Afterthoughts : This Past Month

OK, things are getting better in some ways, and in others things haven't changed.  But, I do see good things on the horizon.  On to the update.

Thursday, April, 1, There isn't much of an update as far as my aunt's status.  I didn't expect much since she only went into the hospital yesterday.  I called the hospital at around 11am, and at that time it was just barely over twelve hours that she had been admitted.  They did say that she isn't likely to get out today for sure.  Perhaps tomorrow or Saturday, we shall see.

At Glendale I got to meet the new librarian, specifically the history librarian.  She's quiet, so it's hard to gauge her, but she seems OK.  I did find her to be attractive.  Not that that means anything, but I'm just saying.  Someone told me that the previous person that was working the history room quit since they didn't give her the job, but rather gave it to this lady.  I don't know her or the other lady from Eve, so to me it's mute.  But, it does continue the pattern of hiring people from outside the organization.  Well, most of the time.  Some internal hires are still baffling since the more qualified candidate doesn't always seem to get the job.  Maybe I'm just seeing things differently, but it sure seems that most of the new hires are from outside.  Maybe that's a good thing, maybe not.  I know with AD it was a bad thing.  She was terrible and she wanted to remake the library into some bullshit factory.  Well, mission accomplished with that.  It's just sickening.  But, I won't judge this new lady yet.  Maybe she's really good.  I plan on chatting her up about history in Los Angeles.  Let's see what she knows.  Also, of course I want to know if she's single.

The work day went pretty quickly today.  I actually finished later than my usual 4:30pm time, but I didn't put that extra time on my timecard.  Mainly because I took a little longer on my break.  So, it evens out.  The weather started out warm, but then some gloomy clouds came out and that blocked the direct sunlight.  That automatically made the weather a bit cooler, just because the sun wasn't baking.  These days have been busy at work.  We're ramping up for the reopening of the library in about three weeks, which means delivering a bunch of supplies to the various branches.  The amount of books coming in and out of these few branches has also gone up.  Not quite pre-pandemic times, but it's slowly inching that way.

On my way home tonight I wondered what I would have for dinner.  I didn't want to get a burger, and I wasn't sure what else to get.  I finally picked California chicken cafe, and I picked a salad.  The salads they have are huge.  It really hit the spot.

Emma texted me the news that Disneyland will have booze at the Blue Bayou.  I'm sure that means that there will be booze at other places in the park in due time.  Nice!  Now, the question is, when will I be able to get into the park.  When will I be able to buy an annual pass?

Friday, April, 2, They moved my aunt into the ICU in order to get her sodium levels to normal.  She's on a drip, but they said it's not working as fast as they would like it to work.  So, they were sending her to ICU to have a mainline put in.  She had one of those when she had pneumonia a couple of years back.  They have to watch her closer when she has that.  The nurse tells me that she's doing well.  The reason why her sodium levels go down is because she pees a lot.  She does, and because of that she loses sodium with every time she pees.  It's because of her Addison's disease.  That thing effects every part of her body.  It's so fucking messed up.  For now it looks like she won't get to go home until at least Sunday, and maybe into the new week.  All this because of sodium.  My friend pointed out that I always tell her that my aunt never seasons anything that much.  Well, maybe this will make her season things properly.  I hope.

I had some booze tonight.  I also took a little tour of the house, my house.  I don't often go into certain rooms in the house.  Mainly my aunt's old room, which is where my mom's old bed is located.  While in the room I saw so many old pictures.  The above is a portrait of my mother when she was younger.

A little while back TheNewCute asked me about my work anniversary, and I was like "What's this about?"  She gave me hits that the administration dopes had plans to "celebrate" those dates.  Well, today the other shoe dropped and I got my "card" in the mail, email that is (see above).  I joked with TheNewCute about where my gift card was, and she of course said there was no gift card.  Fucking idiots.  I like how the card says "Celebrating 13 years together."  Ah, we're not a couple.  Fuck this shit!

Saturday, April, 3, I kinda wanted to drive out somewhere, like Malibu, today.  But, I didn't.  I ended up staying home and doing stuff.  I folded the laundry that I did yesterday.  I know, I'm living the crazy life.  Every moment is nothing but excitement.  Like I said, I kinda wanted to go out and do something.  Ilsa went out to Malibu last week, or this week, I can't remember.  I know it was recently.  It gave me the idea of driving out there, but I didn't.

I made myself busy during the day in order to keep my mind off my aunt's condition.  I wanted to call the hospital, but timing is always crucial.  If I call too early they don't have much info.  Well, around noon, as I was finishing up the folding on my laundry, the hospital called.  Suffice to say they gave me a partial update.  No new news, just must of the same.  Mainly that my aunt still can't go home.  I did get to talk to her.  She sounded better than yesterday.  I guess for now it's looking more like she won't get out until Monday.

There was something I wanted to do for a long time, and that's moving some of the outside lights so that they cover more of the walkway.  I went ahead and moves the lights from one spot to the side of the house where my room is.  I even cleaned the lights in order to have them be as bright as possible.  I like the way they now make the part of the walkway that was dark not as dark.  The side by my window is dark because of the trees next to my room.  They are tall and block all the light from the streetlights.  The lights on the street area pretty bright, but they don't penetrate the trees at all.  So that part of the walkway is always dark.  But not any more.  Woo hoo!

Sunday, April, 4, I got up after not wanting to get out of bed this morning.  ARGH.  I felt like I could stay in bed all day.  But, I made up my mind to get up and get moving.  It was SO hard to do so, but I knew I HAD to, less I really stay in bed all day. My agenda was to sweep up the backyard, cut my hair, and shower.  Oh, and then get some food in my belly.  I went out to the backyard and started to cut my hair.  Not only that, I shaved my silly goatee.  Then I swept up the backyard.  Now that I sweated I could shower. I almost told myself that it was a good idea to go for a drive, but at the same time I worried that the hospital might call me to say that my aunt was getting out today.  More on that later.

