Militaries All Over the World

Being stationed in Germany affords the opportunity to meet and train with your military counterparts from many different nations. It wasn't unusual for our unit to conduct a joint FTX (field training exercise) with a Signal unit from another NATO country. Usually it was with British forces, since there were a number of British bases in Germany. Mostly in the north. Seems as though, after World War II, the Brits took up northern Germany and the Americans settled in southern Germany :-)

It was kind of neat, getting to interact with officers and soldiers from sister units from various countries, all while remaining in the same country of Germany. We all had the military (and, more specifically, the Signal Corps) in common, but we all came from vastly different cultures about the military.

For example, I learned that British officers live much the same way American enlisted soldiers do-- in dormitory-style buildings with shared bathrooms. By contrast, American officers live in the lap of luxury with our own apartments. I remember once arriving on the site of a joint exercise in Krefeld  around lunch time. Our host said he'd wake up one of the soldiers to fix us something to eat. Imagine my shock when he went-- not into a building, not into a tent, but... underneath a 5-ton truck! The soldiers actually draped bedskirt-like coverings all around the truck and slept underneath it!

And while there has always been a clear social divide between American officers and American enlisted, that divide is even sharper and more stringently obeyed between British officers and British enlisted. I remember when we all came back from the field in the middle of an exercise to rest and relax over the weekend. The whole group of us Americans went out to eat, and, of course, I ate with my platoon's soldiers. Who else was I going to hang out with? When we ran into a group of British soldiers at a pub later that night, they were downright amazed that I was actually socializing with my own soldiers... and with them!

The German view of the military is a complete 180 to the American view. In the US, being in the military is something that is respected and honored. In Germany, you join only because everyone is obligated to do either military or civil service after high school. Hardly anyone actually enlists to make a career out of it, and those that do? Are generally looked down upon, as if they can't do anything with their lives, so the military was their only option.

I also remember one time when we did an exercise with a German Signal unit. It was on one of the few German bases actually occupied by German troops (rather than American or British), so even though we camped out in our tents, we were able to visit the neighboring buildings to shower and eat. Since there are no women in the Germany military (or at least, there weren't when I was there-- things might have changed now?), we drew more than a fair share of odd stares when a group of us women would troop to the showers together.

All in all, it was quite enlightening to learn about the military culture of other nations. And despite our differences, our common goal of keeping peace in a non-peaceful world really reminded us that, deep down, we are all truly the same: human beings.

I'm posting every day in October as part of the 31-Day Writing Challenge. Click here to read more about it and to see the rest of my posts this month!

Army Memories... In Pictures

This year's Veteran's Day trend seems to consist of changing your Facebook profile picture to one taken while you were in uniform. I'm not usually much for such trends, plus I'm loathe to change my profile pic that often (I haven't touched it in over 3 years). But if I had to, this was the last photo taken of me in uniform:

Sometimes it seems like only yesterday that I joined ROTC at UCLA, when in reality it was almost 20 years ago. Here I am, barely eking out pushups during my first PT test, and doing rappelling for the first time. Don't you love that short hair, those braces, and those huge glasses?

Somehow I survived and graduated..

Yes, that's me being pulled out from under the barbed wire

Went on to Officer's Basic Course in Fort Gordon, GA, where we worked hard...

Hey! This was legit work! We were applying advanced skills from a knot-tying class!

... and played hard... 

Karaoke (you aren't surprised, are you?) at the Officer's Club

... and graduated, ready to tackle to the world as newly-minted and trained officers!

With my squad and our training officer during the Dining Out at the end of the course

I arrived in Germany and got my own platoon:

1st platoon, 268th Signal Company, 72nd Signal Battalion. Mannheim, Germany -- 1998

And my own Humvee:

And a really awesome platoon sergeant who really took me under his wing. 

If you can believe it, we're STANDING inside that foxhole!

Signal Ball 1998, Heidelberg, Germany

I have some really fond memories of my time in the Army. I didn't like the super-early hours, and I never did get used to running for PT, but I did learn and I did grow a lot. Plus, being stationed in Germany was an awesome way to soak up other cultures and travel around Europe! I won't re-hash everything here, but you can read more about it in a post from 4 years ago: http://heckledtrio.blogspot.com/2008/11/veterans-day-ruminations.html

Happy Veteran's Day!

The Little Things

You know how they say that it's the little things in life that you really appreciate? Well, I didn't really understand that until I got older (read: busier, especially due to a kid).

What are some of the little things that make me happy?

Knowing that I don't have to make my son's lunch for the next day. I would have to say that this tops the list. Silvergreens delivers lunch to Todd's school some days of the week, and I usually order at least one meal a week from them. I keep the monthly at-a-glance calendar on the fridge for easy reference, and I literally (yes, literally!) jump for joy and do a little happy dance when I look at the calendar and see that lunch is being delivered tomorrow. Especially on days when I'm especially frazzled already. I later discovered that I wasn't the only parent who does this happy dance, so I'm glad there are others out there who understand :-)

Being able to go to bed early. Todd isn't yet dry at night, so I usually have to stay up until at least 11:00pm in order to haul him out of bed and make sure he goes to the bathroom, before diapering him and putting him back to bed for the rest of the night. Of course, by the time that chore is done, I'm wide awake and will take time to settle back down to enough sleepiness to climb into bed-- and by then it's already midnight. So when he's out of town (as he is this week), I can take full advantage of going to bed as early as I like, without any worries!

Enjoying holidays that most private companies do not. Veteran's Day a couple weeks ago is a prime example. You see, when I left Citrix, I exchanged 16 days of PTO per year for 10 days of vacation per year at UCSB. However, sick days are counted separately from bona fide vacation days, and I get 12 of those every year. So, for true vacation days, it about evens out, time-wise. Plus the added bonus of 3 extra holidays that places like Citrix don't observe. It's kind of nice knowing you have a day off when everyone else has to work :-D

Unexpected free food at work. At Citrix this was a little more prevalent than it is here (and I'm not talking about the regular things like Bagel Wednesdays and free snacks/drinks perpetually available). Nothing is quite as nice as wondering what you're going to do for lunch, and getting ready to shell out some $$ to eat at the cafe, only to discover leftovers from a lunchtime meeting in the kitchen. But you have to act fast! Those things disappear fast! Here, a co-worker will occasionally bring in baked goods, which makes a nice breakfast treat, but that's really about it.

How about you? What are the little things in life that bring you enjoyment and pleasure?

