Bring the New

I think I should know way more about how to use Power Point than I do just because it is a Microsoft Office product and I worked in administrative roles for so long. But I don't like Power Point just like I don't like the charting features of Excel and Word. No pie chart or power point slide has ever provided a significant benefit for me in any meeting I've ever been in. Do people really sit there, listening to the information given by a speaker and then, upon seeing a scatter chart or whatever, think "oh, wow, I get it now"? It has always struck me as a tool to use for when you have to present to lazy old rich dudes who make the decisions so that they have to do a minimal amount of thinking in order to be persuaded to agree to a project or grant or what have you.

I am wrong in this, obviously. If I weren't these things would not be used so pervasively. And, if anything, I'm clearly the lazy one because I don't want to create graphs, charts, or Power Point presentations to go along with my data or reporting. I mention all of this because Power Point is something that is used a lot in my new job so I ordered one of those "Dummy's Guide To" books about it. I also ordered a book about Agile methodology because that is what my new company follows. I'm actually a fan of Agile, even though I do not understand it fully and have not worked in it for years so I'm looking forward to studying that. The history of it is pretty cool, if you are interested (just to be clear, I'm a business analyst who works for a company that develops software solutions for our clients, not a developer or engineer of any kind. I say that for those who might actually click that link and see that Agile is a method for software development and might get the wrong idea).

I started the new gig this past Monday and I'm really jazzed about it. The building is gorgeous and has all kinds of awesome things in it like a faux Starbucks, a deli, free fountain drinks, and a gym. And if you don't want to eat at the deli, two restaurants come every day (I think they are rotating) or you can walk to a couple of places near the office. It's also just really well-maintained and CLEAN. That shouldn't be a selling point but my previous office was filthy. Cockroaches climbed out of the coffee machines and were occasionally seen strolling about. Dust and grime were everywhere and whilst the facilities department claimed that the carpets were fully cleaned once a year, they weren't. I don't think they were even vacuumed with any regularity. I swear, that company pays for the bare minimum in custodial care and the bathrooms were a horror show. So yeah, the new building being so clean is a huge plus. Oh! And there is a parking garage that I may one day be brave enough to use!

The people are grand, too. I told The Russian that everyone was so nice and welcoming that I mused for a moment that maybe I'd joined a cult. They are really enthusiastic and one of the most reassuring things is that so many of them have been with the company for years. I've learned about the project I've been assigned to and whilst I do not quite know what my specific role and duties will be, I'm looking forward to it and understand the scope overall.

So yay job!

I've also broken up with SA (finally), paving the way for better things in 2020. That sounds mean and I want to make it clear that he is a fine man with some great qualities. We are just completely incompatible because I want more than he is interested in offering. We make fantastic friends with benefits and if that's what I wanted, life would be great. But I want a partnership, a shared life, and someone who opens his arms wide to welcome me into his world. SA is just not that guy. I won't be dating any time soon I don't think. Maybe not ever. I don't know how to meet people other than through online sites and, as anyone can tell you, that is an absolute nightmare and I'm certain that if Dante Alighieri had lived in the 20th and 21st centuries, he'd definitely have incorporated it into his Divine Comedy. It isn't that I think all men are terrible or that I'm jaded, I'm just tired and lazy and have no interest in rooting around in that mess to try and find what I want. I'm also 39 so it's a lot harder (so it seems) to find a guy in his 40's who has no children and doesn't want them. Guys who show interest in me on rare occasions are all in their 20's and I just think "oh lord, please say I don't look like some desperate middle aged spinster who wants to pounce on the young".

Being single doesn't bother me and being alone has never been an issue really. I don't like having people over to my place because it's my place and I like my privacy. I have always been good at entertaining myself and possibly a little too OK with my own company. I will miss spending time with SA and the good things we had, as well as the sex and affection. But I've tried doing the casual thing with him and kept getting attached and wanting more so that won't work and if I'm going to be with someone, I want to at least have a chance at my happily ever after. So for now I'll just try to fill my time with things like cooking and cleaning and forcing myself to get out of my apartment from time to time.

I fell out of my routine regarding cooking and the positive attitude and productivity. It happened because I went to Arizona to visit my mother last weekend and I didn't keep up with my routines and stuff. I'm not going to go into things with my mother because I've decided I want to keep my family out of this but I will say that she's doing well and it is really, really, really lucky that Eldest Brother is out there. He is fantastic with her and great at taking care of her appointments and stuff. So we'll just leave it there.

