Sleep...

My department head and his wife have 10 children together. He claims that child-induced stress levels top out with kid number 4. I have no idea if this is true, and I will never find out.

With both of us working outside the home fulltime, three kids is plenty. With A. waking up every two hours for weeks on end, one is more than enough.

I think I am officially moving past the 'I want another child' stage, and into the 'it's gonna be great when everyone is potty-trained' stage of my parenting life.

Actually, lately, it's been, 'I can't wait until I feel comfortable sending all three to Grandma's house.' I suspect that will change once I actually get a few nights with more than 4 hours' sleep.

The combination of A. waking nightly and the stress of my job waking me nightly has really burned me out. I just hope I can hold out through April. May does not look as bad on the work front...

I am looking forward to actually spending time with my little family.

Shiny, Happy ULEV having fun...

Mr. W. has taken a new job, leaving me alone and forlorn. Gee, I didn't realize how much I relied on him to keep me grounded and as a release valve for stress. He has been my sounding board and reality check here since before we started dating. Many people I've talked to have said they can't imagine working with their spouse. I, however, am trying to figure out how to work without my spouse. I miss him.

Since we no longer work at the same place (or even on the same side of town), we can't exactly commute together any more. Soooo, Saturday, we took the plunge and bought a shiny new Honda Accord. The car is big enough to fit three carseats across the back and small enough to get 30 mpg. Another bit of greenery is the ULEV label.

Since Mr. W. will be working close to daycare, he will continue to drive the minivan while I get to drive the car. It has been so long since I've driven a car, I forgot how much fun they are. I'm glad we got the little 4 cylinder model or I'm afraid I'd be zipping around a little too fast. I did learn how to drive in Germany... and going fast is fun!

Gloomy, gloomy day

Went to the funeral of a former co-worker this morning... He retired almost 4 years ago, but he was so very helpful to me the 6 years we worked together. A very kind man devoted to his church's youth, volley ball and M&Ms. He assured me he could taste the difference in each color M&M. Of course, he also once tried to convince me I broke our mainframe.

Mr. W. knew him just about his entire life due to church connections.

Can we please have a do-over for May?

What...

What do you say to a man when he tells you he's relieved that he will be able to have an open casket for his son?

What do you say when he shows you the newspaper article, tells you that it was a horrific crash and says that they haven't seen their son, yet?

What do you say when he tells you how fortunate they were to have had their son for 25 years?

I stopped by their house yesterday evening and brought a bunch of paper goods (plates, napkins, tissues, etc.) after my mother suggested that those would be handy. I'm both glad I went and really wish I hadn't gone. The funeral will be Friday...

How...

How does a person keep breathing after his/her child has stopped?

There is a very kind and generous spirited man who works in my department. We've done Toastmasters together and are both involved with CPCU Society.

His son was killed in a wreck yesterday. Head-on collision with a truck...

Edited to add: Please, please, please wear your seatbelts. This kid may have been okay if he hadn't been thrown from the vehicle.

Pavlov would be so proud...

Back in late February, I broke out ye olde breastpump. I was having trouble with too much milk production and needed (among other things) some tubing for my breastpump ASAP. So off to the medical supply place I went with baby in tow. They had the tubing at around 2x the price I could have ordered it elsewhere, but it was a bit of an emergency. After we got home, I nursed A. put her to bed and then started up a pot of water to boil for sterilizing the tubes. Once the tubes were boiled and as emptied of water as I could get them, I hooked them up to the pump. In the past, I've used the pump to air dry my the silicone tubes faster. It is a matter of attaching the tubes and turning the pump on without anything else attached. Interestingly enough, the 'girls' remembered the sound of the pump and immediately let down just a ton of milk all over the place. I did grab a bottle and 'caught' 3.5 ounces or so. Arf, arf!

***

Today's my first day back at work, and in a truly boneheaded moment, I only brought three bottles to pump in. I have a stack of baggies for breastmilk storage still sitting at home, where they're just a big help right now. The three bottles have been full for a few hours, and I could really stand to pump right now. However, I just can't seem to bring myself to dump out any milk... Thinking about my baby causes my milk to let down, and well, let's just say I'm VERY thankful I wore my Lily Padz today. I don't usually leak, so I wore them mostly so I don't show through my shirt, if you know what I mean. However, leaking is definitely an issue right now.

Can anyone say 'conditioned response going awry'?

