Whisper

On 9/26/2023 at 12:59 PM, Mistr said:

This time I remembered that joint pain is an inflammatory response, so i took ibuprofen right away. I took another 800mg before going to bed and that seemed to help.

And now I'm thinking I should try some ibuprofen before bed to see if it helps with the overnight carpal tunnel flairups I've been having.  Strange how blind we can be to the obvious at times 

Operation sleep in has failed; I got up an hour early instead.

Getting up was hard this morning,  but ny fuzzy alarm clocks did their job. Sasha yelled for breakfast and ShyAnn kept rubbing her ears against my face.

I've been low dosing my narcolepsy meds for the last month; trying to get through the gap in insurance that came with changing jobs. Finally got the new insurance information and got the ball rolling on an authorization and refill. Not totally secure yet, but decided to take full doses tonight and kill my (electronic) alarms for tomorrow morning. 

Used some of the tome before work to do a deep clean on my CPAP, so hopefully really good rest tonight.

Got up on time today and got a few things done before work. It seem a lot easier to do things before than after, and I like feeling like I've accomplished a something for myself.  Tackled a bit of the mess and it felt good to have that little bit more order when I got home.

Hang in the Flea, sorry things are sucking so hard. 

I love the flower tracing in the background of the painting you're working on.

Goal 1: re-engage with you beautiful people here!

a) post something here every day.

b) read and post in someone else's challenge every day

Goal 2: consistent wake time. Trying for 5:30 am, 7 days a week for alarm and lights on, want to get better at promptly getting  UP.

3 hours ago, fleaball said:

awww! Which one is this?

His Excellency Sasha Generalisemo Meow Von Pussycat, 42nd Earl of Whitehaven, Defender of the Realm, and Keeper of the Faith

Comes from some other beginning's end.

I seem to be ending a lot of old beginnings recently.

On May 20th I ended a relationship of over 10 years with the person that was basically my only close friend.  It was toxic and full of dependency and I couldn't take it any more. I still miss her and feel somewhat guilty for just cutting her out, but at the same time, I think about what it was like, not always, but all too often, and I know that it was the right thing to do.

Yesterday, Wednesday the 9th was the 12th anniversary of my employment with my current company. Tomorrow (or maybe Saturday) will be my last day here.  Lots of reasons, but most of them boil down to unfulfilled promise. I am extremely valuable to them; I am not valued. A former Plant Manager told me "yes, we've screwed you over, and it would suck balls to lose you". Now he's in a Corporate position, ignored me when I asked for a letter of recommendation, and hasn't acknowledged that I'm leaving. The closest they've done to any effort at employee retention was the HR Manager telling me "we're all adults here, I'm not going to try and change your mind". 

I think there might be a deep sea of resentment boiling inside of me. I am angry and I am hurt, and I am sad.

And I am done.

Next Tuesday I start a new job, with a new company. I'll be coming in as "Assistant Maintenance Manager". The Maintenance Manager is retiring in two years; I'll be training as his replacement. 

I don't know what exactly the future holds, but I've got a bit more hope now.

All my challenge stuff went out the window when I started looking for the new job. I don't know why job searching is incompatible with brushing my teeth, or taking my meds, but it seems to be. Working to get back on track with things.

This morning I told my manager to tentatively plan on my last day being the 11th. 

I have shifted my focus from the challenge to finding a job. I started looking on Wednesday July 5th. I had my first interview in 12 years that Friday. Since then I've had interviews (mostly phone) more days than not.

Had a series of interviews with a company that I was getting really excited about, and whom really liked me, but my background issues sank it. Remember kids, crime doesn't pay.

My plan was to try and stick things out for another year or so until I could get my felony reduced to a misdemeanor and change my name, but I'm done existing on hold and letting my employer screw me over just because I'm afraid of the rejection of job hunting. 

My skills are in demand, lots of places want the person on my resume; I'm going to keep looking until I find a place that wants ME.

I've had zero indication from my current employer that they are going to extend any effort to retain my services. In the words of the HR Manager "we're all adults here, I'm not going to try and change your minds".  There is a high probability that my departure triggers a chain reaction 

I had originally planned on just truncating my name to Aaron Marcus, but I'm thinking I want a fuller change. Currently leaning towards Airen Tov Sola-Gratia

On 6/30/2023 at 12:35 AM, TimovieMan said:

the possibility exists that you are not in fact in a burn-out, but rather in a bore-out.

