All Hail the Queen of PNR!!

Last night we learned how to construct Passenger Name Records (PNRs) in Sabre. I got so good at them, I was banging them out faster than anyone else, and I felt so proud of myself.
-LASTNAME/FIRSTNAME. 120NOVSTLDEN8A. 9314-644-9440-A/GO AWAY TRAVEL/KRISTI. 7TAW/. 6PSGR. I was so good. So much that this morning I woke up DREAMING of PNRs. THAT is sad. :)

Today is our Halloween party at work. I will get nothing done. I have two rush résumés with a lot of other projects to do, including a NetStart for Monday (the nightmare of all research reports) that I really should start today. Argh. It is NOT going to be easy... wish I could just enjoy the party without stress...

But I'm glad it's the Halloween weekend. Happy Hauntings, people!!

Shame

(bagpipes playing taps)


Actually... I'm a little bit ashamed of the Cardinals. They couldn't bring home ONE WIN in the series. Not one. We were being hailed as the best team in baseball, lots of people didn't think the Sox could beat us, and we get swept. In our own home stadium even. I'd be more happy for the Sox if we could've beat them just once or twice... but this was just shameful. Bad Cardinals. BAD!!!!

Jax's wound was swollen because of the pressure against the sutures when he bends or moves his little leg too much. They want us to move him as little as possible (i.e, carrying him up and down stairs, not walking him, keeping him still as much as possible at home), but that is just ridiculous to expect of us. It is so frustrating. We have antibiotics to give him in case there's a possibility of infection, but this is the best we can do for him right now. I feel so horrible for him. One and a half more weeks of this until the sutures come out....

Doggie Op - Part II

Jax is home from his surgery... he's still pretty out of it, going in and out of sleep. When the vet handed him to me, he was awake, but still limp. He had a collar on that prevented him from licking the area where the wound was... which is closed up with metal sutures. It looks pretty ugly... uglier than I had imagined. The fur all around the area is shaved off. He has a bandage around his leg where the IV was. Poor little guy. I have pain killers to give him later when the anesthesia has completely worn off.

The vet said that the symptoms that he's been having all seem to indicate Cushing's disease. It's not life-threatening in and of itself, but it can lead to more serious problems, such as diabetes, liver and kidney problems, and other things. Frequent urination and lack of bladder control are also symptoms, so that explains the accidents. There's a drug that he can take for it, but I get the feeling that it's expensive and the vet would like to see how he does for the next two weeks until we get the sutures taken out. Then, we'll talk more about it after that.

The main thing I'm worried about now, however, is whether or not the tumor that was just removed is malignant. The vet said it was a pretty aggressive, nasty one, so it is a possibility. We should get the results in about a week... I'm just trying not to think the worst until then.

Thanks for all your well wishes...

Doggie-Op

Dropped Jax off at the vet this morning for his surgery... I had imagined myself waiting there while they did it, but they said "Ok, we'll call you when he's all done." So I left and came back home. The vet called a little after 10:00 to say that the surgery was over, Jax was just waking up, and everything went well, and I can go get him around 2:00, I guess so that all the effects of the anasthesia can wear off. Can't wait to see the little guy! They're also doing some x-rays on him too... I hope those turn out ok.

So I'm just hanging out at home today... watchin TV, did my workout, and maybe now I'll put in a movie or something... :)

Oh and the Sox aren't quite YET an unmentionable to me, but we'll see what happens in the game tomorrow night.

Who needs the Everyday?

So we're looking up information on car rentals in Sabre last night, and we go to Hertz, and in all the information on Hertz, there was a place to get some trivia questions and your horoscope. I totally felt like I was at lunch at work, reading the Everyday section of the Post Dispatch. Hee hee. Here was the trivia question I read:

"Where in the U.S. does a law state it's an offense to push a live moose out of a moving airplane?" (answer at the end of this post!)

Then I read my horoscope:

"LEO - You continue to struggle to achieve balance between the head and the heart but you are doing well. Today the brain has the edge and your partner may be wondering what happened to that red hot lover."

