sail_aweigh

Has it really been that fucking long???

2023-03-13T21:04:03Z

So, my last post was almost 3 years ago. Damn. No idea what even to say at this point. Not worth recapping, it would take me too damn long.😜

Best thing coming in the next year or so--retirement. Yay! Anywhere from April 2024 to December 2024. Depends on whether I can tolerate this place enough to hang out for the extra 8 months to get a little extra health insurance from the state. Right now, my banked sick leave would buy me about 3-1/2 years of insurance. If I stick out until December, I could get around 7 years worth. Ehh, That's actually quite a bit, but I hate this place that much...

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State of the Sail

2019-01-31T17:10:50Z

Well, only 4 months since my last post? Getting better!

• GPF Vancouver was awesome. Did NOT get to see my favorite skater, though, as once again he injured his ankle during a previous competition and had to sit out the GPF. For the second year in a row. I cried when it first happened, but then I enjoyed the hell out of myself, because why not? I have other favorite skaters and enjoyed them, too! Anyway, he came back for the Olympics last year; he'll be back for Worlds. I won't be there, but he'll be back. As long as he doesn't retire between now and March 2020! I fully intend to be in Montreal for Worlds then. And he better bring his 4A.

• Son went back to Phoenix at the start of the year, just for work over the tax season; he's works as a sign spinner for a tax preparation company. He hasn't been able to find anything up here, yet. When he gets back, we're going to do some serious work getting him signed up at all the agencies that can help him find work. He just can't fill out forms or gen up a resume on his own. Between dyslexia and other disabilities, he's just not having any success trying to do it on his own. And I can only help so much. We didn't have everything he needed to get a WI state ID before he left, but we should now, so once he's back we can get right to it, since that was one of the things holding him back.

• Second 2% pay raise kicked in. It's nice, but it doesn't keep the moneylender from the door much. Since that is the case, I've applied for a different position on campus that would pay about $1.50/hour more. That would help a lot. I'm eminently qualified for it and since my current department and potential new department work hand in glove with each other, I already know all the players over there and they know me. Keeping my fingers crossed.

• Brother is still sitting on dad's estate. Claims he's turning everything in to the accountants to make sure it's all there and that he's hired a lawyer, blah blah blah. He said that ages ago. He says this every couple of months. Blah.

• Also, this polar vortex sucks. -28 is just unreasonable, even for WI. Have a hot Chris Pine icon to warm you up if you're in my neck of the woods.

That's the highlights!

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Um, hi?

2018-02-08T13:49:57Z

Oy, vey. It's been a long, long time. Where to start:

1) Work hasn't changed much. I'm doing the same job. Very settled into it. The only thing I dislike right this minute is that I got moved into a new office, which is about half as big as my last one and I still have an officemate. We're bumping into each other constantly and I always have to warn her when I'm opening to file cabinet, because it is directly behind her chair. Ugh. I complained to my boss during my mid-term review. Not that it will change much, but I'm not one to sit around and be shat on.

2) Family is fine. The daughter sold her last house and down-sized quite a bit. She was finding her old house hard to maintain and with roommates who didn't feel it necessary to chip in with household chores, she decided she wanted something smaller that didn't bust her bank account and easier to keep up with cleaning, etc. It's a really cute little house and it's close to all kinds of little shops and eating places that she can walk to. Her cousin is living with her, so she's always got companionship. The neighborhood is really tight; they have an e-mail listserve that helped her find her cat after he did a bunk during a cold snap. He came back when it warmed up. They figured he was hiding out somewhere warm until he could get back home.

3) My brother is still dragging his feet on probate for my dad's estate. It's been almost a year and a half. The only thing I've seen any payout on was dad's pension. Brother had to notify them so they'd quit sending his pension check and what was left was distributed to the beneficiaries. It wasn't a lot of money, but it allowed me to pay off what was left of the student loan I took out for my daughter 15 years ago, plus it's funding a trip to Milan, Italy this March for the World Figure Skating Championships.

4) Speaking of which, Yuri On Ice got me back into watching figure skating. With all the online streaming and uploading to youtube it's been easy to catch up on the past few years. I've discovered some truly amazing skaters, including Yuzuru Hanyu--the current reigning men's Olympic champion (2014) and World champion (2014 and 2017)--and Daisuke Takahashi--a retired Olympic bronze medalist and World champion the same year (2010). Among the current female skaters I really like Wakaba Higuchi and Mirai Nagasu; among retired female skaters is Akiko Suzuki. Pairs skating I am totally in love with Wenjing Sui and Cong Han, along with Vanessa James and Morgan Cipres. For Ice Dance, I'm all about the Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, along with Kaitlyn Hawayek and Jean-Luc Baker. Some have been around forever and will retire after the current Olympics, so I won't get to see them at Worlds, and some are up-and-comers who didn't make the cut for the Olympics, but their skating federations are sending them to Worlds instead. That's the problem with going to Worlds after the Olympics--many of the skaters sit out Worlds for a variety of reasons: retirement, skating fed decisions, and sometimes the skater themselves will sit out if they did well enough in the Olympics that they don't need to go to Worlds to try to boost their world standing. World standings are based on the highest placement in either Olympics or Worlds, but not both. Theirs a ton other things that go into World standing, but those two count the most.

