While I appreciate the great job my husband does in cleaning his bathroom (aka the guest bathroom), I am perplexed as to why it takes weeks (yes as in many weeks, almost a month) for him to return the cleaning products from inside the bathtub to their proper location under the kitchen sink. This is very problematic when I come home in a bad mood and want to take a bath. My mood then escalates since the stupid cleaning products are still in the bath. Of course I am not mad at the fact that it takes weeks and many reminders about putting this items away, oh no, the problem is not his inability to finish his chore but my PMS is the problem.
/rant
Monday, April 27, 2009
Friday, April 24, 2009
And now another question
Sciencegirl asked (a long time ago! she probably forgot about it)
"How is the transition out of the grad student/postdoc stage treating you? Are you still enjoying living back home?"
The short answers are great and yes. I love being near family and old friends again and living in this town is just awesome. We get to bike all around, we are near the beach, the weather is always pleasant and all the wonderful places to hike around are amazing.
While at times I miss the freedom of being a grad student it is nice to be done with that. I think the hardest transition for me is dealing with managing my time. As a grad student it was acceptable to put something off and then deal with it when I was ready because I was working all the time. Now I'm on a more strict schedule and I find that if I feel in a bad mood or don't want to write (like now), I'm still stuck at work. Since my work load isn't very big right now it's hard to say, not want to work on something so I move over to something else-as there isn't something else. I also have to bill all my hours to get paid and there is no line item for "didn't feel like working so I blogged," i.e. I'm not getting paid for sitting here at my work desk writing this post. Which is fair. I shouldn't get paid to sit here and write this, but I've created this bad habit while writing my dissertation of inefficiency, and I can't figure out how to change this bad habit. It wasn't this hard when I first started my job, there was a lot to keep me busy and when I'm out in the field I have a great time. So here I sit, trying to find the motivation to work on a project I know nothing about, hopefully it will come to me soon so I can actually make some money today. . . .
I've been putting off Psych Post Doc's questions "why don't you tell us about being a consultant? What are the pros and cons (other than the crazy commute)? Are there any things about the job that surprise you? In a good way or a bad way? Do you think you'd want to do this long term?" I will answer this soon.
"How is the transition out of the grad student/postdoc stage treating you? Are you still enjoying living back home?"
The short answers are great and yes. I love being near family and old friends again and living in this town is just awesome. We get to bike all around, we are near the beach, the weather is always pleasant and all the wonderful places to hike around are amazing.
While at times I miss the freedom of being a grad student it is nice to be done with that. I think the hardest transition for me is dealing with managing my time. As a grad student it was acceptable to put something off and then deal with it when I was ready because I was working all the time. Now I'm on a more strict schedule and I find that if I feel in a bad mood or don't want to write (like now), I'm still stuck at work. Since my work load isn't very big right now it's hard to say, not want to work on something so I move over to something else-as there isn't something else. I also have to bill all my hours to get paid and there is no line item for "didn't feel like working so I blogged," i.e. I'm not getting paid for sitting here at my work desk writing this post. Which is fair. I shouldn't get paid to sit here and write this, but I've created this bad habit while writing my dissertation of inefficiency, and I can't figure out how to change this bad habit. It wasn't this hard when I first started my job, there was a lot to keep me busy and when I'm out in the field I have a great time. So here I sit, trying to find the motivation to work on a project I know nothing about, hopefully it will come to me soon so I can actually make some money today. . . .
I've been putting off Psych Post Doc's questions "why don't you tell us about being a consultant? What are the pros and cons (other than the crazy commute)? Are there any things about the job that surprise you? In a good way or a bad way? Do you think you'd want to do this long term?" I will answer this soon.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Dissertation Town
I'm flying back to dissertation town tonight. I haven't blogged about it yet but one of my advisers is hosting a small (50 or so attendants) symposium of four speakers about a particular subject that is my dissertation subject. He invited me around January to be a speaker, all expenses paid. My work is very supportive and have given me the time off.
It's an hour time slot so I'm hoping a 40-45 min talk is plenty. No one wants to hear me talk for an hour! and I'm sure we will need time for questions and to transition to the other speaker. I get to go first, which is my favorite, and the symposium doesn't start until 10am so it's not too early.
