Monthly Archives: January 2014

One Last Work Happy Hour (or I Guess I Really Am Unemployed Now)

Posted on January 31, 2014 | 1 comment

To be perfectly honest, it didn’t hit me that I’m actually unemployed until yesterday. Before then, it just felt like one of our usual breaks from work. But it’s now sinking it that I don’t have a job to go back to in a few weeks.

It’s actually been a while since I was really unemployed. In 2011 I started working at a credit card dispute company. I worked there until I got my telesales job in May of 2012. I’ve had plenty of times that I’ve been out of work, but this time feels so different because I had been working pretty steadily for a while.

Part of the reason the unemployment is starting to sink in is because I only have one more show shift at work. I’m working tonight, and then after that, they might not have any people working a member table at shows anymore. If they do bring it back, it won’t be for a few months. I’m still trying to see if there is another position open for me at my old work, but it’s not looking too good.

Another reason this is all hitting me now is because yesterday was the goodbye happy hour for my boss. Everyone in telesales was invited as well, but I was the only one who could make it.

Everyone else at my work is still pretty much in shock that our entire department was let go. All through happy hour people kept asking me what I knew about the lay offs and what my plan was to do next. I wish I had a plan, but right now, I’m just trying to get my cover letters and resumes in order and start going crazy with applying for jobs.

Happy hour was fun, but it definitely had a somber vibe to it. I think that with so many people being let go at once, everyone is feeling a little insecure about their jobs.

After most of the people left happy hour, there were still a few of us who wanted to hang out and get some dinner. We had a great time just chatting about crazy things that have happened at work and random facts about our lives.

It’s a little sad that most of the people I worked with I didn’t know too well. The trailer that the telesales team was in was a little isolated, but I always tried to make an effort to get to know people. But I have to say that at the dinner part of the happy hour hangout, I got to know my co-workers better than I had in the entire time I worked there.

Eventually, we all had to head home. Everyone else had to be at work early the next morning and I just wanted to get home (it’s a bit drizzly out and my hip was killing me).

Tonight will probably be my final goodbye to my workplace. I know that I’m going to see some of my co-workers again (we are trying to organize a monthly get together even if we are all working in different places), but it does feel like I’m closing a chapter on my life. Hopefully the next chapter just gets better from here.

1 Comment

Posted in Celebrations, Food, Fun Stuff, Work

Tagged happy hour, job, laid off, unemployment

Time For A Celebration! (or A Pie Date)

Posted on January 30, 2014 | Comments Off

Yesterday marked my mom’s final day of chemo. Not just the final day of a type of chemo. The end of all chemo treatments!

Even though my mom still has radiation to go, the end of chemo is something that everyone in my family has been counting down to. It seems like it’s taken forever and taken no time at all at the same time.

I told my mom that she should celebrate with the nurses at the chemo room. She was already ahead of me and told me that she was going to make a carrot cake for everyone. And I promised to celebrate for her in LA.

A few days ago, it was National Pie Day. My pie friend, Emily invited me out to pie but I had to work a crazy shift that day. So I suggested we get pie to celebrate the end of chemo. We went to Marie Calendars (where we always go for pie) and my friend Kate joined us too.

The way we always get pie is each person gets a slice and then we share the slices among the group. So we got 3 slices: cream cheese, chocolate, and razzleberry.

I know the pie doesn’t look pretty since we cut each slice up to share, but it was still delicious!

It was a nice lunch outing. We spent a lot of time catching up on life and I updated my friends on my job situation. One of the advantages of being laid off is having time to see people I haven’t seen in forever and having a relaxing visit with then.

And of course, we thought about how awesome my mom is. Through all of the chemo, she’s rarely complained. The only times I really remember her saying a thing negative is when I called to ask how she was and she’d tell me that she was having a bit of joint pain. But the pain didn’t get her down. She’s been busy training Tucker and making sure that he is becoming a well-behaved and polite dog (he’s totally getting there). She’s played tennis every week and her record has way more wins than losses.