5) I now know more about figure skating than I thought I'd ever know. What can I say; I was inspired. Ask me just about anything; I can answer it.

Anyway, time to go shower for work. We'll see how often I come back to update.

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Not so fine

2016-12-20T21:48:21Z

November shit the bed.

1) The fuckwad Trump got elected. #NotMyPresident. Saying any more makes me sick to my stomach.
2) My father passed away November 17th. Fuck cancer. Yeah, he was 93 years old, but minus the cancer he was in damn good shape for his age. There were no clues until about a month before his passing and he was diagnosed less than a week before he died. I guess I should be glad it was quick, but I miss him so damn much.

So, not feeling the joy of the season one damn bit. The only things keeping me going are good friends and the sweetest anime out there-Yuri!!! On Ice. If you haven't seen it yet, go. Go and hie thee to either Crunchyroll or Funimation; they're paid anime streaming services, but the creators of these shows deserve to be paid. The English subs come out every Wednesdays (the English dubs a couple of weeks later), so you have tonight to get caught up. The episodes are less than 25 minutes long, so you have time in one evening (more or less) to catch all 11 episodes; the finale is tomorrow 4pm Central time; I'll let you do your own math to figure out when you can watch it.

I'll leave you with a sweet illustration by a friend of mine of Yuuri and Viktor skating together:

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Holy crap, did I fall off the radar!

2016-10-23T20:52:09Z

Damn, and here I promised to post more often. Not so much, eh?

( So, what's new? )

Overall, being pretty social, which is good for me. But, somehow, the past few weekends I've ended up holed-up in the condo being a hermit, doing pretty much nothing, and feeling way sorry for myself. Not sure where it's coming from, so I'm just doing my best to wait it out.

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Dammit, Ellen!

2016-08-28T20:12:26Z

I promised to post more frequently and there I go, again. Ah, well, it is what it is, yes?

Interesting events of the past *mumbletysquat* weeks, plus upcoming events:

• Saw the new Trek movie--Star Trek Beyond--twice! Love it to death. It's exactly what I wanted for the second movie and got cheated out of. At least we have a fourth movie to completely wash the bad taste of #2 out of my mouth. Ugh.
• Still getting plenty of exercise playing Pokémon Go. I've consistently average over 10k steps per day. Even hit the 15k mark a couple of days (new Fitbit badges!)
• Pokémon Go also gets me out to be more social. Went out 2 weekends in a row with various friends to hunt the wild Poké.
• Survived the week-long workshop we (the UW Radiology Dept.) put on last week--54 hours and I'm toast, but the weekend is helping tremendously with that. I'm also taking off two extra days next weekend for the Labor Day holiday. Five day vacation--score! I should be well-, well-rested.
$bull; Despite the fact I promised myself I'd do nothing this weekend and just veg, I still ended up tidying up various things around the condo: replacing lightbulbs, cleaning out under the sink so I can--finally--replace the garbage disposal, unclogging the bathroom sink. Still to do, today: laundry and grocery shopping. Also, go to see Hell or High Water, Chris Pines' new movie, with a couple of friends. Being social, go me!

( Interesting things in photo form, behind a cut to save your friends list )

And that about does it!

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I've been sucked in...

2016-07-11T18:05:21Z

to the world of Pokémon Go. It's good as I'm actually getting outside more. Yay! I'll probably play on campus the most. I've got multiple Poké Stops within a block of just the front of my building--Wisconsin Institutes for Medical Research (WIMR). There's the Medical School, the Nursing School, the Nielson Tennis Stadium, the Waisman Foundation, and a bunch more; most accessible just from the front of my building. I'm sure if I walked further, past the UW Hospital, the AFCH Children't Hospital, the Veterans Hospital, the Medical Foundation Centennial Building (they're all connected into a huge conglomeration), the Pharmacy School, and more. Plus, there's gardens and memorials all around and inside the buildings. As long as my GPS holds. Inside WIMR, GPS won't work until you're close to a window. Bummer. No getting pictures of water Pokés with my tea. Adagio is running a contest; we'll see if I can get some at home.

