Category Archives: Work

What I Plan To Do This Year (or 2015 Goals)

Posted on January 1, 2015 | 5 comments

Now that I’ve reflected back on my 2014 goals and how well I accomplished them, I really thought hard about what I want my 2015 goals to be. I think I’ve got a good list going for this year and I’m excited to see how well I get them done over the next year.

My first goal is workout related. I want to get 175 workouts done in 2015. That’s pretty much 3-4 workouts every week of the year. I’m not allowing myself workout vacation time (even though my dad did suggest it). I’m sure a majority of the 175 workouts will be at Orangetheory. I have every intention of going at least 3 times a week (and trying to add in a 4th day every other week). But I’m also going to include any 5Ks that I chose to do this year as well as other fitness classes (SoulCycle and maybe trying yoga again). I will also consider including hiking, but I don’t think I’ll have a lot of hiking days except when I get to Tahoe in the summer.

My next goal is a food goal. I want to have home cooked dinners at least 4 times a week. Since I started bulk cooking, I’ve been eating something home cooked most weeknights. I usually prepare food for 4 nights and then on weekends I’m out. And many times on Tuesdays or Thursdays (when I don’t workout after my day job) I don’t necessarily eat dinner. I’ll have a big late breakfast (since my shift doesn’t start until 10am) and then have another bigger meal around 4 or 5pm. Both of those meals are home cooked, but I don’t know if it counts as dinner. So I’m saying home cooked dinners 4 nights a week. If I do more than that, all the better for me.

Next is a day job goal. I want to be down to 2 main day jobs (not counting babysitting or running the film festival). Right now, I have 1 main day job and 6 sporadic jobs. I don’t make enough each week (to the point that I’m still collecting unemployment to make up for the fact that I don’t make enough to not be eligible anymore) and this needs to end. I’m enjoying my box office from home job and if I made enough doing that job I’d be so happy. But I don’t think that will be a reality even with the raise we are supposed to get this year. And while I love being able to make some extra money babysitting, I don’t see that as something that will make enough to make up for what I’m lacking. So I need to find one more steady day job that has regular hours to help me make enough to pay all my bills comfortably. There is a chance to make the film festival another main day job, but there is no guarantee with that.

And I’ve made this a goal in the past, but I really want to get into an improv class this year. I think that now that I feel secure with my day job and have a steady schedule with it, I will be able to pick out a class time that will work for me. I’m working on saving up the money for the class right now.

Again, another repeat goal from last year, but I’d like to travel again this year. I have a trip to Napa planned in 2 months and I’m really looking forward to that. And there is a possibility of another New York trip in the fall this year. I don’t know if I’ll have any other trips (besides visiting my parents or grandparents) but 2 trips in one year sounds wonderful to me!

And my final goal which is a goal every year is to keep blogging. Not just on here, but on other sites as well. I freelance on two blogs and I’ve written a few guest posts on other sites. I had no idea when I started this blog how important and therapeutic writing would become for me. It’s an amazing journal of the past few years of my life and I love going back and reading some of my old posts to remind me how far I’ve come. And I can’t wait to track 2015 the same way.

So those are my main goals for 2015. And in a year, I’ll let you all know how I did with them.

You Might Also Like

Default Thumbnail2015 Recap (or How I Did On My Goals) Default ThumbnailMy 2016 Goals (or I’ve Got Some Big Ideas This Year) Default ThumbnailReflecting Back On 2014 (or How I Did With My Goals) Default Thumbnail2014 Goals (or Hoping To Get More Goals Done This Year) Default Thumbnail2020 Goals (New Year, Not All New Goals) Default ThumbnailMy 2013 Goals (or I’m Not Calling Them Resolutions This Time)

5 Comments

Posted in Acting, Celebrations, Fitness, Food, Fun Stuff, Health, Travel, Weight Loss, Work

Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

Reflecting Back On 2014 (or How I Did With My Goals)

Posted on December 31, 2014 | 1 comment

I can’t believe that 2014 is ending! It really seems like it was just a month or two ago that I was posting my goals for this year.

