My absence: Just call me Pat Benetar!

So the reason why I have not managed to make my regular appearances in the blogesphere for the past few month, well really, at least a half a year is because life has just been working me out!

I went from having no job to basically having 3 jobs! My regular full-time job has been going really well. I am really enjoying what I am doing and feel like I am making a contribution that is being valued. I have had two bosses in the past 8 months but that is because the guy who hired me got promoted to his boss' position, which is not a bad thing for me since he thought well enough of me to hire me in the first place and has direct knowledge of my work. And I like my new boss, who is a woman. I was not sure of her when I first started the job and she was in another group within my department. I got a strange vibe from her then but now that I report to her, she has been really great. She was promoted when she came to my group and is very inclusive and treats me very congenially, which is the opposite of what I felt from her before. So things are good!

Additionally, I am still working at The Container Store. A lot of people have asked me why I am still working there and it is not that the money makes a huge difference but I like it and it doesn't really interfere with my schedule that much. I work truck uploads, which is normally one night every 5-7 days (9-midnight on a weeknight/Saturday or 6-9 on Sunday) and I have started picking up store hours on some evenings and on the weekend. I cannot under emphasize how different this company is from regular retail --- and the people I work with are all pretty much very nice, helpful, agreeable people. But of course, that is why they were hired.

And lastly, I have been dealing with some investment properties that I purchased last year. The long and the short of it is that they have not worked out quite as I had originally envisioned. I have ended up renting them out as Section 8 housing, at a loss, and using a property manager (who is also an owner in the subdivision) to manage them. I was very hands off for a little less than a year but then the finances of it all caused me to take a closer look. I had not foreseen not having a job for 6 months when I purchased them and any extra that I could have dedicated to these properties disappeared into living expenses. But honestly, even if I had kept my job, the economics of this endeavor disintegrated as the housing market started going south. So while I am able to collect income on each property every month, it is not enough to cover the mortgage by a sizable amount. So I have spent a fair amount of time trying to figure out what to do. And I still haven't gotten it figured out.

What I did figure out was that I could not continue to afford a property manager if I was already losing money so this fall I started the process of managing them myself. And in the process I discovered that a few things were not being managed as I expected. So I had to dive in on my own -- manage the transition in management with the manager and tenants, sign new leases, sort through a whole mess of things with the housing authority including rent increase requests, etc, steering clear of an investigation that they launched against my former property manager, and finding someone to do maintenance for the units. Additionally, one tenant and the former property manager did not get along, for a number of reasons, and while I has trusted his advice in the past with regard to tenant matters, I started to question if the rendition of events he had been telling me was completely accurate.

There have been periods where I worked at least 5 hours a day for 13 days straight plus had to manage stuff with the properties in addition.

I definitely feel like an adult these days.... Got some big ol' adult issues to deal with. Whew!

An interesting result of Facebook friendship....

So.... The other day I was helping my boss with her blackberry and I saw that she had a Facebook app on it. So, I asked her where she got it and she showed me how to download it. Well, that night I got a friend request from her. It lead to a little dilemma....... Do I really want my boss to be my Facebok friend??? But.... I know she knows I use Facebook so if I don't accept that will raise suspicion. So, I accepted -- she's pretty cool anyway. I will just have to censor my status updates a little.

So, then, other people from work started friending me since they saw I was her friend. One of them is this woman who I have known professionally, although we haven't worked much together, for a while. We have worked at the same last 3 companies so she is a good professional contact.

But, after we became Facebook friends I began to realize that...... she is a RAGING Republican! Ugh! A Palin supporter nonetheless...... So, this has an interesting affect on our hallway chatter. Basically, now I strongly question her judgement and am not as excited about speaking to her. Am I wrong? Anyway, it doesnt affect my opinion of her work but I don't think I will be clamouring to hang out with her or go to lunch.... especially not before the election is over for a little while!

The unintended affect of technology!

What a difference a day makes....

Yesterday, I started my day at the County Tax Assessors office...

And the day just continued to be stressful, including some incidents at work (which actually were just more stressful given the day's tone.) It was just one of those days where nothing went quite as planned and you just want to crawl in bed and start over the next day....

And that is about what I did.