So! I had a busy weekend! Went to an art fair in Delafield with a good friend and picked up a new lanyard for work and a pair of turquoise earrings to match. When we came back, we sat around my condo and gossiped. :) Didn't get out for any PokéGo, though.

Sunday, I went down by the park by my house, about 3 blocks from me. It turned out to be the closest Poké Stop to me going south. Haven't tried north of me, yet. Cut my stay at the park short (there were Pokés all over the place and one guy had just thrown out a lure), because MOSWUITOES. Holy Hell, there were mosquitoes. Took an allergy relief tablet as soon as I got home and that seems to have killed any itching dead in its tracks. I will make sure I slather on mosquito repellent if I go out again, tonight.

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Hey, check this out...

2016-07-07T01:40:48Z

posting twice in the same week!

Had beautiful weather for the 4th of July weekend up in Door County. Made me wish I had a convertible. Still, I took advantage of the awesome weather and drove around the peninsula with the windows down, refamiliarizing myself with a bunch of the back roads I don't normally drive on. I love driving and it really helped perk me up. Gills Rock pulled out all the stops on their fireworks display this year; very glad I went. Did a little shopping, picked up a couple of Halloween treats for the daughter: a ghost flag mounted on a vertical pole for her garden and a skeleton poncho. Also, picked up a few smaller things for folks: consumables, so my daughter can't complain about clutter. :) Breath mints, soap, infused olive oils, stuff like that. An all around satisfying vacation.

Took today off as part of my vacation and I actually got some of the stuff done around the condo that I wanted to do! Amazing. A list, just so I can look back at it with satisfaction:

• Swept and mopped the kitchen floor
• Folded laundry
• Sliced up strawberries and made shortcakes, which, unfortunately, were so good that I ate them all in one sitting. Oops?
• Cleaned off the dining room table, er, mostly

Actually sort of looking forward to going to work tomorrow. There's only two days left in the week! Yay!

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Heading off to Door County...

2016-07-02T16:43:02Z

for the Fourth of July weekend, today. Since I was going to be gone four days, I decided to take a little extra vacation to gird my loins. So, I actually took off from this past Thursday through next Wednesday. Taking a couple days before actually making the drive was intended to give me time to gird my loins in preparation and get some chores done without undue pressure. Since I'm just getting my laundry done, now, and I wanted to hit the road around noon, you can see that really worked well. @@ Anyway, while I enjoy the scenery and spending the weekend with family (I usually go with my dad and my brother, sometimes with the daughter added in), it's also a bit of a chore. On the times it's just the 3 of us, I'm not usually interested in what the men want to do and, conversely, they aren't interested in my activities. Plus, dad is 92; he doesn't move fast and tires easily; he actually goes back to the hotel to read and nap than go out and do anything. So, I more often end up finding a bar/restaurant with wi-fi, since the very old motel we stay at doesn't offer it. That way I have contact with the rest of the world and some form of entertainment. Frequently, I go on shopping sprees to find early Christmas presents. However, this year my daughter said she didn't want any "knick-knacks"; she's trying to declutter her house. It makes me a little sad, as I usually pick up at least one Christmas ornament for her at the specialty Christmas shop, Tannenbaum. She did say that I could still get her Halloween themed stuff, because they sell that there also; Halloween is the daughter's favorite holiday. I guess I'll look for stuff for my balcony container garden, even if I didn't do much other than a rose bush and a couple of cherry tomato plants. This year has just been discouraging.

ION, the condo association had the parking lot completely repaved. I think they did a fairly good job, although, this coming winter will be the judge of that! They did one thing, though, that threw me for a bit of a loop when I went to do the laundry this morning. Our laundry room is connected to the end of a row of garages for the condos. There used to be a step up from the asphalt to the floor of the laundry room. Well, the raised the level of the asphalt to the threshold of the door. Going in isn't too bad; you don't really notice the missing step. When you leave, though, it's sort of muscle memory to step down. I keep stubbing my toe on the higher level asphalt! I suppose I'll get used to it, but for now, it's just a bit annoying. Mainly, because I feel like a klutz and think that anyone seeing me will laugh. Ah well, I remind myself that my place in the world is not of that much interest to others; plus, I'm sure they're going to have the same moment of discombobulation, themselves, and we'll end up commiserating with each other over it. I'm sure I'll bump into my downstairs neighbor, Janice, at some point and we'll both bitch about it.

And that's about all that's going on right now! Work is kind of at the status quo: major conference planning for August still ramping up, but kind of in a holding stage right now. Not actively looking for a new position at the moment. I'll probably look into that again toward the end of the summer, once the conference is done; I don't want to leave them in the lurch as it would be kind of a dick move.

Anyway, I must pack! The road is calling. See you...whenever. :)

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The black dog is barking.