Even though radiation is an unknown and we don’t know if it will be easy or tough on my mom, I don’t question for a second that she won’t still be kicking butt and doing all of her usual things every day.

The final countdown of my mom’s treatment has begun and I can’t wait until we can really celebrate the end of this.

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Posted in Celebrations, Family, Food, Health, Tough Stuff

Tagged breast cancer, cancer, chemo, mom, pie

Take Two With Day One Of Unemployment (or Doing Some Fun Stuff, Finally!)

Posted on January 29, 2014 | Comments Off

I’m going to share my second attempt at my first day of unemployment, but first, I want to do some updates.

First, an update on my job. It was officially announced yesterday that we are not coming back. They have decided to use an outside company to do telesales, which is what they did before I started working there. I’m hoping to see if there are any other opportunities for me at my current work, but I’m also working hard on finding something elsewhere.

Second, an update on my health. Thanks to everyone who tweeted, Facebooked, or messaged me that they hoped I was ok. I’m almost feeling 100% back to normal now. Those antibiotics really worked quickly!

So after my first day of unemployment was spent in pain or at urgent care, I wanted to try to make my next day be a lot better. I was calling it my do-over first day.

I spent a lot of my morning binge-watching “Veronica Mars” on Amazon Prime. I’m almost done with the second season and I know that I’ll be done with the third season before the movie comes out.

I met a friend of mine for lunch in downtown Culver City. She saw that I posted on Facebook that I was looking for some recommendations of places to go to in New York when I take my trip with my sister-in-law. She used to live in New York, so she had a ton of recommendations! She was going to email me a list, but since she and I are both unemployed right now, I said that we should meet for lunch so she could go over her list with me.

We met at Ugo and they have an awesome lunch menu where pretty much everything is under $7. I had a sandwich and she had some fries (sadly, I forgot to get a picture of the food but it was delicious!).

After eating, we went over the list that she made for me about New York. When she mentioned making me a list, I thought maybe it would be a couple of things in a few categories. No, this is an awesome list that had more suggestions than we’d have time for!

I know you can’t really read it in that picture, but just know that it’s a full-page list that is double-sided!

After lunch, I had some time to relax and then I went off to work to work a show shift. I personally didn’t think it would be awkward, but since everyone had just found out about us being let go, others thought it was. A couple of people who work there came up to me in shock that we weren’t coming back. I guess I’m not too shocked because I had a warning that this would probably happen about a week ago. I’ll be working 2 more show shifts this week and then I’m not too sure what will happen after that.

All in all, it was a pretty good 2nd try at my first day of unemployment (although can I still call it unemployment when I worked 2 hours at my old job?).

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff, Travel, Work

Tagged job, lunch, unemployment

An Interesting Start To My Unemployment (or Trying To Always Look At The Positives)

Posted on January 28, 2014 | Comments Off

My first official day of unemployment was pretty weird. But this required a bit of going back to say what’s been going on the past few days.

On Thursday this past week, we all found out at work that there is a chance that we will not be returning for the next season. While it wasn’t completely unexpected news, it was still surprising. On Friday, I started to feel a bit off. I joked to my boss that my body was rejecting the idea of the job ending forever. I didn’t feel sick, but I didn’t feel right. Saturday I was doing worse. My stomach was killing me. I took some painkillers but it wasn’t helping. Saturday evening I made a stop to a drugstore to get some medicine my dad recommended before working a show shift. I still felt pretty off, but I made it through the 2 hour shift.

Sunday, I was miserable. I had told my parents all my symptoms (I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this before but my mom is a retired pediatric nurse and my dad is a retired OB/GYN), and they said if I didn’t get better by the next day, I should call the advice nurse at my hospital and see if I could get a prescription for some antibiotics. Monday was just as bad as Sunday. I called the advice nurse at the hospital and unfortunately they couldn’t give me a prescription over the phone. I ended up going to urgent care and spending about 3 hours at the hospital.

