this and that.

After dealing with people all week, I've been thinking. I can handle various situations at work. Disgruntled customers, annoying employees, irresponsible trainees, management errors, you name it. But what about as a nurse? I mean, I feel confident in myself that I can properly handle what each day brings, but holy smokes: the things I deal with while making lattes and folding clothes are nowhere near the caliber of the situations I'll be meeting head-on in my profession. How can I ever be ready for that? Pft, someone who complains about getting 2% milk instead of non-fat in their over-personalized-latte has there socks matched properly compared to the parents who need to be told that they just lost their child on the operating table. Good grief. I'm a tad anxious, no lie.

Along the 'work' train of thought, the most BIZARRE thing happened on Monday. But let me backtrack for just a sec. In high school, in grade 10 to be exact, there were a group of grade 12 girls who hated my guts for spending time with one of their guy friends. This young guy and myself dated for only a short short time, but no kidding: these girls, and a certain one in particular, would go out of their way to shove me in the hallways, and deliberately point out every flaw of mine to my brand new interest. This whole cafuffle of nonsense pointed me to a new path, and I left my high school in town for one in the city, and went on to enjoy grade 11 and 12 as a typical teenager should. Praise 'da lord. But it TURNS OUT that the ring leader of that group from my grade ten days is now a Barista at my lovely Starbucks. Working with me. At the same time. SAME SHIFT. Oh yes, hilarious indeed. It has been years since grade 10, and a long long time since I've even thought about my lovely friend - can we call her Opal? - and the havoc she once caused me. Despite growing up and just getting over that deal all together, it was a little bizarre to be working with her, and almost as her superior. I'm an 'oldie' at my Starby's, so I thought that the moments when I was helping her with cash and whatnot stood out to be a little surreal in my mind. It's interesting to see, however, how people change, or remain stagnant, over a couple of years. Opal didn't budge a whole lot: my genuine 'good morning' was met with a forced smile, and my opened ended questions about her travels and past-times got only one-line answers. All in all, our shift together was fine and no references to our past was brought up. There's no need to. But I guess that marks our ground, right? Some people move on and grow up, while others still cling to the past and constantly search for a trace of what once made them 'cool'.

I appreciate the days when I meet a nice gentleman. These days occur around the nights of a blue moon, or the sightings a purple kangaroo. AKA: NEVER. But the other day, my good friends, I met an actual gentleman. (I understand that this term is relevant - for me, it's basically a guy who impresses me. It's proved to be harder than it seems!) It was my Starbucks, of all places. Another barista of my store, of whom I had never personally met, walked right up to me to introduce himself. It wasn't cocky or arrogant, but genuine. And he actually looked at me with a quiet confidence. In stark contrast, the usual word to describe my first impression is 'intimidating', and boy oh boy - it often shows on the faces of most guys I meet. But not with him, which I found so interesting. He remembered my name the first time I said it, and conclude our brief chat with a 'it was great to meet you Danielle, I hope to talk with you again soon!'. UM - confident much?! But just the right amount. He left me intrigued, and wondering when we actually would have a chance to talk again. Too bad he doesn't have dark features or a scruffy beard. We'd be married by now for sure.

My wireless connection at home is utterly awful. According to various tech people, some outside signal is blocking my connection between my Mac and our wi-fi. Essentially, any attempt to connect my laptop to the internet will surely have a detrimental effect on my health. I try to keep my attempts at a bare minimum, and save my patience for when I'm in dire need of a good rant-session. Hopefully this connection whatnot is all sorted out soon - I'll be updating my blog a lot more when this happens. But for now, that's all folks!

Love, D.

ps. - Christmas is in LESS THAN TWO MONTHS! Am I the only one who is counting down??