Only 7 more work day remain until my boss comes back.

I am looking forward to her return.

Here's what I learned this week:

• Preparation is important. If you are going to serve lunch at 10:30 because of a field trip you should probably get the frozen PB&J sandwiches out the night before. They were a little on the chilled side today. **smile**
• Paperwork. I thought there was a lot of paperwork and then the month ended and I realized I hadn't seen anything yet. Plus, my boss is still handing all the actual food ordering. All I'm doing is milk and bread and that resembles a trig problem.
• Muffins with Mom. It's only 300 plus people at 8:00 a.m. on a Friday. There's no reason to panic. You can have a muffin with your kids before you get there......at some ungodly hour like 7 a.m.
• Steamers are hot. My co-worker learned the hard way not to get too close to the steamer once it is opened. Good thing she was wearing glasses or she might not have eyebrows.
• Pay attention to the alternate. Everyday we offer a regular lunch, PB&J and an alternate. The alternate varies from week-to-week. This week it was Yogurt/cheese/crackers. While you may be able to eat ravioli with a fork...you can't eat yogurt...especially if you are five.
• Bag lunch rocks. Once you get past all the bag stuffing, bag lunch can be fast and efficient and if it's a nice day you can send kids to the playground to eat. There are limited dishes to wash, the cafeteria is easy to clean and you may just find yourself pulling out of the school parking lot at 12:45 on a Friday!

Peace, love and joy to you and yours this weekend.

Doesn't ABC realize that it is impossible to do a recap blog post when they run a repeat episode of LOST.

Seriously.

That. Was. Annoying.

On the off chance that you are visiting just to read my recap (which is likely wishful thinking on my part) I'm sending you here.

Visiting will allow you to read one of the most clever LOST poems e-vah!

So what are you waiting for? Click the link and come back and tell me what you thought.

Ever been a witness to bullying?

Last week at t-ball practice, I was sitting down at the field watching my son practice while my girls enjoyed some time at the playground a few feet away.

At the end of practice, I learned that some older girls were torturing one of their classmates.

They made her sing.

They mocked her.

They made her cry.

They laughed at her.

Seeing them all huddled together on the playground made me angry. I wanted to kick all of their asses and call all of their mothers.

Sometimes I forget that I'm 5 foot 2 and the size of an average fourth grader.

It wasn't until we were in the car driving home that I heard most of the story but it made me realize something.

I'm no better than that gaggle of girls on the playground.

Down at the field was the grown up version of what was happening on the playground. I was in my own gaggle of moms. We are comfortable with each other and we don't usually invite anyone else into our circle.

Especially those a little different than us.

Especially the mother of the classmate who was being tortured.

Granted, we weren't openly mocking her. But we weren't openly welcoming her either.

I guess if I'm going to angry by the behavior of the tweens on the playground than I should be equally as angry by my own behavior.

This Thursday I will make more of an effort to make sure my circle seems welcoming and inviting.

I invite you to do the same.

This was the first full week of me, as cafeteria manager.

The first full week of being in charge of two women who really don't like each other.

The first full week of having to order the f**kin' bread and milk.

The first full week of lots of paperwork.

I am happy to report that I survived.

For what it is worth here is what I learned:

• Don't forget to count the trays. On Tuesday we didn't count out any trays or have anything ready to serve food on. Trays are very important.
• PB&J is a pain. We only get one count for how many students are having PB&J. However, we serve both grape and strawberry uncrustables. So basically if 56 kids order PB&J I have to decide how many grape and how many strawberry to thaw. You can bet your fanny that if I thaw more grape they ask for strawberry and if I thaw more strawberry they will ask for grape.
• I don't like it when people talk for me. Have you ever worked with anyone that no matter who the question is addressed to ie: "Kisa, can you tell me where the crackers are?" that they will answer before you can speak. The sub is a talk over you all the time kind of person. It is making me mad...mad I say.
• Servings per bag are not accurate. For example we thought one bag of curly fries made 22 servings. Apparently it does...but only if you have a person capable of of grabbing an actual handful of fries and putting them on the tray. If they grab a teeny tiny bit instead you will have SIX totally full trays of fries left at the end of lunch.
• Math continues to suck. I've said it before and I'll say it again. I don't like math. Somehow I added 117 and 16 and got 155. I was even using an adding machine. LOL We made a few extra chicken patty sandwiches because of that.
• Dick the milkman. Until today I've never heard him speak and I learned that he is one funny guy. Plus I enjoy yelling "Hey, Dick!" Another great point is that if you see Dick, you can be sure it is Friday.
• Working with my kid. I took Big G to work with me on Thursday for the day. We had to start at 6:30AM to set up a staff breakfast because apparently I didn't have enough to do this week. She did really well as a lunch lady but was exhausted by the time we went home. She said, "I didn't realize that lunch ladies never sit." Also, whatever I was thinking she was saying....it was sort of humorous. What age do you learn to bite your tongue?
• People will fight over everything: The funniest argument of the week was whether or not to serve 4 cheese sticks or 6 cheese sticks. Everyone was sure they were right. I, personally, couldn't give a rat's ass how many we serve as long as we have enough. So I decided on five because believe it or not this decision will not change the world. Now how can I convince the rest of the cafeteria staff that it doesn't really matter.

