[Jupiter]

On 1/5/2022 at 9:26 PM, Rookie said:

Better to end it early then keep going to be honest. So  I think you did the right move! With the horses my coach always says by all means have a plan but get ready to throw the plan out because the horse usually has different plans lol and I think that applies to dogs too. 

 

Yeah, I knew if I was frustrated, then she was probably frustrated too and if I kept going then it just wouldn't have been any fun for either of us. Thanks.  

 

On 1/5/2022 at 10:53 PM, Kishi said:

 

Aah, total envy! I used to have a writer I'd meet with to work and talk shop, but that's kind of ended these days. So happy for you!

 

Yeah, it's definitely hard to find that these days. Thanks!  

 

On 1/5/2022 at 11:04 PM, Scaly Freak said:

 

Absolutely. They have good days and bad days, and they are very sensitive to moods and emotions in general. I once read somewhere that when training a dog it's important to remember that feelings travel down the leash, so if I'm stressed and angry, the dog notices and will reflect that. (As I recall from my childhood, the reins of a horse are also effective emotion conductors.)

 

Very true! 

 

On 1/5/2022 at 11:28 PM, Harriet said:

 

Alas! I hope you make some progress today instead.

 

Thanks! I made very little progress yesterday, but at least it was a little. 

[Jupiter]

Small rant, feel free to skip:

 

Spoiler

Yesterday was...not a good day for me mentally. I acknowledged the problem, set tools I'd previously dropped back into place, and I am moving on. Anyway, work today really sucked. Everyone rode my butt today and asked me the same two questions ("Where is my file?" and "Is this done yet?") all. Day. Long. Only two hours into the work day I nearly left for a mental health day. I didn't, but I should have. Seriously, two people sent four emails within fifteen minutes asking about the same file and when it would be done. Four emails in fifteen minutes. Another sent me a file and within, what, twenty to thirty minutes, asked, "Are you done yet?" Because apparently I was supposed to drop everything I was doing and work on her file right that second. And I sent stuff to another co-worker three or four times and told her very clearly exactly what she needed to do every time and she still comes back every time and says, "I don't understand. What is this? What do I do with this?" She had one thing to do. One. Thing. She's not a new employee, she knows what she needs to do. And yet. If my desk wasn't so cluttered, I'd have banged my head against it. This is what I deal with most days. 

 

Anyway, Day 5 check in:

 

Move Like Black Widow

 

-       Strength training 2x’s a week - Sort of. I only did two rounds of two exercises, but I used a slightly heavier dumbbell to make up some of the difference.  

-       Yoga 2x’s a week

-       Beat Saber 2x’s a week 

 

 

Practice My Craft Like Scarlet Witch

 

-       Read 30 minutes to an hour a day - Done, and finished my book. 

-       Writing prep 1 hour a day - Done. Not quite an hour, and I only worked on one character sketch, the one for my antagonist. Mostly I did a lot of thinking.  

-       Gain new knowledge 1 hour a week

 

 

Cook Like Green Arrow

 

-       Pick a recipe in advance 

-       Get the ingredients  

-       Cook a meal 1x a week

 

 

Stay Connected like Black Canary

 

-       Post on the forums once a day/respond to at least 2 other posts - Done. 

-       Social things 1x a week 

-       Dog training 15 minutes a day - Done, though for only 10 minutes, not 15. Still, she did pretty good today, I think. She's doing better with "sit" and "stay" at any rate. With "come" she still loses focus more often than not and goes all over the place. I also gave her the puzzle game today. She enjoyed that. 

 

And that's it for tonight. Hope everyone had a good day today. 

