Joyless January

Since we couldn't really go anywhere anymore, we settled down at home to take care of some things we've been wanting or needing to do. Christian worked on his stick welding and made his first project.

Rocket Stove

Emily had to hose down all the salt on her truck so that it doesn't rust and eat away the metal on her truck. They salt the roads like crazy in the snow there in Idaho and Utah too. She was also due for an oil change.

Christian also got her some new weather stripping for her window as they were getting old and brittle. Apparently, she broke off some parts of it when de-icing her windows with a ice-scraper in Idaho.

Caitlyn got some bits and pieces for her XJ for Christmas. Emily helped her put them on her car. Caitlyn worked on a few minor projects but didn't get a whole lot done. She had to get back to school a week before her dad.

Emily worked more in earnest in getting a job. Unfortunately, she found out that for a lot of the jobs, they required her to be 18. She applied for a ton of your typical fast food/retail jobs. She didn't hear from most of them. Some seemed to be taking applications but not really hiring. She ended up accepting a job to work at McDonalds but they dragged their feet in getting her started with having to do hours and hours of paperwork and sludge through redtape. Seemed kind of ridiculous. When she finally got some training in and received her schedule for the next week, she found out her boss scheduled her to work on Sundays and some late nights which she specifically stated that she could not do. Her manager disregarded the information she put on her application as well as what she stated in her orientation and what they entered into the computer system as her availability. She argued that that is not what she stated orally at her interview (which we doubt). She kept forgetting that Emily wasn't even 18 and was not currently going to school but insisted that Emily said that her schedule was completely open. Anyway, after a week of training and crap, she quit because of the grief the manager was giving her for "changing her availability."

Emily was super pissed because Wendy's had contacted her after she accepted the job to McDonalds and now she lost that position as well. She went and applied for a few part time jobs at the University Village and had an online interview but nothing became of it. 

First paycheck

After over a week of not being able to find another job, Emily called her manager to find out about getting her paycheck. Her manager offered for her to come back to work. Emily really didn't want to take it because her boss had been such a jerk to her and wasted so much of her time. Plus we spent something like a hundred dollars on clothing and her food handler's license for her to even get the job. Her first paycheck would barely be enough to offset what was spent. In the end, Emily decided to go back but keep her eyes open for anything else that might come through that was better. She is frankly running out of time. Of course, when she finally got her paycheck, it was missing a couple of hours so she still has to get that fixed.

They had her finish her training but she still hasn't gotten regular hours yet so she is only working part-time. More of her boss jerking her around because the job position she applied for was supposed to be full time. She would have been better off going to Wendy's but it is too late now and some hours is still better than none since so many jobs have been eliminated and so many business closed down due to the stupid coronavirus.

It will get her some money to be able to go back to school and give her job experience to be able to get better jobs later.

Snow on BoxSprings Mtn.

We got some super strange weather this month. Most of the time if felt more like June than January. We got epically hot days and when we finally got a few days of rain, it got so cold that we actually got some snow. But it didn't last and we are back to sunny clear days but thankfully not as hot as previously...yet.

We were supposed to get more rain but as usual, the chances of that happening shrunk to nil and we are back to warm dry weather. The sun is bad but the wind is the worst.

Emily and Caitlyn attended a winter formal with many of the youth in our stake. It was not official as we are not allowed to do anything like that, but a family in the stake with a large property decided to have a private one for the kids. The kids really needed to have something like this as they have all had their young lives disrupted this past year and have been isolated for too long. My kids would not even have wanted to go to something like this is the past because they were not comfortable going to dances but we encouraged them to go and they somewhat reluctantly agreed but they ended up having a really good time.