Working

There were a few big things that happened at work this past week.

First, there was the opportunity to run in a race that was a lot of fun.  There have been a few marathons that I missed due to work, but I got to run one last weekend and then go immediately back to work.  It was essentially the worst idea ever and nearly impossible to stay awake during one of our briefings halfway through the day, but it was completely worth it to get to run another marathon with some people out here!

Second, we had what we thought was an enormous breakthrough.  There was much rejoicing and we managed to feel elated for three full days.  It wasn’t until we were starting to wrap up one of our programs that someone tossed a wrench in the plans and basically tossed us back to the beginning.  We weren’t frustrated (that has happened before, we have kind of come to expect it) we were mostly just disappointed that we had used all our confetti and streamers for the first celebration when we’ll definitely need some for the next time we are partying upon completion.

Third, it has been determined that the single most used item of technology in our group is a Kindle.  Every single one of us has one and we all use it more here than we have any other time.  We trade books so each of us can get exposure to types of books we may not have seen, we trade reviews of books to buy and we trade Kindles if we two people have books the others want to read.  The only bad thing about having that much literature at your fingertips is the insatiable need to purchase more books.  My brain thanks me, my bank account does not.

Quotes

As an update, the meeting requests at work have not slowed. This coming week has 18 meetings from one person.

Here are a few quotes from this past week that really made us laugh.

(Sitting in a room giving a presentation that the head guy is giving in a few days to some very important people. I finish the presentation and click to the “End of Slide Show” screen.)
Head guy: That’s it?
Me: Yep.
(Silence)
Head guy: Hmm.

(Driving while the rest of the passengers look out the window.)
Passenger 1: (Looking wistfully out the window) This is my life.

(Giving a presentation where we had a placeholder slide we had copied and pasted from an earlier slide and colored the text red.)
Me: This is a placeholder slide.
Unaware guy: That’s the same text, it’s just red.
Me: Yes, it’s just a placeholder until we have the information to fill the chart.
UG: But it says the same thing!

And the one that takes the cake:
Anyone who is completely unaware of what they are asking us to do: Make it happen.

If you tell me to make it happen, I will.  The product might not be what you wanted, it may have been procured illegally or immorally and it might actually hinder progress in the long run, but I WILL make it happen.  Be very careful if you tell me to “make it happen”.

Meetings

Meetings are reasonable, correct? Oh, how silly and incorrect you would have been had you said yes. Meetings should be event-driven, rarely time-driven. You should have milestones with meetings to fix problems or meetings when deviations from an accepted plan occur. Meetings should not be scheduled simply because it’s time to have a meeting.

Even that is not enough to get me riled up; after all, I’m a fairly calm and consistent person regardless of what I have to deal with. I have my younger sisters to thank for teaching me the patience and indomitable ability to ignore irritating people.

Meetings are essentially the bane of my existence.

I have never had to deal with so many meetings (which is saying quite a bit) that don’t really create any beneficial action except for tracking current progress on tasks and conveying information.

Again, I could find reason in that concept; after all, it is important to track your personnel and ensure they are being tasked appropriately and effectively. Meetings are a great strategy for large groups of people.

My problem: our group is just four people and we all sit in one room when we are at our desks. We are essentially sitting in one long meeting every day. If you need something, just ask!

My Outlook calendar (which I’ve never used before now and I have access to even less frequently) is now filling up with blocks of time that could have the potential to be used for other things.

Don’t get me wrong, meetings can be wonderful tools if wielded correctly; they should just never be used as a sledgehammer when a nail file is needed.

Charging

As I plugged my second cell phone in one night this week, I realized that the charging situation in my life has become fairly dire. I have both a personal and work phone, a laptop, a GPS watch, an iPod, an iPad, and a Kindle that all have to be topped off at various times depending on their battery status. It has come to the point of traveling with a power strip/surge protector because I have found hotel rooms rarely have enough power outlets for me to have everything plugged in at once and that just will not do. Along with the power strip, I have a small Pelican case with all my chargers and a spare wireless router just in case the hotel I’m going to only allows one connection or makes you sign in with MAC address filtering. I can’t have just one of my devices connected to the network; I demand continuous and full connection to the Internet at all times on all my devices.

Remarkably, I’m still able to travel for great lengths of time with just one suitcase and one carry on. There are the occasional trips that require either a larger suitcase or two smaller ones, but in general I am able to make everything fit in one. Any by “make everything fit” I mean “shove mercilessly until I can force the zipper shut and hope it does not explode at any point in my travels”. So far, the strategy works though I can see it causing problems later on if I arrive to an empty suitcase and my clothes strewn about the baggage claim area.

Mentioning my GPS watch; I’ve really started wearing it every time I run now. I kept forgetting it or not charging it for a while there, but I’ve now logged 197 miles on it (most of which have been added in the last month or so). Now that I wear it everywhere, people I run with have started to rely on it more for split times and mile paces. I forgot to bring it to a run the other morning and I felt as if I was going to be ostracized or outcast from the group because I could no longer provide them their splits or know the exact pace we were keeping. I offer more than just a technologically advanced watch, people; I offer witty banter and constant encouragement as well!