Tag Archives: HR

The Gray of Storm Clouds, the Tarnished Silver Lining

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In our last episode (OK, the last three), Kate was struggling with her spouse’s recent revelation that he established an account on Ashley Madison two years ago.

So, for any of you who haven’t bailed on this leaky tugboat…here’s an update.  Sorta.  It may just be more blommit.

I love that word.  Blommit.  Super-big puffy heart it so hard.  And I love you guys, too.  MWAH

I am still largely numb.  There are occasional brief bouts of anger, and there’ve been a couple of tears…but apparently, I’m still in shock.  What he did is so incongruous with the behavior of the man I married – the man I THOUGHT I married – that I’m having trouble reconciling the two.

Sometimes, I even forget for a while that this is actually happening.

Emotionally, anyway.

Physically, it’s a different story.

I feel raw.  Hollow.  Like my soul has been in a horrible motorcycle accident;  I’m covered in road rash on the inside, the smashed fragments of my heart staining the pavement a bright red.  My mouth tastes of metal.  My stomach randomly churns and dips as if I’ve been blindfolded and thrown upside-down onto the Gatekeeper at Cedar Point.  I’m exhausted, yet wide awake.  I spend much of my day feeling like one does the day after a bad stomach flu.  Drained.  Empty.

Weak.

Sometimes I am weak, sometimes I am strong.

I am strong because I am demanding the space and time that I need to think this through.  I am weak because sometimes I still want to hug him and hold his hand.

I am weak because I realize this sends mixed signals.  I am strong because I don’t care.  The final decision is up to me, when and if I make one, regardless of how he perceives I am feeling today.  Regardless of what HE wants.

I am strong because I’m getting myself tested, and requiring him to do the same.  I am weak because my gut tells me that this isn’t necessary, because he’s telling the truth.  That he never met any of these women.  That nothing physical ever happened.    I desperately want to believe this is true.  Every fiber of my being tells me he isn’t lying.  But that’s the same clearly faulty intuition that completely missed this was happening in the first place.  IT WENT ON FOR FIVE MONTHS AND I HAD NO IDEA.  (Sporadically, he says.  But the window was open, so SOME sulfur must have blown in.)

I am strong because no one at work has any inkling of the internal chaos I’m carrying.  (I even finished that blasted EEO-1 report – EARLY – go me!  Although of COURSE now that I’m DONE I see they extended the deadline A WHOLE MONTH.  I put in 3 hours on my day off and NO ONE THOUGHT TO TELL ME I HAD 31 EXTRA DAYS?!?  <stabs air wildly and sprouts hissing rattlesnakes from scalp>)

I am weak because I don’t trust any of my family or friends enough to share this burden.  And because saying it aloud will make it real, and I don’t know if my heart can sustain the blow.

I am strong because even though I had previously quit going to therapy, I made some new appointments today.  (And he’s going to pay for them.  OBVS.)

I am weak because I still love him.  And because part of me thinks we can fix this, and a bigger part of me still wants to.

Is there any chance at all that he’s telling the truth?  Is it possible he was just window-shopping, clicking on the pretty things he’d like to have and adding them to his cart, only to abandon them by closing the browser instead of clicking “Complete Order”?

Does it matter?

I am strong because I’m keeping to my exercise routine.  I ran yesterday and today.  Although I am weak because I’m just not eating.  My body simply doesn’t want it.

My run times are suffering – badly.  I’d been doing a 9:20 mile, and this week it’s been 9:45-10.  Ouch.  (Side note:  The fact that I think a 10-minute mile is “bad” is freaking hilarious.  I spent most of my life being completely unathletic, and I am realizing as I’m typing this that I sound like an ex-smoker telling tobacco users that they smell bad.  I’ll slap myself FOR you, so you don’t feel you have to do it.)

<slap>

So, as I write this, it’s Tuesday, and that means…

…it’s time to face the scale.

I mentioned in my last post that I was pretty sure I’d lost some weight this week.  After all this, that’d be a definite plus, right?

I thought I was looking a bit thinner these days.  I mean, I believed I could actually see a difference.  And that NEVER HAPPENS.  This morning I went as far as to take some pictures, because it felt like a pretty dramatic loss, and I was thinking I would have a physique I could actually show off a bit. <strut strut>

But when I looked at the pictures, I saw this fold here and that bulge there, and promptly hit delete.  Must have been an optical illusion.  I should know better than to trust my vision at 6 AM, before I’ve had any coffee.  HELLO.

It was time to face the music.  Numbers don’t lie.  Let’s get today’s.

I went for my slog run.  I came home.  Peeled off the sweaty running togs.

I dust off the scale with the broom (because I have three cats, and hair weighs something.  So does dust.  Can’t be too careful when you’re letting an inanimate object set your mood for the week.)

(Quit looking at me like that.  I KNOW you have your scale rituals, too.  Shave first?  Pluck your eyebrows?  Visit the restroom for one last hurrah?  Yeah, I’m on to you. <points finger-scissors at eyes, then back at yours>)

I step on.

I look down.

HOLY FREAKING FAINTING GOATS BATMAN.

I LOST SIX EFFING POUNDS LAST WEEK.

ALL HAIL THE ASHLEY MADISON DIET!

Seriously, do they need a new spokesperson? I hear they’ve had some publicity issues.   And I have WAY more mass appeal than that Jared ex-Subway clown.  (Especially now.  Couldn’t set THAT bar much lower.)

All kidding aside – I know I need to eat.  After living on swallowed angst all weekend, I’ve been trying to force myself to eat one good meal a day.

But I’m struggling.

I don’t want to eat because I want to lose weight.  (That’s a given.)

I don’t want to eat because starving myself will hurt my spouse.  A sweet, slim revenge for what he did to our marriage, a full dish of piping-hot guilt stew to go with that regret roll he’s been noshing on.

I don’t want to eat, because I normally don’t want to WANT to eat, and eating when you don’t want to ACTUALLY eat seems like a waste of a perfectly good gift horse.

I don’t want to eat because my heart is screaming that it’s hurting.  It screams so loudly that no one can hear it.  Eventually, maybe they will see the screams.

I don’t want to eat because I want to disappear, fading gracefully into the ether, drifting off to a place of peace where no one hurts.

Is that weakness, or strength?

Does it matter?

My spouse says he’ll do absolutely anything to keep us together.  He’s had a taste of what it might be like to lose me, and it’s wrecking him.  I can see he’s lost weight; I can see the anguish in his eyes and feel it vibrating from his very core.

He’s terrified.  Absolutely frightened.

(Good.)

I have agreed to try counseling with him.  I have also insisted (as I said above) that he get physically tested.  He didn’t even hesitate.  Didn’t protest “but nothing happened”- he understands why I might not can’t believe that right now.  He even offered to go to a Christian counselor (remember, he’s been a fairly hostile atheist, so him seeing a Christian counselor is kind of a big deal.)

What else should I ask for?  What would YOU ask for?  What would you need him to do?

Am I an idiot for giving this a chance?

I know that doesn’t matter.

As long as I’m at peace with whatever I decide.

Speaking of peace, here’s a giant chicken.  BECAUSE GIANT CHICKEN.

giantchicken

He lives at the Farmers Market. I have no explanation.

Bawk bawk, homies.  Thanks for hangin’.

Glass Slipper, Revisited: What to Do with the Other Shoe

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My last post was decidedly unfunny.  I’d apologize for that, but it’s not every day that the man you married confesses to dabbling with Ashley Madison.  I think I’ve earned a temporary hall pass on that.

This post won’t be all that hilarious, either.  I need to take some time to purge the thoughts in my head.  It’s like I binged on a full jar of chocolate peanut butter and a large pizza; it’s bloating me and congealing on my insides, and I’m desperate to get it out as quickly as I can before it consumes me.

I’m finding myself trapped in the incongruous dichotomy of having a racing mind, yet not being able to actually feel anything.

I’m keenly aware of a number of thoughts (How did I miss this? and My spouse cheated) bouncing uncontrollably around my head like a giant tub of Super Balls broke and scattered all over a gymnasium – hundreds of thousands of pinging bullets that roll and bounce and refuse to be stilled.

Yet, at the same time…I should be upset.  It would be natural to be angry.  Logical to be yelling.  You might expect me to cry.

But other than one or two stray tears, I’ve been numb.  I’ve been walking around like I’ve been mentally anesthetized.  I feel detached; I’m absently letting the situation play in the background like some third-rate sitcom while I nonchalantly go about my business, seemingly unaffected.