And this morning I vowed not to let the previous day's events shake me. And today was a good day. Work went well and I even got some face time with my Executive Director who I really haven't spoken to much at all since I started this job.

What a difference a day makes!....

Fridays mean something to me again....

So the first week of work down and I am feeling pretty good about it, although I definitely have a lot to learn. The folks in my group seem pretty nice. My boss, and the rest of the group, took me out to lunch the first day, and then a bunch of us went out again on Tuesday.

The guy who is training me, whose responsibilities I am taking over, is actually the guy I talked to get info on the group back in December. He had been really helpful then and had actually worked for my former company. My former boss knew him and gave me his contact info originally. Well, now, I am taking over his responsibilities as he is moving to a different role in our group. So the good thing is that he will be around if I ever need to pick his brain. There is a lot to pick though as he had been doing the job for 4 years and knows all the history, all the people and all the vendors.

But I am plugging along.... some days I feel excited, some days I feel a little overwhelmed but I think this is going to be a really good opportunity for me. I have a lot to learn. I realize that I know a lot less than I thought. But I am up for the challenge! My big accomplishments this week are that I got my ID, parking pass, computer (delivered and set up), and blackberry (delivered and set up) and lot of reading (lots more to do though)!

Oh, and as to the title of this post..... I had blogged previously about how weekends lost their meaning when you don't have to go to work during the week. Well, they have returned to their prominence and they seem shorter than ever!

When it rains, it pours!

So, the same day that I started to get an inkling that I was going to get an offer from Company A (I got contacted by HR to complete an employment application) I also got a call from a recruiter at Company B. He and I chatted and he told me he wanted to set up a phone interview with the hiring manager for a position I applied for after I had interviewed at Company A.

The next day, I was called by the recruiter at Company A who asked me if I would consider an offer that was a little lower than my requested salary. I told her that I would consider it and she said that she would have to get special approval for the offer and would plan to send me an offer in two days.

Day 3, I had my phone interview with the hiring manager and I started to get excited about that position. Although it was not a consumer-facing business, it would be working on a product that had a lot of exposure and could include some international travel. The hiring manager told me that I would be contacted to schedule a round of in-person interviews in a week and a half. I also got contacted by a recruiter at Company C who had encouraged me to apply for a position at her company a week or so back. She wanted to talk to me more about the position and some of my past experience. Now, I knew when I applied for that position that it was a good fit from some of my prior experience but not really something I wanted to continue with in the future. I still applied though because any job is better than no job, okay! But, now that I knew that I was getting an offer, I declined to go any further with Company C.

Day 4, I was supposed to get the offer. Instead I got a call from the recruiter at Company A going over the offer. While I didn't quite get the money I wanted, I reasoned that given their historical propensity to payout well on the yearly bonus (something that didn't really live up to it's potential at my old company) I would end up at about the same as what I was making before, if not a little better. But, you should always negotiate. Women historically are afraid to negotiate, and black folks as well. It seems to be drilled into us that we are lucky to have a job. But, traditionally, white men aren't hindered by the same viewpoint and just about always negotiate. So remember, always negotiate --- they will not take the offer from you! In fact, they expect you to! If you don't, you will be leaving stuff on the table. And there are more things that you can negotiate on besides salary. I was able to get a few more vacation days out of the deal.

Day 5, I got the offer. It was like we discussed but I was confused that there was not anything to sign and send back. So I sent an email asking about that.

The weekend was pretty quiet, save a yummy dinner that I cooked and a Brazilian party with a few too many caipirinhas!

Day 8, the recruiter from Company A saying that email acceptance would be fine for the offer. When I was just about to send the email accepting the offer, I got an email from Consulting Company D. (are you confused yet??) A great friend of mine who lives in the city I used to live in works for Company D and when he heard about my situation at the beginning of the year, he offered to submit my resume as an interal referral. Now, I was not all that excited about the travel associated with consulting but like I said before, a job is better than no job, okay! To be honest, I had forgotten all about it until the recruiter contacted me. Now Company D has done some really exciting projects in my industry and it was very flattering that a senior director there was interesting in my resume. But what do I do?!