I've started getting back into my routines and made myself shower and get dressed about an hour into my workday today (I'm working from home) as a jumpstart. I also make myself putter around and clean to try and spark that desire for productivity again and I think I'll be back to my giddy, enthusiastic, rah-rah self soon. I'm reminding myself that this is the perfect time for that attitude because I've started a new chapter. I've shed my old company where I was going nowhere and just stayed out of complacency and laziness and shed my old relationship which was basically the same. Time to be my best self and live my best life. In with the new.

A Perfectly Sunday Kind of Post

Oh dear, I seem to have run out of scheduled posts and have nothing to publish this week. Good thing I have this new job lined up because I am never going to hit it big with this blog. Is that even still a thing? Hasn't it all been transitioned over to Insta-fame? I will never be Insta-famous because I do not have anything gorgeous to post, do not travel, and am not into fashion. I have zero to Instagram about. Sigh. 

Do you know what I think is a scam? Dry shampoo. I know women who swear by it but for me, it really just seems like a waste of money because I can make my day old hair even more greasy by running my hands through it for free. It has been suggested that I am just not using the right brand, and I'm certain that could be true, but I am not going to spend money just so I can avoid washing my hair. Which seems weird considering how much I hate washing my hair. Well, it isn't the washing part so much as it is having wet hair. I just do not like that and drying it is a pain in the butt as well, especially now that my hair has changed. Yep, at some point, certain portions have decided they are going to be curly. The majority of my hair is straight but there are sections, mostly in the back, that are legit curly, and I find I play with those portions a lot because the kinkiness is so strange. But, because I don't know how to straighten them out (and am too lazy to really do so), I just look like I have curly hair and am terrible at straightening it so do a halfassed job. People have noticed and asked me if I'd slept in a braid the night before and then I have to explain that no, I'm just becoming a woman now and my body is changing. 

Possibly not-a-scam? Feliway Multicat plug-in diffuser. Bubbles continues her campaign of over-grooming and has massive bald patches on her back. The vet has been pretty worthless about this and I haven't had the $170 to pay for "senior" blood work in an effort to get her on anxiety medication, so I try, from time to time, over the counter remedies. I've tried diffusers before without really noticing a difference but I'm going to be hopeful about this one. I went to SA's around 2PM yesterday and got back to my place around 11AM this morning. No sign of Bubbles. Usually, she comes out to greet me and for pets and for me to feed her. But I've seen neither hide nor hair of her and there were no hairballs on my carpet and rugs. Sure, it's only been a day of the diffuser but still, it's nice that I've been home for an hour and she's just somewhere chilling. At least, I hope so. I also got this stuff you put on her paw that she will lick off and it is supposed to help chill her out. I did that yesterday so now a part of me thinks she may be dead under my bed. I'm going to give it a few hours before I check because a) I don't want to ruin this lovely peace of being left alone and b) I need to prepare myself if I'm going to find my cat dead under my bed 😑

But surely Teddy would let me know, right? He'd be meowing at me and leading me to her? He's sleeping on the back of the sofa so I'm assuming everything is OK and I'm just being my neurotic self. Sigh. I think I'll run to the store for something I've already forgotten that I need for my meal prep today. I'm doing/attempting baked falafels and quinoa-stuffed bell peppers. Neither seems too ambitious so hopefully it will all turn out well and delicious and keep for this week. And a short week it will be too! It is my last week at the company I've worked with for the majority of my adult life. My projects are all but transitioned so I'm in that "over it and don't care" phase, and really, it's just a matter of my taking some stuff home, returning some stuff, going out to lunch with my team, going to happy hour, and then, finally, turning in my access badge. My last day is Thursday so I should be out by 11 a.m. at the latest and I'll have an extra day and a half off. 

Then I will dive into the scary world of new job on the following Monday. 😵

Change for the Better All Up In Here

Oh man, YouTube, amirite? I've not been a big YouTube viewer, historically. I've used it mainly to look up how to do stuff and, more recently, talent competitions. Well, there was a period a few years ago where I would look up Belgian Beat Box competitions but we won't discuss that. Anyhowzits, a week or so ago, I came across Diane In Denmark and I've been hooked ever since. If you want to see someone truly living her best life, tune into that. She is a native of Scotland who has lived in Denmark for over 20 years with her husband and children. Her videos are short and they are all about home management, from cleaning to de-cluttering, to organizing, as well as some crafts, recipes, general Danish life, and some Q and A. I am simplifying it a bit but I can't do it justice; just trust me, she is amazing. Again, her videos are short and she is just this fireplug of positivity who is a cheerleader for her viewers and an inspiring and infectious source of enthusiasm.

And man, Denmark sounds amazing and I want that life. I even love the idea of the winter when the days are incredibly short so it is dark all the time.