Uh. Yeah. Whatever. Anyways, all we needed after that were some celebrity birthdays, and I would never have to go to the lunchroom again. Okay, except to eat lunch. :)

In another area of Sabre, we were able to get soap opera updates. "So-and-so told So-and-so that she's leaving So-and-so for So-and-so, and So-and-so's baby got abducted by So-and-so..." anyways there was a whole plot synopsis. Funny. Why would you need that? I guess in case some client comes in who all of a sudden freaks out, "OMIGOSH! I'M MISSING 'DAYS'!" and you, as the swell travel agent who knows everything, can pull up the plot synopsis and say, "No problem, would you like to know what happens?" Sheesh. Travel agents really CAN know everything!

Here's a strange thing about my teacher. He insists that the spelling of "sign" (as in "sign in to the system") is sine. You can even do a search for it in the help database as that spelling, and it comes up, only when you click on it, the spelling changes to sign. Yet he insists on spelling it this way. And he says he knows how to spell sign and that it's a common spelling in his experience. Whatever. I'll stick with sign, thanks.

Anyways, just some humorous observations from last night that I wanted to comment on...

Answer to trivia: Alaska! (I guess they don't like the moose over there... if this has to be written in the lawbooks!)

World Series Bound!!

Cause I'm on my way, I can feel my ring comin'
It's the blood of a champion pumpin'
Deep inside my veins, too much pride to be runnin'
I'm-a get what I can, and more even if
My blood, my sweat, and my tears don't mean nothin'
It's the heart of a champion in me
-Nelly, "Heart of a Champion"

I need to get me a copy of that song... :) We're really going! Really going!! YEAH BABY!! WHOOOOOOOOO!!!!!! OMG... OMG! OMG!!!!!!! YEAH!!!

I have another post to put up about my class last night, but I'll get to it later. For now, WHOOOOO!!!!!

ST. LOUIS CARDINALS: NATIONAL LEAGUE CHAMPIONS 2004!!

Yeah! (x2)

I'm sorry, but you'll have to read entries from me about baseball until after the World Series... I was pretty excited about both of last night's wins!! Well, of course the Cardinals (thank you Jim!!), but how about that historic win by the Sox over the Yanks? Their comeback from a 3-0 deficit in the series is something that has never been done before and you can't help but feel a little happy for them for that. Well, now if by some chance the Cards don't make it to the WS, I will still have a team to root for; I'll hope that the Sox can make it all the way. But not if they're playing us. :) I was worried for a little bit that it would be a Houston/New York matchup, in which case I probably wouldn't care who won. Actually, I'd probably pull for Houston over New York. Yes, that's right, even with the "Killer B's". (Sorry, Jaime P.!)

Anyways... well since I didn't blog yesterday, I'll fill in a little bit about Tuesday night's class... we played around with Sabre a little bit. The most I can do in it right now is bring up a simple flight schedule. I can type 12DECSTLSEA10A and that should pull up a list for all flights going from St. Louis to Seattle around 10:00 a.m. on Dec. 2. (no, not Dec. 12... the first 1 is an action key saying "check for availability". So if I wanted Dec. 12, it would be 112DEC...) I'm also kind of excited that you can choose your own color scheme. So if I want a PINK screen instead of a blue one, I can do that. :) Anyways tonight we'll play around with it some more.. but the bad part is that when we have Sabre open, we're not supposed to have any other programs running at the time, so I won't get to watch tonight's game in class!! Hmph. I'll just have to check it during breaks.

GO CARDS!!!!!!!!!!!

Bad Words

Do not say any of the following words to me today:

• Bedsheets
• Skirt
• Finger
• Fudge brownies
• Cleaning
• "Kristi, that resume was due yesterday, why isn't it done yet?"

And worst of all...

• The Houston Astros.

If you say anything about bees, I will likely give you a dirty look too.