I basically talked myself out of taking a nice drive.  I hate that I do that shit to myself.  I really do need someone to mention doing something.  Like Emma.  She says let's do this, and let's do that.  If not for her I wouldn't have had the adventures I did in 2019.  I don't know why I do this to myself.  Anyway, I went ahead and washed my work clothes, and while waiting for them to get washed I sat outside in my backyard.

I decided to check out my new books.  I love them both.  The 3D one is pretty cool in that it shows a bunch of pictures of Disneyland from the early days.  There are some more contemporary pictures, but I love the old pictures.

As I was checking out my books I figured that it was a good time to call the hospital to see what was going on with her.  They told me she was doing much better, but that they would have to run a few last tests to make sure she's 100%.  So that means that she most likely won't get out until Tuesday.  But, there is a possibility that she could leave tomorrow (Monday).  I'm not holding my breath about Monday.  I know how these things work.  Those tests will be run later in the day, so that means she won't get out until Tuesday.  Because the doctor has to review the results and that won't happen until the evening.

I received a call from my aunt around the time I was cooking up something to eat.  She tells me that she's getting out of the hospital tonight.  TONIGHT, I ask.  That's insane.  And the worst part is I had some wine before I started to cook, so I was feeling really good.  I wondered if I was sober enough to drive at that exact moment, and I knew I wasn't.  Her phone connection was bad, so I then called the hospital, and they told me she wasn't getting out tonight.  Whew, I thought.

On the advise of one of my coworkers I was checking out the online schedule for us dopes at Glendale.  I know that this particular coworker is full of shit.  He has this idea that they're going to fire some of the full timers.  Yeah, right.  They don't fire anyone in civil service.  They didn't fire anyone during the whole pandemic.  Anyway, in looking for anything related to that I noticed that TheLooker is going to be working this coming week.  She has ignored my text messages, so I figured I would never see her again.  What with her working her full time job out in Chatsworth.  But, the hours are clear, and they are in the middle of the day.  Hmmm, what's up with that?  All I know is that I need to make myself busy and not talk to her so much this time around.  Not out of spite, but really it's a waste of time.  If we were only to have a nice friendship I was ready for that.  If it was to possibly something more than that I was also ready for that.  But to not even respond.  That's telling.  Oh well, it is what it is, but as I've said before, time to stop being a doormat.

Monday, April, 5, I told my supervisor at San Marino that I might be leaving early to pick up my aunt from the hospital today.  But the day continued and I never got the word that my aunt was ready to go.  One nurse tells me that she will be ready to go home today, but then another tells me she will have to stay another day.  Hmmm.

The hospital my aunt is ini isn't very good at telling me the entire story.  And as I just said, the story keeps changing.  It's all very frustrating for obvious reasons.  All I know is that at this point I'm just waiting.

I had a feeling that despite the hospital telling me that my aunt might come out today, there was no way.  So, I went to visit TheGirl, but without Chan in tow.  It was a bit of a somber visit.  TheGirl mentioned that she's lonely.  She also mentioned that her ex-husband drives her crazy.  In addition, she mentioned that she was getting her latest tattoo taken off.  She just got it a little while back, but now she hates it.  Poor thing, she's not doing well right now.

After getting home I figured that I should go to the market to get some food that my aunt likes.  If she's going to come home tomorrow or even Wednesday then she's going to need food.  I bought some bananas and yogurt, oh, and some soup.  I hope she's coming home tomorrow.

Tuesday, April, 6, Today I got to FaceTime my aunt.  The hospital told me that her sodium levels are back to normal.  Not only that, but she's doing well.  But, and here comes the but, she can't exactly go home.  Not unless she would have 24/7 care.  Of course I go to work, leaving the house at around 7:30ish and getting home around 5:30ish on most days.  Except on Wednesdays, which is when I get home later because I have dinner with TheGirl.  That's about ten hours a day that I'm out of the house.  I'm basically there at night.

Because of this the hospital said that they are going to move her to a care facility, much like the one that my Godmother lived in the last few years of her life.  They said that my aunt might just be there for a short amount of time, but they don't know.  I'm hoping that this confusion that she seems to be suffering from goes away.

I saw on the schedule that TheLooker was working this week.  I wondered how quickly I would run into her, and sure enough, it was barely past 9am when I saw her in the circulation room.  She mentioned that she saw my last text, but then she forgot to text me back, and because of that she felt awkward since so much time went by.  I told her not to worry.

She told me she was going up north to Monterey, and asked if I knew any good places to eat up there.  I mention this because she said, "We are going," up north.  I'm wondering if "we" means a boyfriend.  Most likely.

So then she told me that she quit her other job.  She never quit the library, which is a smart move.  She was happy with the job until her supervisor left, and then her supervisor's supervisor became her supervisor.  That person was terrible, she said.  Hence her quitting that job.

I do have to say that TheLooker did look really nice today.

Wednesday, April, 7, They're going to move my aunt to the care facility today.  I was told that I have to make an appointment to visit her.  I'm OK with that.  There is a chance that my aunt won't be there for long.  But, as I said in another entry, she needs to get out of this confused fog that she's in.  But then again it could be that she might have to stay there.  The doctor's don't know.  For now, all I know is that she's at least out of the hospital.  And I better start preparing for the possibility of her not living with me.

I was busy at work today.  This seems the norm these days, since I have to do work for a fundraising event coming up in May.  The closer we get the more Pseudo supervisor has me doing.  I'm good with that.  There may not be a big end of the year fundraiser, but there are still a lot of plans for other online and in person fundraisers.

TheGirl and I went to a different place for dinner tonight.  We ended up going to a place called Don Cuco in Burbank.  It was nice to try a new place.  New to me, anyway.  I wish I could say that the food was amazing.  It wasn't.  The food was pretty bland.  How do you make bland Mexican food?  Just ask the cooks at Don Cuco.  Just terrible.  At least the margaritas were good.  If not for me not wanting to get super sauced I would have had a second margarita.  TheGirl and I did share one margarita so we basically had one and a half margaritas each.  I wonder how a place like this stays in business, seeing as the food really isn't that good.  The good thing was the company.  TheGirl and I have a good time at our Wednesday night dinners.