Well, I tried to find out as much about Company D from my friend as I could and I called back the recruiter there the next day. I also called a guy I knew in the group at Company A to ask some more specific questions about what it is like to work there on a daily basis and what it is like to work for my potential new boss. Then, about 45 minutes later, I got a call from the recruiter at Company A telling me that she was hearing rumors that I was going to reject the offer. First of all, rumors?? It was a little bit of a strange conversation. It was like she was trying to do the final sale, telling me that there were 300 applicants for the position and how great my manager would be, and also trying to put the screws to me. So, I don't know if someone actually talked to her or if this was just a final negotiating tactic but it sort of worked. After the conversation I knew that I would not be able to effectively stall Company A until I could get anything tangible from the other companies. I called Company B and declined to interview further.

I did still follow through with a call with a principal at Company D, just to find out more about the company. And I made a decision. It was rather flattering to have multiple companies competing for me, even if the timing wasn't right. And, while I got the position that I wanted, this situation underpins the need to continuously network, even when you have a job, so that you won't need to start from scratch when "things happen." I am the kind of person who really dedicates themselves to their job and the group that I work in but there are no guarantees, no matter how big the company is. So, while I will continue to be dedicated to my job, I will still keep my eye out for the next opportunity.

It's over!

Well, it looks like, after 5 months, my sometimes paid vacation is coming to an end! A few weeks ago I was finally contacted by a company I was targeting to come in for an interview. In fact, that day I was contacted by two hiring managers at Company A to interview for two different positions that week. So I scheduled both.

Now one was in a group that I have been working on getting a position in since December. I had talked to a number of folks about the group and have a number of people forward my resume to the hiring manager. The other one, apparently some of the folks I know from job had recommended me to the hiring manager. I started doing a little research as I prepared for the interview and found out that both hiring managers sit on the same floor, around the corner from each other.

So I went to the first interview that week and it was organized for me to talk to 3 people, with the hiring manager being last. 45 minutes with each person separately. It was a rather long afternoon. 2 1/2 hours is a long time to talk about yourself. And to re-introduce yourself each time. I started to forget who I had said what to! I was also warned that the hiring manager was a tough interviewer and that she didn't really give much feedback at all during the interview. And it was the truth. Plainly put, I would not want to play poker with her! You cannot read any emotions on her face or in her voice during interviews. But I felt well prepared and thought I did pretty well.

The other interview was 2 days later, with only one person (Thank God!) The funniest thing was that I had to walk past the office of the other woman I interviewed with 3 times before the end and the third time she says "Hi RedDred (well not really but you get the point)!" with a big smile on her face and I had to say back "Hi Poker-faced Interviewer Lady!" right in front of the guy I was interviewing with. It happened to be a great segue to introduce to him that I had already interviewed with her earlier in the week. In fact, at the end of the interview he asked me when she said that she would get back to me and then he assured me that he would be making a decision a few days before when she said she would. So I left the interview feeling pretty positive.

Now, given my new dedication to positive thinking , I decided to alter my approach to how I thought about the interviews as I waited to hear word. I knew that I had done the best job I could in my interviews and I was not going to fret about what I could have said or done differently. I would only think positively about the experience and not let fear or worry get the best of me. So I took two post-it notes and wrote the titles of the positions on each one and stuck them to my mirror in my bathroom. Then, every time I saw them I would think, "I am going to get one of these jobs!" or " I am going to be working at Company A soon!" A few days I did something that I felt was a little corny but I figured it was not bad to send this type of energy out into the universe... I visualized, turn by turn, me driving to work at Company A on the first day with my box of stuff to put on my desk and then parking and walking up to the building and talking to the receptionist. I also decided to pro-actively buy a pass for the toll since I would have to pay a toll to get to and from Company A so I wouldn't have to carry quarters with me all the time.

Now, a pragmatist would say that these things really didn't make a difference and that the difference was made during the interview but I figured my attitude couldn't have hurt. And the punchline is, I got an offer last Friday for the second position I interviewed for, which was the one I had been tracking down since December! So I am returning to the realm of the employed and not a moment too soon and doing something that I think I will really enjoy!

Thanks so much to all of you for your words of encouragement during these times, especially Brunsli, BlackRussian, and Naturally, Sophia. You helped me keep my spirits and my resolve up. It is great to have a supportive online network of friends cheering you on when you need it the most. Thanks guys!!!

Job search update: Day 85 - the thrill is gone....

