Bam

I believe that I've just been hit in the face with a wall made of cucumber melon. It's an invisible wall, but it's making my eyes burn and giving me a headache all the same. I'm not sure what's going on here. It used to be strange lunch time odors that I had to worry about. (The next door cubicle has a contraband microwave and they commit grave sins with it.)

Last week there was 4 days of horrible cloying sweetness. I kept leaving work with a headache that miraculously was cured the minute I got into fresh air. Around 11 am it seemed to appear out of no where, and lasted all day. I have no idea if they are spraying something or what, but it's really annoying. Today was fine until just a few minutes ago, and to be fair the cucumber melon is not as bad as whatever last week's smell was.

Our work space is so condensed you can smell scented lotion being rubbed into someone's hands from two cubicles down. Offices are small with low walls, and no doors or ceilings. I really hope whoever it is gets over their current fascination with freshening their work space before I have to just stand up and ask, "Who is that? Who do I smell, and can you tone it down a bit please?"

Skechy at Best

As much as I would like to think that I have nothing in common with the women I work with, that is obviously just not the case. Here you can see we all came to work modeling the same shoe in different colors. (Left: Melanie, Right: Hae, Bottom: Me)

It's not that there's anything terribly wrong with these folks, it's just that there's about a 20 year gap in our ages. They all have children, but those kids are old enough to have moved out from home already. They've both been married, divorced, and married again. And... I think they might both be republican.

Still, comfortable yet attractive footwear can bridge these gaps of age, and history to bring us all a little bit closer together, and I think that's kind of cool.

PI is Suck

sticks the group shot,
originally uploaded by Tara DuBose.

We've had quite the rough time with this new inventory management software change over. We've been putting in 10-12 hour days since last Wednesday, and I'm working all weekend.

I've started relieving our stress and boredom by drawing stick figures killing themselves, and in a few cases, each other.... Don't worry we're not really going postal, it's just good ol' fun.

Pictionary

Pictionary,
originally uploaded by Tara DuBose.

This was how I finally communicated to my Korean co-worker what I
meant by "pot sticker".

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday,
originally uploaded by Tara DuBose.

You gotta love it. DG has a birthday and I get cake!

I've Got the Blahs

I can't seem to think of anything to post about. I'm still knitting Potatomaus, although I'm on to the second sock now. I still haven't taken any photos, but that's how it goes. Pretty much I go home and flop on the couch, knit and watch tv a bit, then I go to bed. I have managed a little laundry, but I'm not quite keeping on top of it. I've done my best to keep from trashing the house, but I'm not really working to improve the cleanliness of it this week. Of course today I get to look forward to Cat Box Day. Man, that is my least favorite day of the week. Woohoo I get to play in the Sandbox of Eternal Stench. *sigh* I should also vacuum, since I have no intention of doing any other housework today, but I don't know if that will happen or not. Maybe I'll just do the back half of the house. Since that's the half that didn't get done last weekend it needs it more.

Am I boring because I'm bored, or am I bored because I'm boring?

Work is going well. Every day I'm getting more and more comfortable in my duties. I'm still not totally with it, but at least I don't feel completely lost anymore. There's so many things to keep an eye on that every once in a while I lose track and some area piles up, but day to day it's not too bad.

Rumors abound with the purchase of The Company by The Other Company. The earliest rumors were that The Company was going to be handing out raises soon. Why this would happen the rumor doesn't say. It's probably just wishful thinking on some random person's part. The rumor that I heard yesterday has to do with the fact that we become owned by The Other Company at the end of September, beginning of October. Rumor has it that The Other Company will be gathering all the employees (all shifts) at one time somewhere off-site for a meeting on Columbus Day. Supposedly the originator of this rumor worked at another company that was bought by The Other Company, and when they had this off-site meeting it was to tell everyone they no longer had jobs. Pretty much any time there is a change at The Company about 2/3 of the work force turn into the human equivalent of Chicken Little, so who knows how much truth is in the second rumor either. I suppose on both counts it's business as usual and wait to see what happens.

I promise that when I know more, you will know more. Of course if you knew more first you'd tell me right?

How's It Hanging?

So I've been doing my new job here at The Company since a little before my vacation and entirely since the after vacation, and boy howdy. I'm still here getting my arse handed to me regularly. It seems like everytime I think that I have a concept figured out there's a new twist to it that makes half the stuff that I already knew go kablooey. I guess I did say that I wanted more of a challenge, so I've got that at least.

All in all I'm having a good time. I definately enjoy my days here more than I was in my previous post. And slowly but surely my replacement is standing on her own two feet and keeping off my back. It was strange yesterday when I had some material to take back to the warehouse. I realized that it was the first time I had walked past my old co-workers since June 25th, I felt out of place, almost like I was trespassing.

