singedsun

The new couch has arrived and in true I hate moving and/or cleaning, we did not get the old couch moved out in time. So our living room is currently in a great state of disarray as we've basically moved everything to one side of the room so the new couch could be moved in. I love it, the new location is weird but we'll adjust to it, I definitely think I'm going to like this look better once the rest of the room is put together.

Today was one of those work days where from the very beginning I thought... I'm not getting through this without a lot of caffeine. I did manage (after a doubleshot which are my worst guilty pleasure drink when mornings are bad). We've had some bad storms recently and last night our power went out and it wasn't back until some time early this morning. I had a rough time getting to sleep and ended up reading in the dark on my phone until I finally crashed (hence the particularly rough morning). I did have a very nice woman ask me today out of the blue how I was doing. She's one of the many PMs for a big project I'm working on and this wasn't an ask about anything, not even asking for an update, just a honest-to-goodness 'how are you really' kind of message. It really meant a lot to get that mid-afternoon. One of our vendors made some comments yesterday in a big meeting that implied my team was behind on work (not the case, and also not the whole story) which after hearing my name for like the dozenth time, felt really personal. I meet with that vendor like twice a week to move things forward and the fact that she waited until a big meeting with leadership to mention it was rude. So knowing people at this job, in other parts of the business, are thinking about me and checking in just because, is really really sweet.

Due to the storms and the cleaning and the power, I know I'm missing a chunk of posts over the last several days, so if I have not commented or if you posted your next entry for Anemnesis, I'm sorry, please point me in that direction! I read back like 8 or 10 pages and ran into a place where I couldn't figure out where I'd left off from a few nights ago. I've my own next post ready for Anemnesis - part three - that'll probably go up late tomorrow evening. I'm still in absolutely love with this deck and this story, so I'm eager to get to the last part.

I'm giving thought (at the last minute) to trying to do Camp Nano for April using everything I learned while writing There's Nothing Here But Light. That story has a lot of touches from the novel I was writing two years ago but got stuck on and I think I might be able to go back, re-outline and fix the stuff I was struggling with.

Like this isn't New Music Friday yet or anything (Maker, do I wish it was Friday though) but I do need to quickly update to say that the new Fiona Apple album I mentioned last Friday "Fetch the Bolt Cutters" is so ah-maze-ing. Work has been a ball of stress (as I mentioned yesterday) and I haven't done any yoga the last three days as I was getting used to in the last few weeks, but when I have time during the day to have something on that isn't a work meeting, it's this album. I mean. It's just so good. It's typical Fiona Apple sounds, but graduated to like this whole new level of good. I'm in love. If you want some song recs off the album to try, there's "I Want You to Love Me" with all the drama that title entails. There's "Shameika which I can't even describe really but is very self empowering. OH and "Under the Table which has all the power behind it that a line like "I would beg to disagree, but begging disagrees with me" implies. Lastly, there's "Ladies" which is about leaving behind your stuff for the next woman who takes up with an ex. But really, the whole thing.

I spent $40 tonight buying bleach and dye in order to dye Matt's hair blue once it all arrives. I don't know why he picked the hardest fucking color in the world to dye yourself when you're starting with dark hair. But whatever. It's the first time in his life he's in a position to do something fun with his hair and he's decided to make it blue until he gets the call to return to work. I polled the people in my life who do this sort of thing on their own to good results to figure out what they use and what they like and I THINK I'm prepared, but I guess we'll find out when it all gets here.

It's just as well that the beauty supply places I looked at didn't have hair clippers in stock, at least not any decently rated and well-priced ones. Because I'm so tempted right now to cut off the front sides of my undercut I've been growing out. The more the back of my undercut grows out, the more annoying it ALL is and having to be on video calls (they're expecting when available at least 75% of our staff in each meeting to have their videos turned on) it's a reminder of how much I hate what it looks like right now. Now I'm not some fucking Karen that wants my hairdresser back in the salon so he can fix my hair. I have a very overactive sensory issues that mean things like itches and hair growth and rough clothing trigger anxiety in not great ways. But I WANT these front sides grown out, so I'm trying my best to just deal.

Especially since we heard today from our executives that it'll be at least two more months before anyone returns back to working in the office and even then it'll only be a small percentage of our staffs. They'll continue to increase small percentages in our offices (10-15% returning every couple of weeks) as they track what the pandemic looks like in our area and how safe it is to continue to let people back into the building. Most of our teams are small (there's eight people on my team but those people are split among three specific dedicated tasks, plus me and my manager) so losing a couple of people of a team at a time for potentially weeks at a time, would really dent our productivity. When keeping us working from home optimally is the better long-term solution. Honestly, I while I'm stressed currently, I appreciate the efforts our office is taking to contain our workers and keep people safe as possible. Plus, I think it helps drive home exactly how serious it is in the areas where our people live.

I did find out that another team has requested me to upper management as a transfer to their team, not as a team lead but to move over as a developer. Honestly, it might be a pay bump and it'd be great experience. It's not exactly the career path I was headed towards, but having people request me specifically because of my current knowledge and experience is pretty cool. Although this would be a crazy time to be switching roles and trying to train up. I have no idea what that'd look like. Something to think about though.

I've been avoiding writing by working on making some icons for the Chiaroscuro challenge at icontalking. I watched Highrise on Netflix the other day and there were so many good moments but I got two that stuck with me and made some icons out of them.

Take them & use them if you, like me, love Tom Hiddleston. (Just credit singedsun, if you do.)

I've also discovered some musicians on Twitch that do some really awesome live sessions. For New Music Friday I might drop links to a few people I've discovered. They're not new, just new to me so they might be new to other people too.

( Rambling about work stuff )

questionoftheday asks: What’s the most epic way you’ve seen someone quit their job? Do you have an epic “I quit!” story?

I haven't quit many jobs. But I have been fired in some spectacularly shitty ways. This is kind of an "You're Fired! No, I quit!" kind of scenarios.

When I first was diagnosed with Fibromyalgia it was because I had some severe gland flare up in my tonsils and I had to schedule surgery to have them removed. My doctor took one look at them and was surprised that the size of them wasn't impacting my eating or breathing, they were that bad. I was working retail at the time and had to go out of my way to make sure that my time off for the surgery was approved. The doctor told me to make sure I had the full two weeks for recovery since I was over 20. So I did, having my office manager sign off on the two week request.

Thinking I was in the clear, I scheduled surgery and arranged to stay with a friend for my recovery. A week and a half into my recovery the office manager called to tell me they needed to let me go. She assured me of course that if I wanted to come back after my surgery was over I was welcome. But she also told me if I came back it would be without the insurance or raise I'd earned in the previous months I'd worked there. (I'd been there about six months at the time, but had gotten a raise and benefits after 90.)

I told her in no uncertain terms that I wouldn't be coming back.

I did call the store manager, the regional manager and the corporate HR folks all to make sure they knew what had happened. The store manager said he'd try and get me back on with all my stuff still in place, but by the end of the second week he said it wouldn't happen after all. According to the corporate office my two weeks of time off wasn't allowed. Apparently the office manager had never cleared it with corporate like she'd said and so I was out of a job.

I really struggled for awhile after that. I couldn't find anything new and the company fought against me to claim unemployment. Though eventually when it came time to attend the hearing, they never showed up. So I got my unemployment with back pay and a payout for the two weeks of sick time they were trying to avoid paying me in the first place. I was an expensive loss.

To this day I still get weird about having to call out sick or schedule long vacations. My boss now is great and has repeatedly told me to stop apologizing and to stop worrying when I need time off. She doesn't have to be reassuring, but I love that she is.