So, the corner is getting a little dusty, my apologies for that. Lots of stuff going on. And I’d like to mention one thing here – this thing you are reading is an outlet for my thoughts, ideas, hopes and random ranting. If you don’t want to hear it, you shouldn’t be here. If you don’t like to read about people complaining about their jobs, lives, cars, financial situation, etc – please move along. I don’t need you cluttering up the area. So, that being said – let’s get right into it.
I’ll first update on my wife. Robyn went in this week for a little out patient surgery (yeah, quick and easy – still scary!). She’s doing very well and that’s good news. So, nothing but good stuff to report there.
We’ve made our plans to return to Naples, FL later on this year. We always look forward to that time. It’s become a really great time for all of us as a family. We go, have fun and don’t have to deal with all the pressures of life and the daily bullshit that confines us. I never was much of a vacation person until I got married – now I see what I was missing. It’s an experience I treasure and look forward to like nothing else in my life.
Adoption update – we’re just about done with ALL the paperwork. Can you believe it? We’re about thisclose to getting all of our information over to China. We’re also coming to some resolutions on the name. We were stuck in the Corrine zone for a while and now I think we are considering Ellery. Or maybe Ellary. Not sure. It’s uncommon, it’s pretty and quite frankly, I love it.
Work is the oddest thing for me right now. I’m feeling a little uncertain quite honestly. Here is the deal – work is always a bad deal (well mostly). Other wise they wouldn’t call it work. The problem is that I think I was spoiled to working some really high-quality, low bullshit jobs in the past and that has ruined me and set my expectations all out of whack. I had a run of terrific job after terrific job there for a while and now I seem to be just bouncing around and it’s a little upsetting. The last place I worked wasn’t bad, it was just that I felt like I needed to be more management. This job is something else entirely… The people who are working here have all been here for a very, VERY long time. And as such, they are steeped in their ways, which is understandable and infuriating all at the same time. The resistance to change here is nothing short of monumental. Their ways are their ways, not to be questioned, not to be commented upon. Changes and new things are summarily disregarded like Michael Jackson’s chances to adopt any more kids. They just don’t get it. They hold on to ideals that are ten years past. Probably the biggest frustration is the fact that management sees this problem but is unwilling to do anything about it. So, the employees are left to hold the company hostage as things continue to deteriorate and the proverbial “head is in the sand”. Did I say it was frustrating? It’s more than that, it’s infuriating. But sadly, it’s not my place to tell anyone this – other than you, lone blog reader. Only you now know of the problems here, because even if people here knew? They wouldn’t admit it.
The other big issue at work is the momentum that I was building during my first few months here of meeting with people and stirring up interest in my department has waned. The marketing that was taking place on my behalf has diminished to nothing. The marketing materials that were to inform the company about me and what I’m going to be doing – has died (or is on life support) in some committee somewhere. It’s discouraging to not have a vision anymore.
So now the issue is, do I light the fire myself? Do I try and insert myself into the process and force the CTO to push my stuff through committee? Would this be seen as a positive or a negative? The staff hasn’t warmed to my presence here in six months. I’ve done everything I can do to talk and communicate with the staff – I’m still seen as an outsider. And the fact that I was asked to “audit” the internal group didn’t make the relationships any better. If anything, it’s worse. That pretty much solidified my standing as an outsider, and I don’t think I can recover from that. The staff doesn’t come to me to ask for help, they contact people outside – even on things that I offer to help with. So, that’s probably the most clear sign that things are bad, and not getting better. So you may ask – Am I a sensitive bastard? That’s a valid question. And I suppose that I am, somewhat. I think it’s that I am getting older, but things seem to “get to me” more than they used to. But I’m also more observant, so I tend to “catch” more things than I used to notice as well. I have even managed to make a few friends who pass along the not-so-subtle comments and innuendo directed toward me. And that’s fine, I know I’m not going to make everyone happy. But it’d be nice to know that I have the backing of the guy in charge, who told me all sorts of wonderful things before I started here.
Is all of this whining? I suppose you could call it that. I like to think of it as expressing my discontent and my disappointment with what has happened in my new job. It’s not the end of the world, so no one freak out. People can be unhappy with things and still not hate their life. Something good will come of it. One way or another.
I hope.
And one more thing, a quick update on the Couch-To-5K program. I’ve taken about two weeks off, which is probably going to kill me. I strained a calf muscle and it was a bad, bad deal. Combined with the shin-splints its all added up to me not running much. I’ve simply GOT to force myself to get back on the wagon. I’ll let you know if I’m successful at doing that. It seems such a shame to waste all that progress.
