Junie's Online Thoughts
Friday, November 21, 2003
Due to a miscalculation from my car's odometer, the eight miles I thought I ran/walked today turned out to be only 6.2. That's a pity, considering its not even half of what I need to achieve in a week. Argh.
Wednesday, November 19, 2003
Emeril's is highly overrated. I have no idea why theres a wait to get into the place, because our meal at Nava last year kicked Emeril's ass. After paying $2.50 for a glass of diet coke in the lobby bar, I met with Ginny and we joined the group upstairs. THe restaurant itself is quite beautiful...lots of flashy decorating and wine bottles, lots of glass and space, LOTS of servers. (How do they make any money?) Less than fifty of us were gathered at tables for six to listen to a doctor speak about how the brain changes as we age. Due to the clatter of the folks below and his inability to project, we missed half of what he said. So we wrote notes back and forth like schoolchildren, gulped down the free-flowing (FREE) wine and tried to talk to the rich yuppies sitting at our table. There was a point in the evening when I had to laugh...they were all talking about their Audies and Porsches and BMWs and Mercedes and I wanted to blurt out, "Well, I have a 91 Grand Prix, thank you very much!" Its a whole lifestyle I just dont get....and I dont quite understand what happens to your brain when start to earn more than $65,000 a year to make you turn into that sort of person who cares so much about appearances and fancy cars and trips around the world only to brag loudly about these things to strangers like it makes you a better person. After spending so much time in Ghana and being appalled at the wealth and waste here, its hard for me to give a crap about it all. So, I just gazed over the balcony and guzzled more wine until the food came. (Ginny is cool though...she's still my favorite boss because we knew how to work together. She's fun and funny and generous, even if I cant always relate to her lifestyle.)
We had a selection to choose from and I tried to be as veggie as possible. My appetizer, a pastry box filled up with mushrooms, actually had a beefy gravy and twenty-two pounds of diced ham bacon on it not listed in the description. (Blech.) My salad was fine, although covered in sour feta cheese (blech). My main entree was mahi mahi on sweet potatoes with three lonely asparagus sprigs in some buttery sauce. It was okay, but certainly not work the ungodly price Im sure I would have paid if I were sitting downstairs instead of at the free-mooching-the-pharmaceutical-company's-dinner-seminar. (I made an exception last night and ate the fish. Didnt taste like much, which helped me not to be sad and grossed out. Its back on the no-flesh wagon for me from today onward....) Dessert was supposedly his specialty--banana creme pie with caramel sauce, but the pie was sugar gritty and not that good. So I took my 2/3rds of piece home, as well as a piece of red velvet cake (two of the yuppies went home early to tend to their flock of children) to share with Kim tonigh. The wine was nothing stellar, but truly the highlight of my evening. (Emeril's is also known for pairing the "perfect" wine with what you eat, but we just got the same bottle of house red all night long. Oh well.) I drank some coffee, which helped to sober me up enough to drive away from Buckhead safely. It was all so silly. I shouldnt complain since it was free, but really.....its just so wasteful and showy. (Actually, its quite common for doctors. They are lured all over Atlanta to the finest restaurants to hear a speaker funded by the pharmaceutical companies--who make sure they leave lots of their post-its/pens/cards on the tables--and eat for free. This ensures the doctors think of this related drug when writing prescriptions and solidifies a loose sense of loyalty while pandering to the desire to see and be seen at Bones or Chops or Emeril's. Whatever.)
Anyway, that was that. Today is back to real life errands and seeing Lost in Translation with Leah. Turned down a one-day temp job, just so I could have my today. I have a long stretch at the temp agency as well as lots of long shifts at Noodle. I need today to just veg out before the whirlwind.
Have a good day, everyone!!
Tuesday, November 18, 2003
I woke up this morning feeling drugged and touch-hungry. Long distance relationships suck!! So thanks to friend here--Leah, Dave, Kim--for good friend hugs. (Although a Jeremy hug is what I really need.)