2016-06-27T16:41:18Z

Not much going on in my life right now. Work is just chugging along, see the family every couple of weeks, see friends every couple of weeks. I think I'm in a bit of a funk, because I can't seem to get myself off the couch as often as I'd like. This past weekend sucked. Sat around and did nothing other than eat, read Twitter and tumblr all day, and continue my rewatch of Leverage. God, I fucking love Parker. That part was enjoyable, but by Sunday evening all I really wanted to do was go to bed, because I may as well have stayed there the entire weekend for all I got done. It's really hard not to listen to the black dog in my head repeating, "loser, loser, loser," into infinity.

At least by skimming Twitter, I'm keeping up with world events. Shocked/not shocked by the results of the Brexit referendum. Going to fuck my investements for a while, but it's not like something else wouldn't have come along anyway and done the same thing. Hoping November doesn't fuck me over even more.

Very glad to hear that SCOTUS ruled as it did with HB2 from Texas. Roe v. Wade has been eroded enough; we need to take back some of that yardage we've lost over the years.

Not sure if I should cross my fingers on it, but I'm very happy to see Elizabeth Warren stumping with Hillary. I'm hoping it means she'll be picked as HLC's running mate. That is a ticket I can get behind. I'd vote Hillary, anyway, but I'd double down with Elizabeth.

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Well, that didn't go as well as I hoped.

2016-06-06T16:37:23Z

Update on job interview - didn't make it to the second round. Ah, well. I went to the campus job postings website and found another bunch of jobs to apply for. See what shakes out of the tree with those. Current prospects:
• Undergraduate Degree Coordinator for the College of Letters and Sciences
• History Dept. Career Connections Advisor and Dept Communications/Alumni Relations Spec
• University Services Program Assistant for School of Nursing Academic and Student Svcs
The first two are academic staff and would mean a little more money; the last one is what we call university staff and would merely be a lateral transfer with probably no extra money as I'm already making above the minimum rate and this place is chincy as hell under the current budget forced on us by Weasel Walker. Jhere's a fourth position I'd be really interested in if it were a renewable position: Program Coordinator, LGBT Campus Center at the Division of Student Life. Unfortunately, it's only a one year appointment.

Finally vacuumed the lower level of the condo for the first time in, like, 6 months. Don't laugh--I've got a Kirby that weighs a million tons and, somehow, my ex-roommate disconnected the clutch pedal from the transmission. Yes, it has a drive and a neutral: drive to vacuum and neutral to push around when the vacuum is off. Trust me, that sucker is heavy (broke a toe when I tripped over it once!) and it doesn't roll freely until it's in neutral. Damn good thing the machine was left in drive before she did whatever she did to pull the clutch pedal out. At least I can still vacuum!

I've been trying to get back into healthful eating and an exercise program. The healthful eating has it's ups and downs. I'm holding steady at my current weight and NOT GAINING, so I'm good with that for now. I try to exercise 4-5 times a week and mostly succeeding. I actually got in over 50,000 steps last week, which is excellent as I'd been barely making 40,000 most weeks. I'd like to get that up a little more. The extra steps with 30 minutes of exercising in the morning makes me feel much better than just sitting around in my easy chair, moping.

I am enraged with the current Captain America storyline in the comics. I haven't picked up my pulls in a couple of weeks; when I do go in, I'm telling them to put it back on the shelf.

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Second post in one day!

2016-05-30T18:26:00Z

I haven't posted any memes in years, so I thought this would be a good one to rejuvenate the genre in my journal.

( How many of these have you done, the SFW version. :D )

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I think I need to...

2016-05-30T17:38:44Z

dial back on social media; I can barely keep up on anything! But they're all so fun in their own way.

So to update some stuff (no way I can fit all of the past 2 months into one post without boring the shit out of everyone.)

• Applied for a job with the School of Medicine (already work for them, but this would be working in admin versus research) as the Phase 1 Educational Coordinator. They're revamping the curriculum for the med students and an entire new system is being put in place starting Fall 2016, so this is a newly created position to manage the paperwork/electronic media aspect of it; right up my alley. I think I did well in the first round of interviews; we'll see if I get called back for the second round. I interviewed on May 18th and they were holding interviews pretty much through the end of the month, so I will hear back sometime around June 1 if they want me back. Crossed fingers, please!