Her channel is not monetized, she does not ask you to subscribe, and she does not ask you to "like" her videos. In return, she ever so gently reminds her viewers that we aren't friends in real life and she must maintain boundaries so put your comments under the videos because she doesn't check private messages and you cannot send her presents, as lovely as that is (she suggests you donate to charity or treat a friend to coffee instead.

Because Diane in Denmark is damned delightful.

But that wasn't what I came on here to talk about. I have news. After nearly 12 years of full-time employment with my company, I am leaving to take a new position elsewhere. I interviewed back in November and never heard back so figured "oh, interviewing is like dating now and you get ghosted. OK, cool. Whatever." My friend and former colleague came to me about this, I didn't go looking so it was a situation in which I couldn't lose. I like my job, I love my team, and I've just been happy where I am for the past three years or so. But my friend had come to me at the beginning of October about one position that I knew wasn't for me and then she came to me again towards the end of the month and I thought "OK, that's twice in one month. Let's listen to the universe and give it a chance."

So here I am. In three weeks (at the time of this writing) I will begin at a new company doing a mixture of what I do now and what I did five years ago. So, basically, I'm not at all sure what I'll be doing. But it is a very nice raise and, eventually, I will be working from home on Mondays and Fridays. There is also the potential for a real annual bonus, which is unheard of for plebs like me at my current employer. I really couldn't say "no" when it was offered so I accepted and, a week later, I told my boss. It is bittersweet but kind of exciting as it is a brand new chapter in my life. I am kind of excited and utterly terrified all at once. I am definitely going to miss seeing my work friends every day but New Company is only two miles down the road from Old Company so we'll still do our monthly happy hours and I've decided to force myself to go out a bit more so that I spend time with them.

That is a nice way to segue into how the above two topics have joined together to encourage me to make some changes in my life. I'm still working on quitting smoking (as of this writing, I'm on day 8 of smoke free) but I'm also making a few other changes. One of the things that I really take away from Diane in Denmark is the idea of wearing your nice things and not "saving for best." If you have nice things, why not wear them and get enjoyment? Don't wear ballgowns to the office or anything, dress appropriately, but if you have nice jewelry, why keep it in a box? Also, take the five to ten minutes to put together an outfit the day before so that you do accessorize and make a special effort. I've started to do that and I feel almost giddy with anticipation about my outfits and am just tickled to be wearing my jewelry, the nice stuff or, more often than not, the cheap stuff. I find that I like being put together and feeling pretty. So, as suggested, I put together a few outfits at the time so that I can have them all planned out. It's been so, so fun. Because, like DID says, what is the point of having things you like and enjoy if you don't actually enjoy them often?

The new job and the focusing on small things like my wardrobe - along with seeing that I've gained ten pounds in the last months that I haven't been able to shift - is what led me to start cooking as I mentioned in my last post. I'm not going to lie, I wasn't excited about this food. I still want burgers and pizza instead but more than that, I want a nice body that fits into my clothes properly (because pay raise or not, I'm not buying wardrobe to facilitate weight gain) and I really can't afford to fuck around with this anymore. So I'm trying to make myself eat things that are healthy, even if out of my comfort zone, and my goal is to be consistent. It isn't about a diet and I am not planning on cheat days or whatever. In my mind it is like what I did this evening: you can have the chocolate cookies but you have to eat that healthy junk first. Earlier in the month I started trying to get myself to eat at least one serving of fruit a day and I found that I was looking forward to or craving an apple, even though apples are a pain in the ass to eat (they are tasty but they just take forever and make me feel like, welp, this is what I'm doing for the next half hour).

This is encouraging and so I want to ride this wave and continue the good work. And I like cooking. I've had a blast this past weekend busy in my kitchen. I wouldn't want to do it every day but weekends and maybe something quick once a week is nice. It's also handy so that I have lunches prepared in advance, especially on nights when I go to SA's house because it means I can come home from the gym (because I typically see him on gym days), feed animals, grab my clothing for the next day, a bottle of wine, and anything else I want to take with (when it isn't something that will wrinkle, I often pack ahead), and grab a lunch out of my refrigerator so that I can avoid rush hour traffic and get to his place. And all of this in advance stuff means that I can either enjoy some time in the morning before I leave for the office or, sleep later before having to go to the office. A win all around. 😊

I just saw that there are emojis. Were they always there? Well, here is hoping that my happy mindedness continues into the rest of my week!

*I'm glad I previewed this post after I published my last one. I've been writing and scheduling my posts so things can be out of order if I write/publish in real time. And I need this to be clean and orderly and sharp if I'm to get internet famous, right? 