Pavlov's Wikipedia entry

Exam's comin' round the bend

You may (or may not) have noticed a marked decrease in the amount of posting lately. Weeellll, truth be told I'm obnoxiously busy at work, and I'm actually still trying to study for the actuarial exam next month. I would dearly love to pass this exam, but realistically, I hope to merely flunk well enough that they don't toss out my score altogether. The concepts covered in the material aren't bothering me much at all. The killer part is all the math I forgot or never knew in the first place. Things like natural logs, integration, geometric series, quadratic formula, that stupid e, etc.

I checked my blog traffic yesterday and was pretty shocked at what I found. People are still coming to read here! In fact, somehow my Actuarial Schmactuarial post was linked to from Actuary.net. Weird... and unexpected. I don't believe I'm the only person to grouse and whine about actuarial exams on a blog. Maybe I should take a look and see if I can find any brothers and sisters in pain. LOL!

I have 6, possibly 7, days vacation I need to use before the bean gets here in early February. Between training up my fill-in for my maternity leave and dealing with end of year bonus schedules, I won't be able to take any vacation starting January 2. I'll be using 2 day in order to travel to see my folks over Thanksgiving and 1 day for L.'s allergy test.... oooh, I haven't posted about that one.... which leaves me 3, possibly 4, vacation days just begging to be used. Guess who'll be using 'vacation' time to study? No, no, no, YES! Yours truly.

Now, the big dilemma is deciding WHEN to use those days. Should they be grouped together right before the exam? Should they be spaced apart evenly between now and the exam? Should I save one for the day after the exam when I will be in a big sulk and not want to talk to anybody, especially co-workers who will be asking me how I did on the exam, thus bringing the pain of my first failure ever to the forefront over and over again?

M.W.

The security system woks

We have a brand new security system at work. Badges are required to move from floor to floor and into certain departments. After more than 9 years of never having to deal with a locked door, I have definitely hit a learning curve.

I can tell you with 100% certainty that the lock on the glass door that goes into IS works perfectly, seeing as how I have smashed myself into it on multiple occasions. Maybe a broken nose will help me remember to swipe my ID badge? ... Probably not.

Funny at work

Conversation with Sales VP and his secretary while discussing end of year bonus issues.

Me: I want to let you know that there may be a few issues concerning end of year retro incentive. I will be on maternity leave when that kicks off, but I am working on procedures to ensure it goes as smoothly as possible in my absence.

Secretary: So, does that mean you're pregnant?

VP: Yes, I do believe it does.

Secretary: Weren't you, like, that way a year ago.

Me (laughing really hard by now): More like 3 years ago. The baby turned 2 back in February.

M.W. (still laughing)

Just for Greeblemonkey

So, I was, like, in the bathroom, and like, you know, hurling up breakfast. Wouldn't you know there'd be someone else in there. She was like, are you okay? I was like, yeah, it's like morning sickness. No big. She was like, do you want me to get Mr. W? And like, I was like totally touched she was being so, like thoughtful and all.

I totally told her everything was cool, but she, like, went to Mr. W. and told him his wife was barfing in the bathroom.

I guess my little secret is, like totally out there now. Fer shure.

I had fun at lunch today

I presided over and ran the Table Topics portion of my company's Toastmasters club. Neither of our speakers could make it to the meeting, so I did up Table Topics a little differently. Normally, during the Table Topics portion of the meeting, the Table Topics master gives a topic to each person, who then gives a 45 second to 1 minute 15 second speech over that topic.

The company has been on a big push lately with Customer Service, and I thought a complement to that initiative would be handling sticky situations. I gave each of the attendees a sheet of paper listing seven sticky situations that I personally experienced in recent memory. Each member was asked to either pick a scenario off the list or describe one from their own experience. Then, the speaker would give a short talk on how he/she would have handled the situation. Once everyone in attendance gave a short talk, I switched gears and we had a good 15 minute discussion. We talked about how to tell a customer 'no' and what to do when your supervisor said something you knew was incorrect in a high-level meeting.

Just in case you were curious, the sticky situations were:

1. You have been asked to evaluate a speech given by a novice speaker. The speaker struggled through the speech. You spoke to the speaker before the meeting and found out that the speaker was worried about nerves but was very excited about the topic of the speech.

2. A customer has asked you for information, and you are unable to provide it for him/her.

3. Your supervisor has given a presentation and has asked for your feedback. Overall, you thought the presentation was great, but there were a couple areas that needed improvement.