• Spent most of this weekend at WisCon 40. Skipped Friday as I was having vision problems that flirted briefly with developing into a migraine. The thought of going to the con nearly sent me into a panic attack, so I bowed out that day. I did make it to Saturday and Sunday for some interesting panels. I hit up a few different panels about gender identity as it's something I've been turning around in my own head for about the past two years. They didn't have a lot of words about how I felt inside when I was younger; I think I'm settling on bisexual, sapiosexual, biromantic, genderqueer--all very subjective and fluid, which was the point of one of the panels. Anyway, not going into the navel-gazing of the why's of my choices, but if anyone's interested, comment me. :D

• It also gave me the chance to spend some time with a friend, S., that I don't see nearly as often as I'd like. I'm hesitant to say I'm in love with her; but she's the only person I've been interested in sexually or romantically in years. We flirted very briefly a few years back (she's a great kisser), but she's married and wasn't willing to continue down that road. I definitely don't like going that route, either; it's something I made a pledge about to myself many, many years ago after playing the field extremely widely in the Navy without thought to the cost. She's the one who set the limits and I am grateful for that, because I don't think I would have had the willpower to stop the momentum. We still have a lot of affection for each other and I content myself with having that much of her.

• Went to a great panel about female superheroes in TV and movies! I may have to start watching Supergirl. I don't watch any of the DC TV shows, but a couple of the panelists really raved about it. Also, I need to finish watching Jessica Jones. Many of these shows seem to have very well-developed female friendships that I'd like to track. One panelist was over the moon about Legends of Tomorrow, but many of my online friends are really critical of it and have stopped watching it, so I'm torn on whether I should even give it a shot. And since I don't have cable anymore, I'm not sure if I even have access to some of these if they're on paid cable channels and not broadcast TV. ( Spoilers for Agent Carter and Agents of SHIELD )

• Despite the fact I've written no fanfic in nearly 2 years, I did post on AO3 a couple of very short vignettes that I pulled out of LJ comms that were never posted on my personal LJ. I give you:

Let Me Be Your Sugar. Star Trek AOS, Kirk/McCoy, gen. Jim likes his coffee hot and sweet.

The Christening. Star Trek RPF, Pine/Urban, explicit. Move-in day for Chris and Karl.

Enjoy!

So, that's enough for now. See you all laters!

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waves

2016-04-06T12:07:30Z

Not dead yet. (Sherlock quote, no need to panic.)

It's been much too long. The last 6 months has been a bit of a rollercoaster, going from feeling good about work and life in general to stressed beyond belief (money woes, as is usual when you live on the edge.) Hanging in there, though.

Had an opportunity toward the end of the year to apply for a higher level position at work and blew it because I didn't completely understand the modified hiring rules on campus under the new administrative policies as of July 1. Thought I had to wait until my probationary period was over, because I started in June, which was under the old rules, but that turned out to be incorrect. Ah well, the job went to the predecessor in my current position (not exactly a surprise there), so I console myself that I wouldn't have gotten it anyway, because she was a shoo-in.

Finally had to dispose of my old car--a 16-year-old Alero--by donating it to the local NPR station. Bought a 2008 Mazda3. It was not my first choice, but it fit my budget. As long as I can make it last for another 8 years until I retire, I'm golden.

Also, I'm on twitter, now. Not sure why, as I'm on tumblr and Facebook and can barely keep up with them! I signed up for twitter a long time ago, just never used it. We shall see what we shall see. If anyone's interested in following me, it's ellenrmorin.

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Too soon to post again?

2015-10-04T01:00:43Z

LOL! As if.

Anyway. How about a work update? I haven't mentioned much of what I do, which has turned out to be a different proportion of things than what I expected. It's more of an event coordinator/party planner/troubleshooter than I expected. To enumerate a few of the things I've had to do:

• Set up lunch catering for a twelve day lunchtime lecture series, including ordering the food and then setting up/taking down, submitting the correct documentation for reimbursement, etc. That particular series started Aug. 3 and ended Aug. 18. These dates are important for reasons.

• Coordinate aallll the things for a week long programming workshop with 25 attendees from all over the world (Italy! Thailnad!) Dates of event: Aug. 17 to 21. Seeing the glitch here? Two days of overlap with the other event. ::headdesk:: But now, add in what was required for the workshop:

Contract hotel and negotiate pricing when the state changed the minimum they'd reimburse per night (from $70 to $83.) The hotel wanted to increase our charges despite the contract signed months before the change. Wankers. I made them stick to the contract. It's a fucking contract!

Facilitate arrangements for attendees with special needs (crib for one who was going to bring her nanny and baby)

Monitor registrations and help untangle travel arrangements/billing difficulties (Italy! Thailand!)

Catering contracts for four evening meals off-site (three restaurants out in town, one on campus at one of the conference facilities)

Arrange transport to and from dinners

Shepard attendees to and from, smoothing out catering glitches and generally keeping everyone happy.