[Jupiter]

Just some thoughts, feel free to skip:

 

Spoiler

I've been thinking a lot this morning about what to do about some of the stuff I'm dealing with at work. Follow-up emails from a bunch of people constantly all throughout the day, not to mention the constant micro-managing, is driving me crazy. For now I'm going to put up an email notification during the day and see how that works (I think someone here mentioned this before but in the work/life rush, I forgot all about it). It won't really help with the micro-managing but hopefully it will help a little with the constant flow of follow up emails. I'm not supposed to do it, and I'm sure I will get in trouble and/or someone will complain, but I honestly don't know what else to do. We're not really allowed to do anything that would actually help us do our jobs better, so my hands are kind of tied. So I guess I'll try this for now and see how long I can get away with it. 

 

[Scaly Freak]

Spoiler

There are also a lot of things you can do in Outlook that makes inbound emails less intrusive, that may be worth experimenting with. Like setting up rules about sending them to folders that are not your inbox, turning off banner notifications, etc.

 

Other than that.. I remain absolutely baffled that your work doesn't use some kind of ticketing system for these requests. That way, the ticket sits there, the requestor can look at the status, and see an expected ETA, and the ticket also acts as a barrier between them and you. Your company seems as if it is very bad at making it easy for you to do your job.

 

[Jupiter]

On 1/8/2022 at 12:45 PM, Scaly Freak said:

  Reveal hidden contents

There are also a lot of things you can do in Outlook that makes inbound emails less intrusive, that may be worth experimenting with. Like setting up rules about sending them to folders that are not your inbox, turning off banner notifications, etc.

 

Other than that.. I remain absolutely baffled that your work doesn't use some kind of ticketing system for these requests. That way, the ticket sits there, the requestor can look at the status, and see an expected ETA, and the ticket also acts as a barrier between them and you. Your company seems as if it is very bad at making it easy for you to do your job.

 

 

Spoiler

Yeah, I'll have to experiment with it and see what I can do. And what I'm able to actually get away with. We're not allowed to do much. 

 

I wish we could do a ticketed system like that, that would be so nice. Unfortunately, the other departments would scream. We have to keep them (and our third-party partners) happy since they're the ones who bring in the money, so we are pretty much at their mercy.  

 

[Jupiter]

Check in for yesterday and today: 

 

Move Like Black Widow

 

-       Strength training 2x’s a week   

-       Yoga 2x’s a week

-       Beat Saber 2x’s a week 

 

I had planned to do yoga, but the day was busier than I thought it would be. Still, I did walk 40 minutes while running errands, so I’m counting it.

 

 

Practice My Craft Like Scarlet Witch

 

-       Read 30 minutes to an hour a day - Done, started the next book in the trilogy.

-       Writing prep 1 hour a day - Done. Only did 30 minutes, but I’m fleshing out the antagonist a bit more and I think the session went well.   

-       Gain new knowledge 1 hour a week

 

 

Cook Like Green Arrow

 

-       Pick a recipe in advance - Done.

-       Get the ingredients  - Done.

-       Cook a meal 1x a week

 

 

Stay Connected like Black Canary

 

-       Post on the forums once a day/respond to at least 2 other posts - Done. 

-       Social things 1x a week 

-       Dog training 15 minutes a day – Done. Did around 10 minutes. Still working on “come”. It was funny, at one point she started going in the opposite direction and I was like, “Wait, where are you going?” Still, overall I think she’s doing better. She's listening to me a little more even when we aren't doing an official training session (with treats as incentive). 

 

 

I did some other stuff too that weren't on my list. Overall, I felt pretty accomplished yesterday. Today, less so. I had planned to cook one recipe, but I wasn't feeling up to it, so I cooked a healthy breakfast instead (scrambled eggs, toast, and coffee) and did some dog training. Otherwise that was it. Nothing else got done. Gah. My superhero spirit guides would be disappointed. 

 

 

[Kishi]

Meh. Superheroes have down days and off-streaks too. Don't be too down on yourself. I'm sure there's a run of at least one of these characters who would sympathize at some point.

[Jupiter]

22 hours ago, Kishi said:

Meh. Superheroes have down days and off-streaks too. Don't be too down on yourself. I'm sure there's a run of at least one of these characters who would sympathize at some point.

