baby steps

Right now I am recording my progress for myself more than you... but hey, I made some small progress so far!!

This is the week I decided to take my life back. This is the beginning of my eighth week at my new job. It feels like I've been there forever on the one hand and not long at all on the other hand. And I have got to find some equilibrium and balance in my life again, no matter how much work is dropping on my lap on a minute by minute basis.

Last week was my final involvement with my old job. I am just relieved to be done. I offered to help out in limited ways for about 6 weeks, but it was pretty frying for me because of adjusting to the new job and the holidays!! Anyway, I'm done. And I survived. Whew! Another step toward getting my life back.

Here's what happened so far this week:

Monday - work 12 hours. Get home late. Visit with my dad who stopped by for some paperwork and to deliver my awesome Christmas gift - a portable table saw!!!! So excited!

Tuesday - work 10 hours. Leave work only 45 minutes later than I intended (I was in a meeting). Arrive home, help homie shovel the drive, make dinner, have dinner with homie and her bf. Wait for friend to come fix computer (I blame the snow). Bake like a fiend. Get to bed at a reasonable hours.

See??? Progress!! Hooray! And I've got social plans Weds and Thurs... so I've got to leave work at set times.

Not to mention I had a good talk with my boss last week, just about my need to find some way to get everything done while being interrupted every 2 minutes. I think it sunk in, and though nothing has really changed, he is aware of how much more work people are trying to drop on me / involve me in, and he's better about asking before interrupting. Like I said, progress.

Things are good. I love my job. And look, I'm even making progress towards getting my life back!

Since I was last here...

Work continues to be good but insanely busy, especially with all the end of the year billing / tax credit / scheduling work craze. It has been difficult to find uninterrupted time to work on some of the clean up I need to do. One day at a time. I love it, but I'm exhausted. And I'm ready to find that balance in life again. I'm just not cut out for working 50-60 hours a week, especially during this very busy time of the year! We got Christmas eve and New Year's eve off, though I still went in to work for half a day on New Year's eve, just to get some of that uninterupted time. Anyway, things are good but I'm still not quite transitioned past the exhaustion just yet. Almost there...

Christmas!! Having a few Scrooges in my family makes me realize just how much I do love Christmas and all that surrounds it. The exhaustion factor this year made me slightly more wary of all the activity, but only because I am tired and have less reserves with which to handle the numerous events with huge crowds - no matter how fun they are. It has been a great Christmas, tiring to be sure, but wonderful. I love the reality of what we are celebrating- God becoming Man. Mmmmm. And I love the traditions, the celebrations, the gifts, the family, all of it.

We are mostly through the Christmas marathon- Christmas eve Mass. Christmas morning I slept late and was home with the dogs and one of the homies for awhile. Christmas dinner with my immediate family (missing the far away siblings and their families). The day after Christmas with the extended Cous crowd - always a blast! The housemates on Tuesday night. And my mom's extended family on Thursday. All that's left is Epiphany (when my parents give us our gifts from them) and we're putting that off a week. And then Owen's and Suzie's birthday (Jan 5th) which we'll also celebrate next weekend most likely.

New Year's eve was a small and fun affair with some friends. I managed to stay awake until 12:30 (greatly helped by the fact that we were playing games until just about midnight). Then we moved to the couches, toasted the new year, then there was a movie on so I snuggled under a blanket and fell asleep, managing to doze for awhile and then listen in on conversations in a tired haze for the next while. Good times. Welcome 2011.

I don't have New Year's resolutions yet. That's just too much on top of everything else. And as of today I'm getting sick-- so I'm drinking copious amounts of fluids, EmergenC, and spent a lot of today just chilling and doing some laundry. Some day I may get around to resolutions, right now I want to survive the rest of this job transition and work on balance in my life. That's all I got so far folks.

Happy 2011!

One of those days...

Today I laughed until I cried at work over the ridiculousness of the past week. Without giving incriminating details, I will try to share the mirth:

Tuesday was rough-- The crazy bookkeeper was in, not answering my questions, not making any sense, ugh. Then the accounting meeting, which was really really intense... not a good intense, like the partners at odds with each other intense over some really awful accounting errors made by crazy bookkeeper. Oh boy. I actually thought the most upset party handled it admirably (thought it would be worse really) and was glad it wasn't my accounting screw up- though it is my mess to help sort out now. Anyway, it was tense. Everything was tense. Then I had to return a dozen calls and head out for a relaxation massage with my sister in law. Awesome. She commented that I was tight. And I was.

I should interject here that in spite of a crazy intense week, working 60 hours a week, feeling like I may be going nuts there's so much to do... I leave work happy. Peaceful. Feeling like I am doing what I'm good at, solving problems, figuring things out, making progress... beautiful! So it is completely nuts, but still goood. It is so good to like my job. Soooo. good.

Anyway, Wednesday morning was no better. It is our busiest month of the year, the calls, emails, paperwork is endless. L was in working with me in the office, we were attempting to make progress and really just scheduling more work and putting out some fires. Mid-morning, the woman from the office we share comes in and says to L, "Is that your car?" Pointing out the window. We rush out. And here it is, the story of the week...

So this woman was at the building next door and got into a car accident up there. All the driveways slope downward into the parking lots and buildings. So she was up a hill, on the street, and apparently had finished dealing with that accident and went to turn around in the parking lot next door. Somehow her door wasn't all the way closed... she leaned on it and half fell out of the car, running herself over with her own car somehow (I think maybe just her foot). Then the car continues down the hill, smashing into L's parked car, making it swerve up onto the curb, and smashing it into the other parked car next to it.