What did you learn this week?

This week on Lost....

Jack and Flocke have a man to uh...man?

Sun visits the only hospital in L.A.

John visits the only hospital in L.A.

We learn that the depth of wells can be deceiving.

Sawyer can sail a boat.

We learn that boat sailing is sexy.

Ilana is a lawyer? WTF?

We learn that Lost writers love Star Wars.

I had a nice weekend.

Of course, the pending "Your in charge for the next three weeks" begins TODAY.

Ugh. I don't want to be in charge.

We had a low key weekend. I took Little G swimming and HE CRIED. He hates swim lessons. I'm about to give up. He loves the water and he loves being in it but he HATES swim lessons. I don't know what to do. What would you do?

I scrapped a little, I shopped a little, I ate a little.

All in all it was a fantastic weekend. The weather sucked but it made being inside all that more enjoyable.

What did you do this weekend?

I was very excited about this episode as, like the title eludes, I love Hugo. I think most Losties too. He is an unlikely hero and I have high expectations for him as this show nears its conclusion.

On the island, Richard and Ilana are in a sort of power struggle and grasping at straws.

Richard: "How do you kill smoke?"
Ilana: "Dynamite. That kills everything."
Richard: "True. And I know a ship that has been on this island since the late 1800s that is loaded with dynamite. It still works because this is not likely to solve any of our problems."
Ilana: "Let's go get some."
Richard: "Where will we put it?"
Ilana: "I will just shove it down into my backpack. We'll trek it through the forest and blow up that plane. That way even if we don't kill smokey we will successfully trap us all on this island until the end of time."
Richard: "This is a good idea. Especially the part about you carrying the dynamite."





Meanwhile, back in LA. Hugo is a gazzilionaire with a heart. Yep. You heard that right. He is not only The Mr. Cluck Chicken he is the man of the year, the person of the year and the bachelor of the year.

His mama is proud of everything except the bachelor part. She fixes him up on a blind date.

She doesn't show. But guess who does. That's right. LIBBY! Sweet! I love Hugo and I love Libby. This has to be great. Wrong. She's in the mental hospital that Hugo used to be in. She was apparently on an outing and her doctor lost track of her.

Before she is carted away, she tells Hugo that they are soul mates. That they were in a plane crash together. That they liked each other. He likes her but can't get over the fact that she is loony. Or so he thinks.




Richard is pissed that Ilana blew up the only dynamite they had and he wants to get more. Jack says, "Maybe she blew it up to show us not to mess with dynamite." Jack does have a doctorate degree. He may be on to something.

Michael appears to Hugo and tells him that they must not destroy the plane. That he must convince everyone to go and talk to Flocke.

Meanwhile, Flocke is getting to know Desmond whom Sayid captured and tied to a tree. While he was there "rescuing" Desmond he didn't bother to bring back Jin.

Flocke wants to know all about the experiment that Desmond was involved in and why Chuck brought him back to the island. Desmond seems to be on Xanax and says, "I have no idea, brother."

Flocke takes him to a well in the middle of nowhere and throws him in. In the Bible, Jacob had a son named Joseph. He wore a coat of many colors. In the Veggie Tale version, he is a pickle and his brother's are peas. They throw Joseph down a well. Things end up better for Joseph than all of his brother--just sayin...

Back in LA: Desmond shows up and talks to Hugo. He says, "What's the matter, brother?" Hugo tells him that he met a nice woman but that she is crazy. Like really crazy...he saw the van and everything.

Desmond tells him not to give up. Hugo go to the hospital and makes a huge donation and visits with Libby. She tells him again that they are soul mates. He asks her out on a date. They finally have their picnic on the beach. You know the one Michael so jacked up when he MURDERED Libby!!!

When she kisses him he sees their life on the island.

He is remembering.

Back on the island:

Hurley blows up the black rock. No more dynamite. No more problem. Richard is pissed. He is going to look for some more elsewhere. Ben and Miles go with him.

Hurley convinces the rest of them, mute Sun, Jack and LePenis, to go with him to talk to Flocke. Hurley is scared. Jack is thinking about Kate. Sun wants to see Jin but will have to wait until the finale and LePenis can't believe that he hasn't blown up yet.

I'm completely losing my mind.

I'm living on red bull and little to no sleep.

I'm convinced that I'm actually starting to look like that scary lunch lady from your nightmares.

I'm overwhelmed.

Do you want to know why?

