October 2006 Archives
Went to the grocery store on my lunch hour. I did actually leave a couple bottles on the shelf. They were way back in the back, though.
Got my laptop back from Apple. Turns out the whole video display required a brand new hard drive. I powered it up and got the Welcome screen. Last time they called me to double check before they did that. Not so, this time.
Had to re-load the OS and re-run all the software updates. I din't lose too much stuff, I don't think. And I did kind of need a new hard drive. Got a new keyboard and they replaced the two missing rubber feet. For all that they could have given me a new battery, too, but okay.
I'm probably gonna put it up on eBay when I get a new one, so hopefully this'll up the resale value a little. Looks like similar models are going for about $250. Not great, but it's better than nothing. Especially considering I got this one for free when my last one died. It'll pay for AppleCare (the extended warranty) on the new one.
Thanks to Senuti, not only did I not have to lose everything I put on my iPod since the last backup, I actually copied it all back to my laptop. Yay, Senuti!
This has not been the best start to a week. So, I was working nights last week and my sleep schedule was all jacked up. I think I made it worse by staying up all day Friday (Fly Girl and the outlet mall beckoned), so I was exhausted by Friday afternoon. Got in bed at 4pm and didn't budge until 11:00. So I missed out on Girls' Night at KathyHowe's and I missed out on the 612 party, both of which I very much wanted to attend. I then spent the rest of the weekend either sleeping or dozing on the couch.
This jacked up sleep schedule resulted in my being wide awake at 4:30 Monday morning. After laying in bed for an hour, I decided to go for a morning run. As I'm returning from a very pleasant 5 miles, I see a tow truck in the parking lot of the hardware store across the street. The lot where I had left my car. You see where this is going.
I need to take my iBook to the Genius Bar. It's on. It reboots. But it won't go to sleep and I've got no display.
I wanted an excuse to buy a MacBook, but now is not a good time.
*sigh*
The night shift is both a blessing and a curse. If I'm so inclined, I can get so much done. I have gotten quite a bit done. On those days where I was so inclined. Not so much on the other ones. And then there's only such much you can do when other people aren't around for input.
I have tried very hard to not check my work email from home during the day. All it does is stress me out and usually I can't do anything about it anyway.
The hardest part has been trying not to get sucked in in the morning when everyone else gets in. The phone calls and emails start coming, and if I try to address them, I can't get out the door. I purposely scheduled morning appointments a couple days this week to force me to leave. Otherwise it's a 12-, 13-, 14-hour day.
I'm so ready for Friday. I hope I'm not too tired to celebrate.
Yesterday morning I left my safety glasses out on my desk, instead of putting them in a cabinet where I usually leave them. Wouldn't you know it I got back in last night and they were gone. Bastards. Stealing shit out of people's cubes.
Via Tony, I was paging through the comments on a Deadspin post on the Tigers, and found this:
That picture is actually of people cheering on Claude Lemieux being torn apart by a mountain lion.
Bwaha! Bwahaha!
Of Magglio Ordonez.
(photo borrowed from Mickey Tettleton Memorial Overpass)
Bonus: Video from a fan in the stands in left field when Ordonez hit the homer, complete with guy in rally cap.
(via lauren)
My self-evaluation for work is due today. Since I've been here all night, the sooner I turn this in, the sooner I can go home. I have my 1-on-1 at 8:30.
This was so much easier to do when I didn't have much responsibility. Read up on the job description, throw in a couple extra things about whatever new projects showed up on the line, and boom, you're done.
Most of the operators like to gripe about how stupid it is, but also gripe about how no one notices what a good job they do. So they all hate it and some won't even do it. Idiots. I put some effort into mine last year, and pretty much all of it came back in my review, which was very good. Significantly better than all of my co-workers. See how that works?
The reaction is more mixed amongst the engineers. At this level, the value of the self-evaluation is directly proportional to how seriously your boss takes it. If the manager that quit were still here and doing my review, I probably wouldn't be worrying about it. But since my director seems to care, I figure I ought to make it good.
It's pretty easy to sum up what I've done all year. At least lately. I kinda blocked out everything that happened before I switched departments. The part I'm struggling with is the intangibles. How exactly do I say, under my accomplishments, that I've singlehandedly kept this department running for two months, with not very much experience, at a very busy time?