I can see how it might seem like bore-out, enough that I've been thinking about it since you posted the idea, but I don't think that's it. I'm not bored, I'm discouraged and I've given up. It isn't that there isn't things to do, it's that there's so much to do that it can't possibly get done, and the company refuses to provide the resource needed to make it possible to even make a dent in things, so why keep banging my head against the wall? Why try at all?

At full staffing, I should have 4 guys on day shift, plus the manager, a guy working a split shift, and 4 guys on night shift. When we had that, the general feeling was that we didn't have enough people. Now? Two guys on nights, still got a guy on split, and day shift?

Me.

A guy retiring at the end of the year that's busily burning all his PTO (out all this week) that they're not going to try and replace before he's long gone.

A guy out on short term disability that's about to roll over to long term.

A guy that quit nearly two months ago, with notice. They posted for his replacement last Friday.

and a guy that I am fucking pissed as hell that they haven't fired yet. Late, half an hour to hours every day. Got a text from him 30 minutes into the shift that he forgot to set his alarm and would be in as soon as possible. Never showed. Not even surprised. I want him gone so someday they might start looking for a replacement. 

The manager I had when I was hired never did any real managing. He retired, the guy they brought on to replace him and build a real Maintenance program lasted less than a year before giving up and retiring. They wouldn't give him what he needed to do what they wanted him to do. Then they had me running around trying to cover his role for nearly 6 months with no additional compensation until they finally hired another Manager in February. He's still trying, but has started to give up too. 

Updated my resume, put it on Indeed. Working on updating LinkedIn. 

I'm not bored. I'm done. 

On Saturday, I took a quick lap around my block in the cool of the pre-dawn morning before going to painting.

On Sunday, I took a much longer walk around my neighborhood; it was mostly lovely, except I was wandering and ended up going past the creepy house with a menagerie of giant stuffed animals all over the yard. It's the kind of thing that could have been delightful for a day, but left out in the weather for years? I hate that house. 

Yesterday I followed the advice of "easy hike near me" and went to Hidden Hollow, only about 5 minutes drive from my house. The Hollow itself was really nice, a stream with trees and ferns and such, but it was really small, surrounded by a shopping district, there was a longer, paved walking path that ran through it that I followed for a while, but wasn't really what I was looking for. It ran next to a really large park, with even mowed grass on one side, and an overview of a freeway on the other. I think it would be really good for people jogging or biking and I'm happy it is there, but if I wanted to walk next to mowed lawns, I can do that in my neighborhood, with my better variety of flowers and things to look at.  

I might try checking out the hollow again after work one day, with the water and shade it should be fairly cool and might be good for a short walk, maybe try and take a few laps around it. 

This morning I went 10 minutes away to a proper trail head. I had the choice of going up or down, and figured I would want to be going down on the way out, so went up. I could only go about 20 feet or so before needing to stop and catch my breath, but it had a nice view out over the Salt Lake Valley, with the lights of the city, and the trail just lighting up enough to see. There was a good length of fairly level ground that I followed for a while until it started to get steep again, so headed back to a fork and followed a different section for a bit. When that started going up again, I decided to head back out. Not sure how long I spent, probably less than half an hour, but it was good and exactly what I'm looking for with a hike, something that gets my heart going without needing to be fast, and being out in something that feels a lot more like real nature. Sure, there has to be some level of maintenance, but it isn't manicured. 

I don't think I would want to do it after work right now, not with the temps getting up above 90 degrees, but I do think it is well worth revisiting weekend mornings. 

I'm kind of missing having a Fitbit, or something like it, right now. I would like to know how many steps I'm taking on any given day, and have a record of the walks/hikes to compare and see how long/far I'm going. I wore a Fitbit for a few years, but ended up being frustrated by how well they didn't seem to hold up, and how big they were getting. I might look into what options there are now. For a long time I was averaging 10-12k steps every day. I'm sure I'm way under that now. Just a couple years ago, I could go for a 6 mile walk and be fine, and was hiking almost every day. I stopped when I moved to my current place; didn't know where to go and didn't make the effort to find out. But this morning really reminded me of why I was hiking so much, it's hard and I don't have the "body" for it, but it also feels good and accomplished and peaceful and beautiful. 

Struggling and tired. Most boxes have happened. Sunday I fell asleep without brushing. Yesterday I almost skipped most of them but managed to push through and do all but sorting. I tried, but when I looked in the box my brain just started screaming "no". So two red boxes.