I just want to take some time and reflect on my year and the goals that I had set out for myself.

I really felt like 2014 was a rebuilding year for me and my family. While 2013 did have some great moments, there were also a lot of sad and stressful ones. I think of 2013 as the year that Ross and Krystle got married, that my mom was diagnosed with cancer, and my family lost two dogs. While we did technically adopt Tucker right before New Year’s Eve last year, I think of 2014 as the year he joined our family.

In 2014, so many positives happened for my family. Adopting Tucker was a big one, but the biggest was my mom being declared cancer-free. Knowing that she is ok (even though we all knew that she would be in the beginning) really has taken so much stress out of my life. I know that there are still some stressful times ahead with making sure that she stays cancer-free (and now I have annual mammograms to worry about too), but knowing that it’s all good right now just makes me so happy.

This was also a rebuilding year for me as far as my health goes. I have finally connected with a workout in a way that I had hoped for. And very recently I’ve been getting my food in a better place too. This isn’t to say that I don’t have days where I seriously struggle, but I’m taking more and more steps in the right direction.

So let’s take a look back at my goals from last year and see how I did with them.

My first goal was to continue to do 5Ks. I did 3 this year. And while that is much less than the year prior, I’m ok with that. I don’t love doing 5Ks as much as I want to, but the few races that I did do are ones that I look forward to a lot. I also got a new PR which I am very excited about!

My next goal was to make spin a regular habit. This did not happen. I stopped going to SoulCycle a while ago because I have replaced it with Orangetheory. I’m planning on going back next year every so often to spin, but I really wanted to focus on Orangetheory during the second half of this year. But since I did make exercise a regular habit, I’m declaring this goal as a partial success.

Next on my list was to track my food/exercise better. I’m still using MyFitnessPal to track my food every day. I’m much happier tracking it when I’m making smart choices. And as far as tracking my exercise, I think I’m doing pretty great at that too. It makes it easy to track my exercise in MyFitnessPal when Orangetheory tells me exactly how many calories I’m burning in each workout.

The next goal I had set was to get into an improv class. I failed to do this goal. I had every intention of getting started at UCB this year. I even purchased the book that all students are required to read. But I think the lack of stability with my job got to me. When I thought I knew when a class would fit into my schedule I would lose my job and everything changed. I’m feeling pretty stable with my current day job, but I’m still looking for something else to help me make enough each month. Once that stability is set, I think I can look into class again.

Next was pay down my debt and not add more. While I did pay down some of the debt, it was impossible to not add more this year. With some expenses having to be put on a credit card, there was no way to not add to it. But when I did have those expenses, I tried to pay off exactly what I spent by the time the bill came around.

Then I had the goal of going on another vacation. While I did go to visit my parents, those don’t seem to feel like vacations to me. They seem like getting to have family time. That’s probably because I’m either visiting them at the house I grew up in or I’m at their place in Tahoe. But I did get to go on a fabulous trip to New York with my sister-in-law this past spring. That trip was amazing and we are planning to try to go to New York again in the coming year.

My final goal for 2014 was to continue blogging. While some days are tough to come up with a topic to write about, I have maintained posting a new post Monday-Friday every week of this year. That’s a lot of posts!

All in all, even though I didn’t complete all of my goals, I think that I did a great job in trying to do them all. I’ll post my goals for 2015 tomorrow.

