so, want to know what’s NOT COOL?
me being at work at 7PM, when I should be an hour and a half away from friends in Delaware. YUCK. Today has been so primo busy, and I’ve got another hour or so ahead of me and I just want to cry but that would make me work slower…
just repeat after me… BEACH BEACH BEACH BEACH BEACH…
I guess we’ll get on the road tomorrow. Sad.
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
I can’t jump up and say this to the people who are talking behind my cubicle, because I am EAVESDROPPING. but:
stop bitching about public transit! it’s the best thing ever, especially getting into and getting around NYC! it’s cheap, it’s fast, it’s usually quite convenient. I would LOVE to be able to take a train to work! LOVE to have time to read, or knit, or whatever! LOVE to not get frustrated at tailgating, to not use up oil, to not leave a nasty vapor trail of potential carcinogens behind me as I zoom!
1. I don’t care if you think subways are FILTHY. stop being such a priss! You know what’s filthy? your lungs after breathing CAR SMOG all your life.
2. I don’t know WHY you think it’s hard to go from NJTransit in Penn Station to anywhere else in midtown. I hear you talking about your options like they’re awful, but really, are the choices of bus, subway, walking (gasp!) or cab just too wonderful and plentious that you can’t choose?
3. I am SO SURE you’re not that important that waiting for a train is going to kill you . Seriously. No, REALLY. you are NOT THAT IMPORTANT! if you were, someone would be providing a CAR with a DRIVER to take places!
you know what bugs ME? sure, maybe I get a tiny big squicked out when I hold onto a railing on the subway that is warm from someone else’s hand, but really what bugs me are smug suburbanites in big cars with matching unexercised legs and lungs bitching about public transportation. you are the people who tailgate me when I’m on my bike because you don’t know how big your car is and you’re afraid to pass. you are the people who buy giant SUVs and pickups because you might need them for 2 weeks a year when you’re on vacation with your whole family. You are the people who require a 2500 sq. ft. house for a family of 4ish. KNOCK IT OFF! you have NO IDEA how good you have it!
and why are you in such a flippin’ hurry, anyway?
EDIT:
snerk. it’s a good thing I didn’t poke my head out of my cube and butt in, b/c I just checked the log and one of the PThaters is a client from a Major Automobile Company. For all I know, she loves public transportation, and gets a bonus every time she slams it!
Posted in all posts, environmentalism, jobby job job
if I am drinking several cups of coffee a day, but they’re all 1/2 coffee, 1/2 milk, can I count that as my daily calcium?
and also, if everyone in the ladies room at work uses the seat covers except for me, the seats are really clean, hey? It’s nice of them to protect the seat from their dirty butts. Thank you ladies!
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
Sweet Holy Kittens, but I am so wretchedly busy. I am seriously cracking, like, my hair is bushing out from the sheer electrical energy leaving my skull. I keep sticking pencils into my coiffure and it’s getting pricklier and pricklier, like a porcupine head. I’m so busy with so many different jobs and I’m not sure if it’s because I’m hopelessly overwhelmed or if I have been seriously dropping balls over here.
And to add to the fun, I’m heading down to my PE review course today. It’s just a pesky hour+ drive, you know, except for that whole crappy NJ traffic thing. I can’t wait until we move to our new office and 1. I can’t get sucked into stressful reports in person (can deal with that stuff remotely no problem) and 2. only have a 10 min. drive to the review course (until mid-October, when I take and really truely hopefully pass the PE).
Heck. All I want to do is stay at home, watch Brigett Bardot filmes, eat guacamole, drink mojitos, and read Harry Potter.
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
I had posted a while ago about my big boss borrowing my little car and I never followed up with the rousing conclusion.
Maybe because the conclusion, she is not so rousing.
I got into work that day and waited and waited and waited for news from the big boss. He didn’t come in until 10Am, and by that time I was sure that 1. he flaked or 2. it was canceled or 3. I had stranded him without a car by flaking on some kind of meeting that was vaguely and forgetably scheduled.
Turns out, he forgot to tell me that they cancelled the visit.