I'm depending on my director to recognize that and I fully expect to see it when he gives me my review. But I ought to document it myself. This is where I'm supposed to be tooting my own horn, after all.
I'm working nights this week. Expect some strangeness.
Click through for details. This (and this) is as far as I've gotten personalizing my cube. All the rest is paper, paper, paper. I've been meaning to bring pictures. Maybe get a plant or something.
Fly Girl called the other day and the first thing out of her mouth was, "The new Justin Timberlake song is way better than that other one you posted."
Totally right, that one.
My Love*
(Right click, whatnot, por favor.)
*no mas
I haven't been paying any attention to baseball all year. Baseball bores me.
But I did watch the Tigers come from behind to beat the A's to get to the World Series. Magglio Ordonez's last home run was a thing of beauty.
As is his hair. I could totally run my fingers through that. *purr*
22 years ago today, the Tigers won the World Series. And have pretty much sucked ever since. But this could be the year. Go Tigers!
Okay, not so stressed. Until Sunday night, anyway.
I left work at a reasonable hour and went and saw a comedy show with some work peeps. The show was entitled "The Left, The Right, and The Ugly, or Blue State Blues." They were having a 2-for-1 "bring a Republican friend" night.
There are lots of young Republicans at work. It's weird. Nobody really talks about it much, though. Me and Bosslady are about the only ones who aren't. Both she and the Republican friend enjoyed the show.
I've been in a constant state of low-grade stress where work is concerned for, oh, about 3 months.
After the last guy quit, we brought in a consultant which turned out to be a disaster. Impossible to communicate with. I timed him once; he talked for 25 minutes straight without pause. If you tried to interrupt him, he just wouldn't stop, and he'd raise his voice to talk over you. He'd cut you off, and then keep talking and not stop. On top of that, he couldn't write for shit. 70% of my job is technical writing, and he could not write a clear, concise sentence to save his life.
I couldn't take it anymore and I told my Director I wouldn't work with him. The result of that is that a huge facility project that's taking place in a week has none of the requisite paperwork in place as it should be right now.
The next guy to rotate into my department isn't going to make it over until mid-November, so we brought in another consultant who is actually a dream to work with. Wish we had gotten him the first time around.
So he's helping out, but this month is an extremely busy month. We've got a bunch of big executions scheduled. The problem with that is when you're busy with an execution, none of the other paperwork stuff gets done. And there's a lot of paperwork to be done for the next big execution that immediately follws this one, and the next three after that, etc.
On top of that, a few of the people that are supposed to be helping me out are pretty much unavailable. Not their fault, but I blame their bosses for getting us all into this situation in the first place, making commitments that couldn't be kept, etc.
I'm also sick and tired of people crying to get their projects moved up on my to-do list, but then when I get some of that work out the door, they can't be bothered to take the time to look at it. If you're irritated that my boss and your QA guy haven't reviewed it, then how about if you tell them that instead of pestering me about it? Or if your project was so important that we needed this turned around ASAP, how has it been sitting for a week because you haven't reviewed it yet? I did my part already.
A lot of these things are out of my control, but I'm ultimately responsible anyway. And it drives me insane.
I hate that there's the potential for my quality of work to suffer because 1) I simply don't have adequate time to devote to a project and 2) the people responsible for input and review can't be bothered to pay attention. Never mind the part where I don't know any better and really need to do some research on things.
I like being busy, but not like this. This sucks.
Mel tipped me off to the existence of International Delights' Pumpkin Pie Spice flavored creamer. So I looked for it while I was at Lunds the other day and this is what I found in the refrigerator section:
That empty space on the right is where all the bottles of pumpkin spice should have been. Dammit.
- Tony's Spinach Manifesto, parts 1 and 2. Anxiously awaiting Part 3. Tony should have started blogging a long time ago, but he's only just begun and already he's got it down. I think there are two particular style attributes that make for great blog writing. One is a phrasing/punctuation thing which I don't know how to explain real well (helpful, I know). The other is creative linking. Tony totally gets them both. P.S. Tony and me.
- Bayou's continuing series on her trip to South Dakota to volunteer on the Pine Ridge Indian reservation. Photos and narrative. Moving in so many ways.
