Thursday, January 18, 2018

Hawaii and Missiles Don't Mix

As I previously mentioned, I’m in Hawaii. You probably couldn’t tell, what with the very few posts and even fewer photos we’ve plastered all over social media.

But if you had asked me a month ago what I was going to be doing in January, my answer would have been, “Oh, probably freezing, like everyone else in Ohio.”

Instead, I’m relaxing and enjoying the sunshine and warmth and the absolute beauty that is Maui. 

How it happened was all rather random. One evening in mid-December I came home from work. Vince had had the day off and, instead of doing helpful things around the house like, oh, like laundry, he spent the day chatting with family and friends online and over the phone. 

But – in this instance – that was okay. Because he reconnected with an old friend, Donna. And Donna was heading to Hawaii at the end of the month. She had invited another couple to join her for a couple weeks in January, but they had had to cancel at the last minute. It just so happened that Donna was talking to Vince right after the couple cancelled.

So during the conversation, Donna spontaneously asked Vince if he and I would be interested in taking a vacation to Hawaii.

Um…yeahhhh! Like she had to ask twice.

Talk about being in the right place at the right time. 

The thing was, though, Donna and I had never met before. When Vince asked her about it, Donna’s response was, “Well, if she’s married to you, then she’s probably a nice person.”

Nevertheless, Vince suggested the three of us get together to make sure we were all compatible. So we did – and we were. And so we decided we’d love to go.

Of course, the hurdles were, (a) could we get reasonable flights in this short a time and (b) could Vince get the time off work?

When the answers were “yes” and “yes” – I started mentally packing. 

Oh, who am I kidding? I was already upstairs dragging my flip flops, summer clothes and suitcases out of storage!

And before too much more time passed, we were winging our way to Maui.

So now we’re spending our days in the sunshine. We have relaxed, eaten great food, dug our toes in the sand, hung out by the pool, gone sightseeing and shopping. And we still have some fun things in store.

So we are loving it.

The flight on the way here, however, was long and arduous. Last time I spent that much time in an airplane, I was traveling to another country. And the flight attendants offered free booze. Take a note, United Airlines. But we made do with water and juice to stay hydrated and I read an entire book from Denver to Maui – so I wasn’t completely bored.

When we arrived in Maui, Donna met us at the airport with real flower leis. They were beautiful and smelled heavenly!

As it was late afternoon, we went to an Italian restaurant near the airport for some sustenance. Both Vince and Donna had steak – probably the last time either of them have had anything except seafood. Makes sense, sure, but for this non-seafood-loving traveler, I was pretty happy with the chicken and pasta on the menu!

I fell asleep pretty early that night – and slept in pretty late the next morning. When I awoke, I started my morning routine. I had barely finished brushing my teeth when I saw an Emergency Alert come over my phone, which stated:

EMERGENCY ALERT
BALLISTIC MISSILE THREAT INBOUND TO HAWAII.
SEEK IMMEDIATE SHELTER. THIS IS NOT A DRILL.

My first thought was someone who was really, REALLY good with computers was playing a joke on me.

My second thought was, Oh crap. We just got here. And now we’re going to die?

But rather than rush out to see where Vince and Donna were, I just stayed in the bedroom and got dressed for the day. I figured we were on the fifth floor – if it was real, we were goners anyway. I might as well apply a little lipgloss and fluff my hair. If it was a joke, I’d be ready for the day. And if it wasn’t, well, it wouldn’t matter.

Truthfully, I concluded that if it were a real threat, Vince would’ve come in to tell me he loved me so we could kiss each other goodbye or something. I had brief visions of the old couple on the Titanic who lay down on their bed fully dressed with their arms around each other waiting to sink together into the murky depths.

Instead, I heard nothin’.

A little while later, I saw another alert flash over my phone that said, basically…Oops. Our bad.

Vince and Donna had been out on the lanai talking and drinking coffee. When they saw the initial alert, they had called down to the front desk to ask about the alert. They were told to stay in the room, close the drapes and lock the door. 