Which is really too bad, because I had removed all of my friends, and even washed all the windows:
Posted in all posts, gear-head, jobby job job
learning how to do financials is HARD. I mean, on the one hand, it’s good that I don’t have a lot of experience b/c the system here seems really complicated, and I’d hate to have to remember how to do things after learning another totally different but equally complicated.
on the other hand, heck, I need to ask someone how exactly these dag-gum mupltipliers are calculated! good night!
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
so I just mapquested the new office vs the current office and apparently, new office is only 1 minute further away from my apt. than current office! When I said I wanted to pick a place right in the middle, well, I had no idea that I actually WOULD. NICE.
I went ahead and said I’d start working from Edison. Silver linings are:
1. there’s a food coop in new brunswick that will be convenient to me;
2. my girlfriend gabulo works in the same area, maybe we can have lunch occasionally; and
3. it’s not any further, apparently.
Also, they gave me a laptop! so I’m mobile! I can probably come to either office when neccessary.
and now on my list of things to do: not entirely related but not UNrelated — put name on list for 2006 honda civic hybrid. It’s not out yet, but heck. I hear that this is the last year for the sweet $2K federal rebate on purchase of a hybrid, and I don’t want to potentially miss out on that just because of limited hybrid supply! and of course, it all comes down to this: if I’m going to be driving for at least 1 hour every day I need to drive a super efficient car. mine is quite efficent, but the clutch is going and the bumper is falling off and etc. etc. I have to start really planning ahead.
In other news, I bought a digicam. So if that arrives I’ll start taking pictures. I’m bummed that I missed the dogwood flowers but maybe next year…
Posted in all posts, gear-head, jobby job job
This weekend I’m graduating from CMU. I wasn’t going to go for the ceremony, but I heard the food at the reception is really good, so…
no, that’s not true. Graduation is a great excuse to go back to pgh and see my buddies. And also help michelle out with packing because she’s a moving super star.
Official word came through, they’re going to be staffing the new office in central NJ next month. My Project Manager will be working from there and I’ll be working mostly on his projects, so it makes sense to move there also. It’s a little crummy b/c my commute is nice and easy now: if I leave at 7 in the morning I’m at work by 7:20 or 7:25. Of course, the drive home takes a little longer, but it goes through paramus, which is where my CSA box will be for pickup! If I’m working from Edison I will have an easy but longer drive TO work and potentially an easier and just as long drive home. That’s the theory, anyway. I have a feeling that going north from Edison in the AM and south TO Edison in the PM is NOT the right way to go, and that’s just what I’ll avoid.
I gambled that it would take them longer to find this office than it really did — but truth be told, I couldn’t have spent another 2 months at the Misters despite our overwhelming and smooshy love for one another. And the whole “boarding house” thing didn’t work out either (I didn’t look for one), and actually, with michelle finding an apartment in PGH (even though she did that b/c I moved for real) the timing would have been pretty awkward. I’m happy with my town! I’ll find a way to get my CSA on back roads and Wednesdays I’ll ALWAYS have to leave work on time. No problem.
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
I thought I’d make a list of things that are stressing me out:
1. Painting. I need to finish painting so I can;
2. Unpacking. I have a friend who may be staying with me overnight on Sunday, and I need to unpack an area large enough for 2 people to walk around in by Friday afternoon when she picks me up for our PGH trip.
3. Work. I feel like I’m not pulling my weight. This is due to several items, including
3a. I am getting familiar with the managment systems and programs available here.
3b. I am getting familiar with the people I’m working with, and how they work.
3c. I am getting familiar with the projects — it’s really like I’ve changed careers, because lots of the technology I am using now I’m not very experienced in. and
3d. The woman I’m taking over for is still here, and won’t be on maternity leave for a couple of weeks. On the one hand I’m really really nervous about what it’ll be like when she’s gone, on the other, She’s still doing a lot of the work, so what am I supposed to be doing?
Anyway: to counter that, I sleep through the night every night, and the only person’s alarm clock that wakes me is MINE. and also: if can’t sit in a chair it’s because MY things are in it and I always throw garbage away virtually immediately. So, I guess while I may be stressed, there’s a certain calm that comes from switching my living situation!
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
of course, the day that I’m leaving at 3:30 in the afternoon I have 2 sit-downs with PMs AFTER LUNCH and at 1:45 I learn that before I leave I have to give drafting a heck of a lot of stuff and at 2:15 I learn that the thing I’ve been doing kind of halfway is not done enough, so I need to get on that super fast and OH HECK why are you going away for 3 business days almost exactly 1 month after you started here?