So I have been contemplating writing another job search update post for a while but to be quite frank, not that much has happened. I have gone to all the Tuesday morning breakfast sessions, reached out to tons of folks via email or phone, gotten replies from some, met or talked with others but nothing really substantive has come of it yet.

I have been keeping an open mind but it is all starting to get old. The novelty of being out of work is wearing off after 3 months and I am getting a little bored and frustrated. I even decided to do a little seasonal retail work to pass the time since things are slowing down on the job market and put in my application at a store where a friend of mine works. Turns out the store manager has been out for the past two weeks so she hasn't been looking at applications and the season is passing by.... I am starting to feel a bit of the whole Groundhog day syndrome. Every day the same thing.

I did take a few days off from the job search thing and bought Christmas decorations. I also did some cooking and my refrigerator is filled and I am getting sick of washing dishes. Even with taking time away from the job search, a couple balls that I had in the air kept on moving so I have a few folks to contact next week. Eventhough it is slim that I would even get an interview between now and next year, it is still a good idea to get on people's radar ahead of time. I know that a couple of companies I am targeting are planning expansion starting in January so i will need to hit the ground raring to go!

Don't be shy!

So, when all this stuff was first brewing with my job, I wasn't really talking about it with anyone except close friends. But since it has become official, and the news publicized, I have readily been talking about the layoff when asked. And I have been getting help from the most unlikely sources....

I had mentioned my situation at the place where I take my dog for daycare and the owner asked me to send him my resume. "I am always hearing about things," he said. What the heck!

Also, my aunt called me the other night and said that one person she talked to asked that she send me their contact info and another, who I met before, asked about me when he heard about the news at my company and said that he might be able to find something for me to do at least temporarily at his company if need be....

You never know where help might come from. You just have to leave no stone unturned. You never know where it will lead...

Job search chronicles, Days 8-9

I am balancing guilts right now.... procrastinators guilt, shoppers guilt, emotional eaters guilt..... all my bad habits are manifesting themselves these days. At least I am exercising! I have managed not to do very much on the job search the past two days and I am feeling a little bad about that. Yesterday was spent working on real estate stuff --trying to work on this business with my investment property, so I guess I can't feel too bad about that. That does have a financial payoff. But today....... after meeting with my former co-workers for the second job searchers breakfast, I decided to head over the the mall. You see, to this point, my laptop has been set up downstairs in front of a big TV. This is because 1) when I was working, it was primarily used for recreation and 2) I couldn't get very good wi-fi signal in my office upstairs (I think there are some old concrete walls lined with wire mesh or something that interferes with the signal) I recently bought these wireless repeaters to hopefully extend the reach of the signal into the office but have not really tested it extensively. So I decided that I need to move my butt into my office so that I can have a space where I can have distinct, dedicated job search time, without a TV or Tivo to distract me. Which brings me to my shoppers guilt.....


A couple weeks ago, I was looking in the Pottery Barn catalog that they so sneakily sent to my house, and I saw this really cool charging station. It basically have a drawer with a shelf on top and in the back are holes that you can thread the charging cords through. Then, in the back, you plug them in to an internal surgeprotector thing and the cord of the surge protector comes out of a hole in the back panel and it plugged into the wall. I said to myself "I need that! That is cool!"

It comes in black which is the color I like.

And then I noticed that it is a part of a collection that has a matching desk. Another thing about my office is that the filing is over flowing. Partially because I don't do it often, but also because my filing cabinet has seen better days. It got beaten up in one of my moves. Also, the door on my desk has become misaligned and doesn't close anymore. It is one of those inexpensive, vinyl coated, pressboard desks but it has served it's purpose for a few years. But now, I think I have outgrown it. So I was considering getting a grown-up real desk to spruce up my work space and solve a few space problems.