I hope that you all have an amazing New Year’s Eve tonight! If you chose to drink, please don’t drive. Take a taxi/Uber/Lyft to get home. Or you can call AAA for a Tipsy Tow.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailLooking Back At 2013 (or Where Did The Year Go?) Default Thumbnail2014 Goals (or Hoping To Get More Goals Done This Year) Default ThumbnailReflecting Back On 2017 (Kind Of Reaching My Goals) Default ThumbnailWhat I Plan To Do This Year (or 2015 Goals) Default ThumbnailMy 2016 Goals (or I’ve Got Some Big Ideas This Year) Default ThumbnailMy 2013 Goals (or I’m Not Calling Them Resolutions This Time)

1 Comment

Posted in Acting, Celebrations, Family, Fitness, Food, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff, Travel, Weight Loss, Work

Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Getting Too Comfortable (or Getting Ready To Quit)

Posted on November 19, 2014 | 2 comments

I’m in a very comfortable spot right now with my day jobs. The national box office job is going really well and I just got a raise. While customers are still mean to me all the time, I’m getting used to that, and my co-workers experience the same things so I know it’s not just me.

I’m getting babysitting jobs most weekends now too. While I don’t make a ton of money all the time babysitting, ever little bit helps. So many of the jobs I get are only 3 or 4 hours, so it’s not too hard and many times the kids are already sleep when I get there so I spend my evening reading on someone else’s couch.

The survey coding job is the weird spot in my life right now. I put in my availability every week, but I’m averaging 1 hour of work a month for them right now. That’s nothing (especially since that pay seems to be cut in half by taxes).

Obviously, I need to move on from the survey coding job. They don’t need me when I can work and some of the emails they’ve sent to us employees have been pretty rude and condescending.

My boss had asked me if I could work an overnight shift on a particular evening. I said that I was only available until 11pm because I had to be up early the next morning. The next email was a mini-rant from him about how he never asks for overnight shifts unless he’s desperate and I better have a good excuse why I can’t work. I sent another email explaining that I had to work early the next morning and I would be willing to come in until 11pm. I never got another email back after that and I didn’t show up for that shift because I was never told that I was scheduled.

They are using me so few hours each month that I could probably quit that job now and not see a financial hit in my life. I’m still struggling because I make very little money, but that extra $8 a month isn’t going to affect me too much. But I’m choosing not to leave that job until I have another one lined up.

What that other one might be is the issue. I have no clue what types of jobs to look for next. I know when I can work and how my jobs are structured, so I have some idea of the time that I can devote to another job.

It’s just too bad that this survey coding job isn’t going to work out for me unless something major happens. I really thought that it would be a great match for me, but it turns out that either they are not getting the amount of work that they were expecting or they don’t need work done when I’m available.

The one thing that irks me about eventually leaving this job is that this will be the second time I have left work with this company. It’s the same company that did the movie recruiting, and I quit doing that pretty quickly as I realized that it was not the right job for me. I’m not going to leave this job this time because it’s not a good match for me, but I need a job that will give me work. And I can’t keep keeping hours free for a job that doesn’t use me.

My time is worth more than that and I know that there is another job that will fit into my schedule that will be just right for me.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailBeing On Hold With A Job (or Not Quite A Quitter) Default Thumbnail6 Jobs Not Enough? (or How Can It Be That I’m Still Underemployed?) Default ThumbnailDay Job News (or Things Are Getting Better) Default ThumbnailGoodbye To July (or Looking Forward To Having Steady Work In August) Default ThumbnailUnderemployment Is Frustrating (or Trying To Find The Balance Of Flexibility And Work Hours) Default ThumbnailBack To Real Life (or One Week Of Normalcy)

2 Comments

Posted in Tough Stuff, Work

Tagged , , , ,

Adventures In Customer Service (or Trying Not To Be The Bad Call)

Posted on November 7, 2014 | 1 comment

I’ve worked in customer service for many of my day jobs. Most of the time, I’ve been interacting with customers in person. But with my telesales job and my current box office job, I’m just doing customer service work on the phone (or in a chat feature like at my current job).

When I worked in telesales, I did discover that I was being much nicer to telemarketers on the phone. I didn’t hang up on them (unless they were robo calls) and if it was something that I know I wouldn’t be interested in, I would politely ask to be put on the do not call list.