The Perks Of My Old Job

It's been a little over two months since I left Citrix Online and started working at UCSB. I wrote a bit about the why here. Shortly before I started working here, I came across this post by Young and Thrifty, a personal finance blogger I follow. She wrote a post about the perks of your job, and at the time, I was transitioning into the new job, and really missed the perks of my old job. Funny isn't it, how easily we take things for granted when they're readily available at all times.

First up, the food:
The kitchens at Citrix Online were well-stocked with all kinds of snacks: granola bars, Cheez-Its, Wheat Thins, peanut butter crackers, Corn Nuts, peanuts, sunflower seeds, various trail mixes, popcorn, pretzels, cookies. Whatever you had a hankering for, something was guaranteed to satisfy it.

Every Wednesday the Tech group was treated to free bagels with a wide assortment of cream cheeses. I could never decide on which cream cheese to get, so my bagel always ended up looking like a Christmas ornament-- 1/3 honey walnut, 1/3 strawberry, 1/3 blueberry.

And to keep things healthful, there was always fresh fruit onhand: apples, bananas, strawberries and grapes.

Then there was the drinks:
We had fancy coffee machines that dispensed a variety of different coffees and hot chocolate. You could control what kind of milk you got, and what flavorings were added. 
There were tons of Tazo teas in addition to the standard Lipton. I usually drank these.

There were sodas: your standard Coke, Diet Coke, root beer, Dr. Pepper, Mountain Dew
Other cold drinks included apple juice, orange juice, Snapple (various flavors-- both regular and diet), lemonade, pineapple juice, and V-8.

Even the water had plenty of options! There was ice, cold water, hot water, room temperature water, and even fizzy water!

And a lot of other things:
The work-life balance is pretty enviable. For the engineers, at least, the hours were relatively flexible. You had people working all kinds of hours, from the standard 8-5 to a typical engineer's 10-7 :-) And when not in the office, our own remote access products enabled us to easily work from home anytime, whether we simply felt like it, or had to stay home to mind a sick child without taking time off.

There are plenty of ways to take a break at work, besides feasting on the myriad of snacks and drinks in the kitchen ;-) Each of the buildings on the Citrix Online campus housed something different in its break room. One building has billiards. Another has foosball. Yet another has ping pong. And all have some large-screen TVs featuring either cable channels or an electronic game system, such as the Wii. One building even has all the equipment for Rock Band!

One unique thing about the company was the ability to bring dogs to work. We took this a step further and brought our kid to work. Twice a week Todd would come hang out with us in the afternoon, saving on after-school care costs. One day he'd be in my building, another day in Allan's. It worked especially well when he got older, and I could simply plop him in the break room to read his book, watch TV or study. He knew his way around the building well enough that he could even hit the bathroom on his own when he needed to.

Contrast that to my current job, where I think we're lucky to HAVE a communal fridge, sink and microwave to share. We just recently got a water filter installed, so now I don't have to lug water bottles back and forth from home anymore. There's no denying that I miss a lot of the perks from my old job, but so far, it's been worth the trade-off.

What kinds of perks does your job have?

The Copier Warms Up

Our ancient copy machines take forever to warm up after a night of "sleeping". I had the happy "fortune" of having to wake one of these behemoths up, as I was the first one to use them one morning. I waited, and waited, and waited. Then waited some more. Before long, I realized that the screen kept changing pictures to match the warming-up progress. I decided to take pictures of it as it went along, not realizing that I'd have a whole slew of pictures by the time the copier was completely warmed up. It probably took a good 5 minutes, but at least I was somewhat entertained throughout it all!

It began with a space shuttle, ready for launch:

I missed the shot of the space shuttle reaching the top of that... whatever that scaffolding next to is called, but there is a screen where it has risen, plumes of smoke billowing out behind it. Then came a picture of the shuttle well on its way into space:

 

Distant planets are starting to come into view:

 I see meteors and other distant galaxies!

Finally, docking with another spacecraft. And now we actually get to see astronauts floating around in space.

Did you notice something interesting-- the progress bar to the left the entire time? It started out completely filled, and then emptied as the copier warmed up. Quite the opposite of what you'd expect in a progress bar, isn't it? Usually you expect those things to fill up, not empty, as it progresses. Definitely threw me for a loop the first time I saw it.

I have to admit, this sequence of pictures was actually kind of neat. kept me entertained during the wait, at least!

The New Job at my Old Haunt

As many of you are no doubt aware, I started a new job at UCSB 2 weeks ago. I'm currently starting my third week, which is also my first full 5-day week. The first two were short ones: I started on a Tuesday, then last week was shortened due to the Labor Day holiday).

I first came to UCSB exactly 10 years ago, in the Fall of 2001, to begin my studies in computer science here. This is where I met my husband, this is where our son was born, and this is where we bought our first house. And now, 6 years after graduating, I am back-- except now I can park in some of the better-located parking lots! :-) It feels a bit strange to back on campus amongst all the young 'uns. Today's freshman class was born during my senior year of high school! How's that for perspective? A lot has changed on campus since I was last here, and I feel a mix of nostalgia as I walk by our old haunts near the Engineering building, and take in some of the new scenery that has been constructed since I left.

Anyway, I digress... the new job!

Many of you have long known that I've had aspirations to move out of the software engineering industry. I mean, the field is fun to a point, but I knew early on that this was not something I wanted to do long-term, as a career. I thought about the various types of things I'd done in my career thus far and came to the conclusion that there were a couple of things I knew I enjoyed doing, and did well. One was training, which I discussed briefly in an older blog post here. The other was basically anything that was highly-organized and highly-structured in nature.

I remember when I first arrived at the 72nd Signal Battalion headquarters in Mannheim, Germany, a brand new Army lieutenant. As part of my inprocessing, my sponsor took me to meet the Battalion Adjutant (S-1), which is essentially the equivalent of an HR manager for the unit. I remember sitting in Darren's office, thinking to myself, "this is the job I want". Sure enough, after a couple of years, I landed the job. And just as I had imagined, I loved the job. I loved the administrative nature of the job. I loved organizing and analyzing data, having it at my fingertips whenever it was needed. I loved figuring out ways to streamline our personnel processes. When it came time to write my annual review (which came close to the time I was getting ready to leave the Army), my commanding officer acknowledged that I had a passion for this type of work, and that if I had chosen to stay in the military, he would've recommended me for a personnel-oriented career track.

Unfortunately, I had no idea of what kinds of civilian-equivalent jobs my work as the S-1 would translate to. I wasn't aware that there was such a thing as "Human Resources" in the civilian world. Instead, having been surrounded by fellow Signal Corps officers who came from engineering backgrounds, I decided to give computer science a try. After doing that for 6 years, though, I was feeling burnt out enough to realize that I needed to actively pursue a different career. I had held out for something within Training or HR at Citrix, but nothing really panned out.

