A good friend recently told me that it's normal for someone who is laid off to be hard on themselves afterward. This pearl of wisdom came after I told her that I felt deserving of my recent lack of employment. Even though that conversation was only 2 days ago, I can honestly say it feels so far in the past.
Last night I had difficulty sleeping, so I laid in bed for hours thinking about my future. You know - the one that is wide open now. I shifted from thinking about my previous job to realizing that I don't want something similar. I had spent all last week looking for the same job with a different name when I could have been focusing on something much more suitable for me.
Regardless of how influential my performance was in my unemployment, I hated my job. It consisted primarily of the type of work I don't enjoy doing. There were statistics for how to do the investigations correctly, statistics for financials, even statistics for the employees' performances. I am not a numbers person.
I like adjectives, emotions, expressing opinions, gaining new insight, creating positive change. My previous job was none of those things.
As soon as I realized that I am truly in a position for creating positive change in my own life, I fell fast asleep.
Showing posts with label Work Related. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Work Related. Show all posts
March 09, 2009
February 27, 2009
Fruition
Last week I sent myself an article from the New York Times about writing a cover letter.
Today I was let go.
Coincidence?
Today I was let go.
Coincidence?
November 28, 2008
Fed Up
Work is really starting to wear on me. Is there such a thing as the Four-Year-Itch? Cause I think I've caught it.
October 07, 2008
The Right Place at the Right Time
I was walking out of a restroom this morning when a woman walked in and I noticed that she was crying. I had just gone for a walk because I needed to clear my head. I was thinking about Thoreau and how he believed that man is, at its core, truly unhappy. He believed that sometimes those thoughts of displeasure are tucked away but they tend to resurface now and again; reminding man that he is unsatisfied with his life. (An interesting tidbit: In Buddhism, that philosophy is called Dukkha and is roughly translated to mean living with suffering.)
With Thoreau's thoughts on my mind and the walk behind me, I decided to go into the restroom for one final moment to myself before heading back to work. I allowed myself a few minutes to strategize about how I was going to manage the hectic weeks ahead of me and then I focused on the one part of me that was seeing those thoughts float by and I cleared everything else out of my mind. I sat there for a while - just being - and I felt somewhat restored. And at the moment when I felt that I had accomplished my task of shoving out the negative thoughts, I ran into that woman at the sinks. She was wiping a few tears from her face; attempting to hide her crying but it was obvious that she was shaken up. As a woman, it isn't rare to see another women visibly upset in a restroom so you learn to gauge people's needs; whether they need someone to talk to or whether they need to be alone. This woman looked scared and vulnerable so I decided to see if she was okay.
She was receptive to my concern and told me about her recent Epileptic attack. She said she is given enough warning to be able to brace herself but unfortunately, this time she was around a group of co-workers and was mortified when she began to seize. As soon as she regained control of her body, she rushed to the restroom to regain her composure. There's a possibility that she wished she'd been alone in that bathroom, but I hope that she was as relieved to run into me as I was to run into her. Maybe for her I needed to be there because she needed someone to sympathize with her epilepsy. And for me, maybe she was there because I needed genuine human interaction; I needed my day to mean something; something other than meaning to make money. I'm sorry that my sense of fulfillment came at her expense but the next time I'm having a rough day I hope to remember that maybe my discomfort is helping someone else to feel fulfilled by helping me.
With Thoreau's thoughts on my mind and the walk behind me, I decided to go into the restroom for one final moment to myself before heading back to work. I allowed myself a few minutes to strategize about how I was going to manage the hectic weeks ahead of me and then I focused on the one part of me that was seeing those thoughts float by and I cleared everything else out of my mind. I sat there for a while - just being - and I felt somewhat restored. And at the moment when I felt that I had accomplished my task of shoving out the negative thoughts, I ran into that woman at the sinks. She was wiping a few tears from her face; attempting to hide her crying but it was obvious that she was shaken up. As a woman, it isn't rare to see another women visibly upset in a restroom so you learn to gauge people's needs; whether they need someone to talk to or whether they need to be alone. This woman looked scared and vulnerable so I decided to see if she was okay.