I’m feeling almost completely better now (antibiotics really are the best!). But all through yesterday I kept on thinking that even though I was in pretty bad pain and not really able to do anything, at least I didn’t have to work.

At the hospital, the doctor who saw me offered to write me a note to turn into work (I guess some jobs require doctor’s notes?). I said I didn’t need one since I was out of work. The doctor felt so bad that I lost my job and had to deal with urgent care all within the same day. I told her that it was ok since I would rather be sick at home than at work. She couldn’t believe I was being positive and having a good attitude about it.

I wasn’t going to have a bad attitude about getting sick. This is so minor compared to what many people have to deal with. In the waiting room at urgent care, I was pretty much the healthiest one there (I wore a face mask because so many people had colds or flu-like symptoms). And while I’m not entirely grateful that I’m out of work, I know it could be worse. I do still have some work at my old job and there’s a small chance that they will need us back next season (I’m not depending on that).

I know that I’ve been working hard on focusing on positivity in the past, and I think this weekend proved that it’s starting to pay off and I’m becoming a much more positive person in general in life.

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Posted in Health, Tough Stuff

Tagged doctor, health issues, positivity, sick, unemployment

Day One Of Unemployment (or Trying To Not Stress Out)

Posted on January 27, 2014 | 1 comment

I’m out of work again for the end of the season. This is now the third time we’ve had this break, but this time it’s different.

We aren’t sure when/if we are returning to work.

Nothing has been communicated with us officially, so I’m still waiting to see for sure what is happening. But just in case, I cleaned out my desk before I left after my last shift on Saturday.

I’m still working some show shifts (I did one after my last shift on Saturday and I have another one tomorrow), so I’m not completely out of work, but those show shifts aren’t enough to live on.

I’m going on unemployment again, but I’m looking hard for a new day job. I don’t want to be in a situation where I’m out of work for too long. And best case scenario, we do get asked to come back to work for the next season and all of this looking is unnecessary.

But this uncertainty has kind of screwed up my plans for this time off. I was planning on taking an improv class (finally). At UCB, they have an intensive class where you go every day for 2 weeks instead of 1 day a week for 8 weeks. But now I don’t want to take that because I don’t want to be unavailable if I get a new job.

And I have my trip in March with my sister-in-law to New York. No matter what, I’m still going on that trip, but I have to remember to mention that to any potential new jobs as a non-negotiable vacation.

I’m still planning on having fun, I just have to be more structured with my time. I’m hoping to make it to Disneyland this week (my pass expires soon and I want to make sure I get a few more visits in before then). And I’ve made plans to see friends who I feel like I haven’t had a chance to see in forever.

I know that I’ve been saying for forever that I want to get a new job. Now, I pretty much think I have to. I don’t have the crutch of my other job anymore to rely on. I am going to see if there is another job at my workplace for me, but I’m not sure there will be one with enough flexibility for me. But it can’t hurt to ask.

I’m really not trying to worry about things, but when everything is up in the air like this, it’s hard not to think of the worst.

1 Comment

Posted in Tough Stuff, Work

Tagged job, laid off, stress, unemployment, work, worry

400 Posts (or Wow, That’s A Lot Of Writing!)

Posted on January 24, 2014 | Comments Off

Today marks my 400th post on Finding My Inner Bombshell! I remember when I started writing I wondered how long I could keep doing this. Now, it’s a part of my day that I look forward to!

I’ve mentioned in the past how this blog is almost like therapy for me. I’ve gotten so much out of it that I would probably still do this even if nobody read it (but please keep reading it because I love the feedback and stories I hear from you all!). Writing on here has also helped my relationship with my family and friends. There have been many things that I never would have the courage to share with them if I had to say it out loud. But writing it helps to disconnect it from me and make it seem less personal.

In the last 400 posts, I’ve done a lot of things. So I thought I’d share some of the highlights of my first 399 posts.

