Category: work

Walk

The city has been doing a big ‘wellness’ kick this years and as part of that, my dept was able to secure a treadmill that fits at a workstation.

At first thought, it sound a bit gimmicky but after seeing (and using) it in action, I’m sold on it. It is basically the tread part w/o the top. The control panel is attached by a wire which makes it incredibly mobile. It only goes up to 2mph for safety reasons. [1]It doesn’t sound like much but walking at that speed and typing does take a little adjustment. lol It sticks out far enough to be seen but not too far so that people are tripping over it.

I scoffed at the idea at first. I am happy to be wrong. Not only does it appear to be a success so far, but I even find myself using it. On a 10-hour shift, I tend not to get a lot of walking in. I will sometimes walk for lunch but I don’t always feel like shlepping all over the area. Having an option to walk and work is definitely nice.

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↑1 It doesn’t sound like much but walking at that speed and typing does take a little adjustment. lol

VA

VA is our code for vacation time on the books. For the first time in 14 years (as of April), I am eligible to take the week between xmas and NYE off! And by eligible, I mean I have enough seniority to grab the slot before it gets snapped up. I’m not sure why but I’m overly tickled by that. hehehe​ I feel like I have "made it" so to speak.

I’m changing schedules in March for our bi-annual sign up. Now that Shawn has weekends off, I get to go back to a weekend slot and slightly later hours. Both options are nicer for me. The down side is I’m officially on ‘swing shift’ again which always tends to have more internal drama. I’m not quite sure why.

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Having Fri/Sat/Sun’s off will be nice again though. I am looking forward to it.

Schedule

I recently switched to a slightly later schedule at work. It is amazing what a two hour difference makes. hehehe For you long time readers (if there are any left), you’ll remember how much I just loooooove day shifts.

Having worked swing shift for roughly 12 years, I made the jump to an earlier shift for the previous project I was on. It wasn’t as early as our normal day-shift so it was bearable. It was also very flexible. [1]It gave me a huge advantage for travel when The Pup and were still courting. After finishing the project I opted to go to our normal day-shift, which is 0700-1500. That means getting up roughly 0530 to 0550 to get the Cooper fed/walked and then off to work. Since The Pup has almost identical hours, it made sense. And as much as I grumbled, it was an easy sacrifice to make.

Sadly, I just couldn’t keep up with the hours. I’d come home tired pretty much every day. Motivating myself to do the gym or anything beyond sofa lounging was always a challenge. I am just not a early morning person by nature. It’s not so much the getting up as getting to bed that is the problem. And unlike a lot of folks, I simply do not function well on a lack of sleep.

The later shift is also 10 hours instead of 8, which is another reason I was reticent to switch. The 2 hours later/2 hours longer makes for a 4-hour chunk out of our ‘home time’ during the week. It doesn’t seem like much but trying to sync gym schedules or even dinner is a bit of a chore. The upside is I get an extra day off every week. The Pup has already commented on how much more energized I am when I come home. lol

Ironically, his schedule has become more fluid so between both our schedule changes, we still see each other plenty enough during the week. Call me silly but I still rush home every day to see him. We end up lounging or playing video games but the desire to be with him is still very very strong.

 

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↑1 It gave me a huge advantage for travel when The Pup and were still courting.

801

‘Eight Oh One‘ is our local PD code for suicide. Today is the unfortunate anniversary of a coworker/friend’s death by suicide 9 years ago. She shot herself in a moment of sadness and her light was forever extinquished. Her death was especially painful for me. We weren’t besties but we were friends and I always considered her a kindred spirit. And in moments alone, she would often open up a little more to me and share in that connection. Our connection stemmed in part due to similar struggles in life. We both experienced a harsh and abusive childhood because we had the audacity to be born gay. Having already survived my own brush with suicide, it was a big blow to hear of her death. I knew what she must have been going thru internally and lamented that she didn’t reach out to me. Of course, no one knew how bad she felt. She was very stoic and kept it all hidden.