But things have changed since I started my current box office job. I’ve had some really crazy customers since day one. I’ve never been threatened more at a job than with this one. Customers tell me that they are going to have me arrested to show up at a show and demand to see me so I can apologize for doing whatever they believed is wrong.

First of all, what saves me every day are my co-workers. While none of us work in the same city (I think only 1 other employee works in California), we are able to chat with each other through the chat feature while we work. We can ask if someone had previously spoke with a customer. Many times, customers will say that someone else told them that they could do something that is against the rules. I check with my co-workers to see who spoke to them and exactly what was said. That way, I can let the customer know that the information that they got from one of my co-workers is correct and I’m not able to bend the rules for them.

For some of the more detailed issues, we just direct them back to the location that they are attending. This is all done by email, so we have records of when we passed on a customer. Since a lot of the tough issues are not dealt with the box office, I’m grateful for that.

But ever since starting this job, I’ve noticed a change in how I deal with customer service people on the phone. I don’t believe that I have ever been mean to anyone, but I’m learning what preparation goes into making sure everything is done correctly.

For example, I ordered a DVD box set for my brother for his birthday. It was a pre-order so I knew it would take a bit of time to be shipped. I got an email 2 weeks ago saying that it would be shipped then, but there was no tracking number. I also had a charge and a refund on my credit card.

Before contacting customer service, I gathered all the information that I had gotten from the company. I knew when emails were sent to me, when the charge and refund was on my card, and when they claimed they would be shipping the DVDs. When I got a hold of customer service, I presented all my information and she was easily able to find out what happened and what went wrong (they are finally shipping the DVDs this month now).

I also recently called an Orangetheory location down in San Diego. I will be there for Thanksgiving and my dad, my brother, and my aunt all want to take a class with me on Thanksgiving. When I called the first time, the guy I spoke to seemed very confused by my request to schedule a class. He took down my information, but nothing seemed right.

After going to my Orangetheory and getting some more information about my membership from them, I called the San Diego location again to get everything straightened out.

The woman who I spoke to on the phone the second time kept saying how great it was that I was prepared to schedule everything and that I had all the information in front of me. It made her job simpler and allowed the problems to be corrected (it was mainly some typos and the previous employee using a different account to schedule my class).

Basically, from being yelled at on the phone every workday at least once, I’ve really learned that there is no reason to not do everything that I can do to make a customer service call as easy as possible. It’s not just about being nice (although that helps and I wish more customers were nice to me), it’s about knowing what had happened with your interactions with the company in the past and knowing what you need to have accomplished (as long as it is possible and not breaking any rules).

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailBeing The New Employee (or Starting Yet Another Day Job) Default ThumbnailAdventures In Banking (or More Customer Service Stories) Default ThumbnailHaving My Patience Tested (or Taking Deep Breaths) Default ThumbnailBeing Upset With Customer Service (or Trying Not To Be The Type Of Customer I Hate) Default ThumbnailExcellent Customer Service (or A New Fitbit) Default ThumbnailA+ Customer Service (or Loving Benefit)

1 Comment

Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff, Work

Tagged , , , ,

Food Plans (or Working From Home Does Have Some Diet Benefits)

Posted on October 31, 2014 | Comments Off on Food Plans (or Working From Home Does Have Some Diet Benefits)

I’m basically only working from home now. It’s probably going to stay like that since any additional jobs I add on will pretty much have to be done while I’m working my other job (unless I find a night/weekend job).

I used to have such trouble with lunches when I worked outside of my house. Remembering to pack and bring my lunch was one issue. The other was the temptation of all the other food available nearby work.

I don’t have that issue anymore. My work hours are 10-3 and I don’t really get a lunch break. I’m able to step away from my computer to eat lunch, but I pretty much stay at my desk because I never know when a chat or phone call will come in.

Because of this, I’m eating pretty much at home for all my meals. My breakfasts on work days are almost always toast and peanut butter. It keeps me full and it’s not too bad calorie wise.