So, after breakfast, I decided to head over to the Pottery Barn store to see if they had one of the desks in the store that I could see..... they did..... And I liked it.... A lot.... I thought that it might be the kind of thing that would have to be delivered so I asked the sales lady what the benefit was to me to get it from the store. Well, they load the stuff in your car and you have NO shipping cost, which would be 10% of the purchase price. Um yeah, I would say that is definitely a benefit. I also had this girt card that some old co-workers had given me over a year ago when I was changing jobs and bought my new house so it could help defray the cost a little. So I bought it. It will help me be more productive, right? Turns out after I bought everything, the sales lady told me that one of the end pieces was actually not in stock so they would have to get it shipped to the store for me to pick up in about a week so I won't be able to set it all up until then :-( So then, after I was leaving the store, I felt guilty, not so much because of the money I spent (only partially) but because I spent most of my afternoon shopping for this thing. (Oh, did I also forgot to mention that I stopped at Williams-Sonoma on my way out!...) I will admit though, that I am a bit of an emotional shopper, something that I probably shouldn't be doing much of since I don't have a job!

Also, the past couple days I have been eating in a very balanced way. Well, Monday started pretty good. I have leftovers from my dinner on Sunday for lunch but from the evening on it has been the pits.... I had guacamole and chips and apple pie (and drinks at the show) for dinner, a late night snack of scrambled eggs with smoked turkey and cheddar cheese when I got back from the show, yogurt with granola and honey for breakfast today and apple pie for lunch/snack. Not a good thing and I have healthy things in the house because I just went grocery shopping....

Okay well, enough beating myself up. Knowing is half the battle, right? Tomorrow is another day and an opportunity to refocus!

Job search chronicles, Days 4-5

Day 4

I decided that I needed to unpack and try to straighten up my house, which looked like a hurricane hit it. I spent all morning unpacking, cleaning up my room, doing laundry and cleaning dishes. But in the afternoon, I had, what could only be described as a little anxiety attack because I hadn't done anything with the job search that day. It was really strange....I started to feel really uneasy and my heart started beating really fast. But then I talked myself down and it passed.

I am paying attetion to my procrastination practices and coping mechanisms. I will be honest, when I was a kid, I was really shy, starting from about 3rd or 4th grade and I still have some closet introvert tendencies. A lot of people would probably be very surprised to hear this, especially those who have met me in the past 10 years because I make a conscious effort to not be so. And, it is easier to be more extroverted and outgoing as I have become more and more confident in myself and my accomplishments. But a situation like a job search can really tap into these latent tendencies if you let them. So I need to make sure that I do a certain amount of job search stuff every day and not get distracted by the other (non-money making) things that I get distracted by.

When I was still working, I committed to run in a corporate sponsored 5k run so I spent the afternoon trying to update my Shuffle so I could take it with me on the run. But it had been cloudy all day and started to rain. I could not find any rain day information anywhere and since partial thunderstorms were forecasted for the rest of the evening, I decided to not go. Of course, after I changed clothes and made other plans, it had dried up completely. :-(

Day 5

I was Job Search Johnson! I spent just about all day looking at job listings, sending emails, looking in LinkedIn etc... I applied to 3 jobs and talked to a friend I know at one of the them. He said that he will talk to HR about me and put in the good word for me.

When looking through the LinkedIn network of the recruiter I met this week, I saw the information for a guy who works for a company that I had no idea had an office here. While looking at the company's website, I saw that there were a couple jobs there that I might be qualified for. I typed up an introduction email and asked the recruiter to forward it to him. I also applied for one of the jobs. Hopefully, I can catch up with the man this upcoming week for an informational inteview. I also discovered that a man, who I was familiar with from my previous company, now works as a VP at one of the companies I am looking at for a new job. We actually have 7 contacts in common on LinkedIn but I am trying to figure out who is the best person to forward an introduction to him. Some folks who I think might have a closer connection to him, I don't have such a close connection to so I will have to work on this. One of our common connections is a former boss of mine and I already have some emails out to her so based on her response, I might ask her to forward an introduction.

Then, one of my old co-workers called me to meet with some other folks in the company for drinks. So I went! The weather was beautiful and we enjoyed some drinks, wings and blue cheese chips on the patio, while I got to hear about all the changes that have gone on in the past 2 weeks since I have been gone. I am still thinking that I am probably better off to be in the position I am in (except for the regular paycheck.) because there is no guarantee what will happen in the next few months. There may be more cuts, the severance packages might not be as nice... who knows....

The Job search chronicles, Day 1-3

So I have decided to add a regular installment to my blog about my job search as 1) a way to keep myself honest and focused and 2) because hopefully, in all of this, I can provide some useful information to someone out there who is or may be in the future in the same position soon...