So when the job opportunity came up at UCSB, I jumped at it. I wasn't really holding out for much, as I knew how hard it is to break into the UC system, since many of the job placements are done from internal hiring/promotions. But lo and behold, here I am!

The days have been flying by. Each day keeps me so busy that time zooms by before I even realize it. In fact, the only way I even know that time has gone by is by the rumbling in my tummy alerting me to lunch/snack time. I'm enjoying the work, and am learning about all sorts of things related to Academic Personnel and campus-wide policies pertaining to personnel.

My job is strictly 8-5, which is great because I can leave work at 5:00 on the dot to pick up Todd from school. And when I arrive at 8:00 in the morning, my co-workers are there, too, in case I need to pick anyone's brain for something. Unlike Citrix, where most of my co-workers showed up between 9:00 and 10:00, so if I ever ran into an issue at 8:00am, I'd have to wait at least an hour anyway. And leaving at 5:00pm wasn't so easy either, as I'd often find myself right in the middle of something I couldn't easily break away from. That wasn't so bad when Todd's after-school care was nearby and open until 6:00pm, but now that it closes at 5:30 and is farther away, it's even more imperative that I leave right at 5:00.

The benefits are really good too-- especially the defined benefit retirement plan-- that's pure gold in this day and age. Discounted university classes are a nice plus (not that I have the time or inclination for that these days, anyway), and there are all kinds of opportunities for training within my field.

Anyway-- so far so good! I like being at a job where I'm not only in my element (I get to wield a red pen! It doesn't get any better than that! ;-) ) but where I'm busy and productive all day long and where I can go home and just NOT think about work in the evening or on weekends.

There you have it. My first couple weeks (and the years leading up to it!) in a nutshell :-) Here's to many, many more!

Know your own stuff

Interview processes vary from company to company, and even from department to department within a company. But no matter what the process, I honestly think the best way to prepare is to really know the stuff you've learned and claim to know on your resume. Oh sure, you can prep for behavioral interview questions such as "What do you perceive as your weakness", but by and large, I would figure that the interviewer is largely interested in your job-specific skills, experience and what you can bring to the job.

So where do they first get wind of your experience? From your resume, of course. Which means that no matter what sort of question an interviewer throws at you from their pool of potential questions, the one thing you can be solidly sure of is the material on your own resume. Which YOU wrote. Which speaks to YOUR experiences.

Let me backtrack a little. Our department's interview process is fairly straightforward-- start out with a phone screen, and if you make that cut, come on site for in-person interviews. Now obviously, since we're a tech group, we're really mainly interested in technical knowledge and look for proficiency in specific skills outlined in the job descriptions. Fairly straightforward, no? Either you know X programming language well or you don't. And if you don't, that becomes apparent in the interview, which runs the gamut from answering basic conceptual questions to outright writing coding examples. Nothing outside the norm from usual tech company practices.

Candidates come from a variety of backgrounds, and will thus respond in a variety of ways, depending on their experiences. Even an ideal candidate can miss a question or two on occasion, and still show enough potential to bring on-site, even hire. It's not a game of seeing how many questions they get right, it's a matter of evaluating their problem-solving approaches and their ability to pick up concepts unfamiliar to them (which happens. Nobody knows everything about everything).

Still, in my mind, there is one way a candidate can raise a red flag to me, that *does* have to do with answering questions right or wrong. As I mentioned earlier, your resume is the one tool you have complete control over-- you decide what goes into it, you craft the descriptions of your job responsibilities to convey what you intend to the recruiter, you know better than anyone else what you've learned and what your proficiencies are.

So why, oh why, when an interviewer asks you a simple question about something on your resume (sometimes just as an icebreaker), is it so difficult to answer? Why do you hem and haw when asked to provide details about a recent school project? Why do you make us practically pull teeth in order to get anything deeper than high-level details of a particular job responsibility? If you can't even speak to your own resume intelligently, if you can't even articulate what exact skills you gained/utilized in a particular project, that doesn't really bode well for the rest of your technical knowledge. Because if nothing else, if you can't answer a single question from our list, the least you should be able to do is know the stuff on your resume well. Right? Right!? It's YOUR resume!!

It's not that hard! The mind. It boggles...

On Giving Back

'tis the season for people to be charitable and, even in these tough economic times, give back to their communities, whether it be donating money to favorite charities, donating food to the local food banks, or volunteering time with their favorite causes. Something about the season brings charitable good to the forefront of people's minds.

Our company is pretty big on giving back to the community. Every year, they match your donations to non-profit organizations, dollar for dollar, up to $1000 per individual, per year. Every year, each employee gets a free volunteer day, where they can take the day off (without cutting into accrued PTO) to do volunteer work. Earlier this year, we used our volunteer day to participate in Disney's give-a-day, get-a-day program. Not so much volunteering in the true sense of the word, since we did get "paid" with free Disney tickets, but it was fun helping out our church's preschool, running errands and cleaning up. This year, the company gave everyone a second free volunteer day in October, to be used with specified local non-profit organizations.

I wound up volunteering for Life Chronicles, an organization that makes video recordings of people wishing to leave their loved ones a last message. The service is employed not only by the terminally ill, but by the elderly who wish to document their memories, or soldiers who are about to be deployed to a war zone and aren't sure if they'll return, or mothers who give their babies up for adoption, leaving a message for the child to view when he/she grows up. I gathered with a group of co-workers in one of our conference rooms, and we set about transcribing DVDs.

Let me tell you-- transcription is hard work! I'm not exactly the world's slowest typist, but often times I had to repeatedly rewind the DVD to try to understand something that wasn't spoken clearly (names of people/places were the worst!). I had to pause to create sections with timestamps, as individual, topical sections do not become apparent until after you've heard/read everything. I managed to get through 2 DVDs during the day.

The first DVD was of an elderly lady with Parkinson's, recounting memories of her childhood, growing up on the farm, and raising her daughter (who also has Parkinson's). There were some funny moments, and it was largely autobiographical in nature.
The second DVD was of a woman who was battling cancer and did not face a good prognosis. She wanted to leave behind some nuggets of wisdom to her children, grandchildren, siblings and nieces/nephews. Some were basic: stay in school, stay away from drugs, get a good job and be independent (mostly for her baby granddaughter). Some touched more poignantly on her current situation: this family is prone to cancer, get yourself checked out early and often! Some were insights borne of years of experience: don't waste energy holding onto grudges, focus that energy on something more positive instead. It made you realize that when you're facing the end of your life very soon, the really important things become clear. It is sad that it takes a lifetime for many people to realize that, and I hope that she made an impact on her family long after she departed this earth.