Dinners are a lot of prepackaged meals, but I’m still considering that better than ordering pizza or Chinese food delivery. I’m again being careful with the calories, but I know that there are things in the prepackaged meals that I don’t need.

Lunch is a little tricky since I am pretty much eating at my desk and have to stop every so often to help a customer. I’m working on finding things that I can eat over a long period of time incase I get stuck helping a customer for a long time. I’m really liking the egg white salad mix from Trader Joes. I eat that by itself with a piece of fruit (that’s exactly what I did yesterday). Also, the premade salads from Trader Joes are really yummy and don’t go bad or get weird if you don’t eat it all right away.

I’m finally out of my food rut of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I’ve told myself I can only have peanut butter once a day and right now, I’m really liking it for breakfast.

I know that I need to start cooking more and stop eating the prepackaged food, but I’m looking at this a baby steps. I haven’t had any fast food for a long time (easily over a month ago) and I haven’t been ordering delivery food either. I’m finally getting those bad habits out of my system.

Now I need to focus on the next step of introducing more good habits in. This is such a long process for me and I know that I need to be patient. I’m just trying to focus on the steps I have done so far and not how many more I need to go.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailStill Figuring Out Meal Planning (or Will Food Ever Be Easy For Me?) Default ThumbnailFood Scheduling (or Trying Out New Things) Default ThumbnailGetting Back To Better Food (or Finding My Own Balance) Default ThumbnailCheating With Pie (or Trying To Splurge The Right Way) Default ThumbnailWorking On Figuring It Out (or I Wish This Was Easier) Default ThumbnailBringing More Food Back Into My Diet (or Staying Vegetarian For Now)

Comments Off on Food Plans (or Working From Home Does Have Some Diet Benefits)

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

Tagged , , , ,

Sometimes It’s Not About Me (or Not Freaking Out)

Posted on October 23, 2014 | 1 comment

This past Tuesday, I was supposed to have an in-person interview for a babysitting job with the mom who didn’t want to hire me for a previous job because she could not read my entire background check.

This in-person interview was discussed during a phone interview I had with her last week. I had requested that she send me a formal interview request through UrbanSitter (the babysitting site I’m registered on) so that I would have all of her information and the request would block off my calendar so other families don’t request me for the same time.

I didn’t think too much more about it because the mom promised to put the request in.

Then the weekend came and I heard nothing from her. I sent her a message on UrbanSitter mentioning that she had said she wanted to do an in-person interview but I had not received the request yet. I let her know that I was keeping that time open to her and not accepting jobs with other families.

I still heard nothing back from her.

I started to freak out. What did I do wrong? Did the mom read my previous post and didn’t like what I said (although I don’t think that I made her sound bad)?

I really started going back in my head every encounter I had with this mom (which was pretty much 2 phone calls and a few messages through UrbanSitter) and couldn’t figure out what I had done wrong that she was no longer interested in interviewing me for this other position she needed filled (basically a driver for her daughter who is a child actor).

Finally on Tuesday, I realized that I was not going to hear from this mom through the UrbanSitter app. She might not get alerts that there are messages waiting for her like I do. So I looked up her phone number from our phone interview request on the app and called her and left her a voicemail. This already made me nervous because I don’t like sending messages to parents outside the app without previous discussing that.

About 30 seconds after hanging up the phone, I got a text message from the mom. She forgot that she had said she wanted to do an in-person interview that day and was out of town on business. She asked if we could reschedule when she was back in town.

I sent the mom a text back saying that I would be happy to reschedule and it wasn’t a problem that she forgot.

I felt so stupid for worrying about this. I did nothing wrong so why had I been so worried? But this is a common issue for me. I’ve had this with all of my day jobs. Whenever I’ve been called in to speak with my boss, my first instinct is that I did something wrong and I’m about to be fired. This is probably because I’ve had so many horrible day jobs in the past.