So here it goes.....

I told myself that my vacation would be a great way for me to clear my head and then I would hit the ground running when I got back. Well, it didn't really happen that way....

Day 1
Day 1, I got so overwhelmed by all the stuff I had to do, job search, cleaning my house, unpacking that I got tired and decided to take a nap! Luckily, I had agreed to help my admissions director from my business school at a recruiting event so I had something to get me out of the house!

Day 2
One of my former co-workers had this great idea that a bunch of us should get together once a week for breakfast to talk about how we have been, share contacts, keep each other from being lonely/depressed/going crazy... We are meeting at this funky little place with free wi-fi... So we had our first breakfast meeting and one of use already has a job. She is starting on Monday which is really great for her.

We actually ended up staying longer than I expected so I had to run home to change for an orientation session with this company that is providing job transition and training services. It was pretty general -- they have a bunch of other classes to sign up for to help you with resume editing, interviewing skills, networking etc and a computer lab and job bank listing. It will probably be a good resource -- and another reason to get myself out of the house, motivated in my job search and around people.

One thing that the woman told us was to make sure that we stick with our regular routine, not to stop doing things that you would normally do which I can see could be a very important thing. When you don't have a set schedule anymore it is important to keep some sort of routine going so that you don't just sit around like a lump on a log. One thing that is routine that I am not doing so well at is getting up at my normal time. Some of this is probably because I am still adjusting to the time difference from my trip but some of it is also that it is one of those actual benefits of not having a job.... to be able to sleep late! My dog is not too good about letting me do this though. I manage to wake up, let her out and then go back to sleep for as long as I can.

That afternoon I decided to go to the Tuesday step class that my regular step teacher (who I love!) teaches at another location. I normally go to her Monday and Wednesday classes but since I hadn't been in 2 weeks I decided not to wait until Wednesday to get back in the swing of things. It is an advanced only class and it was really great and fast paced. I always love going to her classes because the music is good, the choreography is fun, she is really enthusiastic and kicks our butts!

Day 3
I met a friend at the gym this morning for a moderately vigorous weight training session. I figure if I am going to be out of a job, I shouldn't be out of shape too. If I dont have to go to a job everyday then I can at least go to the gym!

Then, in the afternoon, I met with a woman I had been referred to at a recruiting/executive search firm. We had a really good meeting and I also got to meet the managing partner (who I still owe an email....) She emphasized the importance of using LinkedIn for networking and told me to send her an invite to join my network so that I could then look at the companies in her contacts and see which ones interested me. She also told me how important it was to make sure that my profile is up to date. While I actually got my last job because a recruiter saw my resume on Monster (yes, it actually does happen!), she said that she and other recruiters now more often do candidate searches in LinkedIn. She also recommended the site The Ladders, a job search site that specializes in middle management and above jobs. It is actually a subscription job search service but she says that she often finds better candidates
on the site, probably because you have to pay for it. They do offer a 30 day free trial however.

Then, since it was late, I skipped going home and headed back over to the gym for my regular Weds step class. I was a little early so I hung out in the coffee shop nearby, checking my email. There I actually ran into a woman who I am friendly with from my step class. We used to live in the same building and I would see her at the gym all the time. Well, she has been out of work for a number of months now and has been having quite a lot of difficulty finding a new job, especially since she needs sponsorship to work in the US because she is a Canadian citizen. Turns out that she was meeting a friend there who lives one street over from me. So, I got to meet a new neighbor.

I was all pscyched up for another great step class but to our dissapointment, there was a sub... :-( This guy who is much slower and not as interesting. I hung in for as long as I could but was getting bored so, since this was my second time in the gym for the day, I left early..

The atmosphere.....

A strange thing happens to the atmosphere when you tell folks at a company that the current structure of the organization is too cost heavy and that lay-offs are coming, no matter how motivated and dedicated the workforce was previously. It is an interesting intellectual study.....


Initially, you get either the optimist or pessimist reaction. Some remain optimistic that the changes will not effect them, their group is really important to the well-being of the company. Or you get pessimists who are sure that fire and brimstone are coming any day now....