She was receptive to my concern and told me about her recent Epileptic attack. She said she is given enough warning to be able to brace herself but unfortunately, this time she was around a group of co-workers and was mortified when she began to seize. As soon as she regained control of her body, she rushed to the restroom to regain her composure. There's a possibility that she wished she'd been alone in that bathroom, but I hope that she was as relieved to run into me as I was to run into her. Maybe for her I needed to be there because she needed someone to sympathize with her epilepsy. And for me, maybe she was there because I needed genuine human interaction; I needed my day to mean something; something other than meaning to make money. I'm sorry that my sense of fulfillment came at her expense but the next time I'm having a rough day I hope to remember that maybe my discomfort is helping someone else to feel fulfilled by helping me.
April 23, 2008
Douche Recipient #2
My co-worker has decided to schedule a vasectomy at the same time that his wife is about to go into labor. (I know this because he scheduled the appointment FROM HIS DESK!)
First of all, who does that at their desk? I mean, really?
But second, and more importantly, who schedules a surgery right as their spouse is about to deliver their 3rd child???
What a douche.
First of all, who does that at their desk? I mean, really?
But second, and more importantly, who schedules a surgery right as their spouse is about to deliver their 3rd child???
What a douche.
November 05, 2007
So I Don't Forget
Because if I don't write it down, I will.
All the jobs I've ever had:
Babysitting:
-4 kids under the age of 6 and I was 12. You do the math.
-Subbing for a family Paige used to sit for. I made chicken and rice casserole fordinner only to find out that the rice had moths in it.
-Staying with my eldest sister during the summers of 1992-1997 to help her with 2 daughters. At the end of the summer I went school shopping with the money.
Pizza Hut:
My first real job. Taxes taken. I got the job because my friends Brittney and Renee worked there. Three years spent waiting tables, bussing, hosting, doing dishes and occasionally cooking. It was your typical high school job. We took beer in soda cups, had parties in the back when the boss wasn't around and dated our co-workers. My boss, Omar, and I did not get along. (I'm not even sure what it was about him, but he really pushed my buttons. I was actually sent home a few times for arguing with him.) It was while I was working there that I got a phone call from Paige saying she was engaged. I also heard that my ex-boyfriend Aaron was killed in a car accident while working there.
A Day Care:
That lasted a week. I worked out of someone's home and it was she, I and about 12 kids. I'm pretty sure that's illegal, now that I think about it. Aren't there supposed to be 1 adult for 3 kids, or something like that? Anyway, that job made me never want to have kids. There were just too many of them to get things under control.
A Toy Store:
Supplemented income during a summer at Laurie's. She wasn't working much so there wasn't really a need for me to be there. But I think my parents were happy to get me out of the house for a few months. Since I was there, and didn't have much to do, I got a job at the mall working in a toy store. Almost as bad as the day care. And again, another reason in the "cons" field for having kids. Oooh, I remember this one toy. It was a train that made noises when it moved. I could go the rest of my life without hearing that damn train toy again. But the worst part of that job was having to count the till at the end of the night. Math is not my forte, to say the least. As the clock ticked down to the end of my shift, my hands would begin to sweat and I would begin to tremble. It was me versus the machine and I always lost. In the 3 months that I worked there, I don't think there was a single time that I balanced that son of a bitch.
Techtronics:
After graduating high school and moving in with Paige in Portland I tried to get a job as a nanny. Ironic since I'd twice convinced myself that I never wanted kids. But it seemed like the thing to do if I wanted to go to college. Take care of kids during the day, and go to school at night. But after 2 months of mooching off Paige and having nothing to do but TaeBo all day, I went to a temp agency. I had to take tests. Lots of tests. But the most surprising was when they ushered me into a room with motherboards and printers and had me follow instructions. I really should have tried harder to get it wrong, but damnit I passed those tests and was assigned a job at Techtronics.
