Tagged: thedayjob

16
May
2023

UNREASONABLE EXPECTATIONS

Work is crazy right now. Which makes me laugh, because when is work ever not crazy? Work is ALWAYS crazy. The stream of incoming work is always equal to or bigger than the stream of finished, closed work each day. Even though I truly love my job, and what I do, sometimes it’s a lot. Sometimes you just want to take a breath and sit back for a minute. Sometimes you just want to be able to really concentrate on designing something excellent, instead of putting out fires and scrambling to get things done as quickly as possible because you’ve...

30
Mar
2023

HOME-ISH

I’ve been in the US for nearly 2 weeks, and it’s mostly weird to be here. I don’t know if that’s because I’m in the Carolinas instead of Michigan or because I’ve been away from the US for so long. I’ve read that it only takes about 5 years for someone who has moved abroad to find things have changed so much in their home country that when they return it’s like coming to a foreign country. One that SHOULD feel like home, SHOULD smell like home, SHOULD behave like home, but doesn’t. I’ve not been back for 4.5 years,...

14
Mar
2023

HOMEBODY

There seems to be a fundamental battle shaping up after the pandemic, between employers and employees, in regards to working from home. Before the pandemic, we all basically worked in the office (at least those of us with white-collar office jobs). Now, three-plus years later, we’ve learned, adapted, and adjusted to the hybrid reality of post-pandemic work. My company began sending people home part-time fairly quickly once the pandemic became a known issue, and we went home full-time before the end of 2020. We worked from home for nearly 2.5 years, with lots of benefits and help with materials and...

06
Feb
2023

RESUMÉ

Three men seen at the same time, at the same crosswalk, in Malmö: one wearing a full dress tuxedo tails riding a bicycle standing on the pedals with flowers in the front basket one walking, wearing a bright green tracksuit, holding a large globe of the Earth one leaning on a bike, waiting for the light to turn, with a HUGE blonde afro (at least a foot out from his head or more) and a ginger beard When we were at our friends’ Mats’ birthday party some weeks ago, his nephew Jon, who is now 32 but whom we’ve known...

14
Jul
2022

IT’S NEVER TOO LATE TO BE WHAT YOU MIGHT HAVE BEEN*

I’ve got the house to myself. I would say that is just how I like it, but that’s not always the case. I wonder if all parents secretly wish their kids were at home just so they knew where they were and that they were okay. I have one in Detroit (visiting friends) and one in Gothenburg (took the day off to go to Liseberg amusement park…and drove the Tesla there). Anders is on an overnight trip with work…with his NEW JOB. I think what I like is that 1) it’s quiet and 2) it’s clean and 3) I can...

12
Jul
2022

HOW SWEET IT IS

Look at me posting again! Whee! Russell helped me add a Contact page last night, and we fixed some formatting issues on the About page, and he added a captcha safety measure to the comments form so that I don’t get bombarded with spam. I don’t expect I will, regardless, as I don’t link to my blog much or advertise it publicly, but you never know. *** We had a cake party at work this afternoon, and I’m still on a sugar buzz. Helen, who is a friend, and the Marketing Director’s assistant, took it upon herself to organize a...

18
Mar
2022

WASTING TIME ON BEHAVIORAL BALONEY

What do you do when you find out that everything you thought you knew about yourself is wrong? That’s what happened to me yesterday. A few months ago, at work, we were informed that we were going to be taking part in something called a DISC analysis, organized by HR. It’s apparently something the entire department, and possibly the entire company, are doing. DISC is, according to its own website, “a personal assessment tool used by more than one million people every year to help improve teamwork, communication, and productivity in the workplace.” Our HR representative marketed it my team...

21
Feb
2022

NOT SO SWEET SIXTEEN

My yearly goal for 2022 is to do art every month. I did a pencil drawing of a cat for January (and drew a self-portrait for a work contest that I can’t share yet), but for this month, I brought out my old collage book and did a spread. I still have most of my scrapbooking stuff: boxes and drawers and holders stuffed with cool textured papers, and stickers and ephemera. I just went back and looked and the last time I did a spread in the collage book was 2006. 2006! !!! That was SIXTEEN years ago. What the...

22
Sep
2021

FLEXIBLE AND FORWARD-MOVING

Today is the autumnal solstice. It’s been a week of really cold temps, steady winds, rain, and cloud cover, but today was lovely. Warm and sunny and just what I needed. Today’s the last day this week working from home, and my shoulders are up around my ears. Work is intense as always and we’re already feeling the fall crunch and that’s before we’ve really gotten started on monster project season. Last night, I prepped dinner, chopping all the veggies, pressing garlic and setting the table. Anders was out in the garage getting Karin’s car prepped as he was going...

16
Apr
2021

ALL THE THINGS

I made it through another work week, and this one without crying in front of my manager on a Teams meeting, so I call that a win. Work is still crazy but I am proud of my team for managing to keep our task queue at a reasonable level, despite the fact that we were 2 men down this past week as our freelancer wasn’t able to help us at all. Next week I have a massage scheduled and a hair appointment so I will actually be getting out of my house (more than just to the grocery store) for...

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