And then the rumors start.... When are you going to find out, how many people are going to be affected, when they are affected what does that mean? Do they leave immediately, or at a later time? What is the severance package? And all this has an impact on productivity. Some just walk around talking about it, others get heads down, either because they have dusted off their resume and have already started their job search, or because they are working hard to make whatever impression they can while it still makes a difference.


And when the employees have a date by which they will know, things get more and more tense as that date approaches. Everytime the EVP comes downstairs, he is watched to see where he goes and who's office he goes to, what mood he's in. And when rumors spread that the word on who is being cut is already known, just not being communicated yet, well then forget about it! And then when people, who are supposed to know, start asking questions about and wanting to know status about projects that they never cared about before or where never their responsibility, people start to get suspicious. Is this person going to be your new boss or is his existing group getting ready to take over the work of your group?

Can someone just drop the shoe so we can get this over with!?!?!?

Breathe.....

So I think I peaked on the stress-o-meter this morning.... And to top it all off I was working on this stupid portal that someone in our company bought and we are trying to repurpose to fit the needs of our group. And right about now I am about sure that the guy who was responsible for purchasing it had to have gotten a kickback because this thing defies logic. Nothing is intuitive. There are so many steps to accomplish a task it is crazy. And I am pretty good at this stuff. Top it off with my current state of mind and I just about went insane this morning!

Luckily there were people around to talk me off the ledge... thank god we are allowed to have IM at work! I talked by IM with a number of folks, including Naturally, Sofia and Brunsli, who gave me calming words of enthusiam and support.

Then, by this afternoon, I had reached this zen sort of calmness.... Stressing is not helping... Just do the stuff that you can do and then you just have to leave it up to the powers that be and wait....... So, I will try not to stress about the job before we find out the word..... I am supposed to find out more about this investment property deal next week and I have appointments lined up to see the apartment for the rest of this week. So, that is all I can do right now. Might as well think about other things...

Up in the air.....

So I am a Libra..... Libras like balance. Our sign is the scales! It has become very obvious to me that August is going to be a transitionary month for me. I was preparing to make a new step this month since things seemed pretty stable for me and since then, everything has been thrown into FLUX! None of the stable stuff is feeling very stable these days....

My job........ Found out there are layoffs imminent and the future of my group is in jeopardy right when we were hitting our stride

My house...... One of the great things about my house is that there is an apartment over the garage that I rent out. I found out that my great, quiet, pay rent on time tenants are not going to renew their lease! :-( So I have to look for new tenants and figure out how to get them in there without losing any rental income.

So then, on top of it, I have this investment property deal...... It is all stressing me out! The thing is, if everything works out well then I will be great. If everything turns out bad, then I will have a lot of challenges ahead of me. If it ends up somewhere in between, hopefully it will be the right combination.

Keep your fingers crossed for me!! (and toes too!)

An unsettling week....

Well, I didnt have to take the bar exam this past week, but it ended up being an unsettling one for me nonetheless. The week started out interestingly. I was presented with an opportunity to purchase some investment property. After much consideration, I decided to take advantage of the oppurtunity. And then.... about an hour after I signed the contract with my agent, I attended a meeting at work where I was told that the new CEO, as he is evaulating the business, has told our group not to do anymore new expansion and that, since we are staffed for expansion, that some employees will likely not be needed..... Ugh!

Now, who knows what this will really mean for me but we are supposed to get more direction at the end of August. It is really unsettling though. I mean, I thought my job was something that I would not have to be worrying about right now. Things were going well, I really like the people I work with and the type of work we are doing. I have a short commute to work. Things were good. Now, I don't want to be premature.... Maybe this won't effect me, but it could. So, i am dusting off my resume and starting to look around. It is just sort of disappointing.

I am also getting this feeling that my renters are not going to renew their lease, which will be another stress to find someone to rent the apartment. They have not really stayed in the apartment in the past couple weeks but I see their cars parked in front of the apartment his mother is renting up the street. (I know, a little weird, huh?) I mean, maybe they are just hanging around there because it is the summer but I don't know. I sort of feel like that is coming too. Well, I will know this week since they have to either renew their lease or give me 30 days notice to vacate. I think I need to change the lease to give me 60 days notice!

So, what I thought would be a relatively mild fall might end up being one full of challenges. Guess I better get my mind right!