My cousin texted me that she wanted to come over to pick up her mail.  She asked me if it was OK, and I told her that it was fine.  I just reminded her to remember to check the front door and make sure that it was locked when she left.  Well, I saw my cousin's kid run into the house on the security cameras I have set-up.  In the video I saw my cousin's kid jump into the house and seemingly fly out in a moment.  I saw that and I texted my cousin, "Are you sure Jackie locked the door?"  My cousin said that she, "Checked twice."  Ah huh.  It takes but a moment to lock the door, but I didn't see that beat on the security cameras.  I took my cousin's word, but really I think my cousin should have gotten out of the car and walked over to check.  Did she?  Nope.  And predictively when I got home I found that the door was left unlocked.  Fucking shitheads.  I immediately texted my cousin to tell her that Jackie left the door unlocked.  Good thing we're in a nice neighborhood.  So for HOURS, the door was unlocked.  I really want to get a new lock.  Since my aunt doesn't want to take care of the girls I think I have a good excuse for not giving my cousin and her husband the new key.  Fuck that shit.  I thought about maybe buying a lock that would lock itself.  That way I could have checked online and seen that the door was not locked and locked it.  But, I haven't... yet.  I am thinking what I might do.  There is a lock that will lock itself if I hit a button on my phone.  But, the door has to fid perfectly, otherwise the lock wouldn't be able to lock.  That makes sense.  The new back metal door aligns perfectly with the jam hole, but the front door isn't like that.  There is a wee bit of space that I compensate by pushing the door in a bit when I lock the door when I leave home.  I guess I could get a spring that pushes the door to close.  It's food for thought.  I just don't want dummies leaving my door unlocked.

Thursday, April, 8, These dopes at Glendale set up a BIG meeting online for today.  I was going to skip it, but then I came back from the mail run and everyone was sitting and standing around a computer that Achee set up on her desk.  I figured, hey, why not watch this stupid thing?  Because why not?  They're paying me for the time.  I don't have to tell you it was a shitshow, because that's par for the course.

The meeting covered the topic of re-opening the library.  These clueless fucks are still focusing a lot of energy and time on this "security theater" shit.  They continue to focus on temperature checks and cleaning surfaces.  Zero information about ventilation, which is the actual important topic that should be covered.  But no, there is no word on how they would add more ventilation to the library.  As a matter of fact, the social worker got in trouble for mentioning that in her weekly email.  That to me is insane.  They originally brought it up, but because they have no idea what they're doing that topic gets swept under the rug.  Idiots.

After the "meeting" they told us to head upstairs in order to continue with more training.  They sat us at the big table that they had my coworker and I to put out.  Little did I know I would be sitting at this table.  What followed was forty-five minutes of so-called "training" to deal with problem patrons.  But the training wasn't really training, because they just asked us "What would you do if" questions.  That's not a training session, that's an opinion poll.  Forty-five minutes of this shit.  I told a few people that a proper training session would be to show us scenarios and then tell us what we should do.  Asking us isn't the way to help us all be on the same page, it's the exact opposite.  But, these clueless fucks think this little kumbaya session is actually training us to deal with dummy patrons.  Typical of this place.  They never "empower" me like they keep saying they're doing.  They just make me feel that I will have no back-up when something happens.  Whatever!

I got a call from the social worker that's taking care of my aunt's case.  She was mentioning that she's scheduled for home care just as soon as she goes home.  I liked hearing that she is definitely going to come home.  It will be a few days to make sure she's 100% and that she's not saying strange things any more.

I had lunch at Montrose today where Emma was working.  Her lunch was later in the day, but she was nice enough to bring her computer and sit near me, but still six feet away.  We chatted about hanging out in the near future.  I really wish that hanging out turned into something more romantic with Emma.  I wish I had a little bit of a sign that said it was OK and that she wanted something romantic to happen between us.  For now I get no message, overt or otherwise.

The route was busy today.  Nothing too nuts, but there were a lot of little things to get done, as usual.  When I got home I fixed myself some fish tacos.  They really hit the spot.  I have to come up with some other creative foods to have so when my aunt comes back home I can make that.  I'm not sure what to make though.  Gotta think.  Overall it was a good day, and I'm pooped.

Friday, April, 9, Work was busy today.  I don't like moving donations from the different locations to Central, because it's really a waste of time.  Those books should just be thrown in the trash.  But, I don't have a choice most days.  Like today, I had to move some boxes to Central.  I would burn them, if given the chance.

Before some of these books would go to a "charity" supposedly.  But it turns out these idiots didn't renew the agreement with the company.  So now there's no outlet for those books.  And really that means these books can now be tossed, and not boxed up to send to charity.  Because now they don't have the excuse that they're sending them to charity.  Bullshit!  I do love that they forgot to renew the contract with this company.  But the funny thing is that they wanted to continue, but the company basically said nope.  I'm not sure if they can start again, but for now they don't have to box books up to send to this so-called charity.  Fuck'em.

When I got home I wondered what I would eat for dinner tonight.  I didn't want to have fish tacos again tonight, but I think I would have done better with the tacos rather than what I had for dinner.  I had a couple of lasagnas in the freezer that I figured I should eat, because they've been there for so long.  Well, that was a mistake.  The lasagna was tasteless.  I've had this lasagna before, and in the past it had more of a taste.  But, I think it's been so long that it's been sitting in the freeze that it killed all the flavor.  Sad.  At least future me won't be eating that now.

Saturday, April, 10, I went to visit my aunt at the home where she's currently staying.  She looked good.  I asked her if she was ready to go home and she said she was.  She sounded normal.  Nothing like last week where she was saying some crazy stuff.  I'm not sure when she will be going home, but I hope it's soon.  A place ike this isn't good for anyone.  These homes will drain a person.  Hence me wanting to get her out of there as soon as possible.  I guess we'll see in the coming days.