The scariest (and best) thing I’ve ever put on here was in the beginning when I wrote about my eating disorder and credit card debt. I was so terrified to put that out into the world. I’ve hidden both of those things for many years and even some of my close family had no idea (or if they did, it’s because they guessed it and not because I ever told them). But after writing that post, it was like there was a weight lifted off my shoulders. And people started sharing their stories about money issues or eating disorders. I had no idea so many people had the same problems as me. By sharing my story, I discovered I wasn’t alone.

Another tough post to write was when I wrote about my mom being diagnosed with breast cancer. I knew about the cancer for a few weeks before I was allowed to share her story. I felt like I was faking it on the blog because I couldn’t be completely honest. But sharing that story again has made me feel less alone. Many people have shared their stories with family members dealing with cancer. When my mom was diagnosed, I started to research joining a support group. I never found one that I connected with. Then once I shared on here, I realized that my support group was on the blog. And I hope that I can support others in the future who are going through the same thing. And just to update you on my mom, she’s still kicking butt and only has 1 more chemo treatment to go before starting radiation (the final treatment step)!

The most positive thing that has happened since starting the blog was discovering SoulCycle. I never thought I would connect with exercise this way. But it’s happened and I’m definitely obsessed (this entire list is totally true for me). Celebrating a year doing the same exercise is a first for me, and I’m already looking forward to my next SoulCycle milestone (maybe taking 50 classes?).

I wish I could make some predictions to what the next 400 posts will bring. But honestly, when I started this 400 posts ago, I had no idea that it would become what it is today.

Thank you all for reading and following my journey so far. I just know that the journey will only continue to get better and there are amazing things ahead for me.

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Posted in Celebrations, Fitness, Food, Fun Stuff, Health, Saving, Tough Stuff, Weight Loss

Tagged blogging, breast cancer, cancer, debt, eating disorder, exercise, milestone, SoulCycle

Going With The Flow (or When Craziness Happens, Sometimes You Can’t Do Anything)

Posted on January 23, 2014 | Comments Off

Tuesday was seriously just a crazy day. I don’t know how all the weird stuff seemed to happen in one day, but it did.

First of all, as a bunch of you probably noticed, the blog was going crazy. Posts that were very old kept getting tweeted or posted on Facebook without me doing anything. And whenever I tried to fix that, my blog went down and I couldn’t see any of my sharing settings. I’m sure some of you were annoyed by that, and I’m sorry. I’m working with my hosting service (BlueHost) to try to fix everything right now. Some of it has been fixed, but I’m not sure about the random posting of old posts. I appreciate your patience in all of this. Plus, if you are new to the blog, this is a perfect chance to catch up on some old posts!

Then there was the craziness at work. I hadn’t really been at work since Friday (working at the show on Sunday doesn’t count because I was only in my office to grab my name tag). I was starting to finally feel better (although still not completely able to breathe through my nose). And after being at work for about an hour, I started to feel sick and like my brain was foggy. It was really weird.

My boss was looking weird too. I asked him how he was feeling and he mentioned that he was feeling fine until getting to work. It’s really strange that both of us started to have symptoms again when we got into work. Neither of us have any idea what is causing this (and it doesn’t seem to be affected any of my other co-workers). I think maybe the cleaning people came in and used a lot of chemical cleaners by my desk and I was being bothered by fumes or something. It was really just weird and made my work day a bit difficult.

I did finally start to feel a bit better closer to the end of the shift, but by that time we had opened all the doors and windows just in case it was some sort of fumes that was making us feel sick.

Dealing with trying to fix my blog (from my iPhone at work) and feeling like I was coming down with my cold again really did make Tuesday a weird and crazy day. I hope that all the craziness was on one day so that the rest of my week goes easily.

We are winding down the season at work. My boss told us that there is a small chance that we are shutting down at the end of this week, but it’s still up in the air. More likely, we will work through the end of the month and then have our time off. I’m still trying to plan for that time off right now so I’m nice and busy, but since I’m still unsure about the start date of the time off, I can only really plan for the second half of my unemployment. But hopefully soon I’ll know what day is the last day and I can start booking my calendar with lots of fun stuff!

