Grueling Two Days

I had two very hard work days this week at the Post Office. I was determined to have Tuesday off this week so I shut my cell phone off so they couldn't call me. As luck would have it, they were short carriers Tuesday and tried to call me in. As they couldn't get me, they cut back the mail that didn't have to go out THAT day. (Don't get alarmed. All the important mail was delivered.) Bad luck for me, the next day I got to do one of the routes they cut back on. I was seriously swamped. I desperately tried to catch up but it was an uphill battle. I hoped that I might get lucky package wise and have only a few to deliver. My hopes were dashed as one lady alone received 20 packages over the two days I had to do rural route 7 and she lives on the third floor on her apartment building. The only good thing I could say about Wednesday and Thursday was it helped me go into overtime. I should get over 13 hours of it this week. Still, I'm big time wiped out. Next week, I'm supposed to have 3 days off BUT the Post Office has been expecting me to help out on the city routes on the days I'm not working the rural routes. I'm debating whether to help out on the city routes or not. So far, I haven't been able to make up my mind. We'll see what happens.

Recycling

I did my little bit for the environment yesterday. I finally loaded up my car with all the plastic bottles and jugs, fliers, glass jars and cardboard I've been saving and drove to the Glen Burnie Recycling Depot. There I dropped the stuff off so it could be recycled. It wasn't much but at least the stuff didn't end up in a landfill. I was also able to get rid of a broken VCR, an ancient 28.8K modem, my broken digital camera and a semi-broken CD player that I've been meaning to get rid of. I figured it would be better to get rid of those at the depot vice putting them in a dumpster. Hopefully, they can salvage the metal in them at least.

Long Day

I had a long work day yesterday. I was scheduled to work at the Post Office on rural route 7. I was looking forward to route 7 as it is one of my favorite routes. I always seem to do well on it. Shortly after I arrived at the Post Office, the Postmaster walked up to me and asked if I could help with the city routes after I was finished doing route 7. I wasn't keen on helping but I knew they were probably in a big bind. I offered to do 1 hour on city routes as I was pretty certain I could finish route 7 by 5 p.m. The Postmaster accepted my offer and left. I was now in a bind. I had to finish route 7 by 5 p.m., help deliver mail on the city side for 1 hour, do a mystery shop at a local Weis supermarket and work a show at Medieval Times. It was going to be a long day.

Route 7 went as expected. I had no problems and made few mistakes to my relief. When I returned to the Post Office, they had the mail ready for me to deliver on the city side. They had me walk a short loop called Snowden Loop in Laurel. All totalled, I delivered mail to maybe 20 homes. I found it kinda neat.

After finishing with that, I drove back to the Post Office to wrap everything up. Once I was clear at the Post Office, I had to rush to a nearby Weis supermarket where I had to do a mystery shop. I was hoping the store wouldn't be that busy. I wasn't so lucky. I guess a bunch of people were doing their last minute shopping. I picked up the store's weekly ads at the entrance so I could find out what was on special. One thing I have to do during my mystery shops at Weis is buy at least one item that is on sale. The point of that is to see if the cashier tells me how much I saved with my Weis discount card. They're supposed to but I've seen in a number of cases where they haven't.

The store was nice and the people working there were enthusiastic. There were only two things I could ding them on: a number of sale items were missing on the shelves and there was some water on the floor in one of the aisles that should've been mopped up. The store also ended up providing me something to eat prior to the show I had to work at Medieval Times. I bought a pound of bologna and munched on that when I arrived at Arundel Mills Mall.

After finishing the bologna I bought, I walked into the mall and decided to treat myself to a Dairy Queen blizzard. These are ice cream treats where they mix in various things like Heath toffee bar or Butterfinger bits with vanilla ice cream. They're really good and I enjoyed the one I bought. Unfortunately, I also got in slight trouble with the castle over it. I walked into the arena and continued to eat the thing. Employees aren't supposed to eat anything in the arena. I forgot this and got caught by the Operations Manager who in turn got on my supervisor's case about it. Mike, my supervisor at the castle, was having another tough day. Batteries for the radios the departments use to communicate were running out of charge making extremely hard for everyone to communicate. Also, the castle was doing three shows and after the third show, one group was going to have an awards ceremony. The last thing Mike needed was the Ops Manager getting on his case about something I did. Damn!

The show itself went fine. It has become seriously old hat to work the spotlight at the shows. I know the cues by heart now. The only thing I work on now is promptly opening and closing the shutter on the spotlight during the cue. It looks more professional if you open and close the shutter crisply vice having it linger. Ideally, you want all four people to open and close their spotlights at the same time but there is always going to be slight variances between the operators. In my case, at times I was smack on and other times I was little slow. It didn't help things that I was tired.

My work day wasn't over when I finished the show at Medieval Times. When you do a mystery shop for ICCDS, you have 12 hours to fill out the survey you have to do after the shop. The survey asks all kinds of questions on customer service, sale items being available and store cleanliness. Once you finish the survey, the website software will prepare an invoice so you can be paid for your shop. You can mail, fax or email the the invoice and receipt (from your shop) to ICCDS. ICCDS's website will tell you when they've received your paperwork (which is pretty nice). The survey took me approximately 10 minutes to finish. I printed the invoice and planned on sending it in the next day.