This can’t be real, can it?  This is just a very long, drawn-out dream; soon I’ll be rudely interrupted by the morning show blaring through my clock radio and be jolted into a perfectly normal day.

You’ve certainly heard the old adage, “Pinch me, I must be dreaming.”  Unfortunately, I’ve tried that, and it just isn’t effective.  I used to pinch myself when I was dreaming – but my brain outsmarted me by allowing me to feel pain while I sleep.  I’d actually feel the pinch, but wouldn’t wake up.  So I devised a new trick to help me discern dreams from reality:  telekinesis.  If I can move things with my mind, I’ll know INSTANTLY that the situation isn’t real, and I can happily coast along knowing it’s just a dream and I’ll wake up soon and it’ll all go away.  When I’m having a bad dream, I focus on something lightweight – a tissue, a piece of paper (because even though it’s a dream, we don’t want to get all crazy here by trying to throw cars.) If I can get it to move – if I can get that piece of paper to twitch, even just a little bit – it gives me the courage to stand up to whatever demon is chasing me, because I’ll know I’m only dreaming.

Suffice it to say on Thursday night, and at least hourly since then, I’ve desperately tried to get papers to flicker.  I’ve begged tissues to please, please, just flutter a teensy bit so I know this will be over soon.

But all the paper products have conspired against me and refuse to budge.

What the hell do I do now?

I work in HR.  My career is built on how I react when people surprise me.  But this has struck me as unexpectedly as a truck barreling through a stop sign, hitting me so hard that I’m having a discarnate experience, watching my body violently bounce off the hood while thinking, “Dayum…that’s gotta hurt!” as I painlessly float above the carnage.

He tells me that, although he was on the site, he didn’t actually meet anyone.

In the unlikely event that it isn’t blatantly obvious, this article provides an excellent summary of everything that’s wrong with this.  But, in the spirit of trying to get it to soak in so I can accept it and address it, I’ll list it out.

He set up an account, with a new email I’d not been aware of.  Deception with intent to harm.

He paid for the account.  To the tune of $250 or so.  And when I think of all the forgotten birthdays and neglected anniversaries, this is the closest I can get to tears.   He’s never spent that much on me.  His wife.  Yet he found it a worthy investment to make in the collapse of my trust.  (Him:  “I promise there was no further money spent.  I didn’t mortgage the house.”  Me:  “No.  Just our marriage.”)

He contacted two women and communicated to four.   But he insists that he never met any of them.  And it was two years ago.  In the past.

Where I struggle with this:  My gut is convinced he’s telling the truth.  But based on how many clues I missed – based on how completely oblivious I was to his discomfort when the data breach broke – I can’t trust my gut.  I would be foolish to do so.

And frankly, what would YOU tell your best friend in this situation?  If she said, “He was on the site, but he swears he never actually met anyone”?

<cue the rousing chorus of “Yeah…riiiiiiiiiiiiiight.”>

I am a smart woman.  Aren’t I?

How can I possibly believe him when I can’t believe myself?

He tells me that he’s tried a number of times to tell me.  (Well, once the news broke and it was conceivable that he’d get caught.  Eyeroll.)  To his credit, he knew it’d be better if he told me, as opposed to waiting until I found out.   And there were a number of reasons why it wasn’t a good time – the kids were home all day during the summer, which segued into my super-busy season at work – and he knows about my food issues and my anxiety and wanted to wait until a time where I’d be better equipped to handle it.

As misguided as it was, he was sort of trying to do the right thing.  (Which would have been a much nicer sentiment when he was whipping out his credit card to buy deception and lies. Obvs.)

But there’s no good time for bad news. HR folks talk about this quite a bit, in the context of “what’s the best day of the week to fire someone?”  Is it Friday, so they have the weekend to cool down? Is it Monday, so they have a full week to job hunt and file for unemployment?  There is no clear answer.  (Although, if you can avoid canning someone on their birthday, they usually appreciate that.  My sincere apologies to Pat.  Know that I learned from it, and I always check birthdays before a layoff now.)

He tells me that he’s incredibly sorry, and that he’ll do anything – ANYTHING – that I need him to do in order to make this work.  He’s already offered me full access to all of his PCs and his phone; he’s volunteered to carry a GPS 24/7.

He’s begging me to stay.  To give him another chance.  He pleaded with me to go to counseling with him, to please, please let him try to fix this.

He’ll do anything.  Anything.

He’s doing his best to give me space, backing off quickly when I don’t want him near enough to touch.

Over the last two days, he’s broken down completely.  I’ve never seen him close to anything like this.  We’re talking big, ugly, snot-dribbling sobbing here.

While I sit there, numbly, listening.

It’s so surreal.

He is absolutely terrified that I’m going to leave him.

And I don’t know that I won’t.

My heart desperately wants to forgive him.  My head, however, knows that I need to do my due diligence here – while it may be a long time before I can trust him, he can certainly work his a$$ off proving to me that he means what he says in the meantime.

I’ve told him that I don’t know where this will go.  That I may seem fine some days, and then suddenly be angry, and I have every right to react in whatever way my emotions choose to express themselves.

He said he’s just thankful I haven’t left yet.  That I’m talking to him.  He said he’ll take any and every moment now, because he realized in full force what it would mean to lose me.

All the right words.

Will the right actions follow?  As we say in HR: “Immediate, significant, and sustained improvement is required for continued employment.”

Show me.

I attempted to escape from this today by taking my bike out.  I thought a long ride would do me some good – if I logged a solid 20 miles, perhaps I’d burn off some of this numbness and be able to sleep.

It was a beautiful ride.  Good for the soul.

bikedam1 bikedam2 bikecity1Unfortunately, I got lost, and ended up clocking 27 miles before I got home.  But, as with my marriage, I can take all the time I need.  There’s no deadline here; I can take it moment by moment, stopping to snap some pictures or to rest a bit, and head home – or wherever I want to be – when I’m ready.

Liebster, Revisited: Part 1 of 3: History of My Career

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Recently (OK, it’s been a couple of weeks, because summer, yo!) sonofabeach96 was kind enough to nominate me for a Liebster Award:

liebster3This feels a little bit like cheating, because I actually won one of these before, and wrote about aliens and my cat.  But this one is a different COLOR, and like shoes THAT MAKES IT TOTALLY DIFFERENT so I’ll make room.

Before I dig in, lemme tell ya about sonofabeach96 – he writes about life and family, and seasons his posts liberally with great music.  He’s a good read, so go check him out. kthx

DA RULZ:

  1. Make a post thanking and linking the person who nominated me and include the Liebster Award sticker in the post.
  2. Nominate 5-10 other bloggers and notify them of this in one of their posts.
  3. All nominated bloggers are to have less than 200 followers.
  4. Answer the 11 questions posed by your nominator and create 11 different questions for your nominees to answer.  Or, you can repeat the same questions.
  5. Copy these rules into your post.

And now for the questions, which are sure to provide fascinating insight into the mental supply closet that is my psyche….

(Some of these are repeats, so I hope y’all don’t mind some backwards links.  Actually, I think I’ll list those questions first, just to get them checked off.)

What is your favorite movie and why?  I have two:  Hitch and The Incredibles.  You can read why here. 

Do you believe in an afterlife and/or ghosts?  Oh yes indeedy.  Here’s THAT post.

Describe your family and its dynamic.  I think most of it, and how it plays into the hot mess accomplished, mature professional I am today, can be found HERE.  

And now, some new stuff:

What is your career and is it what you’ve always wanted to do or did you just fall into it?

I work in Human Resources.  NO ONE wants to work in HR when they grow up.  No one even really knows what that IS, honestly.  I think “human resources” comes from an ancient Gaelic term meaning “shoveling employee drama that stinketh like elephant droppings”.

ihatepeople

Getting into HR was a total accident.  The kind where you’re juggling hot coffee and a plate of danishes, and your stiletto catches in the sidewalk, thrusting you rather violently and ungracefully into the cement, resulting in 1) hot coffee all over your white blouse, 2) scuffing your heel up beyond any hope of repair*, 3) tearing holes in the knees of the ONE pair of pants that don’t make your thighs look like they need their own zip code, and 4) all the pastries you were carrying landing sticky-side down in the dirt.  (Krispy Kreme redefined.  Bleck.)

*what nail polish and a Sharpie can fix.  (Don’t judge.)

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a meteorologist.  (OK, to be fair, not a lot of kids have THAT dream, either.)