But I’m trying to think positively about my day jobs. I know that I’m doing great work and that my bosses know that I’m working as hard as I can. But sadly, that little negative part of my brain keeps acting up. I just need to learn how to make it quiet.

 

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailThinking I’m Good Enough (or Not Freaking Out Over An Email) Default ThumbnailMissing Out To Make Money (or Realizing When I’m Over-scheduled) Default ThumbnailInterview Time! (or Maybe I Can Find Another Perfect Day Job) Default ThumbnailShooting In Santa Monica (or A Little Too Close To Home) Default ThumbnailAdventures In Customer Service (or Trying Not To Be The Bad Call) Default ThumbnailBeing Smart But Playing Dumb (or Adventures In Job Hunting)

1 Comment

Posted in Tough Stuff, Work

Tagged , , ,

Having My Patience Tested (or Taking Deep Breaths)

Posted on October 17, 2014 | Comments Off on Having My Patience Tested (or Taking Deep Breaths)

Lately, it’s felt like my patience has been tested all the time.

This mainly is work related, but my personal life has had its moments too.

At work, my main day job is working for the box office job I have. Even at my old box office job I dealt with a lot of angry people who wanted certain seats that aren’t available or want to attend a show on a date that isn’t happening. But since they knew that we wired at the theater, I think people were a bit nicer because they knew that we might eventually meet them.

At the new box office job, people pretty much know that they will not see us. There are always a couple of customers each week who are threatening me on the phone about suing me or having me arrested. What prompts this is usually either unavailable tickets or not having all the answers and having to pass on a message to the particular location that they are going to attend. Most of the customers are nice, but when you get a really angry one, it sticks out in your head.

Thankfully, I can use the chat feature to chat with my co-workers in other locations. We help each other out when we can and if we need a moment to vent, we are there for each other as well. This also has been extremely helpful when a customer contacts us multiple times hoping to get a different answer from a different person.

I’ve also noticed my patience being tested regarding babysitting jobs. First of all, many parents put out a job request to a dozen or so sitters. And whoever responds back first gets the job. So I keep seeing jobs getting cancelled on me because I’m not fast enough to respond (usually I respond within 10 minutes but there are some people who are very fast).

I’m also hearing from multiple parents that they need to see my background check before they can hire me. I’ve passed the background check that the service I use has and it says so on my online profile. But parents want to read it all before they consider me. So I contacted the background check company and they are mailing me a hard copy of the background check. My plan is to scan it in to my computer so I can email it out if necessary (after blacking out my address and social security number).

And in my personal life, it’s not too bad, but all of it adding up has gotten to me a bit. When I moved into my house 4.5 years ago, my landlord promised to re-do my kitchen. He would have done it before I moved in, but I didn’t want to have to wait an extra month. I never really heard back from my landlord on when he would fix my kitchen, but since he wasn’t raising my rent, I stayed quiet.

Now that my rent is raised every year, I want things that were promised to me to be done. Finally last week, the handyman came to my house and took all the measurements for my new kitchen counter. It was supposed to be done by Wednesday of this week.

On Tuesday, the handyman told me that the shop screwed up cutting the counter and that the new one won’t be ready for another week or so.

I shouldn’t let this bother me, but it did. I’m still getting my new kitchen counters (and refusing the clean my old ones since they are about to be trashed). I just need to be ok with things not being done when promised.

All of this has been a big lesson in patience. I’ve always considered myself a patient person, but realizing how this has all tested me has proved that there is room for improvement for me.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailA Challenge For A Weird Month (or French And Deep Breaths) Default ThumbnailSometimes It’s Not About Me (or Not Freaking Out) Default ThumbnailHappy Birthday To FMIB! (or 2 Years And Finally Taking Myself Seriously As A Writer) Default ThumbnailNo More Playing Victim (or Taking Control) Default ThumbnailAnother Leak In My House (or Testing My Patience) Default ThumbnailLearning More Patience (or Figuring Out Where I Can Succeed)

Comments Off on Having My Patience Tested (or Taking Deep Breaths)

Posted in Tough Stuff, Work

Tagged , , ,

Missing Out To Make Money (or Realizing When I’m Over-scheduled)

Posted on October 14, 2014 | Comments Off on Missing Out To Make Money (or Realizing When I’m Over-scheduled)

This past Saturday I had a really full day planned. And sadly, I wasn’t able to get everything done that I wanted to.