My work day was finally over and I blissfully crashed. Today, I get to work at the castle again. I look forward to it as I enjoy playing one of the castle guards. Tomorrow, I'll get to do rural route 10 which I hate. The only good thing is I'm scheduled to work 4 days this week and should get my 40 hours in so I'll get paid for all the hours I'll work at the Post Office. I'm supposed to have Tuesday completely off i.e. I won't be working at the Post Office or the castle. I hope to do my quarterly recycling trip to the Anne Arundel County recycling depot. I also hope to visit the Baltimore Aquarium. If I get to do the trip to the Aquarium, I plan to post a blog on here about it. Stay tuned. Cheers!

Show Review - "Annie"

I got to see the musical "Annie" last night at the Baltimore Hippodrome Theater. The show is based on the depression era comic strip Orphan Annie. It tells of the 7 or 8 days leading up to Christmas in 1933 and shows how she meets her future step-father billionaire Oliver Warbucks.

I found the show to be absolutely delightful. The young girls in the show who play Annie's fellow orphans were outstanding. At times, they were very funny. At other times, they were very touching. All did a great job with the songs they sang. Marissa O'Donnell who plays Annie did a fantastic job as she sang and acted into people's hearts. The interaction between her and Conrad John Schuck who plays Oliver Warbucks was particularly touching and amusing. Warbucks doesn't know what to do with this precocious youngster and it makes for some great laughs. Elizabeth Broadhurst who plays Warbuck's kind hearted personal secretary Miss Farrell was equally outstanding. She exuded great amounts of warmth in the show that were very touching.

Overall, the show was fantastic from beginning to end. It had great song numbers and superb acting. I was surprised by a number of great comic lines they had in the show. You'll get plenty of laughs during the show. Kids will particularly like this show as they'll be greatly amused by the antics of Annie and her fellow orphans. The show was superbly supported by an excellent orchestra conducted by Kelly Ann Lambert. This is one show those with kids or who are kids at heart won't want to miss. I believe it plays for another 13 days at the Hippodrome. If you live in the area, this is one show you'll want to see.

On a slightly separate note, the Hippodrome offers reserved Grand parking. They have an 11-story parking lot which is attached to the theater. I found using this parking lot to be an invaluable convenience. I was able to park my car and and take one of the parking lot elevators right to the theater. The cost is $10 if you reserve in advance and $7 of the show though you risk them selling out if you try to use it the day off the show. I would definitely recommend using this lot as it makes things enormously easier in seeing any show you decide to see at the Hippodrome. For further information on up coming productions at the Hippodrome, check out their website at: http://www.france-merrickpac.com/home.html.

Restaurant Review - Potbelly

I've been wanting to visit the Potbelly restaurant next to Arundel Mills Mall for a while. It's a sandwich restaurant specializing in 11 different sandwiches. You can get turkey breast, pizza, roast beef, chicken salad, vegetarian, tuna salad, meatball, Italian, A Wreck (salami, roast beef, turkey, ham and swiss cheese) and peanut butter and jelly. All sandwiches are a flat $3.99 plus tax. You have a choice of white or wheat bread. They have bottled sodas or a soda machine. They also sell milk shakes, malts, yogurt smoothies, sundaes, and hand scooped ice cream cones.

I tried the chicken salad and roast beef sandwiches. To drink, I had a vanilla milk shake. I found the sandwiches to be good. They were made right in front of me. They toasted the bread and offered mayonnaise, mustard, italian seasoning, lettuce, onions, pickles, hot peppers, tomato and oil on your sandwich. My only complaint with their sandwiches is that one would not fill you up. Also, there is no way I'm going to pay $4 for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich though I suspect it's popular with the kids. Shake wise, I was very pleased with the vanilla shake I ordered. It was excellent and a lot better than the one you can buy at McDonald's. My only complaint would be its size. It didn't seem very big though it did only cost $1.59 (I think).

Decor wise, the restaurant had an old time feel to it. They had a potbelly stove in the restaurant and stored various sandwich fixings on old time store shelves. It's a pleasant enough place to enjoy a sandwich and drink. Hours were also convenient with the Arundel Mills restaurant open Monday to Thursday to 9 p.m. and till 10 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays.

Overall, I thought the Arundel Mills Potbelly was a nice restaurant. It's a pleasant place to eat. I don't think it's great value. Value wise, I think you'd do better at Chipotle's or Golden Corral. Still, if you're hunkering for a sandwich, it might be the place to satisfy your sandwich craving. Bon Appetit!

Disclaimer: All opinions stated here are my own. I didn't receive any kind of reimbursement from Potbelly nor do they know of my review of their Arundel Mills restaurant. Each person has different tastes so you may like Potbelly better, the same or worse than I did. If you try them, I make no guarantees whether you'll like them or not. For further information on Potbelly, you can check out their website at http://www.potbelly.com.