I didn't want to go straight home after visiting my aunt.  Taking a page out of Ilsa's playbook, I drove up Topanga Canyon to PCH.  It was nice to get away.  The drive was nice.  The closer I got to the ocean the cooler the weather was.  When I got to PCH I ended up going to turning left, which means turning towards Santa Monica.  I was OK with that since I was starting to get hungry.  With Chan in tow I was thinking of where I might go eat.  I thought about going to Bay Cities, but then thought of something else.

I ended up going to Johnnie's pastrami in Culver City.  I have been wanting to go there since last year.  I watched an episode of Huell Howser where he visits Langer and Johnnie's for pastrami.  And that really made me want to go.  Today I gave myself a chance to go there and it was good.  I drove home, warmed the sandwich in the microwave and enjoyed the amazing taste.  It really hit the spot.

Sunday, April, 11, I visited my aunt again today.  She looked even better than yesterday.  She's eager to go home, but I told her that the doctor still had to evaluate her.  Most likely tomorrow.

Yesterday after visiting my aunt I went to Johnnie's in Culver City.  Today I didn't think to travel that far, mainly because I knew where I wanted to go after my visit.  That place was Cupid's hot dogs.  Oh the dogs hit the spot.  Mmmm, Mmmmmmm.

Monday, April, 12, I went to sleep kinda early last night, but even still I was super sleepy at work today.  All I wanted to do was sleep.  Despite sleeping early I did have some booze though.  So that must have contributed in how I felt today.  After lunch I was really feeling sleepy, but at the same time I was still sorta awake.  I know, it doesn't make any sense.

Since I hadn't any word from the facility about when my aunt was going to be going home I figured that I best visit her today.  So, I decided to leave work early.  I figured if I left around 3pm I could be there at around 4pm.  Just as I was about to take off someone from the facility called me to say that my aunt would be getting out on Thursday.  Thursday, I thought.  That seems like a long time.  She looks good, and I know that she really wants to go home now.  But OK, if that's what they want.  Thursday it shall be.

On my way out to visit my aunt there was some traffic, but thankfully it only made me a little later than I wanted.  When I got to the care center they brought my aunt out to the lobby.  I was there to talk to someone about coordinating the move home on Thursday.  But, when the lady arrived my aunt was there and after we talked about leaving Thursday my aunt spoke up and said, "How about tomorrow?"  The coordinator said, "You wanna go home tomorrow?  OK, we can do it tomorrow."  And with that she's going home tomorrow.

Since today was the last day I would have the house to myself I thought about calling Talia over and sending her a car to pick her up so by the time I got home she would arrive shortly after.  I wanted her to come over in order to sleep with her.  Tell me if you've heard this story before.  We've been texting each other and we've been talking "naughty."  I mean, I don't have any other prospects.  But, at the same time she's still nuts.  On my way home I thought better of having Talia come over.  Maybe, big maybe, when I can I'll go over to her house.  Maybe.

Tuesday, April, 13, A few years ago when AD started working at Glendale she and the rest of the dopes there made a decision about "floating" the book collection.  What that means is that a book that had previously been assigned to a specific branch is now no long attached to that branch.  Hence the meaning of "float."  But, of course these dopes didn't do "float" correctly, and now years later the flaws all come out at once.  The pandemic has exposed so many things that we used to take for granted.  Floating was exposed to my buddy and I early on as a thing that just didn't work.  Mainly because you can't just freely float the entire collection.  There is the matter of books "pooling" in certain more popular locations.  So it's not something you just set and forget.  Like so many things you have to cultivate it.  You have to tweak it to make it work, and continually tinker with it to keep it working.  But these dopes never did that.  From jump they did it the wrong way.  Their idiocy has been exposed already, but it wasn't until now that everyone sees the flaws.  So many books have "floated" to Central that now there's no room for anything else on the shelves.  Hence the overflow.  Today they sent out a bunch of these books to the branches.  But guess what they did?  The branches are full as well.  Because a smaller amount of the collection is actually circulating thanks to Covid, there are more books on the shelf everywhere.  There is literally no room for more books at any location.  But really float brought everything back to the only branch that was open, if only for curbside, and that's Central.  That is why the shelves are packed and now these dopes upstairs want to start flinging books to the branches.  If they had just kept the old system this would not have happened.  My prediction is that the branches won't be able to shelve all these books being sent to them.  There are just too many books.

I left work early in order to pick up my aunt at 2pm, just as we agreed to yesterday.  I actually arrived about twenty minutes early, but it was a good thing I did, because there wasn't any parking in the lot.  I drove around the block and just as I was driving up to the care center someone pulled out of a parking spot on the street.  It was only about fifty feet from the entrance to the center.  I went in, told the lady behind the counter that I was there to fetch my aunt.  She made a call, someone came and went and in a few minutes my aunt was in the lobby.  I told the orderly that I was going to pull up my car.  I leaped out of there and parked the car right in front of the door.  We were off in a matter of seconds.

We didn't go straight home, because we definitely needed to go to the market to get my aunt some food.  We didn't buy a ton of stuff, but we did buy a good deal for my aunt to eat.  I already have food in the house, since I went to the market last night.  I bought a cane along so that my aunt would get used to using it.  I know now that going to the market with my aunt is the future.  She can't go to the market alone anymore.  She always has to have someone with her.

After going to the market we went home and at 3:20pm my aunt officially was back home (as seen above).  We have a doctor's appointment on Friday.  Which, of course, I'm going to take her to myself.  There is no way she's going on her own using CityRide.  She also already has a physical therapy appointment for this Saturday.  I know, fun times.  She had to take her meds tonight and she was saying it was too many pills.  It's not too many, it's just the right amount.  As a friend said to me, you can lead a horse to water, etc.  Amen.  Maybe the doctor on Friday can convince her that taking these pills isn't some sort of punishment.