People often think of suicides as cowardly or selfish. That is simply not true. That is just a projection of our own pain over the loss. When you reach that awful stage there is no thought of self. [1]And I hope you haven’t and/or never do  There is no reason. There is no right or wrong. There is no thought of those who will miss you after you are gone. All of it is stripped away, layer by layer, until nothing is left but an all-encompassing blinding pain. A singular thought remains….escape!  Sadly, suicide is often the only mechanism that seems to offer a solution at that moment. But, I am here to tell you you can escape it without resorting to death. I am living proof.

Anyway, I decided to take her badge to work and remind everyone of her anniversary. On a side note, LGBT folks are 4-6 times more likely to commit suicide before the age of 25. [2]The statistics vary from org to org but this is the rough average.  In my line of work, suicides are also higher due to the stress and constant raw emotions that we process day after day. After decades of exposure, it can really wear you down. So, I wanted to reach out to my coworkers in the hopes that if they should ever be in such a dark place, they should also feel comfortable reaching out to me or anyone in their life for help. We all talked about fond memories of her and how she impacted us.

As for my coworker, where ever you are my dear, I hope you are in a better place. I hope you escaped the misery and pain. I hope that those around you can experience your light and love and be better for it.

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↑1 And I hope you haven’t and/or never do
↑2 The statistics vary from org to org but this is the rough average.

Care

Sort of related to my last post, I’ve been looking toward the future. It’s funny, as a kid, I never imagined old age. I guess that is to be expected in your youth. I mean who really thinks of retirement in their 20’s?  Most of my 20’s were pretty rough so probably even more so for me. And while I’m far from ancient, I am at an age where one certainly begin to thinks of the future. I’m nowhere near retirement but the idea of such a thing no longer seems foreign.

Being in civil service and unionized does come with some benefits. I’m fortunate to get good health and life insurance. I’m ‘vested’ [1]I’ve worked the required number of years to qualify for a pension so when I do finally retire, I’ll have a paycheck for the rest of my life. This comes on top of social security (if it still exists by then). It is comforting to know I won’t have to worry too much when I retire. Granted, I won’t be living the high life, but I also won’t be eating out of cat tins. Growing up very poor I usually avoided the thought of what retirement would be like. If I’m being truthful, in my 20’s when I did think of retirement I figured I’d just off myself when I got old so I wouldn’t be a burden. Yes, I know how awful that sounds now but youth isn’t always about being smart. For you long time readers, you know my first 25 years weren’t so rosy.

Anyway, as I look to the future I worry for The Pup. God forbid anything should happen to me, but since I am older I want to make sure he is taken care of in the event of my death. Granted, he isn’t one who needs to be ‘taken care’ of but you get my point. It has always been my nature to take care of those I love so this is just an extension of that. It gives me great comfort to know he’ll be ok in the event something does happen to me. Of course, when we do get married he’ll be eligible to get my pension just like a straight couple would. (There are profound benefits for the LGBT community finally acheiving equality under the law, this being just one.) 

I guess going from having nothing as a kid to my current status, it gives me a strong sense of pride and accomplishment.

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↑1 I’ve worked the required number of years to qualify for a pension

Settle

Life is slowly settling back into normalcy for me. The work project is over and I’m coming into the last week of training a new recruit. I’ll be back on my own then. I don’t think I realized how much this project impacted me. You’d think I’d have been less stressed considering my main job often deals with life/death scenarios. Oddly, I found that I was bringing my work home with me, at least in my head anyway. Normally, when I leave work I leave it all behind. The place could burn down and as long as they don’t call me I don’t think about it. On the project, I was constantly worried about progress and deadlines. The interdepartmental fights and obstruction was extremely frustrating. It affected not only my peace of my mind but also my gym schedule and even my *ahem* libido. The latter wasn’t as bad as you might think though. For someone who has always had a libido, not having one for awhile was kind of nice. Ever since puberty it has been on full. It usually isn’t a matter of am I frisky but how much so. LOL Not having that constant heat in head for awhile was kinda nice. [1]And it most definitely has come come back!  hehehe