I haven't been posting much because I'm busy all the time. I mean, I haven't even had time to finish my vacation posts. There will be more coming, but they will be back dated to go in line with the others. I have a Flickr album where I am loading the pictures from my trip in chunks, or at least I was before I took a week off from the computer. I'm literally so tired of looking at the computer by the time that I leave here that other than paying bills and checking my email twice I've stayed away from the computer at home. I also have a small issue in that my laptop needs a new video card fan (oops forgot to order that when I got home last night) that I need to order. Once Jeff hops on the WoW that means I have no computer access for the rest of the night. Still there will be more photos added. I'm really excited about the fireworks photos that I took, so I can't wait to get those up there.

We went and saw Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix last week. My feelings go back and forth with it. There were some aspects that I really loved, like the visual style that was breath taking. I also had some issues with it. I think the most common complaint that you will find fans have with it is just that the beginning of the movie moves too quickly through plot points. Each point that had to be made gets a line or two of dialouge and it feels somewhat empty. Still, all in all I did enjoy the movie and I'm sure the next time I see it I'll like it even more. There's always little things that you miss the first time around.

I've also managed to re-read the last two books (5 & 6) in anticipation of book 7's release. I believe that it goes on sale this Friday at midnight (Saturday morning). As excited about reading it as I am, I can't say that I'm pleased that we'll be buying two copies. There's just no way that I can wait for Jeff to finish, and I also don't want to read it and not be able to talk about it in front of him until he gets a chance to read it. So we have to get two copies and that's just life.

Okay, I'm getting too far behind so I gotta go. Take care peoples.

At Least It's Only for 7 Days

I am working on training my replacement. I'm only working until Wednesday this week, cause I am having the lasers, so we are running out of training time. I think I just finished talking for 2 1/2 hours straight.

I mean, I'm a pretty good talker and all, but there comes a point when I have had enough. All the bits that aid sound coming out of my pie hole are getting dry and sticking together all at the same time. Needless to say my goofing off time is very limited at the moment. I can't very well sit here and surf the internet while they watch, and then be upset when they have questions later.

So, I'm going to go grab some water and then spend the next 30 minutes trying not to have to talk to anyone at all. My pipes need a break.

Hope you're all having a good day!

El Yay!

Guess what????

I got a promotion! I got chosen for the internal movement here at The Company. I get a "job grade" that is numerically 2 higher than what I am now, and I'm also getting a wage increase. How much of an increase, you might ask. The answer is 10%. Oh yeah, it's gonna be awesome! The wage increase and new job don't become "official" until June 25th, so don't be all asking me for money just yet. I'm still not going to be rolling in cash, but at least I have climbed out of the pay cut that I took when I lost my shift premium by switching to day shift.

Okay, still have a few more things to do before leaving work, so I'll let you get back to whatever it is that you were doing.

YAY!!!

I'm So Sorry This Post Sucks

I wanted to do the magazine meme, but I don’t think I’ve ever had a magazine subscription. I planned, and may still, post instead my dream list of magazines that I wish I had subscriptions to. That will have to wait until I get home and I can actually spend the internet time to research, because I honestly don’t know.

I’m having a shit kind of day. The kind of day when the first email you see is from your supervisor that he sent 10 minutes after you left the day before, and is just illustrates how little he knows about anything. He is really trying my patience, and I think it’s starting to show. So I started off my day pissed off. I got over it though, and I vowed that I was going to make progress on the stuff that’s been piling up in my office. I was going to be productive damn it. Yeah, notice the past tense there.

Now I’ve slid past productive and I’m down in low places. I’m having more doubts about my ability to escape this stupid job. Erin spruced up my resume, and it’s much nicer than before. It’s pretty much the same content, but with a new layout and a bit better wording. I used this resume to apply again to Blizzard. I had applied on 3/30 and heard not a peep, then I applied on 4/30 with the new resume and had a call within 3 hours. It was kind of freaky. Alas, they are cheep asses and only want to pay $9/hr so I’ll not be a GM. *sigh* Oh well, I was pretty sure that’s how that was going to end anyway.

I’ve mentioned in the past that there was a possible internal movement. They finally posted the job opening and I applied, but I haven’t heard anything. So I’m getting all discouraged. I feel blah, and I just don’t care to work anymore. I want to go home, and that’s just about all I can think of. Sorry for the boring blog, but I’m just completely sapped of energy.

