Friday Wrap-Up (Brief Edition)

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• I never thought I'd say this, but I am looking forward to my co-worker Norm returning to work on Monday. OK, maybe that's not entirely true, but I am looking forward to having only my job responsibilities come Monday.

• My incompetent Arizona bookkeeper slipped up big time this week. In an attempt to prove she had done something that she didn't do, she "manufactured" an email. She may have gotten away with it, except when she edited the date in the forwarded email, she neglected to change the day. Her email "proof" she claimed was sent on Monday, October 25th said it was sent on WEDNESDAY, October 25th. And yes, she still has a job.

• Snugs stopped by and left a comment on my Fears post that asked, "Wouldn't it be really funny if your husband has his own blog and does all sorts of posts about you?? He could call it, 'The other side of the crises'." Although her comment was off topic (again) and dripping in snark, I'd love it if he had a blog with posts about me. Communication was always a challenge in our relationship and I think understanding how he sees things would be extremely valuable. Probably not the response snugs was hoping to poke out of me.

• Halloween. ICK! I hate it. I hate all of the dressing up, mask wearing, face painting, scare the shit out of you "fun". This has very little to do with the actual "holiday" and far more to do with my quirks. I'm trying to decide if I should buy candy or just close the curtains and turn off the porch light. I'm leaning towards the latter.
  

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Friday Wrap-Up

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We now return you to your regularly scheduled blogging.

Not sure what happened this week - I've got tons of ideas for blog posts - just couldn't find the discipline to sit down and put those thoughts together. I'd think it had something to do with Cam returning to school, and attempting to adjust to a new schedule, but he doesn't go back to school until next Wednesday ... maybe ...

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Cam's new school is about an hour away and the district is providing transportation (i.e. taxi service door-to-door). I hadn't heard anything on the transportation schedule so I sent an email to the district explaining my concern.

I received a phone call from Leonore shortly after sending the email. They were putting the order in on Thursday - they would get back to me Friday with the details. I asked who I should call if I didn't hear anything on Friday and got the, "Oh! You'll hear back on Friday. You won't need to follow-up!" Ummm ... yeah ...

Yesterday was the one week mark and I have heard nothing. I called Leonore and suddenly she wasn't the person I needed to talk to - she transfers me to Patty.

Patty insists this isn't a quick process - that Leonore gave me incorrect information a week ago - but that she will have the transportation information for me Friday (today). Anyone want to take any bets??

Accountability seems to be as elusive as the yellow-bellied sap-sucker these days.

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I created chaos at work this week and - for a period of time - thought I might have pushed a little too far.

I am the regional accountant for our western division branches (Northern California, Southern California and Arizona). My AZ branch has always been a thorn in my side. I've got an incompetent bookkeeper there, and a General Manager who has an odd (inappropriate?) relationship with her. She continues to screw up - to negatively impact the success of the western division - and no one will do anything about it.

This has been going on for 3+ years. It came to a head on Tuesday, and resulted in closed door conference calls involving the Controller, the CFO, the VP and the GM in AZ. I was a bit stressed.

True to form, no one has given me any status update, but I do know that my bookkeeper in AZ did exactly what she was supposed to do yesterday, and that was my goal.

What happened to people honoring their word? Doing the right thing rather than the easy thing? Addressing conflict and performance in a direct manner rather than bitching about it behind closed doors and doing nothing?

*shakes head*

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Donations for Boo and her family continue to come in. Thanks again to all of you who have supported her with donations and continued thoughts and prayers.

Just a reminder that Nitebyrd is donating 100% of the proceeds from any/all sales in her Etsy Shop to Boo and her family through 25th.

I am a huge fan of her Designer Upcycle/Recycle Tote Bags. Not only are they adorable, but they are quite practical too!

Clicking on the banner below will take you directly to Nitebyrd's shop

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Friday Wrap-Up

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A few of you asked how the IT server migration turned out last week. That wonderful idea to shut down the server that hosts the accounting software on the busiest day of the accounting year? Yeah ... well ...

They assured us they'd make our server the priority and it would be back up in 30 minutes. Can anyone guess how accurate that was? We were back up 1 hour and 47 minutes after they took us off-line. Even better? My employer let everyone go at 2:30PM on New Year's Eve and IT was walking out the door promptly at 2:30PM. Guess where I was? That's right ... sitting at my desk trying to get through the work that had to be completed before I left. I was here until 4PM.

