OK, so I'm gonna get a little sappy here.

But I was just thinking that I live a very blessed life. I have a wonderful family, a wonderful girlfriend, a supportive job, I'm healthy and I get to do neat things. I'm financially stable (though far from rich) and generally don't have much to complain about except other drivers *lol*

What made me think of this? Well, today I got an email from someone at Starbucks (my employer) who had done all sorts of research trying to track down the email addresses of all the Starbucks employees who are currently serving overseas with the military. She wanted to get my mailing address so she could put together a care package and distribute my address to anyone else at Starbucks who might want to send a package or write or something. Then, just a couple hours later, I received another email from a different person at Starbucks (again, whom I've never met) wanting my address to send a care package.

I have never met this woman in my life. I think she actually lives and works in Seattle. But here is this stranger making all this effort just to do her little part to support a fellow Starbucks employee. And it got me thinking about just how great Starbucks is to their people and how generally nice people are who work there. And that really is the best way to say it. They're just plain nice.

Yes, I do my fair share of griping about work just like we all do. But at the end of the day Starbucks treats their employees pretty darn well. I don't know if you've heard it, but there's a rumor circulating that someone came to Starbucks asking for a donation of coffee to send to the soldiers in Iraq and Starbucks said they did not support the war in Iraq so they wouldn't donate the coffee. Now, I know this urban legend started simply because Starbucks is supposed to be the big, soul-less corporation that takes over every where it goes. And to be quite frank with you all it bothers me that people have to hear this because the company has been nothing but wonderful to me. They have paid me the entire time I've been over here in Iraq. They allow me to maintain my full health benefits at normal prices if I chose to keep them. When I stopped home recently everyone at my store was excited to see me (or at least pretended to be *wink wink*). And most importantly, I have absolute confidence that I will have my job back without any hassles when I get home from Iraq. I know my boss will do everything in his power to make my return to work as simple as possible.

So anyway, getting back to my original point, it got me thinking how privilege I am to have had the opportunity to meet all these neat people in my life, from my family to co-workers to fellow soldiers to friends. I've got a wonderful circle of people around me and I'm thankful for it.

OK, enough sentimentality. I promise my next post will be sufficiently cynical ;-)