I worked steadily for 5 hours, transcribing the two 1-hour-long DVDs. By the end of it, my shoulders were aching, my eyes were watering and crossed, and my ears yearned for fresh air after being oppressed by headphones for so long. But in another way, I felt good. It felt good to contribute in some small way to a larger project, a project that is important to a lot of people, a project that leaves behind a loving and lasting legacy for many loved ones.

I hope to instill this sense of helping and volunteerism in Todd. Perhaps one day, when he's older, we can go as a family to DAWG (Santa Barbara's local dog shelter) and volunteer from time to time there. I live too far away from any coastal areas that serve my biggest animal love, sea turtles, but I happily donate to the organizations that do help the turtles. Todd has already developed a love of animals. Let's see if we can turn this compassion into some good for the community :-)

Kicked out, college-style

Okay, this post probably would've had more oomph if I'd posted it last week, right when we were in the thick of things... but I had a rare weekend all to myself and decided I'd rather spend it vegging out on the couch, reading and watching TV.

But... a brief update on what occupied half of our week last week:

The annual Tech Retreat! Every year in mid-September the Tech Group goes out for some team-building and some fun and relaxation. 2 years ago we descended upon a beachfront hotel in Pismo Beach, doing Amazing-Race-style challenges as teams, eating delicious food and of course, drinking. Last year was a little more low-key with a camping excursion to El Capitan, and a geocaching exercise which was pretty lame and not very team-like.

This year, we headed south to Carpinteria State Beach, invading a large portion of the campground.

Wednesday started out ordinarily enough, with the team-building exercise of a chili cookoff! It was actually kind of fun-- designing a marketing campaign and cooking delicious chili. Our team actually made it to 3rd place, not bad considering how we didn't hit on any marketing  inspiration until we had about 20 minutes to go, and then scrambled to put it all together. I'm sure the delicious chili helped :-) That evening after dinner, Allan and I broke out our copy of the Game of "Things", and proceeded to introduce several of our co-workers to the game. As always happens with this game, lots of raucous laughter ensued. Elsewhere on the campsite, other folks were involved with other games of their own. That's when the trouble started.

You see, unlike last year at El Capitan, we didn't have a section of campground exclusively for ourselves. In other words, we had "civilian" neighbors. People who didn't appreciate our noise. But the truth was, it wasn't all that bad. Sure, there were a few tables full of loud laughter and talking, but it wasn't anything out of hand. And! It wasn't. Even. 10pm! When the complaints started.

A little after 10pm, Allan and I packed up our game and headed out. Since we don't believe in tent camping, we booked a motel a half mile down the road to spend the night in. We had plans to be back at the campground by around 9am to get breakfast.

Thursday morning, we roll out of our clean, comfy beds, and Allan checks his phone for email. And he starts laughing. There was an email from the VP of Engineering, announcing that 1) we'd run into some problem with the authorities and 2) we were being ejected from the campsite.  Since Thursday activities were still on, however, we were instructed to reconvene further down the beach. All morning long I couldn't stop giggling everytime I thought of that email. We arrived at the beach and patiently awaited everyone else, eagerly anticipating all sorts of stories of crazy hijinks the night before. After all, I'd heard some stories about how out of hand some of the engineers could get at previous retreats!

To our disappointment, we learned that our co-workers hadn't gotten much crazier than we already were after dinner, playing our games and just hanging out. And that most people actually retired by midnight-1am, a relatively reasonable hour considering that... well, if you're out camping, where are you gonna go the next day? To work!?

Turns out it was mainly a case of picky neighbors and a picky campsite who just wasn't used to even a subdued version of our tech group. Apparently at some point there were six cop cars congregated in the campground, leaving our admin, who arranges these things, scrambling to smooth things over. At 8:30 the next morning, we were officially kicked out by the campground personnel, and everyone scrambled to get their stuff together and make the "Exodus of Shame" out of there by 10am. I still laugh when I think about it.

Still, Thursday's activities went off without a hitch-- football, frisbee, bocce ball in the sand, as well as kayaking and paddleboarding lessons, and serenading by guitar/ukulele players. Oh, and another round of "Things", of course ;-) Lunch was served at the beach, and dinner was fan-damn-tastic, and was a really great way to close out the retreat.

This was definitely one of the more entertaining retreats. 2 years ago, the team-building exercise was just too exhausting, and last year it was kinda lame. But this year was great-- a fun exercise, lots of fun and relaxing beach activities, and being kicked out just like a bunch of drunken college frat boys. Something tells me we won't be going back there again next year! ;-)

Thoughts on SAHM-hood

A while back I remember having a conversation with some friends, other couples, I'm sure... and the conversation somehow turned to careers after kids. I don't remember whom exactly I spoke with, but I do remember indicating that if I could stay home to be with Todd, I would, and they remarked: "Would you really?" i.e. would you really give up your job if you could afford it, in order to do so? I recall being interrupted by something/someone else before I could answer it, so I guess I could say this blog post delves into that question a bit more.

I admit don't have a whole lot of first-hand experience with being a stay-at-home Mom (aka "SAHM"). But I remember when Todd came to live with us full-time, and I remember disliking putting him into day care all day while we worked. He never really took to his new preschool in SB, and while the morning (preschool) portion was fine, the afternoon (day care) portions were not. He always came home dirty and snot-covered, had frequent accidents, rarely finished even half his lunch, and often played by himself in the corner. When he started kindergarten later that year, things weren't much better on the after-school-care front, and I addressed the stay-at-home vs. working-world question in a blog post during that time: http://heckledtrio.blogspot.com/2009/01/stay-at-home-vs-working-world.html (in fact, re-reading that post just now breaks my heart all over again)

Child care, while being the focal point in the discussion of staying at home vs. working, is not the only issue. I've lost count of how many times we've simply heated up frozen dinners or bought take-out because we were too exhausted at the end of the day to cook healthful food. Even some of the home-cooked meals contained some pre-packaged, processed food in the name of efficiency, especially when Todd's activities kept us out so late, getting dinner ready quickly was time-essential. Not only were we spending more than we liked, but we weren't eating very healthfully as a family. Another issue was just time, itself-- because Allan and I work till at least 5pm most days, any after-school activities would have to occur after that time. I must've called a dozen martial arts studios before finding one that offered kid classes that "late"... which enables Todd to attend, but also brings us home much later afterward... and with much less time to enjoy hanging out as a family before the dinner-shower-go-to-bed rush for the little man is upon us. Everything is always so rushed.

