making marla's mom into soap

there was a fire in my building after work yesterday.
lucky it was on the first floor and no real damage was done.
but i will be getting renter's insurance soon just in case something more sever happens in the future.
the elevator in my building has been broken for about 4 or 5 days now.
it sucks walking up 5 flights of stairs several times a day...
but at least i'm getting more exercise in i guess.
hopefully they are able to get it fixed soon though!

macy's has some strange policies, but on other things they seem to have total lack of concern.
like, in order to get your employee discount, you have to sign-up for a macy's credit card or a pre-paid credit card.
i think that's a really stupid way to give their employees discounts.
but at the same time, they don't drug test.
which i think they should with it being a high-end department store.
but a good things is, i will be eligible to sign-up for health insurance through them after my first 30 days.
yay!

today was my first official day of work and it seemed to go fine.
all of my co-workers on the fifth floor and within my signing crew have been very nice and helpful.
all i did today was go around and switch out old price signs for sale signs.
and if it didn't have a sale sign, i would make one.
pretty easy stuff.
tomorrow hopefully i will do something different though.

what i find to be incredibly amusing is that a customer service manager emailed me from envirosax today about an order i placed (and never received) back in november 2007.
apparently she was unaware that i did finally receive my refund for the sacks (after being called a liar by the "founder" of the company).
this customer service manager requested i give her my credit card number to do a refund.
lol like that was gonna happen.
and she was sorry that my previous experience soured me on the company.
i made sure she knew that it more than sourer me.
and that if i changed my mind, i could contact her directly about ordering.
to me, this sounds like a scam. i would never ever trust or buy from www.envirosax.com ever!
sure, they have some cute bags, but i always place customer service first when i decide to purchase something.

i have to go to the ups branch on broadway to pick up the bicycle basket that i had shipped to me.
apparently the dumbshit that i bought it from failed to put my apartment number on the form. nice.
so i have to waste my time and money to go pick it up sometime soon.
i also had to go to the downtown post office and pick up a package of spices i ordered online because the mail man didn't want to walk up 5 flights of stairs. whaaaaaaa... lazy bastards.

anyways, the spices were bulk spices from the monterey bay spice company.
i've smelled a few of the spices, and they smell great.
my new ground cinnamon actually smells better and bolder than my crappy mccormick brand.
i have used a couple in making my black bean burgers and the spices not only smell good, but taste good.
but they are very well packaged and they even threw in some freebie teas since i also ordered a 1/4 pound of peppermint tea from them.
their prices are SUPER CHEAP.
but the minimum order is $20.00 ... which i spent a little more than.
i couldn't see paying over $6.00 for a small bottle of cumin at my local grocery store when i could get a little more than the same amount for $1.40. seriously.
i plan on getting some of these next to store all of my spices more organized in.

anyways, so yeah.. i finally got around to making black bean burgers.
if i do ever make them again, i will opt to leave out the green bell pepper.
the recipe actually yielded 8 or 9 (i lost count) patties.
so i froze them between pieces of wax paper.
they were actually decent tasting.
i have had mass-produced black bean burgers before, so i knew what to expect.
sure, its not as tasty as beef... but it's cheaper and healthier for you.
if you load your burger up with lettuce, tomato, cheese and all the condiments you normally eat on a burger, you can hardly tell the difference.
i recommend giving it a try.

i wish i could get more done on my list of goals.
http://www.43things.com/person/na0
sometimes just seeing them listed helps me want to get them done so i that i have one less goal to see on my list.

i finished reading fight club.
i've read a few of chuck palahniuk's novels and i have seen fight club the movie countless times.
i think i prefer the movie over the book.
there are maybe a handful of ideas in the book i would have liked to seen played out in the movie, but overall, i preferred the movie.
my favorite parts of the book is when tyler mentions that marla said she wanted to have tyler's abortion.
and when they making marla's mom into soap.
i guess i mostly preferred the way the sequence of events played out in the movie better.

i will start george orwell's animal farm this evening.

i should be getting chuck palahniuk's novel snuff in the mail soon through www.paperbackswap.com
but i've heard that it is not very good.

thanks to steve, i am addicted to that stupid myspace app game mobsters.
and i went ahead and joined vampires as well (just like mobsters).
i hope to not play those games much anymore because they are sucking the life out of me.

so i have found so many cool-looking shops downtown since i've started walking and taking the bus.
when i become rich and famous, i'm going to buy stuff in all of these little shops, i swear!

i dunno if anyone uses hard candy cosmetics, but they are all on sale for 75% off.
i think they are discontinuing a bunch of stuff.
might be worth checking out!
i may buy some eyeliner from them since my "good" eyeliner is almost gone.

i finally found arm & hammer washing soda in a store!
i searched high and low at every store in tulsa to find it, and then just out of curiosity i looked at the grocery store by my apartment, and it was there!
this will help me with the laundry detergent recipe i've been wanting to try for over a year now.
so i bought the washing soda, now all i really need is borax (which was on the shelf right next to it) and a 5 gallon bucket to mix it all in.
i'll save a massive amount of money on laundry soap if i can manage to make this stuff.

