I knew it had been a long time since my last post--mostly because I had completely forgotten my Blogger password--but had no idea it has been over a year. Of course, there really aren't too many things that are different from June 2009. Still in grad school (with this being my last semester of course work, thank the lord), still happily married to TLS, still refusing change unless it is forced upon me. Yup, same ol', same ol'.
That being said, I have started a new job. What, you might ask, brought this on? Well, the prior job had become almost unbearable. Not because of the people (who were great) but because of oppressive management and a general boredom on my part. But me being me, I didn't set out to make a change. I just sat back and let it come to me. And, almost magically, it did. A couple of former co-workers contacted me and said that their company was looking for an administrative person and asked if I was interested. I initially told them that I wasn't looking to make a change because I was getting close to graduation and it wasn't in my new chosen field. They continued to woo me and we ultimately came to realize that their administrative needs included information needs that I was pretty uniquely qualified to provide. It has really been a win-win situation. I guess it just goes to show that inertia does have its upsides--occasionally.
It's good to be back in the blogging world and I hope to be a much more frequent poster, which is really not a very high bar to set for myself!
Showing posts with label Poor Pitiful Me. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Poor Pitiful Me. Show all posts
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Thursday, June 04, 2009
It Was Like Night of the Living Dead Around Here
So, you might have noticed that I've been away from blogging for a while. (I didn't really realize it had been almost two months until I logged in this morning. Sorry!) School really kicked my boot-ay this semester. I ended up taking two classes that were extremely assignment heavy. Like weekly reading/writing/project-y type assignment heavy. At one point I described my experience as living in a zombie horror movie. In one of those movies, the plucky survivors have to mow down waves of zombies coming to eat their braaaaains. Once they kill the first wave, there is another right behind the first, and so on. That's what the assignments were like. I'd do the reading summaries, exercises, information hunts, and other assorted projects due for the week and then have to turn around and have to immediately start the next week's. It was not much fun. I'm 95% done for the semester, though. (That extra 5% is due to taking an incomplete in one class. Doing that was like admitting failure. "Yes, Ms. Extremely Understanding Instructor, something has got to give.") I have one more project to complete to be totally done. I calculated my grade and I only have to make a 58 to make an A and an 8 to make a B, so I think I'll be alright.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
One Way to Know That You're Turning 40
The only piece of real mail that came yesterday was my notification that it is time to schedule my first screening mammogram. Yippee.
In other unrelated news: work is a pain, school is a pain, but I'm surviving. Hopefully, more witty things to report soon.
In other unrelated news: work is a pain, school is a pain, but I'm surviving. Hopefully, more witty things to report soon.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
I Could Go for a Xanax About Now
A few years back I had what I would delicately call (after coughing behind my hand) a female problem. No one really wants all the gory details but what it came down to was experiencing a lot of pain in an area of the body that about 99.99999% of the time you don't even think about having. My doctor could diagnose the problem as generic "inflammation" but wasn't able to pinpoint the cause...or alternately, provide much in the way of treatment options. As you might imagine, this made me more than a little cranky and depressed. I sought the counsel of a wonderful psychiatrist who tried prescribing an antidepressant, but as I am extremely sensitive to prescription drugs (and probably the illicit ones too, but as we've established previously, I've never done any of those before) I wasn't able to continue taking the Zoloft she prescribed. As a result, she gave me a prescription for the anti-anxiety medication, Xanax, with a stern warning that it would not be given long-term due to its propensity for addiction and abuse. And after taking it, I could understand why. I used to take a half of the smallest dose (1 mg as I remember, but it's been a few years so I could be wrong about that) and that was enough to spread a warm feeling throughout my whole body. Oh sure, my problems were all still there, but I just didn't care. It was a delicious feeling, but I was smart enough to use it only on the most dire days--when I was having a hard time of it--holding myself together with duct tape and baling wire, which seems to be an extremely Texan saying. Long story short, I was able (through help from my mom and mother-in-law) to find a holistic treatment that made me pain free (Hooray!) and I didn't need to use the Xanax anymore.
I could definitely be talked into using my little friend "Xan" for the last month or so, though. My company experienced some layoffs in January that directly influenced my workload (and not in a good way). Don't get me wrong, I am happy to have a job in today's economy, but added to my schoolwork this semester I seem to want to escape to "Xan" island. Things have been better in the last couple weeks but anxiety seems to be my constant companion these days. Sigh.