I just finished the slides last night and although I have practiced bits a pieces I haven't gone through the entire talk yet. I'm hoping to give it one more go before my 10pm flight. I'm a bit nervous, but feel confident I have a good talk lined up and an interesting subject matter. I just hope new information hasn't come along in this past year that makes my data seem obsolete, or some background information I know about is no longer valid. I just haven't been keeping up on the subject matter that closely anymore.
Well I'm off for a fun week-end with the rugby gals from dissertation town, a day at the symposium, and two days with my best friend from dt and my godson.
Good times.
It's an hour time slot so I'm hoping a 40-45 min talk is plenty. No one wants to hear me talk for an hour! and I'm sure we will need time for questions and to transition to the other speaker. I get to go first, which is my favorite, and the symposium doesn't start until 10am so it's not too early.
I just finished the slides last night and although I have practiced bits a pieces I haven't gone through the entire talk yet. I'm hoping to give it one more go before my 10pm flight. I'm a bit nervous, but feel confident I have a good talk lined up and an interesting subject matter. I just hope new information hasn't come along in this past year that makes my data seem obsolete, or some background information I know about is no longer valid. I just haven't been keeping up on the subject matter that closely anymore.
Well I'm off for a fun week-end with the rugby gals from dissertation town, a day at the symposium, and two days with my best friend from dt and my godson.
Good times.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
One small step
Picture this, three professional women are sitting at a table waiting for the PO (project operations) meeting to get started. A senior principle (the founder of the company) walks in from his office and selects one of these women and says to her, "Women X, you sure are looking good this morning." Women X is very surprised and instead of her usual, oh thanks, brush off she fumbles for a while and says, "What do you mean?" The principle, of course, doesn't really have an answer for this so Women X changes the subject and says, "Oh you must mean that I got some sun this week-end, my mom and I went for a walk, ect." At which point the other two women roll with this and talk more about walking and the sun and such.
After the PO meeting Women X realizes that this principle doesn't know (or wishes to ignore) which statements make her uncomfortable. After he (I realize this is the first time his gender is stated) is finished with another meeting Women X says she'd like to see him in his office. In simple terms she states that his comment this morning was inappropriate, embarrassing and makes her uncomfortable. Of course she sugar coats it by stating that she knows he doesn't have bad motives for these statements but that they need to stop. He is taken aback and states (in summary) that these statements are professional (just wait 30 years and I'll understand), that these statements are important for safety reasons (need to make sure everyone is alert and their home life is good) and three he will do his best but give him slack . . It takes a while for an old dog to learn new tricks (his exact words).
If you have read my previous post you have likely guessed that Women X is me. I feel better now that I have confronted the issue. I feel like my point was taken, although diluted by his responses. I am worried that our relationship might suffer some. I could tell I surprised and maybe even hurt his feelings, thus I made sure to tell HR about our conversation. I don't want our relationship to suffer but the truth is it was already, he just didn't know about it.
After the PO meeting Women X realizes that this principle doesn't know (or wishes to ignore) which statements make her uncomfortable. After he (I realize this is the first time his gender is stated) is finished with another meeting Women X says she'd like to see him in his office. In simple terms she states that his comment this morning was inappropriate, embarrassing and makes her uncomfortable. Of course she sugar coats it by stating that she knows he doesn't have bad motives for these statements but that they need to stop. He is taken aback and states (in summary) that these statements are professional (just wait 30 years and I'll understand), that these statements are important for safety reasons (need to make sure everyone is alert and their home life is good) and three he will do his best but give him slack . . It takes a while for an old dog to learn new tricks (his exact words).
If you have read my previous post you have likely guessed that Women X is me. I feel better now that I have confronted the issue. I feel like my point was taken, although diluted by his responses. I am worried that our relationship might suffer some. I could tell I surprised and maybe even hurt his feelings, thus I made sure to tell HR about our conversation. I don't want our relationship to suffer but the truth is it was already, he just didn't know about it.
Saturday, March 14, 2009
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