Well. enough screwing around.
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
Things I like about my new job:
* lots of free stuff. Nerdy free stuff, like shirts and caps and hard hats and engineering scales and safety glasses and ear plugs and steel toed boots and a wind shirt (and cabbages and kings).
and best free stuff of all: hot chocolate, tea, and coffee in the lunch room. and REAL MILK to put in it! it’s incredible. It makes me so happy to know that I can have a cup of tea the way I really like it, with milk and sugar. Even when I don’t drink the office tea that often, I know it’s there, and I am At Peace. That’s right, free beverages make me feel peaceful.
* they’re working me hard already. I kind of like that. Plus, they’re giving me bunches of responsibilities. I know that I really DO have 4 years of prior experience, and now a shiny masters degree, but heck. I was so startled to actually be thrown into a real management situation! I don’t know what I expected, but this is a LONG way from burning CDs, Toto!
Things I had forgotten about consulting that I remembered when I got to my new job:
* timesheets
* job numbers
* office politics (not to say that I’ve noticed office politics here, because I haven’t. but I remembered them!)
Things that surprized me about my new job:
* aforementioned lots-of-work
* This is the quietest office I’ve ever worked in. not that I’ve got a LOT of offices under my belt, but maybe it’s b/c we’re so busy? Who knows. The ventilation system is PRIMO loud and the lights are nice and hummy.
* not being able to use my webmail. I guess I have been v. lucky all this time to not have that blocked…
Things that are weird about “living” in NJ:
* driving to work
* driving to work not being horrible
* having a job
* running into people who I know from the past
* not living with michelle anymore
* living with a bunch of boys in my beau’s flop house
* not reading books constantly
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
ok, so, I have decided to not stress out about getting an apartment just now. I think that this is a better chain of events:
1. go to new job
2. learn about new job, including: who I will be working with and what projects/sites I’ll be working on and THEN
3. Determine which office to live near.
This is much better than:
1. find an apartment, sign a year lease.
2. start new job.
3. realize that everyone else will be working in a different place. Increase already long (but on public transportation with a hearty walk) commute by 20 min.
4. be sad because I’m spending 2+ hours commuting every day.
So the big reason why I was shooting for lyndhurst was because it’s on the train line that goes near the office. But I drove up there today, and apparently, “near the office” means “about 2 miles and frustratingly without a direct route” which might be nice in the summer, but probably won’t be nice at all the rest of the time. Including days like today, where it was gorgeous and sunny but also 16 degrees and with a fierce windchill. and forget yesterday, where it was near blizzard conditions!
and at sometime in the near future they’re opening another office in central NJ and I may want to be located there, you know? It all depends on who I’ll be working with, where they’ll be working, and also if there’s a lot of out-of-office site time, and where THAT is. so because the public transportation concept isn’t going to work out for me I think I’ll just wait until I get a feel for WHERE I’ll be working most of the time, and then figure out where I should be living. Piece of cake, no? Until I get a handle on that, I’ll crash with the mister or find a room for rent, perhaps in a FLOP HOUSE. wouldn’t that be exciting? and wouldn’t you, dear reader(s), love to hear about my exciting stay in a FLOP HOUSE?
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
It’s official — other than actually signing papers, I am 100% taking the job, moving, and starting on March 21.
Man. That means I have to:
1. Get an apartment
2. Pack my stuff up. Including 20 boxes of books, plus or minus.
3. Move. Yuck.
4. Have a going away party.
5. Enjoy Pittsburgh before I go, which may include one or more of the following: The Orchard Show and Medicinal Plants Exhibit at Phipps Conservatory; the Carnegie International Exhibit; and riding the incline with Michelle, perhaps holding hands b/c we’re so sad about breaking up;
6. Appreciating some of the many Lenten Church Fish Sandwich dinners in the area
7. Determine if I have enough suitable clothes for an office job and if not
8. Sew more skirts because I refuse to buy more clothes until I get a real paycheck. and also
9. Have sewing school with Joy and Michelle because that’s the kind of thing that’s important.
10. Make my “Christmas” cards and mail them to many many people I know. Yee-ikes.
(of course, this may or may not occur in this order.)
