So, I wanted to say thanks to everyone who still visits my blog in the hopes that I have updated it recently. And also my apologies for making you wait.

I am now running my own business and realizing the benefits of becoming an independent contractor! Well, at least that's what the newspaper office tells me. The reality? I'm a news-carrier. I have a paper route. That's all. Oh, and

I'm exhausted!!!!

I have 83 customers on the weekdays and 95 on Sat and Sun. My papers get delivered at 2:30 in the morning. If the alarm doesn't wake up Daniel and I can extricate myself from the bed relatively soon after, I can be done and back in bed by 4:45.

Unfortunately, as I am running my own business, I seem to have done a horrible job of hiring a newspaper distributor and could I threaten to move my business elsewhere, I would! My first day it took me 5 hours to do my route. Why? Well, I followed the route sheet that my supervisor gave me as a suggested delivery order. Dumb not to double-check, I know, but it turns out that she gave me a super old list. I had to go back out and move papers from one porch to another and drive all the way to the office to get three more papes because a few people apparently thought they got a free paper that day! So I was up from 2:30 am until 9:30 pm. The second day was rather uneventful. However that evening, I began shaking and shivering and couldn't feel the tips of my fingers. I'm guessing my body was pretty worn out. (You see - my children didn't stop nursing just because I started a route!) On the third day I had my route, my papes didn't arrive until 3:40 am. Saturday morning I got 95 papers but only one new address to deliver to. When I called the carrier hotline, I got no reply. On Saturday evening I got 95 papes deposited on my doorstep. 12 bundles that collectively weighed about 200 lbs! I guessed they forgot to tell me that the Sun papes arrived on Sat night. I was excited that I could deliver them at midnight and just sleep through on Sun morning. Thank goodness I slipped in a card with my name and number to each paper because when I opened the door Sun morning there was the rest of the paper! I believe the first word out of my mouth was "Shit!!" My phone rang off the hook as I ran my ass off delivering the rest of the paper to my entire route. Again! I really wish they would have thought to tell me about this Sunday difference. Thanks to their incompetence, I now have 8 service reports on my record with at least 2 runners being sent. Each one costs me $3!! I'm going to contest the ones from Sat as they screwed up and failed to give me the customer's addresses. And starting next week they will no longer be delivering the papes to my doorstep. I now have to drive 1 mile to pick them up. But it's only a mile! But it is now impossible do do my route without a car which was one of the main perks of this job. That and that I can do it while the kids are alseep and with Tuan. As of now the route is still worth having as the times and location are ideal. I just wish the news office took better care of their carriers.

The hardest part about the route is that I am more tired during the day making it that much harder to have endless patience with and not yell at Emma and Daniel. But if it ever gets to be too much, I will not sacrifice my kids for $250 a month. I'm very much hoping this will work because I really, really, really want a house with a yard for Emma and Daniel to run around in.