blogeois

Well, this LiveJournal version of Blogeois.com was fun while it lasted.  But blogeois.com is up and running at it's usual address. As for LJ, unfortunately, I won't put myself or my readers through the pain of crashing, javascript requirements (not everyone on the planet absolutely needs to love javascript) or the lightbox-stylized commercials.

 So, go on to blogeois.com.  Take a gander and leave a comment while you're at it, because comments are working now.

Sorry, LiveJournal.  In this economy, you priced yourself right out of my wallet.

Well, it looks like this LiveJournal version of Blogeois.com won't work for us much longer. This place requires readers to run a script or allow commercials to be seen before posts can be read. In my opinion, that's not acceptable. I've never wanted Blogeois.com readers to jump through hoops. That feeling hasn't changed.

Even I can't log in here to post until I watch some commercial first. Yeah, I know. I could probably get around that if I paid the twenty bucks a year membership. But here's the deal: My readers would still have to jump through hoops. That is just not acceptable.

And so, another solution, one that allows commenting and what I'm hoping will not be script crashes or commercials to be played or flashing ads or that ugly guy's mug showing up everywhere advertizing home loans, car insurance rates and tips on how to lose belly fat.

But I need a little time to get it set up (please visit blogeois.com to see what I have been doing this month). And then, if all things work right, you won't need to go anywhere else to leave a comment or see if something different was posted there or here. It'll all be in the same place, Blogeois.com, the way it used to be, the only way it should be.

I guess I'm asking for a little more time. But I swear, I'll do everything I can to get this right.

Small dogs scratch and whine incessantly at a back sliding glass door at Cap't Dan's. It's the same every day, rain or shine, thirty degrees or a hundred and five, for years now. Scritch, scritchy, scratch, whine, whine, whine. It's why we keep all the windows in the back of our house tightly closed even though we've got a water fountain out there that would be great to listen to.

At The Dimmers, the blaring sounds of power saws and grinders go on long into the night as Mr. Dimmer 'remodels' his garage to accommodate supplies for his latest business attempt - house painting. Somehow I don't think the rickety cabinets he's building (he showed them off - Scary!) will help contain the paint and chemical fumes wafting from over there.

Rocks fly over the fence from The Renters. It's like we've taken a two-year backward step in time. WS went over and talked to Mr. Renter yesterday, alone, after glaring but not saying a peep to the youngest Renter kid sitting on top of our shared fence who with a friend was stripping bark from our birch trees and after gathering softball-sized rocks off our front yard grass and picking a handful of golf ball-sized ones off the cement in back. WS went over there at my insistence because we all remember what transpired when I went over there and because WS didn't want to do anything but look up legal services and surveillance camera stuff online.

Nothing changed then, if you don't count the year-long daily spitting and flipping us off at every occasion. Nothing has changed now.

But at least our house wasn't set on fire overnight. For the first time in years, I honestly feel threatened living in my own house.

Two weekends ago, The Renters chopped down a couple of bushes that had gotten out of control on their property. They left the branches lying in their side front yard (an area approximately five feet wide by fourteen feet long), the one next to our front yard. We've had two big windstorms since and every morning I've pulled their branches out of our flower beds and grass and laid them back in their side yard. Every morning since, I've had to do the same.

This is no different than last year when they did the same thing with another bunch of shrubs. This year, however, unlike last year, we can't afford to pay for yard debris pickup where our bin is filled with their dead branches picked up from our yard. Unfortunately, WS didn't talk to Mr. Renter about that little problem.

WS wants surveillance cameras even more than he has wanted them in the past. I still fail to understand why we seem to have this level of neighbor problem and no one else seems to. Why is it a crime to keep a place nice? Wouldn't that just help to raise surrounding property values? Why is it flawed to expect people and kids to have respect for other's property? Why does this matter to us and only us? And why do people allow members of their own families to get away with perceived destructiveness under the guise of "Kids (Boys in this case) will be kids" and a shrug of the shoulders?

I just don't get it. All my young life, when I quite literally had little to my name, all I ever wanted was nice stuff. Now, as a maturing adult, when I think I've got it and am starting to enjoy it, others are just as determined to ruin it. Those, I am supposing here, who are to look out and guide those young destroyers, don't think it's a big deal in the least.

