Kenny Pawski Revisited

A year after Jason's death, Kenny Pawski was found guilty of vehicular manslaughter. And while I thought it was a terrible accident, the conviction seemed right with the letter of the law. That does not mean that I liked the sentence, but know that life is not fair and it is what it is. Well Kenny appealed the conviction. And the courts move slow and the attorneys move slow and life moves fast. So fast forward to this month when the appeal only affirmed the conviction. Kenny Pawski is now serving his time. My very first thought was if he had not appealed he would be almost done now. My perspective has changed after my child spent his time in prison. Washington isn't a bad place to be if you have to go. So hopefully Kenny will find his time uneventful and he will get through it without hardening. I hope that when this is all done he will be able to move forward with his life and do something good.

Rplc Please

We get lots of books at work. Afterall we are a bookstore. Every book has to be checked to make sure it is in new condition and not damaged. When we find a damaged book we set it aside and the buyer checks it. She then decides whether it is fine, needs to be replaced or ask for credit. Most of the time we ask for replacements. She puts a sticky note on the ones she wants replaced and we give it to the bossman to do his thing. Then most of the time we ship the damaged books back to the vendor. So I am unpacking a box and I take a book out of the middle. When I flip it over there is one of Liz's sticky notes asking for replacement. I take the book to her and ask if she would like it replaced again. She said yes and then cracked up about it. Too funny.

Some Lessons Learned

Tanya has decided to close her store. The wind went completely out of her sails after the Misty fiasco. Once Misty couldn't use Tanya anymore she disappeared, leaving Tanya holding the bag. Now my point of view was that Tanya always had the bag since it was her money, effort and time put into the business. Anyway.....Tanya realizes that it would take more money now to keep not making money and has decided to end the experiment. She will run through the end of April and try to recoup some of her money. Everything will be for sale, from merchandise to the fixtures. I know that Tanya learned the lessons about friendship and money. Although she still has a generous heart and wants to fix things for people. This was kind of an ironic lesson as I don't believe Misty was ever her friend. Anyway money and friendship almost never ever mixes well. I think Tanya may have learned that she does not know enough about business and should have done more homework before she ever jumped both feet into the fire. So once this one is put to bed she will have to get figuring out what it is that she wants to do. And maybe she will heed small bits of advice next time.

"Go Dog. Go!"

Adrianna and I went to see our play today. The Northwest Children's Theatre put on "Go Dog. Go!" for the younger set. We arrived early and tried to go to Powell's bookstore. We could not find a parking spot. So after circling quite a bit we ended up at the cultural center and walked to McDonald's.

The play was wonderful. Adrianna laughed and I laughed. It kept her entertained the entire hour and a half that it lasted. Afterwards we bought a poster and had most of the actors sign it. She said the red dog was her favorite, but she liked them all.

She talked about it all the way until she fell asleep. Course that was just until we crossed the Fremont Bridge. She had a nice nap all the rest of the way home. It was a very enjoyable afternoon and she loved it also.

Work

So work has slowed down briefly. New orders went in so we expect some more pallets next week. I got to go home early today. I always like it when I get to do that. Kind of breaks up the routine. Today I was completely caught up again by the time I left. Fedex hadn't came yet so Brenda would still have something to do today. She let me do all of UPS while she worked on her one amazon book. I don't mind working hard. And I'm always happy to have work to do when I am there. So I am trying to keep that as my new attitude, but sometimes it is hard to work hard and cheerfully while it appears others aren't. And I hate complaining so much. It doesn't do any good and just puts me in a worse mood. So tomorrow is a day of no complaining and working hard no matter what anyone else is doing.

Game Night

Elizabeth and Adrianna spent the night last night. We had game night after eating our bbq-ed hot dogs. We decided that we would play Yahtzee this time. Elizabeth said we would have to teach her, but she got it pretty quick. She was so quick that she whipped our butts both games. Mom came over and joined us. Adrianna played also by rolling the dice every turn around the table. :p She actually rolls pretty good numbers. We had a good time.

Grocery Shopping

I finally made it to the grocery store today. It hasn't been critical so I have procrastinated it. Anyway....I picked up everything I wanted and when it was rang up, it was only $118. Yea! Got to like that. First I bought no snacks for the grown-up children in our house. They have food stamps and can get their own snacks. I also bought very little junk. Maybe that is the way to beat the rise in prices at the supermarket. :P

Psychic Shopping Works Again

Way back when I used to belong to a frugal newsgroup we talked about garage sale-ing and when we would find just what we were looking for right away as psychic shopping. And it worked.
Skip ahead. So I am reading this book by Margaret Atwood. It mentioned that a couple of the characters were introduced in a previous book of hers. So I put it in my head to look for that book sometime. So today I had a little time to kill and went to Goodwill. I was thinking that it would be awesome if I found that Atwood book there, but totally did not expect to. After all they have a small book section and this book was wrote almost a decade ago. Imagine my surprise when I found that book on the shelf. Psychic shopping still works.

