Thursday - 10-29-09, feeling a little rested.

I seemed to get a good night's sleep last night, and am feeling a little rested this morning. Although I am also feeling a little guilty too this morning.
Since we put Daisy back out she's really been hanging around outside, and really kissing up to us. She keeps coming right up to us, and rubbing our legs, and meowing with this sad look. IF we knew she would start using the litter box we would let her back in.
Then you have Rebel. Since we put her out the other night for crying all night we haven't seen her. Someone is eating the food we have out, so we assume that Daisy and Rebel are coming up when we aren't around, but Rebel isn't meeting us at the door in the morning like she usually does.
I got into work, and got the stand set up in no time. I then got a sale before I was officially open. Barb sent one of the security guards down to buy her a large icee. So that could cause me to have to stay open all day, but I would have to wait and see.
I got my second sale, and first real customer, around 11:45. At this point the zoo was kind of busy. Since no one else was coming up to buy though, I decided to take my lunch. While I was eating Sophia came in. She said they were just here to take some pictures, and she thought she would check on me while she was here. It was her Kevin O’Brian, and two other people I didn't' recognize. I'm not sure where they went off too.
I don't know if I put this in yesterday, and I'm too lazy right now to go back and look, but anyway, I got an update on Sally. She is still out of the exhibit, and in the med building recovering from her illness. They aren’t' sure what she has, and did send blood work out to get checked.
I also found out today that they are working on redoing the bear exhibit again. They are repainting some parts of it, and they have an idea to totally redo the pond in it. I'm not sure what it will look like when it’s done.
At about 12:30 Barb called down. She wanted to know how much the pizzas were. So I knew that was a hint that she wanted to buy one for her lunch. She said she would send Pat down to get it. He showed up about 10 minutes later for the two pizzas and fries. So that put me up to three sales, so that meant that I would almost definitely not close early.
I'm half way through the book again studying for my general class amateur radio test. This time through I'm averaging about a 90% over all. I'm hoping I can keep the percentage up around that same area. If I can I'll probably look into scheduling the test for next month. I know there is a location giving it on the third Saturday in November. So maybe I'll shoot for that day.
Around 1:30 I got a family that came up. Their order was the largest order for the day. It also was enough that I knew there would be no way I would close early. That was ok though, the day seemed to be going really quickly.
Since I didn't go up home last Sunday, we decided we would go up tonight to drop off the candy for the kids for trick-or-treating. I didn't know if Cathy intended to stay until the kids got there or not, but she thought that's what I wanted to do, so we did. It was really kind of a nightmare. They were all hyper from the candy, and until we left I had a killer headache. I couldn't wait to just get home, and go to bed...

Wednesday - 10-28-09, I need sleep.

I didn't get hardly any sleep again last night. Rebel was crying again all night. We tried being nice to her to get her to sleep, I tried being mean to her to get her to sleep. Finally around 12:30 we put her back outside. When I got up this morning I saw the food out there was eaten, but there was no sign of her. I don't know if she really wants to be out, or what it is.
I got to work today to see they are having another one of the "Fulltime employee meetings". They have them every few months. They are all the same from what I was told. It’s just Hershey's way to tell everyone how much money they truly lost.
I set up the stand, but didn't really make anything. I don't want to have a ton of food to throw away. I just had this feeling that I'm going to be dead all day since it was raining.
I was shocked to see warehouse show up with my stock by 9:30. They almost never get there that early on the off season. So I had all the stock away before 10:00. Whoever did the ordering on Sunday didn't do a good job at all. I got in tons of things I didn't need, and didn't get half of the stuff I did need. So I had to go around quick and do up a new order for the weekend.
Harry must have read my mind today. I was literally walking to the phone to call him about closing early when it rang. It was Harry. He asked if I had any sales yet today, and I told him no, so he said he was going to call up to admissions to see about closing me early today. He called me back about a minute later and told me to close at 1:30.
Closing at 1:30 got me home by 2:00. I was able to watch the Glenn Beck show I DVRed last night. Then I got some general cleaning done that I knew Cathy would want me to do while she was at her class.
I went over to get our standing order at Fabio & Joes. When I got back Cathy was already home, which was a surprise. Usually I get over there, and back before she gets home. After dinner she left for the last night of her class, and I watched TV while dozing off.
I watched my normal Wednesday shows of NCIS on USA until 7, then Mythbusters from 7-9, and ghost hunters from 9-10, then if we don't head to bed its Destination Truth from 10-11. But tonight we're heading to bed....