stubbly hobo "beard"

yes, it's true... i got the job at macy's that i was hoping for. :)
i will be working on the signing crew for the 5th floor.
i walked home from my interview grinning ear to ear and so a lot of people stopped and talked to me that day. lol
so it's a little less than a mile and a half from my apartment, so i will walk to work in the mornings (because i have to be there before the buses run) and i will take a bus home everyday.
it will save me about $20 a week in gas opposed to the rgis job. :)
the bus picks up practically in front of my building and drops off at the bus plaza which is right around the block from macy's!
so there is no big hurry/worry to get my car fixed. :)
finally everything is coming back together again for the time being.
i start work on tuesday.
it's only 25 hours a week (mon-fri 6am-11am), but the pay is a dollar more an hour than rgis with quarterly evaulations/raises.
so i will be making a lot more money in no time.
the supervisor i interviewed with was very very nice and sweet and i think i will like working there a lot.
plus i don't have to go out and buy a bunch of new fashionable clothes because they don't really have a dress code (within reason).

so with the $20 saved in gas each week,
i am placing in one of my ING bank account to save for a weekend trip to seattle sometime before winter.
hopefully i will have my car fixed by then as well! :P

ming wah chinese restaurant by my neighborhood was the best chinese food i have eaten since i moved here!
i was pleasantly surprised because the place seriously looks like a run-down shack from the outside.
steve ordered us take-out of beef & broccoli and sweet & sour chicken.
we got such large portions, we had enough for two meals.
i think i found my new favorite spokane restaurant! :)

steve drank 1 entire glass of a mixed alcoholic beverage last night and he was annoying as hell.
i should have been the highly annoying one, but nope.
note to self: don't allow steve to drink unless you want to listen to him sing a bunch of random made-up songs to you all night and tickle you with his stubbly hobo "beard".

we went to riverfront park for a couple of hours today and walked around.
mostly just sat around watching the ducks and geese.
but i took some photos of more sculptures and whatnot.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/darksidesunny/

we also went into boo radley's for the first time ever.
i LOVE that place so much.
i would like to buy all of my xmas presents to people from there, seriously.

i am almost pretty sure that i love spokane way more than i did indianapolis now.
if indianapolis had a park like riverfront park downtown and had lots of mountains and trees, it would be a tougher call.
thank you to anyone and everyone that has helped me see some of the nicest things in spokane.
i hope that i continue to find new cool things (to me) frequently.

cooky cookies

i finished "the curious incident of the dog in the night-time" soon after i wrote about it in my last blog.
i had a lot of spare time on a car pool trip for work, so i took advantage of it.
the book was decent.
it was full of useless information and i was not all that impressed with the plot.
it was a quirky book... but i would not say it was worth reading.

i started up reading a new earth by eckhart tolle again and finished it.
i was afraid that it had been so long since i started reading it,
that i would have to go back and start from the beginning again.
but it was fairly easy to pick back up on.
and it's honestly just what i needed right now.
how to stay present in my life and with all of the situations that are thrown my way.
which i think i am starting to do more and more.

i had yet another good interview on tuesday afternoon at the downtown macys.
the manager seemed happy about my job history and skill level and even went out of his way to try to find out if their were any job openings in the departments i would be best suited for.
unfortunately, the managers for those departments were not answering his calls/pages, and he did not want to waste anymore of my time.
so he said he would pass along my resume to the lady in the department i was looking to be placed in.
well, the lady called me back today and requested to interview me tomorrow afternoon.
so here i go for a second interview.
i hope that i can win her over like i did the manager who first interviewed me. :)
the only bad things is... if i get this macys job, i need to buy new work clothes.
macys is kinda higher fashion than what i typically wear.

i only did 1 hour of physical work today for rgis.
my numbskull bosses forgot the printer cable they needed at the office in the valley, so they volunteered me to drive the new company car back to the valley from sprague.
so i got about 2 hours of paid time just driving around.
they didn't even ask me... "hey... you have a license, right?"

i'm sorry to anyone and everyone that i have not spoken to in a long time.
if you are reading this, you know i have been in a terrible funk the last 5 or 6 weeks and it was continually getting worse.
i HOPE that i am coming out of it now and will want to see more people and meet more people.
i'd like to actually take the time to see more people than just the people in my apartment building, at work and steve. :)
if you have some spare time and want to meet up, let me know. :)

i made a shitload of cookies today since i was in such a good mood.
i made oatmeal & raisin, cooky cookies (oatmeal, rice krispies, coconut, raisins, dried cranberries and walnuts), and lemonade cookies.
i liked them all except the oatmeal & raisin.
i must have messed something up on that recipe.
but i have a lot of them, so i'm gonna have to eat them regardless.



also, sims is slowly taking over my life.
thanks to steve and his need to be entertained at all times and wanted to play sims when he is over here,
i am now addicted to it again.
i am seriously considering upgrading my sims soon (income permitting).
i think i have like the first version or something... it's prehistoric.