CoCo's Corner

About two weeks ago, maybe a bit longer, I got an email that I had been "selected to attend" this event that Delta does a few times a year.  I was very excited.  I have an idea as to why I was selected, but I am not sure.  As far as my station goes, I was the lowest in seniority to be there.  This entailed flying to Seattle on Tuesday morning and flying home on Wednesday night.  Delta paid for everything, my hotel, my food, a gala event on Tuesday night.  It was a BUSY two days.  I am still trying to get my feet back under me from the whirlwind.  I spent most of my two days just exhausted. However, that is not what I want to gab about. I spent 32 years in a job.  It was a local government job.  I have been through my fair share of "leaders" in my 32 years there.  This would include mayors, police chiefs, deputy chiefs, captains, directors and such.  Some of those leaders were good; i.e. the chief from 2000 to 2006 was an am...

Chaos:  noun - a situation where everything is confused and in a mess I am living in chaos right now. We are in the process of completely remodeling my living room.  I mean completely.  We have torn the fireplace out from the middle of one wall and are moving it to a corner.  That meant tearing walls out and then having to mud and patch where the holes and such were.  The tile that was in front of the old fireplace spot has been torn out.  The carpet in the one corner has been cut away.  There is a hole in my wall where the fireplace will vent to the outside.  There is dirt, dust, sheetrock gunk and general ick around everywhere.  Once the fireplace is done, painting will need to be done and the new flooring laid down.  Once that is done, then we can put in new furniture and decorate.  But, in the meantime, my living room looks like a hoarder's dream, little pathways between boxes and furniture.  Boxes of DVDs, knickknac...

I have been sick all day.  It started last night.  Just a bug or something.  Mostly sitting on the couch or laying in my bed to this point.  But, that isn't why I'm writing this post. I usually don't answer my home phone to toll free numbers and such.  There is really only one person who calls my home phone number and that is my mother.  I've thought about getting rid of my home phone, but while she is still around, I don't know that I can.  She used to know my cell phone number, but with her memory problems, she doesn't really remember it.  She did call it the other day, but she thought she was calling my oldest sister.  I was at work and I answered it, while at the gate, because I was concerned there may be a problem.  Again, not why I'm writing this post. I am writing this post because I DID answer the phone to a toll free number.  When I answered it, this young man with a very thick Pakistan or Indian accent asked for ...

January has always been my least favorite month of the year.  It's cold.  The coldest month of the year as far as I'm concerned.  It's cold on day one, it's cold on day thirty one.  Because it's so cold, whatever snow you have that falls doesn't really melt.   Here in Utah, you have to add one other thing, it's gray.  We live in a valley with beautiful mountains on either side of it.  It's a very beautiful place to live.  But, in January, we get inversions.  It's like putting a lid on top of a bowl of soup and it traps the horrible gunk that is in the air in our little valley.  It's just a nasty, ugly, gray of gray smoky stink.  That snow that doesn't melt, it turns ugly gray.  It's not pretty at all.  The exhaust, the dirt, the smoke all attaches itself to the snow.  It's completely ugly.   I don't care what people say, February is cold - but, by the end of the month, it's so much better. This year has been am...

Ted and I have been planning to go to Honolulu, Hawaii for our tenth anniversary (or annual honeymoon) for the last couple of years.  Before I left my old life and began my new life, we had planned on going in May and spending about a week there.  When my new life started and I happened to work it out that I had ten days off, we decided that a quick trip to Hawaii would be a great way to go.  We had looked at Galveston Island and Orlando to do, but then decided to just throw caution to the wind and head to Hawaii. In order to go, there had to be space on a flight for us to get there.  Now, when I began watching the flights, the flights looked really, really good.  January is supposed to be a good time to go.  Then the last couple of weeks, they started to tighten up.  We started to look at going through Seattle or Los Angeles and finally figured LA was probably going to be the only way to get there. Thursday, the flights through Los Angeles started...

I survived my first "busiest travel season" which in the rest of the world equates to the Christmas and New Years holiday time.  I'm not sure how I did it, because when it all boiled down to it, I ended up pushing myself to the very, very limit.  I worked out some trades and somehow had myself working all but one day since and including Christmas day.  I ended up with some painful ankles and shin splints - the explanation on that to follow.  But, the biggest news is, I survived it.   I agreed to work Christmas day for someone who was offering to work two shifts in exchange for that.  Well, that worked out nicely in my favor, so I jumped on it.  I had intended to find someone I felt deserved it off anyway and cover it for them.  The selfish side in me decided that the two for one offer couldn't be refused.  It worked out for the both of us, she got to be home on Christmas and I now have two days off.  I then worked my four shifts. ...

It's Christmas time.  I haven't been feeling it so much this year.  It's been like that for the last few years.  It's just kind of work.  I think it's more work than I want to put in. Decorating, shopping, buying, wrapping, more decorating, cards, more shopping, mailing, delivering, driving, cooking, more wrapping, baking, more decorating.   Just work.  Once it's all done, especially the decorating, I'm good.  I get up in the morning, I turn on my tree, it's on until I go to bed. Once the presents are bought, it's a good feeling - there is  nothing more I love than giving a gift.  I love giving a gift a Brazilian more times more than I like receiving a gift.   Once the presents are wrapped, I love the sight of them.  Once the stockings are hung, I'm very excited that they are there.  I think it's just the effort it takes to get to that point.  It's almost exhausting.  You throw in there your  normal life and ...