Maryland Weather

This past week was a showcase of how Maryland is weather wise. Earlier this week, we had sunshine and the temperatures hit the low 70's. Yesterday, the temperatures dropped, it rained all day gradually turning into a freezing rain which made a mess of things. This morning, I got to try to pry my car door open without breaking the handle thanks to the ice freezing it shut. Later, as I was delivering mail, I had to watch out constantly for black ice. It was all very annoying. I suspect the problem weather wise is that Maryland is on the borderline between the North and the South so it gets both kinds of weather. We'll get warm Southern periods of weather then the cold Northern weather will move in. One thing that is particularly hard about Maryland weather is it makes it easy to catch a cold. The constant change in temperature is hard on the body. So far, I've been lucky cold wise (knock on wood). I'm going to keep my fingers crossed and hope it warms up soon. We'll see.

Databasing

I finally started databasing my CD and DVD collections. By doing this, I'll know what I have and stop myself from buying the same CD or movie twice. To my embarrassment, I've done that four or five times. I found out a month ago that I bought the CD The Beach Boys Live in Concert twice. I also discovered I have the Best of the Rippingtons. What's embarrassing about the Rippingtons CD is that I've had it for over a year, didn't know I had it and haven't listened to it yet. I'll have to put that in my stack of music I plan to listen to. I have 5 or 6 CDs in that stack already. You can expect to see some new Music Reviews in the future on this blog.

Daylight Savings Time

Don't forget to move your clocks forward 1 hour. Daylight savings time ended this morning.

Mystery Shopper

I did another mystery shopper shop this evening. It was at another supermarket. Prior to the shop, I checked out the store's weekly ad to figure out what items on special I was going to buy. I also tried to figure out what questions I could ask various departments. Once I had my shopping list and possible questions ready, I drove out to the store. The visit itself went fine though I can't say I would've given the store I checked out the highest marks. Salespeople were no where to be seen in a number of departments and items on sale were missing in some areas. It didn't seem like a number of employees were making any great effort. Overall, I wasn't super impressed with the store. I won't name the store as I don't want to take the chance they might get tipped off that I was doing a mystery shopper visit on them.

Concerning ICCDS, I still haven't gotten paid for any of my mystery shops yet. However, they do have 10 more days to pay me for the first one. We'll see what happens on this score. If worst comes to worst, I'm out around $17 so far which is nothing to me. Stay tuned to see how things work out with ICCDS.

Mystery Shopper Update

I finally decided to see if ICC Decision Services (ICCDS) is a legitimate company. They're the company I've been doing mystery shopper visits for. I contacted the supermarket chain I've visited twice to see if they use them. To my relief, they confirmed they did. It's nice to know I don't have to worry about getting taken in by a scam. Because of that, I definitely plan to do more mystery shops for them. They do offer some nice assignments though they also have some stinkers. I've turned down a number of assignments with them because they haven't offered enough compensation. I'm also limiting my travel range to 30 minutes each way. That way, I don't spend all the money I made doing the shop on gas. We'll see how it goes.

Music Review

I finally got around to listening to one of the CDs I bought a while back. The CD is "Borrowed Heaven" by The Corrs. I've liked some of the stuff the Corrs have done. I think their songs "Breathless" and "So Young" are particularly good. They also did a great instrumental version of "Paddy McCarthy." Sadly, I found their "Borrowed Heaven" to be lacklustre. None of the songs were particularly good. It seemed on some of the songs that the lyrics didn't seem to fit the music. The Corrs did include one instrumental called "Silver Strand" which I thought was nice but not enough make the CD worth buying. In my opinion, this is one CD you can pass on. It isn't a stinker but it isn't worth spending your money on either. I found out from the Corrs website (http://www.corrs.net) that they've come out with a greatest hits. I plan to buy that and see how it is. I'll let you know what I think of it once I've bought it and listened to it. Cheers all!

Agent Ditto

I completed another mystery shopper mission today. It was another supermarket of a major chain. The mission was the same as before. I had to visit all six departments (produce, grocery, meat/seafood, pharmacy, bakery and customer service). I had to ask an associate from each one of the departments some kind of question and grade them on how well they answered if they answered at all. Another duty was rating how well or not the cashier did his/her job when I checked out with my mandatory purchase(s). Supermarket cleanliness both inside and out was another area I had to rate the store on. Lastly, I had to spend a minimum of 35 minutes at the store. I don't know why they mandate you stay that long. I guess to make sure you give the store a good lookover. In my case, the extra time caused to notice that the store's stocking staff wasn't doing their job. I found a number of sale items that weren't on the shelves and they should've been considering the store had only been open an hour when I did my mission. Overall, I found it easier to do the evaluation and play the part of a normal shopper.

I still not sure about the company I'm doing the mystery shopper missions for. I will say again that if they are a scam, they are the most thorough one I've seen. It took a lot of work to come up with the list of questions I have to answer when I do a mystery shopper mission. They also have a very sophisticated website. Plus, I can't see where they could take you for some serious money. I imagine they could apply for a refund from the supermarket chain for the purchases I've made for them but that money is minuscule. Lastly, they are very consistent in what they have you do. I'm waiting to see what happens with my first invoice I submitted for payment. That will give me some idea how legit they are. We'll see what happens.