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Posted in Health, Work

Tagged blogging, cold, job, problems, sick

Another Cut On “2 Broke Girls” (or I’m Glad I Went To The Taping)

Posted on January 22, 2014 | Comments Off

Remember when I went to see my friend Ace film his episode of “2 Broke Girls”? That was a great evening. Ace was awesome in the show. He was so funny and I really thought that the scene he was in added a lot to the plot.

But as I’ve mentioned before, scenes get cut after taping sometimes. And when the episode aired on Monday night, Ace was pretty much cut out. You could still see him in the background in the scene he was in. But all of his lines (and his character’s name being mentioned in another scene) were gone.

I was sad for my friend, but he had such a positive attitude about how he had such a great experience with it all. His positivity was infectious and now I’m no longer sad that he was cut out but instead happy that I got to go to the taping and see a great friend act in a great part. And I’m hoping that when the DVD of the season comes out that his scene is included in the deleted scenes.

The timing of this was funny. There’s been a story about actors being cut out of shows going around Facebook and various websites. There was a storyline on “The Big Bang Theory” with one of the main characters acting in a tv show and then their part getting cut (sorry if I’m not describing the plot correctly, but I haven’t seen that episode). The creator of the show, Chuck Lorre, always writes funny little vanity cards to show at the end of all the episodes of his shows. And for this particular episode, this was the vanity card.

In case you don’t want to click on the link, the card talks about how in this episode where one character gets cut from a tv show, an actor who booked a co-star role on the show was cut even though she was funny. Her being cut had nothing to do with how hard she worked or how great she was, it was all due to timing.

I’m pretty sure that’s what happened with my friend Ace’s part. He was funny. I know that because I was there and heard all the laughs that he got. I know that he’s a hard worker and he put everything he had into that part. But I also know that they tape more than they can air on tv. Every show has to get some cuts to fit into the time slot and allow for commercials.

This is a reality of the job. You work so hard to get the job and sometimes, you never see your work. It’s happened to me before and I know it will happen to me again.

But even with not knowing if you will ever get to see your hard work air on tv, the movie screen, or your computer screen; it is still the most amazing job in the world. And I will continue to share when I book things (or when my friends do) because I know one day the hard work will be shown to the world and it will all be worth it.

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Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff

Tagged 2 Broke Girls, acting, TV, work

A Free Weekday (or Planning Ahead For Fun Things)

Posted on January 21, 2014 | Comments Off

While I was out sick last week from work, I missed some schedule changes that were made. So when I returned on Friday, I learned that we were going to have Monday off because of the MLK Holiday. I still ended up working on Sunday so it didn’t feel like an extra day off, but it was a pleasant surprise.

A lot of times with these extra days off I try to plan some sort of adventure. But since I’m still in recovery mode from this cold, I tried to take it easy but have a fun time as well.

I went out to lunch with my friend Kate. She’s currently job hunting so I wanted to catch up on that with her. And I had my usual randomness to catch her up on. Since I will be unemployed soon, we are trying to figure out some fun outings to go on when we both are out of work. One thing that is definitely on our list is to go to California Adventure at Disneyland. Kate has never been in that part of Disneyland before and I told her that she has to do it (she agrees with me).

After a nice lunch, I continued on my adventures by doing a little shopping for a trip that I have in a few months. My sister-in-law, Krystle, and I are going to New York for a few days in March. I don’t really need too much stuff for that trip, but there is a new Nordstrom’s Rack I wanted to check out and shopping for that trip was a good excuse.

I’m still not in “standard” sized clothes, so shopping is still pretty tough. And the plus size clothes options are pretty pathetic. But I did managed to find a 100% cashmere sweater that was only $40. So I got that. And I’m still on the lookout for a trench coat for my trip. I don’t really own any rain coats or nice jackets and I’m pretty sure that I will need that for my trip. It might not be as cold in March as it is right now in New York, but it will probably be colder than it is right now in LA (where it’s been 75 degrees and sunny every day).