I started college with no idea what I wanted to do for a living, and ended up gravitating towards education.  (Hey, I’d spent twelve years in school, it was the one thing I knew about.  I really wanted to study diet and nutrition, since that was the OTHER thing I knew about, but as a fat freshman, I didn’t think I’d be all that believable, so…. Voila!  Education it is!)  Unfortunately, after a fairly significant investment of four years and 175 credits, I learned in my last semester (during student teaching) that, while I enjoyed the actual TEACHING part of the job, I just could not stomach school politics.

The last straw?  I gave a kid a D in music class, and his dad threatened to kill me.  Note – the kid EARNED that D, refusing to participate, or listen, or do anything.  Essentially, he was a little a$$hole.  And his dad came to the school and told me I’d better think twice about keeping his precious little groinfruit off the honor roll, because he’d hate for me to be found dead in the park across the street like that 13-year-old girl they found there six weeks ago….(and I’m like, yeah…that totally just happened.)

I’m SURE this kid is enjoying a lucrative career now, thanks to Daddy’s stellar influence.  Somewhere that serves french fries.  If he’s not in prison.

The kicker?  The principal said I should consider the guy’s offer.  Uh no.  Little Lucifer got his D, and I washed my hands of the mess of trying to mold tomorrow’s society.  (Epilogue:  it broke all by itself without my help.) 

Unfortunately, when you study teaching but decide to pursue other careers, you really don’t have too many other readily marketable skills.  However, I had worked in college for the Conference Services department, managing the ins and outs of various camps and classes in the summer. (Yes…”band camp”.  And cheer camp and choir camp and art camp and robotics camp and football camp and pretty much everything else camp.)  So, with the handy skills of distributing keys, collecting payment, and working holidays under my belt, I got a job working the front desk at a hotel.

Hotels are crazy businesses.  Because people stay there, and people are nuts, especially after dark, and times fifty when you add in “I’m on vacation!” and alcohol.  For example – did you know that the reason there’s no roof access from hotel stairwells is because people go there to jump off?  There’s a whole book of “wow, people are totes craybeans” procedures around all kinds of stuff like that.

Unfortunately, employees aren’t much better, so eventually we had to fire someone for absenteeism or stealing food or sleeping with a guest or something, and no one wanted to deliver the message.  Which stumped me.  I mean, with all the crazy sauce the guests were slinging everywhere, employee discipline seemed like a fairly logical progression:

flowchartfiredSimple.  No guesswork here; I was just telling them they had arrived at the end of the chart, right?  This wasn’t complicated, or difficult…yet no one wanted to do it.  I guess they were afraid the person would be…angry?  Cry?  <eyeroll>  Whatever.  Just gimme the phone, Nancy-pants.

And that is how I got into HR.

Quickly, I became a pro at terminations.  Which served me well, career-wise – after working in manufacturing for 20 <gulp> years, and with all the ups and downs of the economy, and its myriad permutations of rightsizing and downsizing and layoffs and restructuring – not to mention the occasional employee bad behavior (and yes, there are some GREAT stories there…but we’ll save those for another day) I have had to fire literally hundreds of people.

At one company, we (read:  I) went through six rounds of layoffs in fourteen months.  And I sat through them all.

One by one.

It was…sucktacular.

If you could be anything, career-wise, what would you choose to do and why?

HR, of course.

frognope

I actually have a plan for this.  Once I can afford to retire HAHAHA who am I kidding win Powerball and become independently wealthy, I’m totally quitting HR for good.  I’ve told my coworkers, and my boss, this very thing – the moment I can afford to no longer work, Kate will turn into a puff of smoke and a screech of tires.  <poof>

My actual exit will be more subtle, though.  Because once I’m a bazillionaire, I need to fade into the sunset so people aren’t hitting me up for cash.  So one day, I’ll leave for lunch (which I have done maybe three times in as many years) and simply won’t come back.  My coworkers will start to miss me later in the afternoon:

“Uh…where’d Kate go?”

“Gosh, you know, I haven’t seen her in a few hours….Wait.  Didn’t she say she was going to lunch?”

“Yeah…which is weird because she, like, never goes to lunch.  She usually eats her six Cheerios at her desk.”

Eventually, one of them will text me, and I’ll simply reply “still at lunch.”  Which, a week later, will be freaking hilarious.  Right??

But I digress.

So my dream job?  I’ll learn to play guitar and sing folk songs in coffee houses and wine shops around the city.  I guess that isn’t really a job.  But I don’t care, because I’m independently wealthy now, and your rules no longer apply to me.  Neener neener.

I’ll continue answering the rest of the questions in another post….because by now, your nether-regions have likely fallen asleep, and you probably need to get up and stretch.

But without further ado…here are my nominees:

NOTE:  This is a zero-obligation nomination.  I swear my feelings will not be hurt if you don’t do this.  It’s just a way to give y’all a shout-out and say thanks for hanging your mental skivvies out on the line for all of us to gawk at.  Heh.  😉

But if you’re game….here are YOUR eleven questions – certain to provoke riveting and inspiring trinkets for conversational fodder…. 😉

  1. Describe for me your favorite piece of jewelry.
  2. Regarding #1, tell me where you got it, and who gets it in the will.
  3. What food should be made illegal, and why?
  4. In exactly fourteen words, tell me how you feel about clowns.
  5. Tell me how you got that scar.  (Pick your favorite.)
  6. What’s something you enjoy eating that others might find odd?
  7. What’s your favorite thing to look at/see in the sky?
  8. What’s the most interesting thing you’ve found while outside?  Jewelry, money…?
  9. What’d you do with what you found in #8?
  10. Have you ever stolen anything? Besides my heart.  <barf>
  11. Have you ever won anything?

Enjoy, kids.  😀

The Love/Hate Challenge! Part 5: A Second Pot of Coffee

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Bear with me, folks – we’re on part five of six – I PROMISE I’m wrapping this up here.  Eventually.

Coffee was the subject of my last post, and I suspect will occupy the better part of this one.  But because my daily cup of personality allows me to spell it “morning” instead of “mourning,” it deserves a little extra love and attention.  So pour yourself a fresh cuppa joe, prop up your feet, and get comfy.

lovehatechallengeDA RULES:

  1. List 10 things you LOVE
  2. List 10 things you HATE
  3. Nominate a few suckers to do the same

10 THINGS I LOVE and 10 THINGS I HATE (in unranked order)

PART 5:  MORE COFFEE COFFEE COFFEE

9.  I love gas station coffee, and I hate Starbucks.

In my last post, I may have mentioned that I love coffee.  And while this is very true, I’m totally blue-collar about it.  As long as you’re drinking it black, I’m the furthest thing from a coffee snob that there is.

Confession:  I actually drink – and like – coffee from the gas station.

<passes smelling salts for delicate flowers who dead-fainted>

Hey, don’t knock it ’till ya try it – if you can’t find a McDonald’s, know that Sheetz, Holiday, KwikTrip, and SuperAmerica all have decent roasts – and they sell 24oz cups to tote it in.  WINNING.  (Side note:  Sheetz actually has some decent food, too, for a 24/7 gas station.  Certainly a few notches above Taco Bell, and deny all you want, I KNOW you are totally eating that shiz on the sly.  Taco Bell is the Walmart of fast food – the largest chain where <cough> “nobody” eats, EVER.)

My fave chain coffee is Dunkin’ Donuts.  I’m self-aware enough to realize that it was probably because I was raised on the stuff – I’m from the East Coast, and Dunkin’ dominated; back home, this chain is everywhere. Although Tim Hortons is seriously encroaching on the terrain; once we let him out of Canada, he started to spread like some sort of mutant coffee kudzu.  But if he chokes out Starbucks, I’ll consider it a symbiotic relationship and agree to peacefully coexist.

Side note:  Where you’re raised definitely influences your tastes.  I remember reading a study years ago (it was probably Consumer Reports, but do you think I can find it now?) with taste-test results for different brands of dark chocolate.  Hershey’s makes one called Special Dark.  You probably remember this as the also-ran in the bag of miniatures, left to grow stale long after the Mr. Goodbars and Krackels were gone.  (Except in my house, where Mom and I fought over them.  We also fought over the Brazil nuts in the Chex Mix.  Ah well.)  Although it tends to get mediocre ratings nationwide, Special Dark tends to be the favored brand of dark in the region surrounding Hershey, PA.  Whether they actually like it, or pretend to out of unfailing loyalty, I can’t say for certain, but if you know any Steelers fans, you’ll likely lean to the latter theory.   Because those people are in their own special category of uniquely nutzoid.  Green Bay and Dallas fans have NOTHING on loyalty next to Steelers fans.  Nada.  Zip.