And My Weekend Begins

All done with work for the week. I have a nice three day weekend that isn't totally booked up. The girls are spending the night Saturday so we may have game night again. That was pretty fun on New Year's Eve. We'll invite my mom over and that should make her happy.
I've picked up Adrianna a couple days this week to come home and take a nap with us. Figure the nap is better than her hanging out at the store with Tanya. Tanya seems to like it when I pick her up also. :P

One Day at a Time

We are just taking it a day at a time. Myk and Cassie have both been job hunting. Cassie seems a little more enthused about it. They both have prospects that they need to tend to tomorrow.
Audrie loves having her parents around. And as long as they want to be there for her and are clean we have to let them. It is all supervised and going well. It is nice not having diaper duty all the time. :P
Dave is busy with Adrianna's dresser. The drawers are now made and it is looking like a dresser. He has an interview with the park next week for a seasonal job up there. That would be convenient for him.
Mom, Audrie and I are looking at a trip to MN late in August. Mom has her high school 50th reunion. Looking forward to seeing the family back there.
Ashlie has now moved on from Tanya's house. It was a necessary thing that was a bit stressful for all of us, but now it is done. So her house is getting back to normal. Sad that it had to end that way.

Making Progress

Marti, from work, and I were talking about clothes and how she got rid of all her old clothes that she never wears. It inspired me to think about it. And think about it I did. I decided to do it myself and set my goal for the end of January. Frankly I was tired of all the clothes that I wear living on top of my dresser. So the end of Jan. came and I was not done. Since I live in increments of Audrie time that is not surprising.

This last week having Myk and Cassie here has given me a bit more space to do some things. So I finished my dresser and it looks so much better. All the clothes out of the dresser have already made their way to Goodwill. :)

Making Progress

It's all Up in the Air

So Myk and Cassie are back. So much for our no non-family living here. Although you could say Cassie is blood to Audrie. Anyway the PO told Myk that he would live here. He would not be homeless and then he UA's him. Myk passed his UA. Therefore we assume that Cassie is clean also. She looks clean and acts clean. That said......
The house rules are;
1. No drugs or usage here or anywhere. Myk fails a UA and they are gone.
2. This is a sober house so no alcohol here.
3. They both need jobs.
4. This is just a jumping point. They need to be working on getting their own place.
5. They will help with Audrie.
6. They will contribute and not make more work for us.
7. They will provide their own food and not sell their food stamps.

We'll see how it goes. But right now they are paying a lot of attention to Audrie and that is always a good thing. And she is paying a lot of attention to them. The first couple of days she almost ignored Nana and Papa and that kind of hurt our feelings. But then the newness wore off and now she is everyones' girl.

Non-Family Dinner

Tanya and the girls came over for dinner tonight. I don't know if that was their plan, but I knew I was feeding them since the middle of last week. We just had cheesy hamburger hot dish and good visiting. Adrianna and Audrie played and struggled with each other. Audrie no longer just lets Adrianna take things away from her. They are funny. Decided we would do it again next week.

Quiet

Audrie and I went to lunch with Mona, Barb and Fred yesterday. Took a few pictures. Mostly she covered her face. Said the flash was too bright. She sure likes dining with my friends though. She amuses them greatly. Fred said he was going to bring her some hand-me-down clothing from his granddaughter. Made my day. I know that Savannah has a lot of really nice clothes. And I love hand-me-downs.

Myk and Cassie made it over to see her. Myk has decided that he wishes to rekindle his relationship with Cassie so therefore he doesn't live here. Makes him homeless with her. And that is his choice. On a positive note neither one was high when they came over.

Dave has a first look appt for a job. Has some aptitude tests to take. He also has a possible line on working seasonal at the lake. And in the meantime we are doing all right.

Quiet; The Calm Before the Storm?

Myk came home on Monday. I dropped him off at DOC on Tuesday morning before work. He hasn't been home since then. I saw him briefly yesterday and talked to him on the phone. No news today. I am hoping that thisis not the ca,2

Recent Pictures

Audrie is growing, exploring and learning about her world. Now that she is up walking and climbing she is getting many more boo-boos. She also will not leave the cats alone so she almost always has a scratch on her.

Pallet Count

Brenda and I counted up the pallets from February. We unloaded 27 of them. Yeehaw. With most of them being in the last two weeks. No wonder I'm tired.

Myk is home. And the drama begins. He went to DOC today. He was also going to DSHS, but I have no clue if he made it there. I dropped him at DOC this morning so I know he made it there. I also know he talked someone into taking him to Cassie's to pick her up to come see Audrie. That was about four hours ago and they haven't made it here so.......