Inconsiderate

At work we have those nifty paper towel dispensers where you wave your hand and it gives you a piece of paper. This piece of paper is almost enough to dry your hands, but not quite. My hands will typically be completely dried by the time I finish walking the 15 feet back to my office. There is a small delay before it will spit out a new piece of paper once it has been activated. This keeps a slightly “special” person from accidentally shooting out the entire roll to dry one pair of hands. I believe that it should be common courtesy if two people reach the paper towels at the same time that Person A will take one square and let Person B take the next instead of making Person B sit there dripping water on the floor for a few minutes because Person A has some sort of complex and needs 3 sheets of paper to really feel dry. It’s F’ing water and it won’t kill you. Just give me a damn paper towel! Please? At the very least I'd appreciate it if you didn't make inane small talk while denying me the ability to dry my hands. I promise, there is a 98% chance that I don't like you that is rapidly climbing to 100% as my hands drip, and a 0% chance that I want to hear what you have to say.

For the Record

It should be noted that the push that would require no effort from employees and would just go in all on its own caused 30-45 minutes of downtime for anyone actually trying to use their computer at the time. Luckily I was at lunch, so my system didn't act like it was still working while steadfastly refusing to print labels.

Ripped From the Headlines

This is from an email that I just received at work:

"To standardize workstation Desktop backgrounds, Screen savers and Game settings as announced in the All Hands meeting, IT Support will be pushing a script to install a "One Company" desktop background, a "Blank" screen server, and disable Games on workstations in Manufacturing Operations. The push will start this afternoon, 4/18. The push will be silent, No user interaction. The new settings will take effect the next time the workstation is rebooted. The screen saver will be set to activate after 10 minutes of inactivity."

I mean, I understand blocking games, because people do seem to find Solitaire and Mine Sweeper irresistible. I just don't see why I need to be confronted by some ugly Company logo any time I minimize my windows at my computer. I'm currently using this picture of Cabbit as my desktop background, and I'm sure it's cuter than anything they are going to use.

In Which I Elaborate

So I briefly mentioned yesterday that we rearranged the living room. I think I’m going to be much happier with the setup. We still need to finish putting the gaming systems back together, but after working on the room for about 3 hours yesterday, we decided that we were done. (That’s when we set up the Wii.) I’d try to describe it, but I’m not great at that sort of thing. It was quite a chore to figure out how we could move things around and still fit all the furniture in the room without blocking the path from the front door to the rest of the house.

The Wii was Jeff’s belated Christmas/birthday present. It’s something that we both wanted, and I suppose it’s technically his, but since I got Zelda for Christmas I’m probably going to be the primary user for the time being. I played a little bit last night, but I was responsible and stopped at 10:30 so that I could still get a good night’s sleep. Is that one of the signs that I’m “old” now? I think that this might be the first time I’ve ever been able to stop playing a new game before I was falling asleep sitting up. Although, I also stopped because I was frustrated with a stupid jump that I wasn’t being able to make. I’m hoping that it’s easier when I’m not all tired, but we’ll have to wait and see.

For party time fun we have Wii Sports and Wii Play, which amounts to I think around 15 different games for people to choose from. Jeff and I played some tennis last night, before he ran off to WoW and I started up Zelda. It gets really old to see a big ol’ YOU LOSE on the screen. So either I need to get better at tennis, or we need to play a sport that I can win. We may have to move the dining room table out of the living room during my party though. You need a decent amount of space around you to play, especially with any sort of liquor flowing. It wouldn’t be a good idea to have spectators sitting on the couch right behind the players. Man, I hope nobody gets a Wii related injury at my birthday party, that would be sad. People won’t want to come back if I give out black eyes as party favors. (Evite is in progress, and will go out soon. The party is going to be on April 28th, so you can pencil me in ahead of time.)

Despite the fact that I went to bed at a reasonable time, I almost didn’t get up for work today. My brain almost sabotaged my efforts at punctuality. It’s all because of these 3 day weekends that we’ve been getting lately. When my alarm went off my brain remembered that I had Friday off, and that I didn’t have to get up. Luckily I didn’t turn off the alarm, I only hit the snooze button. The rest of my brain kicked in a few minutes later and I remembered that although that it is true that I don’t have to work this Friday, it is not Friday today, and I did need to get up for work. I clocked in at exactly 7 am, so no harm done.

It's a Rut of a Different Color

Okay, I finally managed to talk to my manager this morning. He was supportive I guess. He told me to let him know if I needed anything, and wished me luck with my job apps. I was hoping for more of a magic wand waving, but I guess that will have to do.

Option#1 for internal movement has been nixed. They’re already in the process of offering the job to another applicant. I missed the boat on that one. Now I just have to get the second option to actually post an opening so that I can get an app up there. It will just be another rut to fall into, but at least it would be a different rut. That might be enough to help me tolerate this place for a little while longer.