Weekend Wrap-up

None too happy about the Cardinals' defeat yesterday by the Astros... now the series is tied at 2. It is now a best-2-out-of-3 series. Well here's hoping we have nothing to worry about. Although I wish every guy in the Astros' lineup whose last name begins with a B would suddenly fall sick or something. That would make our job SO much easier...

My weekend was pretty quiet... spent some time watching movies, went shopping, did laundry at the parents' (sans the parents, because they were in Phoenix visiting my brother and his family), and almost finished reading Stardust for Book Club. Didn't get as much cleaning done as I'd like, but I was feeling pretty lazy this weekend. Today I feel even lazier. Didn't get up and work out as I'd planned to. Maybe being woken up at 4:30 a.m. by that thunderstorm had something to do with it...

Very much looking forward to the "Moonlight Masquerade" on Friday!!! I just hope we can get tickets.

Well, it's better than the LAST one I had...

My pirate name is:

Dirty Bess Flint

You're the pirate everyone else wants to throw in the ocean -- not to get rid of you, you understand; just to get rid of the smell. Like the rock flint, you're hard and sharp. But, also like flint, you're easily chipped, and sparky. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from fidius.org.

The first time I took that quiz some years ago, I got "Dirty Prudentilla Flint." I wonder why it's Bess this time. (And that's not what I'm referring to in the subject.)

(and they really need to do a better job on their graphics.)

Sabre is FUN!

STL AA X/DFW AA TUS89.3LL14QD1N AA STL89.3OLL14QD1N N 178.61 END ZPSTLDFWTUSDFW XFSTL4.5DFW4.5TUS3DFW4.5 NOREF/CHG100 PLUS FARE DIFF/NO VALUE AFT FLT DATE

It's a line of an itinerary from St. Louis to Tucson via Dallas. Maybe in a couple of months I'll be able to skim that and actually make sense of it, but for right now, I'm kinda feeling like you... "OY!"

Travel Class Part II

Last night we started on the second part of the class, Travel Foundations II. This will focus more on learning the computer reservation system, also known as a global distribution system. The one we're learning is called Sabre. We'll have less quizzes and homework assignments, but participation in class is even more important because there's so much to learn in Sabre. The teacher said "you'll be saying, 'I can't take any more slashes, dashes, or astericks!!'" (wait a minute, I'll be sounding like Julia! ;) ) So it'll be interesting to say the least.

As I move on with this class and progress further towards my goal of a career in travel, doubts begin to pour in. Will I really get a job after this class is over? Will I really be effective in sales? Will I be smart enough to make recommendations and earn customers' trust? I've never been in sales before, nor have I ever thought it would be something I'd enjoy doing. But travel is a very sales-intensive field. Unless I move beyond working in a travel agency and get to do some planning of itineraries for tours and/or cruises. That's where the real fun would be for me. But you have to start somewhere, and it's usually in sales. I'm a little scared. But it's either that or stay at the place I'm at now... and we all know how I feel about that!

I made this entry using the "BlogThis!" feature on my Google Toolbar. Pretty nifty. :)

To Book Club Members:

Book club is being held at my apartment this month! It is on October 20. Come over around 7:00. Bring food if you wish, but I will also have some snacky-things available. Let me know if you need directions. See you all there!

Pupdate

Took Jax to the vet this afternoon. Diagnosis not good. A couple weeks ago I noticed a small lump in his skin on his chest, just above his left leg. The vet had it tested and it is growing rapidly and has to be removed. The vet called it a tumor, but seemed to shy away from the word "cancer" until we have it sent to a lab and analyzed. So, Jax has to undergo surgery sometime next week to have that lump removed. He is also on antibiotics for his bladder infection, and hopefully that'll go away and never come back, otherwise we have to have him x-rayed and checked for stones. He also has a bit of arthritis in his right hind leg... poor little puppy is just a wreck. Hopefully he'll get through all of this and be fine, but I have to tell myself.. he did just turn 10 years old. Still... little dogs are supposed to live longer than that... well anyways. We'll just take each thing one at a time and do all we can for him. And hope it doesn't get TOO expensive...

Top 5 Most Annoying Things...