Garbage, Food, and Brains

Well I just fed the more industrious of the dumpster animals in my complex. My money is on the raccoons and that is fine with me because possums are fucking terrible and should be eradicated from the planet. Seriously. I love animals but those things are incredibly creepy and gross and I have a weird phobia about them (yes, I know they eat mosquitoes or whatever). Honestly, if I had to pick one, a room full of cockroaches or a room full of possums, I would choose the cockroaches. And I hate those things too, especially the big bitches we have out here in Texas. They are just these cocky sons of bitches who look like they should be wearing a top hat and twirling a cane as they casually walk across your carpet like they own the place. I once found a dead one in my bathroom and the noise I made was akin to the sound of a character dying in super old school Nintendo games.

I've been cooking lately and focusing on plant-based recipes. This isn't because I'm looking to transition to being vegetarian or vegan but because I am 39 years old and if I don't start eating vegetables and healthy foods, my body will probably start flat out rejecting nutrients and we can't have that. It's been nice and I've been reminded of how much I enjoy cooking (on the weekend, naturally; I don't want to spend hours in the kitchen on a Wednesday night) and I've had mostly success. Who knew I loved quinoa? Who knew that crispy quinoa cakes with tomato and chickpea relish would be delicious and that you could get so much mileage out of it? Also, quinoa has a lot of nutrients and health benefits so score! So do lentils, which I also cooked. They were OK but kind of dry because I overcooked them by being a dummy and not paying proper attention. I still ate the hell out of them though.

Sadly, however, it doesn't all turn out well. Today I attempted a butternut squash and kale casserole. Disaster. I'm not sure how to tell if butternut squash is ripe or whatever but I'm guessing maybe the one I got wasn't. Also, the recipe, which I failed to look at previously, was shit. I'm in the camp that doesn't need seven pages of pictures and personal backstory before getting to the nuts and bolts of a recipe but I do need the basics. I need to know how much of an ingredient I need and how it should be prepared (minced, diced, etc). This recipe was just a list of how much of each an ingredient you needed and then a list of what to do. How should I prepare the half butternut squash? How should I cut the potato? Do I keep the onion in large rings or am I dicing it? So I just guessed at it and cooked it and it was terrible so I put the baking dish in my freezer for ten minutes so that I could then dump it into a plastic carrier bag and take it out to the dumpster (I was sort of in a hurry because, after cleaning up, I had a full trash can to take out and I didn't want to leave it and didn't want to make two trips). I actually double bagged it for fear it would leak, hence the more industrious of dumpster animals.

It was as I was taking the trash out that I came up with most of this post, which is funny because it wasn't what I'd planned on writing about. My intention was to write about the following.

Middle brother messaged me on Tuesday evening saying "Hey." Well, I knew something was up because he doesn't do that. He proceeded to inform me that whilst on a little vacation, our mother was involved in an incident that saw her go to the hospital even though she was perfectly fine (venue insisted) and the results of a CT scan found that she had an aneurysm on her brain. They'd wanted to send her to a hospital for emergency surgery immediately but she was all "nah, I'm good. I'll go when I get back to Phoenix." Eldest brother was due to arrive on Wednesday and the surgery was scheduled for Thursday. I was all "thanks for letting me know. How bizarre." It was only as SA and I were on our way back to his place that it hit me.

My mother is having brain surgery in two days.

I know, right? How does one process that? This one kind of didn't. I held it together completely and felt very unemotional about it. I don't think I could really believe it and treat it as real because of the enormity of the situation. I didn't know what time the surgery was scheduled so decided, in my mind, that it was going to begin at 9 a.m. Arizona time and, upon googling, found that aneurysm repair typically takes 3-5 hours. So I expected to hear something around 5 or 6 p.m. my time and just went about my day, making plans with friends and doing some work. I didn't hear anything so eventually, around 6:30, I texted my mother's former neighbor to see if she'd heard anything. She hadn't and I told her that I was too scared to reach out to Middle brother. She pointed out that if something bad had happened someone would definitely have contacted me but Middle brother lives in China so the time zone thing is hard and I'd have to wait for him to have heard something because Eldest brother doesn't have my phone number and can we get into peoples' phones these days to get contact information? Who would want the task of using my dead hand to use the finger scan to unlock my phone?

I finally ladied up and messaged MB around 8:30 and he got back to me 45 minutes later saying that the surgery couldn't have gone any better, that mom would remain in the hospital for about a week, and that when he'd talked to EB, mom was still knocked out but that the doctor said if there were going to be any complications, they would have shown by then. Evidently part of me had been clenched and sucked in all day because all of me exhaled when I read that and it was then that I felt like weeping.

So yeah, that happened. One minute you are sitting on a stool enjoying a drink in Lake Tahoe and the next you are having brain surgery.