Did you read that?? The woman half falls out of her car, runs herself over, is kind of hanging out of the car while it rolls down the hill and smashes two other cars. All with her grandkids in the backseat. L and I run out there and the woman is hysterical. Completely hysterical. L handles it beautifully, telling the lady not to worry, so long as no one is hurt, things will be fine. Then L comes over to me and breaks down crying on my shoulder. Oh boy. The police and fire department came. Insurance information was exchanged. Hysterical woman calmed down and was unhurt by the whole bizzare incident. The rest of the day L spent dealing with car details, while I continued putting out fires and working my way through the day.

For some reason every single this story was retold, it got funnier. Today L was telling it again (probably my 7th time around) and it just was unbelieveably awesome. I laughed so hard I was in tears. Feeling bad for laughing, but seriously! How freaking hilarious!! (Funnier because no one was actually hurt- although the cars were smashed). And a little disappointed that this happened right outside my window and I only saw the aftermath. Sigh.

Anyway, I hope you have something ridiculous to amuse you today.

A Day in the Life

Today:
-Mass at 7 am for the Immaculate Conception. Beautiful!
-Get gas while freezing butt off.
-Stop at Meijer to buy lunch stuff and supplies for the office.
-Head into the office.
-Get buried in paperwork, phone calls, coordinating schedules, dealing with crisis...
-L tells me she needs me at an afternoon meeting. oy.
-Cancel meeting with J the crazy bookkeeper.
-Jump in the car with L and head out for the meeting. Hear all about a "more than a friend" situation she has... oy. Take down the sign Reenie.
-2 hour meeting.
-On the way back, we strategize (aka Reenie figures out how to solve the current problem. Quantify the backlog. We've put good processes in place to take care of the problem going forward, but still have backlog to deal with. And no time. And lots of work. And insanity.)
-Experience incredible sense of accomplishment being able to figure out what the problem is and how to fix it. L is relieved. I life coach a bit, telling her how critical it is that she find some work / life balance.
-Back in the office at 4.30 pm. Paper, messages, emails, the guys with things to work out on tomorrow's schedule, go go go.
-Work on quantifying the backlog so I can assign the work to other people. Done. Backlog quantified. L is thrilled. Isn't as bad as we thought (which I knew was the case somehow).
-While wrapping up the quantifying thing, I get into a long discussion with boss #1 about another of our guys who is way backlogged... and we have to solve it. We've got to make him more effective getting the unnecessary stuff off his desk so he can focus on selling jobs, which he is fabulous at. Long discussion about that with the same solution- quantify the backlog. Once it is on paper, we can know what needs ot be passed off, what needs to be done, who needs a phone call, etc. It becomes a solveable problem. Boss thinks I'm great. This leads into a discussion of the production side of the business.
- Walk back into the main office with L, discussion with boss #2 about the next day being overbooked, solve meeting situation, convince B to go to the meeting. B and L both leave. I should go home.
- Instead boss #2 and I get into a long discussion about the business, where they've been, how it came together, what we think of the previous bookkeeper, how the production crew works, the history of that one guy they fired, how we are quantifying the backlog to solve it (he also thinks it's brilliant), the history of him working with L, etc. Good discussion.
-7 pm I finally walk out the door...
-Walk in the door at home, collapse on the couch, trying to motivate myself to work on the family calendar, finalize my Christmas shopping list, contemplate a Christmas letter, and ultimately do nothing.

I love my job. It is totally nuts, but I love it. But I do have to find a way to get back to working 8-9 hour days instead of 10-12 hour days. Some day soon I'm going to find that balance again, figure out how to work normal hours and still have some steam at the end of the day. Some day...

Jingle Ears

I am visiting some friends this weekend and one of our many activities included getting and decorating the Christmas tree. It is hard to describe to you what that activity is like if you haven't met Thomas the Tornado. Loveable, adorable, and incredibly energetic toddler. He's nuts and we love him. But he does have a way of introducing a higher level of energy and chaos into every situation.

At some point we had a pile of jingle bells and needed some occupation for Thomas. So I hung two of the jingle bells on Thomas' ears. Enter the new trend: Jingle ears.

For the rest of the visit, every few minutes, Thomas appears with two bells and says: "Aah bells ears" and hands them to me to put on his ears. Completely delighted, he grins, shakes his jingle ears, and goes back to his activities the happiest boy alive.

Exhaustion

I knew I would be exhausted. Transition wipes me out big time, every single time. And this is no exception. And every time, even trying to mentally prepare, the extent of the exhaustion surprises me. So here I am, finishing up week two on the new job and I'm completely exhausted. Happy, but absolutely exhausted. However, I will say, the first week I only worked three days (it was Thanksgiving week) but I worked 9 and 10 hour days, so it felt longer. So far this week I've worked 42 hours at the new job and 6 at the old job. And it's only Thursday night. Thank God for a long weekend (I am visiting friends Friday morning through Monday afternoon).

But, I am happy to report, even days like today, where I worked from 7:45 am until 7:45 pm, I leave happy. Exhausted, but happy. There's a ton of work. There's a lot of chaos. There's a bunch of good people and a lot of problems for me to solve and processes for me to work out, eliminate wasted time and energy, and basically just do everything I do best. And they think I'm great and respect me -- amazing how those little things can make even the long days feel better. I'm part of a team-- and I like it. Apparently today the general manager told one of my coworkers and the CEO that he's thrilled because he's convinced in short order, I will just be running the business. Hmmm.

So... in a nutshell, it's an adventure. I am happy and feel so blessed to be where I am at. God is good. Happy Advent.