Usually, I brew my own coffee at home.  I justify my addiction by supporting small farmers and/or local businesses while I’m getting my fix.  (Shout out to Velasquez Family Coffee, who delivers my monthly prescription subscription of beautifully delicious beans.  African Cinnamon is da bomb, but they’re all excellent.  Trust me.)

But if I’m on the road, and there’s no Dunkin’ available, I will happily hit the local fill station for my morning boost.  No matter how questionable the store appears, the coffee there HAS to be better than what I’ll find at Starbucks.

Ah, Starbucks.  The one chain coffee I canNOT stomach.

This isn’t a political statement, nor is it a protest against the overpriced blended dessert drinks made-to-order with a brutally bastardized handwritten approximation of your first name.

It’s simply because THEIR COFFEE IS TERRIBLE.

Aficionados of the swill will claim, with their noses pointed high, “it’s DARK roast…you must not like coffee that dark and robust.”  I raise my pinky delicately <snort> and call BS on y’all.  Folks, it’s not “dark roast” any more than charcoal is ebony wood, or broken glass looks JUST LIKE diamonds.  The Emperor is naked – in the name of decency, grab a tarp to cover the floppy bits.  THAT SHIZ IS BURNT YO.

The last time I voluntarily drank a cup of Starbucks coffee was in 2005.  I had to make a long drive, and it was early in the morning on a holiday and I was bone-tired.  I was heading into a rural area (read:  nothing open, not even gas stations) and, out of desperation, made a regrettable decision – I pulled into Starbucks to grab a small cup.  Just a little, to get me through the drive.  I mean, it was either that or headbob my way into swerving offroad through the forest.

I did what I had to do.  I knew it wouldn’t be great, but how bad could it be?   I needed it, right?

I selected something called Christmas Blend.  Gamely, I raised the cup to my lips.  My sophisticated tasting palate has identified the composition of this brew, just in case you’d like to replicate it at home:

  1. Chop down a pine tree.
  2. Let it rot in your backyard for approximately 12 months.
  3. Burn it to ashes (be sure to leave the dead bugs, dog hair, and bird droppings!)  Grind well.
  4. Pour hot water over the whole thing and drink up.

Halfway through the cup, I gave up and chucked it out the window.  And probably killed an endangered turtle or something.

My aversion to Starbucks has gotten so bad that the very smell of it triggers my gag reflex.  It’s like morning sickness all over again, when the smell of the fireplace, of all things, sent me on a frenzied sprint to find a bathroom. (Hmm.  Fireplace = burnt wood.  Coincidence?  I THINK NOT, Starbucks.  I.  Think.  Not.)

If Starbucks is the only option available, I will actually make the risky and painful decision to <gasp> FOREGO coffee, even when I desperately need it (read:  mornings with boring meetings, mornings when I didn’t get much sleep, mornings in general, and mornings on days of the week ending in Y.)

I’ve attended enough local seminars to know which hotels have the hazard placard on the silver vat of caffeine:

hazardsign

Image obviously from http://www.starbucks.com

(Dear Hilton:  I used to be an HHonors Diamond member.  DIAMOND.  THIS IS HOW YOU THANK ME?)

Thankfully, Starbucks hasn’t ruined tea.  Yet.  So that’s still a relatively safe bet if you’re stuck in an endless meeting and can’t get out to bring your own.  It’s a poor substitute, true, but it might be just enough caffeine to keep you on the left side of regrettable decisions that get you fired, arrested, or both.

Of course, that might be a super effective way to get banned from meetings for a while.

<raises Friendship mug and winks conspiratorially>

One more and I PROMISE we’ll be done with this.

I pass the torch to Lauren Hayley at Madness, Sparkle, and Creative Flair.  She’s pretty busy but I suspect she has a lot to say, too. 🙂

The Love/Hate Challenge! Part 4: COFFEE COFFEE COFFEE

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And here we have part four of what was, for most bloggers, a simple challenge:

lovehatechallengeDA RULES:

  1. List 10 things you LOVE
  2. List 10 things you HATE
  3. Nominate a few suckers to do the same

(Really, this is getting ridiculous now.  Part FOUR?!?  Stand up and flush already!)

Like I said in my last post, it’s hard for me to condense “hate” and “love” into a compact form – it doesn’t do the words justice, ya know?

So do you think we can wrap this thing up here and ship it out?  Place your bets, peeps.  <dealer spins>

10 THINGS I LOVE and 10 THINGS I HATE (in unranked order)

PART FREAKING 4:  ALL ABOUT COFFEE

Coffee and I have such a long relationship, it gets its own post.  YAY COFFEE

7.  I love coffee, but hate when people pretend to love it.

Coffee and I have been seeing each other regularly ever since high school (really, isn’t that where most haunting life rituals and obsessions get started?)

I first picked up the habit to meet a dual need of 1) keeping warm yet 2) not ingesting any additional calories.  Every woman in America who’s ever flirted with dieting or food issues knows that coffee is pretty much calorie-free AND that caffeine keeps you both awake and kills your appetite.  Also, I’ve mentioned before that I have Raynaud’s Syndrome, and keeping your hands warm when you’re trying to play clarinet and march around a football field when it’s sleeting presents its own unique challenge.  (I usually failed.  But as long as you keep marching, nobody cares.  You can’t really expect a clarinet to be heard in a stadium filled with 90,000+ drunken fans, anyway.)

I drink my coffee black.  If you truly love coffee, you will too.  Adding sugar, cream, and sprinkles to it means you are drinking dessert. It’s a coffee-flavored milkshake – THIS IS SO NOT THE SAME THING AS COFFEE.

Now, don’t get me wrong –  I have NOTHING against dessert here, folks.  There’s a time and a place for it.  Just don’t lie to me and pretend you are drinking coffee.  Because you are not.

This is like the Pizza Lie, which I also hate.  If you tell me “we’re having pizza”, this will lead a gal to have certain…expectations.  Such as red sauce…maaaaaayyyybe white.  But there will be sauce on the crust.  There will also be cheese. No cheese = NOT PIZZA.

And there may be toppings within the realm of socially acceptable parameters.  Cured meats?  Sure.  Ham, chicken?  Also OK…but pushing it.

Veggies?  Slow down there, cowboy – there are a few that are OK, but this ain’t a free-for-all.  Feel free to chuck on onions, peppers, mushrooms, tomatoes, even olives, if that’s what puffs your sails.  But when your pizza starts to look like a not-so-cleverly disguised salad, YOU HAVE CROSSED A LINE.  Broccoli?  Oh hell no.  Cauliflower?  You’re joking.  Arugula?  I may have to stab you.

And don’t even TRY to pass off Thai Stir-Fry, Taco, or Cheeseburger as “pizza.”  That is food on a crust.  It may be edible.  It may not suck.  But it is not pizza.  Just like milkshakes who once participated in a flash mob with coffee ARE NOT COFFEE.  They’re…acquainted – a third-degree connection on LinkedIn at best.  But firmly in the category of Not Coffee.

8.  I love my coffee mugs, and I hate tiny coffee cups.

In my twenties (OK, and my thirties…and maybe a couple times last week) I drank a LOT of coffee.  This did not go unnoticed by my coworkers:  At one of my first jobs, the boss had handmade pottery mugs made for each of us for Christmas one year.  Everyone received a normal-sized mug except me.

Mine held HALF A POT OF COFFEE.  SCORE.

I drank three cups of coffee a day at that job.  (That’s a pot and a half, for those of you who haven’t had any coffee yet today, and/or don’t math, or both.)

Now that I’m older, and need to work a little harder at things that used to be easy (Sleep? I’m giving you the death stare) I’m down to just one cup of coffee a day.  (It’s about 24 ounces.  BUT TOTALLY COUNTS AS ONE CUP, just like when you pick the biggest slice of pizza in the box and count it as “one slice” on MyFitnessPal.)

For my daily commute (40 minutes without traffic – attempting this without a shot of caffeine is a hay bale on the NOPE farm) my mug of choice is a Bubba Keg, one of the only travel mugs out there that both holds a sufficient volume of coffee AND fits in a standard car’s cup holder.  Which doesn’t sound that significant, but you’d be surprised how hard THAT combo is to find.  I have a few older versions of this one:

BubbaKeg

Buy one at shopbubba.com. Really, go do it.

When I’m at home, and can get up for frequent refills (because cold coffee is just a black vat of sadness and disappointment) I rotate between these mugs:

coffee mugs

Note my champion photo editing skills. Snort.