So, SURE, I have nearly 3 weeks. But heck! I feel like I have a whole passel of things to do.
I’ll start off my rush by going home and not doing ANYTHING. If you haven’t noticed, I’ll let you in on a little secret: while I might make a lot of secret plans, I am undeniably a PROCRASTINATOR.
Posted in all posts, crafts, jobby job job
I was thinking this morning: there’s something so funny about being in graduate school. Everyone assumes you are driven and have a goal and know exactly what you want to study, but depending on what school you attend and who your advisor is your project may be in or out of your control, maybe what you want to study, or may be something that you’re funded for and that you’ll work on anyway. It’s a wild system, really.
that said, there’s been a job offer to me that requires a move to northern new jersey. I am going to take it despite the move from my newly beloved Pittsburgh. The job is primarily environmental engineering and hazardous waste cleanup, like designing site cleanup stuff. Which is something I’ve never done before and which I would be interested to learn. But most attractive is the potential to possibly work on sustainability. I’ve done a pretty exhaustive survey of people with an understanding of what I want to do and of the engineering market, and it seems that there probably isn’t the kind of potential of possible work here. So I’ll do the truly bizarre and put my career first and move away from here, even though I’m not necessarily interested in leaving 1. Michelle and 2. Pittsburgh. Le sigh. being a grownup is truly hard, and it’s no fun to make a decision and to feel crappy about it. Especially when I know if I had this job offered to me and it didn’t require relocation I would totally jump at it, and be so happy and excited I had the opportunity.
(I know everything will work out smashingly. It’s just there’s a big bump called “moving” in the road that I have to get over first!)
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
I am sort of officially done with my thesis: done in the sense that my advisor said I had fulfulled my requirements, and as far as the dept. is concerned I’m done. I am still waiting for thesis review to finish up, and because it involves a committee (aka lots of people) I do not anticipate really finishing until the end of march.
that said, am getting ready for interviewing. today is my GET A JOB LEGWORK day, although I am sure I’ll substitute that for FOOL AROUND ON THE INTERNET day. will do my best to stand firm. mostly firm. Everytime I look at this unfinished WP page I want to get everything right and shiny and pretty on karinajean. I flew to tennessee and back last week and thought “if I had a laptop this airport time would be PERFECT for website fixing.” Instead I read 7 books. I am a beast when it comes to book finishing! I wish I could get a job doing THAT.
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
Big News!
Oh, right, besides the part where I really truly do want to keep updating my webpage, swear-to-god-really, and that’s all that will be said about that for now.
I’m leaving New York. I’m moving to Pittsburgh. I’m going back to school to get my environmental engineering masters.
There.
I gave notice a couple of weeks ago, and El Bosso took it very well.
I am leaving this job on the 31st, and it’s kind of bittersweet. Despite any annoyances I’ve had, the opportunity to work with this bunch of smart, interesting, diverse individuals was fantastic.
Everyone is saying very nice things about me. It’s all nice to hear. I’m still leaving, though.
Michelle is moving with me – we’re going to enjoy being away from New York City for a little bit. No matter how fantastic it is here, it’s still a hard place to live. There’s a lot of pressure, and you meet lots of people who ask you what you “do,� as if my job could even begin to encompass the craziness that is me. C’mon! And you end up working very hard just to make ends meet, and actually, I feel like living in NYC is like having a never-ending guilt trip. I know there are millions of things I should be doing. There are free concerts and movies and shows and the opera and museums and art galleries. There are volunteering opportunities and interesting people to meet. But when it comes down to it, I can’t do everything I want to go to go. I just can’t. I have to work for a living, firstly, and there’s not that much time left in the week after that. I can’t afford to go to cool bars and rock shows every night. And I don’t have that many nice clothes anyway. I find myself over committed and overextended. I want to go to tae kwon do and meet my coworkers for drinks after work and join a regular knitting group and make things (including finishing the xmas presents still left undone, horrors!) and go to museum exhibits and see movies and run in the mornings and meet up with my crafty friends for dancing and fun and visit the parks and trees and go to belly dancing. But I just can’t. It doesn’t work out for me.
