Hello there everyone! How are you all today?
Well, today I am very well. It’s the 9th now, July 9th, a Thursday, and I actually have Friday off this week. I’m taking my holiday tomorrow, which means I have a three-day weekend! Yey!
Though I have to admit, I feel a little bad whenever I take a day off, becasue I know someone else who works normal hours is going to have to go into the office at 2 a.m. But I like having my days off, too.
But anyway, I should go on with what’s been going on lately. No of course this isn’t going to be in any certain order, but I did my best to write all these things down in chronological order, ya know?
So, first I have been cooking again — which I’m coming to find is a dangerous thing to do — and I sent some cookies off to my directors. It was more or less like, “Hey. . . .I hear ya make cookies,” and I was, like, “Yup,” and then I figured I’d send another box off to Lincoln. I started laughing, thinking that I should start charging for this lol.
Let’s see, then WF and I went to Kearney! It was super cool, I wanted to take a trip to see some of the Nebraska Passport Program places and also just to have something fun to do outside of town, right? So anyway, we get up on Saturday and get all dressed up and all nice, and we drive over and have tea (sans scones and sandwiches because I messed up) at a coffee shop. We stop and have lunch at Cunninghams On The Lake (where I ate with my coworker awhile back), and then head home. It was a wonderful outing — very fun. WF also showed me this film, “Whiplash,” with J.K. Simmons. Very disturbing, but the cinematography is excellent. would recommend.
Now last Monday, June 29, was an uber long day at work, right? My boss asked me (very nicely) if I would be able to cover commissioner’s. And naturally I said that yes I could, cuz ya know, it was extra money and they needed me. So I went to do my normal shift and then stayed to go to this meeting. This time it was actually pretty cool, it was essentially a lot of people very nicely yelling at each other (a construction company made some mistakes and is now going to go fix them). So I went and shot the story, and then put it all together, right? Well since I’m a perfectionist it took awhile, and I ended up working about 12 hours that day.
Oh! Speaking of my boss — so a LOT of people have been going to court lately, right? But before we can go and bring a camera into a court room, we have to fill out this official form and get it approved. So early in the mornings during my shift, I’ve been filling out these papers so that it’s on the court’s desk first thing at 9 a.m. My boss has been super nice about it (since I make a few mistakes on filling them out) but I have to admit sometimes it’s a bit annoying — the stopping everything I’m doing to fill out a form. Especially if I’m super stressed.
But, after that was Tuesday — #TakeoutTuesday — and WF and I went to Tempura, which is on my Netflix and Swill page; it’s a Japanese restaurant and I love their sushi. This this I got their calamari, which was so, SO good. . .oh my god. Truly. They are amazing.
Now onto something super cool. So Humanities Nebraska is starting this new thing to get people more excited about bring stuck at home, right? So, it’s called “Dear Stranger,” and it where you write a anonymous letter to send to someone in another part of the state — and then you get one back. So it’s like a anonymous pen pal about whatever you want. Well, naturally when I saw that in my inbox, I was like “YASSSS” and immediately wrote a letter as soon as I got home. I sent it off either June 30th or July 1st, and I’m supposed to get one back once they “swap” the letters, right? So I’ll get a letter back as long as another person writes (which I’m sure they will), but I’m just anxious to see what I get back!
The leading question for the letter was essentially, “How’s 2020 going so far?” even though you could write about anything you wanted. Well, I went with the prompt, and ya know, just wrote like I was talking to anybody. I told this person about my cooking, a little about my job (vaguely, though), I wrote down some recipe for them. To be honest, I’m super interested in what my letter sounds like to others — as in, when someone reads this, how old do they think I am, you know? But like I said, I’m super excited to get my Anon Letter.
Oh, I got super fancy one day — one day, must’ve been a Thursday or Friday last week — where I made tea in my teapot (Blood Orange tea) and then made scones and bacon. I was super fancy for no reason, and it was glorious.
But(t), I have to tell you about last weekend.
Okay, so my coworker send me a message a few weeks ago, and she’s all, “Hey Erika, could you please cover for me for July 4th? I’m running out of people to ask, thank you for considering it in advance.” Turns out this could be her last summer in Nebraska and she wants to go tanking.
What’s tanking? That’s when you float down a river in a large livestock feeding barrel and drink. Which is one of the most Nebraskan things I have ever heard lol.
But anyway, so I doubled-checked with WF to make sure he was cool being by himself for a night, and he was, so I told my coworker I could cover it. Now, if you’ve been reading this blog — or even if you haven’t — you need to know that I’ve covered the Saturday night shows twice.
Both times where was breaking news: a kid falling off a stage, and a huge fire.
So this time around, especially since there would be fireworks going off, I’m just hoping and praying that there isn’t any breaking news to compound my stress, ya know?
Well, turns out I got lucky this time! Both shows (the 6 p.m. and 10 p.m.) went well; no breaking news, no fires, mostly July 4th content, no technical difficulties, nothing like that. Honestly as much as I didn’t care for the “missing most of my Saturday” thing, it was a very nice and relatively easy way to make 8 hours worth of overtime pay. That is typically how Saturdays are, so I’ve been told, but it just happened to be my first time doing a Weekend Show without breaking news, ya know? But it was nice, super nice. Plus I got to talk to a coworker of mine about stuff.
Now, that being said, the fireworks around town started at about 10 p.m., which is when it got dark. So. What does this mean?
It means my entire 10 p.m. show (30 minutes) sounded like I was in a war-zone, because there were contant BANGs and BOOMs and such. I am certain whoever watched that show could hear it, and we even brought it up being the Goodbye.
In fact, for July 4th, I made a dessert! It was actually the day before, but I made this new thing called a Strawberry Cheesecake Dumpcake, or something like that. it’s strawberry pie filling, droplets of cream cheese, and then topped with a mixture of melted butter and cake mix. Ya back that, scoop it count, top it with some ice cream and it’s good to go. YUM! But ya can only have a little at a time cuz it’s uber sweet.
Now, last Friday night, about a week ago, WF and I made Gobi Manchurian! Okay, so this is a dish from that Indian restaurant we love in Colorado, Haveli’s, and it’s basically fried cauliflower tossed in this spicy, chili sauce. It is so amazing, so delicious, so good — and I suggested that we try to make it for ourselves, right? Well we did, and it turned out great! next time around (which may be tonight) we will need to make double the sauce, but it was just so good. Like, literal mouth-gasm with this dish.
Oh! I also made my own ice cream — in that pint ice cream maker I bought in Kearney during my shopping spree? But this time I made actual ice cream — milk, sugar, vanilla extract, ya know? and let me tell you, it’s amazing. perfectly sweet.
And honestly the last major thing is we are supposed to get a new staff member on Monday, since our office manager is doing orientation that day. I think her name is Stephanie, and she’s a meteorologist and MMJ. Through the grapevine I hear she’s going to be working weekends, and I hope I get to meet her. Not sure if we’ll ever cross paths, but maybe!
But that’s all, actually. I know I didn’t cook a lot this time — only maybe two or three things — but eh, it’s just the way it worked, ya know? But I can’t tell you how excited I am to have this three-day weekend…I mean, a three-day weekend, AND overtime pay from last week? AND I get to cat-sit for my coworker? I’d say I’m sitting pretty at the moment.