Here's a few reasons:

~my boss, the head cook, is having surgery and will be out for three weeks. This is causing me to have some serious anxiety. I know what you are thinkin--how hard can it be to be a lunch lady. The answer is that it is not that hard, but that is because I work with S. She is organized. She knows how to make Pot Pie. She gets the big ugly bags of eggs out the night before to thaw. She orders the bread and the milk. She knows exactly where the chicken nuggets live in the freezer. I, on the other hand, have never been called organized. I don't like to do math. I'm not sure how to order the bread even though she has shown me. Bags of eggs gross me out. I do not like to go in the freeze because it is cold and I'm afraid of getting stuck in there. I don't want to be in charge.

~The lady who I replaced at the cafeteria is coming back to work the three weeks that S is off. She and D (the only other cook/person there) don't really like each other. That is one of the reasons she left. I am grateful she is coming back but I worry that my referreeing skills are a little weak from constant over straining when dealing with my own children. I will have little patience for childlike behavior when "in charge" over the next three weeks.

~In addition to my lunch lady by day career, I also write for the evening paper. It is school budget time. Did I mention that I don't like to do math. It always boggles my mind when I write about millions of dollars and have to figure out things like tax percentage increases and how that transfers into a millage rate and how that millage rate increase transfers into a tax increase. Just typing that sentence gave me a headache.

~I'm a day behind in everything. A day behind in blogging. A day behind in reporting. A day behind in bread ordering. A day behind in laundry. A day behind...okay more like a month behind...in home upkeep. I promise to visit your blogs sometime this month.

To quote a hobbit..."I feel thin... sort of stretched, like butter scraped over too much bread."

Probably the bread I'm going to forget to order next week.

I went on my semi-annual scrapbook trip with my friend, Megan from New York. Actually we had a heck of time getting together last year because of our busy schedules and this year we had to reschedule twice because of the weather. So maybe I can't call it a semi-annual trip. It's more like a oh-please-let-this-happen kind of a trip.

Anyway, I'm happy to report that I got 35 pages completed! It was a great escape from my daily routine and my face still hurts from laughing.

I'm having computer issues and i can't post any pictures right now. But I will try to update the post later with a few of my favorite layouts.

Happy Monday to you all.

Here are a few Easter greetings I made. The cups are new from Stampin Up. They already have adhesive on them and I really like them. They fit perfectly with their circle punch.


The ladybug is a stamp my mom got me for Christmas and it is also my first attempt at using my new Copics.







Here are the other two cards I made. I have no idea why blogger is insisting that they be turned this way. I hope it's not too annoying as I can't be bothered to change it.

This week flew by. Here's what I learned:

• Only KFC should serve anything called a potato bowl. There are multiple reasons for this post but the top three reasons would be 1) elementary students do not like their food to touch let alone to mix 2) the only word they saw on the menu was popcorn chicken 3) they had no idea we were going to bury that chicken in mashed potatoes, corn, cheese and gravy.
• Serving food mixed together in one big bowl will result in many children crying.
• Numerous children crying about the same thing is very loud.
• Be specific about everything. For example, when taking a part time job make it very clear up front that you have no desire, want or need to ever start work at 7 a.m. and fill in for the Cafeteria manager for three weeks while she has her gall bladder removed. Seriously, people I'm not doing it and it will now become one of my standard interview questions.
• Having the water heater go on the fritz can be a blessing. It means you get to serve lunch on paper trays for two straight days.
• Hash browns are considered a vegetable. So are pickles.

What did you learn this week?

I'm tired of french fries qualifying as a vegetable.

I think baked beans are legumes and should be considered a protein.

I believe that fresh is best.

I think strawberry flavored milk with 26 grams of sugar should not be put on Lucky Charms.

If you agree click on the banner above.

I've been blogging for a while now.  I'm not famous by any stretch of the imagination.  I'm not even looking to make money off this blog (gasp).  I just enjoy writing it. 

This being my 600th post I thought I would share with you some things blogging has taught me.

1. There are some amazing and fantastic blog writers out there.  They make me laugh, they make me cry and they make me want to come back for more.
2. Comments are like crack.  I can never get enough of them.
3. Blogging is better than therapy.
4. Blogging has helped me learn things I never thought I would be able to do.  Among them:  changing my blog from two to three columns and how to make my very own blog header.
5. People actually stop by regularly to hear what I have to say.  (This one still boggles my mind).
6. Digital pictures are more useful when you blog.
7. Friendships can bloom from blogging.  This is something I never really dreamed about.
8. Blogging can encourage you to do more.  More reading, more writing, more walking.
9. I am not the only mom out there who sometimes feels overwhelmed, under appreciated and disrespected.
10. When we blog, we are never alone.

Thanks for stopping by.  This post was inspired by Mama Kat's Writing Assignment.  Stop by and see what everyone else is talking about.