Alright, drum roll please... By request, this is the list of my Top 5 Most Annoying Things in Major League Baseball:

5) Beer Prices at the ballpark
4) The Braves' Tomahawk Chop
3) Sammy "Corky" Sosa (and the rest of the Cubs)
2) The New York Yankees

And the Number One Most Annoying Thing in Major League Baseball:

1) Barry Bonds.

There ya go folks! Okay, what are YOUR top 5 lists? :)

I was RIGHT!!

Cardinals beat the Dodgers last night, 6-2, winning the series in four games, as I had said. :) Wish I had put some money down on that prediction.. hee hee. They play again on Wednesday, facing either the Braves or the Astros, depending on which of those two teams win tonight, since their series is tied at two. So lemme ask my fellow Cardinals fans out there: Which team would you rather have the Cards face on Wednesday? I'm thinking the Astros, since we seemed to be able to beat them over the regular season pretty well. Am I out of line?

Game 3

Alright, so far my prediction is correct (that the Cardinals will take this series in 4 games). The Dodgers took Game 3, 4-0. Kinda bummed that we couldn't score at least one run in this game, allowing José Lima to get the shutout, but it's ok. We'll bounce back and get 'em tomorrow. Tune in if you can! It'll be a party! :)

Other scores : Astros beat the Braves 8-5 (they lead the series 2-1), Yankees beat the Twins 6-5 in 11 innings (they won the series 3-1.. blah), and Boston eliminated Anaheim 8-6, winning the series 3-0 (so there we go, a Boston-NY matchup...watch out!).

It's getting exciting, folks! Be sure to tune in again later to your Open Seas Sports Desk, giving you the latest from the world of MLB Playoffs!! GO CARDS!!!!! :)

Scores from yesterday...

Cardinals took Game 2, by the score of 8-3 again! (Good score... that's my birthday! Yay!) KEEP ROCKIN, CARDS!! They only need one more win to take this series and move on to face either the Astros or the Braves. They face the Dodgers on their homefront on Saturday at 6:30 p.m. Central. Hopefully I will have my rear planted in front of a TV somewhere to see!

In other news, the Braves beat the Astros last night 4-2 in 11 innings. That series is tied 1-1. In the American league, Boston is leading the series vs. the Anaheim Angels 2-0 and the Yankees-Twins series is tied 1-1. Looks like a Boston-NY series is very possible... that could be exciting, but still, I want the Yanks eliminated as soon as possible just to get them OUT. Although it would be SWEET to beat them in the World Series. I'm just so tired of the Yanks in the World Series year after year... why not let someone else have a chance (to get dealt with by St. Louis of course!)?

This has been your morning baseball report... Stay tuned in for more updates as they come! :)

Can I do it??

Augh! I just learned that my class will not meet on October 20, which is once again, you guessed it, BOOK CLUB! I have two weeks... can I read "Stardust" in two weeks? Anyone have a copy I can borrow real quick? Even if I can't read all of it, I still want to come to see everyone. Amazing how he keeps picking Book Club nights to call off class...

DogBlog

Most everyone knows that I am just crazy about my dog, a cute little black peekapoo (Pekinese/poodle mix) named Jax. And some of you might know that I actually very rarely call him Jax. Some of you have been over to my place and I'd say to my dog, "Come here, Sugar Muffin, let's go outside..." and I'd get a funny look from you and explain, "yeah, I call him just about everything there is." Well last night I was thinking about just how many nicknames I have for my dog. I'm only going to list my favorites here, just to give you an idea:

• Sugar, Sugar Muffin, Sugar Sweets, or Sugar Pops
• Little Dog or Baby Dog
• Pumpkin, Pupkin, Puplet, or Pupcake
• Sweetie Pie or Sweetheart
• Schnookums
• Bitsy Boodles
• Poodlums
• A combination of any of the above: ie, Sugar Schnookums
• And when my dog was ill: Sicky Poo

I think the only times I call him "Jax" are when I'm mad at him or trying to make him do something. "Come here, Baby Dog... Come here. Come here, Jax. JAX! COME HERE!"