I was worried about her after she went to bed and I was still up.  I think I checked up on her two or three times.  Each time she was snoring.

Wednesday, April, 14, I've talked about my photo feed before, so it should not be a surprise by now that I'm posting a picture from the past.  This one is of Talia posing naked at some abandoned house in Bel Air back in 2005.  Back then Talia would get naked for me at the drop of a hat.  I do miss that.

Pseudo supervisor told me today that she was talking to the new director about the library's reopening schedule.  Because of the fact that we have people from the police department and code enforcement in the building, it might not be possible to open up so soon.  Those people can't return to their offices in the police department because they can't socially distance.  I've been to the police station and it is really tiny, and cramped.  Because they can't go back that means they're going to stay here.  And that means we can't open the library.  Funny enough, I'm not too broken up about that.  It's possible that the library might not open up until 2021.  Incredible!

TheGirl and I went to dinner at the Counter.  The weather was super nice tonight.  The counter had some special burgers they called "bourbon burgers."  I got the bourbon glazed burger, which was super yummy (see above).  I hope they keep it on the menu permanently.  We had some Fess Parker wine and I was feeling fine.

Thursday, April, 15, I know I've spoken about the idea of a "floating" collection before, but a quick rundown is as follows.  Floating simply means that a book in a collection does not have a "home" branch that it assigned to be stored.  If a book is at branch A and it returned to branch B it will now belong to branch B.  If it is taken out from branch B and returned to branch C it now belongs to branch C.  That's pretty much the idea.  Well, the problem lies in the fact that all branches aren't equal.  Some are more popular, and have more circulation and returns.  That means those branches, let's say in this case branch A, will get more books returned to it than the other branches.  So what happens when a book is requested and is located at say branch C and it is checked out at any other branch, but upon return is returned to branch A?  Well, it stays in branch A, of course, but now it will not return to branch C for a while, if ever.  It has the potential of returning to branch C eventually, but the probably is higher that it will remain at branch A.  In this case branch A is Central.  Books have been pooling at Central for this past year.  Did anyone think to maybe do something about it before now?  Nope.  So now, in a desperate scramble, these dopes have now panicked and have sent books out to the branches hoping to alleviate the "overflow" of books now at Central.  The problem with this move is that all it does is push the problem to the branches.  For them it works, because they don't go to the branches, and they can say there's no problem now.  Yeah, but dumping a bunch of books on the branches now overflows the branches.  Like I said, since they don't see the problem at the Central anymore they think that they did good.  But really the seeds of this go back about five years when they thought to "float" the collection, but never did the legwork to make sure that it worked correctly.  Like so many other things, the pandemic has shown the fractures in the system, and shown the library administrator's incompetence.

Speaking of failure... Montrose.  The old desk at Montrose had power running through it, via a conduit under the floor.  The new desk doesn't do it that way.  It's even better.  If you count almost sending me to the ground better.  These dopes placed a carpet over the plug.  But the plug is so high that I tripped over it.  The carpet actually made it harder to judge just how tall that mound is.  This is yet another fail for this desk and this library system.  I like how they think this is OK.  I like how they think this no one is going to notice this huge bump right in the middle of where people walk.  I want to see how many times someone trips over that bump like I did today.  Fucking idiots.

Emma sent me the above picture of us at DCA back in March of last year.  I'm not sure when I shall return to Disneyland.  Disney did start to sell tickets today.  While I was up at Brand one of my coworkers said that she was on the computer waiting to get tickets.  I went on my phone to see if I could get tickets, and what I got was a webpage that said there was at least a one hour wait.  I checked on the way home, without luck.  So, who knows when I'll be able to return to Disneyland.  It will certainly be later in the year.  And maybe it's too early now anyway.  Also, Emma looks nice in that picture.

Friday, April, 16, The administrators at Central have been "busy" moving furniture around at Central in order to get ready for opening on Monday.  Because I was taking my aunt to her doctor's appointment in the afternoon I only worked until 12:30pm.  In that short amount of time I was still able to get a lot of books out to the branches.  Once again these dopes sent out the float "overflow" to the branches.  I basically drove and dumped the bins at the branches.  I had one special delivery to pick up some items at graphics.

I told my aunt that there is no way I'm allowing her to go to a doctor's visit on her own from now on.  True to that word I went with her to see the doctor for a post hospitalization visit.  They wanted to make sure she was OK and that there were no issues.  So far, so good.  The doctor did order up some blood tests, because my aunt's weight went up about ten pounds since her last doctor's office visit.  That's unusual, so they wanted to check some things.  All in all a good visit.  Yes, it was a little long.  We arrived at 1:45pm, as told, but we didn't leave until 3pm.  That's a little long, but oh well.  Aside from that I see that my aunt looks better.  She still walks slow, but on the security cameras in the house I see that she's active.

I told Emma that one of our coworkers got tickets to Disneyland yesterday.  She asked me if I wanted her to try to get us tickets.  I said damn right she should.  About an hour plus later Emma was telling me she was in the system.  I told her we could go on a Monday, not just on a Saturday.  Well, she found that we could go on Memorial day.  Yes Virginia, we're going to DISNEYLAND!  It's going to cost a pretty penny to go, but I want to go.  Even if it's only once this year.  More details as I learn them from Emma.

Saturday, April, 17, I was texting Emma if the trip to Disneyland was confirmed for May 3st.  She said she didn't know, because she couldn't figure out the reservation system.  She gave me her password and I logged into the Disneyland website.  Sure enough, she hadn't made the reservation for any day.  Within a few minutes I was able to confirm our reservation.  Yay!  We're going to Disneyland on Memorial day!  This, is going to be epic.  For sure we're going to arrive early and leave late.  I have no idea what time they open now.  Oh, and what time they close as well.