I worked in a warehouse in 4 ten hour shifts. Training lasted a week and then our class was split up to do various assignments. I was the youngest one there. There were a lot of immigrants and social skills seemed to be lost in translation. There was one Russian man in particular that didn't understand it was unacceptable to follow an 18 year old girl around all day. The situation was brought to management's attention but it was taken lightly. Until one day, he cornered me in the breakroom and as soon as I got away from him, I ran to my boss and demanded something be done. The Russian was transferred to the night shift, but that only made doing my job easier. He would be finishing his shift when I arrived and coming in as I was leaving, so I still saw him regularly and he still overstepped the lines by waiting by my car and following me to the bathroom. I quit three months into it.
After Techtronics I decided I needed a more teenage-appropriate job. So I worked at Abercrombie and Fitch. The thing about going from a warehouse with hard working immigrants to a frat house (aka A&F) was that I had no patience for the people who preferred to socialize over help customers. And I took a big pay cut. So two months into working there, I picked up a day job at
Cucina! Cucina! Italian Grill as the lead host. The restaurant was in the parking lot of the mall I worked at so I would often open the restaurant and work the lunch shift and then change clothes and work at A&F until midnight. This put a damper on my intentions of going to school. I quickly learned that being a grown-up was expensive. It was during those first few months at A&F that Logic was diagnosed with Hodgkins so it wasn't long before he moved back to Roseburg and our relationship turned long-distance. Six months of that was tough, especially since I wanted to be there for him. So in November of '99 I packed up my .. hmm. Well, I didn't really have much. I guess I just packed my suitcase and moved to Roseburg.
I'd been offered a job at Enterprise Rent-A-Car before the move, so after unloading my clothes at my new apartment, I reported for my first day as a Car Prep (ie: bitch). It was exciting to tell people I worked at Enterprise because it sounded very responsible, but in all actuality, I was treated worse there than even at Pizza Hut. I cleaned cars, I picked up customers, I cleaned toilets, I did lunch runs. And I put up with that for a year.
Again, to make more money, I decided to get a second job. This time it was at a place called Ridgeway Market. A little mom and pop convenience store that also had a coffee drive-thru. That job would have been okay had the owners not been maniacal, sadistic tightwads. There were post it signs everywhere. "Don't do this" and "vacuum here" to the point where I didn't want to do my work just to spite them. And the security cameras weren't set up to protect us from robberies. No, they were there so the owners could monitor our ice cream consumption! I can't remember how long I worked there, but I think it was around six months. And then one day a woman came into the store to get a coffee and mentioned that she was doing interviews for servers at the new Applebee's that was going up by the freeway. I applied, along with another girl at the Market and we both got the job.
I started at Applebee's in June of 2000 and went through a month of training before the restaurant even opened. Since Roseburg isn't exactly a metropolis, Applebee's was the talk of the town. We were finally getting a chain restaurant! The day that we opened was complete mayhem, but in a good way. Everyone wanted to come see what Applebee's was about. And everyone wanted to work there. Having gone through extensive training together, our team had a strong bond. We all went to the same college and hung out before work. And then Logic asked me to marry him and move to Florida. So we traveled cross-country in our U-Haul without a place to stay or a source of income.
Within a week, however, we had an apartment and I was a server at Hop's Microbrewery. I waited tables there for nine months while I went to school and then found out none of my previous credits transferred. So I dropped out of school, resigning myself to go when we moved back to the West Coast (where my credits were still good) and graduated to bartender. But shortly after becoming a bartender I realized that I wasn't cut out for it. Sure, I liked making all the drinks and socializing with people but I hadn't anticipated having to fend off every drunk that thought I was cute. Typically, the guys were random and moved on to the next girl after they were rejected by me. But one guy in particular wouldn't leave me alone. His tips were always amazing and at first the girls all vied for his tab. But then he started requesting me and started making inappropriate comments whenever I'd take him a beer. Having dealt with this before, I used my strongest voice and informed him I was married. But the cat-calls continued. And then one night he took it too far. And my management didn't do anything about it. I no longer felt safe and had no other option but to quit.
After that, I decided I didn't want to bartend anymore so I took a job waiting tables at Carrabba's. The owner was really intense and didn't take kindly to excuses. I liked that about him. Especially since restaurant work was leaving me jaded. I was tired of picking up other people's slack and having to compensate for their lack of cleanliness, etc. Carrabba's was fun, and I made some good friends there. But after a year of making $2.13 an hour plus tips and not having health insurance, Logic and I decided it was time for me to get a 'real job' until he could graduate and we could move.