Yesterday I got a chance to experience SAHM-hood to a much larger extent than I ever had, because the day consisted of daily chores and errands, rather than a special day off, spent out somewhere with the boy. I discovered at the last minute that Todd's Spring Break lasted through Monday, and he didn't start school again until today. So I took the day off yesterday to hang out with him.

We hit the library for books to keep him entertained, and went grocery shopping for all sorts of healthful meal ingredients. I cooked lunch from scratch, Allan came home from work at noon, and we all enjoyed a hot meal together at home. I cooked dinner as well, and kept the kitchen clean-- an endless process! The meals seem to blend together into one looong timeframe when you include prep, cooking and washing up afterward. No sooner are you done cleaning up after one meal, than it's time to start prepping for the next. Todd helped me clean the house. I helped him with his homework. I folded laundry, though I didn't get a chance to wash the bedding or do the ironing that I'd planned. By 10:30 pm, after having been on full-throttle for 12 hours with only a 20-minute break in the midst of all of it, I had given up.

It was a busy, busy, busy day-- and I didn't even get to spend as much one-on-one time with Todd as I had anticipated... I was too busy with all the household stuff. I was tired by the end of it, but it was a good sort of tired-- I felt that I'd had a productive day. I found that though I worked pretty hard (a lot harder than sitting in front of a computer all day!) I felt good about it. I liked making sure the family had good things to eat. I enjoyed making the meals and cleaning up and generally making a nice, comfortable home for my two boys.

And I could see why being a SAHM is one of the hardest jobs there ever is! I mean, Allan and I work pretty hard balancing both a job and the daily household chores, but it's different somehow. With a 9-to-5 job, once you quit for the day, you leave the office, you leave your work behind you, you wind down at home and don't have to do work or even think about it. But with a SAHM, that distinction does not exist-- the day continues, the chores continue, and you just don't get that sort of break.

Still... I would have to say that yesterday's activities were rewarding enough that my answer still stays the same: if we could afford to, I would be a SAHM. I think the family as a whole would be a lot less stressed. Not to discount our blessings-- having everything: work, school, after-school, home, all in close proximity to each other, working for a flexible company at jobs that aren't terribly stressful themselves, dividing up the chores evenly so they still get done everyday, etc. We're pretty lucky to be where we are with respect to all those factors, period. But I think my penchant for organization lends itself well to the job of running a household, and merely the effect on Todd for one day was noticeable-- such a happy, relaxed kid! Definitely worth it. Maybe someday...

Passing Notes, Modern Style

Remember when you were in school, and you used to pass notes to your classmates? This was in the day before cell phones became so prevalent across high school campuses, and well before text messages.

Well, today Allan and I were in a meeting that got a little boring. Part of it was the subject matter, and part of it was the speaker, and part of it was the fact that the speaker was remote, so instead of having a live, talking, moving human being to at least focus on, all we had to stare at was the screen with the presentation slides, and a disembodied voice emanating from the speakers in the ceiling.

We'd whisper to each other, but that isn't easy to do or keep surreptitious. So I asked him to bring up a Notepad-style app on his phone so we could converse that way. It was almost like IMing each other... except we could look over each other's shoulders as we typed. I'd type on one line, and Allan would type on the next line:

(Helly in red, Allan in blue)

Look we can pass notes
Haha
We're naughty
How naughty? ;-)
Naughty enough. does this remind you of school days
don't know too long ago
Lol. I should blog this. Save and send: )

It all reminded me a bit of our recent trip to Vegas, where I lost most of my voice on the first day, and had to resort to using Allan's phone to type casual messages to him at the breakfast table... and try to save what little voice I had left.

So there you have it. Passing notes, updated a little from the old-school style of pen-and-paper. Ain't technology grand? ;-)

Mid-March Updates

Hello, blog.

I can't believe it's been nearly two weeks since I've last spoken to you. It's been an insanely busy month.

We started off at the beginning of it by taking a volunteer day at our church's preschool, running errands and doing miscellaneous chores around the place. We worked hard, but also enjoyed ourselves. And we were rewarded with free tickets to Disneyland as part of Disney's Give-A-Day-Get-A-Day program. We were lucky we got our volunteer day in when we did, because a week or two later, Disney reached the maximum number of vouchers it was planning to give out this year for the program, and shut it down. What was the max? 1 million. That's right-- in the span of less than 3 months, 1 million people signed up. What I'm more curious about is how many of those people actually return to volunteering on their own. Someday, when Todd is older, I'd love to take him to the one of the animal shelters here and volunteer.

First weekend in March, we took a trip down to Rowland Heights, where Allan grew up. Friends that he's known since age 5 and now live far away were all in town at their mother's house that weekend, and he wanted to visit with them. Two of them we had already visited nearly 3 years ago, when we were going through Seattle on our way from Vancouver back down to Santa Barbara. The other kids there were either quite a bit older than Todd (ages 9 and 11) or quite a bit younger (ages 2.5 to baby) so there was nobody really his age to play with. We walked up the street a few houses to Allan's mother's house and visited with her and her dogs for a little while. It was nice to see folks we wouldn't otherwise see on a regular basis.

The following weekend (this past one), we again took a trip down to LA, to Sara and Jason's house in Topanga. Every March since 2003, Sara has held a St. Patrick's Day dinner at her place, serving boiled cabbage, potato leek soup and corned beef. The food is delicious, the desserts are divine, and the company is mad. These days, most of us have graduated and dispersed across the country, but enough of us are still in Southern California that we were able to see each other for the 8th annual dinner. We took Todd, who had a grand time playing with Sara's cat. I even tried stroking its super-soft fur, but apparently the cat knew that I wasn't overly fond of his ilk, for he flattened his ears and took a swipe at my hand! Yikes! I rest my case :-D

This week Allan has been busy with jury duty, which just happens to coincide with the one time at work where he actually has a hard deadline to meet (for once! He's really earning his paycheck now!), so he's getting little sleep himself these days, going to court in the daytime and working at night. We're really looking forward to this coming weekend, where we can do nothing but rest and relax... and then spend the week after that enjoying Disneyland for Allan's 40th birthday with friends and family!

By the time we get back and settled into the daily routine again, it will be Spring Break (yay for kid-less week!) and the end of March. Let's see if April is any less hectic than March, because May promises to be another busy busy month!

Readin', Writin' and... Trainin'?

