I'm here, but in not-so-great of a mood. Sometimes I wonder if I'm just plain losing it.

My boss is out of the office today. Hopefully that means I'll actually get some stuff done. But it could also mean that a bunch of her customers could call in, and I'll have to do her job too. I'm really hoping for the quiet day, I need it.

Night night D.

Hi Thump thanks for breakfast.

Hope you have some peace MZ.


I am here got a great night sleep after a HORRIBLE evening. Everything is going wrong... a/c in the van went out yesterday, Emily was left out of the calls about cheerleading, so she is behind, but she will start cheering next week, her teacher sent a note home that she is behind in school standards- which means that she does not know 80% of the alphabet upper and lower case ,Ruby ate my MP3 player and Zach is sick.

I am really upset about emily and her teacher and sent a scathing letter back. She is 5 in kindergarten and does not every letter and that is what I thought they would learn this year. She was tested the first week and made a 46, I worked with her- flash cards and books and games and the next week she made a 48, but this week she got a 77. I think that is GREAT and I will not let her b of a teacher discourage her progress or me. SHE IS 5!


Today hopefully will be better, I am leaving early to take the boy to the dermatologist- his poor face is behind bad:(

I propose we post silly things and request happy songs to get our spirits up today.

I'll go along with that idea, Mz.

Squonk, I can't say that I could name you a name of a specific person that I personally knew, but I sure remember it just like it was yesterday. I was watching the live coverage from just a bit before the second plane hit through the rest of the day well into the evening. It was so unbelieveable. That was the first real disaster I ended up working on for my company.

-- Edited by Mad Mema at 08:24, 2008-09-11

I am here but busy. I tried to get some work outta the way before logging in and it took me longer than I expected. The first thing I heard on the radio this morning was people crying. It was then that I knew what the date was. I do not want to forget what happened but I am a very emotional person and that just breaks my heart and I always end up crying when I watch or listen to the stories.

I was still the facility manager at the shop when this happened. I remember being scared and sad. I wanted to listen to every report that came on the radio but because of the field I work in I couldn't. I had to switch all the radios to playing whatever cd's we had so that our consumers would not become upset or paranoid. Then when I got home I couldn't take me eyes off the news.

confuzzed wrote:

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Thursday. What can I say? Not much. I am just glad it is creeping towards the end of the work week. The week has seemed long.

I have a problem waiting for things from other departments. Yesterday around noon I asked AP for some invoices. I need to review them to see if we paid sales tax. Blah, blah. I only asked for five invoices to review. For a month that is a great number for me since it is usually a lot more. It should take less than 10 minutes to pull them out. I still don't have them. I use to be able to get to the files before we moved. Now they have a centralized file location and we have no access. I follow the procedure, asked the manager for what I need. Her temp couldn't find my stuff yesterday afternoon. Actually, he told me he spent the afternoon looking and only found one.  I asked the manager again this morning for my stuff. The temp won't be in until noon. Fine. Let me in and I'll get the crap myself. I need it now. I needed it yesterday when I asked for it. No. Apparently, since they share this location with other departments (HR & Legal), they can only get in at certain times of the day. Are you kidding me? So you push me back on my work, that after all is said and done, some of it affects your department? And then when I say, "I have to have these checks today" you will tell me I missed the cutoff and can't have them? Bite me. Taxes have deadlines and you know that.

Sorry for the summarized rant. And I was more business like during the whole thing. I feel better now though.

p>

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Maybe if you sit back, filing your nails until you get the documents you need, they'll get the idea that you needed the stuff YESTERDAY!

They don't care. Plus, I don't sit near AP. Problem is, I don't know who to complain to about it. My boss is useless since she is offsite. And our boss, who is here, doesn't really care about us. Long story. Short version - he is a bad manager. I guess I could try your suggestion though. I do sit outside the CEO's office now. Somehow, I think I will still end up being the one in trouble.

Bad management is frustrating, Fuzzy. I deal with it too. My immediate boss is a spineless corporate yes man. His boss is relatively lazy. Neither one of them know much about what we do for a living in our group, despite the fact that boss #2 used to be one of our design engineers. My solution: As fortunes have it, my Director ( boss's boss's boss) is a friend of mine from well before I worked for him. I go to happy hour with him a few times a month. Every time I see him, it's hugs and laughs. Drives the other two INSANE... and makes them be nice to me. They have learned to be a bit supportive around the office too. If they get out of line, I just tell an amusing story about the last time I was hanging out with "Skippy". Yeah, it's shameless but effective. The really great part is Skippy and I never speak of them.

-- Edited by Mad Mema at 09:40, 2008-09-11

Oh yeah. My supervisor knows next to nothing about our network, so his massive contribution to any major activity is to stand there playing "20 questions" while we are trying to work. His boss is a slacker who stands there playing with his phone. Good luck to us trying to get them to help with anything other than deciding where to go to lunch on Friday.