Citibank Fraud Department turned out to be that 'real job' for me. I went through six weeks of training before moving down to a large room with 60 other people answering fraud related questions for customers over the phone. It was really exciting. At first. And then the monotony kicked in. "Hello, this is _______, how may I help you? Oh, your credit card was stolen. Please hold while I access your account." (insert voice similar to "Bueller? Bueller?) I was promoted to specialty unit that investigated mail fraud but luckily the time had come for Logic to graduate and we picked the spot farthest from Florida on the map and got the hell out of there.
-Another move across country, another U-Haul, and again - no shelter, no job. Luckily, we'd saved up this time, which would turn out to be detrimental. I tried to off-shoot a company my sister started that was somewhat similar to catering while Logic looked for post-collegiate work. Three months later, he finally accepted a job at Lowe's and I was working with about 3 restaurants. Money was tight. So again, I took a second job. During the day I would run around like crazy, trying to start up my business and at 2:00 I would show up at Buca di Beppo's to coordinate their holiday functions for the next five hours.
Nine months after starting up my own company, I laid it to rest. The Seattle market was extremely fickle and my heart was no longer in it. I also couldn't see myself coordinating functions for Buca di Beppo for much longer so I did what I'd been dreading. I put my application out on the web in search of another fraud related job.
A week after signing up with Monster.com, I received a phone call from a temp agency wanting to place me with a contracting position at Amazon.com. Having felt defeated in all other realms of work, I accepted. Nine months of contract work turned into a permanent position on their fraud team. That was three years ago.
(to be continued...)
All the jobs I've ever had:
Babysitting:
-4 kids under the age of 6 and I was 12. You do the math.
-Subbing for a family Paige used to sit for. I made chicken and rice casserole fordinner only to find out that the rice had moths in it.
-Staying with my eldest sister during the summers of 1992-1997 to help her with 2 daughters. At the end of the summer I went school shopping with the money.
Pizza Hut:
My first real job. Taxes taken. I got the job because my friends Brittney and Renee worked there. Three years spent waiting tables, bussing, hosting, doing dishes and occasionally cooking. It was your typical high school job. We took beer in soda cups, had parties in the back when the boss wasn't around and dated our co-workers. My boss, Omar, and I did not get along. (I'm not even sure what it was about him, but he really pushed my buttons. I was actually sent home a few times for arguing with him.) It was while I was working there that I got a phone call from Paige saying she was engaged. I also heard that my ex-boyfriend Aaron was killed in a car accident while working there.
A Day Care:
That lasted a week. I worked out of someone's home and it was she, I and about 12 kids. I'm pretty sure that's illegal, now that I think about it. Aren't there supposed to be 1 adult for 3 kids, or something like that? Anyway, that job made me never want to have kids. There were just too many of them to get things under control.
A Toy Store:
Supplemented income during a summer at Laurie's. She wasn't working much so there wasn't really a need for me to be there. But I think my parents were happy to get me out of the house for a few months. Since I was there, and didn't have much to do, I got a job at the mall working in a toy store. Almost as bad as the day care. And again, another reason in the "cons" field for having kids. Oooh, I remember this one toy. It was a train that made noises when it moved. I could go the rest of my life without hearing that damn train toy again. But the worst part of that job was having to count the till at the end of the night. Math is not my forte, to say the least. As the clock ticked down to the end of my shift, my hands would begin to sweat and I would begin to tremble. It was me versus the machine and I always lost. In the 3 months that I worked there, I don't think there was a single time that I balanced that son of a bitch.
Techtronics:
After graduating high school and moving in with Paige in Portland I tried to get a job as a nanny. Ironic since I'd twice convinced myself that I never wanted kids. But it seemed like the thing to do if I wanted to go to college. Take care of kids during the day, and go to school at night. But after 2 months of mooching off Paige and having nothing to do but TaeBo all day, I went to a temp agency. I had to take tests. Lots of tests. But the most surprising was when they ushered me into a room with motherboards and printers and had me follow instructions. I really should have tried harder to get it wrong, but damnit I passed those tests and was assigned a job at Techtronics.