 

Yeah, true. Thanks.  

[Waanie]

On 1/10/2022 at 2:13 AM, Jupiter said:

I did some other stuff too that weren't on my list. Overall, I felt pretty accomplished yesterday. Today, less so. I had planned to cook one recipe, but I wasn't feeling up to it, so I cooked a healthy breakfast instead (scrambled eggs, toast, and coffee) and did some dog training. Otherwise that was it. Nothing else got done. Gah. My superhero spirit guides would be disappointed. 

 

You should be a little nicer to yourself . With work like yours, it's no wonder that you're exhausted at the end of the day, and doing anything at all is already an accomplishment. Don't forget that for decades, working fulltime was the only job that was expected of men outside of some yardwork in the weekend. What you're doing is already great, and if that means that some days are just work and eating, then that's totally normal.

 

Also,

Spoiler

Why would they NOT want a ticketing system? It feels like a no-brainer! If I'd be in an office with your work, I'd make a post-it wall at least. There are also plenty of digital post-it walls out there (e.g. Trello is simple and easy to use), why don't they want this?!

 

[Scaly Freak]

Spoiler

Quote

Why would they NOT want a ticketing system? It feels like a no-brainer! If I'd be in an office with your work, I'd make a post-it wall at least. There are also plenty of digital post-it walls out there (e.g. Trello is simple and easy to use), why don't they want this?!

 

A ticketing system puts a buffer between requestor and developer, which in turn gives the developer space to spend more time on work. The developer also spends less time on updating a number of people on status changes, because all they have to do is update the ticket once and call it good. Meanwhile the requestors who try to reach out directly to the developers will be sent to the ticketing system, where there is no personal information, and no opportunity to ask follow-up questions, and if they post multiple requests for updates in a short amount of time everyone else can see them do it and see them look unprofessional and panicky.

 

In other words, ticketing systems takes power away from the person requesting  work, and makes it impossible for them to bully and micromanage. Instead, it forces them to wait patiently, while trusting that the work will be done on time.

 

Knowing what we know of Jupiter's workplace, I'd say it's blindingly obvious why they don't want one...

 

[Waanie]

Spoiler

36 minutes ago, Scaly Freak said:

Knowing what we know of Jupiter's workplace, I'd say it's blindingly obvious why they don't want one...

Fair enough. I'm so happy that this is not okay anywhere I work. Although even with a ticketing system, people can still micro-manage and ask for updates continuously of course. As long as email and mobile phones exist, all the annoying things are still possible.

 

In other words, did you get any reactions to the automatic notification?

 

 

[Jupiter]

On 1/11/2022 at 12:11 AM, Waanie said:

You should be a little nicer to yourself . With work like yours, it's no wonder that you're exhausted at the end of the day, and doing anything at all is already an accomplishment. Don't forget that for decades, working fulltime was the only job that was expected of men outside of some yardwork in the weekend. What you're doing is already great, and if that means that some days are just work and eating, then that's totally normal.

 

 

Thanks, I really appreciate your support.  And I definitely should, but it's hard LOL. 

 

On 1/11/2022 at 9:11 AM, Waanie said:

  Reveal hidden contents

Fair enough. I'm so happy that this is not okay anywhere I work. Although even with a ticketing system, people can still micro-manage and ask for updates continuously of course. As long as email and mobile phones exist, all the annoying things are still possible.

 

In other words, did you get any reactions to the automatic notification?

 

 

 

Spoiler

Well, they either ignored the notification completely, or they noticed it but didn't read it, assumed I was out for the day and went straight to my boss. Nobody complained about it specifically, but having it didn't really matter either.  