Tuesday - 10-27-09, What a wakeup call.

Today started out really bad. First of all I didn't get hardly any sleep last night. It seemed like every few minutes one of the cats was crying. If this keeps up there is no way we will be able to keep them inside. But the worst part was we figured out which one was peeing on the bed. It turns out its Daisy. At about 4:30 this morning we heard her digging on the mattress next to me. I swatted at her, and felt something wet. I smelled my had, and found it smelled like cat pee. So she not only peed on the bed next to me, but on me as well. So I had to get up and get a shower, and I just stayed up then.
We decided to put her back outside. We're going to try the other cats in and see what happens. I hope this works out. If not, then I guess we will just have to put them all back outside.
I got to work to find myself locked out of the foods office. Normally if the lights are on then the doors are unlocked, but not this time. I was just about to knock when Sophia came out of her office and saw me there, and left me in. She wasn't sure why the door was looked either.
I found out when I got to the stand that my cell phone battery must have died over night. I went to put it on silent mode, and found it wouldn't power up. I don't know why I’m losing power so quickly on it. I had three lines of battery yesterday.
Denise just told me that Sally, the one black bear, still isn't feeling good. They are pulling her out of the exhibit, and taking her up to the med building. Once the vet gets here and looks at her they will decide what to do next. I'll have to post an update if I get one.
The zoo is extremely slow today. As of noon I had only seen one person go through, and they were heading up the hill toward the exit. I figured at that point that if I didn't get any sales by about 1:00 or 1:30, I would call up to see about closing. I know that Harry is off today, so I guess I'll just call up to the office and see if they can find someone to make the decision to close early.
I did end up closing around 1:30, and was home by 2:00. When I got home the cats were resting nicely in the apartment. The evening was pretty uneventful, and I'm just hoping for a good night's sleep tonight...

Monday - 10-26-09, what a mess.

I guess I'll start by recapping the weekend a little. On Saturday we got the third cat into the house. They seemed to be doing fine once they got used to it. I had to work during the day, but Cathy was able to spend most of the day with them. Work was a slow day, but then it rained off and on most of the day. Saturday night was a bit disappointing. The Bears lost yet another game. If this trend keeps up they will never make the playoff this year.
On Sunday I stayed home. We had Dish Network coming out to install a new receiver for us. We upgraded to DVR. They said they would get there between 8 and 12. They called around 10, and showed up around 10:15. The guy switched out the receiver, and then was basically ready to leave. He really didn't want to explain anything about it to me. So when I got a call to do an automated survey about his installation I gave him a low rating in that area. Sunday night's Bears game was a good one. We finally won one again. They had Bacashihua in, so I think that helped. But then having the Pirate's goalie tip the puck into the goal for us doesn't hurt either. Over all it was a good game.
Sunday night we found a mess before bed. One of the cats decided to pee on the bed. So there we were cleaning it up before we could go to bed. I just hope they don't keep up doing that. If they do we will end up having to put them back out.
Now onto today. It was a messed up day from as soon as I got to work. I walked down to Vault to pick up the money. When they handed the loan bag out to me it was really heavy. I couldn't believe they ended that much change. Well when I opened it I found that I didn't. They ordered $24 in nickels last night. The par for nickels is only $20 and we still had $12 in the stand. They should have ordered $8 tops. So now I have way too much change in the loan box.
Then I make my way over to the stand, and find that a mess. They patio wasn't touched, which was the first thing I noticed. Then I came into the stand to find what looked like they just turned off the equipment and went home. I don't know why people think they can do things like that. I made up a list of what wasn't done, and I'm putting a PAM on Harry's desk when I come in tomorrow. If he doesn't sign it oh well, but at least I tried.
I'm at the point now where I feel if people don't want to be part of the solution to cleaning up Timber Treats, then they are part of the problem. And if that is the case, then I don't want them in the stand. But I know I can't make that decision. That would be up to Harry, and I Don't think he will go that far with fixing it.
Once I got everything set up for the day, I spent about two hours catching things up from last night, and I still wasn't done. I don't know how they could have made such a mess. By that time I was really starting to think that it was an intentional mess.
After having to spend an hour on the pretzel oven, and change the water three times, I've decided that I am going to do my plan for next year. I just hope I get the backing of Harry, and the foods office. But my new way of thinking about things is this: you are here to do a job, either do it, and do it right, or you won't have a job. I am going to start PAMing people for not doing their jobs correctly, and if the office follows through on their end, the people will lose their jobs after four times of doing the same thing wrong. That will either cause people to straighten out, or me to get new employees every few weeks.
On a better note, between cleaning I've been studying for my amateur radio test. I'm really starting to see improvement. I'm getting up to the upper 70, or lower 80 percent range over all now. If this keeps up I should be able to take the test and pass it.
It was an extremely slow day. I didn't get my first customer until 1:45, and he turned out to be my only customer. At least that let me get caught up on the cleaning that needed done.
I got home to find out that one of the cats had peed on the bed again, and that they had messed on the floor. We have to figure out which one is doing it, and try to stop it. We can’t have the house smelling of cat pee.
I finished watching the BBC series “Being Human” last night. From the shows I’ve seen it’s a pretty good series. I’ll have to watch for new episodes to come on in January….