I've also had the "pleasure" of working for the invisible man, the out of control pill-popping perv, and the stress monger. Bad management sucks. Truly, I feel for you.

Jeremy Riggs wrote:

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WOO! What the heck!!! Is that the first non-Buffy avatar you've ever used?!?!?

What gives?

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don't be silly. I've had other images besides Buffy. I just thought I would join you for Ghostbusters. Although to honest, I always see the evil Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in my head

 

-- Edited by Woo Hoo at 10:37, 2008-09-11

Here we go...

I wrote a story a few months ago kinda inspired by 9-11. It kind of goes like this....(ahem)....

The Grill Out Guy

some of the best glimpses of life come to me when I'm simply out back by my grill.

I treat my grill times oftentimes as a sort of exercise in Zen. Not on purpose either. Lets use the element of fire, my volition, barter for nature provided sustenance, the joy of wine and get outside and cook a meal that has the whole neighborhood salivating. This is what I do. Its so simple, just people in their busy lives don't take the time to do it themselves as often as they should. Fire? In a microwave world? pheh. Like food is some sort of problem to solve.

Tonight I was out back at my grill. Stinkin up the neighborhood with smoked porkchops, southern style peppers & corn, and warmed hard-rolls.

I've been here for a few years now, so much so that I suppose I'm known as "the grill out guy". In years past, young couples have walked by, lady pregnant. A few months later, a baby carriage. Very nice young people liking their neighborhood and I must look like a nice enough "the grill out guy" neighbor. (In some cases at least. We got some cell phone innundated baby makin machines here too that hate walking, much less their neighbors etc.)

well tonight, a lot of these kids are out in the alley becoming friends. I am guessing ages 4 to maybe 10. a young group of girls in this age range were walking arm-in-arm starting to own their world. It was great! "I don't like that garage, that garage is stupid. Ooooh look at the roses etc. hey that car has a flat tire, lets go look!!"

they walk past the yard of "the grill out guy". "Hey is something on fire!?" "Hey that smells goooood!" Littlest one coughs. Oldest one "hey what are you cooking???"

"Tonight ladies, its smoked pork chops, hard-rolls and southern style corn with red peppers!"

"wow! yum!!" littlest one still coughs. "my dad just makes hot dogs!!!!!"

Of course he does, little lady. Of course he does.

It reminded me of September 11, 2001. 9-11. Jeremy Riggs and I were to take a couple of friends to the new Miller Park to see it for their first time. The events of that day unfolded, all ballgames (obviously) cancelled, and we all ended up that afternoon talking about the day and watching the news loops on Riggs tv. We had planned to tail-gate before the game, and decided that, at the very least, we should still grill out and be thankful that in spite of that terrible day, we were here, the new future of gloom busted through the door of America, but nothing was more important than friends, family and loved ones that day.

I started up the grill on the front porch. Noticed a lot of kids out that day, a lot of people on their front porches, neighbors talking, etc. Right as the fire got going good, a little girl came up, maybe 7 yrs old, in face paint. "I'm a lion!" she announced. Indeed she was. "What are you making??" "Hamburgers and cheeseburgers, Lion!!" Pretty soon a couple of other girls walked by "I'm a tiger! I'm a princess!- Hey what are you making!?" Pretty soon it was apparent that on this block on that terrible day, it was a day for a parade of children.

Those children probably now are ready to enter high-school. Here comes the next wave of lion, tiger and princess children loving their world tho. I'm still at the grill as I think I will always be in my summers.

Fuzzy you just described me when I was younger. I never cried in front of anyone. I always held my feelings in except anger. But when my Grammy died it all changed. I was still acting normal for the most part. i went outside her room at the funeral home because I couldn't take it anymore. But someone insisted on hugging me. I yelled at them not to do it. When they did I lost it. I've been a blubbering fool ever since. Today I think I soak in everyone's emotions- kinda an empath. That's what it feels like anyways.

I don't think that's unusual. It took my Dad nearly 55 years before he could cry!

I remember when I was seven and my grandfather died, my Dad's Dad. It really bother my father that he couldn't cry over losing his own father. But for some people emotions are tough to show I was just telling Webguy the other day that something happened somewhere in the late 90's that changed my Dad. Suddenly he became more open. He'd talk about his time in Vietnam, and he'd show emotion more openly. When my other grandfather died in 2000 he was very emotional over it.

Once he opened up more our relationship got so much better. It was if we went from being just Father and Son to being friends too. I'm so glad that happened before he passed away.

So Woo, you're basically an emotional sponge now huh? I can kind of relate to that. My problem is that stuff sticks with me too long. I have a really hard time letting go of emotional things that I've experienced or people I know have experienced.

I suspect 9/11 will be just as strong in my mind when I'm 90 as it is today.