Today I picked up my new glasses, picked up a Christmas present that
had been ordered online, did a little grocery shopping, wrapped 3
Christmas presents, did some complicated laundry, tried to shop for
decorations, and moved some furniture around. That's not counting the
stuff I do routinely.
It's also not counting my actual
job. Today was a work from home day. Submitted 3 requests for new
products, got at least 3 more moving - they were stalled, someone was
waiting for input from someone else, I reminded the right people or at
least tried to - edited 3 different documents, and updated I don't know
how many records. That's more work than I do on some days in the office.
I was busy. I honestly put in a full 8 hours if not more.
I feel like I should feel proud about getting so much done, but I don't. I feel guilty for not getting a lot of this stuff done earlier. I worry about some stuff I didn't get done. Maybe that's rational, maybe not, who knows. I kind of resent being so busy on a work from home day, although I can't articulate why. (I blame the holiday season, plus the fact that upper management has created dumb processes for us to follow, I guess?) I worry about the fact that I probably would have done much worse, if WoW had been available (it usually is available on Tuesdays, but today servers were down for a patch).
Submitted for your approval: random thoughts, opinions on subjects political, cultural, and psychological.
Tuesday, December 11, 2018
It could be worse
World of Warcraft is down for most of the day due to a patch, but
then, that's just as well. Today is still busier than I'd like,
considering that I have to pick up my new glasses and run various other
errands and do some Christmas-related preparation, and I also have a
moderately busy day working from home.
Despite all the complaining, perspective is helpful. While we were going through the chimney stuff and pink eye, a friend was dealing with the fact that her mother has brain cancer and my friend's husband has been working a fair amount of 12-hour days lately. That party where my glasses were broken? On the way back to the metro, a guy who looked homeless asked me to call 911 and proceeded to have a seizure in front of me. I was debating whether to start CPR when the ambulance showed up. It was drugs, or just alcohol, based on the EMT's familiar response to him.
Things could have been a hell of a lot worse for us, and they've been better for the past few days than they were for the previous month. Perspective.
Despite all the complaining, perspective is helpful. While we were going through the chimney stuff and pink eye, a friend was dealing with the fact that her mother has brain cancer and my friend's husband has been working a fair amount of 12-hour days lately. That party where my glasses were broken? On the way back to the metro, a guy who looked homeless asked me to call 911 and proceeded to have a seizure in front of me. I was debating whether to start CPR when the ambulance showed up. It was drugs, or just alcohol, based on the EMT's familiar response to him.
Things could have been a hell of a lot worse for us, and they've been better for the past few days than they were for the previous month. Perspective.
Thursday, December 06, 2018
It never stops
For the past few nights, the kid has waked us up in the middle. Today she saw a nurse and she said Atossa had pink-eye. Cassandane has commitments tomorrow, so I'm planning to WFH with a sick kid as well. Tonight, to get ready, I tried to email my boss about this and couldn't log on to work. After trying a few things, I think the problem is my computer, not my office network. Not sure if I should call that good or bad.
Wednesday, December 05, 2018
It's been busy
For the past several months I've been wondering about ADHD or mental health issues. Over the past few days I've been thinking maybe I'm fine and it's just that I'm having a whole bunch of bad days in a row.
At work, I feel stressed even though my responsibilities don't seem too bad in an "objective" sense. There's not more going on than there's time for and everyone is reasonable about expectations. I feel bad about it because I could be doing more and getting things done faster, but my supervisors seem happy with me. Maybe I just find it difficult because it's more than I was used to, and because a big part of my job is keeping track of many different projects and organizing has never been my strong suit.
At home, I have a 3-year-old. It's rough. Beyond that? Within the past 3 weeks we've spent the night in a hotel room unexpectedly due to no heat or hot water in the house due carbon monoxide issues, I got a bit of CO poisoning, replacing the chimney liner cost $2,000, and even before we actually shut the heat off, we had no hot water for several days, probably just because the pilot light went out while poking around down there and we couldn't get it back on. Does this all sound like one big but ultimately monocausal issue? This past Sunday at a holiday party my daughter fell and broke my glasses.
When I put it like this, wanting some time to myself seems totally understandable.
