work=junior high

A long time ago…

Posted by Nightravyn on September 11th, 2011 | 4 comments

So yeah, I get a new job, hit the ground running with it, then promptly fall off the blogging planet. Really, I do blame the job. Most of the time, when I get up in the morning, I’m still groggy and out of it, and have a very short time to get ready for work and out the door. When I get home, I’m immediately hitting the shower to get cleaned up, as most of my day involves me running up and down ladders or stairs, hauling mannequins or large artwork, usually with little air conditioning or hot lights overhead. After that, all I want to do is not move, while various body parts yell at me for taking the job. Then it’s an early bedtime and we start it all over again. /sigh

The job itself is somewhat physically demanding. It depends on what day it is and what needs to be done. Two weeks ago, not a whole heck of a lot other than putting up new pretty pictures in little frames. This past week? Lots of ladders, lots of hauling, lots of racing around with no where near enough time. When you add in the various office politics and personalities, things get… interesting. My stress levels kinda peaked out Friday and i had a complete meltdown at work. A couple of texts and a phone call to another store’s visual department manager later, and I was a lot calmer. I’d helped the other manager earlier in the week at their store, and he reassured me that I was not sucking, i was doing a good job, and to just do what I could do. It’s always nice when someone says “Damn, girl! I wish you were closer to our store, cos I’d steal you away in a heartbeat, cos you rock!”

Oh and three weeks ago, Jared tripped at work and broke his elbow. /facepalm He’d been hoping that the doc would tell him he could go back to work this past week, but alas, he’s still healing and must stay at home some more, since work can’t accommodate his one-armed self. At least he’s got workman’s comp. ^^;

In more pleasant news, our insanely crappy internet connection will soon be a thing of the past. I need to make a phone call tomorrow to set it up, but we’ll be having a proper high-speed connection soon. Looks like it’s going to be just in time for a couple of new games that I’ve been waiting on: Diablo 3 and Star Wars: The Old Republic. I loved, nay, adored Diablo 2. Still do. There’s just something satisfying about starting at one end of a map and working my way to the other side, leaving nothing alive in between. Everything that I see on D3 just makes me more and more excited for it.

And then there’s SWTOR. When they made the announcement for it, I looked at Jared, who is a massive Star Wars fan. He said we’d absolutely be playing it, and there was no contest: we’d be playing Sith. I sighed and started looking into what little bit of information they had and started preparing myself to play Sith (just know I’m going to be the world’s worst Sith). As more and more information starting coming to light, the more excited I started getting. At this point, I’m bouncing, eager to play, and looking forward to “seeing” friends online again. Hell, I even went and upgraded my pre-order to the Collector’s Edition. We’d started getting the old guild interested in playing, but just ended up merging those from the old guild with friends in a new guild. Everyone’s still in the “getting to know you” phase, but it looks like it’s going to work out well. :)

I’ve been plowing through as much information as I can, and pretty much have decided to start with a Sith Inquisitor as my first character. I’m most likely taking her through the healer tree, but the DPS caster version is also tempting. SPARKLEDEATH and all that. ;) The second character I make will most likely be an Imperial Agent, so I can pewpew again.

At this point, I’m ready to just go to bed til SWTOR comes out. By that point, we should have a better internet connection as well and hopefully work won’t suck as hard anymore. Well, one can hope. ^^;

. . . .

New day, new job(s), new kid in school?

Posted by Nightravyn on July 11th, 2011 | 0 comments

Saturday, Jared started his new job. So far, everything seems to be going well with it. It’s not ideal, as he’ll be working 6 days a week (6 hour days), and his day off is during the week, but hey, it’s money. Money = good. ^^; The people he’s working with all seem to be decent enough and he’s not come home stressed, just sweaty. Him not being stressed = excellent. :D

Sunday, Jared slipped off to work and Mom and I eventually wandered into town to look for me some pants and some shoes for work. Success was had, and we stopped at the local Baskin Robbins on the way home. Once we got home and after I’d relaxed for a bit, I headed off to the kitchen to start work on Jared’s birthday dinner: lasagna. He got home and got his presents from Mom and I (a book on wolves and a mug with Darth Vader quotes on it), we sacrificed the lasagna and followed it with the Baskin Robbins ice cream cake Mom got for Jared. All in all, a decent evening. :)

Today, I got up at what is now the ungodly hour of 6:30 am to get ready for work. I used to get up anywhere from 5:30-6am when I lived in Atlanta. I’ve been spoiled these past few years getting up at 8am, and recently whenever in the hell I damned well felt like it. And after this week of training, I think my schedule shifts to getting up at 5am or even possibly earlier. Since we have my car and Mom’s car, and 3 people with 3 different times to get to work, this is going to get interesting real fast. There’s a couple of options open to us, and we’re going to start looking at them soon. But until then, we’ll muddle through as best as we can.

The good news to the hours for me is that even though I will most likely have to be at work anytime between 6 and 7am, I also get off earlier than 5pm. So while the morning is a return to Atlanta hours, the afternoon is not. /happy swoon My schedule is only 32-38 hours a week, and from the looks of it, I have a 30 minute lunch break.

These next couple of weeks, I’ll be finishing general training, going to another store for specialized training, figuring out what the “real” schedule is, office politics, what I’m really allowed to wear (skirts and heels do not make a comfortable “I’m working on a ladder” situation), and who all of these people are. While I was contemplating what the heck to wear tomorrow, it suddenly hit me: this doesn’t feel like “going to a new job” to me. This feels like when I would be heading off to school for the first time after summer break. I loved going to school, but I’m totally all nerves about this job, so I honestly have no idea if this is a good feeling or not. While I interviewed, I was confident about my ability to do this. But now, faced with training DVDs, I’m suddenly nervous. I mean, even in Atlanta, we never took a training course on how to not sexually harass someone (at least not that I remember). This is how “normal” companies work, and I’ve never been in this environment and I’m finding it a little unnerving. ^^;

So today, I walk out of the house, packed lunch in hand, heading off to “school” to learn how to do my job and play nice with the other kids and hope they don’t make fun of what I wear. And god help me if the principal calls me into her office with a disappointed look on her face, cos I think I might cry. ^^;

My god, it’s junior high all over again… /headdesk