First I had my day job. Saturdays are 8am-11am (even when I’m working my normal hours). Then I had a girls empowerment event that I won tickets for right after that.

It was going to be tight for me to make it to the event after work. The check in for the event started at 10:30am and went until 11:30am. And even if I left my house the second my clock said 11am, it would be at least 30 minutes for me to drive there and to park.

But I was willing to be late because that’s the only other thing I had scheduled for my day.

Except that I forgot to change my availability on UrbanSitter and got a job request for Saturday evening for babysitting. I spoke with that mom on the phone and it turns out that they live pretty much across the street from me.

So as much as I wanted to go to the event, I would have arrived late and would have had to leave early to make it to the babysitting job. So it just didn’t work out for me to go.

I was a little disappointed because I really was looking forward to the event, but I had to focus on working money-making jobs.

And I’m glad that I did. The family that I babysat for had 1 kid and I was his first babysitter outside of family members. And he was a very sweet boy who listened really well. The job went really easily and the family told me in person (and wrote in a review about me on UrbanSitter) that they will be using me again as a babysitter in the future.

That’s important to me. I need to find work wherever I can. And babysitting for date nights and other occasional times really is a great way for me to help supplement my income (and it really needs to be supplemented right now). And the fact that this family is just a walk across the street is amazing! I haven’t had a babysitting job I could walk to since high school.

I’m working on not having a “fear of missing out” feeling or attitude, but it’s hard not to feel that way a little. But it’s my own fault for not adjusting my availability for babysitting. And honestly, it probably worked out for the best this way.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailGetting My Butt In Gear (or Missing Out On Fun Stuff To Work) Default ThumbnailBeing On Hold With A Job (or Not Quite A Quitter) Default ThumbnailDri-Tri (or Suffering From Fear Of Missing Out) Default ThumbnailMissing Out On Some Fun (or Flexible Time Management) Default ThumbnailBusy Unemployment (or Maybe I Over Scheduled) Default ThumbnailA Bit Over-Scheduled (or Starting To Stress Out)

Comments Off on Missing Out To Make Money (or Realizing When I’m Over-scheduled)

Posted in Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff, Work

Tagged , , , ,

Early Days (or 2 Weeks Of Long Shifts)

Posted on October 10, 2014 | 1 comment

For the past 2 weeks, I’ve been working 2 hours earlier than usual at my new box office job. And I’m still finishing at my usual time so I’m working 8 extra hours a week.

I agreed to this because one of my co-workers has been shooting a movie and he wasn’t able to work. So I agree to help cover his shifts.

Having this happen so early in my time with this new job really has been good. It reassured me that if/when I need to take some time off for booked work it can be done without having to be laid off. And I’ve proven myself to be a reliable employee by agreeing to start early.

It hasn’t been easy working longer hours sitting at my computer. I’m trying to get up every so often and just walk around my living room. I can’t go too far in case the phone rings or a chat comes up, but I need the time to stretch.

It also was tough making sure that I could get all my morning stuff done before I started working. Even when I was working as a recruiting assistant from home, I always was dressed and out of my pjs when I worked. I’m doing the same thing now. Every morning, instead of waking up and making breakfast in my pjs before getting ready to start working, I’m now not leaving my room until I’m ready to work. I make my bed and get dressed (even though it’s usually just yoga pants and a tank top) before walking into the rest of my house and starting my morning.