All of that said, NYC is a wonderful beautiful exciting place to live. I would love to be a woman of leisure and be able to do everything I wanted to and to take full advantage of the city. That’s the best way to experience it, as a woman of leisure. The other good way is to be like a friend of mine, who says “I’m paying nasty rent to live here, hell if I’ll miss out on ANYTHING that’s free.� If I ever end up with a large endowment and an aversion to driving I would come back here and start doing good works with my free time. That, and try to join up with the kind of people who appreciate calling cards and thank you notes. You know.
Michelle and I went to Pittsburgh a couple of weeks ago for Mariss+Kelly’s wedding and we were able to find an apartment then, in a really nice neighborhood with trees and many rooms and possible parking in the back and super cheap rent and it’s in a house, not an apartment building and… it’s just fantastic. We’re going to ditch our couches here and pull up the carpets there and paint the walls and probably the floors. We’re going to have a beautiful fun and quirky home. It’s close enough to school that I could ride my new bike there, and it’s also close enough that it’s right on a bus line for the nasty winter days. And it’s v. close to M+K’s house, which is super!
My last day at work is 7/31. I’m going to have to start packing. And then Michelle and I will get a truck and load it up on August 4th, and then start to drive. Yikes. It might be a long couple of days (we are resigned to take a break at a hotel halfway there if it gets too late/tired), but at least when we get to Pittsburgh we’ve got some friends who can help unload. We’ll probably rent a wet-dry vac, and I imagine I’ll need to take a stiff brush to the floor, but it’ll be totally worth it in the end! We will be able to fix up the joint and make it our own, and also, we’ll be able to spend some time doing that before we return to NYC for a walkthrough with the landlord and then a trip to the beach in MD before getting back for orientation in Pittsburgh.
I’m very excited. Looking forward to starting this new part of my life!
Now, regarding that updating thing. I don’t really have a computer at home. I hope to soon, the beau has mentioned helping me fix up the disaster scene that I have now. But outside of that, I don’t have an internet connection at home either. So while I still have big (little) plans for this webpage, I might have to wait for a while to put them into action.
Happy summer y’all!
Posted in all posts, jobby job job
It’s starting to seem very nice outside. Is it spring yet? Honest?
I am so busy, but I don’t know what I’ve been doing at all. So here’s some lists:
Things that bothered me today at work:
Things that I want to buy and am totally not going to because I’ve been a huge spendthrift lately:
Things I wish I could stay in one place long enough to do:
Things I love doing that I have been doing lately and want to do more of:
In an effort to accomplish SOMETHING, here it is: I am making a mailing list for this page. If you want to be included, send me an email! And as always, compliments are always appreciated…
Posted in all posts, crafts, jobby job job, knitastic
Wow, it’s flippin cold out there today!
And, um, it was yesterday, and the day before. And it will be tomorrow, also. We’re in a Deep Freeze! A Cold Snap!
I can’t complain, you know, because it’s not too cold, and I do have lots of warm clothes and layers and long socks and long johns to wear. And the heat in our apartment works pretty darn good right now. And even though it’s cold at work, I dress appropriately, so it’s no problem. And, I really can’t complain to my dad or mom, b/c where they live it’s regularly below zero at night these days. And my mom works outside. Yep, outside, in the cold. And my brother does, too, pretty much, only at night! My family is so tough I can’t say a word about cold weather. It’s not that cold, really.
Plus, I really love the cold weather! I love real winters, I love bundling up in wool and layers and wearing long socks and ridiculous hats and mittens. I love snuggling up under my covers at night, and I love that I can’t sit up and read late because my hands get too cold. Winter is good times, if you ask me. I love the snow. I love storms. I love power outages. I love having to be prepared for cold weather when I leave the house, and I love having to pack extra things with me. Have I said all of this before on here? I may have.
So, I badmouthed some kids in my neighborhood and said people had let the air out of my tires: that’s not true. They’re just leaking and leaking and leaking. I have to fill them up all the time. I don’t know if it’s the rims, which would mean the tire guys in Albany who put on the new ones were negligent and didn’t tell me about it, or if it’s the cold weather, which is, lets face it, very very cold, or if I’m not inflating them far enough and pocky rims let the air drip out (which would imply that kids DID let the air out, the first time). I took the car to a tire place down here and they took the tires off and checked them well, and said there was no problem. So, I don’t know what’s going on, other than I have tires that need new air every 3 days.