At work, I feel stressed even though my responsibilities don't seem too bad in an "objective" sense. There's not more going on than there's time for and everyone is reasonable about expectations. I feel bad about it because I could be doing more and getting things done faster, but my supervisors seem happy with me. Maybe I just find it difficult because it's more than I was used to, and because a big part of my job is keeping track of many different projects and organizing has never been my strong suit.
At home, I have a 3-year-old. It's rough. Beyond that? Within the past 3 weeks we've spent the night in a hotel room unexpectedly due to no heat or hot water in the house due carbon monoxide issues, I got a bit of CO poisoning, replacing the chimney liner cost $2,000, and even before we actually shut the heat off, we had no hot water for several days, probably just because the pilot light went out while poking around down there and we couldn't get it back on. Does this all sound like one big but ultimately monocausal issue? This past Sunday at a holiday party my daughter fell and broke my glasses.
When I put it like this, wanting some time to myself seems totally understandable.
It's been crazy
Yesterday I planned a relatively rigid schedule for today, starting
with a couple hours of work. Not required due to the day of mourning but
I thought it would be nice to catch up a bit.
Then the kid woke us up 3 times or so overnight. She was cold and wanted me to put her blankets on her, even though that's how she'd gone to bed and had taken them off herself! For one example. This morning I managed to work for 10-20 minutes before she woke up, crying inconsolably. She said her stomach hurt. After she calmed down I asked her if breakfast would help and she said yes. When she got downstairs, she saw that the TV room light was on (it was simply where my computer had been left) and asked if she could watch TV. I told her no, it was a school day today, she could watch TV after she got ready, she knows the rules. She started crying again. I figured if she really was sick, she'd spend the day at home. I told her we'd compromise: she could eat and go potty and then we'd see. By the time she'd had breakfast, she forgot about TV and finished getting ready for school and went happily as if nothing was wrong.
So I figured I could skip work. Instead I spent the morning mostly working around the house, getting to a few tasks I'd been thinking about for a while. Some stuff is done. Some isn't done, but I got the first part done and found problems with the second part, or decided that the whole thing wasn't worth it. Good enough. Productive. At noon, I decided I'd get takeout for lunch instead of a sandwich or frozen meal. My wife said she'd like to go too. I wanted to go alone, to have even more time to myself, but I thought it would be rude to ask. Until it occurred to me that I had actually had less time to myself today than I do by noon on most days. (Most days I have an hour or so in the morning while I eat.)
So, really, fuck it. The morning was productive, I might run one more errand this afternoon, but other than that I'm on my own between lunch and when I pick the kid up after school. I can spend it watching Game of Thrones (two seasons behind), playing World of Warcraft absolutely guilt-free, or jerking off if I want. Sounds good.
Then the kid woke us up 3 times or so overnight. She was cold and wanted me to put her blankets on her, even though that's how she'd gone to bed and had taken them off herself! For one example. This morning I managed to work for 10-20 minutes before she woke up, crying inconsolably. She said her stomach hurt. After she calmed down I asked her if breakfast would help and she said yes. When she got downstairs, she saw that the TV room light was on (it was simply where my computer had been left) and asked if she could watch TV. I told her no, it was a school day today, she could watch TV after she got ready, she knows the rules. She started crying again. I figured if she really was sick, she'd spend the day at home. I told her we'd compromise: she could eat and go potty and then we'd see. By the time she'd had breakfast, she forgot about TV and finished getting ready for school and went happily as if nothing was wrong.
So I figured I could skip work. Instead I spent the morning mostly working around the house, getting to a few tasks I'd been thinking about for a while. Some stuff is done. Some isn't done, but I got the first part done and found problems with the second part, or decided that the whole thing wasn't worth it. Good enough. Productive. At noon, I decided I'd get takeout for lunch instead of a sandwich or frozen meal. My wife said she'd like to go too. I wanted to go alone, to have even more time to myself, but I thought it would be rude to ask. Until it occurred to me that I had actually had less time to myself today than I do by noon on most days. (Most days I have an hour or so in the morning while I eat.)
So, really, fuck it. The morning was productive, I might run one more errand this afternoon, but other than that I'm on my own between lunch and when I pick the kid up after school. I can spend it watching Game of Thrones (two seasons behind), playing World of Warcraft absolutely guilt-free, or jerking off if I want. Sounds good.
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