Anyway, tried to put my damn rearview mirror back on, but the epoxy sucked. After shopping at the Farmer's Market, I drove to Tires Plus, but learned they dont do glass. He suggested a place in the adjacent strip mall--Auto Glass Plus. Some old guy took my car. As I sat in the waiting room, I wondered how much I would have to pay him. $10? $15? If it was more than $30 I was going to be SO pissed off. But nope, it was FREE!!! Who does that anymore these days??? Then I ran around like a crazy person--seeing Leah at Charis, buying a necklace and some perfume oils at Soul Kiss, on to the temp agency to check in and pick up another job (which truly sounds like a shit-on-a-stick job...sitting at a fifteen line switchboard and transferring calls to one of four different companies for seven days. I have to keep telling myself----work these seven days and our storage space is paid for through August. I can do it!), then to UPS to pick up my shirt from YumPop, to Target to pick up film from my sister's wedding and deoderant (which I forgot to put on this morning), then to Noodle to make sure my shifts didnt conflict with Axiom and to eat a late, late lunch.
Tonight Im going with Ginny to some doctor's seminar at the new Emeril's in Buckhead. I guess there's a month-long waiting list to eat there and if I go with her (posing as someone from the Association) I can eat for free. Free booze too. I doubt there will be anything vegetarian, but Im mostly going for the alcohol and dessert.
Other than that, Im going to be sooooo busy in the next week or so. Im bouncing between Noodle and temping, with half-assed half-marathon training in there somewhere. Yeesh. Where did my calm and aimless days go? (ha ha)
Monday, November 17, 2003
This morning on my rainy drive to work, as I made my turn, my rearview mirror popped off the windshield and fell to the floor. This was not a good sign. Then I spent eight hours at my mind-numbingly boring temp job, watching the printer spit out my sheets of paper and meandered through the office trying to be invisible. My work ethic forbids me to pull out a book and read it, despite my lack of work to do. Thank goodness I only had to do that for two days. I'd rather wait tables.
I didnt sleep well last night, so Im exhausted. After buying epoxy for the mirror (gonna do that tomorrow), I came home to eat and veg out. Whew!!!
Sunday, November 16, 2003
Well, I inadvertantly told both guys today that I would work for them and handled the Sunday shift by myself. Good thing too, as it was soooooooo slow. Alone I could walk away with some money. Spent it on taking Kim and Paul out to dinner to celebrate Paul's bday and general good-eats-ness. Otherwise, Im off to bed.
I worked last night at Noodle. While we werent busy, I still had the flow. I kept track of my tables, I help run other people's food, I pulled it together. I was a good server. Its nice to know that although there are frequent times when I have absolutely no idea what the hell Im doing with myself, I can do something really well and get paid for it. A server certainly isnt glamourous, but everyone's got to eat.
Didnt make that much for a Saturday night and crashed into bed when I got home. Despite the fact that I slept for over nine hours, I still feel tired. It might be because I ran/walked four miles yesterday before my shift and was quite dehydrated, but even when I drank water I didnt feel better. Oh well. Hope it goes away.
I picked up a shift from some guy named Billy, who actually called me twice because he forgot he called me the first time. But on the schedule, he wasnt crossed off....Keith was. So Im praying to the server gods that someone is going to join me today and I wont be forced to work all by myself the whole afternoon. (It wouldnt be back if it was as slow as Saturday morning, which had only about ten tables the whole shift, but knowing how things go, I would be slammed to the gills if alone.) Anyway, I might pick up a shift Monday night too, if they let me work it from 6:30 instead of 4:30. I know it will take me too long to drive all the way from the temp job in order to make the start of the shift. We'll see. I dont mind picking up shifts, as long as I have a few days in between that I dont have to work anywhere. Lili said there would be plenty of days during Thanksgiving week where I could work since a bunch of folks asked off. Nice.
After work this afternoon, Im running errands before going out to eat with Kim and Paul for dinner. Besides Paul's birthday, he's leaving for Wales for a whole month and it would be nice to see him before he leaves tomorrow.
Anyway, blah blah blah. Thats my life. Picking up speed despite me doing nothing to promote it. More later....