I worked in a warehouse in 4 ten hour shifts. Training lasted a week and then our class was split up to do various assignments. I was the youngest one there. There were a lot of immigrants and social skills seemed to be lost in translation. There was one Russian man in particular that didn't understand it was unacceptable to follow an 18 year old girl around all day. The situation was brought to management's attention but it was taken lightly. Until one day, he cornered me in the breakroom and as soon as I got away from him, I ran to my boss and demanded something be done. The Russian was transferred to the night shift, but that only made doing my job easier. He would be finishing his shift when I arrived and coming in as I was leaving, so I still saw him regularly and he still overstepped the lines by waiting by my car and following me to the bathroom. I quit three months into it.
After Techtronics I decided I needed a more teenage-appropriate job. So I worked at Abercrombie and Fitch. The thing about going from a warehouse with hard working immigrants to a frat house (aka A&F) was that I had no patience for the people who preferred to socialize over help customers. And I took a big pay cut. So two months into working there, I picked up a day job at
Cucina! Cucina! Italian Grill as the lead host. The restaurant was in the parking lot of the mall I worked at so I would often open the restaurant and work the lunch shift and then change clothes and work at A&F until midnight. This put a damper on my intentions of going to school. I quickly learned that being a grown-up was expensive. It was during those first few months at A&F that Logic was diagnosed with Hodgkins so it wasn't long before he moved back to Roseburg and our relationship turned long-distance. Six months of that was tough, especially since I wanted to be there for him. So in November of '99 I packed up my .. hmm. Well, I didn't really have much. I guess I just packed my suitcase and moved to Roseburg.
I'd been offered a job at Enterprise Rent-A-Car before the move, so after unloading my clothes at my new apartment, I reported for my first day as a Car Prep (ie: bitch). It was exciting to tell people I worked at Enterprise because it sounded very responsible, but in all actuality, I was treated worse there than even at Pizza Hut. I cleaned cars, I picked up customers, I cleaned toilets, I did lunch runs. And I put up with that for a year.
Again, to make more money, I decided to get a second job. This time it was at a place called Ridgeway Market. A little mom and pop convenience store that also had a coffee drive-thru. That job would have been okay had the owners not been maniacal, sadistic tightwads. There were post it signs everywhere. "Don't do this" and "vacuum here" to the point where I didn't want to do my work just to spite them. And the security cameras weren't set up to protect us from robberies. No, they were there so the owners could monitor our ice cream consumption! I can't remember how long I worked there, but I think it was around six months. And then one day a woman came into the store to get a coffee and mentioned that she was doing interviews for servers at the new Applebee's that was going up by the freeway. I applied, along with another girl at the Market and we both got the job.
I started at Applebee's in June of 2000 and went through a month of training before the restaurant even opened. Since Roseburg isn't exactly a metropolis, Applebee's was the talk of the town. We were finally getting a chain restaurant! The day that we opened was complete mayhem, but in a good way. Everyone wanted to come see what Applebee's was about. And everyone wanted to work there. Having gone through extensive training together, our team had a strong bond. We all went to the same college and hung out before work. And then Logic asked me to marry him and move to Florida. So we traveled cross-country in our U-Haul without a place to stay or a source of income.
Within a week, however, we had an apartment and I was a server at Hop's Microbrewery. I waited tables there for nine months while I went to school and then found out none of my previous credits transferred. So I dropped out of school, resigning myself to go when we moved back to the West Coast (where my credits were still good) and graduated to bartender. But shortly after becoming a bartender I realized that I wasn't cut out for it. Sure, I liked making all the drinks and socializing with people but I hadn't anticipated having to fend off every drunk that thought I was cute. Typically, the guys were random and moved on to the next girl after they were rejected by me. But one guy in particular wouldn't leave me alone. His tips were always amazing and at first the girls all vied for his tab. But then he started requesting me and started making inappropriate comments whenever I'd take him a beer. Having dealt with this before, I used my strongest voice and informed him I was married. But the cat-calls continued. And then one night he took it too far. And my management didn't do anything about it. I no longer felt safe and had no other option but to quit.