Jade sent me a text early this morning complaining about someone moving some bins off "his" desk.  First off, I did it.  I took those damn bins off "his" desk.  Secondly, they were not on "his" desk, they were on the desk next to what is his desk.  He keeps them there just so people don't sit next to him.  They are always empty.  One bin had some cardboard rolls, but aside from what those bins never had anything in them.  I fucking hate that when the library reopened after the renovation that he took a bunch of the bins and used them for magazines, books, and whatever.  That diminished the amount of bins I had at my disposal.  And that's what they're for, delivery.  They're not for storage.  They're not for other things.  Like I said, he only wants them there in order to keep others from using that space.  Fuck this guy.  I like how at the end of the text he says he's going to report it to Mala.  Ha ha.  Go right ahead, it was her need to send all those books out to the branches that necessitated taking his bins away.  Let her tell him they're not "his" bins, nor that it's "his" desk.  That desk is useless because he monopolizes it those bins.  He just wants to be in that corner alone.  Well too bad.  I'm going to suggest when my supervisor returns that we need to ditch the desk in what would have been Herr's office.  That room needs to be totally redone.  We have this huge area that's not used properly.  It's time we better that.  Also, fuck Jade.

Sunday, April, 18, I haven't had much luck with my submissions to art galleries and such.  The Brand library at work has a couple of times a year where they ask for submissions.  I think I've submitted my work to them at least three times, maybe even four times, without a single call back.  Today I submitted the picture above for my latest submission.  I don't know if it's any good, but it's worth a shot to try.  If it doesn't go anywhere it's yet another "Oh well" moment for my work and me.

Tuesday, April, 20, Last night before going to bed I decided to jerk off and have some booze, at the same time.  After finishing up I still drank a little more.  Around 4am I woke up feeling wet.  At first I wasn't exactly sure what was going on.  But it didn't take long for me to realize I had pissed my pants.  I took my clothes off and stripped the bed.  I'm not exactly sure why I peed the bed, but I did.  I want to say it was the booze, but I've never done that before.  If it doesn't happen again I'll be able to chalk it up to the drinking.  If not, then maybe it's something else.

There wasn't much going out to the branches today in terms of books.  But, I was given a special assignment to bring back RFID pads and receipt printers.  That filled most of my time.  I stopped off at Montrose and Emma was there.  She wanted to have lunch together.  But, Mala was around and I didn't feel comfortable with her around.  Too bad.  So I had lunch at Casa, something I haven't done in years.  It was OK, but having lunch with Emma would have been better.  Perhaps Thursday.

I was on the route and while moving some books to other bins in order to be able to use a bin I noticed three books fall out of the bin (see above).  Three of the same book fell out.  Three.  Of course having three copies of the SAME book in one location is completely stupid.  Yet another fail.  Also, I pointed out today that most of those books we delivered to the branches have not been checked into that location.  That means in the computer that they still show as being at Central.  Good job, dopes.  Now if someone wants to place a book on hold that's in one of the bins they won't be able to find them, because who knows what book went to what location.  Again, good job dopes.

The other night I tried to get Talia an appointment to get vaccinated.  Her phone died, so she could not text me back after I as asking her questions about availability.  Today I tried again and succeeded to get her an appointment for May 4th.  She'll have to take a short bus right to Beverly Hills.  I'm glad I could do this for her.  I want her to be vaccinated.  I was starting to wonder if it was going to be possible, because it seemed like every time I would ask her about her availability.  But, I went ahead and made the appointment first and then told her, not the other way around.  Success!

Wednesday, April, 21, My assignment today at San Marino was to talk videos of the librarians for the upcoming fundraiser.  The fundraiser is coming up in about two weeks, and there is a lot to get done before then.  Of course the kid here gets to do a bunch of that work.  It's a living.

Pseudo supervisor said that she was talking to the head librarian today and she mentioned to her that the library might open June 1st.  MIGHT.  Big emphasis on the might.  A lot of things need to happen, mainly the code enforcement officers would have to be moved back to the police station.  If that doesn't happen then we're not opening any time soon.  But if it does, then supposedly we're opening at 75% capacity.  I think that's overkill, but I think most days even before the pandemic we didn't come anywhere near being at capacity.  Perhaps when the kids would get off of school, but not otherwise.  I was kinda liking not having to deal with the public.  It was a dream that could not last forever.

TheGirl and I went to dinner up the street from her house at this place called the Morrison.  It was a wee chilly out, so Cheyenne needed her sweater (see above).  I had some nachos, because I've had nachos on the brain since I looked their origin up earlier this week.  I wanted to find out why they were called nachos.  Nacho is the nickname for someone named Ignacio.  Well, it turns out that some guy named Ignacio worked at a restaurant when a group came in and asked for something new.  He went into the kitchen, the story goes, and took some freshly made chips and put cheese on top.  After placing them under a broiler for a few minutes he topped them off with jalapenos.  Ta da!  The customers asked him what they were called, in order to be able to order them again next time.  He named them, "Nacho's special."  The name stuck, and from then on they were probably just called nachos.  And so, I had nachos on the brain.  They hit the spot.  As always, it was a great night.

Thursday, April, 22, Talia's birthday is Sunday.  I thought of buying her a gift, and really by that I mean a gift for me.  I bought her the above fishnet bodystocking.  Insert sexy whistle here.  She wants to take pictures, so I figured this stocking would be a good thing for her to pose in.  I hope she wears it well.  *wink*

Jade won the last round of BS, getting to keep those damn bins next to his desk.  Not only that, this latest win for him has even embolden him to not just have the bins he had before, but he added bins to his collection.  What a douche.  I like to know where he got these bins, because they all look brand new.  My coworker and other driver thought that maybe he took some of the new bins.  I checked, and these bins are not from the new batch.  Zero idea where this guy gets off using these bins as nothing but a barrier to keep others away from his desk area.