I’m zooming along on daddy’s mittens. They’re freakin big, let me tell you! And, also, I’m having such a great time getting home at a reasonable time and making my dinner. I had really good curry noodle soup with tofu, and I can’t recommend the Thai Kitchen products highly enough. They are so good. The curry noodle soup called for 1 ½ cup of water and ½ a cup of milk, soy milk, or coconut milk. I mixed it up a little and added 1 ½ cup of coconut water, and ½ cup of milk. It was so good, and mildly coconutty. Yum. So, I guess as far as my new years resolutions go, I’ve been very good at keeping the One Against Bitching, the One Against So Much Coffee, the One Against Eating Out, and the One For Keeping Cupboards Full. Exercising? Well, it’s 8 degrees when I wake up, and very dark. Making stuff? Doesn’t count until I finish my xmas presents.
Tuesday I went to the NJ office for a big meeting. It went really well, except the tights I was wearing were too small, and they gave me monster gas. I didn’t disrupt the meeting, or anything, but it was a little uncomfortable for a bit. The fun part about Tuesday was driving to work. Even though my car tires were getting low by the end of the day, it was great to drive a couple of pals back into the Big City. The drive home wasn’t long at all, and traffic was superfantastic at the Holland Tunnel (I’m a car pool!).
Wednesday I took a bit of time to go down to Cooper to drop off recommendation forms. That’s right, I’m really going to apply to grad school. It’s a long arduous process, but I’m really going to do it. I did have a great lunch with Matt at the sushi place. It seems so luxurious to take a nice lunch with someone you care about. It was great.
Today, speaking of no bitching (ok, so I wasn’t speaking of it recently, but I was before), I had a tough time with an email that implied I had been assigned a task at a meeting on Tuesday, and had shirked my duty. Man. Stupid office politics. The email made it seem like I was goofing off! There’s this bitchy game that people play sometimes in offices, where they try to be the best, most perfect employee. And I don’t know if the person who’s sending the emails is really playing that game or not! Oh well. El B. likes her better than he likes me, anyway, because she actively is trying to be his golden-girl employee, and I’m just ultra-professional and unflappable. That’s right, I’m unflappable. Or I try to be. Nothing to be solved by getting upset by El B.!
Did anyone notice I updated the crafts page with new embroidery section? Well, yeah, I did.
Out into the cold I go! It’s probably very cold, with a windchill of very very cold. Luckily I’m wearing my long johns and tall socks under my skirt!
Posted in all posts, crafts, jobby job job
Happy Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. Day!
I am at work. Apparently, besides us here, there are about 30 people working in Manhattan today. The train was empty! The streets are empty! The drugstore is empty! Despite the cheesy subcontractor advertising calendars of choice, which mark today with a brown and a white hand shaking in apparent racial harmony, we don’t get today off. Sigh. I wish I did! We used to get lots of holidays off, including days that others didn’t get, like Presidents Day and Columbus day and Good Friday. Now, we get nothing. We go from New Years in January to Memorial Day in May to the 4th of July to Labor Day in September to that whole Thanksgiving/Christmas thing. Sigh. The good old days? Gone. And I love Martin Luther King Jr. Day! But none for me!
I was in a meeting last week and these are the notes I took:
The last one is the most interesting. The way people sit in meetings is so fascinating to me – most of the guys in meetings, at least, internal ones, sit in their chairs with their feet planted on the ground, leaning way back, belly sticking out and crotch wide open. It’s kind of a gross, undignified position, in my opinion. I’ve noticed that most women don’t sit like that, mostly because it’s kind of inappropriate to flash your crotchal area around.
The prioritizer is a very interesting tool here, kids. You put in what you’re trying to prioritize, you answer questions (which of these pairs is better?) and it tells you what you think!
This weekend I went to Philadelphia for a friends party, and also, we went to the Mutter Museum. It was really neat. I looked for Grover Cleveland’s tumor, but couldn’t find it. Chief Justice Marshall’s bladder stones were on exhibit, though! His weren’t too large, but there were some really honkin’ big bladder stones. Like, as large as a tennis ball. Yar! The most interesting exhibit was on Fibrodysplasia Ossificans Progressiva, where the muscles and other tissue are slowly calcified to bone. You could see where the muscles, especially in the upper arms, had been turned to bone on the skeleton. It was pretty neat, and also, pretty horrible.