After that, I decided I didn't want to bartend anymore so I took a job waiting tables at Carrabba's. The owner was really intense and didn't take kindly to excuses. I liked that about him. Especially since restaurant work was leaving me jaded. I was tired of picking up other people's slack and having to compensate for their lack of cleanliness, etc. Carrabba's was fun, and I made some good friends there. But after a year of making $2.13 an hour plus tips and not having health insurance, Logic and I decided it was time for me to get a 'real job' until he could graduate and we could move.
Citibank Fraud Department turned out to be that 'real job' for me. I went through six weeks of training before moving down to a large room with 60 other people answering fraud related questions for customers over the phone. It was really exciting. At first. And then the monotony kicked in. "Hello, this is _______, how may I help you? Oh, your credit card was stolen. Please hold while I access your account." (insert voice similar to "Bueller? Bueller?) I was promoted to specialty unit that investigated mail fraud but luckily the time had come for Logic to graduate and we picked the spot farthest from Florida on the map and got the hell out of there.
-Another move across country, another U-Haul, and again - no shelter, no job. Luckily, we'd saved up this time, which would turn out to be detrimental. I tried to off-shoot a company my sister started that was somewhat similar to catering while Logic looked for post-collegiate work. Three months later, he finally accepted a job at Lowe's and I was working with about 3 restaurants. Money was tight. So again, I took a second job. During the day I would run around like crazy, trying to start up my business and at 2:00 I would show up at Buca di Beppo's to coordinate their holiday functions for the next five hours.
Nine months after starting up my own company, I laid it to rest. The Seattle market was extremely fickle and my heart was no longer in it. I also couldn't see myself coordinating functions for Buca di Beppo for much longer so I did what I'd been dreading. I put my application out on the web in search of another fraud related job.
A week after signing up with Monster.com, I received a phone call from a temp agency wanting to place me with a contracting position at Amazon.com. Having felt defeated in all other realms of work, I accepted. Nine months of contract work turned into a permanent position on their fraud team. That was three years ago.
(to be continued...)
October 04, 2007
Morale
In a rare attempt to cheer us up before the busy holiday season, my office is taking everyone out to The Garage this afternoon. My team will play pool, bowl, drink beer and eat a lot of crap. Should be fun.
July 03, 2007
Office Space
Anyone who has ever had a 'desk job' (which isn't nearly as dirty as it sounds) has probably heard one or more of these sayings.
For me "we're gonna need to go ahead and move you downstairs into storage B" rings true. It's not uncommon to shift seating arrangements at my job. People have been set up in storage closets, stairways, conference rooms and even a former mortuary. Lucky for me, I've only been stuffed like a sardine into a small office with 5 other people. Hey, coulda been worse.
For me "we're gonna need to go ahead and move you downstairs into storage B" rings true. It's not uncommon to shift seating arrangements at my job. People have been set up in storage closets, stairways, conference rooms and even a former mortuary. Lucky for me, I've only been stuffed like a sardine into a small office with 5 other people. Hey, coulda been worse.
June 07, 2007
Training Led Me To Drink... Caffeine
My manager asked me to train the new guy. I was flattered and relieved. My job can be very interesting or extremely monotonous depending on the day.
I saw this as an opportunity to feel engaged and busy for a few weeks. I didn't take into consideration how much talking I would need to do. Now, for anyone who knows me this may come as a shock, but in recent years I've mellowed out a bit and no longer need to explain every detail of my day to anyone who will listen. (This blog may have something to do with that, but I digress.) When I'm at work, I like to listen to my music or the news, etc. It gives me focus and sets the tone for my day.
But when I'm training, I have to structure my day in a completely different way. Slowing everything to down to explain, answering questions I don't necessarily have answers to and trying to put the 'first-day-jitters' at ease. It's exhausting, damnit!
The first few days I dragged my feet through the threshold of my condo and spent the next few hours searching for the energy to fix dinner and pack my lunch for the next day before crawling into bed an hour earlier than usual. It was on day three that I finally put two and two together. "Doh! It's the training that's making me so tired!" And it's because of this training that I'm off the wagon. Caffeine is the only thing getting me through the day at this point.