I wanted to check out the tally of people that have come through the doors at Central.  It's not nothing, but you can't say it's a lot of people.  I think that's a good thing though.  I think the one thing these dopes upstairs in administration got right is the idea of not announcing the reopening with big fanfare.  Keeping the amount of people coming to the library low is a good thing.  We're not over this pandemic.  And yes, the majority of us are now vaccinated, but that doesn't mean we can't catch Covid and act as a carrier.  That's really my biggest fear right now.  By the way, the announcement of the library reopening wasn't big because these dopes upstairs never communicate with anyone about anything.  It was not so much a thought out thing, more something that's in line with their usual thinking.

Friday, April, 23, Jade and I talked about a book that I brought down from Montrose a couple of weeks ago.  At that time he said he was going to mail it out to the school that it came from, in the Valley.  I asked him about it today and he said that it was among the stuff that Tony threw away when Tony took away his bins.  Little does he know that I'm the one that took his bins away, not Tony.  So Tony could not have thrown anything away.  Once again, another lie.  He continued by saying that he didn't know where the book was.  I'm hoping that the responsible person in our office actually sent it away.  I have to ask him next week.  Because Jade is not to be trusted.  I know nothing was thrown out.  I didn't throw anything away, I simply took those bins from that desk that he claims is his desk.  Liar.

Fridays I still get to have lunch by myself at Montrose.  My coworkers are now in the building the rest of the week.  So now that I'm driving Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, I get to see them.  But Fridays are still mine.  The funny thing I wanted to point out that the sign where I sat said that I had a one hour limit, and added that no food or drinks were allowed.  Funny since I was having lunch there.  I have to keep remembering that this is a unique time and that I need to enjoy it.  Well, that goes for everything, even not during a pandemic.

Despite the fact that it was a wee bit cold today I still felt like hanging out in my backyard.  I'm glad I did, it was nice.  It turned out to not be that cold.  Only thing missing was a glass of wine.

As I sat in my backyard I was watching a video on social media about making restaurant reservations at Disneyland and I thought about my upcoming trip to Disneyland.  I sent Emma a text about it and said that maybe we should make a reservation.  She went to work and made the reservation for Carthay Circle.  We are now all set for our trip to Disneyland in late May.  Woo hoo!

Saturday, April, 24, Last night my finger was bothering me.  The dry skin felt itchy.  I started to pick at it, taking pieces of it off my finger.  I didn't realize until later that I had taken a huge hunk of skin off of my finger (pictured above).  It doesn't hurt that much, but it looks terrible.

Sunday, April, 25, I drank a bit after my aunt went to bed last night.  I stayed up late a bit as well.  Today I just chilled in my back yard.  It got cold and I went inside to watch the Oscars.

Tonight was really quiet.  I don't remember the last time I didn't randomly hear the neighbor's dogs barking at random times.  It was nice.

Monday, April, 26, I only went into San Marino for a couple of hours this morning due to the fact that I was taking my aunt to go see her specialist.  This appointment should have been a visit she made on April 1st.  But, that was the day after she fell and was in the hospital for over a week.  Hence her missing that appointment.  I rescheduled it for today, and it went well.  And it got me off work early, which is always good.  Ha!

The doctor that we went to today was an Endocrinologist, which my aunt has to see at least one a year.  My aunt liked the new doctor.  I'm glad that the doctor told her that she HAS to take her medication "religiously."  She told her that it was like, "Oxygen" for you.  I hope that got through my aunt's thick skull.  Because I know she regularly doesn't take the prescribed dose, which is wrong.  If the doctor prescribes say 5mg of some medication and you only take half, the doctor will go by the assumption that you are taking it all.  So if there are no results they will often up the dose, to say 10mg.  But of course it also depends if the patient then takes 5mg or still takes less.  Then the doctor might up the dosage again.  My aunt seems to think lying to the doctors is a good idea.  They're just going to continue to up the dosage, and that's what she doesn't get.  They are going by the assumption that she's taking the correct dosage.  She wonders why the doctors up her dose, it's because of this.  I hope she finally understands.

It was late when I went on social media to check some things.  One thing I saw was a post by Disneyland showing the lighting of Sleeping Beauty's castle.  Boy, they know how to tug at my heartstrings.  With each video or online post I see of Disneyland I get really emotional.  Emotional as in happy.  I'm thirty-five days from going to Disneyland for the first time in over a year.  Not going for over a year is not a record for me.  I've often gone years without going.  But was not in that when everything closed down.  I was doing about every two weeks, and I loved it.  Emma going with me didn't hurt.  But then Covid closed everything up and we couldn't go.  It was a forced exile.  But now it's almost time to go back.  Things are going to be different, but it's still going to be tremendous fun.  I know it.

Tuesday, April, 27, Jade really is a fucking asshole.  Jade not only has permission to do this shit, he has to announce it to the world that his bins are not to be moved.  Fucking idiot.  I said it before, but of course none of these bins have anything in them.  They never have anything in them.  What a fucking moron.

There isn't much I say about the route today.  It wasn't exciting.  The one out of the new ordinary thing that happened today was that I spotted the Redhead that works in the Perkin's building.  I wasn't even sure she was going into work.  I figured she must have been working from home.  Not that this one sighting means that she isn't normally working from home, just that I saw her today.  How can I get to talking to her, I wonder.

Emma texted me this morning to ask what time I was going to be having lunch.  I told her I usually have lunch at noon.  She said she could have her lunch at that time.  I told her that I could push it to 12:30pm.  And that's the exact time I showed up, 12:30pm.  We had lunch in the Montrose community room, talking about our plans for Disneyland.  Our third in our Disneyland trio told Emma that she wanted to go to Lamplight lounge.  I'm good with that.  Emma said she would try to make a reservation for dinner.  Nice!  I told her that one of the things that is now on my Disneyland bucket list is getting a caricature from the lady that does that in New Orleans Square.  If not this time she will be there eventually.  And I'll be back.

Talia's flowers arrived today.  Next time I should order them earlier than I did this time.  Geez, am I saying this is going to be a regular thing?  All I know is that she felt really nice getting those flowers.  She's alone in the world now.  She has no parents, and no close family.  If I can cheer her up a little I'm happy with that.

