Less Hustle More Coffee

I didn’t sleep well on Saturday night. It was both humorous and kinda sad. It was our first night with Findlay, and normally seamless, but we decided to let her decide whether to sleep in her crate (her bed) with door open or on our bed or wherever and we had an extra dog bed in the bedroom. She slept in crate for a while and at 1:30 she jumped on the bed on top of me. That is the humor of it. You want to bust out laughing but you are half asleep. I mean imagine being asleep one minute and the next a CockaPoo landing on you from mid air. Then she had to “explore” the frontier in the darkness and scurry around to greet each person and animal in the bed, disturbing all – and had I not been so tired, I would have giggled my way through the morning.

However, I kept waking up and thinking about George’s Uncle Robert that has passed. I was thinking about work. I was thinking about what I needed to finish for the holidays. I was wondering if I’d get everything done. So I did not get proper sleep going into Sunday morning for the payroll processing. I was wondering if I’d be able to go to the funeral and when would it be. All I knew was that company was coming for Christmas and that we would do what it took to accommodate all. I was so wiped as I headed out just before daybreak to close 4 payrolls.

It was both exciting and scary – being there by myself to do the payroll. No one there anywhere around and I had the building to myself. But bushes checked and an empty parking lot, it seemed safe to go in.

The office no longer smelled like diesel fuel. I was able to get through the time sheets in record time. Plants had done their work and only a few corrections had to be made. No piece work issues. Well only one where someone (every week this happens) adds something and puts an old date on it. All month someone has put stuff in October. They are probably like me and can’t grasp that time moves so quickly along. Although the month has sent us in overdrive and who can forget it now if you are busy with the shopping, decorating, cleaning, baking, wrapping. Somehow we have managed to do it all.

So I was able to get through it all and do two days of work in just one day. Amazing how much on a regular day – there would be so much more to do – an outbox, an inbox, conversations, answering questions, calls, emails, and it all adds up. With no interaction whatsoever and PTO forms already in – it was much quicker. I did have one person that hadn’t been put on payroll yet, and no one had turned in a time sheet for the person anyway, and I didn’t have the information to fix it so had I been at work with others I’d have probably held up payroll a while – to get it fixed. But yesterday I charged on and will likely have to do a manual check for this person. And when there is no one working – there is no one in the system changing things when you are half way through payroll and something’s different and it has to be fixed back or reprinted- and no one is there to chase out of payroll when you are needing to run payroll reports and only one person can be in it at a time. So these factors all made it go quickly. I didn’t have any problems at all. And I went to work with no makeup on. lol

So about 3:15 I left to come home and was able to go out with Katy and Cody and George and I didn’t miss anything – other than the day off that I wish I had. But knowing this was coming and I’d lose yesterday – we broke our necks during the last two weeks during the nights and on Saturdays to get things done. It is almost here and we are in pretty good shape.

And we have the news that the funeral arrangements are posted and the visitation and funeral for George’s uncle is today. So I will be leaving work early today and so will George to be with our extended family. It is very sad that this has happened right before Christmas. My heart hurts for the immediate family – his wife, children, and grandchildren. Our Christmas has been jolted a bit by death in our community with the child being run over in the Christmas parade here, a death at George’s work that stunned everyone, and now a death in our own extended family.

All that said, let me focus on positive things – like our time with Katy and Cody last night.

We stopped by Yee Haw so Katy and Cody could see it. They were excited. The decorations were fun and the gift shop sections are huge as is the biggest TV screen we have ever seen.

Then we went on to our dinner reservations at Texas de Brazil and thoroughly enjoyed the salad bar, lobster bisque soup, and then all the meats that come around when you turn your card over to the green side. On red they leave you alone. The steaks were awesome, and the bacon wrapped chicken, the lamb, pork and fish. Yum.

The meal was excellent and we headed home and food comas set in. I was so blasted tired before the day began, but I tried to enjoy the moments. And bed felt so good. I slept good and we kept Findlay in the crate bed which she is used to and will go in it on her own. If she stayed with us all the time we’d try to get her to sleep in routine with us on the bed but it would take a while to make it work with three doggies, lol. The other two are not fond of space invasions by other critters in the night. We are lucky they let us humans sleep with them in their bed. ha. But I feel great having had a good night’s sleep.

And I’m looking forward to tomorrow and Christmas Day. We are off and I’ll be making sausage balls and getting ready for our company when Mom and Aunt Martha and Uncle Ken, and Fancy and Coco come for a visit. We are very excited and that has given us some extra happiness during the season – knowing we get to host Christmas this year.

So I better get ready and get on the road to work. I have no intentions of being early since I gave up my day yesterday. I am getting some of my time back by blogging this morning and will also get some of it back by leaving early for the funeral/visitation today. Anyway I will get done what I can, and that is that. The main part is done anyway.

If I can I’ll pop in over the next couple of days, but probably going to be really busy. I’m back at work also on the 26th and will be looking forward to being off the weekend. I think I can squeak by without having to work on Sunday for the New Year’s holiday but the timelines for Monday and Tuesday will have to be more rigid. I have to send out my specifications today for this week’s expectations so I will have to decide in the next few hours.

But once we get through the funeral – I will be a free bird for the next two days and then work two and then off two. Lots of things have to be done on the 26th and 27th and printed and set up after the last payroll and before the first payroll run of the year.

Ahh, better go……….