Shopping for the trip is really getting me excited about it. Krystle and I really need to get on top of doing some planning. We have our flights and hotel booked, but that’s it so far. But I’m looking forward to doing whatever we end up doing because I haven’t been to New York since the summer I turned 17.

After my shopping (where it seemed everyone was shopping because it took me almost an hour to pay), I headed back home to do what I usually do on Sundays to prepare for a full work week (grocery shop, clean, do laundry). I’m starting to feel almost back to normal again and I feel like taking the time yesterday to have some fun has really gotten me ready to be back at work for a full week.

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Posted in Fun Stuff, Health, Shopping, Tough Stuff, Travel, Work

Tagged cold, day off, friends, holidays, lunch, New York, plus size, shopping, sick

Enough With Being Sick (or Holy Moly I’m Craving Exercise)

Posted on January 20, 2014 | Comments Off

I really spent most of last week being sick. I worked on Monday and stayed home Tuesday and Wednesday knowing that I was way too sick to work. I went in to work on Thursday but as soon as my boss saw me, he sent me home. I guess I looked pretty sick still. I finally returned to work on Friday but I still wasn’t completely better.

I’m not so good at sitting at home waiting to get better, but that’s what I had to do. For those few days I was sick, even walking down my driveway seemed to wear me out. And I didn’t feel too sick while I was sick, which bothered me a lot. I felt like I could do whatever but then when I tried it I was exhausted. But I did manage to make it out of my house each day while sick.

I’m writing this on Sunday and I’m still not completely better. I had to stop taking decongestants because you can only take them so many days in a row. But I’m still not able to breathe out of my nose all the time. It’s pretty annoying.

Midway through the week, I really wanted to go to SoulCycle. Obviously with a fever I couldn’t go. But I was so shocked that I craved working out. That’s a new thing for me. Normally I’m looking for ways to get out of a workout, not ways to tell myself that I’m healthy enough to go.

But I think I need to wait until I can breathe through my nose before doing a workout like spinning. So I’m still waiting to return. Hopefully in the next few days all my congestion will go away.

I’ve got a few weeks left at work before we are supposed to go on another break and I really want to make the most of my time there before not having any income (outside of unemployment). Being out this past week really didn’t help. But I’m taking extra shifts working at shows on the weekends. I did one tonight (Sunday) and I’m scheduled to do another one this upcoming Saturday night. Every little bit helps. And working is helping me to start feeling like I’m healthy again.

Even though being sick totally sucks, I’m still trying to look at the positives. I used to get sick a lot more often. Before my tonsils came out a few years ago, I seems to have strep throat or a cold every other month. Now, since I don’t have my tonsils anymore, I seem to only get sick twice a year. And I have to be very grateful that I got sick now and not at a time that I’m visiting my parents. My mom is still going through chemo (only 2 more left!!!) and she cannot get sick. I don’t know if it will be the same when she’s going through radiation, but I know that if I was home this past week, it could have been very very bad for my mom.

Hopefully this will be the last post about me being sick for a while.

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Posted in Fitness, Health, Tough Stuff

Tagged cancer, chemo, cold, job, sick, time off, work

Monthly Archives: January 2014

One Last Work Happy Hour (or I Guess I Really Am Unemployed Now)

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Time For A Celebration! (or A Pie Date)

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Take Two With Day One Of Unemployment (or Doing Some Fun Stuff, Finally!)

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An Interesting Start To My Unemployment (or Trying To Always Look At The Positives)

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Day One Of Unemployment (or Trying To Not Stress Out)

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400 Posts (or Wow, That’s A Lot Of Writing!)

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Going With The Flow (or When Craziness Happens, Sometimes You Can’t Do Anything)

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Another Cut On “2 Broke Girls” (or I’m Glad I Went To The Taping)

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A Free Weekday (or Planning Ahead For Fun Things)

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Enough With Being Sick (or Holy Moly I’m Craving Exercise)

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Monthly Archives: January 2014

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