 

[Jupiter]

Small rant, feel free to skip:

 

Spoiler

So today was bad. The notification thing blew up in my face. My teams got confused (because heaven forbid they actually read their emails) and sent panicked emails to my boss who emailed me and told me to take the notification down. Of course, I also got the usual complaints from them, like how they don’t like how I respond to emails (if I don’t respond with “I’m doing it right now,” they tend to get upset) and how I’m not fast enough in completing their files (because it's not like I have a ton of other files or anything). The usual crap. But they really freaked out about the notification. Combine that with their other complaints and they told my boss they didn’t want to work with me anymore. Granted, this was after only two days. I've been doing this particular team's files for over a year and working my butt off for them, but after only two days of trying something new, something that might actually help, they decided they're done with me. I am that disposable to these people. And that's not including how awful they were the last few days to me, emailing me every five minutes about their files and being otherwise obnoxious and overbearing (and that's just the one team, I'm not even including all the others who did the same thing). I swear, I spent more time reassuring them that I was working on their files, than I did actually working on their files. And they wonder why it's taking me so long to get their files done? I complained to my boss about it and explained in detail about their harassment and everything I’ve been dealing with the past few days, and she basically told me that they do this to everyone and to suck it up. I spent a good part of the morning in tears. I was so close to walking out today, it’s not even funny.

 

Anyway, not much got done this week. Today was pretty much the only day I got anything done, but only because I was mad. 

 

Move Like Black Widow

 

-       Strength training 2x’s a week - Didn't quite do a full 3 sets of all the exercises, but I increased the weights so I think it balanced out.  

-       Yoga 2x’s a week

-       Beat Saber 2x’s a week 

 

 

Practice My Craft Like Scarlet Witch

 

-       Read 30 minutes to an hour a day - Not yet, will do after this. 

-       Writing prep 1 hour a day - Done. Got through 40 minutes. I worked on 2 more character sketches, but I struggled a little bit.  

-       Gain new knowledge 1 hour a week

 

 

Cook Like Green Arrow

 

-       Pick a recipe in advance - 

-       Get the ingredients  - 

-       Cook a meal 1x a week

 

 

Stay Connected like Black Canary

 

-       Post on the forums once a day/respond to at least 2 other posts - Done. 

-       Social things 1x a week 

-       Dog training 15 minutes a day – 

 

That's all I've got. 

[Novaurora]

Spoiler

I'm so sorry that you are going through all that shit at work.  Your company does not deserve you!!

 

[Scaly Freak]

Spoiler

Can you afford to walk away? Literally, from a financial and purely practical point of view? If you can, do it. They don't deserve you.

 

"They do it to everyone", is the very definition of an abusive work environment. Fuck all of them.

 

[Harriet]

On 1/14/2022 at 3:59 AM, Jupiter said:

Small rant, feel free to skip:

 

  Hide contents

So today was bad. The notification thing blew up in my face. My teams got confused (because heaven forbid they actually read their emails) and sent panicked emails to my boss who emailed me and told me to take the notification down. Of course, I also got the usual complaints from them, like how they don’t like how I respond to emails (if I don’t respond with “I’m doing it right now,” they tend to get upset) and how I’m not fast enough in completing their files (because it's not like I have a ton of other files or anything). The usual crap. But they really freaked out about the notification. Combine that with their other complaints and they told my boss they didn’t want to work with me anymore. Granted, this was after only two days. I've been doing this particular team's files for over a year and working my butt off for them, but after only two days of trying something new, something that might actually help, they decided they're done with me. I am that disposable to these people. And that's not including how awful they were the last few days to me, emailing me every five minutes about their files and being otherwise obnoxious and overbearing (and that's just the one team, I'm not even including all the others who did the same thing). I swear, I spent more time reassuring them that I was working on their files, than I did actually working on their files. And they wonder why it's taking me so long to get their files done? I complained to my boss about it and explained in detail about their harassment and everything I’ve been dealing with the past few days, and she basically told me that they do this to everyone and to suck it up. I spent a good part of the morning in tears. I was so close to walking out today, it’s not even funny.

 

This sucks so much Your clients sound like petulant toddlers.