One of my favorite things to say to my dog goes like this: When it's time for him to go for a walk, most people would say, "Do you wanna go for a walk?" Not me. I need something a bit more humorous. So first, I'll ask my dog if he is feeling particularly like a large lizard commonly kept as a pet. "Jax, are you an iguana?"

Then I'll ask him if he is feeling like a small burrowing rodent often found on golf courses with qualities of a large lizard commonly kept as a pet. "Jax, are you an iguana gopher?"

Finally, I'll ask him if he is feeling like a furry teddy-bear-like Star Wars creature with qualities of a small burrowing rodent often found on golf courses and of a large lizard commonly kept as a pet. "Jax, are you an iguana gopher Ewok??" Then I'll say that a couple of times until he starts getting excited and jumping up and down, which I think is hilarious.

Yes. I am weird. But I love my doggie, despite the eccentricities it makes me have.

Oh man... I just realized that no guy who reads this blog will ever want to date me, for fear of eventually being called "Poodlums." Don't worry, guys. Won't happen. I only say it to Jax because he can't understand me and bite my ankles for it.

Well, enough of that...

I got rid of my alias. I figured after yesterday's post, with just about every name anyone has ever called me, it's pretty dumb to keep using it. Oh well, anonymity was a lost cause anyway. :)

Cardinals won Game 1 of the series vs. the Dodgers, 8-3!!! I am so excited! Keep it up, guys! I say it will be Cardinals in 4 games.

The Nickname Game (Me too! Me too!)

Alright, here goes my turn at the Nickname Game, started by Anna and continued by others, just cause it looked like fun. And I think I have some fun ones to throw out there, so here we go:

If you call me Kristi, you are one of 95% of people I know. Yay for you!
If you call me Kristin, you are someone I deal with on a professional basis only. Boring.
If you call me Kris, you are one of my immediate family members, most likely my mom, dad, or one of my brothers.
If you call me Kdub, you are probably my sister, or quite possibly C2 (although if it's the latter, it's more likely to be "kdubbadubbadub" or something to that effect.)
If you call me Deestie-Deestie, you are one of my siblings and we are back to being 5 years old.
If you call me Twisti, you are my best friend Twacie, er, I mean Tracie.
If you call me Kwippie, you are from a select group of college friends from my Newman Center days, most likely Tanya, Lisa (Weesa), or Melcher.
If you call me Hot Dog, you are either Tracie (Special Correspondent Corn Nut) or my friend Stephanie (Taquito). (don't ask)
If you call me Banana, you are my friend Stephanie. (taken from a skit we wrote in Spanish class in high school, in which she was Chiquita and I was Banana. "Hola, Chiquita!" "Hola, Banana!")
If you call me P.I.T., you're a certain pirate captain who has taken me in as her "pirate-in-training."
If you call me K-Swiss, you are a woman I used to work with named Gwen who loved to come up with cute little nicknames for everyone.
If you call me Kristine, you are someone who didn't hear me yell my name loud enough in a crowded bar over all the music.
If you call me G(word deleted) Kristi, you are a particular pirate at the St. Louis Renaissance Faire who went out of his way to attempt to make me blush. And succeeded. (From this point forward, you are to discontinue this nickname and replace it with Thousand Sunsets Kristi, to quote the lovely compliment you bestowed on me later.) :)
If you call me Sapphirine, you are, well, ME. Cause only I call myself that. Hey, I found it in the dictionary when I was like 11, thought it was neat, and have used it as my "alias" ever since.
And finally, if you call me "Smile!", you are dead.

And that's a wrap! Please remind me if I have forgotten any, excluding ones like "hey you," and "dork" and the like. :)

The "Little Flower"

In eighth grade, I was going through the motions to prepare for the sacrament of Confirmation in the Catholic Church. I did not feel ready for it and it was more like a chore for me. One of the things I had to do to prepare was to choose a saint whose name I would take on as my Confirmation name. I didn't feel particularly close to any saints and was rather daunted by all the saints I'd have to read about in order to choose one. As the day drew nearer, I had narrowed my choices to two: St. Cecelia (the patron saint of music) and St. Thérèse of Lisieux.