Last Tuesday, I attended a presentation sponsored by the Santa Barbara chapter of the STC (Society for Technical Communication) It was a discussion on Trends, Tools and Technologies of Software User Assistance (UA). This immediately piqued my interested. I've always had an interest in the field of training, having had experience with it in the military and in grad school. Since my background is in computer science, it seems natural that I could try to combine the two. But where? How? It's a known fact that I don't like kids, so grade school is out. Dealing with adolescents and teenagers? Don't even want to think about it. I'll have one of my own soon enough, thank you. College? Maybe, but there's no real job stability in that. University? No thank you. First of all, I'm not qualified, and second of all, professorships are oriented more towards research than teaching.

Two years ago I took a day-long career development course held onsite. It was primarily to help us identify our strengths and weaknesses, and apply them towards our current jobs. No surprise, I turned out to have an affinity for organization and attention to detail. At the end of the course, I approached the instructor and told her that, quite frankly, the job SHE had was my idea of an ideal job. Well, save for all the traveling. Maybe in my younger years, but not now, with a family. That's when she pointed out that a lot of organizations that sell products like we do have in-house staff to run training for its salespeople. I had never heard of that, and was glad she had mentioned it to me.

Later I discovered that our company actually has its own small, separate training department which currently trains and documents help files for our customers. I started researching it more, especially at the encouragement of my manager, who's really supportive of professional development endeavors. Fast forward to nearly 2 years later, where a discussion with my manager about upcoming goals (new year, new start!) brought about some concrete plans to pursue this further.

The presentation was rather informative. It revealed a whole word of possibilities in the area of technical communication. While a large part of the focus was on the technical writing aspect of it, there was clearly more to "software user assistance" than just writing help manuals. There were all kinds of parts to it, from the typical tech writing to online documentation to actual training. I got a brief introduction to some of the tools and standards out there, and I picked up a flier for the upcoming WritersUA conference in Seattle, WA. I also perused the STC's website and noticed that in May, they've got their annual conference in Dallas, TX. For both conferences, the seminars and workshops look really interesting. The STC conference especially has a lot of sessions devoted to the area of education and training. I'd really love to go. The conference alone would cost nearly $1800 (including the pre-conference overview certification, which would be ideal for a newbie like me), plus travel expenses on top of it. Since I'm not exactly working in the tech comm area, there isn't much justification for the company to foot the bill for it, but it was nice to take a peek at what's out there, learning-wise. Maybe next year. I'd certainly learn a lot!

In the meantime, my book on technical training finally arrived after a week on hold at the library, and I shall delve into it :-)

Friday Night Procrastination

I suppose, technically, it's Saturday already. I should be getting ready for bed, but I'm having fun updating my blog layout yet again. Usually I go months before giving the site an overhaul, but since, unlike Blogger, you have to pay to edit the CSS on Wordpress, I figured I'd get my money's worth :-) Although I'm curious now-- what will happen if I don't renew my subscription? Will my edits be reverted to the original theme? Or will they stay, and I simply can't make any more edits till I pay again? I guess I shall find out in November! Anyway, this round of editing went much more smoothly than my last one, partly because I started from an existing theme instead of the bare-bones minimum Sandbox, and partly because at work this week I've been tweaking the look and feel of some of our webpages, using-- you guessed it-- CSS. So I'm a little more familiar with it now.

So I figured, while I was here, that I would write a little something. Or a lot something. I have a tendency towards verbosity. As Lisa puts it: "Why use 10 words when you can use 100?" :-P

Our insurance claim and the business of Allan's car is behind us. The auto shop did a great job fixing the back, his car looks good as new! While it was in the shop, the sheriff who took my report called me to give an update on the case. They found the guy who did it, and although they couldn't place him at the scene of the accident without eyewitnesses (and thus arrest him for drunken or reckless driving), they could at least prove his vehicle was the one that hit ours, and so the insurance carrier on that car would take care of the reimbursement. Well, this week I got a call from USAA-- turns out that the car was not actually insured at the time of the accident! So now they're going after the guy personally to get their money back. I hope they're able to nail him. We're extremely fortunate that we suffered no monetary loss and only slight inconvenience by his actions-- he could've gotten someone killed!

In other news, I conducted my first phone interview at work the other day, and I spent quite a bit of time preparing for it. It was a good learning experience, and I get to do it again next week. I'm definitely feeling more confident about it!

I'm glad things are starting to dry up and warm up after last week's endless rain (though the snow on the mountains made for a pretty sight!). Our apartment, though it gets direct sunlight in the afternoon, stays cold all day. The bathroom gets so cold that one day I noticed the big lotion bottle kept dispensing thinner and thinner lotion. It was almost watery. Thinking it was going bad, I opened it up to investigate-- only to discover that, much like curds and whey, it had separated! I now keep the lotion bottle on the dining room table, where it's warmer. At least the place will stay nice and cool during the summer! Not that it gets very hot here in the summer, anyway.

I've been experimenting with conditioners lately, trying to find the right one. It's amazing how a particular conditioner can yield such beautiful, soft, shiny hair on my husband and son, and yet actually DRY my hair out worse than if I'd used no conditioner at all (Tresemme, in case you're curious). And some conditioners are so weak that despite lathering it on my hair, it does absolutely nothing. What I've found is that 1) I need a really thick, heavy conditioner-- the kind that's almost solid and 2) I always end up going back to Pantene. The cabinet under our sink is now littered with various sample sizes of various conditioners-- not only different brands (Garnier, Dove, Tresemme, Pantene) but also different sub-types of Pantene (Moisturizing, Smoothing, Ice Shine and Breakage Defense). It's easy to experiment with inexpensive, $1 sample size bottles, and I continue my quest for the perfect conditioner! :-D At least I know now what brand to stick to. That narrows it down some ;-)

And now that I've rambled on enough and procrastinated even longer, I shall wrap this up and go to bed. Good night!

Hump Day Hodgepodge

Ah, Hump Day. That middle of the week we've all got to get through. Allan always looks forward to Wednesdays because that's when we get bagels at work. I quickly got tired of them, though, and stopped eating them a few months ago.

These days, I look forward to Wednesdays not only because its end signals the arrival of the weekend, but because now it's the one day in the middle of the week that we get a break from after-school activities. It's only one kid, and it's only two things-- swimming and karate-- but when you get home with just enough time to shower, eat dinner, and get ready for bed, it gets tiring after a while. Last quarter was especially tiring, with swimming MW, small group Tuesday, and karate Thursday. Never has the term TGIF been so appropriate... and so welcomed! So this quarter we decided, for the first time, to forego small group, especially since Todd's schedule has shifted so that he now has karate twice a week instead of just once.

So... no posts for a while, as you can see. But I didn't want to let *too* many days go by without trying to post. But what to write about? These days my head is filled with work and Todd. Not the most exciting of writing material, and Todd has his own separate blog anyway. So here's a hodgepodge instead:

Came back with the little man on Saturday night. Went to church as a whole family on Sunday, for the first time in... I don't know how long! Between Todd's absence, lack of car, and Allan's commitment to help with sound/equipment, I honestly cannot remember the last time the 3 of us all went to and left church together... in ONE car!