Tuesday - 10-20-09, Signs, signs, everywhere the signs.

I forgot until she reminded me that Cathy had to go into work early today. She's going to another place for training. She actually took the GPS with her to direct her there. I had to set it up for her, but other than that she seemed OK with it.
When I got into work I had to stop at Minetown to get some stuff. We were totally out of a few things from the weekend, so I picked it up. Plus I wanted to get vinegar to boil out the fryer. When I got to the stand I noticed that they did put up the other signs on the pole outside the stand.
They now have the direction signs for the different areas of the zoo, plus the restrooms one they put up yesterday. Then this morning they did put up a "Timber Treats Food & Beverage" one, plus a "Gift Shop" one, and an "Exit/Enter" sign. So now we have signs everywhere. The only thing is I would have actually pointed the "Timber treats" sign at the stand, not up the path like its facing now.
After I got in, I started the fryer boiling out, and set the stand up. Setting up didn't take me long, which is normal. The fryer wasn't as bad as I thought I it would have been. I knew from the fact that the filter was clean on Monday that it wasn't cleaned properly on Saturday or Sunday. That usually makes the oil really bad when you boil it out.
After I opened the stand I had a lady come up with a cooler. She said that security told her to give it to me. She's with a school group that's here. I told her that people usually just put them on the tables where they want to sit. She didn't seem to sure about doing it, but I told her that's what they normally do, and finally she put it on one of the tables.
I got a little business around 11:45 when the school group ate their lunch. Some of the chaperones that were with the group didn't bring lunches. So that got me a few ales with them. Surprisingly I took my lunch at the right time today. I was finishing it up when they came up. Usually I'm right in the middle of it.
At about 12:00 I had a lady from the group come up for a cup. She seemed like she didn't want to ask for it. Her bottle of apple juice had sprung a leak. She then tried to pay me for the cup. At times I wish I could be more dishonest, and charge people at times like that. But I just can't do it.
I did more studying of for my general class amateur radio test. For the sections I studied today I'm getting better. I have about a 12% overall increase so far. If I can keep that increase average than maybe I will be able to pass the test. I think what I should do is find a place that is giving the test sometime before the end of the year, and set a date to force myself to really study hard, and learn the material.
Around 1:00 I got another line. It was a group of mentally challenged students from Reading Area High School. They were actually some of the nicest students I've had here in a long time. What really surprised me was the fact chaperones were even nice.
The second grouped I got just a few minutes after them were kind of rude. The lady kept changing her order, and then getting mad at me for not getting it right. Plus she kept insisting that the icees were only one flavor, "Blue Cherry Pepsi". I finally gave up trying to explain it to her, and gave her a mix of all three, since that was basically what she was ordering.
The rest of the day at work was fairly slow. I got home to see the neighbors were out cleaning their yard. They told me they would be moving soon. They got a house out on 39. They said if they knew they would get taken care of, they would leave the cats behind. I told Cathy we should offer to take them in. I know Cathy is going to miss them. I just hope when the house sells that we get good neighbors....

Monday - 10-19-09, What a wet weekend.

