Tickets and Pharmacy Remarks

I'm trying something a little bit different today by bringing you a blog post in high quality video.  I assumed that since everyone was so awestruck by my appearance on News 2 last week, you would enjoy seeing more video footage of your favorite blogger.  Enjoy!

Nothing Too Serious

First of all, I just want to apologize for not blogging in nearly a week. (Don't even try to pretend that my absence has not deeply saddened you). I've had computer problems, was out of town for the weekend, and spent 15 hours at CVS on both Monday and Tuesday. Therefore, my blogging time has been severely limited. I know many of you have been disappointed to not hear what is going on with the Hatchers or to know how I feel about any current events, and for this, I am deeply sorry.

Anyway, Betty Clair and I went to Auburn for the football game this past weekend. Our alma mater was almost able to get away with a surprising win over the top-10 ranked Georgia Bulldogs but came up a little bit short in the end. I wasn't too surprised by the result, but we still had a lot of fun. Nevertheless, the team does finally seem to be showing signs of improvement. Hopefully, they have just been saving their best performance of the season for the final game of the year. I also must use this space to give thanks to John Aldridge, my brother-in-law, for providing us with the tickets for the game. This was very kind of him.

Today was my first day off of three in a row, which will be very relaxing. I almost feel a bit lazy about it, though. I did, however, call our district office and try to see if there were any open shifts I could pick up at other stores. That gave me somewhat of a clear conscience about it. Betty Clair and I also found out earlier that I will be working on Thanksgiving Day and she will be off. We were originally told that we would both be able to work on Thanksgiving (and get holiday pay), but CVS has decided to close more stores than previously planned in an effort to produce better fourth quarter earnings. They have also cut employee hours for all stores, so the next couple of months should be really exciting...but not in a good way.

Taboo Topic

Auburn just lost to another football team with far less talent. This deeply saddens me. Therefore, I will not be posting about football for a while. This topic has just become too painful recently.

On another note, I have had really good days at work the past two days. The number of disgruntled, snotty customers has been drastically low this weekend. Hopefully, they haven't just been saving it all up for Sunday, since I'll be there again for 8 more hours tomorrow. The wife and I both have Monday off, though. That's a good thing because my feet are really starting to hurt. Both of us bought lunch for our technicians today, which seemed to be greatly appreciated. The girls at my store chose Ruby Tuesday. I had to spend a little bit of money, but sometimes it just feels good to do something nice like that for your fellow workers.

We have some fun plans scheduled for Monday. We plan to take the bikes to this park to go for a little ride. If she allows it, I'd really like to spend some time here, too. Another thing we've been planning to do is see this movie. If you've seen it already, let me know what you thought about it. The previews make it out to be really funny. We'll try to squeeze it in on Monday if we can.

Betty Clair also cooked a very nice meal tonight (and this was after working all day). I came home to the refreshing aroma of spaghetti and garlic bread that filled our quaint, little home. I think she's back in the cooking mode again, so I better not mention any more on fears of jinxing it. If any of you talk to her, though, be sure to encourage these habits. Thank you in advance for your help.

Today's Ride

Riding a bike uphill is hard! This is probably an obvious point to everyone reading this. Anyway, I took my new Trek down to Percy Warner Park today and had a pretty hard time getting up the hills. It was a whole lot of fun coming down, though. The trail starts with a pretty steep climb, but the ride down is quite exhilarating. Being able to travel over half of a mile without pedalling once makes for a fun ride. I had to wait until later in the afternoon to take the bike out since the weather here in Nasvhille was a bit dreary for most of the morning. The weather also kept me from being able to work on my golf game earlier today. Even "Joe Scarecrow" had to come inside for the day due to the inclement weather. However, he will be headed back out soon since the rain has ceased.

*Update: the DOW is down over 500 points today. Other numbers: it is down 33.3% from its peak a few months ago. It is below 10,000 points for the first time sine 2004. Man, this bailout sure is working nicely.

The second debate between the presidential candidates is here in Nashville tonight. The town seems to be pretty excited over all this attention. I will actually play a pivotal part of this debate. One of the debate organizers from Belmont University came in my pharmacy yesterday to purchase cough drops for the audience. I made a recommendation to use the CVS brand honey-lemon flavor based on my own personal experience. She followed my advice and purchased two large bags of individually wrapped cough drops with hopes that they will keep members of the audience from creating too much background noise. So, if you tune in to watch tonight and notice no coughing from the audience, you can thank me. In advance, you are welcome.

Well, my natural desire to feed is beginning to kick in, so I need to find some nourishment. Check back soon, my friends.

A Late Night Post

Last Wednesday, Betty Clair and I replaced our HD cable box with a HD/DVR cable box. Now we will be able to record all the good television shows that come on while we are at work. Actually, the primary reason we increased our entertainment capabilities was to record The Office. Since it airs on Thursdays, and we are at work most Thursdays, this was our only option. I've also been able to use it to rewind and review football plays and to record King of the Hill.

This week is our "bad" work week. I work on Monday and Friday, while BC works on Tuesday and Thursday. We both have Wednesday off, but that is our only real time off together the entire week. This happens every third week. Other than that, our schedules are pretty similar. I'm still not sure if that is a blessing or a burden, though. I'll get back to you on that one later.

I'm going to try to make it down to the driving range tomorrow to get some practice in for the Butt-Whipping of Ryan coming later this month. He has no idea what is in store for him. I'll also be holding out hope that BC's bike comes in tomorrow. If so, we'll definitely be headed to a trail somewhere so I can spend the day showing her the cool and stupid things I can do with my bike. If it doesn't come in, it will be almost a whole week before we get another opportunity to ride together.

Well, I'm going to go to sleep now and recover from another 15-hour day. Check back here tomorrow to see what's going on!

The Vote

I am grateful and relieved for the results of the vote in the U.S. House today. Our representatives (at least the majority of them) felt the economic bailout bill was not what our country needed at this time. I heard the news on the radio at work today, and it was quite possibly the highlight of my day. While I do not completely understand all the intricacies of the plan, I can not in any way agree that our government need to be spending $700 billion dollars on correcting the poor financial decisions of other people. Wouldn't that money be better utilized if it was just given back to the taxpayers themselves. If you were an ACTUAL TAXPAYER with a little bit of mortgage trouble, you could use that money to help improve your individual situation. If you're a taxpayer who was smart enough not to buy a house you couldn't afford to begin with, you could simply get the honor of receiving some of the money you worked so hard to earn in the first place.
On another positive note, I also got my XBox back from Micorsoft today via the man in the brown shorts. Well, I actually got a brand new one as they were unable to repair the old one I sent to them that got the "Red Ring of Death." See above picture for my example of the "Red Ring of Death." A new one is fine with me, though. It did, however, act a bit moody when trying to connect to the internet which made me a little perturbed.
Today was also a fairly pleasant day at work since we were almost fully staffed for the entire day. It's amazing how a nearly full staff can make such a huge difference in a pharmacy...simply amazing! Well, I should be off to bed now so I can get up tomorrow and do it all over again.