Speaking of cars... we got Allan's car back yesterday, yay! Nice new bumper and trunk, and shiny coat of paint on the back. They cleaned and vacuumed the interior as well! What service :-) I also spoke with the officer who took my report on the hit-and-run, who gave me an update on what they'd found. Although they found the guy, who had injuries consistent with the crash, and on whom the cops have had their eye on for a while, they couldn't outright arrest him for the hit-and-run, since there were no eyewitnesses to confirm that he was the one behind the wheel when it happened. Still, they at least have the car and its insurance information, which means that our insurance will have someone concrete to pursue for reimbursement. As for the guy, well, there's the civil suit option available to us... although I have no idea what we could actually sue FOR.

Ever partake of the phenomenon that is Craigslist? We found our living/dining room furniture there, as well as our current rental deal. Well, our company has its own internal Craigslist, the Bulletin. It's typically used to sell all sorts of things, or get recommendations for services such as doctors, hairstylists and auto mechanics, or request things. I've used the Bulletin for recommendations. I've used it to sell stuff. I've used it to buy our current VCR/DVD player when our VCR conked out. And yesterday, it came to the rescue once more. I realized too late that I'd left Todd's swim trunks at my parents' house. His first swim lesson of the season was that evening, and they wouldn't allow him in the pool without appropriate swim wear. So I scoured the various stores in the area-- K-Mart, Sears, sporting good stores both big and small. None had any in stock, as it was off-season. So I decided to try the Bulletin, figuring that there HAD to be some parents out there with boys older than Todd, who would be willing to sell the now-outgrown trunks! Sure enough, I got several responses and came away with a nice pair that Todd really liked! :-) All hail the mighty Bulletin! :-D

Time for more meetings and then, I hope, an uninterrupted afternoon of working... without having to worry about rushing off by 4:30 to pick up Todd for something. And nothing to rush about doing tonight... just laundry. Ahhhh.... Hump Day isn't so bad after all!

Service with a Smile

A few things this past week have got me thinking about the thankless task of being in a job whereby you do things for others, whether you're a dealer in a Vegas casino, an insurance claims rep, or a cleaning lady.

Because of my military service, I'm eligible to use USAA for my auto insurance needs. I eventually started using them for financial needs, as well: banking, investments, credit... because of their stellar records for service. All my experiences with them have always been very positive. After Allan's car was hit, we began the process of filing the claim so we could get the car repaired. I hadn't anticipated any problems, but I didn't expect things to go as smoothly as they did. They made the arrangements for towing and for the adjuster to inspect the car at the repair shop. All we had to do was await a phone call to set up a time to meet with the appraiser. Of course, there's still work to do ahead of us, but so far USAA is certainly living up to its reputation, as I once made a point to blog about.

A conversation I had with a friend at work this week also made me think about experiences I'd had in a completely different setting: Las Vegas. The last time I've been there, before our most recent trip last week, was 5 years ago. Still on starving student budgets, Allan and I stayed at the Gold Spike, one of the more run-down and seedier hotels in downtown Las Vegas. Still, it was a decent hotel-- good water pressure and drainage (something you see a lot of complaints about), clean rooms, excellent food value for your money. All that paled, though, in comparison to the service! We didn't need anything out of the ordinary, but the staff we encountered everywhere in the hotel were exceptionally courteous and friendly, much more so than you would normally find elsewhere. My friend had a similar experience-- after having some trying luck with the casinos on the Strip, he tried one of the casinos downtown while his friends watched the Fremont show. And the dealer there took real good care of him, enabling him to turn his luck around a bit. It seems ironic that the run-down, shabby places, the ones most people would sniff their noses at, are the ones with the best service. Why is that, I wonder?

And finally, I noticed a little gem when I went to the restroom at work earlier this week. You know how, in upscale restaurants, your cloth napkin will be folded into neat shapes? Or in some of the nicer hotels, the cleaning crew will sometimes fold the towels into cute little shapes for you? Well, I came across this in one of the stalls. Not just a triangular fold job you see in most hotels, but an intricate little design. And not just on one toilet paper roll, but all the rolls in the stall! The person who did this was probably used to it and likely didn't take very long to do it, but I was particularly impressed just by this little gesture, especially given that it wasn't in some posh hotel, but at work. One little effort to spruce up the place, to give a little attention to detail, really showed how much the person cared about her work. It definitely made a lasting impression!

Holiday Party Silliness

Picture post for today, as it's been an incredibly long day. The usual work (and lunch break taken up scrambling for Christmas cards for Todd's teachers), karate class with promotion ceremony-- yay, yellow belt! -- and school Christmas concert where the kids were hyped up on sugary pastries and wore each other out playing tag.

Last Friday Allan and I attended a work holiday party, with just our department. It was nice to be in the company of people we actually knew, it wasn't as anonymizing (is that a word? It is now ;-) ) as the whole-company party, where we felt lost amongst a sea of faces from other departments we never interact with. It was outdoors at the Santa Barbara Historical Museum, where tents and heaters protected us from the rain and cold. There was no formal set of courses for dinner-- just tons of tasty and filling appetizers and mini-meals, including such delicacies as bacon-wrapped shrimp! Drinks were free, too, so I tried a pomegranate martini (yum) and a regular margarita before washing everything else down with plain water.

The entertainment of the evening consisted of a musical chairs + scavenger hunt combo game with a flip camera prize at stake, a video put together by various members of the department, and a camera that was hooked up to a projector, instantly putting up pics the moment you take them, for all to see. Here are the ones Allan and I snapped when we took our turn:

We were forewarned that Allan standing at his full height would wind up out of the picture, so he scrunched down... wayyy down. It's not often I'm taller than him ;-)



Now that I could actually see over the top of his head, I decided to have some fun with our snapshots:



And finally, we decided to showcase exactly what effect having kids has on the average couple. After a long week, this was how we felt... even though it was barely 8:30pm!

Unexpected free day

There I was, working away in my cubicle, when, at around 11:00am, my boss's boss came roaming around the hallways, chasing everyone home early for Thanksgiving. Todd was starting to get bored (I didn't realize he had a day off school today) so I wrapped up my work and jetted out at lunchtime. Apparently Allan's bosses were downstairs doing the same thing-- shooing their minions home early for the holidays, so the entire family took off and headed to Zodo's for lunch and bowling. Todd won. He was the only to score in the triple digits-- he got exactly 100, while Allan came in with 86 and I trailed with a measly 69. Hey, I'm just happy to have broken 50!