From left to right:

A.  I got this one from a friend about 15 years ago as a gift.  I haven’t been in touch with her for at least 10 years – the only reason I keep it is because it’s incredibly sappy and, like, totally ironic to use first thing in the morning when I legit want to punch people smack in the happy.

B.  I bought this in NYC when I went to my FIRST BROADWAY SHOW EVAH.  My true soulmates will know which show this is.  The rest of you can no longer Drink With Me even One Day More.  Also note that this mug was from the ORIGINAL tour – not the recent refresh that generated the movie.  Which means that this mug is older than some of you reading this post right now.

This kind of blows my mind because that means this mug has survived <counting furiously in my head> FOURTEEN MOVES.  That’s gotta be some kind of physics miracle.  I mean, doesn’t everyone break at least six coffee mugs when they move?

C.  I got this from a local church as a welcome/guest gift around move nine.  I love the message – who can’t benefit from a reminder that they might be loved? – but it also sort of irritates the hubs, due to him being an avid nonbeliever.  So this is the mug I use most often.  Heh. (Hey, cut me some slack.  I’m reaching for this BEFORE I’ve had any coffee.  It’s either passive aggression or a body count.)

Anyway – the point here is that there are PLENTY of coffee mugs out there that hold more than a shot of java.  Hotels and conference centers of America?  I’m raising my eyebrows and pointing finger-guns directly at you.

You’ve noticed this, right?  When you have the “privilege” (read: lost the office Fantasy Football pool and ponied up by “volunteering” for conference duty) of attending an offsite training session, seminar, or conference, you’re rewarded with hard, unforgiving chairs in a room with the ambiance of a meat locker and the treat of mystery chicken in secret sauce for lunch…and to top of the indignity of it all, they serve a sad excuse for coffee in little baby-sized cups.  Your grandmother, upon spotting the array, would have picked one up, shrugged, and stuffed it in her purse to repurpose as a thimble.

Seriously, when you have an audience that has been involuntarily restrained for four, six, EIGHT FREAKING HOURS in a freezing-cold, mind-numbing coffin of monotony, is there some sick and twisted delight that meeting planners take in ordering coffee cups that would be an inadequate helmet for a window-bombing sparrow?

I don’t ask for much.  But at 8 AM, when faced with a full day of detailed, riveting Powerpoints and presenters who obligingly read them aloud to you word by word, GIVE A GIRL SOME SERIOUS JAVA or someone’s gonna get cut.

Hmm.  I guess I hate conferences, too.

I get to go to a couple of these a year.  You’ll know if I’m ever at one you’re attending.    I’m the chick walking in ten minutes late, muttering obscenities to herself while balancing three miniscule cups of coffee to the last remaining seat in the front row.

Feel free to introduce yourself.

AFTER the cups are empty.  AFTER.

So…I’m not quite finished yet.  Dealer is collecting chips from those of you who bet red.  I think one more post will do it.

And today’s nominee for this challenge….Walking After Midnight.  Because she hasn’t posted in awhile.  <poke poke>  😉

The Love/Hate Challenge! Part 1: Let’s Talk About The Weather

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I mentioned in my last post that Chelise at Caterpillar to Butterfly was kind enough to nominate me for two things.  This second bit is a challenge.  I’m gonna have to break it into chunks, because once I get ranting, it’s like planting zucchini – once it sprouts, it NEVER STOPS COMING.

lovehatechallengeDA RULES:

  1. List 10 things you LOVE
  2. List 10 things you HATE
  3. Nominate a few suckers to do the same

OK, nice and simple.  Except…ten is a lot.  Like lots of a lot.  And I don’t want to just regurgitate stuff I already wrote about.  That feels…kinda lazy, and sort of missing the point of the challenge, no?

Plus, “hate” is a pretty strong word.  Do I really HATE hate ten actual things?  Maybe we can agree to use “hate” here like we do in the common vernacular, versus its actual, too-dark-for-my-blog meaning.  Kind of like my kids do with “literally.”  (No, you will not literally starve to death if we don’t eat now, and you will not literally die if we do not buy this dress.)  So here, “hate” literally means “strongly dislike.  Mkay?

This may take awhile….

10 THINGS I LOVE and 10 THINGS I HATE (in unranked order):

1.  I hate to be cold…and I love being warm.

I despise being cold.  In addition to getting cold easily, and needing more layers than most folks, I have this lovely condition called Raynaud’s Syndrome that turns my fingers into Frosty Pops when it’s cold outside:

raynaudsAnd by “cold,” I mean anything under 40 degrees.  Which, in the Midwest, is fall/spring weather.  For winter, 20 is a warm day, and I would cry except the tears would freeze and glacier-slice my nose off.  Which might scare small children.

“So why did you move to Minnesota?”  BECAUSE I’M AN IDIOT.    (Well, technically, it was for a job, but I got the job because of a boy…but that’s a story – which, incidentally, still ends with “because I’m an idiot” – for another day.)

The good news is that it’s July and it’s WARM outside. It’s been close to 90, and I’m sitting outside as we speak just to soak it all in.  I cannot get enough of the WARM!

Unfortunately, the hubs (along with most normal humans, come to think of it) doesn’t like it much warmer than, say, 78.  That’s the tipping point for me where, if the sun’s out, I MIGHT be able to leave the sweater at home…as long as we’re not going anywhere, like out to eat, or shopping.  In that case, I’ll need to bring the sweater – or a parka – along for when we go back inside.

Which brings me to….

2.  I love my space heater, and I hate air conditioning.

So the building I work in used to be a window factory.  They eventually went out of business.  Why?  Well, in short, their windows totally blew goats.  In the summer, when the sun is shining, my office very quickly gets up to 84 degrees.  (Which is 100% hunky dory in my book – this is the first place I’ve EVER worked where I could actually wear seasonally-appropriate short sleeves in the office and not be looking to supplement my body heat with an auxiliary bonfire built from junk mail and personnel files.)

But in January?  I GET ACTUAL FROST ON MY WALLS. SOOOO NOT OK BRO.

So since I’m a unique, delicate orchid, I got special permission from HR* to have a space heater.  I crank that sucker ALL.THE.TIME and year-round.  (Yes, even in summer – my office will get up to 90 and BONUS!  Nobody stays more than five minutes!)  HEAT HEAT HEAT!  Aaaahhhhh.

*Yes.  This is the department I run.  I did ask myself very nicely, though.   And, after much deliberation, my request was approved.  Our HR team ROCKS!

Back to the sweater in my purse.  I live in the Midwest, where the temperature is below freezing pretty much from October through April, and for two of the three last winters, we’ve had snow in May.  Yes, you read that right.  Snow.  In.  May.  IN MAY PEOPLE!

So why, for the love of all things good, pure, and holy, must you attempt to replicate our annual deep-freeze INDOORS in the summer?  Do you not recognize the sheer insanity of recreating the Arctic Circle INDOORS WHEN YOU GET IT FOR FREE SIX MONTHS A YEAR?  Al Gore is TOTALLY going to smack you upside the head with a sustainable hunk of bamboo.

Sigh.

So I keep a sweater in my purse, just in case there’s an emergency and I have to go to the drugstore to pick up medication, or get groceries, or need new shoes.  It’s all about survival, peeps.

3.  I love sunshine, and I HATE SNOW. 

This is probably obvious, and somewhat redundant, given the first two.

No surprise on the sun here.  Sun = Warm.  But beyond that, I’m a big believer in the whole seasonal affective disorder thing, too.  You know how it is in the winter….

You wake up, and it’s dark. You drive to work…in the dark.  You drive home AFTER work…in the dark.  Day in, day out, for months on end.  By Valentine’s Day, we’re all a bunch of grumpy, pale vampires, just looking for an excuse to sever a random artery.  (I think this is why we began the tradition of passing out cards and chocolates in the shape of a heart.  So we don’t all kill each other.  Even though we want to kill SOMEBODY.)

So let’s talk snow.  I used to LOVE snow.  Snow was beautiful.  Snow was EXCITING!  When snow was a-comin, the energy was palpable.  People would be abuzz with wondering how much we’d get and what would be closed, and then when the snow DID come, we’d all stay inside all day and just watch it fall.

Aaaaahhhh.

So when I had a chance to take a job outside of Erie, PA, I jumped at the chance.  Erie gets TONS of snow!  And I LOVE snow!  SNOW SNOW SNOW!!!!

What I didn’t know at the time was that snow in Erie (a.k.a. “The Snow Belt”) is NOT like snow everywhere else.