Oh sweet White Chocolate Mocha! How I love thee!
I saw this as an opportunity to feel engaged and busy for a few weeks. I didn't take into consideration how much talking I would need to do. Now, for anyone who knows me this may come as a shock, but in recent years I've mellowed out a bit and no longer need to explain every detail of my day to anyone who will listen. (This blog may have something to do with that, but I digress.) When I'm at work, I like to listen to my music or the news, etc. It gives me focus and sets the tone for my day.
But when I'm training, I have to structure my day in a completely different way. Slowing everything to down to explain, answering questions I don't necessarily have answers to and trying to put the 'first-day-jitters' at ease. It's exhausting, damnit!
The first few days I dragged my feet through the threshold of my condo and spent the next few hours searching for the energy to fix dinner and pack my lunch for the next day before crawling into bed an hour earlier than usual. It was on day three that I finally put two and two together. "Doh! It's the training that's making me so tired!" And it's because of this training that I'm off the wagon. Caffeine is the only thing getting me through the day at this point.
Oh sweet White Chocolate Mocha! How I love thee!
April 05, 2007
January 02, 2007
Break Time
I have been a little down at work lately. And after a long talk with Logic last night, I've decided to try and change some things. Things within my day that might make a difference in my attitude. For one, I never take a break. Not sure why, but I never get around to leaving my desk. So I am choosing to not only leave my desk twice a day, but to also go outside - regardless of the weather.
I guess you could call this a New Years resolution, although an odd one. Who resolves to leave their work desk more?
Anyway, today being the first day of the rest of my life, I promptly got off my ass at 10:00 this morning and did a loop around the block. At 3:00 I stepped outside for the same loop when I was suddenly compelled to call my sister and brighten her day.
I dialed her number, and as soon as she answered the phone I broke in with the reason for my call. I kept things short and sweet. Only taking enough time to give her 2 reasons why I love her. She nearly started crying. I reminded her this was to cheer her up and then requested she call someone else and do the same thing.
It was a pretty great break. Maybe I'll do the same for someone else tomorrow.
I guess you could call this a New Years resolution, although an odd one. Who resolves to leave their work desk more?
Anyway, today being the first day of the rest of my life, I promptly got off my ass at 10:00 this morning and did a loop around the block. At 3:00 I stepped outside for the same loop when I was suddenly compelled to call my sister and brighten her day.
I dialed her number, and as soon as she answered the phone I broke in with the reason for my call. I kept things short and sweet. Only taking enough time to give her 2 reasons why I love her. She nearly started crying. I reminded her this was to cheer her up and then requested she call someone else and do the same thing.
It was a pretty great break. Maybe I'll do the same for someone else tomorrow.
December 10, 2006
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Here I am at work on my day off. The guilt of not helping my "team" during the holiday and not doing enough around the house while Logic slaves over new countertops and flooring forced me to get off my lazy ass and come in for a few hours today.
I'm not happy about it. I know I'm just making it harder on myself since I'm already burnt out. And yet I'm here. It's only been 2 hours but I feel like I've been here all day. Guess 3 hours will be my limit today.
I still have so much I want to do today. I need to hit the gym after this. Not only for my mental sanity but to burn off some work-related aggression. Then I need to get some holiday shopping done. Which unfortunately means I'll be entering the mouth of the beast (aka the mall) to find a few last-minute things. And after that, I have to head home and do laundry so I have something to wear tomorrow.
This Sunday blows.
I'm not happy about it. I know I'm just making it harder on myself since I'm already burnt out. And yet I'm here. It's only been 2 hours but I feel like I've been here all day. Guess 3 hours will be my limit today.
I still have so much I want to do today. I need to hit the gym after this. Not only for my mental sanity but to burn off some work-related aggression. Then I need to get some holiday shopping done. Which unfortunately means I'll be entering the mouth of the beast (aka the mall) to find a few last-minute things. And after that, I have to head home and do laundry so I have something to wear tomorrow.
This Sunday blows.
December 08, 2006
Underneath My Keyboard
Does your keyboard look like this?