I could definitely be talked into using my little friend "Xan" for the last month or so, though. My company experienced some layoffs in January that directly influenced my workload (and not in a good way). Don't get me wrong, I am happy to have a job in today's economy, but added to my schoolwork this semester I seem to want to escape to "Xan" island. Things have been better in the last couple weeks but anxiety seems to be my constant companion these days. Sigh.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Auld Lang Syne
So we've arrived at the last day of 2008. It is amazing to me how quickly time passes anymore. I remember being a kid, when the only things you really looked forward to were your birthday, the last day of school and Christmas and how it seemed like it took F - O - R - E - V - E - R for each of them to get here. Now it seems as if I blink and another year has passed. Birthday? POW! Anniversary? POW! Christmas? Again?! Really? POW, POW, POW!
I was musing about life in general the other day. I have never been one to have an actual five (or ten or even one) year plan for my life. I cringe when I have to answer those types of questions during job interviews. I usually end up saying something along the lines of, "I don't have a specific job or position that I envision, but I do want to be doing something that I enjoy and find challenging and exciting." Which, while it is a cop-out of sorts, is true. I have a couple of hard-charging friends from college that actually did have the next five years of their lives planned out at age 18. I admire their drive and ambition, but could never really see myself with the proverbial clipboard and ruler planning out every possible permuation. Come to think of it, though, this particular foible of my personality does seem to be a little out of character. As I believe we've established in the last year or so, I am an anal retentive, control freak but something about the "life" situation makes me just want to float along reactively taking things as they come. Ah, what a complicated lass I am! Apparently, it's all part of my particular charm.
Twenty years ago, the only things I pictured myself being were a wife and mother. I managed to achieve the former but not the latter and while there are days that I mourn the "me" that could have been, on the whole, I am probably happier than if I had had children. I've come to know myself well after some time in therapy and much soul-searching and though I could have been what we call in Texas a "fair to middlin'" parent, I would have struggled daily with my limitations. Many mothers would be perfectly fine being the proverbial "C" student of parenting. "Better than most" could be the rallying cry of great hordes of people and, really, since perfection in the raising of children is a quixotic goal, they are probably the healthiest of us all. But none of that is my style. Call it personality or genetics or personal idiom but only the loftiest of goals is good enough for me and when I cannot live up to them, mounting frustration often gets the best of me. My mother tells a story about me as a very young child that I find summarizes that characteristic of mine better than I ever could myself. When I started to talk, I started saying words. (I believe that car was the first one I said.) I was making the transition from babbling to words beautifully and then I just stopped altogether. Dead in my tracks. Nary a word was coming from my mouth. Mom was starting to really become alarmed and then I suddenly busted out with a complete sentence. She said that it was as if I knew that sentences were the next step and that I wasn't going to talk anymore until I could say them. Perfectly. And she truly suspected that I was practicing in my crib by myself so that I could unveil the first sentence in a dramatic fashion. Fast forward a year or so later when I was learning my ABCs. I would get somewhere around the dreaded L-M-N section and would lose my place. Instead of calmly starting over again, I would suffer a world-class meltdown with full on crying and carrying on and probably even some flinging of myself to the floor. And, yes, I am thirty (mumble, mumble) years older and have better control of my emotions but I still find that lack of perfection causes frustration which often threatens to boil over into anger. And I truly believe that the years of daily mounting frustration of parenthood would have turned me into a horrible, shrieking shrew.
I guess that somewhere in this end-of-year post, I fell into the justification for why we didn't pursue egg donation or adoption after our failed fertility treatments. I know that my dear, sweet friends and relatives will chime in with the "you'd be a GREAT parent" and "nobody's perfect" and "everyone thinks they are a worse parent than they really are" statements. And while they are all probably true, it wouldn't be the act of not being perfect, it would be my reaction to it that would potentially drive me over the bend. Self awareness is a beautiful thing when you're able to act on it.
And now in the worse segue of time, may you all have a happy, healthy, and safe New Year. I promise to be back to my normal, inane postings very, very soon.
I was musing about life in general the other day. I have never been one to have an actual five (or ten or even one) year plan for my life. I cringe when I have to answer those types of questions during job interviews. I usually end up saying something along the lines of, "I don't have a specific job or position that I envision, but I do want to be doing something that I enjoy and find challenging and exciting." Which, while it is a cop-out of sorts, is true. I have a couple of hard-charging friends from college that actually did have the next five years of their lives planned out at age 18. I admire their drive and ambition, but could never really see myself with the proverbial clipboard and ruler planning out every possible permuation. Come to think of it, though, this particular foible of my personality does seem to be a little out of character. As I believe we've established in the last year or so, I am an anal retentive, control freak but something about the "life" situation makes me just want to float along reactively taking things as they come. Ah, what a complicated lass I am! Apparently, it's all part of my particular charm.