Golly! If I'd have had that 1 hour and 47 minutes of WORK TIME during the WORK DAY, I could have left at 2:30PM too! Bitter? Just a wee bit.

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Speaking of bitter and work ... We were notified today that the natural gas will be shut off to our building beginning at 11AM and will (hopefully) be turned back on at 1PM. This means we will have no heat in the building for those two hours. Granted, the IT department isn't in charge of this shut down so it might actually last only two hours, but again, is the middle of the word day the best time to do this?

I went to the "Big Dog" and inquired about making the day a "casual" Friday (we don't have those here - men are required to wear ties daily and women are encouraged to wear skirts/dresses) so that we might be better able to keep warm during the gas shut down. And the response was?? I'm wearing a dress today!

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Thanks for all of the feedback on the PTO issue. I've decided that I will make my position on the matter clear, then let it go. I will vote against any measure that excludes any parent from being a voting member of the organization and will continue to use my "executive board" member vote to advocate for the student/parent population not represented by the PTO membership.

Then I'll be grateful that most of the "executive board" members have younger kids and will likely continue running the middle school PTO rather than moving on to the High School PTO!

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Confession time ...

Remember when I told y'all that I was adding the Project 365 Blog (Dana Does Digital - if you haven't been over there you're missing out, so here is a little preview to entice you)?



Anyway, I mentioned that didn't foresee it changing anything about this blog. Well, that does seem to be the case, but something is changing this blog - LOD!

LOD you ask? Why yes! Lack Of Drama! I didn't realize how much I blogged about the craziness that my life had become until there wasn't so much craziness to blog about. Now I'm really struggling to come up with things to write about.

I must keep reminding myself this is a good thing!

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HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND!

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Signs of the Times

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Ha! I finally read the directions figured out how to get pics from my cell phone to my computer, and am I ever glad I did! You see, I walked into the "rest"room (does anyone really rest there?) this morning at work and found this sign on the stall door:


First of all, could we get just a little more passive/aggressive? It bugs the hell out of me that people post idiotic things like this in the work place.

Second, does this person have any idea how many people walk out of said "rest"room without washing their hands after "resting"? I'd be far more tolerant of a sign that read:

PLEASE WASH THE FECAL MATTER OFF YOUR HANDS BEFORE GRABBING THE DOOR HANDLE ON YOUR WAY OUT OR SITTING DOWN TO EAT LUNCH AT MY TABLE.

And last but not least, can we please use some other term than "remains"? What? My "remains"? I didn't flush uncle Joe down the toilet! And if I did I would certainly make sure he was ALL the way down before leaving the stall! Maybe something a little more appropriate like:

IF YOU SHIT, MAKE SURE TO SEND EVERY LAST TURD TO THE SEWER TREATMENT PLANT. THEY HAVE FRIENDS THERE WAITING FOR THEM!

Who needs fiction in a blog? Real life is so much more entertaining!

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Friday Wrap Up

First things first! Remember that contest that Talisman was having? The "What the f*ck is that thing?" scanning electron microscope contest?? Well, even though I didn't enter the second chance part of the contest, I was first loser runner up! I guess that $$ I promised to put in her son's 529 college fund wasn't quite enough to win the drawing. For all of my mad Googling skills I won this (Ha! The story of my life):

Who says chemists don't have a sense of humor??? Now, of course she's telling me this is a prize, and she did fork over 5K in PsyPets money for it, but I know it's nothing more that a shameless, self-promoting blog plug pity gift. Oh well, I had fun and she promises to do this again!

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I often click on the DISCOVER button in my Google Reader just to see if it really can figure out what I like, and occasionally I happen upon a blog that is a perfect match. Recently, Google shared House of Lime with me. I've been lurking there for a bit, but decided to come out of the closet to snag this "What is your Karaoke Theme Song?" quiz (and no, I would never sing Karaoke, but the quiz was fun):

Your Karaoke Theme Song is "Margaritaville"

You are a true party animal, but your style is mild and chill. (It's true! I can party with the best of them but prefer a select handful.) Kicking back with a few friends and a few drinks is all you need to be happy. (Not only is it all that I need, it's all that I want.) You certainly don't feel pressured to be a part of any party scene. In fact, you avoid trendier spots. (And here I thought this was just because I'm old!) You've been known to kick loose anywhere and everywhere. All you need is a cooler. (It's not about where the party is, it's about who the party is with) You might also sing: "Gin and Juice," "Love Shack," and "Red Red Wine" (*sings* Love shack ... baby love shack ... *stops singing before you all run away*) Stay away from people who sing: "Wind Beneath My Wings" (I don't think anyone who reads my blog would sing "Wind Beneath My Wings" would they??)