The Search Continues

I’m feeling a little blue. I got two separate rejection notices from the same company, and I felt like emailing them back, “Okay I get it, you don’t frekin’ want me. You can stop rubbing it in any day now.” I’ve decided to try and move around within The Company for the time being. I am going to continue my external job search, but if I can at least move into a different department maybe things won’t seem so bad. I’m just more burnt out than a dead light bulb. I need me some change, and so I really applied for one job, but that posting had been up since 3/2 and probably isn’t available anymore. There’s another department that I am well suited for that is desperately in need of 2 people and will need a 3rd before the end of the summer, so I talked with the lead over there, and she’s going to talk to her manager for me. She was excited about me moving over with them, largely because I wouldn’t require as much training as a new hire.

I haven’t talked about it with my manager yet, by which I mean my boss’s boss’s boss. In the past he has said that he would help me get any job that I saw that I wanted, but I’m scared that it’s a lie. What if I tell him that I want to move and then he makes it harder? I know, I need to suck it up and talk to him. It’s hard because he’s always busy and rarely in his office. It makes it really easy to avoid the situation. The ironic part is that his office is directly across the hall from mine…. Okay, next time I see him and he isn’t on the phone or talking to someone else I’ll tell him. What’s really the worst thing that is likely to happen? There are horrible retaliatory things that could be done, but most likely either I get to move or everything stays the same. Okay, I’m ready. I can do this.

Are We There Yet?

We are now 2.5 hours into my work day that began at 7am. Well, to be honest it began shortly before 6 which, according to the color of the sky, was before the day began. Still, none of it counts until I am in The Building. *bleck* I have 5.5 hours to go until I can clock out and leave. Apparently my boss was looking for me at the start of shift meeting at 7 this morning. There are a couple of issues with that. The first issue is that he didn’t tell me that he wanted me to go to any such meeting, so I’m not going. It’s really kind of stupid. The main purpose of this meeting is for them to “call roll”. I’m not a kindergartener and I clock in for crying out loud. He can look at the system and see if I was here on time or not, which for the record is the second reason for my lack of attendance. Yes, I’m off to a great start by being 10 minutes late today. Jeff’s opinion is that I was 1 hour and 50 minutes early, and so everyone should be happy. We’ll see how well that goes over. Anyway, this meeting is completely on the other side of the building from my office, so until I am specifically told that I must attend this thing, I will just abstain. Man, I hope that he doesn't tell me that I have to go.

No More 9 to 5

Well it finally happened. I knew that it was coming, but I kept my head down and tried to stay under the radar. My manager finally figured out that there really isn’t a good reason for me to work my off hours anymore. Starting next week they want me to work a “real” first shift. I’ll be working from 7am to 3pm. It’s dreadfully early, and I’m not looking forward to my alarm going off at 6am, but on the other hand I won’t have any traffic to speak of. The real bummer is that I won’t be able to carpool with Jeff anymore. Most of his calls don’t start until 9 or 10 in the morning, and it would be difficult for him to be done by 2:30 in the afternoon reliably. We might still do it once in a while, but we’re going to have to buckle down and get his car fixed this weekend. He made some progress yesterday, but it’s still in pieces. Maybe with me hovering over him while he works it’ll happen faster. I hope we have nice weather again. *crosses fingers*

GRRRRR

You know what’s even cooler than having your manager ask you every day about one of the seven jobs he’s assigned you? Finishing one task, and going to start another one only to find a hand written note from said manager, “These need to move. When? – Ira” I saw that and wanted to write back, “When you figure out how to take care of it yourself, cause I quit, you stupid dickhole.” I restrained myself. I wrote back, “I’m working on it.” and then bitched to my supervisor. I explained that maybe if I didn’t have 1 critical task taking up all my time, almost every day, that perhaps this other thing would have been done faster. Poor guy, he’s not used to my crazed bitching yet. Still, he’s gonna have to get broken in sometime, so I guess today is as good a time as any. He seems to be recovering okay. He even came back to my office after that, so I didn’t totally scare him off. I think my supervisor even sympathized with me a little bit.

Get Me Out of Here

Yeah, I'm just killing the last few seconds before I can clock out for the day. Nothing new or interesting. I've arranged for my dad to dogsit while we are on vacation this July, and I still absolutely hate my job. I know there are worse jobs out there, and I don't want to do them either. I want a better job that pays more and sucks less, but at the moment that appears to be too much to ask. Ahh.... there we go. It's 5 o'clock and I am outta here!