I think our days are numbered here, in the house we built with love a decade ago, regardless of WS' job-issues and the eventual turnout of that. Now might be time to pull out and begin the move countdown clock.

--

Yesterday's exercise: None.
This morning's weigh-in: 158.8.
Reading: Nothing.

It should have been a quiet Sunday morning, the first Daylight Savings Time day of the year, a day when three times as much coffee needs to be consumed to get through it. But that would have been too easy.

Cross-posted over at blogeois.com:

Early this morning (yes, on Sunday), WS received an email congratulating him for "landing a position" with a team in another department. This came from the big cheese, the Division head.

Certainly, this would be great cause for celebration, had WS actually received an offer for a position with a team in another department. The sad fact is, the team leader of that department was the one WS had an interview with last week in which he was told the position would be a step down from his current job. Essentially, the nail in the career coffin job. Additionally, all truths being told, the position did not or would not come with a salary increase quite possibly ever. Team leader's words, not ours.

Just to be perfectly clear, the job was not offered to WS, and therefore, he couldn't have accepted the offer because there wasn't one. He didn't land anything.

Okay, who looks stupid here? Before you answer...

WS had to work all weekend. On top of 'deliverables' that are due tomorrow morning, he had to sort through all this misunderstanding mess, contacting his current manager (who was none too happy), the other department team leader (who was way confused), HR and the Division Manager who WS is still waiting on to receive retention offer details...only to find out through round-about means that his old boss, Mr. Snake-in-the-Grass had set the whole misinformation thing into motion.

It was all a set up. The guy has nothing what so ever to do with WS any longer and hasn't for over a month and still, he set WS up.

I'm sure Mr. Snake got a big laugh out of it. I've met the guy and I'm certain of this. And he'll get an even bigger laugh after hearing that WS wasn't able to complete his tasks due.

This is what that guy does, particularly when people no longer work under him.

You see, Mr. Snake takes all management changes personally, doubly so if his ex-employees have nothing to do with management changes. That's when Mr. Snake works overtime on burying the employees, systematically, one by one, for what we can only assume is that ex-employees no longer serve a purpose to Mr. Snake. In fact, Mr. Snake is responsible for causing so much internal job grief that many of his ex-employees have left the company. Of course, Mr. Snake is rewarded for that. He just saved the company from having to pay severance and unused vacation pay! Let's pay one hundred percent of his relocation expenses to Boise in gratitude.

If any part of this could be considered humorous, it'd have to be that Mr. Snake did all this, not from across the aisle where he used to sit from WS, but from Boise, where Mr. Snake and his family's been since the end of February. And before dawn on a Sunday morning, no less. I have to see that as humorous. Anything less would be tragic.

WS had seen this happen time and again over the four years he worked under the guy. All too well we know Mr. Snake's next step: To put the bug in the ear that no one should offer a job to someone who isn't able to keep up with the work load.

Yep. That one's coming. Mark my words.

Now who looks stupid?

--

Yesterday's exercise: .50 mile run at 13:20 minute mile pace at 4.0 incline. .35 walk at 18:00 minute mile at 4.0 incline.
This morning's weigh-in: 157.8.
Reading: Nothing.

Yesterday I had a decent writing day in that I figured out an ending to the story I'm working on.

Today my writing day turned into a sucky pile of goo because I don't have the middle to go with the ending to the story I'm working on.

Yeah, I thought I wanted to be a writer. I'm having serious second thoughts.

Cross-posted over at blogeois.com:

WS' prom date finally showed up, a week late. The Division Manager who was supposed to meet with WS last week sauntered into town yesterday, no apology given other than to say he had his date wrong. Sounds like someone needs to fire an executive assistant.

Or was it a test? Coming from a company now known, according to Forbes Magazine, for pushing employees hard and without mercy, through tests of personal trial and tribulation, I kind of think it was just that, a test.

The Boise relocation offer is officially off the table. Moving to Boise is not anywhere in line with our personal objectives and aspirations moving forward. In fact, it'd nearly bury us financially. The Division Manager accepted this and thanked WS for his honesty. He said he knew the relocation would hurt a lot of people, offhandedly mentioned that most of them just didn't know it yet.