I’m grateful home life has been amazing. Nothing glamorous or riveting mind you, just two people who get each other spending quality time together. Many evenings, after I’d made dinner, he’d be in the bedroom on the computer playing video games and I’d be in the living room watching Tivo or playing my own video games. We would both check on the other from time to time to make sure we weren’t feeling neglecting. We finally just realized we didn’t need to, we were both content. Even though we were home together, we were both doing our own things and having ‘me’ time. I can’t tell you how amazing that feels.

So now that things are settling, I need to get my butt back on a steady gym schedule. I’ve been very negligent in going and have put on a few pounds. Tis  true, I’ve gotten a little bit of a gut. I miss the gym but I’ll admit I’ve gotten a little used to just coming home and relaxing. It’s been hard to get back into a solid routine. [2]It doesn’t help when my neighbor literally just dropped off some delicious homemade cookies!  It is time though. The GHHD’s [3]Gay High Holy Day are approaching. lol

I keep getting asked if I’m giving up blogging. The answer is still no. I always put life first and blog second. The blog has suffered a bit. I had some hiccups recently with my new(er) ISP a few times as I got migrated to a new server.  During one such short outage, I got several freaked out emails asking if I had deleted my blog. Nope, still here.

Tomorrow starts the new week and a new gym schedule. I’m only slightly outside of the range I like to be in physically. I just need to get a good schedule going again.

The Pup and I are headed to Phoenix the last week of June. He hasn’t been back since he moved here and I know he misses it. I don’t mind (except for the damn heat). He spent his whole life there so I’d be surprised if he didn’t miss it. The roomie is watching Cooper so he’ll be in good hands while I’m gone.

Time for GoT’s so more later.

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↑1 And it most definitely has come come back!
↑2 It doesn’t help when my neighbor literally just dropped off some delicious homemade cookies!
↑3 Gay High Holy Day

Almost

Today was the first day in weeks I came home and did not become a heap of exhausted flesh curled up on the sofa. While I am worn out, I’m not bone tired. As the work project has moved into it’s final phase, deployment, things have been busy. Being someone who can’t just say, ‘Oh look, time to go home’ I’ve put in some long days lately. But my part is almost done. I volunteered for this project out of a desire to make our work environment better. I also didn’t want the users to get the shaft by having people who don’t use the system on a daily basis making decisions about what we got. A year and 2 months of my life has flown by and I’m proud of my work. It may not be everything I wanted but it is 5 times better than what we would have ended up with otherwise.

From a technical stand point, the rollout went off without too many major hiccups. The biggest unexpected glitches dealt with interface connections. Overall, once the new system went up, it stayed up. The glitches are still being worked on but the list is down to less than a handful.

From a user stand point, many of my coworkers hate it (so far). While we stayed with the same vendor, we switched to a new product. It looks similar in many ways but the underlying architecture is completely different. This translates into many of our day to day tasks being different or even an extra step at times. And for people who rely heavily on cognitive muscle-memory and reflex, this can be a royal pain. You, in essence, have to relearn your basic job functions over again. Throw in a healthy dose of random unexpected configuration issues [1]Even something as simple as new screen resolution has been an issue , functions that are similar but different, and  you have a recipe for some consternation. Two weeks in and we are still whittling down the list of issues. And while mostly minor, together they collectively make for some very frustrating attempts to get thru what used to be 2nd nature.