Mine wishes it was that clean. Being the multi-tasker that I am, I tend to eat at my desk while I work. This has led to a keyboard tray filled with powdered sugar, parmesan cheese, and bread crumbs. And I just cleaned it a few weeks ago. I'm a disgusting eater!
December 07, 2006
Holiday OT
I'm sneaky and I didn't even realize it.
My boss asked me to "volunteer" for some overtime this week so I offered up 2 extra hours tomorrow, knowing that Logic had the afternoon off and carpooling wouldn't be an issue.
All morning I've been psyching myself up for a long day tomorrow. Thinking of different things I can do to get myself through the day. Then I received an email reminding me of our team's Happy Hour tomorrow at 4:00.
I giggled conspiratorally. Tomorrow won't be so bad afterall.
My boss asked me to "volunteer" for some overtime this week so I offered up 2 extra hours tomorrow, knowing that Logic had the afternoon off and carpooling wouldn't be an issue.
All morning I've been psyching myself up for a long day tomorrow. Thinking of different things I can do to get myself through the day. Then I received an email reminding me of our team's Happy Hour tomorrow at 4:00.
I giggled conspiratorally. Tomorrow won't be so bad afterall.
December 06, 2006
Group Outting
Last month I received an email from my boss asking me to organize a function for my office. Since I used to be the Event Coordinator at Buca di Beppo (for a total of four months) I thought I'd set up dinner there and have everyone walk over to Jillian's Pool Hall afterward.
The event was last night and everything went according to plan. Dinner was good and conversation was fun. I learned a lot about my co-workers (like that my boss's name is Jason. Who knew?) and that I'm a pretty good air-hockey player. But mostly, I learned that the people I work with aren't as foreign to me as I'd thought.
Being in the tech industry often times leaves me feeling insecure about my computer-related knowledge and my lack of desire to remain in this field for life. But last night proved to me that a lot of people are here for the same reason I am - it's stable. Everyone has a passion and last night I got to see that. Being reassured of that motivated me to focus more of my energy on my passions. This blog being one of them.
The event was last night and everything went according to plan. Dinner was good and conversation was fun. I learned a lot about my co-workers (like that my boss's name is Jason. Who knew?) and that I'm a pretty good air-hockey player. But mostly, I learned that the people I work with aren't as foreign to me as I'd thought.
Being in the tech industry often times leaves me feeling insecure about my computer-related knowledge and my lack of desire to remain in this field for life. But last night proved to me that a lot of people are here for the same reason I am - it's stable. Everyone has a passion and last night I got to see that. Being reassured of that motivated me to focus more of my energy on my passions. This blog being one of them.
November 29, 2006
Wednesday Schmidnesday
I'm done with Wednesday. It just gets in the way of the weekend. Always slowing my week down. I think it might be my least favorite day of the week. Yes, even worse than Monday.
Monday still has lingering memories of the weekend. And I'm usually asleep until noon on Mondays anyway, so it's really like having a half day.
Tuesday is fairly nice. It's that wonderful day that verifies you made it safely through Monday. An indication that you are one step closer to freedom.
But Wednesday might as well be Monday itself. "Oh, I'm hump day, oh". That's basically like telling me that to get past Wednesday I need to climb a large hill. Tuesday didn't make me exercise. Where does Wednesday get off telling me what to do?
~for the record, I enjoy Thursday a great deal. It's gone down in stature since the departure of FRIENDS but at least I have Grey's Anatomy to look forward to.
And who doesn't like Friday? You'd have to be silly to pick on Friday.
Monday still has lingering memories of the weekend. And I'm usually asleep until noon on Mondays anyway, so it's really like having a half day.
Tuesday is fairly nice. It's that wonderful day that verifies you made it safely through Monday. An indication that you are one step closer to freedom.
But Wednesday might as well be Monday itself. "Oh, I'm hump day, oh". That's basically like telling me that to get past Wednesday I need to climb a large hill. Tuesday didn't make me exercise. Where does Wednesday get off telling me what to do?
~for the record, I enjoy Thursday a great deal. It's gone down in stature since the departure of FRIENDS but at least I have Grey's Anatomy to look forward to.
And who doesn't like Friday? You'd have to be silly to pick on Friday.
November 15, 2006
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