With the weather we had this past weekend the business wasn't too good. On Friday Hershey actually decided to not open HersheyPark in the Dark. This decision was made around noon. They decided to close me around 1:45, which was ok with me. I already had everything cleaned up, and was ready to go. All I had to do was just lock up the money and lock the door.
Saturday's weather wasn't any better. They did have HersheyPark in the Dark, but there weren't a lot of people there. I was scheduled to work from 9am until 7pm, but I left at about 4:30. We were totally dead. I did see that they got a little business after I left, but not enough to need me to stay.
Sunday morning started out cold and wet, but it got better. We had decided weeks ago that we were going to go to HersheyPark in the Dark that day. So we were hoping the weather would clear up, and it did. There really weren't too many people there either. We were able to ride all the roller coasters without having to wait in any lines. We got on everything we wanted to. We walked through the zoo several times, and saw the stuff they had set up just for HersheyPark in the Dark. We watched their one skunk paint, and also one of the snakes paint. That was kind of interesting. Overall it was a fun day.
Today I came in to the normal mess I find after I'm off. The stand wasn't properly cleaned last night. We were totally out of hot chocolate mix, and things were rearranged again. So I spent my first hour putting things back to where they should be. Then I spent a few minutes doing up the orders I needed for the week.
Once all that was done then I went to studying my amateur radio test again. I am still holding steady at about a 55% over all. Although I get some sections where I do really good, I then get ones where I do really badly, and it just balances out again.
There was one school group in the zoo around 11:00. They looked like 1st or 2nd graders, so I'm almost positive they won't eat here. There were also some other women with children walking around already at that point, but like usual no one buying anything yet.
Around 12:45 I got my first customer. Although it wasn't a huge sale it was enough for me to have to stay open all day. By 1:00 I had finished going through my General Class test study book. I got an overall score of only 55%. So that means I need to do some more studying. I really wish I knew which test I would get. Then I would know what questions to focus on. But that's why they do it randomly. They don't want people just memorizing a few questions and taking the test.
I've been spending most of the day watching maintenance putting up new signs in the zoo. They added poles in the summer that said "ZooAmerica" on a flag a t the top. Now they are putting directional signs up. The first ones they put up on the pole outside Timber Treats were ones pointing people to the various sections of the zoo like "Northlands", "Big Sky Country", and "The Great Southwest". Now I see the7y are back with new signs. I saw one that said "restrooms" and one that said, "Timber Treats". They spent about 20 minutes discussing how to put them up, and in what direction to point them.
After this long discussion they decided to only put up the one restroom sign. They put it up pointing up the hill toward the new staff house, and new restrooms. They took the Timber Treats sign with to another location in the zoo. I also noticed when they left that they had a sign for the exit with them as well. Since most of the maintenance people only work until 2:30, and this was around 2:00, I figured they weren't going to actually put the other signs up, but just slowly walk out to their truck and then slowly head back over to the office. That would get them there by 2:15 or 2:20, and they could get ready to leave.
A little after 2:00 Harry called over to see what kind of business I had done so far. I told him I only had one sale, and the amount. He said, "Well, enjoy the rest of your day," and hung up. I wasn't sure if that mean close down and go home to enjoy the rest of my day, or to stand here bored and enjoy the rest of my day. So I decided to just stand here bored.
I don't know if I was right or not, but maintenance never came back before I left. After I got home we decided to run up to the pet store to look for a tank heater for the two fish we got. According to the guide for that type of fish the water should be between 72-78 degrees, and without a heater it’s staying at about 70-72 degrees.
Since they didn't have the heater we wanted we decided to get the next size up, and to get the 5 gallon tank out of the attic. This will give the fish a bigger swimming area.
After the pet store we decided to stop at Red Robin in Harrisburg, since its right next to the pet store. Well that took a lot longer than we thought it would. I don't know what it was, but it seemed like our waitress was disappearing for long periods of time, and it took forever for our food to be made.
Since we ended up getting home so late we decided to wait until tomorrow to set up the other fish tank. I called Dish Network to see about upgrading out receiver and getting DVR. They said that if we signed a two year agreement they would send us a free receiver, with free installation, and then the DVR service would be $5.98 a month. So we ordered it. They will be upgrading us on Sunday between 8 and noon....

Wednesday - 10-14-09, a chilly day.

