My mood right now

Recruiter: Hey we are looking for a LEFT-HANDED WIDGET Maker. I see that you are a Left-handed Widget Maker. Are you interested?

Me: sure.

Recruiter: Great, send me your updated resume. Because the resume I have, the one that shows your vast experience of being a Left-Handed Widget Maker just isn’t good enough, for reasons.

Me: !@#$.

My frustration is that 1) if I were still working at my last employer, my resume would be fine and 2) the contract gig I’m working on isn’t a game-changing experience. No one looking for a Left-Handed Widget Maker will choose me over another LH Widget Maker based on the 6 months of pushing a button on a lame project that I’ve been working on.

And now it's April

 I thought I'd do a quick update just for the sake of posterity.

My contract was extended until July, even though I still have relatively nothing to do.  The PM is a bit more polite but still asks us to do stuff she could and should do herself.  I understand and am all about delegating but in the time it takes her to ask us to do something and then explain what she wants because she didn't communicate it properly, she could have completed it herself.  It just boggles my mind that someone like her is gainfully employed and I'm struggling to find permanent work.

Speaking of, I had interviews with three places that seemed promising.   One was another contract job that would have kept me employed for the year at a decent hourly rate.  It wouldn't have been joyful work, nor anything I could really leverage to a future position, but it would have been steady income. 

 The other two were consulting gigs with benefits that would have kept me busy and gotten me back into the No-Name Software ecosystem.  There are some law firms that have remote positions available but the caveat is you have to work in a state where they have an office because of taxes.  Or so I'm told.

Both consulting gigs eventually reached out to say they were moving forward with other candidates. That's about the best answer you can get legally.  The first consulting firm said they were trying to fill multiple positions and had a backlog of projects, so it technically doesn't make sense that they didn't bring me on.

I'm still going through the PSTD that my Office Nemesis from the last job put me through.  

On the homefront, I'm going through the stuff in the box called Memory Vault.  I have scanned some old stories that I wrote ages ago and now they will collect digital dust instead of paper dust.  I'm also reading and shredding my old Journals.  Honestly, I should just shred and skip the reading part...do I really need to read 8 years of journals?  And that was before I switched over to typing my journal on a computer in the 90s.  

Finally, my weight is hovering between 206 and 212, give or take. I managed to damage my right knee, so even running a mile is out of the question right now.  

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It Feels Like

In the years that my in-laws lived in Olive Branch, Mississippi, we visited them numerous times throughout the year.  Usually for Christmas but sometimes for Easter, which floats between March and April for no good reason.  We also made some other off-holiday visits now and again.  

The point I'm trying to make is that while we couldn't speak to the temperature of Mississippi in the day-to-day experience, we had a decent sampling of what the climate would feel like most months, give or take.  

My FIL says that the seasons here are about six weeks earlier or behind what we are used to back home.  That seems to gel.  While spring here is much warmer than in Chicago, which got some more snow over the weekend but will be 80 on Thursday, it still is chilly.  My weather app tells me that the "Feels Like" temperature is often colder than the indicated temperature because of wind chill. 

This is a very long way of going about saying that while it's good running weather (could I still run), it is just a little too cold to hang out outside without a jacket or sweater.  There are a variety of things I need to do outside but by the time it warms up enough to deal with them, it's time to get the kids from school.  I expect that will change in April and May.  And in June it will be too hot to be outside much past 11 am, I suspect.

Those Blue things still need to go

So we got the kids these loft beds for their room.  We also moved the spare TV into it and now the room is 7-year-old Heaven.  They now spend more time in their room than any other room in the house.  To be fair, they always spent time there on their tablets, but now they have even more options.  

We also got ourselves a piece of furniture.  We struggled to find an appropriate sectional and finally settled upon one from Costco.  Throw in a nice rug and now the room feels more like ours.  We still need to put up some artwork and I'd love to get rid of the leather sofa the in-laws gave us.  We could even move the Entertainment Center there.  For Father's Day, I'm going to invest in a new TV.

Our next project will hopefully be redoing the fireplace.  We need to replace the gas logs and we really should replace that door from the 80s.  I'm not crazy about the mantle, the surround, or the brick.  The problem is there really isn't anyone around here that seems to do this kind of work and it might be just a bit much for DIY.

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Organizing, cleaning, and cleansing

After a few false starts, I finally got the attached garage clean enough to install the overhead hanging racks I purchased back in December.  I tried to install them myself but found quickly that it is a two-person job and it is best if the other person is someone who is very good at installing things in a straight line.  Even so, my handyman, Mark made a goof or two (quickly resolved) that vindicated me that this isn't the easiest thing to do.

The thing about these racks is you can either put a lot of light stuff or a few heavy items on them. Each rack can hold 500 lbs.  Optimally, you want to put things you don't need to get to very often, like the Christmas tree.  I could put a couple more things on these shelves, but for the most part, that's about all I can do for now.  There are some plastic crates that need to go away, some stuff for goodwill, and a Farm Table that no one in the family needs but we are not allowed to get rid of for sentimental reasons.  


Update from the future:  I managed to find the invoice for this purchase I thought I would put it here for posterity.  