 

On 1/14/2022 at 3:59 AM, Jupiter said:

Anyway, not much got done this week. Today was pretty much the only day I got anything done, but only because I was mad.

 

Angry accomplishments? Useful! But probably not sustainable for every day.

[Waanie]

Spoiler

I'm sorry that the notification blew up in your face! Your boss probably also has her back to the wall, but all in all it's not acceptable how they're treating  you. Again, it's easy to say for me in a European country and good career prospects. I don't have any advice for you at this point, I just want to say that I feel for you .

 

On 1/14/2022 at 3:59 AM, Jupiter said:

Didn't quite do a full 3 sets of all the exercises, but I increased the weights so I think it balanced out.  

Good job on increasing the weight .

[Waanie]

On 1/5/2022 at 5:54 AM, Jupiter said:

 (I actually stayed up a little too late last night reading, which is part of why I'm so tired today. Oops.) I'm loving this book so far. Williams is such an underrated author. @Waanie, you might like this book. It's Shades of Treason by Sandy Williams. 

I might have finished this book in one late afternoon & evening, and stayed up a little late to finish this book as well .  Thanks again for the recommendation!

[juliebarkley]

Spoiler

I agree with Scaly. You are being actively prevented from doing anything at all to make your situation better. When you explain what you are dealing with and how it affects you, nothing changes and it is pushed aside. It's clear at this point that the work environment will never change; they are happy to use you up until there is nothing left. Don't let them.

 

Leaving a toxic work environment (which job I had been working towards for years) was the best career decision I ever made. I don't know how much you make, or what you need to live on, or what the prospects are like for alternatives, but if you have options, shop around. The stress you have been under can only harm your physical and mental health long-term. You deserve so much better than that.

 

Are you on track for cooking this weekend?

[Jupiter]

On 1/13/2022 at 8:18 PM, Novaurora said:

  Reveal hidden contents

I'm so sorry that you are going through all that shit at work.  Your company does not deserve you!!

 

 

Thank you, I really appreciate that. 

 

On 1/14/2022 at 4:59 PM, Scaly Freak said:

  Reveal hidden contents

Can you afford to walk away? Literally, from a financial and purely practical point of view? If you can, do it. They don't deserve you.

 

"They do it to everyone", is the very definition of an abusive work environment. Fuck all of them.

 

 

7 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

  Reveal hidden contents

I agree with Scaly. You are being actively prevented from doing anything at all to make your situation better. When you explain what you are dealing with and how it affects you, nothing changes and it is pushed aside. It's clear at this point that the work environment will never change; they are happy to use you up until there is nothing left. Don't let them.

 

Leaving a toxic work environment (which job I had been working towards for years) was the best career decision I ever made. I don't know how much you make, or what you need to live on, or what the prospects are like for alternatives, but if you have options, shop around. The stress you have been under can only harm your physical and mental health long-term. You deserve so much better than that.

 

 

 

Spoiler

Thanks, guys, I really appreciate it. I'd need to have somewhere to go before I can quit (not to mention, if I just quit without a backup plan my family would have a fit). I told myself that I won't get another job in this industry, so I have to figure out where else I can go. Ideally it would be something writing-related, like being a copywriter or technical writer, something like that, but there aren't a lot of options for that here, plus I don't have much experience. I'd also likely take a huge pay cut, which will hurt, so there's that to consider, too. So I'm not really sure what my next steps should be right now. 

 

On 1/15/2022 at 12:46 AM, Harriet said:

This sucks so much Your clients sound like petulant toddlers.

 

You have no idea. 

 

On 1/15/2022 at 12:46 AM, Harriet said:

Angry accomplishments? Useful! But probably not sustainable for every day.

 

Nope, definitely not. But it comes in handy every once in a while. 

 

On 1/15/2022 at 10:07 AM, Waanie said:

  Reveal hidden contents

I'm sorry that the notification blew up in your face! Your boss probably also has her back to the wall, but all in all it's not acceptable how they're treating  you. Again, it's easy to say for me in a European country and good career prospects. I don't have any advice for you at this point, I just want to say that I feel for you .