Catering for four lunches on-site

Catering for five morning breaks and four afternoon breaks (course ended at noon on Friday

Order workshop manuals from campus print services (making sure instructors had the completed manual ready early enough to have time to proof it)

Special order flash drives in the shape of Bucky Badger (campus mascot)

Pulling my hair out keeping track of all this shit. OneNotes is my friend.

Miscellaneous shit that I can't even remember now.

• Current major project is arranging an evening reception for an artwork exhibit in the reception area of the newest addition to the facility (an entire new tower was completed last year.) Which has necessitated:

Ordering the artwork through a company in California that offers fancy printing services (on aluminum, called metalprints)

And since it was an art competition within the radiology department, award ribbons had to be ordered

Labels for the artwork so everyone knows what they are (brains! aneurysms! lungs! drug carrying nanoparticles!)

Reserve the large conference room for mini-lectures by the winners to describe their artwork

Confirm availability of dignitaries (department heads, who are also faculty and sometimes doctors on clinical rotation--harder to rope than a greased sidewinder)

Send out RSVP link to both entire fricking departments involved (Medical Physics and Radiology) to get a final attendance count, so that I can...

Order catering for how every many people are actually going to show up

The only thing I don't have to do for this project is arrange the alcohol license, the staff member I support gets to do that. Also extremely fortunate is that the open house that was supposed to coincide with this has been postponed until forever, maybe. It's been rescheduled four? five? times. Hence, smaller art reception, because who wants to get an award a year after you won a contest! And to think, it was actually my own damn idea to have the smaller artwork reception, since it didn't look like the open house was every happening and my supportee fucking took me up on it. Ah, well, that's what happens when you're innovative and a problem solver—people take you up on it.

• Then, to top it all off, just this past Monday, the department head unloads an event he wants to hold on Friday (yesterday Friday, not next week Friday.) Eep!

Again, arrange for conference room, one that allows live streaming to the room they had originally intended to use. However, department head decided to change locale because guest lecturer had donated the money that paid for the stairway from first floor atrium to the rooftop patio outside the reception area of the new tower. New conference room opens out onto said patio. Therefore, reception on patio! Only it was so fricking cold, everyone had to stay inside. But, I digress; moving on.

Send out RSVP link with deadline of Thursday to order food for Friday

Order said food one hour before catering office closes

Spend an hour and a half pulling tables out of the conference room that holds 30, to set it up with auditorium seating for 65 (we couldn't find enough chairs, it ended up being 63. Fortunately, we arranged for additional streaming to a smaller conference room just off the reception area.)

Adding to the chaos, not being able to eat on the patio meant everyone standing around in the hallway. Therefore, pulling half the tables that had previously been removed from where they'd been stored and putting them back in the room, set up banquet style. About 10 people availed themselves of the set-up, which could have held about 40 people

Then, of course, tearing down food display and setting conference room back to its original configuration. Again, fortunately, I have some awesome co-workers, who chipped in on both the set-up and tear-down. (Thank you, Meredith, Jenne', and Lorene.) Kind of slowed by the broken toe, still, so help was greatly appreciated

Let's not even mention all the other, more administrative, tasks required of me. Thank heavens I'm good with Word, Excel, Illustrator, Visio, Acrobat, Photoshop, etc., etc., etc. Now, all I have to do is learn how to use a dictation machine.

I love my job, my job is fun. For the most part. I really like the challenge of it all and it keeps me very busy, as you can well see. Only it also keeps me away from some of my online social hangouts I was used to skimming during the work day. And it's just so hard to keep up with it all, anymore. I've abandoned my tumblr and I used to have so much fun at it. Pinterest is lagging. I hardly check Facebook except 2-3 times a week. It makes me sad. At least I'm still reading fanfic! In bed, before lights out. It's the only time I have for it.

Okay, enough whinging. I have made plans to go out for my birthday with friends this coming Tuesday, so it's not like all work and no play makes Jill a dull girl! :D

And that's all she wrote&mdahs;for now.

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::taptap:: Is this thing on?

2015-09-30T19:46:03Z

Well, hello, there! Still alive. Time for a brief synopsis:

• Son still struggling, but things are looking up as he seeks more employment opportunities
• One of those opportunities is the offer to come live with me, because—
• I told my EX-roommate to stuff her incredibly judgmental, hypocritical bullshit up her ass and not to come back from Texas. Seriously. She said I needed to step UP for Jesse. As if she hadn't been mooching off of me for the past three years and not getting her shit together despite many, many opportunities. How the hell am I supposed to step UP for my own son when she is the one who's been blocking me from doing just that? She got a hearty fuck-off from me. In fact, I think I repeated that three times to make sure she got the message: one for each year.
• Got my own cell phone plan and told EX-roomie to take me off hers (she had a family plan, it only added $10 to it, so I never felt guilty that I was a burden on her. After all, I stepped UP for her.)
• Took another ride with S. in Lola. Yeah, I convinced her to name her that (S. is totally unfamiliar with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., but I got thumbs up from her hubby on the book of face.)
• Went to my first Badgers game last Saturday! Poor Hawai'i, we steamrolled right over them. Not to say that Iowa isn't going to give us a taste of our own medicine this Saturday.
• Broke the little toe on my right foot this past Sunday. Ow. Currently wearing a spiffy little shoe on that foot to give the toe space and provide a stiffer platform, so the toe doesn't get bent back and even more ow every time I step forward. You know, you roll heel-toe as you walk and the toe, she just don't like that.
• Bought the plane tickets, rented the car, reserved hotel rooms for the trip to California with Jesse in October, so he can go to a family reunion on his dad's side. Expensive fricking "vacation", but as my EX-roommate said, "Step UP." Well, this was planned long before she said that, but I finally dug out the credit card (thank you, Bill, I think I will use those reward points--paid for one whole night in the hotel with those points) and shelled out aaallll the bucks.

I think that's it for now. Lots going on at work, but I like it that way. Never bored!

Ta, until next time. ♥

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I did not mean...

2015-08-20T18:08:23Z

it to be so long between posts! But that's what work will do for you, when you're coordinating a two week lecture series and a programming workshop that overlap with each other. The last month has been head down in restaurant menus, contacting vendors for print services and electronics, phoning in delivery orders to local restaurants, setting the food up when it arrives, etc. The lectures are over and the workshop ends tomorrow. Last catered event is tonight; I finally feel like I can stop and take a breath.

So, hi!

Fun things I managed to squeeze in despite all the work:

• Took a ride out into the country with a friend with a red Mustang convertible. Fun! Despite the 90°ree; temps.
• Bachelorette party for a friend with everything X-Files. I'm not a fan, but it was fun to see everyone try to beat the guest of honor at trivia.

And that's it for fun.

Things that are not going so well:

The son got kicked off disability and is having a very hard go of it. I sent him $150 to cover his rent and his rent is only $450 a month. The daughter sent him groceries through Amazon. Mainly personal hygiene products, but when you're job hunting, having those razors is important. I'm looking up advocacy groups in Phoenix and independent living organizations, stuff the son probably wouldn't think to do on his own. He's very skeptical of many agencies, government or non-profit, and he has a hard time filling out forms, so he puts off applying for programs or benefits even when he qualifies. I'll be going down to Phoenix in October to take him to a family reunion in California, when I could try to help him out on the ground locally, but I don't want him to not have something in the works until then. Fretting from a distance sucks.

Anyway, not dead yet, to quote a certain detective with a hand-drawn mustache.

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Six weeks in and...

2015-07-16T18:24:46Z

I think I'm getting the hang of the new job. I have the occasional dumb with Outlook, but only because there's a few features I don't use frequently at all. It just sucks when one of my bosses has to point it out to me. Blargh. It happens. Otherwise, I get a lot of thanks from him and from my other boss, who often calls my ideas creative (but totally in a good way, not like saying "bless your heart" down south.) I just hope this doesn't mean that at some point this job is going to become boring, like my old one. I'm already starting to have time to actually play on the internet, again--like posting on Dreamwidth/LJ. ;}

The 40th high school reunion was fun. I didn't interact with that many people. As I've mentioned before, social anxiety can whack me pretty well, sometimes. It did, however, allow me to reconnect with my bestie from high school. We haven't made any solid plans to do anything, yet, but I'm hoping it means we do keep in touch better than we have over the past 18-19 years. We used to be the type to keep in touch with Christmas cards every year, but the odd thing was, as soon as I moved back to Madison, it's like we both dropped out of sight. Eh. Life happens: she had a kid barely into elementary school and I was working on my degree. Who has time when that kind of stuff is going on? I barely had time for my own daughter, when she moved in with me while I was working full-time and going to school part-time. Now, though, it would be nice to stay in touch. Also friended a few other classmates on Facebook and got e-mail addresses for others. Overall, it was a great decision to go.

Oh! Saw a former coworker outside work, yesterday, when I was on my way to catch the shuttle to my parking lot. We sat there and bad-mouthed the old work place like pros. He used to teach math for the Independent Learning department, which, when I worked with them was known as UW-Learning Innovations. It's been renamed UW-Continuing Education, Outreach and E-Learning (CEOEL). He says that CEOEL stands for Chief Evil Ogredom by the Egregiously Lousy. We both have a little contempt for the way the program was, and still is, run. They won't offer any online math classes (they did, taught by this coworker, but they cancelled them out of spite when he said he wouldn't put them in a video format, only paper.) Seriously, with all the emphasis on STEM courses and they won't offer online math through continuing education? The regular UW math department offered a few online courses (taught by this same person), but then discontinued them, too. WTF? UW-Madison, for all its innovation in other areas, is shooting itself in the foot in others. Plus, what is it going to do once its online master's program in engineering starts and some of the enrollees are lacking some of these math classes? Geez.