I find that information scary.

The Division Manager wanted to give WS a retention offer to stay working here in town until the end of the fiscal year, which is the end of October. He wanted to...but he couldn't because the assistant typed up the offer wrong. Wrong dates or something like that. WS didn't get to see it so we have to take the Division Manager's word on it.

Another test? Hmm...

For the record, no dollar figure was attached to this alleged offer. Reportedly, retention offer money has traditionally been given in such cases and is based on number of years worked but even so, no one could agree that those rules hadn't changed in the past twenty-four hours year.

---

"he knew the relocation would hurt
a lot of people, offhandedly mentioned that most of them
just didn't know it yet."

---

Even if WS finally gets an official offer, literally in his hands, and accepts the retention offer to stay until the end of October, he'll have no idea what amount, if anything, he might get in addition to what we hope will still be a monthly paycheck until then. I say might because we've heard one report of an employee who had to give the money back, because the company changed its mind. No reason. Just changed their mind.

This is the new model of corporate business where employees are expected to continue their undying gratitude to work eighteen-nineteen hour days seven days a week regardless of pay, or lack of.

WS had another internal company job interview yesterday evening. It looked promising right up to the point where WS learned the only position available would be a step down from his current job. Definitely not what he'd been led to believe would be the case.

In this field of work, even in this job climate, stepping down in job level, even taking a lateral move, is considered a nail in the career coffin, regardless of whether that's the only job available or not, regardless of whether you stay with the company or go elsewhere. It shows weakness and a willing acceptance of allowing oneself to be walked all over. It exhibits a belief in the lack of one's own value and future employers are hesitant to hire such people. I guess it makes sense. Who would want an employee who didn't stand up for oneself? Who wants a doormat?

In this interview, again, no pay could be discussed other than to say he would definitely not be looking at a pay increase anytime in the foreseeable future. And by foreseeable, they mean the next ten years.

We're back to square one. But he's got a job for the time being. We need to count that as something good.

--

Yesterday's exercise: Again, none.
This morning's weigh-in: 156.4.
Reading: Nothing.

Shortly after I arrived at the grocery store yesterday, it began hailing outside. The store has a warehouse-style roof (though it's not a warehouse grocery store). The sound of the hail on the metal roof was loud and although I knew what the sound was and could easily look out the windows to see it, apparently not many shoppers in the store knew what to make of it.

In fact, many were screaming their fear into their cell phones. "I don't know what it is." "My god, I think they are running the fans. THE FANS!" (I have no idea why running fans would be such a scary thing but this woman was literally screaming this in to her phone.)

The store seemed full of crying children terrified by their screaming parents, none of whom would look past their own noses to see that it was hailing outside and the sound was simply hail on the roof.

Good god, is this what people are becoming? Morons afraid of their own shadows?

Cross-posted over at blogeois.com:

Fear is rampant where WS works. So much for telling employees to stop upsetting each other by spreading truths and rumors. That's like opening the fried peanut butter and banana sandwich snack bar after Elvis has left the building.

WS had an internal company interview the other day, one that didn't go well. He said he didn't feel he was at his best and he could tell the interviewer wasn't at her best either. She left him with an unprofessional parting shot questioning his job, his role and his title; a single, fragment of a sentence, a comment that could've easily been held in check, but so telling of how deep the fear runs in some departments over the upcoming job losses.

---

"Naturally, the comment ate at him for days,
completely wiping out twenty-one years of confidence building..."

---

And how ruthless they will be to keep their own. This interviewer, this woman, wasn't in immediate jeopardy of losing her own job but by bringing WS on board, it would ensure one of her close coworkers wouldn't be promoted. Not laid off, mind you, just not promoted. In her mind, that's one step away from being found redundant and a half step away from lay off. So she called WS to the mat and implied he wasn't what he appeared.

In my eyes, clearly, this isn't a department I'd want to have anything to do with but that's not my decision to make. We do what we have to do; we deal with what we have to deal with. I say learn from the experience and move forward. He seemed to agree but if I've learned anything over the years of living with WS, it's not that easy.

Naturally, the comment ate at him for days, completely wiping out twenty-one years of confidence building I've tried to instill in him. In his head, he's back to listening to his mother, his grandmother, his 'friends' and enemies, most of whom had him for twenty-three years before I tried to repair the damage.