You see, when it snows in Erie?  Nothing special happens.  Nothing’s closed, nothing’s rescheduled, nothing’s delayed.  If you venture to the grocery store, you will still be able to find bread, milk, toilet paper, and all of the ingredients to make chili.

In other words, it’s just another day.  Just another day….with snow on top.

And let me tell you what a day in Erie is like:

Get up early, because the weather is probably terrible.  Dig out car from 4-6″ of snow.  Drive to work while another inch of snow falls.  After working a few hours, tackle nature’s slip-n-slide to get some lunch.  Brush two more inches of snow off your car.  At day’s end, scrape your windshield and dig out from 3″ of newly fallen snow. Drive home in a whiteout.  REPEAT EVERY F#@$#NG DAY BETWEEN OCTOBER AND APRIL.

I wish I were joking.  I moved there in mid-November, and by Thanksgiving we had THREE FEET of snow.  THREE.  FEET.  And it just does NOT stop.  And if you’ve absolutely HAD IT and just canNOT go on another day, you can’t even freaking hurl yourself off your roof to end it all, because you just land in a snow pile.  You’re not dead; the closest thing ya got is making a snow angel.

I lived outside of Erie for three long, cold, brutal, hellacious winters.  And eventually, I moved to…Minnesota.  Yeah, it’s stupid cold here – but you don’t have to shovel cold.  (The tradeoff is that the ground is frozen solid, so there’s nowhere to bury bodies….)

Spring always comes.  Eventually.  No matter what that stupid groundhog says.  Right, Punxsutawney Phil?  RIGHT? <cocks gun menacingly and shows him THIS>

So – that’s three.  Seven love/hates to go.  I’m gonna nominate my soulmate fattymccupcakes because she’s hilarious, and because I bet she has some ideas for this that I can steal be inspired by.  MWAH 😉

What Your Incessant Quiz-Taking Says About You

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Unless you live under a rock – one not equipped with satellite internet – you’ve probably stumbled upon a veritable potpourri of assessments, quizzes, and tests.  My social media streams are absolutely polluted with them; trying to purge your feed of their appearance is as productive as attempting to cure Rapunzel of head lice – no matter what you pick, spray, smother, block, and hide, MORE JUST KEEP HATCHING.

Most of these are “entertainment only” (read: meaningless time suck) and have become a bit of an invasive species, subject to a quick “share” and “forward.”  (Even on LinkedIn.  Come ON, people, that’s the ONE corner of the internet that should be a save haven from “Which Kardashian Is Your Style Icon?”)

But others are actually somewhat – and surprisingly – insightful.

1.  The Glorified Horoscope.  These are the zebra mussels of the internet.  Once your social media stream gets infected, you either have to burn all the boats and set fire to the ocean, or just try to wait for it all to eventually, slowly die off.

You’ve probably experienced this:  one of your Facebook friends takes a quiz, and “shares” the results, inviting you to take the quiz, too.  By day’s end, roughly 42% of your friends have shared THEIR results, and the thing spreads like a bad stomach bug, barfing all over your NPR newsfeed and obscuring the new pictures of Pluto.  Just when you think it’s petered out for good, your mother’s results pop up on your feed, and then all of HER friends get in on the game.  Sigh.

These quizzes claim, in a matter of minutes, to offer you valuable insight and self-awareness as to

<insert mystical music and cloud of patchouli>

~WHO YOU REALLY ARE~

Yes, it’s true – in moments, you can find out which character from Friends you are – AND which one you should date, or what your taste in seashells, color patterns, or flowers indicates about what’s really going on inside your noggin.

We all know that these are nonsense, right?

Well, apparently, Monica was spot-on marrying Chandler, and lily lovers are wickedly independent and have killer shoe collections.  I mean, HELLO! <ring ring> Validation calling!

(Okay.  I took a few.  Don’t judge.  You know YOU wanted to.)  <runs to the interwebz to find out the correlation between Shredded Wheat and my penchant for backpacks>

The beauty of these things is that they’re as substantive as cotton candy, and the descriptions are written in such a way that a good hunk of them can pretty much apply to anyone.  Like daily horoscopes and fortune cookies, they’re closer to “one size fits all” than any piece of clothing can ever claim to be.

2.  I’m psychic and/or magical.  There are some other “quizzes” that claim to

<cue filmy scarves and hammered dulcimer tones>

~READ YOUR MIND~

Here’s one example:  Pick Pocket Money Trick.  Use this on your friends and you can MAGICALLY guess how old they are AND how much change they have in their pockets!

MAGIC.  I’m sure Ellen’s people will TOTALLY be begging you to be on her Tuesday show. <eyeroll>

People – this isn’t “neat” or “clever.”  IT’S MATH.  If Common Core focused on teaching THIS kind of logic, maybe we’d be raising a society of rational human beings instead of a plethora of entitled, egocentric, everyone-gets-a-trophy, forever-on-Mom’s-insurance-and-cell-phone-plan progeny.

But I digress.  Because I’m a geek (see Shredded Wheat, above) I actually convert these things into algebraic equations FOR FUN.

So here we go.  Let’s say I’m 29 (SHUT IT) and that I have 76 cents in my pocket.

  • Age (A) = 29
  • Coins (C) = 76

We also know that the answer is a four-digit number – so “the first two digits” means your age times 100 – this pushes your age into the thousands and hundreds column, and  will leave the last two digits (the tens and the ones) for coinage.  Our formula looks like this:

((2A+5)*50)-365+C+115 = 100A+C

Let’s solve the parenthetical expression on the left:

100A + 250 – 365 + C + 115 = 100A + C

Now let’s math out the numbers that don’t have A or C on them – 250-365+115.  Guess what that equals?  ZERO.

100A + C + 0 = 100A + C

See?  Wasn’t that fun?

Side note:  I was a math major for a whopping three days.  Still got it.  <strut strut>

If the above was complete gibberish to you – well, you probably have other talents.  Like maybe you can parallel park, or get past level 452 in Candy Crush.  Or maybe you’re just really pretty.  🙂

3.  Insightful Personality Assessments.  If the above just isn’t doing it for you, there really are some fairly useful tools out there on the Interwebs to help you learn more about yourself.  I swear I’m not feeding you some HR brainwashed psychobabble here – these can be extremely helpful to your own spiritual (and career) development IF you are open and receptive to understanding:

  • more about yourself and how you respond and react to others.  (Good AND bad) AND
  • how your <ahem> unique quirks and foibles are perceived by others, AND
  • how others react to YOU, and modifying your approach in the spirit of furthering communication.

In other words, everyone’s different – and different is OK.  Coexist and all that.

Most HR folks – or employees occasionally subjected to HR folks outside of annual benefits enrollment – have probably taken some form of Myers-Briggs-based assessment as part of “professional/career development.”  If you haven’t gotten your “letters” (i.e. ENTJ, INFP, etc.) yet, you can take a simplified version of this test at 16personalities.com.

Although I don’t love this methodology (because in one session, I (deservedly) was given the nickname “Steamroller,”) I took a whack at it.  It’s highly subjective, of course – but interesting all the same.

What am I?  The Debater.  What I found the most interesting (read: accurate):

ZOMG I DO THIS TO THE HUBS ALL.THE.TIME.

I also learned:

  • I rip apart arguments JUST FOR FUN (see algebra above…yeah.)
  • Arguing both sides helps me understand them better.  But I more do it because it amuses me.
  • I sometimes hurt people’s pwecious widdle peewings….and I don’t really care.  (And this can damage relationships.  Uh.  Duh.)
  • I’m not a huge fan of conformity or grunt work.  (Really – are there people who live to file?)

To be fair, this wasn’t really earth-shattering.  I’m pretty self-aware – flaws, pits, and all.  But it feels somewhat…I dunno, validating?  to see that I’m not a walking freak show.

(THERE ARE OTHERS.  BE VERY AFRAID.)

Chris from Surviving the Specter got me thinking about these assessments the other day.  His blog led me to The Enneagram Institute, where you can take the RHETI (Riso-Hudson Test.)  If you only take one quiz on this page, TAKE THIS ONE.  It’s quick,  free, and pretty thorough for the price!

What I like about this:  There’s TONS of detail in the explanation/description of your “type.”  Also, if your scores are close, there’s an entire section on “misidentifiers” – so you can see if #2 or #3 really fits you better.  I had one score just barely above three others, which were tied – and reading the misidentifiers helped validate my label.  (This seems to be my lot in life….I guess it comes from my need to argue every side of things, being The Debater and all.)