I’ve never really done that before and it does seem to make a difference in my day. Instead of easing into my day, I feel more urgency to get work done in the morning. I’m supposed to go back to my usual start time next week, but I think I am going to continue this new routine of not leaving my room until I’m fully ready for my day.

While the extra money has been really nice, I am looking forward to getting back to my normal schedule. There are some things in the morning that I like to get done before work (like checking email and catching up on the news) that lately I’ve had to do either between calls (there is a decent amount of downtime) or at 3pm when I’m done working.

And while the search for another day job continues, I’m starting to get more referrals to jobs, which makes me happy. I got this box office job off of a referral and I always feel more confident getting work that way. I’ve got 2 referrals for jobs right now (one as a virtual assistant and one as a personal organizer) and I’m just waiting to see if anything comes of either (or both!) of those.

I know that I’ve gone through the adjustment phase of a new job several times by now, but I really do like once I’m settled into a routine and I can pretty much schedule out how everything in my day will go. It’s nice that I’ve gotten to that place again.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailDouble Time (or 2 Days Of Split Shifts) Default ThumbnailMissing Out To Make Money (or Realizing When I’m Over-scheduled) Default ThumbnailGetting Too Comfortable (or Getting Ready To Quit) Default ThumbnailNew Routine Time (or Time Management At Home) Default ThumbnailProductive One Way And Slacking In Another (or Working On Finding Time) Default ThumbnailMaking Busy Days Busier (or I Guess I Like To Maximize Only Certain Days)

1 Comment

Posted in Fun Stuff, Tough Stuff, Work

Tagged , , , ,

Fall Cleaning (or Making My Workplace Spotless)

Posted on October 3, 2014 | 2 comments

I’ve always tried to keep a clean house. I do my laundry weekly, vacuum at least weekly (now that I have a vacuum again), and seem to dust and wipe down various surfaces in my house a hundred times a day.

The one place that hasn’t been super clean has been my desk. It’s not dirty, but until recently it never looked that dirty.

But now that I’m working at my desk and computer a good portion of the day 5 days a week, I’ve noticed that things have gotten a little grimy.

The one positive about being chained to my desk so many hours a day is that now I’ve cut down my computer time to only be when I’m working and then again in the evening (which is when I typically write my posts).

The bad thing is that I’m noticing the grime more and more since I have to stare at it for so long.

One day after work I searched online for how to clean the body of my laptop (I have a MacBook Pro). There were a ton of posts that came up and most had one thing in common.

They said to use a Magic Eraser.

I don’t own Magic Erasers so I went to the store to get one and see if this trick worked (and hoped it wouldn’t ruin my laptop).

It was pretty simple. Wet the Magic Eraser and then wring out most of the water. You want it to be damp and not dripping.

Then you can start cleaning. I first shut down my laptop and disconnected the power source (most websites didn’t suggest this but it seemed like common sense to me). Then I gently wiped the body of my laptop with the Magic Eraser.

It totally lived up to its name!

No joke, it was only a minute before my laptop looked clean again.

IMG_3834

And it worked so well, I cleaned the grime off my desk quickly too!

IMG_3835

I know I sound like a commercial for Magic Eraser. I swear I’m not. I’m just impressed at a product that really cleaned well and easily and figured that some of you might want to know how to de-grime a laptop too.

Now I have another weekly cleaning task to add to my list.

You Might Also Like

Default ThumbnailAnother Monthly Challenge (or What To Do When You Are Crazy Busy) Default ThumbnailFull Day At The New Job (or Seeing My Old Workplace Abandoned) Default ThumbnailWorking On Cleaning (or Time To Declutter) Default ThumbnailSpring Cleaning (or Needing To Declutter Again) Default ThumbnailFeeling Like A Fresh Start (or Spring Cleaning and New Toys) Default ThumbnailIs It Too Early To Be Spring Cleaning? (or Out With The Unused)

2 Comments

Posted in Fun Stuff, Work

Tagged , , ,