User talk:TheEileen/Feb 2009
February 2009
28 Feb 2009
Updated list and wiki but only barely. Didn't do any movements. Nearly time for bed as I have to be up and doing tomorrow. I have developed a bit of a social life. A friend who went sort of "hermitlike" is being forced by his wife and I to get out more. That is getting *ME* out more. Also, I've been forced, at metaphoric gunpoint, to join Facebook and that is certainly a device to take much time. I have kept up with forums and TADA finished all the prep necessary for my content to provide. Now I just need to check all the images for the projects I am currently PM'ing, make sure my ftp is working and I can log in, then I can create and upload my project. huzzah. I'm working on vol 1 of the henrik ibsen also. Part of me is now thinking I should run it back through F2, and the other part says, to heck with it, do it myself. I may run Vol 2 back through, that'll require redoing and setting the instructions that would follow through all 14 volumes. On the to-do list!
We had sunshine, cold rain, sunshine, snow, sunshine, foggy rain, and back to sunshine today with supposed rain tomorrow. I have about 10 crocuses blooming. Much less than usual but I believe my plot has become *THE* place to burrow if you are a wild rabbit in the neighborhood. I seem to be the only person who doesn't chase them out of the yard. But they are soooooo adorable, honestly I don't mind they nibble my plants. They are sooooooo adorable. I may not see them that often, but when I do, I make burbly noises. I can't help it. :grin:
Work is continually busy. I'm trying to remember that I don't have to fix everything, people are not my problem, my job has nice clear boundaries. I try to be grateful for something every day and take the time to acknowledge the beauty and grace that is out there and to feel pity for people who make life around them hard, not get angry with them. This is not easy, obviously, but the more I try the more it works and the more peaceful I feel. Just because they are having anger doesn't mean I have to have anger also.
Oh, besides Facebook, my friends have also sucked me into ROCK BAND. :giggle: Drums baby, I am a rock god drummer (on easy only).
24 Feb 2009
Updated list but not wiki. Barely time to do that. No time for user talk.
16 Feb 2009
Updated list and wiki. One movement on stages and three posted projects. I still have the gunk in my head and I believe I will until about May to June. I think I gone straight into allergies. I'm finding it hard to concentrate on ANYthing. Oddly, I am managing to finally start working on the last of the pngs for my content provision of the book I started over two years ago. :rolls eyes at self: Oh, and I'm reading a book about computer games and gaming and thus have now spent nearly all my recent free time just playing computer games. This cycle will pass also ... one day ... :evil:
I'm off for five days in a row as it is my RL birthday on the 18th. As a "present" to myself, I'm buying a brand new dishwasher as mine is broken. I did all the research (not that hard) and found the best one for my needs and price range only to discover the item is no longer manufactured (argh). However, a nearby dealer had it for a "MERE" $100 more than the original price listed. Conversely, the few places I found on the web all listed it for $50-$150 more than original price listed. Sigh. I am also likely to get a new keyboard. I finally figured out that this one sticks like mad and it isn't my typing. It's this keyboard!
One "funny" thing is that I've gotten so good about watching my nutrition intake and slowly adjusting my regular diet to be healthier and less calorie laden - I wanted to splurge a little about cakes or steak or whatever I wanted for this five day period ... and ... I couldn't. I couldn't even manage to eat an entire brownie! It took me 90 minutes to slowly munch my way through half of the thing. Part of me is happy with this (tummy is smaller, body adapted to not as much sugar and fat) but the other part of me did sort of want to just "go crazy" and eat what I wanted. Apparently, I want to eat brown rice, broccoli, and fish. Dang it. :twisted:
07 Feb 2009
Updated list and wiki. Little movement between stages but two posted. Nice. I got my cold back, or a new "improved" cold. I reviewed last year and I got one last year this same time. It's interesting to me this difference. On Tuesday, I felt like "oh, i'm just tired because I'm bored at home and need to be up and moving" which was a big mistake as I went into work on Wednesday and just drooped all day. Today I woke up and went, "Oh, yes. There is a difference. I do feel the energy, appetite, etc. back". Even though I was bad and stayed up late when I should have gone to bed earlier and not just stared blankly at the TV / computer screen.