Phhht. Like that would’ve helped protect us from a missile.

Since then, many natives have asked us if we were around on Saturday during the “crisis.” It was truly frightening to people who live here. And many friends back home have told us they were thinking about us during the initial scare. Guess we didn’t realize that it had been national news.

Leave it us to arrive in Hawaii just as an employee got a little trigger happy on the computer. Yeesh.

Ah well. It was a relief to know we were safe - at least for now. And we have more stories to add to our Hawaii arsenal. 

Just another day in paradise - right?!




Wednesday, January 17, 2018

The Cookie Factory

It’s the middle of January and I’m in Maui. As in Hawaii. How did THAT happen??!

Well, before I get into all that, I have to explain why it has been so long since I’ve written anything. I have written very few emails in the past few months. We didn’t send out a single Christmas card or letter this holiday season – the first time I’ve EVER missed since I’ve been an adult.

And I haven’t written a single blog since November.

So why the long delay? Well, besides the fact that I’m getting a tad bit lazy in my old age?

It’s because I took a seasonal job, which started in October. This was completely on a whim, mind you.

Evidently, my whims are not to be trusted.

My friend and neighbor, Suzy, took a seasonal job at Cheryl’s Cookies, a local “cookie factory” (as Vince calls it) that had gone national when it was purchased by 1-800Flowers a few years ago. But the main office and actual cookie factory is still down the road a piece in Westerville, which is near me.

When Suzy told me they were looking for additional seasonal help in Customer Service, I figured, Eh, why not? And went in on that aforementioned whim, applied, and was hired on the spot.

Fortunately, the job did not require me to speak to actual customers; I only had to respond to emails. This was a good thing, because I would not have been interested in dealing with upset customers over the phone.

The job started with a two-week training for four hours a day. And then, once we were considered trained, we moved to six-hour days. This was to get us conditioned for the 9+-hour day, six days a week efforts we ended up putting in once Thanksgiving passed and we headed into the mad holiday rush.

Who knew cookies were such a hot commodity these days? I really thought it was the one time of the year that people actually baked cookies at home.

Not so much.

We were told we could expect about 500 emails a day during the month of December, which is why they hire additional seasonal help. A normal number of emails might be anywhere from1-200.

Imagine our consternation, then, when we came in to five THOUSAND emails instead of five hundred. And no matter how hard we tried, we couldn’t make those numbers go down!

Problem was, the company implemented a new computer program/system a few months prior and the bugs had not yet been worked out. So we had production problems. And distribution problems. And shipping problems. We even ran out of cookies.

So we apologized. And gave back money. And apologized some more.

But we persevered. And, eventually, the numbers slowed down. The general manager held a meeting to discuss the problems and to thank everyone for their efforts. And the CEO of 1-800Flowers even flew in to do the same.

So it was definitely not business as usual. Which is a shame. Because I never want to go through that again.

I barely had time to put up a Christmas tree. I hurriedly shopped for all my gifts on Cyber Monday and, if I didn’t order gifts that day, I picked up gift cards when I shopped for groceries. And I only did that when we were completely out of staples like bread or milk.

I was exhausted most of the time. And the dog didn’t know what hit her – she had been so used to me being home to walk her whenever the urge came over her. Frankly, I think she likes to go out so often just to sniff out all the creatures that have been walking around her neighborhood rather than simply to tinkle.

But poor Maggie didn’t get that chance over the past three months. When I finally got home to take her out, she was desperately lunging at the door. So there was no sniffing pee mail at first.

Anyway, so that’s what I’ve been doing lately.

I apologize to those who normally get a card and a Christmas letter from us. I am sorry that I haven’t been in better touch. And I know I’ve missed some opportunities to write some good blogs.

Now I can’t even remember what those blogs were going to be about!

So I guess I’ll start from scratch.

And my next blog? Well, I guess I can tell you how we came to be vacationing in Hawaii.