What's Your Karaoke Theme Song?

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We leave for San Antonio on Sunday and I have TONS of things to do before we leave, both at home and at work. On top of the getting the important things done like laundry and packing, I'm also working on an inaugural vlog. I can't make any promises, but I'm hoping to have it done before we leave.

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This was the first full week of the new 4-day schedule at work. Although it was great having Monday off (Who knew how much fun it is to go to the market during a week day?), it's taking me a bit of time to adjust to the 10-hour work day - especially that initial 7AM-noon chunk. About 11AM, my body is screaming "IT'S LUNCH TIME," but the clock tells me otherwise.

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Random Friday Thoughts

I've got nothing of importance for you today so you'll just have to listen to my brain dump!

• Is it spring yet? My lilacs still haven't bloomed and tomorrow is the last day of May.

• My employer is implementing a 4-day work week beginning next week. It's being offered to reduce commuting costs (gas just hit $4.19/gallon here). The up side? I'll have either a Monday or a Friday off each week. The down side? People are idiots and based on the behavior I've seen in the office (from fellow employees) since this announcement was made I think it's likely that the 4-day work week will be short lived. Why are some people so drawn to screwing things up for everyone else?

• When we moved out here, I made a conscientious decision to be active in the community. Much of that involvement surrounds the public school system. I went to my first School Improvement Plan (SIP) Committee meeting at the middle school last night. Someone please tell me why the school district would require each school to write a SIP but have ZERO accountability for actually meeting the goals listed on the SIP? How ridiculous is that?

• I was elected President of the Middle School Parent Volunteer Organization for the 2008-2009 school year. Do you suppose this little farming community would take issue with the nekkid Thursday PVO President?

• We leave for a week of "vacation" in San Antonio a week from Sunday. It will be me, Husband and four kids between the ages of 12 and 20. I'm pulling my son out of school for a full week. It was originally only the last 2 days of the school year until we had FIVE snow days this winter. Does that make me a bad mom?

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If you are feeling geeky today and want to waste time at work challenge your brain, Talisman is hosting an “identify this image” taken under a Scanning Electron Microscope game. She's got some pretty cool prizes for the winners. Go show her that the brainy readers come from my blog.

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HI-HO! HI-HO! It's Off to Work I Go!

I'm being trained by Norm. If you've never seen Office Space, I've included a little clip of Milton. Norm is Milton with the addition of a bit of tree hugger.



You see, Norm and his wife (Fred - short for Winnifred) have no children, but they do have 7 cats. They recycle far more than they throw away and always try to re-purpose, rather than recycle, if that is an option.

Norm and his wife carpool, but to help even more with the conservation of fuel, Norm walks 2+ miles (each way) to meet his wife at the highway rather than have her pick him up at the office.

Norm is the self-elected recycling police- he peruses the trash cans at work looking for aluminum cans that people have thrown away rather than put in recycling. He pulls them out and makes sure they find their way to the recycling bin.

Norm starts every conversation with, "And how are you on this simply lovely winter day?" I must have heard that at least 17 times today, not to mention he also signs his emails that way. I'm guessing he'll change the season when it becomes appropriate - I'll be sure to keep you updated.

Now, Norm seems to have a good heart, but quirky would be an understatement. Being that I have a fine appreciation for the more odd people in life, this actually works out quite well.

I was given a cubicle with no supplies - no tape dispenser, stapler, adding machine, telephone or computer. I did get my computer at about 4:00 this afternoon, so that is a step in the right direction. Still don't have a phone or any of the other necessities, but I'm pretty certain that if they want me to do the job they'll come up with them.

It was great to come home and have lunch with my son today (he had a day off from school) and the commute was all of 3 stop signs and 4 turns for a total of 7 minutes!

Do I sound flustered? Disappointed? Petty? I'm none of those! As goofy as I am being, not only do I think I'll really enjoy this job and the people I work with, but I believe it was a good decision to set aside career aspirations for a solid family foundation for my son and I.