Anyway, life has been interesting! Have some words. :)

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OMG, I can't believe I'm doing this.

2015-07-11T23:43:53Z

Took the plunge and registered for my 40th high school reunion, today. Which is actually tonight! At 7:00! WTF, self, WTF? Don't expect pictures, my cell phone sucks.

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So, yeah...

2015-07-09T18:16:49Z

I owe you guys a really long post. But, let's do bullet points, because my time is not my own. Seriously, not my own; they're making me work for a living at this new place.

( WORK. OMG, they expect me to do actual work. )

( Personal stuff )

And that's it! I've spent way too much time on this; I have e-mails to answer! See ya!

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Decisions, decisions...

2015-05-08T20:17:25Z

I was offered the position in the radiology department that I mentioned earlier in the week. I'm taking the weekend to make my decision, but I'd say I'm 80-95% certain I'm going to take it.

So! To help make that decision in an informed manner, I've invited some friends out for booze tomorrow night. I'm sure it will result in a great brainstorming session. ;P

I AM EXCITE!

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I do not approve...

2015-05-06T17:24:56Z

of the pollen and other allergens floating around this time of year. For some reason, my face has taken exception to it all much more than usual; I've got a spotty rash on the left lower cheek and chin. And yet the skin is very dry and flaky at the same time! Eczema--I hates it, I does.

My shrink recommended a face wash developed by dermatologists (CeraVe) to help with the dryness and irritation; and, also, to change my moisturizer to something heavier, which I had already done (Ponds). Well, the changes aren't helping that much with the redness, but it has helped the dryness to some degree. Only now, my eyes seem to be irritated, too, and my vision is all fuzzy. At this point, I don't know if it's allergies or one of the different products I switched to. Gah! I think I'll pick up some Claritin and see if it makes any kind of a difference. Otherwise, I'm going to have to start eliminating suspects. Woe.

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Well, damn, where does the time go?

2015-05-04T22:35:44Z

Uhhhh, yeah, been a while. To sum up:

• Spending more time with friends (girl's night out, lunches, movies, pizza, all kinds of good stuff.) Yay, friends!
• Spending more time with family (friday night dinners out, Saturday movies at the daughter's.) Yay, family!
• Had a job interview with the radiology department at WIMR (Wisconsin Institute of Medical Research) - I think they really like me, I really like them.
• Bought a bunch of flowers, herbs, fruits and veggies for my balcony container garden. Includes: blue/purple hydrangea, fuchsia and orange pansies, blue/yellow pansies, some kind of ground cover thing with tiny yellow flowers, tomatoes, chives, rosemary, thyme, strawberries and rhubarb (no harvest this year, second year maturity.) Still have some empty pots, may do those next weekend.

Lots to condense, but to go into detail would probably run me into a character limit of some kind. :)

( semi-lengthy navel gazing, mostly about work )

Saw Avengers: Age of Ultron this weekend.

( Here be spoilers )

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Not sure if it's actually helping yet...

2015-03-23T15:37:13Z

but I got much more done yesterday than I have on any given Sunday in a long time. To whit:

• Changed the sheets on my bed
• Did laundry
• Took out 2 big bags and 2 small bags of trash
• Prepped my DCDD entries for the next week
• Made moussaka for dinner

It doesn't sound like a lot, but for me it is. Most weekends I get close to nothing done, then try to shoehorn it in during the week, more often blowing it off. When I don't and do it after work during the week, I feel exhausted and irritable. I end up feeling like I have no spoons the next day. Which all makes me feel more stressed and anxious. Trying to reduce anxiety, dammit! However, getting all that done made me feel very, very good. Not sure if it was the increased meds or not, but whatever it can be attributed to, it's a good thing.

Started reading a book for one of the meetup groups I joined. It's The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver. Not something I'd normally pick up on my own, but that's part of doing this, breaking out of my comfort zone and trying new things. I rented it from my library through a Kindle app called OverDrive. We'll see if I finish it before it expires!

Short and sweet, today. Maybe my posts won't be so goddamn long if I post more frequently. I'm sure my friendslist would appreciate that. ;}

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I need a hero in my life...

2015-03-21T23:16:59Z

because, obviously, I'm incapable of taking care of myself. Why do you say that, you ask?

( I give you the answer under the cut, where I whine and blather )

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