This isn't the first time I've complained about him still believing everyone else but me, even after I've been proven right time after time. It won't be the last. More damage has been done to our relationship over the years on this one topic alone than anything else, creating at times and again, I say so in my opinion, a quiet, reserved yet hostile home environment.

Is it any wonder I often feel worn down?

He doesn't get it, never has, and probably never will. He doesn't see it that way. This is his comfort zone: Questioning anything he's ever been, everything he's ever done. To talk to him about it causes his eyes to glaze over faster than fresh, hot donuts on the conveyor belt at Krispy Kreme. This is just where he's chosen to live his entire life where what everyone else says is truth, anything I say is background noise.

Nothing's wrong. It's life as usual. Same ol' same ol'. It's not hail, OMG, it's THE FANS!

--

Yesterday's exercise: None.
This morning's weigh-in: 154.6.
Reading: Booklife by Jeff Vandermeer.

It snowed here yesterday afternoon. Only for about five minutes and then hail wiped out most of anything that stuck. The local weather forecasters say it's going to do the same today and it did ever so briefly just as the sun was coming up, and even though I don't trust any of those people as far as I could physically throw them, it's pretty safe to say I won't be driving anywhere. Today's writing day but because the memory of trying to get home in Portland's unexpected late December blizzard is still fresh, I'm choosing to write from home today, which ought to ensure the day will be perfectly pleasant for man and beast alike.

Cross-posted over at blogeois.com

Yesterday I rewrote the beginning of something I'm working on for an April deadline. WS hated the original unfinished story and I've no doubt he'll hate this one too. My error is in asking him to read it before I've written the ending and that's hard not to do because I have the worst, absolute worst time figuring out endings to anything I write. Some part of my brain is convinced WS will spark something within me that'll make an ending obvious.

But of course, it never works that way, and I never seem to learn the lesson.

Half the bark mulching is done in the backyard with the other half happening sometime after the week's forecasted rain and after the remaining scheduled trees are cut down. Half the yard debris is gone already due to being able to cram more in the bin than expected, though we're still running about a full load ahead of pickup. I think we'll be caught up in early April and by then, our yards will be ready for summer enjoyment and I'll move on to finishing up painting indoors.

No news on WS' future job loss other than to say the big boss promises to be in town later this week. Not.Holding.Breath. Don't think it'll matter anyway. We're hashing over options; up to six different ones now, some fun and exciting, all terrifying as hell.

--

Yesterday's exercise: .25 mile run at 13:00 minute mile pace at 4.0 incline. .20 walk at 18:00 minute mile at 4.0 incline.
This morning's weigh-in: 154.6.
Reading: Best American Short Stories - 2007. Again.

On this soon-to-be warm and dry pre-spring Saturday, I hope to get half our backyard bark mulched while removing the rest of the fall leaves that tucked themselves very well under rhodies and azaleas. Today, WS will be removing additional trees from our back and side yards. This is in addition to the two he cut down last weekend. We already have enough yard debris bagged for the next three yard debris pick ups which in our neighborhood, is every other week. We're going to be looking at stacks of branches and pieces of trunks for a long while, I think.

Cross-posted over at blogeois.com:

I asked Mr. Dimmer if he wanted any of the wood for burning in his fireplace. He's one of only three in our entire development who have a wood burning fireplace as opposed to the natural gas fireplaces the rest of the development preferred.

He said no which surprised me a little. He was all about burning anything he could get his hands on up until last year. Then he said his fireplace was out of commission.  I must have looked confused because he said they had burned so much crap and food in it when they couldn't afford garbage pickup for years, the flue was clogged. And whenever they tried to burn anything in it now (the flue is clogged and yet they still try to burn stuff??), it turns the wall and ceiling gray.

Gee, now why would you suppose that would happen, hmm?

The Dimmers. It's not just a clever name.

So anyway, our side yard will be stacked as tall as the fence with branches and cut tree trunks and heavy plastic bags containing spring clean up yard debris and yes, I won't be able to bark mulch over there until everything's gone which will most likely be sometime in May but damn, if the rest of the yard won't look good!