I chose St. Thérèse. I don't remember what it was that I read about her that made me go with her; maybe I just liked her name better than St. Cecelia's. But tonight, after having seen the movie Thérèse that was just released in select theatres this weekend about her life, I'm pretty happy with my choice.

Nicknamed the "Little Flower," she's been hailed as the most popular saint of the modern age, probably because of her simple nature and childlike manner, and the fact that she never did anything extraordinary to distinguish herself, but instead went her own "little way" to show love for others. This simple girl who died at the age of 24 from tuberculosis after living in a convent ever since the age of 15 has now been called one of the Doctors of the Church (there are only 33, and she is the third woman out of all of them) as well as one of the patron saints of France, along with St. Joan of Arc (who was her own personal hero). Mother Teresa was so called because she took the name from her. So much accomplished by being so simple and "little" as she called it.

The movie isn't exceptionally made and it's quite obvious it's an independent film that had no help from top-notch Hollywood producers. In fact, it looks a lot like a TV movie or miniseries would, and is acted as such too. Lindsay Younce, who plays Thérèse, is certainly not the greatest actress around (especially in her "crying" scenes). However, she was good for this film because she seems so down-to-earth: pretty enough without being movie-star gorgeous with a humility about her that makes you think that she could be someone who lives two houses down from you or something. Plus her character in the movie was a bit of a klutz, so at times you couldn't help but identify with her, even though she had a faith that was out of this world.

It's a very CATHOLIC film, so it won't have the same widespread appeal to all Christian denominations that The Passion of the Christ did (even though that movie was also made from a Catholic perspective). But I'm really interested to see how well this movie will do. I found I was quite touched by it and now I have an even deeper appreciation for this saint whose name I took for my Confirmation. Watching movies about saints can sometimes make me feel like I am a horrible person in comparison with them, but it was comforting to see Thérèse go through a lot of self-doubt as well. Plus I heard that Lindsay Younce converted from Quakerism to Catholicism after making this film. There's a lot of heart in it. Still, it's a simply-made movie, which is actually quite fitting, for the type of person St. Thérèse of Lisieux was.

And there you have it, folks, my first-ever movie review! Ok I'm done.

Addendum: I later read this review of the movie and was surprised at all the bits of information about Thérèse that the movie left out. It would've been nice to see some of this incorporated; I think the movie would've been a lot richer as a result. (ok, NOW I'm done!) :)

October To-Do List

OCTOBER IS HERE!!! It's practically a reason to celebrate for me. It is my favorite month, bar none. My ideal October would consist of doing all of the following activities:

• Attending at least one Halloween costume party. Preferably more so I can get wear out of different costumes. The better decorated the place, the better the party!
• Visiting the Lemp Mansion for their Sunday lunch/dinner.
• Participating in a hayride/campfire, roasting marshmallows and telling ghost stories. (Okay so it's been several years since I've done this. I would so love to again.)
• Visiting a pumpkin patch.
• Going on a "haunted tour"... I hear there's good ones of the Alton area. (Alton, IL, was once chosen as the nation's most haunted small town. I believe Savannah, GA, currently holds that distinction.)
• Touring at least one area haunted house. This year, because Molly Crenshaw's Haunted Forest sadly won't be in operation, I may want to try out Tombstone Haunted Ghost Town... if I'm brave enough... looks pretty creepy.
• Fright Fest at Six Flags. I've never been, but it might be really cool.
• Going on a long drive on a road with spectacular fall scenery.
• Eating tons of those little sugarcreme pumpkins and candy corn!

No way would I ever get to do all of these in one month, but it would be cool. Aw, man, I forgot to bring in my little Halloween decorations for my desk... my little ghosties and pumpkins... October's not October without ghosties and pumpkins!! That will be remedied on Monday. Have a happy October 1, everyone!