We had originally planned to do our usual Thanksgiving tradition-- go down to LA and celebrate with Allan's family at his sister's house tomorrow. But this year, with his father still recovering from his recent surgery, and Todd and I both a little under the weather (and probably still contagious, esp with my persistent cough) we all felt it was best not to risk exposing his dad to anything. So, for the first time EVER, the little Knight family is staying home and celebrating ourselves. We're actually looking forward to cleaning up the apartment a bit and then having some ham and mashed potatoes followed by sweet potato pie. Just the three of us. We've never done anything like that before, so we actually had fun shopping for Thanksgiving-related items after we went bowling.

We capped off the evening with a trip to the apartment complex's clubhouse, and enjoyed watching "Wall-E" (yes, I know, for the umpteenth time) on the big-screen TV and comfy leather sofa. My only regret is that I never got to see Wall-E when it came out on the real big screen-- the movie theaters-- now THERE would've been a really great experience!

So, although we'll miss seeing Allan's family (Aunt Debbie owes Todd some long-awaited belly kisses, and vice versa!) and catching up with them, and will miss seeing my family (we'd planned to stop by afterward and spend the night), we're looking forward to another way to celebrate Thanksgiving :-) And we already have a centerpiece lined up-- a turkey made out of a pine cone, that Todd brought home from school! :-)

Been far too long...

... since I've updated this! Okay, a little over 2 weeks may not be much by most standards, but in my small corner of the blog world, it's practically ages. I think the last time my blog was neglected for this long was when I was in Indonesia. Which reminds me, I still have one more post to write about some of the sights and sounds of the country.

But for now, a few brief updates.

It started right after my last blog post, but the Friday (the 6th) was when I REALLY came down with a nasty bout of the flu. Fever, chills, aches and nausea-- the whole kaboodle. Ironically, no congestion or cough, at least not until AFTER the fever and chills subsided. Anyway, I was knocked out of commission for 4 days, and was lucky enough that the weekend comprised half of it, reducing the amount of days I had to take off from work. Thank heavens for Veggie Tales, Winnie the Pooh and Professor Fizzwizzle (yes, I ended up buying the download-- well worth the money, though the whole family is now addicted ;-) )!

Todd came down with a fever himself that weekend, and my mom drove up on Monday (the 9th) with some victuals I could stomach, and to pick up Todd. She had planned to pick him up on Thursday (the 12th) anyway, since Todd got 4 days off for the President's Day weekend. So, he just got an extended weekend :-D

Illnesses aside, the Todd-free week was well-timed, because the following day, the 10th, we released our long-awaited product for sale to the public (it had been in Beta testing for nearly 2 years). Release night went rather smoothly. We usually start at 10pm and finish in the wee hours of the morning (typically 2-3am) unless something goes horribly wrong. But that night, we actually started at 6pm. The 4-hour head start proved well worth it, as most of us were done before midnight. I got to enjoy a normal sleep after all.

The next day was another rare treat-- we developers got to spend time in the customer care department, sitting in with customer service reps (CSRs) and listening in while they handled support phone calls. This was about as close to the customers as we would actually get, and it was neat seeing not only what things are like for our customers, but what it was like for the people in the front lines, fielding their questions.

The entire week was full of festivities, too. Day after release we all enjoyed pastries for breakfast instead of our usual bagels on Wednesdays. We also got fleece blankets (the "s(ch)wag" I referred to in my Facebook status) with the GoToAssist Express logo emblazoned on it. Came in handy for keeping Todd warm in the chilly nights that ensued. Drinks and debauchery (okay, not really) at Happy Hour on Thursday night. And Friday afternoon was champagne toasts and a chocolate fountain in which to dip a variety of goods-- strawberries, marshmallows, pretzels, potato chips, bananas... all in all, good stuff! What a way to end the week and start a long weekend!

I also got new glasses! For the first time in my life, my prescription has not changed significantly since my last checkup-- which was 6 years ago, to boot! My left eye is still the same and my right eye has only worsened by 1/4 diopter. Took me a while to find suitable frames, but I eventually found a pair that was similar in size and shape to my original ones, but only have a frame over the top half of the lenses, and are overall much lighter. Took a bit of adjustment, but I'm happy with them now. Pictures shall be forthcoming soon!

That was my past couple weeks in a nutshell. How about you?

Drumming means you have a job

In case any of you were wondering what mine and Allan's Facebook statuses on Monday meant, well, we spent Monday morning at a hotel conference hall for our company's annual summit, AKA the "All Hands Meeting". Many sales reps flew in from out of state. We enjoyed free breakfast before sauntering into the conference hall, where I promptly stopped in my tracks and wondered if this was the correct room, since every chair was adorned with a bongo drum. After the usual presentations and spiels about how we did last year and where we're going this year, the fun started. Drummers from the Drum Cafe performed some African drumming for us and then had each of us participate with the bongo drums we found on our seats at the beginning. It was supposed to be a whole exercise in communication and teamwork, but honestly, I was having too much fun beating the bejesus out of my drum at an upbeat tempo to really notice the main message. After getting all worked up, we exited for our free lunch, where Allan promptly noticed bruising on his thumbs from all the exuberant drumming. Hehehehe...

As for the title of my post... well, just like many other companies are doing in the face of the souring economy, ours decided to trim jobs in an effort to reduce costs and remain profitable. So last Thursday and Friday, we lost about 10% of our workforce. There was a subdued atmosphere on Thursday as we waited with bated breath and gnashed tooth to find out if any of us would get the dreaded visit from the manager/HR/whoever was bringing down the ax. I was getting an eerie sense of deja vu, as most of you will recall what happened in October 2007. At last, Thursday ended, the announcement came that all the US-based layoffs had been completed, and Allan and I were still there, breathing with a sigh of relief. Back to work :-)

In other news-- life is... well, life is going smoothly. Todd still enjoys school. Not thrilled about after-school care, so every once in a while when one of us is having a slow day, work-wise, we'll stay home with him in the afternoon and work remotely. Little man is also slowly starting to warm to karate, now that he's starting to get the hang of it, he doesn't loathe practice so much. I'm still in the choir at church, although, if I thought our numbers were small before, they're dwindling even more! First day back after winter break, there were only 4 of us. Interestingly enough, all the parts were there, so if all else fails, we could make a good quartet. Allan's making headway with his degree, and has been keeping busy on nights and weekends! Go Allan! :-)

Not much else in the way of updates... we're just grateful to still have our jobs and be where we are. Moving onward, now!

And how have you been?