♫ Vacation All I Ever Wanted♫

A week ago I posted about my surprise party… You know the one were I got a big “surprise” while doing dishes. Here’s a picture of the shirt I was wearing and you can see why I called it “flingy.” I had to take it off to do dishes because they would NOT stay up. (See Barb, you never knew that you were adding such spice to my life by passing this one on to me…)

Here's my cake. I look good for that age!














Okay, here's me at my real age.
















Vacation
All I ever wanted
Vacation
Had to get away
Vacation
Meant to be spent alone

So I’m on to day 3 of the Shalee Files. (Aren’t you glad I didn’t go for a two week stay?)

The day was Monday, May 1, 2006. The destination: Home Office.

Barb and Hussy, the two women who took me out for a fabulous birthday meal where I had the most delicious seafood, work at my company’s home office. They are both Executive Assistants to some of the bigwigs there. I’ve always heard that the campus was beautiful; I just never thought that I would get to see it in real life. I had my chance, so I grabbed it. Barb thought I was nuts to go to work on a vacation day, but hey, I’m just different.

Here is where I would get to see life, California style.

Barb had mentioned that although she is only 12 miles from work, it typically takes her an hour to get there. See, now this boggles my mind. I cannot fathom two hours out of my day. On a bad day, it takes me 20 minutes, and I’m 9 miles out. There are certain things that I do not miss by living in a small city, traffic being the first and foremost on the list. I told Barb this and she stared at me. I don’t think she believed me. (Barb, move out here and I will prove it to you! Plus, I’ll make you my lumpia for you to try. Just think about it…)

Anyway, we were in the car and going ever so quick. Dropped the twins off at daycare, then hit the road. What was not factored in was the Hispanic Walk Out. Barb kept saying, “It’s not normally this clear.” We made it to work with ten minutes to spare… Not bad for a Monday. Maybe that walk out wasn’t so brainless after all… (Really I’m not going there because I just don’t want to think about the stupidity of illegal immigrants demanding rights from another country when they should be making these demands from their own government… Wait I went there. That’s where I’ll stop.)

Back to work: I loved the look of the home office. It was recently built and they put money into the aesthetics of the building. It was a pleasure just walking into the lobby. I could see why Barb didn’t mind driving into this place each workday.

We made our way up to Barb’s level. I immediately asked for the directions to the coffee maker. Life would be good after that.

I had worked it out with my boss to take something to HIS bosses while there. It was a totally brown-nosing tactic with lots of humor thrown in for fun. I handed the box to one of the bosses and pretended to read (choppily) from a paper: “ ‘Here ___________. This candy is from my boss who says that you are the best boss in the world. If you ever need anything from him, you just say the word. Shalee, leave now before you make a fool of yourself…’ Oh wait I wasn’t supposed to read that part. Bye.” He laughed. Whew.

I did not do the same with the other big boss because when I told Barb that I was going to do the same to him, her eyes bulged out and said, “Okay, but I don’t know if I would do that with him.” I may be gutsy, but I’m not stupid. (That is not open for debate at this time.) I just gave him the chocolates, said who they were from and ran walked gracefully from the room.

Anyway, after I got the formalities/jokes out of the way, I was shown to a computer where I could “work”. Okay, I will admit that I got some things done. I did a report and answered some emails. People were walking by me with looks of “who is that” in their eyes. A couple actually stopped to ask. I think most were confused why someone would want to go to a home office while on vacation. I like making people ponder new thoughts.

For the most part, I blogged. I was missing my e-friends!

Lunch was good. Chick-fil-A, baby! Hussy had never been there, so she needed to experience the good things in life. It didn’t matter that she was a vegetarian. She found that they even did salad right. (I so can’t wait to get the Chick-fil-A here… Oh the torture of waiting… I mean, they have them in Utah already for goodness sake! Sigh.)

I stayed at work until about 3 PM. Barb’s husband, J, came and picked me up since he was driving by the place anyway. I had had enough fun for one day. I read a little bit and then decided that I would make dinner again. How often does someone have the joy of not coming home and not having to cook? Barb needed that.

I made this chicken stirfry dish that I probably can’t repeat to you because I threw in a little of this (red and green peppers) and a lot of that (onions) and some of the other stuff (soy sauce, pineapple, garlic). It did taste really good though.

That evening Barb said that we were going shopping for my birthday. The woman is a stone wall to no. So I just accepted it. Besides, she made shopping a bit more fun than I usually feel about it. She completely spoiled me by purchasing a couple of tops for me and a pair of jeans. I think she’s trying to teach me about style. It may take more than one lesson for me.

I started with a picture so I’ll end with them too. Here are the tops that Barb bought for me. I love them because they make me feel pretty.