Twenty years ago, the only things I pictured myself being were a wife and mother. I managed to achieve the former but not the latter and while there are days that I mourn the "me" that could have been, on the whole, I am probably happier than if I had had children. I've come to know myself well after some time in therapy and much soul-searching and though I could have been what we call in Texas a "fair to middlin'" parent, I would have struggled daily with my limitations. Many mothers would be perfectly fine being the proverbial "C" student of parenting. "Better than most" could be the rallying cry of great hordes of people and, really, since perfection in the raising of children is a quixotic goal, they are probably the healthiest of us all. But none of that is my style. Call it personality or genetics or personal idiom but only the loftiest of goals is good enough for me and when I cannot live up to them, mounting frustration often gets the best of me. My mother tells a story about me as a very young child that I find summarizes that characteristic of mine better than I ever could myself. When I started to talk, I started saying words. (I believe that car was the first one I said.) I was making the transition from babbling to words beautifully and then I just stopped altogether. Dead in my tracks. Nary a word was coming from my mouth. Mom was starting to really become alarmed and then I suddenly busted out with a complete sentence. She said that it was as if I knew that sentences were the next step and that I wasn't going to talk anymore until I could say them. Perfectly. And she truly suspected that I was practicing in my crib by myself so that I could unveil the first sentence in a dramatic fashion. Fast forward a year or so later when I was learning my ABCs. I would get somewhere around the dreaded L-M-N section and would lose my place. Instead of calmly starting over again, I would suffer a world-class meltdown with full on crying and carrying on and probably even some flinging of myself to the floor. And, yes, I am thirty (mumble, mumble) years older and have better control of my emotions but I still find that lack of perfection causes frustration which often threatens to boil over into anger. And I truly believe that the years of daily mounting frustration of parenthood would have turned me into a horrible, shrieking shrew.
I guess that somewhere in this end-of-year post, I fell into the justification for why we didn't pursue egg donation or adoption after our failed fertility treatments. I know that my dear, sweet friends and relatives will chime in with the "you'd be a GREAT parent" and "nobody's perfect" and "everyone thinks they are a worse parent than they really are" statements. And while they are all probably true, it wouldn't be the act of not being perfect, it would be my reaction to it that would potentially drive me over the bend. Self awareness is a beautiful thing when you're able to act on it.
And now in the worse segue of time, may you all have a happy, healthy, and safe New Year. I promise to be back to my normal, inane postings very, very soon.
Friday, November 28, 2008
They Shoot Horses, Don't They?
Aaaaand the cold rolls into its seventh day. I am so tired of blowing my nose and coughing and I'm pretty sure that I am single handedly keeping Kleenex, Purell, and the makers of antiseptic disinfecting wipes in business. Yes, I know, TMI. But at this point it is impossible for me to think of anything else but my own bodily functions--seeing as how they have taken over my life.
Thanksgiving confession:
It's official, I am obsessed with Facebook. Is that too 7th grade girlish to admit? I find myself checking it a couple of times a day and thinking about the next clever statement I'm going to make with my status change. I'm sure that I'll tire of it eventually, but in the meantime, it is yet another distraction. (Like I didn't have enough of those already.)
Thanksgiving confession:
It's official, I am obsessed with Facebook. Is that too 7th grade girlish to admit? I find myself checking it a couple of times a day and thinking about the next clever statement I'm going to make with my status change. I'm sure that I'll tire of it eventually, but in the meantime, it is yet another distraction. (Like I didn't have enough of those already.)
Monday, November 24, 2008
Ways to Know That Inertia Girl Is Off Her Game
Ways to know that Inertia Girl is off her game
On positive side, after having two completely unrelated friends ask if I had a Facebook profile, I finally caved. Just what I needed, another way to procrastinate my schoolwork. : )
- No blog posting
- $25 Amazon.com gift card money burning a hole in her pocket for weeks (WEEKS!) on end
- Didn't finish reading the book club book for this month's meeting
- Can't seem to muster any enthusiasm for composing, preparing or mailing the beloved Christmas Letter
- Two words: HEAD COLD
On positive side, after having two completely unrelated friends ask if I had a Facebook profile, I finally caved. Just what I needed, another way to procrastinate my schoolwork. : )
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