For anyone reading this that isn't from central PA, I'm calling it a chilly day because we are well below the average low for the day, and they are calling for it to be well below the average high for the day. It was down in the upper 30s this morning, and I actually had frost on the back window of my car. I didn't really have to scrape it. With the rear defroster on, and letting the car warm up, it was melted before I backed out to leave.
While I was waiting at Vault to pick up money I got a phone call. It was Cathy, she had a question about jumpstarting a van. So I answered that, and still had to wait. There was some guy there cashing in $2000 in $100 dollar bills. He wanted to get it back in all 50s, but vault told him they didn't keep that much in 50s on hand. He was able to get $1000 in 50s, then just got the rest in 20s. While they were counting out his money they got my bags and got me on my way.
When I got to the foods office everyone was shocked to see me in shorts. I guess they don't remember last year. I'll wear shorts almost all the time. If it’s above freezing, I'm usually fine in shorts. Plus once in the stand it gets warm.
I got over to the stand, and set up as far as I could by 9:30, and just had to wait for Harry. He told me he would be over in a few minutes when I was in the office. He got there at about 9:45, which still gave me plenty of time to count the loan box, and be open by 10:00.
I decided that since it was so cold, and I since I usually don't get a lot of customers before 11:00 or 12:00, that I would go through the bread and do some rearranging. I found a ton that was no good, and got rid of it. There were almost 6 trays of bread that had to be gotten rid of. Then I restacked it, and rearranged the soda that's still sitting in the stand. If I would be allowed to sell it most of it would be gone already. Instead it’s sitting back in the back taking up space, and out dating. As cases of it out date, I dump them out, and get rid of the bottles.
I spent from when I was done with the bread and soda until I took my lunch break studying for the General Class Amateur radio test. While doing that I had only seen three people in the zoo that weren't part of the school group that was here. And none of them stopped by the stand. After eating lunch I went back to studying.
I had only started studying again for a few minutes when warehouse showed up with my stock. The guy from warehouse was by himself this week, so it took him a little longer to get all the stock to me. He brought it all in three loads, and by the time he got the second and third loads to me I had the previous ones away. I still hadn’t had a single customer by this point, and figured I would go back to studying again.
I was hoping not to have any customers by 1:00, then I was going to call about closing early. But of course that was messed up now. At about 12:45 I got a family that came up and ordered lunch. So with their order being about $20 I figured closing early was out.
I decided to stop studying shortly after 1:00. It was getting a little depressing. I know that for the actual test only a few questions are pulled from each section, but I like to be passing each section, and over all, before I take the test. As of now I'm only getting an overall score of about 63%. I could do better on the later sections, but I figure I 'd stop for the day.
The day stayed really slow, but that was to be expected with the colder weather. I didn't get any other customers after that first family. There were only one or two more families that came through after that, and they didn't even look at the menu.
Since Cathy had her training class, I got some stuff done around the apartment. I took out the ACs, and did some basic cleaning. I then went outside to try to get my dad on simplex with my 2 meter amateur radio. I figured we wouldn’t be able to reach each other, but we tried. Then at 9 we watched Ghost hunters, and then headed to bed…

Friday - 10-02-09, a rainy Friday

Today is kind of a rainy day. Usually days that are like this aren't very busy. I planned on that when I got to work. When I set up my stand I only made a small amount of food, and figured I'll make more as needed. I figured the only thing that would make me busy would be if we got some kind of a group in, and as far as I could find out there weren't any scheduled.
Around 10:00 someone from warehouse drove into the zoo. They only brought me bread though, and it was bread I didn't order. I don't know how people decide on what bread I'm going to get. What I really wanted to know was where was the rest of my order. They had no clue if I was getting anything else or not, but they were pretty sure I wasn't.
I saw a few people in the zoo, but not many. Around 11:00 Troy went by with a few other brown tags. I only vaguely recognized them. I figured they were probably high up people in Hershey, and if they didn't stop in I was more than happy with that.
I got my first customer around 11:40. He didn't buy much. He got a medium soda. I kind of can't wait for next week. It is antique auto week, and that usually brings in people. So business should pick up for that week.
Around 12:45 warehouse came back with the rest of my stock. So I spent about a half hour putting that away. So between that and the stock that I was given from other stands, I think I have everything I ordered for the weekend. The only thing I don’t have is relish, since I forgot to order it. I figure tomorrow morning I'll check if Minetown has any, and if they do, get a box from them.
I got a few customers between 2:00 and 3:00 while I was precleaning, but not many. It looked like this Friday was going to be the slowest day this week. But oh well, tomorrow is a sell out for the park, so that should boost business.
What an afternoon, I closed and headed to vault. When I got to vault I dropped the one red bag in, but didn't see the other one. I searched my back pack, and didn't see it. I came back to the stand, and couldn't find it. So I assumed I must have dropped them both together.
When I got home, I rechecked my back pack, and couldn't find it. So I again assumed I must have dropped them together. When Cathy got home we left to go grocery shopping.
While at Giant we saw two Hershey Bears. First we saw Grant McNeil by the one entrance. Then several times again throughout the store. We also saw Andrew Joudrey in one of the aisles.
After shopping we came home, ate dinner, and watched TV. I found that Smallville was moved to Friday nights, so I watched that. I must have missed several shows, because a lot didn't make sense. Then Stargate Universe premiered. It was a two hour premier so I recorded it, and watched half. It’s pretty good, but I’ll have to get used to the new cast...

