Spitfire

I put in 160 hours PLUS 7 overtime hours this month (January). I showed up to work in blistering-cold, -47 degrees celcius weather, severe frostbite factors included. I've been battling pnumonia-like symptoms for over two weeks, and had to walk to work for an entire week now, in such crappy weather.
I missed a total of THREE days this month, and STILL managed to make a normal months of straight, regular hours, plus a tiny little extra in over-time.

I called my boss this morning, gagging against my own shortness of breath and constant urge to cough uncontrollably, and told him I was gonna come in today. I asked him politely if it might be okay if I had to leave early today or not. I am sick, after all, and not sure how I can get through this day, especially in the cold.

The fucker told me to stay at home today. He's upset, because I've been missing SO many days this month. Also, apparently, my attitude seems a little bad at work recently. No shit!
How the hell SHOULD I feel, shoveling 4 feet of snow that's packed and solid like frozen styrofoam, drowning on my own phlem, in temperatures that, to this VERY moment, have scarred my own nose, because I got severe frostbite from the rim of my glasses momentarily freezing to my own flesh?
I'm outside, where nobody wants to be, and nobody can see me. I'm the lone guy, braving the cold, making sure all the rich paper-pushers who come onto our chemical plants in their pointy shoes and expensive coats can safely make it to even the most obscure and least-used doors on our industrial plant site.
I bust my ass, working hard and honest, like any real man should do, and I don't complain about it. If I get too sick to work, trust me, I take a day off. Of course I'm worried about losing face-value at work, and looking like I'm weak or un-fit to do my job. I'd rather NOT be sick folks, and it would be nice to get a full-sized pay-cheque with a lot of extra over-time bonuses in it.

So, he's making me take today off. I'm a little angry at this, but also a little relieved.
Today is the day his accountant takes in our time-cards, and writes us up our one, month-end cheque. Since I can't make it in today, I have to wait until Monday, and then maybe another day for his accountant to process the papers that me and Jamie have to turn in.

Jamie is going to the hospital/clinic to get herself checked out today. Hopefully it's not too serious for her. Me, well, I've been through this before. There's a secret cure. My body knows what to do. I will, like before, eventually cough out a black, chunky-looking piece of phlegm. By then I'll be coughing so hard and painfully that my body will throw-up from the system shock. Once that black phlegm is gone, and the acid from my own puke has scoured my infected bronchial airway clean a few times, my infection will almost immediately go away. Trust me, like I said, this is how it works. It's happened before.
Jamie, well... I know she's tough, but I doubt that she could tough it out hat long on her own. Even as a woman, with her temperament and willpower, she wouldn't be able to endure this like I can.
She's allergic to Penicillin, it'll kill her. So the doctors will have to give her some really nice and powerful ALTERNATIVE drugs to cure her.

Me, I'm too stubborn to seek outside help. I refuse to go to the doctor, and get yelled at by them again for being sick in the first place. I don't like being told that I have to eat 2 servings of good meat a day, and 5 servings of fruit a day. I'm poor, and I can't live up to the 'recommended daily intake' as posted by our Canadian Foods Guide. I can't afford to buy and eat vitamins all the time, nor would it fit in with my lifestyle or routine. I'm more of a naturalist, and I believe simple medicines and cures are the best. Preventative action doesn't mean you have to indulge daily in un-natural drugs or vitamin suppliments. My diet may not be as big as the recommended charts say, but I do eat well, most of the time. It's just our variety and amount is limited, so my body has had to adapt and learn how to survive these many years using natural cravings and urges to set me right when my body is lacking something. I love veggies and fruit, and meat, and fresh, warm bread. I love drinking milk (even though it's not always available), and I keep myself clean and fit as I can.

So, back to my job problems. My boss wants to 'have a TALK' with me this weekend, to discuss my attitude at work, and why I've been missing SO MUCH work. (Boo Hoo...)

I went back to Sherritt for Jamie. She's planning on leaving him soon, so there's no need to stay there, except to make money. I can make money anywhere, and get treated better too. Really, I'm staying there right now only to keep Jamie happy, to help her out at work (when I can, we get pulled apart so often it hurts), and to give her a reliable ride to work every day (well, my trucks currently dead...).