Disneyland posted another video on social media today (see above).  They really know how to pull at the heartstrings.  I really need to make a checklist of things I definitely want to do when I go to Disneyland next month.

Wednesday, April, 28, One thing I have been surprised about is that there haven't been many improvements done to either of the library buildings I work in in the last year.  I know that at the beginning of this pandemic there wasn't much that could be done.  But now, since the start of 2021 things are different.  In some cases there is some sort of moment to doing improvement projects while the libraries are closed.  Now that doesn't apply at Glendale, since we've now been open to the public for three weeks.  But at San Marino there is still talk that we may not open any time soon.  Perhaps June, perhaps the end of June.  So this is a perfect time to get some projects done, and one is the tinting of the windows.  These windows are great for letting in natural light, but they also in a sense let in too much light.  In the late afternoons the sun comes through and blinds anyone on the reference desk.  It doesn't last long, since the sun does move around pretty fast.  But for those fifteen minutes to twenty minutes it's almost impossible to see what's on the computer screens at reference.  I will say that by the time the guy left for the day I didn't really notice too much of a difference in the windows.  Hmmm.

Tonight TheGirl and I had dinner at the Smokehouse in Burbank.  They have good booze there, that's for sure.  I ordered up two lemon drops, and a burger.  The burger was OK, but the lemon drops REALLY hit the spot.  TheGirl was telling me about her daughter and how her ex-husband was asking her if their daughter was dating anyone.  TheGirl replied to him, "Don't you know?"  Basically he should know since their daughter lives with him.  She's not dating anyone, but he should know that, so TheGirl thinks.  It's hard, because their daughter doesn't want to talk to her father about this.  Actually, that makes a lot of sense.  We don't often tell our parents about our romantic life.  Most people feel it's not something they share with their parents.  It was a good night.  Cheyenne was adorable as ever.

Thursday, April, 29, We just had an all staff meeting a couple of months ago, but these dopes set up another one for today.  Of course it was completely pointless and stupid.  A nice little email would have suffice.  But, I will say that it was nice just sitting around listening to their tripe for an hour, an hour that I get paid for.  Still, there was a LOT of bullshit said during the meeting.  Here's a little of it.

They started off the meeting with some talk about this and that and then moved into patting the dopes who work here in the back.  The virtual back, of course.  There's a strange thing about that graphic, and it may be just because, but they didn't include my name in the list of people that have worked here for over eleven years.  To be fair it might have been included in the last meeting, but I honestly don't remember.  Still, it's fucking bullshit.

Then the back patting went to their own backs in administration.  The slide above mentions, "Great policy."  I don't know ANY patron that has said anything remotely close to, oh you have great policies.  Who would EVEN know what the library polices are until they were breaking them?  Fucking idiots.

During the latter part of the meeting they started talking about the upcoming renovation to the children's room and the teen area.  Both are areas that were either not touched in the previous renovation (children's) or totally fucked up in the last renovation (teen's).  If these rendering above are anything like what is really going to be done then these renovations will be ten times worse than the last renovation, which was a complete fail.  I remember seeing a comment by someone that was reviewing the plans, and they asked, "Where are the books?"  If you look at the renderings one of them doesn't have any books in sight.  The other has some books in the background.  I'll say it now, just another fail.

After the meeting my coworker and I got to work on the main project for today.  We were tasked with moving a bunch of bound newspapers.  Now these things easily weight between eight to twelve pounds.  Some are a little thinner, but most are around the ten pound range.  We didn't could them all individually, but a quick count showed that there were about a hundred books that we moved today.  And it's not just in one solid move.  We had to take them were they were in storage and place them in the van.  Once back at Central we had to take them off the van and put them in storage.  That's four times, because they went from the room in storage to carts to the van and then back to carts only to finally arrive at the library storage.  That means that we essentially moved four hundred books today.  No wonder I'm dead tired tonight.  I got home and ate something and then went to my room and lay in bed until I started writing this journal about an hour ago.  I'm just glad this thing is done.

LaFlor was the score keeper for tonight's trivia challenge done by the San Marino library.  She dressed up as Dwight Schrute for the occasion (see above).  She is a sexy girl, even with that outfit on.

Friday, April, 30, I saw TheLooker as I was leaving work yesterday, but I just waved at her as I slinked out the door.  I was exhausted.  Today I felt less tired, and TheLooker was at work early.  So we chatted about restaurants, local and in Santa Barbara.  She looked nice today.  She sat next to me at one point and I just wanted to reach out and kiss her.  I know, it's terrible.

For lunch on Fridays I usually buy something from a fast food joint.  Today I didn't want a burger, since I had a burger on Wednesday.  Burger Queen had a new chicken sandwich, and I figured that was better than a burger.  Well, not quite.  It wasn't bad, but it also wasn't that good.  It felt wrong, probably because the chicken likely was filled with water.  It had a bit of a rubbery feel, and it wasn't that good.  Not horrible, but I know that I won't have it again.  Oh well.  I'll just stick to burgers from Burger Queen.  Actually, I thought about how I should order smaller burger meals from Burger Queen on Fridays.  Instead of getting the regular Whopper I think I'll order the Junior Whopper.  Yeah, I need to eat less from fast food joints.

I showed a picture of the stupid carpet that I nearly tripped over at Montrose in a previous entry.  Today I became curious to see what was under the carpet.  It turns out it's a little Ethernet splitter.  This is yet another fail.  Why couldn't they take a Ethernet cable and not have this splitter right where people walk?  Whatever.  Idiots.

As I was driving home Ilsa sent me a message that the library director at San Marino quit.  I had to look up when he started, and of course I don't have an exact date, but he started in late September/early October.  That means he lasted just barely over six months.  I never had an actual conversation with him in that time.  Oh well.  Ilsa told me that he was going to give his two week notice, but that the city manager said it was unnecessary and that he could go immediately.  That city manager is the worst.  I can only imagine how terrible she must be that this guy had to bolt after just barely six months.  Oh well, on to the next dope.