So here’s my rainbow: HybridPersonalityWhat I learned:

* I have a basic fear of being trapped, and need to sustain some freedom.  Interestingly, when I was a baby, I HATED my playpen.  Mom would plop me in there and I’d scream and cry like I was being stabbed.  But, interestingly…if she left me in the room with the playpen, with the side DOWN so I could get in and out by myself, I’d happily crawl in and sit in there and play ALL DAY. Hmm.  No metaphor THERE.  </sarcasm>

* I’m not terribly intellectual, but my brain moves really fast.  (Again, no huge enlightenment there – I’m reading Cosmo, not Tolstoy.)  Often, it won’t shut off.

*  When I’m stressed, I become critical and perfectionist-ish.  <picks up megaphone> Cue the eating disorder!

* I have chutzpah.  THE SITE SAID SO.  And “chutzpah” is one of my favorite words on the planet.  Coincidence?  I THINK NOT.

The details of my type (Type 7, The Enthusiast) are here, but don’t read about ME – go get your own test done.

I know these tests are oversimplified. I know it’s silly – bordering on ridiculous, really – to think that all of planet Earth could be categorized into eight or sixteen or even 1600 “types.”

But if you’ve ever taken the time to find out what your finger length or your wall color “says” about you – why not invest a few minutes in discovering what you “say” to others?

Rather than comparing yourself to a fictional character or a zoo animal, have a look in the mirror.

Study what you see.

Get to know YOU.

Warts and waterfalls, flowers and flaws.  All of it.

Be fabulous, just the way you were imperfectly, wonderfully made.

I mean it.  Or I will totally find you some more algebra to do.  I HAVE MATH AND I KNOW HOW TO USE IT.  Heh.

3 Days, 3 Quotes: Day 3 – Keep Swimming, Keep Treading Water…Keep Going

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LAST DAY OF THE 3 Day, 3 Quotes Challenge!

DA RULZ:  For 3 days, post a quote and express what that quote means to you.  And nominate 3 other suckers lucky bloggers to take the challenge as well.

Today’s quote kind of speaks for itself.  It’s one I started using years ago; to this day, I’m known for sharing it with my friends.

hellbrainThis quote is often attributed to Winston Churchill.  Although we aren’t entirely sure if it’s his, it may as well be.  You can read a lot of boring political and historical stuff on him, if you like – history isn’t my entertainment of choice, but it’s a pretty impressive list.  He made quite an impact for a dude of 5’6″.

Despite the historical snoozefest, he had a lot of interesting things to say:

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”

“You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.”

And my fave:

“I may be drunk, Miss, but in the morning I will be sober and you will still be ugly.”

HAHAHA  HOW CAN YOU NOT LOVE THIS DUDE?

In my last post, I talked about the point in my life where I realized there was more to life, and to relationships, than emotional abuse, and had made the decision to leave my marriage.

What I didn’t fully understand when I made this decision was that the next eighteen months would be some of the most difficult days of my life.

First comes the challenge of separating yourself from an emotional abuser.  It’s a lot like trying to unscramble an egg.  You’re so used to the constant churning of the whisk that it’s tough to understand which of your muddled thoughts are yolk and which are the whites, and he’s always chucking in pieces of shell and other garbage to keep you second-, third-, and fourth-guessing yourself.

Even though you KNOW the yolk is yellow and the white is not, a champion manipulator that’s been chipping away at you for years can make you willing to accept that there’s no difference between yolk and shell, or that eggs are, in fact, blue and pink and pop out of a bloated bunny.

I threw a few additional stressors in my life, too.  For starters, I accepted a promotion and transfer at work; my new job was 60 miles away.

When I started my new role, I discovered that the plant was smack-dab in the middle of a unionization campaign.  From the Steelworkers.  In Pittsburgh.  (This is essentially fighting the enemy on their home turf; you’re battling tradition and “local values” in addition to trying to fix a broken workplace culture.  Ask an HR person how much fun this can be.  It’s not for the inexperienced, unless you relish being doused in A1 and set out for the wolves.)

And, of course, I had to relocate.  There were plenty of houses available – but the challenge was paying for one.  I was still on the mortgage at the house I shared with my ex; this significantly reduced the amount I could spend on a house.  And no, he wasn’t interested in refinancing, or actually divorcing, come to think of it, so I was stuck.

Finally, after obtaining a first – and second – mortgage on a property, I was able to move.  Then came the segregating of the household goods.  One bright spot:  my then-spouse was a bit of a hoarder, never getting rid of extra things, so I was actually able to pack up quite a few things we had never used (NEVER.  IN OVER 10 YEARS OF MARRIAGE) and other than buying silverware, I had a mostly-stocked kitchen.  But when the movers came, he refused to let me take either one of the dining room tables, even though I had purchased one set with a gift from my uncle.  Even though I was leaving all the antiques we had collected over the years.

It’s just stuff, right?  I was leaving with something far more precious – my soul.  It was bruised and battered, but still alive.

Then, as I arrived at my new house, I saw a note taped to the door.

It was a court order for alimony.  ALIMONY.  Because he hadn’t worked in years, and I had been the sole provider.  Yes, he was able-bodied; he had a master’s degree in education and COULD work…he just chose not to.  And now, I was legally obligated to support him.

There’s a “stress scale” that’s often referenced – if you have enough stressors at the same time, supposedly you’re at risk for illness.  You don’t have to be terribly good at math to know I was scoring pretty high here.

It was the tipping point.  I was ready to break.

I just couldn’t do this.

It was too much.

It was too hard.

I could go back.  I could cancel the moving truck.  I could get my old job back.

It would be easier, right?

I could give up.

No.  NO.  NO.

I could go back, but it would kill me.

I resolved to stay strong.  I stopped asking “Why me?” and instead shook my fist at the universe and said “BRING.  IT.  ON.”

I kept moving.

I closed on my house.

I negotiated a lower alimony.

I bought a keyboard instead of a kitchen table, because music makes me happy.

We defeated the Steelworkers by a two-thirds vote.

I was surrounded by flames, and chose to dance.

firedance

My divorce took nearly three years to complete – he fought me every step of the way.  Somehow, I kept going.  I kept my focus on where I wanted to be, and slowly made my way through the pricker bushes and rattlesnakes.

If you’re going through Hell….keep going.  It’s the only way out. The only way through.

There’s a new song playing these days; you might hear it on your local pop station.  The lyrics really caught my ear and reminded me how far I’ve come:

I might only have one match
But I can make an explosion

fireworks(Starting right now) I’ll be strong
I’ll play my fight song
And I don’t really care if nobody else believes
‘Cause I’ve still got a lot of fight left in me 

My final nominee:  kbailey374 at Walking After Midnight.  She’s legit in the water today so she gets to be today’s sucker.  😉

3 Days, 3 Quotes: Day 2 – Changing Direction, Heading Home

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Yeah, I know, it’s been a few days.  Nowhere in da rulz did it say three days in a row, so I’m just going with “the next three days that you blog.”  🙂

So, here’s Day 2 of the challenge:

For 3 days, post a quote and express what that quote means to you.  And nominate 3 other suckers lucky bloggers to take the challenge as well.

Today’s quote is one that I actually heard back in 2004.  I heard this quote at a conference, and I wish I could remember who the speaker was.  I suppose it doesn’t matter, really.  What’s important is that it stuck.

I was working up the courage to make a major life change – I had realized, after 10+ years of marriage, that my then-spouse was mentally abusive.  I discovered that my soul was a shriveled, dried-up fraction of what it used to be.  I was existing solely because I was constantly “in costume” – I focused all of my energy on being the person I thought I was SUPPOSED to be – the person I thought my spouse wanted me to be – not on who I actually was.

And I wasn’t sure who I REALLY was, anymore.  I didn’t know if any of the vibrant, outgoing person I had once been still existed.

I had the opportunity that year to attend a large HR conference. Now, if you’re an employer, and reading this, you should know that these conferences are a fantastic value – your HR professional will come back motivated, energized, connected, and informed.  The knowledge s/he will bring back to your organization will result in increased revenue, improved employee engagement, and capitalization of numerous efficiencies.

(If you’re an HR person, and reading this?  It’s one huge honkin’ parTAY.  Get your drink on and prepare to violate every company policy you’ve ever written.  BOOYAH)

That year’s conference was in New Orleans.  It was an opportunity for me to get away from my confused, stifled persona – a chance to shed the constricting, ill-fitting uniform I had worn for years, and step into something more comfortable…me.

For four days, I could just be myself – whatever that looked like.

