Snow Dogs

Good evening everyone.  I'm sorry that it's taken me so long to post.  As the holiday season progressed and I got more and more busy, it took longer for me to post.  In turn, this gave me more material to steal from my friends and write about, which meant that I'd need to do an even longer post with the material that I had stored up.  This is how my mind works...  :)  Tomorrow I begin a stretch where I'm working several consecutive days again, so I will hit the 'publish' button tonight, regardless of whether or not I cover everything that I want to get to.  I go into this entry knowing that I currently have 4 of 6 days off of work at the end of the stretch, so you will see more posts in your future.  Where to begin...

Let's start with work.  For those of you who don't know, I'm working for Walmart here in my hometown.  I took the job about a month and a half before Thanksgiving, which really means about 45 days before 'Black Friday.'  The time from 'Black Friday' through last Sunday has pretty much been a BLUR...  :)  I am currently training to be a Customer Service Manager for my hometown Walmart, and the past few months have seen me cashier, work at the customer service desk, push carts in the parking lot, and work at the layaway desk, just to name a few things.  For those of you who know me a little, you know that I have quite an extensive resume'.  I have a business degree, I have over 30 post-graduate hours of college on top of that, I taught and coached high school for nine years, I've worked at the World Series of Poker, I've dealt poker on the Las Vegas Strip, and I've worked for the University of Texas at Austin (among my many, MANY jobs)...  Now I can say that I've worked through the holiday season for THE major retailer.  As you can imagine, working for Walmart through the holidays presents several challenges, and I'm happy to say that our group did one heck of a job bringing the store into the new year.  I need to give a shout out to all of my fellow employees for making that happen, and for your support and guidance along the way!  As you can imagine, several people are being tagged on facebook to this post...  :)  My coworkers have also been very kind in giving me rides to and from work when our schedules mesh.  If you'll remember from Austin (and even Las Vegas), I walked or took the bus to and from work (or to the Strip).  The walk is longer here, and the weather is colder, so the rides are GREATLY appreciated.

Ah yes, Coach touched on the weather.  Now seems like a good time to break out the snow dog...

 

My friend Brigette shared this to facebook not too long ago, and I had to do a double-take.  When a snowman just won't do, right?  :)  Okay, about this weather.  Our last warm day was Christmas, when the temperature was 51 degrees.  I have proof of this for you later...  :)  Anyway, when I left work last night, the temperature was 1 degree.  ONE...  For people like me, we have been incredibly fortunate to have such a mild winter.  Well, winter has arrived, and we won't likely see 51 degrees again anytime soon.  Back to Christmas, my mom and her friend were my lunch dates...

And here's my proof of the last warm day ever of 2015...

If you look very closely in the upper left hand corner of the photo...  :)  Don't worry, just for your amusement, I will be sure to post several photos of the snow and misery throughout the winter...  ;)  Speaking of good things winding down, I feel that I must cut this blog post short (ahem)....  :)  If you were looking at my blog note sheet, you would realize how difficult this is for me to do.  A couple of things before I go...  First, I told my friend Michaela that I would include her awesome facebook share tonight, so...

That would be a shot of Texas from the International Space Station my friends...  And I also need to share that with my new job, I haven't seen the amount of football that I'm accustomed to watching.  HOWEVER, I will be able to see the Alabama/Clemson game, and I will also be watching both AFC Wild Card games on Saturday...

Go Steelers!!!  ;)  Have an Outstanding 2016, and I'll see you soon!