Work

3-month followup

I really haven’t felt much like writing lately, and I feel bad about that. Not because I’m suffering any delusions that I’m letting down the two of you that visit my blog on occasion; it’s more that I feel ashamed for not making myself suffer, powering through my creative block until something forces its way to the top. Art should hurt, shouldn’t it? If it wasn’t excruciating to produce, it doesn’t really count, right? Ugh. Work is kicking my butt, and my always-laid-back boss has said that the theme for April is going to be “what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger.” I’m sensing much overtime in my immediate future. Brittney has inspired me to try and find silver linings in lemons (pardon my mixed metaphor, har-d-har), so I will say that being busy is much better than being bored, and that May is looking like it won’t be nearly as bad. Plus, my boss has hard-coded a happy hour into our schedule for the end of April, so there is that to look forward to. Today (squeamish warning: stop reading here) I had another sonogram, so my doctor could inspect my inner girly bits. It turns out that my right ovary is totally cyst-free, and my left one only has two small cysts, which are both well within the range of normal. Also, since I began hormonal birth control in January, my periods have been half as long and half as heavy (thank god!) and right on schedule. I wasn’t wild about taking The Pill, but I am feeling soooo much better (physically and mentally) that I guess it was probably the right thing to do.

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Random Catch Up

I dreamed the other night that at work we had a new building, similar to the old apartment building we used to work in, but more house-like. I shared an office with Amy, in the 2nd floor bathroom. Her desk was in the tub, and mine was in the sink. Our printer sat on top of the toilet. If anyone wanted to bring us anything, they had to shimmy up the drainpipe on the outside wall, and shove their papers in through the window. Ben and I are phone-interviewing candidates for our open web designer position, and most of the people that we really like want way too much money — like, $60-$90,000 annually. It’s really disheartening. There are two people we’re bringing in this week who fall somewhat within the salary range we’re offering, so hopefully one of them will work out. If not, it’s back to the drawing board, reposting the position and probably end of summer before we’re able to hire someone. I’m the only designer on staff right now, and my workload is completely insane. I may only be the dried out empty husk of a designer by the end of summer, if we have to wait that long to get some help. Last night Doc and I watched “The Science of Sleep.” It was a pretty good movie, and a really spot-on representation of the strangeness of the dream state. Things kept shifting, changing, appearing in different places at different sizes, in different environments. I had a nice productive weekend. Saturday I was awake at 6:30 and doing yoga by 7. I know, crazy. I couldn’t get back to sleep after Neko woke me up. I did some gardening and a bit of housecleaning, and Doc and I saw a movie (“The Last Mimzy,” which […]

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the week’s update

I’ve been working on my other website a lot this week so I haven’t had much time to write. Last week kinda sucked, between feeling downright awful for several days (bad period) and some crazy shit going on at work involving deadlines and last minute changes and having to say no and things maybe not working right and the possibility of a trivia slideshow to be presented in front of 2500 rich people going down in flames (it didn’t, but it was nervewracking getting there) and talking to managers about lessening the craziness of the crazy shit and just generally being extra crabby. It was a bad week for a lot of people that I talked to. Also, I barely ran any at all last week; my leg is still not feeling any better. Now it’s doing this thing where if I put any weight on it, it feels like it’s going to buckle! Good times all around. I’m going to try to get back into it this week, maybe run some on the elliptical machine, which I like better than the treadmill and it feels better on my injury. I got a slew of new freelance work and billed for quite a bit from September. I feel that the projects are coming at a good pace now. Nothing like the craziness of the book project. That should be printed and might deliver this week (thus the reason I was working on my business website; my URL is printed in the credits). We did have a good time out on Saturday night with Kirk, Brittney, and Stan. We ate at a steakhouse and then went to the crazy bowling alley-slash-event and entertainment center. We didn’t do any actual bowling, but played some video games, then went to Steak and Shake […]

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make sure you staple the receipt to the Z tape!

Ten reasons I am super glad that I do not work foodservice retail any longer: Enter your employee number, then press “VOID.” (did I have an employee number??) Do the Daily Z. Put the Z key in the keyslot, turn to the Z setting. Subtract paid outs, gift of joy sold, and store coupons — also listed at top of Z tape. (GIFT OF JOY! Oh lordy, I forgot about those!) Pay: Starts at $4.25. Raises depend upon both your performance and your experience here. Customer Complaints: They will complain about anything. Instead of offering money back or anything free, try to give them a discount on their next purchase. The freezer will go into defrost when the outer dial is at a screw and the inner dial reaches 0 (the black area). It will come out of defrost when the inner dial reaches the copper arrow. Get the wet/dry vacuum and suck up all the yucky stuff in the bottom of the case. Register Problems: When it starts to eat the tape, take out the ribbon cassette, just like a typewriter, and try to get the paper out (dear god, this was back in the day when the typewriter was an appropriate metaphor). Use the little black release levers to pull out the paper. It’s a good idea to keep tweezers on hand to get at the paper if it is really stuck in there. Try unplugging the whole thing and then plugging it back in. Is the keyslot on the “R” setting? Is the “B” key in the on position? Take $2 in quarters as a paid out from the register. Drain the bleach water from the towel bucket, and gather the detergent and bleach. The Laundromat is at Parker and Independence on the SW corner, behind Taco […]

Read Moremake sure you staple the receipt to the Z tape!

portentous monday

My day has not started off well. I was late for work because of nasty traffic. A cherrypicker construction truck was too tall for the Skillman/Northwest Highway underpass, and broke the bridge. Chunks of concrete everywhere and about six fire trucks blocking all but one lane of traffic. As I was walking from the parking lot to my building, I tripped over a broken sidewalk and took a skidding face plant onto the pavement. I simply couldn’t catch myself, and my purse, gym bag, and coffee mug went flying as I landed face down on my chest. I skinned my knee, elbow, and knuckles pretty bad, and am just now finding other minor scrapes and road rash on my arms and legs. The worst part was, it happened right in front of somebody. She was very nice and helped me pick up my stuff, but I was mortified that someone caught me in such a completely graceless mistake. The first aid kit seems to be missing from the office. So no bandaids. Then, about 20 minutes ago, I spilled what was left of my coffee down my front and onto my lap. Doomy doomy doomy doom….

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