There's a few places hiring right now. There's even a job opening at the Dow Centennial Centre, the place where they have a cool physiotherapy/massage studio that I've been eyeing. If I get a job there, I can make a million contacts easy as pie. Right now they're just hiring clean-up staff, and there's an Orange Julius stand there that's hiring as well. It'd be as glamourous as working at 7-11, minus the graveyard staff duties, the drunks, and convenience store thefts. Everything is behind a counter, so the job would be solely customer service. During the day. I could live with that.
Or, I could suck up my pride, and move up north to work in Fort McMurray, where all the big money is. Sure, I'd have to shift my entire personality and thought processes to become a greedy, self-absorbed work-a-holic like everyone else up there, but I'd be able to get a job. Maybe not a great one at first, but I could easily get my foot into the door with other companies.

What am I talking about? The boss never said anything about firing me yet. I'm sure he's gonna try hard to guilt trip me into working longer and harder for him. Or he's gonna dump more bullshit jobs on me until I break and quit on my own. Or I'll just get a warning, and get sent back to my normal hum-drum job, being lectured to watch how I act at work. The worst thing he could do is try and force me to work extra hard for him, which I wouldn't tolerate at all.
Gary Sharun is a fat, white-blob, who hates women, couldn't get laid if his life depended on it, and is himself a cheap and petty man. However, he is shrewd, and where he lacks common sense, he makes up for in his fierce business and greedy mind. He's a master manipulator, and even though I can obviously see his manipulations, he's too good to counter them.

Shawn Harding (the guy I fought with over Christmas about Jamie) is coming up for a visit this weekend. Him and I have started getting along again, and I've been trying to repair the damage I did.
Jamie isn't interested in anyone right now, not because she doesn't know who she likes yet or not, but simply because her current lifestyle doesn't allow any relationships for her.
If she ends up falling for Shawn, or me, or another guy, then that's her choice. The bottom line is, right now I'm ready to try a relationship, even a small one, with her. She isn't willing or ready to try herself right now. It's a patient waiting game, one which even I can barely slow down for. Still, I bide my time, and send her messages and clues all the time. Hopefully, soon, she'll start to look for what I'm looking for, and possibly consider me as one of her options.
She knows I'm a dependable guy, one who is filled with nothing but love and encouragement for her. I could make her happy, if I wasn't forced to hide my feelings. I could help her live a wonderful life, and as long as we supported each other just a little, we would both easily succeed. I'm the only guy that gets more pleasure from simple cuddling that just sex. I can listen well, offer advice, and find even the strangest of solutions to problems that she builds up to be bigger than they are.
It's true I don't have that edge of danger or mystery that girls crave. Instead, I'm the kind of guy that girls say they want in the end, even as they're eyeing the dangerous creep in the corner by the pool table.
I'm a compassionate, family man, who longs for simple pleasures and joys in life. Some of my dreams are big and un-realistic, but so too are some of hers. Maybe together we could both get what we want out of life, including happiness.
Well, until she's ready, I have to wait. I have to be her good friend and a loving brother until she's grown up a little more.
She's turning 20 this summer, and I remember hitting that age myself. You get shocked, and realize, that you're not really a kid anymore. Sure, as an 18 or a 19 year old, you feel adult, but you don't really believe it until the digits change. I'm hoping by then that she'll start to awaken.

Valentine's Day is coming up. I plan on giving her a romantic letter, and maybe a little something else.
I'm gonna give Stephanie a romantic letter too, so she can show her asshole boyfriend what a real man would write if he were fortunate enough to have an angel like my littler sis.
Steph and I are real close. If I was a girl, she'd be my 'girlfriend', because we have those girly kind of talks all the time. We sit around together, and openly discuss our own personal love issues and problems. We talk about anything and everything, and I think it's wonderful at how smart and mature my kid sis has turned out to be, and still retain that 16 year old kid spirit too.
We sit together on the couch, I give her foot rubs and massages all the time, I comfort her when her boyfriend treats her wrongly on the phone... Basically I'm doing some of the things that I wish I could do with Jamie.
Ironic, that the intimate relationship I want is being done with the person I don't want to have it with. It should be turned around. I should be darting around Stephs life, and getting intimate and close with Jamie.
It does happen, though. Jamie and I have gotten intimate many a time. We hang out together and have many personal chats with one another. We spend a lot of time together, and I listen to her whenever she needs to talk (happens a lot, but still not nearly enough for my liking). I give her hugs and quick rubs/pats of affection. I tell her that I love her all the time now. She drops flirty hints every odd day, usually in an in-opportune time, where I'm either totally unprepared to react to what she says, or is in a public situation where a response made by me, any response at all, would be disastrous.

Lol, look at me.
My blog started off at how mad I am at my boss. Talking about work, a friend that I'm trying to be friends with again, Jamie...
You are always on my mind. Even when I try to let you go for now, and patiently wait until the day you're ready. You are always on my mind.

^_^