Magic remedy.

I wish there was a magic cold remedy I could take ONCE which would immediately eradicate my cold. I've been fighting off this cold for a while now. It started out not really bothering me except when I would sneeze. I would sneeze and then my throat would suddenly start hurting. In the past week my throat has started becoming scratchy. This weekend I've had a sore throat and been losing my voice all weekend.

I just wish this would end. I was going to participate in Cincinnati Idol, which was to be held this Wednesday night and next Wednesday night. But unless some miracle happens I won't be in any shape to sing this Wednesday. Besides that, I just feel miserable with my throat hurting.

Paid Fun again.

Okay, so I took the fourth of my clients out today. What a talker. I think he talked almost nonstop from the moment we went out the door to when we came back. He's a hyper little 9-year-old who looks like Ralphie from "A Christmas Story." We went to a store to look around and get to know each other. The kid's really smart and funny as well. I liked him immediately. I had to prod to get some of the other kids to talk at times, but this little guy can carry the conversation. That's a relief for someone like me who's quiet at first when I meet people. Like the rest of my clients, he behaved fairly well, with just a few reminders about minor things.

Still enjoying the part time gig a lot.

More Paid Fun

A trip to an art gallery was on the agenda today. Some of it was by art students, while others were from professionals. There was a display of 50 years of art from a particular artist. It was interesting to see how the artist's style changed over the years. The young man I was mentoring was pretty into the whole thing, much to my surprise. I wasn't sure how he would respond, so it was a relief.

Afterward, we went and browsed around at a store before I took him home.

The kids I'm working with at the part time job are so much easier to work with than the ones in residential. Both are rewarding and challenging, but in different ways.

Tomorrow I have my first outing with the fourth of my clients. I don't know if I'll be adding any others at this point. All the driving around gets pretty tedious. None of them live within 15 miles of me, so just going to pick them up and coming home takes quite a bit of time.

I'm Getting Paid For This?

It's amazing that I get paid for what I do on my second, part time, job.

Today I got paid $10 per hour to take a little boy to an exhibit of exotic trees and plants at the Krohn's Conservatory. When we first walked in and he saw the exhibit, he lit up and said "Wow!" He described it as awesome. Afterward we made a McDonalds stop before fighting traffic back home.

Afterward I got to meet the other two boys I'll be working with. They're siblings, so when I was picking up the one I met with tonight I got to meet the other one. We went to a local Megastore and browsed around mostly in the toy section. We even had a really short lightsaber battle. Really short--didn't want to get the hyper 6-year-old riled up or cause a scene in the store. We got along very well and he was fairly well-behaved although he's a handful.

$10 per hour plus mileage.

Am I really getting paid for this? Of course there's also the paperwork I'll have to fill out for billing purposes, but the field work is fun and rewarding even if challenging at times.

My own problems?!?!

I subscribe to Netflix, which works out well since I work third shift and have time to watch a lot of movies, read, or write during my shift. So it's pretty cost-effective since I tend to send the movies right back the next day.

Anyway, I dropped some movies off on Friday afternoon (or it could have been Thursday even) at the mailbox place I use when I get packages and anything else that doesn't fit in my mailbox (basically anything that's over 1" x2"--okay, slight exaggeration). Since it was after mail delivery time they should have gone out in the next day's mail. Saturday I went by again and noticed the outgoing mail bin contained my three movies which should have gone out. I know they're mine because Rhonda, the proprieter always says she knows those big red mailers are mine--I'm the only customer who gets Netflix. I thought it was a little strange and I was a little irritated, but figured they'd go out on Monday.

So today I stopped by and find three Netflix mailers in my mailbox. I thought that was strange since having gone out on Monday, Netflix would only have been receiving my returns today. I hadn't received any notifications that they had received my movies or sent more out, so when I took them out of my mailbox I noticed they were the same three that were outgoing mail.

I took them to Rhonda and let her know they were actually outgoing mail and had been put in my mailbox inadvertently. I also mentioned I had seen them still in the outgoing box Saturday night. She then told me she had had a heart attack on Thursday night. Well, that explains why they didn't go out and why she was still sorting through a bunch of incoming mail this morning. I felt kinda bad. I told her I'm glad she's okay. She's a really nice lady and doesn't have anyone else working for her. She's had part time people, but they've come and gone.

My own problems? Somehow my Netflix delay seems silly to have been frustrated about in light of the situation.