4. An angry customer has called you and insists that you can help him with his problem. However, he has somehow reached the entirely wrong department, and you are unsure who can help him.

5. You have been working as a team member on a major project. Close to the deadline, you realize that you gave other members of the team wrong information. This means there will be additional work for the team, but the project deadline remains unchanged.

6. You are attending a meeting with your supervisor and other more senior staff. During the course of the meeting, your supervisor makes a statement that you know is incorrect.

7. A customer has asked for special consideration, and you find that the customer is not eligible for that consideration.

All in all, I was impressed with the maturity and professionalism of our little group. I hope the others came away from the meeting with an additional tool or two to pull out when the next sticky situation arises. I know I did.

Radio

I'm still at work, waiting for my data to finish loading so I can send my department head the numbers he won't look at for another couple of weeks (bitter, me?).

Since this is way after regular business hours, I break one of the cardinal rules and listen to streaming audio. My favorite station right now is 98.7 the River of Savanah, Georgia. I originally come from that part of the country and love listening to the local flavor.

The Delilah show is on now. That kind of soft pop appeals to me tremendously when I'm stuck working really late. It always throws me, though. I tend to have Delilah on the radio on the way home, too. Since Georgia is Eastern time zone and Texas is Central, I always get major de ja vu listening to what I heard an hour ago. Confusing, isn't it?

M.W.

And so it continues...

4th test was also positive. I didn't take a picture, though. Maybe I can fish it out of the trash?

Ugh. I feel like crap right now. Dizzy, tired, HUNGRY, nauseated all together. Unfortunately, I can't do a blessed thing about any of that right now since I am still at work for at least another couple hours.

Presentation Update

I totally forgot to write up my presentation this week...

I was scheduled to present some analysis (which explained away a source of complaint) Thursday morning at 8:30. Tuesday evening at around 3, I found out I was moved up to Wednesday some time and that I needed to present on some reports I had developed. Yikes!

So, I frantically worked on the second presentation and didn't have a chance to review the first one before I was called on to present at 9:30 AM on Wednesday.

My first presentation went very well. The district sales managers loved what I had to say and wanted copies of my presentation so they could show their agency managers. My second presentation went even better. They loved, loved, loved the new reports (although a few of them would like to see some changes) and even applauded me. :)

I'm feeling pretty good right now.

M.W.

Now THIS is funny

I received an Outstanding Club President award for my area in Toastmasters 'for outstanding performance and lasting contribution during the July 1, 2006 to December 31, 2006 term.'

I have been the biggest slacker president, this club has ever seen! I occasionally check in with my officers, but we haven't had a single formal executive meeting. About all I can say is that we've paid our dues on time, and I've nudged/guilted all the officers into attending officer training.

I wonder what precisely, the criteria was...

It's IN!!!!!

It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in!

That ruddy project that has been keeping me here 12 hours weekdays, with another 6 or so on weekend days is going into production right now! Right this very second!

The heavens have opened and choirs are singing!

No more waking up at 2 am with stomach acid churning. No more not seeing my kids until after they're asleep. No more answering bleepedy bleep bleep e-mails asking the hold up.

My purgatory is over!!!!!!!! Now if Amazon would just ship my camera, already!

M.W.

If you're going to complain to me about something,

then I'm going to assume you are volunteering to fix the problem. So think twice before griping to me.

M.W.

I am my father's daughter

I guess it was bound to happen. Dad's got a terrible case of acid reflux, and I take after him in a lot of ways. My recent dips into 10-12 hour work days are tearing up my stomach. The last 3 mornings, I woke up with stomach acid churning. blegh

This schedule cannot keep on forever. I have got to get these projects out the door before I do permanent damage to myself...

But I still had ten minutes...

Argh! Server backups start at 8:00 PM, so why, oh why, was I kicked off at 7:50?

Dumb things I already knew

1. The magnet in your cell phone's speakerphone speaker will pick up a paper clip. How many of you with speaker phones are going to try this?
2. A Cartesian join does bad, bad, bad things to servers that have limited capacity. Specially when one table has 1,000,000 rows, the second table has 300,000 and the third table has 3,600. For those of you non-techy: I was supposed to pull back 775,000 rows. Instead, my procedure tried to pull back somewhere in the neighborhood of 775,000,000,000 rows. Big, stupid!stupid!stupid! difference.
3. Programmers who get called in the night because their job blew up because your query has a really, really, really stupid basic mistake aren't always in the best mood.

M.W.