Product	Quantity	Price
4' x 6' Overhead Garage Storage Rack - Hammertone, 24"-45"	2	$359.98
Subtotal:		$359.98
Discount:		-$36.00
Shipping:		Free shipping
Payment method:		Credit Card
Total:		$323.98

I've been working on clearing a lot of the clutter as well.  I have this box called Memory Vault.  it contains a crapload of stuff from my early Emo years.  I wish I had the good sense to just chuck it but I have to look through it first.  I've already thrown out my Jr High memorabilia.  that wasn't a good time for me and most of the people I knew then had no redeeming values.  I also chucked most of my Alpha Phi Omega service fraternity stuff.

Now I'm in the process of scanning a lot of documents that I haven't looked at in years so they can live, unread, in electronic format.

Take this photo.  I'm connected to about 20 of these people on Facebook (not including the ones I deliberately defriended over politics) but only interact with 3-4 per year.  I didn't do a stellar job of staying in touch in the pre-internet days, but keeping in touch is a two-way street and they certainly didn't do much either.  And that's okay.  Not every friendship or relationship is meant to last an eternity.  I just wish I had realized that sooner.  

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Rene and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog After the War

 There's bad stuff going on across The Pond.  For posterities' sake, I'm referring to Russia invading Ukraine and half of America thinking that is okay.  Some of them are relations by blood or marriage.  

https://youtu.be/0vDAubIlYOs?t=12 

Last night (2/24/2022 in case I don't post this quickly) I cried for the first time in a long time.  I'm Polish but what is happening right now mirrors what happened to my grandparents.  

I reached out to a Virtual Friend who is Russian.  She told me the following:

Hi, thank you for your message. I greatly appreciate it. This war is a tragedy for Ukraine, Russia, Europe and the entire world. All Russians I know are of course against it. But nobody asked us. And, of course this war will bring poverty to each and every Russian person and will kill the economy. Hope you are well

 

Update:  it's 3/24/2022 and the invasion continues.  Ukraine has done an outstanding job of holding Russian troops off, but it's still war and people are dying.

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What a week

Steps: so for the last month or so, I've managed to hit 10K steps every day with the exception of days when the kids were home and the weather was not conducive to being outside.  There was also at least one day where I got close (8700) and I honestly believe it is more a case of not having my tracking device with me at all times than missing the mark.  NG and I go on walks and usually get at least two, sometimes three laps around the subdivision which nets a good 4500 steps right there.  There have been a few days where I've reached 15K steps as well.

I also do get some running in.  In 2022 I've run 16 miles, which is more than half what I logged for 2021.  

Weight:  My weight is trending down and orbiting the 210 mark.  I'm hopeful that I can get it down to at least 205 by the end of February.

it reads 207.9 lbs

Dry January:  We made it to Day 22 of Dry January.  Honestly, I was only going to go until Jan 28 and then celebrate the end of my contract with the Lunatic PM.  I didn't really notice a difference between Day 2 and Day 22 and that is likely my eastern European DNA being able to process alcohol better than it should.  

Contracts:   speaking of the project from hell....my contract got extended to March 18th.  OF course, no one told me it was extended.  I only found out by logging into the Consulting Firm website and seeing it under Contract Transparency.   There is an option to discuss your end date and I clicked but no response so far (24/48 hrs, it's been two weeks).

I'm not sure why my contract was extended.  First of all, the amount of work we've had over the last two weeks would be equal to one really busy day if we lumped it all together.  Second, the PM and I obviously would prefer a divorce so why not just keep the other consultant and adjust his hours?

Finally, something like this isn't sustainable.  I mean considering we were dropped down to 30 hours, I suppose it's good insurance to have two people available for TASKS that attorneys might need at a drop of a hat, but could be done much cheaper if lawyers could just get over themselves.

The PM is annoying me but this is a sweet gig from the standpoint of I am getting paid to do little to nothing and it is sanctioned and approved.  It won't last forever but I should enjoy the revenue stream while I can.

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Ultimate Playset Drama

Edit from the future:  I had sitting in my draft folder from a year ago.  I finally decided to publish as is instead of working it out.  I'm backdating this to the date I wrote it.

Yesterday we were expecting delivery of a Playset.  We were told it would arrive at 11 am but they did not get here until 1:12 pm and it took 2.5 hours to put together so it wasn't quite ready when the kids got home from school.  It's mostly pre-assembled but the components have to be connected and it has to be leveled and a few more minor things.  Still much better than the two weeks my neighbor and I spent putting their much smaller playset together from scratch last year.

The thing is, we ordered this kick-ass Ultimate Playset in early November.  They said 6-7 weeks which would have put the delivery date on Christmas Day.  I did not expect them to deliver on Christmas Day but I expected it either a couple days before or the week after.  Unfortunately, I waited until that week to call and it turns out, they didn't process our order.  I called the place we purchase from and the person who answered the phone apparently was driving and gave me the builder's number.  I called him and he told me that he just received the order.  I insisted that we ordered six weeks prior and he reluctantly confirmed and said he would try to get it out to us in two weeks.  Of course, by then the Mississippi Winter started and the weather was a factor.  No point in putting it on wet soggy ground.

We finally got a good week (this week) and there was still some gaslighting from the person who was supposed to deliver.  He called on Monday and we confirmed Wednesday.  When I called him he insisted I said Thursday.  There's no point in arguing so I said "okay make sure it's Thursday."  He still was a few hours late but we have it now and the kids can burn energy instead of being on their tablets all the time.