Monday - 10-12-09, catching up again.

I can't remember what day I posted a blog post last, so I guess I'll just recap the last week, and today. I was really expecting last week to be really busy. It was antique Auto at Hershey. That usually brings in tons of people from all over the world. Then not only do they walk around over there, they usually come to the zoo.
Tuesday was the first day that people could show up for it, and the overnight lots seemed to be filling up quickly. But I wasn't any busier on Tuesday then I normally am this time of year. Wednesday to Saturday it was open to the public.
Both Wednesday and Thursday were kind of slow days. I was a little busier, but it was nothing to be concerned with. One of those days I got a lady that was kind of strange, and a pain. She ordered a pretzel, and was getting a credit card out to pay with. Without me saying a thing to her, she snapped at me, "What do you have a problem with taking credit cards?" I told her we didn't, and swiped her card and gave it back. Some people I guess are just strange.
On Friday I got a little busier, but with the threat of rain it didn't get as busy as it could have. Saturday morning also wasn't too busy with the rainy AM, but as the day went on, and cleared up, the business picked up. It turned out to be a pretty good day over all.
Sunday I was off. I went up to church, which was a normal day there. On the way up I tried talking to my dad on my 2 meter amateur radio. We wanted to use the one repeater that was close to where he lives, but I couldn't pick it up until I was only about 20 minutes from where he lived.
Sunday night was disappointment. We went to the Bears game, and pretty good seats. We got section 111, row C free for HERCO night. That part was good, but the way the Bears played was horrible. They just didn't seem to be into the game until about half way through the third period, and by this time they were losing 2-0.
They were able to score one goal, but that just wasn't enough. They just couldn't get the puck in the net. I know they had bad ice, but that shouldn't be an excuse. I do have a problem with the end of the game, but there is nothing I can do about it. The puck went in basically as the time ran out. Myself and several other people I talked to, all felt that it was in, and should have counted. If that would have happened, it would have been tied and forced over time. But the officials decided it wasn't in in time, and the Bears lost 2-1.
Today hasn't been that bad of a day yet. Cathy's car has two tires leaking, so he drove my car to work today. I took the motorcycle. It was a little chilly riding in today, but wasn't too bad with my cold weather gear. She will have my car at least today and tomorrow.
When I got here Harry was outside the foods office talking. It was almost as if he was waiting for me. As soon as I came out of the office he walked with me over to the zoo. He told me that the stock order that I never got in last week would come in this week. He was over at Antique Auto all last week, and not in his office. So he was unable to enter the order. He told me he put it in Sunday, so I should get either today or tomorrow.
I somehow got the stand set up in about 20 minutes this morning, and had a ton of time to kill. So I got a little caught up on the book I'm reading. Since I'm not as far in the book as I wanted to be, I renewed it this morning so I have an extra three weeks to read it. I'm figuring that I will just borrow books from the library until after Christmas. That way I can ask people for the books that I want for Christmas. I know there are several out that I wouldn't mind getting. I don't know if there are enough out though to last me another year. If not then I’ll go back to borrowing them from the library.
By about 11:00 the business was picking up at the zoo, but not yet at Timber Treats. I hadn’t even had anyone look at the menu yet. And no one was buying. It was mostly moms with their kids. A few of them had what I assumed to be the dad's of the kids with them too.
Around 11:30 I got my first costumers. The first one was a guy with his two kids. He came up and ordered three hotdogs. That was all I heard from the order because at that point his son started yelling in a really high pitched annoying voice, "I want a hot dog, I want a hot dog." I had to keep asking the guy to repeat what else he ordered, which turned out to be just a medium drink, but with the kid screaming I couldn't hear him.
The second customer I got was a lady with her son. She ordered a kid's meal, but wanted me to make it to go. All I have to even try to do that with is foil to wrap the hot dog. So that's what I did. She was just standing their staring at it. Finally she was like, "Oh I guess I can put it in my bag", and then she put the wrapped hot dog and chips into her back pack, picked up the soda, and left.
The guy with the three hot dogs came back a little later and asked if we had any kind of wipes. He said that his son had ketchup all over his face. I told him I could wet some paper towels for him, but that was all I had. He decided that that would work, and took them to try to clean his son up. If you know your child is such a messy eater, then you should be prepared for it.
Around 12:00 I actually got a small line. This was started off with a lady ordering a "cheese pizza hot dog." I asked if she wanted both a cheese pizza and a hot dog, and she said, "No, just the cheese pizza hot dog." So I asked if she wanted a pizza, and she said, "No just the cheese pizza hot dog." So I though ok, she wants a hot dog with cheese, and asked her that. Her response was, "I don't want cheese on it. I just want the 1/4 pound cheese pizza hot dog." So I decided she was getting a plain hot dog. This seemed to make her happy, and she paid and left.
The next person wanted a hot dog and a regular bucket of fries. I hate when people order that. So I asked which she wanted, the regular or bucket, and she only wanted the regular. At least her and the lady behind her were kind of smart. When I said that I would have to cook the fries, the next lady said I want to get a regular too. So I was able to put enough for both of them down. Then the first lady said she would be getting a Large for another lady, so I added more to it so I would have enough.
Most of the line seemed to be together. It was a group of kids ranging in age, with several adults. I'm not sure if it was some kind of day care for all ages since schools are off or what it was. Most of them also wanted hot drinks. It started off with hoot chocolates, but then I got 3 coffee requests. I didn't want to lose the sale, so I brewed coffee.
Now if anyone reading this has worked at Timber Treats towards the end of the summer, you know about how the coffee machine leaks. So I put paper towels down under the coffee pot, and started it brewing. It got about halfway through the pot when it started its leaking. Plus after filling the three cups, and the coffee pot, it still filled two and a half more buckets with coffee. It should have only made the three cups, and maybe the one pot, but probably not even that much.
Today was like most days. I waited until I didn't have a line, and then decided to take lunch. And what happens, my 15 minute lunch break gets interrupted several times. When this happens it’s hard to know exactly how long you were on break. So I usually just guess. Once I'm done eating I figure I have time to read a little, then go back to work.
After work we didn’t do too much. We just ate dinner, and watched some TV shows we needed to get caught up on.