- Dawn points to an article that claims women only think about sex once a day. Once a day? Bull. Shit.
- Wendy <3's The View like I do.
- KathyHowe brings the cute.
- Ms Lauren, formerly of feministe, returns to blogging at Faux Real Tho! Yes! *fist pump* P.S. Lauren and me.
I can't get with having The Amazing Race on Sunday nights. Because when football runs over, then 60 Minutes runs late, then TAR runs late, and then I'm late getting over to Desperate Housewives. This is not working for me. Maybe I'll just have to go back to BitTorrent. Since I'm old school and still have a VCR instead of a DVR and can't record shit when the timing's all off. Actually, I'm not so broken up over missing DH. I'll just come in late, watch the end, and be done with it.
You notice how "TiVo" has become a verb like "Google" and "Mapquest"? And how "TiVo" and "iPod" are to digital video recording and mp3 players what "Kleenex" is to tissue?
My favorite new show this season: Brothers & Sisters. Sally Field is the bomb. The story so far is good. I like the ensemble cast. I know everyone's all over Studio 60, to which I say, "Meh."
I totally want that shirt that Addison was wearing. That's a great shirt.
As seen at... Jimmy John's.
I went to IKEA on Saturday on a mission to procure a specific table and some chairs. Needless to say, on a Saturday afternoon, it was busy as hell. I hate that. Hate hate hate it. It's overwhelming for me. I went in, picked out what I was looking for, grabbed a couple other miscellaneous items (a lamp and shade, chair cushions, light bulbs), and got the hell out.
It wasn't until I got all the way home that I realized my dumb ass accidentally picked two tables ('cause the box is L-shaped and they were nested and for some reason I was thinking that I needed to have both). So last night I went to return the table and the light bulbs. I bought some energy efficient ones, but they weren't bright enough. I'm used to selecting light bulbs by wattage and I had no idea how many lumens I needed (which was about twice as many as the bulbs I originally bought).
So I returned the table and the light bulbs. I went out to the parking lot where my car was in the loading zone. I pulled out, and then on a whim decided to park by the entrance and go back in. I mean, hey, I just returned some items, so I can spend that money, even though I never intended to spend it in the first place, right?
So I went through the store, which was almost entirely empty, completely at my leisure. And whaddya know, inspiration struck. I had a vision. I mean, it's no HGTV vision, but it was a vision. And then I had more ideas. And then I had to tell myself I'm only allowed to work on one room right now because I don't have that kind of money lying around, but I scribbled down a bunch more things.
So I think I've got the basics for my dining room/office. I've got the dining room table and the two chairs with cushions. I got a table top and legs in lieu of a desk because I hate those all-in-one computer desk things with the hutch. I knew I needed shelving (since all I had was a table), and I wanted to take advantage of my tall ceilings, so I got this bookcase (without the door, and with lights!), a few magazine files (not for magazines, though), a desk lamp, and some blue tea light holders.
So the theme is birch and navy. I have three different types of wood in my apartment, so I'm trying to keep them in separate rooms and consistent within a room. I still need some sort of window dressing. And, coincidentally, my 3'x5' Michigan flag will go perfectly with the birch and navy. How 'bout that?!
Now I just need to put all this shit together.
Travel websites are pissing me off. They show you all these options, you "book" something, and now instead of actually booking it, they send your reservation. No guarantee that you're going to get what you signed up for.
I found this out the first time when I tried to book some hotel rooms through Travelocity. I didn't realize the booking hadn't actually gone through. Thank gawd I a) called the hotel to confirm and b) was still able to get the last three rooms in the hotel. I had called Travelocity back and they said they had sent the reservation to the hotel but the hotel didn't have the rooms I requested, so the reservation didn't get made. Shouldn't they, I don't know, LET ME KNOW?!
Last week I tried to book a plane ticket on Orbitz (good thing my trip's a couple months out) and got a "we've sent your reservation" message. Screw it, I'm booking directly through the airline. I'll pay a little extra for the security of knowing that I actually have a flight booked.
I kind of liked that A Public Affair song until I found out it's a Jessica Simpson song.
Public Service Announcement:
The GA podcast feed has been updated. In case you've been getting that little exclamation point in your iTunes. Here's the new feed.