Once we work out the kinks and the settings that work best for everyone, I think many will come to enjoy it, or at least not mind it. Right now everyone is in full ‘I hate this crap’ mode. Having the luxury of 13 years on the job, I remember when we upgraded from a very limited custom map software to a newer one. Everyone moaned and groaned about it and now those same people would cut you if you tried to take their map away. Change is hard when you develop a skill set based on not having to think about menial tasks. Ironically, coworkers who’ve been thru previous upgrades aren’t as irate. Anyway, I know after things settle in people we feel better about it. [2]I do admit that every issue I knew would cause heads to explode has done just that. If they only knew my head exploded too. hehehe

For myself, I’m looking forward to going back to my normal job. I miss it. Hell, I even miss talking to the public. More than anything I’m looking forward to regular schedules, hours, and days. Naturally, I have a trainee starting with me next week. He’ll be with me for at least 4 weeks, maybe 5. He scored with a trainer who knows the new system inside and out. And I don’t mind having a trainee as I enjoy teaching.

On a side note, my blog should pick up again. You know you missed me.

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↑1 Even something as simple as new screen resolution has been an issue
↑2 I do admit that every issue I knew would cause heads to explode has done just that. If they only knew my head exploded too. hehehe

End

The end is nigh. No, not my blog, the work project I have given a year of my life. We started the teaching phase a few weeks ago.Teaching 9-10 hours 6 days a week tends to wear on you. I’ve been struggling not to lose my voice from all the talking. [1]The irony in that statement is not lost on me. hehehe That being said, the software upgrade is being received better than I originally thought. It has it frustrations but overall it is an impressive upgrade. It makes some of our more tedious tasks easier.

This is the last week of training so I’ll be getting a break soon. I still have work to do but it revolves around tying up all the loose details. By the end of May, everything will be over. The software will be fully rolled out and I’ll go back to my main job functions. Part of me is glad but part of me will miss it. It gave me a chance to use skills I haven’t used in quite some time. It started out extremely fun and exciting and then the politics and interdepartmental squabbles soured it a bit.

Overall, it has been an exciting experience. I’ll always be grateful as it gave me some flexibility in my schedule I wouldn’t have otherwise had. Said flexibility gave me the space to devote more energies toward time with The Pup and our new (at the time) relationship. I expect my blogging will pickup again as well. Yay!

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↑1 The irony in that statement is not lost on me. hehehe

Here

I’m still here. It’s just been a busy few weeks.

The work project I’ve been working on for the last year is in its final stage and things are more than a little crazy. Beyond the deliberate delays introduced by a certain outside agency, things are moving right along. The build phase has ended and the training phase has begun.

Last week was the ‘train the trainer’ sessions and this coming Sunday night starts the mad push to get everyone trained on the new system. I’ll be a primary instructor along with several of my coworkers. Since the old and new systems cannot run side by side, it’s an all or nothing cut over. That means everyone has to be trained before we can go live. That translates into a mad dash to cram 24 hours of training into 3 sessions across 3 watches.

This next week I’m working 6 days. I’ll most likely end up doing a few 12-14 hour days as not only do we have an entire workforce to train but also a brand new cadet class. We didn’t plan it that way but due to schedules and delays it worked out that way.

So yeah, I’ll be a busy bee this next few weeks. lol Afterwards, I should be back on my regular shift doing my regular job. Well I say regular, I went to days so I’ll still be in early every day.  Ugh

Freeze

My workspace at work is always an ice box. [1]That’s slang for refrigerator for you young’ens We have this awesome temp control system that allows to control the temperature in virtually every room but mine. lol  The space I work in and the space next to me used to be one big room. After a reconfiguration project a few years ago, it was split in two. That’s great but now the temp controls for the other side no longer effects my side. So I work in this nether space of frozen Tundra temperatures. Someone made a conscious decision to not include this little space because all the temp sensors have been removed. Seriously?! lol

My workstation has a little Johnson control heater which is usually enough to off-set the worst of it. But on days like today, it’s just a polar zone up in here. brrrrrr. I keep an extra warm up on the back of my chair so I can bundle up. If you see updates on Google, twitter, or FB that ramble off into one or two letters, call 911, I’ve frozen to death.

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↑1 That’s slang for refrigerator for you young’ens