And the whole thing will be done in perfect timing to worry about more important things, like whether we get to keep this place or have to sell and move to find jobs. If we have to sell and move, that'll be the least ideal time to have to whip it into shape. But if we can stay, we can enjoy this place to the fullest, knowing the work outside, front and back, is done until fall.

Don't even get me started on repainting the last room(s) in our house. That necessity is coming soon enough.

--

Today's exercise: Day Off.
This morning's weigh-in: 155.8.
Reading: Nothing.

Have you ever watched the NFL draft? Young men in suits sitting not so comfortably in auditorium seats too small for their muscular, athletic frames flanked by parents eager to see their cream-of-the-crop son rise above the grind they themselves struggle daily to keep up with.

Cross-posted over at blogeois.com

That's not too far and away of how we're felt waiting for word on whether WS would receive an official offer for relocation to Boise. Unlike those dreamy young men with visions of gold-plated Escalades, parties with Hef and shapely women hanging off each arm, WS doesn't want any part of the offer. To accept would likely be the final hole we'd never crawl out from.

So it'd be safe to say it's not all hope and eagerness, optimism and starry-eyed anticipation here.

I received an email the other day from someone I used to know who's kept up with my whining on this latest job drama and they said we ought to suck it up and "get the hell out of Dodge." "Because you go out of your way to view life negatively, you deserved to crash and burn," they said. They went on to say they were tired of seeing us come out of so many things "smelling like a rose" and "doing so well when [they’ve] struggled all along."

Well then. Haters, you gotta love 'em because well, you can't shoot 'em.

Who wouldn't love to come out "smelling like a rose?" Personally, I never saw it that way (big surprise, I know). Must be my blinders blocking the view.

That said, last week I was talking to someone after a writer's group meeting and we were both lamenting our perceived dire financial straits. And suddenly, in the middle of the conversation, my friend said, "But aside from all that, this really is a good life, a really, really good life."

I stopped for a moment and thought about that and I had to agree one hundred percent. My friend had summed it up perfectly.

Whatever the outcome, whatever our final choice, we'll begin again with new worries, new pain, new crashes and burns and perhaps even new adventures. I'll still whine and lament like always, trying to appear to suck it up but perhaps only fooling myself.

But whatever the conclusion, I'm sure I'll still agree that this is a really, really good life.

--

Today's exercise: Nothing yet.
This morning's weigh-in: 156.6.
Reading: Grants Pass - a short story, post-apocalyptic anthology.

A cold day here today with thick clouds and a healthy drop in temperatures from the 60's (Fahrenheit) that teased us over the past weekend. The good thing is that next weekend is shaping up to be a repeat of the last. I'm hoping to continue the work of bark mulching, in the backyard this time, because boy, oh boy, does this back-breaking work ever clear out my mind. Like taking baths and showers help some writers, hard landscape labor floods my brain with ideas. Good thing I don't mind the work so much.

Cross-posted over at blogeois.com:

A mere trifle of job information trickled through last night. The division manager who called for our local office and plant to close was expected in town today, specifically to discuss WS' possible relocation to Boise. Then the guy never showed up, never made it into town and doesn't have plans to show up anytime soon.

Basically, WS got stood up like a bad prom date. I told him not to hold his breath. This manager has a past history of doing such. But he's a division head manager so he can get away with it. Yeah, right.

On a semi-related topic: Okay, I have to ask. What's with all the mobile homes and acres of trailer parks in the Santa Clara/Sunnyvale California area? Sure, they're practically giving them away at 129K and under compared to half a million for a 500 square foot studio apartment/condo conversion. And yes, they can make them attractive inside, but ugh, the exteriors. And ugly, ugly trailer parks.

Wanna see how whack the for sale housing/condo market is in that area? Type Sunnyvale, CA into zillow.com Then type in Palo Alto, CA. I'm sure the housing bubble burst there too, right? *wipes hand across forehead* Then what were the prices for tiny, dinky places before then??

--

Today's exercise: .50 mile run at 13:30 minute mile pace at 4.0 incline. .50 walk at 18:00 minute mile at 4.0 incline.
This morning's weigh-in: Forgot to weigh in. Again.
Reading: Grants Pass - a short story, post-apocalyptic anthology.