Today is Thursday. I hadn't showered since Sunday. Couldn't seem to get myself up and in and kept saying I'd shower in the morning, when I couldn't get myself out of bed. Made a deal witg myself, I took a shower, but any boxes left undone won't count today. Grey not red.

I think I should probably see my doctor. She normally wanted to see me every 3 months to mange med levels and check blood work. It's probably been nearly a year since my last appointment. Maggie always had questions or other stuff or wanted to come along and I didn't want to deal with it. So I stopped going.

Maggie... she emailed me tonight.  Nothing out of line, I still haven't delt with the car insurance and she was emailed some questions when I had a rock chip repaired. I want to tell her I miss her. I want to ask her how she is. I want her to tell me that she's ok. I don't think it's a good idea. I'll deal with it after I've slept. 

Been thinking it would probably be a good idea to try and find a therapist again. Tried and failed to find one a few years back; may be worth another effort. 

Not really making progress on sorting stuff. Too overwhelmed, stuff in the way of putting stuff away. Starting to think what I should do is put everything not in an "away" into a box, and make a neat stack of boxes  and everything outside the boxes will be  neat and clean and I'll have room to move. Then I can take one box at a time, and everything that comes out of the box either goes to its new away, goes in a donate box, or goes in the trash.

I want to blame work for how burned out I still am; I mean, I am working 50-60 hours every week. But truth be told, I'm not actually "working " that much. I'm being paid to be there and to respond when things happen, but I spend a lot of time at my desk browsing the internet, or watching streams. Something breaks and I'll fix it,but then I'm back to slacking off.

I get a 4 day weekend for the holiday and I've got a few goals.

1. Go to painting on Saturday (been a really long time)

2. Go for an easy hike at least one morning (been a really really really long time since I've done any hiking) 

3. Put all messes into boxes.

4. Get all dishes ckean and put away.

I've been trying to write a post since Monday.

This is a post, I've written it.

I've been doing good on checking all the boxes every day. Sometimes it really is minimal, like brushing my teeth but not using toothpaste, or watching/listening to something self help (I hate that and want a different word) related, but most of the time I'm doing a fuller job. Just, when I'm tired and tempted to take a red box, I'm trying to at least do the minimum my brain needs to call it "good enough for today"

I am not happy with my lack of progress getting things sorted after having the floors redone, so I'm planning to give myself a specific goal every day. I've been stuck at "I need space to have the space to make space " and feeling overwhelmed and not making ground. Today's goal was "switch the ottoman and the folding table ". Took some doing and back and forth, but I got them switched and feel better situated to make more progress tomorrow. 

Ahem

Where were we?

I needed to stop at Walgreens today, and ended spending a bunch of time looking at nail polish, and got the one closest to the color of my unpainted nail. I want to take more control of my appearance and decorate myself in a way that I find pleasing. I'm happy with the color and I think it will help me in that direction. Start really subtle and gradually less so...

Unfortunately, my finishing school completely omitted the fine art of nail painting, and I didn't think to look up instructions before hand. The execution leaves my to be desired. I'll probably clean it off tomorrow and do some reading on HOW before I give it another go.

Challenge went really well last week. Having the physical sheet hanging prominently is a big help. Don't think I'm going to change anything for week 1, but I will say that the "read" goal does not necessarily involve actually reading. A YouTube video on clutter or dealing with trauma would also count. Not sure what a better word would be, so for now it is "read"

As expected, the hand marker didn't do wonderfully in the shower. 

Enough held on that I'm hoping what I wanted on my forearm will last a few days. I have a less temporary marker coming soon.

And I just noticed that I spelled "night" wrong... 

I will have all green boxes for this week by the time I go to bed.

Some of my body art stuff arrived today.

15 minutes ago, fleaball said:

I kiiiinda need to figure out wtf I'm eating. (Don't tell my nutritionist.)

I shan't say a word.

I lived at a place with wisteria for a while. Beautiful flowers, but it does like to grow aggressively. 

I think from an overall life balance, moving over would be for the best.  You said it is at the same agency, so you would still be able to see current boss, and once you're settled in and feel like you have extra bandwidth, could you  potentially offer to pinch-hit?

9 hours ago, Jarric said:

I missed the word 'out' in this quest, and was wondering how you were going to get through the challenge on 6 meals per week

We've had some people on here before that we're really into IF and would add full day fasts as well... so it could have been 6 meals a week.

1 hour ago, TimovieMan said:

There are still letter-shaped biscuits. Wish me luck... 😇

Damned sirens is what they are!

Good luck.