I was also reviewing the statement I made about my "new" guy back then. That I could give him projects and walk away knowing they'd be done. When did that stop? About March I think. It was around June I realized I was back to spoon-feeding him. Step by step. I understand from someone else that apparently any comment I make that isn't 100% "you are completely correct" makes him feel "corrected" so that he doesn't see why he bothers. That is nearly a direct quote (third-hand, of course). Meaning, when he did a 15 step process and missed the 14th step and my response was "good job. you did it faster than I would have done. and everyone is happy. Oh, don't forget you need to do step 14 -send a followup email, minor thing- and then it will be perfect" He took that as a "criticism" and "she is always correcting me".
Now, I freely admit that I can't see myself the same way others see me, I know what my intentions were and so that colors how I think of my responses. But in this case, a disinterested third party told me that he had been surprised when my "new" guy complained about me and gave the above as an example of my "constantly correcting him". That guy stated that he thought it was just a reminder and also, didn't I say it was all good. But, said my new guy, she corrected me. She always has to correct me on SOMEthing. Well, yes, said this other guy (so he says to me). That's Eileen - she's got an editor's eye. She always looks for what is missing or could be improved. She corrects what the Director puts out. She corrects what the Director of the Region puts out. They send things to her precisely because she sees what others miss (and will tell them -ha!) (true, scary but true). Apparently, that doesn't matter. My intentions are irrelevant, my skill set is irrelevant. He doesn't like to be corrected, even if he's wrong (and he has been, so have I, correction is how we learn. He's over 50 so he should have figured this out by now). So he's unhappy with me and one way to deal with that is to constantly ask for "what do you want me to do next" on things he should be able to handle on his own or to not be pro-active on anything.
And then, recently, out of nowhere (it felt like), he WAS proactive about something and it was EXACTLY the wrong thing to be proactive about. Sigh. I had asked him to check something technical, because it wasn't working for me. I did this right as I got sick. I think he checked the technical thing (since otherwise he wouldn't have known about the situation), but then he approached all the people involved and asked them to give him all the details on the situation so he could finish it off/ fix it.
The problem was that it was finished, it was fixed, but the technical thing was glitched and not showing that. I just wanted to check if he was getting the same error as I was before calling the company. Instead, in the three days I was out sick he re-started an entire e-mail thread, got all these people freaked out that they were dealing with something they thought closed and he took it in a completely different direction than I did. When I came back for one day, he was naturally OFF and I had to sooth all these upset people and calm everyone back down. He has a positive genius for upsetting people and then getting angry later when they are angry with him about upsetting him. "Everyone always yells at me" he said once, right after he made a sweeping statement of blame that turned out to be completely wrong in every detail. It's the utter blindness of it. He is a grown man in the business world for 40 years now. How can you still say that you get to be very mean and hard and not polite at people and they should be ... grateful? But if anyone says anything vaguely negative in your direction, you get to stomp your foot, take your ball and go home?
[Sidebar: Going in a different direction is not a bad thing - it falls into what I would call "biting off more than we can chew" category. But that is MY perception of what is more than we can chew. I have a different take on what battles can be fought after 8 years in this job. He and the other new person often start down a path where I am restraining myself (badly I think) from saying, "oh no, don't do that". Mainly because they want ME to go down the path while they follow me. I've been down that path and it didn't work. I'm trying to figure out a way to say, "if you want to go there, go ahead, but I am not going. I'll support you in that I'll not stop you or throw up obstacles but I'm not blazing the path or fighting the fight or taking the meetings. That's it, it is this sense that THEY are committing ME to a lot of work and they don't even see it.]
And now back to Eileen's Talk