Thursday - 10-01-09, Spooky has passed away.

Well, today started off as a normal day. There wasn't anything different that happened until I went up to Troy's office to drop a note on his desk. While I was up there Dee told me that if anyone asks we only have two bears now. The one female, Spooky, died last night.
The strange think is up until today I never knew her name. I knew the male was Butch, and the one female was Sally. But I never knew the other female's name. I also wasn't sure which one was Sally. I found out that the one whose hair looked a little clumped or matted was Spooky. So as Dee put it, "she is now in bear heaven."
I got everything set up pretty quickly, and decided to do some cleaning that needed to be done. I noticed that things were still covered with dust from when Rich power washed the awning. So I cleaned all that up, which took me up to time to open the stand. I figured today was a good day to do it since I figured it wouldn't be busy.
While I was catching up on Heroes on my PDA I only saw three families go by. Two were moms with their kids, which are here almost every day. The other one was a dad with his kids, none of which stopped. Seeing people before 11:00 sometimes is a sign that I will be busy, but not always.
I got a surprise around 11:30. Troy came in to talk to me about the note I gave him. He said he was very impressed by the way it was written, and he gave me a "thank you" PAM for writing it. He told me that he would work with Harry to try to solve some of the issues in it. He also said he didn't realize that there was such a problem with theft, and they would come up with a way to correct that for next year. So we'll have to see what happens.
It was kind of a slow day over all. I did get my normal rush while trying to preclean. I made about as much on average as I did all week so far. I got home, and didn’t really have much to do. My plans were pretty relaxing, just sit and watch TV while reading, which is what I did. :)