I started thinking this morning,  if snow storm (part 2!) comes along tonight there's no possible way I'm going to get out of Wellsburg to get to work.  Now I already called off last Friday because I got stuck on Washington Pike due to numerous accidents and a road closure so I couldn't make it in. They're going to get pretty irritated with me being that this is only my second week there.  What can I do though?  I'm not risking my life to get to work.  That would be stupid!  I'm going to miss the hours on my paycheck though! There goes my new laptop out the window, I suppose.

In the latest breaking news,  my cousin Lynn had her baby.  I was awfully worried about her Sunday afternoon because my sister had called and said they were rushing her to Pittsburgh to have the baby because she went into early labor and her blood pressure was sky rocketing.  Three very bad things:  premature labor + high blood pressure + Pittsburgh (anyone from this area knows that if they take you to Pittsburgh it's REALLY serious).  Thankfully, at around 2 AM Monday morning she delivered the baby, Dylan James.  Although they're keeping him for a few weeks because he's premature he's doing very well.  Lynn is doing fine as well and gets to come home Wednesday they say.   I'll post a pic at the end of this of the new baby.

So my power was off the entire weekend.  I had the weekend off from work and didn't really get to enjoy it.  Friday I went to bed with power; Saturday I woke up without.  They didn't fix it until Monday afternoon and by then I was getting ready for my pre-work nap and then heading off to ol' Walmart for a night of fun--ahem* stocking.  So there goes my time off.  And I guess if this snow storm heads back for another round the power might go back out again.  They don't know for sure--but they did say that they didn't have enough durable equipment to keep it up and that it was only a temporary fix until another storm knocked it out.  Go figure.

Oh, and speaking of work--I have to say I worked rather ridiculously hard last night.  It was beyond my abilities.  I got put in with a new girl (I'm new too, but this girl was on her very first day) and a new lady from another store.  Drove me absolutely insane too I might add.  I don't know if the lady from the other store was one of the numerous people they threw at us from downstate since all of our good old people are at the new location stocking the super-center or what, but she thought she knew every single thing there was to know.  She said she'd worked at Wal-Mart for awhile and kept trying to give me pointers but they were things I'd already learned so it was repetitive and mundane.  Then luckily, I got moved to housewares which I was working by myself but it was SOOO much better than working with someone who kept frequently getting on your nerves.  What sucked though was that they moved me right back into foods with that lady for the rest of the night and she kept trying to tell me what to do and making me do all the work.  Well,  that didn't last because at about 6:55 I told her that I was done.  My shift ended at 7 and you absolutely have to clock out on time plus, my ride was going to be there.  She got pretty angry but oh well.  I'll probably get written up or something for not finishing.   I just couldn't wait to get out of there.

Friendship is the cooperative and supportive relationship between people. In this sense, the term connotes a relationship which involves mutual knowledge, esteem, affection, and respect along with a degree of rendering service to friends in times of need or crisis. Friends will welcome each other's company and exhibit loyalty towards each other, often to the point of altruism. Their tastes will usually be similar and may converge, and they will share enjoyable activities. They will also engage in mutually helping behavior, such as the exchange of advice and the sharing of hardship. A friend is someone who may often demonstrate reciprocating and reflective behaviors. Yet for some, the practical execution of friendship is little more than the trust that someone will not harm them.

Value that is found in friendships is often the result of a friend demonstrating the following on a consistent basis:

• the tendency to desire what is best for the other
• sympathy and empathy
  
• honesty, perhaps in situations where it may be difficult for others to speak the truth,  especially in terms of pointing out the perceived faults of one's counterpart
• mutual understanding