So first, I decided I was a fabulous dresser, and bought a couple new dresses and shoes for the trip.  (OK. I was always a shopper, even then.)  The then-spouse was NOT fond of this – of the trip, of the clothes of any of the other changes I had been attempting to make.  In all honesty, my new things were very classy – but were, admittedly, brighter and shorter than anything I’d bought in the last ten years.  (He preferred to have me dress more “vintage” – if by “vintage” you mean Pilgrim.)

“Why’d you buy this dress?  Who are you wearing it for?”

Me.  I’m wearing it for me. 

“You must be meeting someone at this supposed ‘conference.’  Who is he?  Why are you doing this?”

I’m going for me.  I bought these dresses for me. 

I was excited for my trip.  Even my then-spouse, with his put-downs, frowns and scorny scowls couldn’t kill my anticipation.  I was looking forward to meeting my virtual network – a bunch of people whom I had only “met” online but had been communicating with for years.  I was eagerly awaiting the chance to wear my pretty new things at social events.

But most of all, I had a voracious longing to meet….me.  Myself.

The conference was a superior educational experience valuable networking opportunity

Dude.  It was NEW ORLEANS.  ROCKIN PARTY YO

It was amazing.  I made new friends.  I relaxed.  I had fun.  I wasn’t looking over my shoulder to ensure I was sustaining the approval of a controlling, manipulative spouse.  I laughed as loudly as I wanted; I drank more than one hurricane; I <gasp> danced until 2 AM.

My soul found water and light, and sprouted and bloomed.

I was happy.  I was ME.

Then the conference came to an end.  One more half-day of educational sessions, and we’d all be on our way back to our normal, everyday lives.

But I didn’t want to go back.  I had found my voice; I had found my light.  And she wasn’t going to quietly go back into that dark, confining shell very easily.

I had tasted freedom, and I didn’t want to stop drinking it in.

Right before I chose which final session to attend, a new friend asked me to sit with him at the session HE was attending.  I glanced at the description – something about a life coach.  Meh.  I doubted it’d be of value, but since I was, realistically, probably too exhausted to absorb anything that was actually educational, I figured I’d go along and maybe catch a nap.

The session began.  Instead of dozing off…my eyes widened.  I perked up as I realized that this session was right here, right now, at the right time, just for me.

Are you unhappy with your life?

Are you on a path that isn’t satisfying you?

If you’re alive, it’s never too late. 

turnaround

When I got on the plane, I laid out a plan.  I knew that I couldn’t go back home to the way things were when I left.  After a week of gorging on freedom and peace, my old costume no longer fit.

But I knew I was still alive.  I still had a lot of life left in me.

It wasn’t too late.

I turned around and forged a new path in a completely new direction.  What followed were the most difficult 18 months of my life…but I knew where I was headed.  The vision of peace lit the path in front of me like a promise.

The direction was clear, and I knew exactly where I was going.

Home.  Back to me.

Today’s victim nominee for this challenge:  lynneggleton at Lyma’s Life – because I love reading her stuff and just wish there was more of it.  🙂

Hate Protection

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I think I’ve mentioned before that my day job is HR –  Human Resources.  A lot of people have heard of this, but have no idea what it really is.

Essentially, it’s managing the people asset of the business.  There’s a decent overview here, but the short version that I give (so they quit with the blank staring) is something along the lines of “I manage stuff like benefits, employee relations, talent development, recruiting, safety and risk….”  To which either their eyes glaze over and they stumble off, or they ask me if I have to fire people.

Fire people?  Yes, yes, I do; typically it’s the person’s manager that has to do deliver the specific “your employment is terminating effective immediately,” but I’m the happy little elf who gets to try to explain COBRA and hands you a box for your things.

Does it bother me?  Well, sure, sometimes.  I’ve worked for some very, very big companies; some of which restructure / downsize / whatever the kids are calling it this week every six months or so.  Layoffs suck.  They’re absolutely no fault of the employee; they’re just caught up in a cost-savings measure.  It also sucks when the employee is really, really trying and just cannot do the job.  Unfortunately, effort =/= results, and sometimes that results in having to make a really difficult decision.

But some terminations don’t bother me in the least.  Especially when you’ve received consistent, progressive notice that you aren’t doing your job, or need to quit calling in with spring fever to go golfing, or, for the love of chocolate and cheese, don’t watch porn at work, do NOT make photocopies of your most prized body parts, and freaking KEEP YOUR HANDS (and aforementioned copies) TO YOURSELF.  In most cases?  You’ve earned this termination, so here’s your diploma, go out and make your way somewhere else now.

In other words, if there is inappropriate behavior, you’re outta here.

Which is why I was – what’s the emotion here?  Shocked, disappointed, floored – by this ruling by the NLRB this week.

Let me back up a bit.  Most employees in the US are not unionized.  There was a time, though, maybe 100 years ago, where there weren’t any laws in place to protect workers.  So people started banding together collaboratively to negotiate better working conditions, wages, hours, etc.  Since that time, a lot of laws have been passed that define these things – OSHA for safety/health, FMLA for medical leave, FLSA for wages, etc.  (There are about 5,234,755,989,212 more. Ping me if you have insomnia and need further reading.)  As a result, there are fewer folks currently unionized – the laws have made unions somewhat redundant – but unfortunately, some employers are VERY badly behaved, so there’s still a place for unions.

When there’s a union in place, the union and the company negotiate a contract that spells out the wages, benefits, working hours, etc.  These contracts do expire eventually, though, and have to be re-negotiated.  At that point, if the workers/union and employer can’t agree on the next contract, one of the things that can happen is that the workers will “strike.”  The unionized workers all agree to slow down, or not show up at all, until the company can agree to their demands.

This means that no one’s at work, making the product the company sells.  This can also mean that there’s a picket line, where the union (usually the local employees, but they often bring other union members in for support) protests right outside the employer.

So, if you’re an employer, you have sort of a situation here – you have customers who need their plastic forks, or tires, or whatever you make, and no one to actually MAKE the stuff.  You can’t let your orders go unfilled – that will mean loss of business, which could lead to layoffs – once you tick off a customer, it’s super hard to win them back.  So you often have to make the decision to bring in temporary workers to get the job done.

And this is where it can get ugly.

When you cross a picket line (which is what these temps had to do to get to work, obviously) you’ll get yelled at.  Called names.  (“Scab” is the common one.  But it can get downright ugly.  Go to the ruling for this case and look at page four to see some more specific examples of what you might hear on a picket line.)

In the case of Cooper Tire, several of the employees took things a step further – and made racist remarks.  One of the employees was caught on video saying, “Hey, did you bring enough KFC for everyone?” and “I smell fried chicken and watermelon!”

So Cooper Tire fired him.  I mean, no company should tolerate blatant racist comments, right?

Not so fast.

See, when you have a union, they will represent you in “employment actions” and for your participation in “protected concerted activity.”  So if you get written up, or fired, you can file a grievance, where the union will defend you to the company.

The union actually agreed to defend this guy.

AND THIS GUY WON.

From the ruling:  “(The employee’s) conduct and statements did not tend to coerce or intimidate employees in the exercise of their rights…nor did they raise a reasonable likelihood of an imminent physical confrontation.”

Wait…what?  Racist remarks don’t “coerce or intimidate”?  Marijuana isn’t legal in Ohio yet so I have NO IDEA what this judge is smoking.

Apparently, when you’re “engaged in protected activity,”  i.e. a strike, as long as you’re not violent, ANYTHING GOES.  Anything.

Including a complete disregard for basic human rights.

Are you disgusted?  You should be.  Cooper Tire had to REHIRE this clown – AND reinstate the wages he lost while this was going on.

So – I’m calling you out.  You, all employees who are represented – who PAY a portion of your NEGOTIATED wages – to have the United Steelworkers represent you?  THIS is what they’re representing.  To yell out to a bus of temporary workers, “Go back to Africa.”

United Steelworkers DEFENDS these actions.

You’re PAYING for this representation.  You voted them in.  If you don’t agree with how they’re representing  you – if you don’t agree with this – hold them accountable.

Contact your union steward and make yourself heard.  Contact USW directly here.

Or take it a step further and decertify the union.  Make no mistake – unions are strong.  It won’t be easy.  That stuff you heard about on the picket lines?  Snuggles and hugs compared to what you might see if you take this on.

But if you don’t take action – you’re supporting the action.  You’re funding this abominable, repulsive behavior.  You’re not holding the shovel, but there’s a hole in front of you and your hands are just as dirty.

Cooper Tire is appealing the decision.

We ALL should.