So for like the first time in my entire life I’m counting calories. I hate it, but I also hate the fact that I am overweight. 205, baby! OK, so, I figure I should own the weight, and work for a change, and to do that, I’m posting it on the freakin’ internet. I’m nuts.
I’m supposed to go to a crafty night tonight, from 6 to 10, and now I don’t know how early I can leave work. It’s already 5:30, but I have a meeting in the NJO tomorrow, and so therefore I have to get all of this stuff done, and flipin’ CDs burnt, and El Bosso hasn’t checked it all, and I need to leave, like, in 45 min. at the very very most. Grrr.
Well, wish me luck!
Posted in all posts, jobby job job, measurements
Happy New Year!
I love saying Happy New Year. I’ve been saying it for nearly a week, even though it just started yesterday. I think it’s a really appropriate thing to wish to people to have.
I am starting the new year refreshed of mind, body and spirit. No, really, I am. It sounds silly, and it is kind of, but I didn’t come to work from the 21st of December until Today. Which is OVER a week’s vacation! (Ok, I did come to work on Monday. I kept getting messages about this non-urgent issue, so I thought I’d just show my face to make sure everything was ok. It was, no one was impressed with good thoughts or a positive glowing attitude that I had come in, I checked my email and ordered a teapot, and went home.) And, I billed all sick time! Because I needed to rest my soul! Heh. No, really. That’s what I needed, and that’s what happened. I wonder if I could get a note from my doctor saying that? I wonder if I’ll need to. “Karina Jean could not come to work this week or during the holiday season at all because she was resting her soul, lest it be broken along with her spirit.â€Â
So, 12.20 we had our holiday luncheon. And let me tell you, it was a far cry from the holiday parties of years past. I don’t know why, even, but there was a DJ and the dance floor was open. I mean, sure, I danced, but it was a little weird to dance during a LUNCHEON. After that? I went back to work. But not for long! And then I went for drinks with my department at the Helmsley Hotel, which was fun, and weird, and then to the back of this bar that’s like a tree house, because it has a canvas roof and a tree growing through the middle, and that was also weird, and then Matt picked me up and we met Michelle at Cilantro’s for some fun.ÂÂ
Sunday and Monday I furiously worked on holiday cards and gifts for people. And I went home on the 24th, and kept furiously working. But I finished my mittens! They’re great, even if they are very pointy (is that Latvian style?):
 
 
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And I gave three presents this year that were unfinished (and this includes wrapping a ball of yarn labeled “Daddy’s Mitten†with one of my mittens, labeled “Kari’s Mittenâ€Â. This sounds like it wasn’t too bad, but, I purchased three others, and I haven’t actually given several more, of which at least two are still being constructed, and at least two came very late in the year. And two of the presents I gave (mom’s!) were incomplete! (really, should I send you that crock-pot in the mail? Have it shipped directly to you?) Plus, I haven’t finished sending out all of my holiday cards (ahem, new years cards). But that’s ok! It’s a new year! All will be superfantastico!
Really, I did (re-)gain a lot of perspective while I was away. I needed a big fat break from work and irksome things. And the snow we got on Christmas upstate (nearly 2 feet! Whee!) was fantastic, even if I did break my front tires enough to need new ones on a bad patch of ice. And seeing my mom and nephew being hams? Also fantastic. And having quality down time with Michelle? Again, fantastic.
 
 
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(Daniel is not sick. He’s just, um, thinking about something. Really. The restaurant was reputable and fantastic.)
It was a fantastic vacation. I am really starting to see the merit in making your employees take all of their vacation days by the end of the year, instead of allowing them to put off a vacation until they MUST take it or risk losing days – at least in a profession like engineering, where it’s easy to forget that the project WILL go on without you, to forget that you are not indispensable, no matter how important and depended upon you are.
Happy New Year! (and no, I don’t know where the beans are involved. A hill of beans? The musical fruit? Sprouting, the seeds of life and scurvy prevention? Cause there’s no scurvy in the new year! Yar!)
Posted in all posts, jobby job job, knitastic