 

 

 

Spoiler

Yeah, I don't know, I feel like she should still be able to do something. Thanks, I appreciate it. 

 

On 1/15/2022 at 10:07 AM, Waanie said:

Good job on increasing the weight .

 

Thanks!  

 

9 hours ago, Waanie said:

I might have finished this book in one late afternoon & evening, and stayed up a little late to finish this book as well .  Thanks again for the recommendation!

 

You're welcome, I'm glad you enjoyed it!  

 

6 hours ago, juliebarkley said:

Are you on track for cooking this weekend?

 

Sort of. I didn't really have anything planned, but I had some eggs and bread still left that needed to get used, so I made scrambled eggs and toast again. 

[Defining]

Scrambled eggs and toast is a delicious meal. 

[Jupiter]

Thank you guys so much for your support, it really means a lot.  

 

I did all the things today. I cleaned a little bit, did three loads of laundry, and a bunch of other stuff. And I watched a few episodes of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, because I just needed something funny to watch, and it was awesome. Anyway, stats: 

 

Move Like Black Widow

 

-       Strength training 2x’s a week -  

-       Yoga 2x’s a week - Did around 25 minutes of yoga. 

-       Beat Saber 2x’s a week 

 

 

Practice My Craft Like Scarlet Witch

 

-       Read 30 minutes to an hour a day - Done. Tried reading 3 books and discarded all of them before starting another one. It's actually pretty interesting so far.  

-       Writing prep 1 hour a day - Done. Worked for over an hour and got 4 character sketches done. Just 4 left and then I can move on to the next item on my list. 

-       Gain new knowledge 1 hour a week - Sort of done. Only got in 30 minutes but I learned a lot. 

 

 

Cook Like Green Arrow

 

-       Pick a recipe in advance - 

-       Get the ingredients  - 

-       Cook a meal 1x a week - Done. Cooked breakfast: scrambled eggs, toast, and coffee. 

 

 

Stay Connected like Black Canary

 

-       Post on the forums once a day/respond to at least 2 other posts - Done. 

-       Social things 1x a week 

-       Dog training 15 minutes a day – Sort of done. Only did a few minutes. 

 

 

Don't think I did too badly today. And now I'm off to bed. Night, nerds. 

 

 

[Harriet]

Looking excellent, especially writing prep yay!

[Scaly Freak]

2 hours ago, Jupiter said:

-       Read 30 minutes to an hour a day - Done. Tried reading 3 books and discarded all of them before starting another one. It's actually pretty interesting so far.  

 

Excellent. Life is too short to read books you don't want to read, or enjoy reading.

 

Spoiler

Despite what it might feel like right now, you are not stuck in your current job situation. I hear everything you said about what limits your options, and those are obviously perfectly valid reasons for staying where you are for the time being. But all that means is that you don't have a lot of options right now.  Yes, you have a couple of things to figure out, and the process of figuring that out can feel like it takes forever, but it still counts as actively doing something to change your situation. You are not stuck forever.

 

[Novaurora]

Spoiler

10 hours ago, Jupiter said:

Thanks, guys, I really appreciate it. I'd need to have somewhere to go before I can quit (not to mention, if I just quit without a backup plan my family would have a fit). I told myself that I won't get another job in this industry, so I have to figure out where else I can go. Ideally it would be something writing-related, like being a copywriter or technical writer, something like that, but there aren't a lot of options for that here, plus I don't have much experience. I'd also likely take a huge pay cut, which will hurt, so there's that to consider, too. So I'm not really sure what my next steps should be right now. 

 

I totally get this feeling.  That's exactly how I feel about teaching sometimes.  It feels really hard to escape and the prospects aren't as good in terms of the money.  I will be spending positive vibes into the universe that you find something that fits your interests, financial needs, and desired work environment!