening reading and watching television.

Monday, August 2 was spent sleeping in late, driving the last 6 hours home, and doing laundry and unpacking birthday presents. It was a good, laid-back way to end our trip. One can never argue to coming home to boxes of presents. Heh.

So there you have it. Truly the short version of my mini vacation. And yet somehow this post is still insanely long.

Love!

~g

Pictures!

Norah is visiting again! Below are some pictures from the last few days.

My attempt at using Microsoft Paint to outline just Norah. Not too bad for being free-hand!

Norah likes our whiteboard. I think the draw is not so much the writing on the board as it is erasing things by touching them.

Time to swim! Or look disgruntled.

Love!

~g

What do you do when...

It is raining super hard but you have 10 adults and one baby to feed and your entire menu centers on grilling?

You grill! With modifications, of course.

Love!

~g

Significant Insignificance

I know few people besides me care about this, BUT this past week I swam with my face in the water with only my goggles. I left my nose-plugger-dohicky in my going-to-the-pool bag and swam like a normal person. A lot. 500 yards alone on Friday.

YAYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!

In a little less than 3 weeks I managed to overcome a life-long paranoia. Not bad.

Now that I've taken care of my swimming problem, what should I tackle next? In three weeks can I find a new job? Meet some new people? Find a church and fully accept God the way I feel I want to?

The possibilities are endless!

Love!

~g

Happenings

So, since my last post I have:

• Worked a two-day stint in another Cedar Rapids store
• Met the regional manager who oversees my district manager who oversees my boss who oversees my store and therefore me
  
• Had the belts on my car replaced
• Applied for several more jobs
• Swam with my face fully in the water thanks to goggles and a not-so-attractive-but-quite-ingenious-nose-squeezer-shutter-thingy-mabob
• Had a customer write to corporate about how awesome I am
• Begun following this man's journey (you should, too... it's fantastic)
• Caught up in my daily journal, although I went on such a break from it there are about 4 days that have nothing written because I can't remember what happened on those days
• Pulled together an event for my store that will take place next Tuesday, June 22
• Made an eHarmony profile even though I don't have a full account because a) I'm not sure if I think online dating is worth it and b) because it's freaking expensive
• Passed the 4-month mark of not drinking any pop/cola/soda/whatever

The above list isn't in the slightest comprehensive, nor is it in chronological order (bullet 2 happened just this morning) but I think those are the highlights.

Love!

~g