Projects

I have found a new project for that baby gift. I cannot say what it is, that would spoil the surprise, but I am excited about it. I might even do some giggling over it.

Today is cleaning day. I plan to attack the kitchen. It will be cleaned from top to bottom, front to back, and side to side. It needs it. I haven't done a proper spring cleaning in a couple of years. The cats, I am sure, will hide out in the other room and shed. I may do the bathroom too if I have the stamina.

They are supposed to be doing work on the facade of my building. But as yet I have seen no one. Perhaps they are the Emperor's New Work Crew. Or maybe they all played hookie to go and sit in the sun in the park. I would not blame them for that. As we know, I am a proponent of the mental health day. Go sit in the sun if you can.

Overreaching

Ok, what I wrote in my last post about the gift in afghan stitch, forget it. I don't have the right hook size and I suspect that at this point in time doing a large project in a repetetive stitch might just kill me. I have trouble sitting still as it is. I think the project is going to get an adjustment. It will probably turn into a different item all together. That will mean I have a bunch of yarn left but it's a nice neutral color so I may dye it into something else.

I'm okay with this. Really. I can accept temporary defeat.

Beginning

Three of my friends are pregnant and they are all due one after the other with only a few weeks in between. Knitters out there will understand how inconsiderate this is. We only have two hands for goodness sake. I have almost finished one gift, it just needs its side seams sewn. Today I plan to start gift number 2. And it's a doozy. For the very first time I will be attempting Tunisian crochet. Some might say I should use a technique I know well when doing a large project that's meant to be a gift and has a very real deadline. Hah. To those people I say, "Where is your sense of adventure?".

I will report on progress (or regress). So stay tuned for our next episode.

It's Real

Yesterday I received my first piece of mail addressed to my new company. Granted, it was a piece of junk mail but it still gave me a little warm glow. After all, if it's getting mail, it must be real.

The upshot of this is that my previously mentioned ADD is now even worse. Particularly today which is a perfect spring day. The sun is shining, it's warm with a light breeze, the trees are green... and I'm here in the hole entering UPC codes into a computer. Enough to make a strong man weep.

I have been wondering where to go for part time work come August. I was thinking of a bookstore, maybe. Or possibly Whole Foods. They are apparently in the top 100 companies to work for. It would be nice to work somewhere friendly. Here you spend half your life hiding things and getting around things and hoping She Who Must Be Obeyed doesn't find out about things. This is no way to live.

Go Ahead and Do It

Those who know me would probably say that I am not very tolerant of other people's behavior. (I can hear you sniggering) But it has come to my attention that while this is true of some behavior (e.g. littering, stopping at the bottom of the escalator, playing your car stereo so loud that car alarms go off) there is other behavior that I tolerate easily. Like taking a mental health day. As we know I took one myself. I do not blame my fellow workers if they call out sick on a gorgeous day. Particularly when their next vacation isn't even remotely in sight. A local restaurant owner was in the store a few weeks ago. She told us that one of her employees had called out well. That is, he/she felt too good, too peaceful to come in to work. That's fabulous isn't it? We've all had those days, when we feel so wonderful just to be alive and the prospect of labor is too much to bear. My manager did not see it the same way. She comes in when she feels a little sick, she comes in when it's beautiful out, she comes in if she feels great-so everyone should. I think it is a little sad. Heaven knows that I have wide perfectionist streak and a bit of the OCD but I think I've retained some spontaneity and frivolity. She may also have a bit of the martyr in her, I think. While we cannot do it often, not if we want to keep eating, we should play hookie once in while. Go ahead and do it.

Back Again

I'm having this recurring fantasy of unionizing my workplace. I could be the next Norma Rae. Well, maybe not, but it appeals to my dark sense of humor and irony.
I work in a retail store and yes, in fact there is a retail workers union in existence. It's part of the IWW, Industrial Workers Worldwide. It's kind of a catchall for all those jobs that don't have a union already. Amusement park workers, for example. I picture Mickey, Goofy and Snow White marching for higher wages and less time spent in the god damn suits.
Now, you wouldn't think it could happen in NYC. But there is a coffee shop in Brooklyn where all the workers have joined the IWW. I think I may have to go and have a chat with them about it.
All this has been brought about by a change in the status quo at my job. Sales are down. The reaction sets in. The sales staff is not doing its job. (And to be fair this is true in two or three cases). Time to tighten the reigns, institute more restrictions and procedures (and this at place that already has a bureaucracy bigger than some small nations) and do some talking about how expendable the staff is.
Now, in my experience this sort of thing just doesn't work. Or if it does it's only in the short term. No one changes how they think or behave. They just cover their own asses (already the favorite sport at my store). And eventually when the pressure eases off (you can't maintain it indefinitely) everything goes right back to where it was. It's like taking pills to lose weight. It works but if you don't change how you live you had better keep taking those pills or the weight will come right back.
So where does that leave us? Up the proverbial creek. And not only do we not have a paddle, but the boat is leaking.
I had intended to stay at my job once my website went live, just go part time. But not now. In fact, I am thinking of burning my bridges when I go so I am not tempted to return should I need some extra income. For most of my life I have taken the path of least resistance and it has led me to this paranoid freakshow I persist in calling my job. They say you have to hit bottom before you can change. I can feel it at my feet, cold and unyielding. Time to climb back out.

On a lighter note, here are my kitties, blinking in the light of the flash. That's Nora on the left and Nick on the right. Not the best picture but I lost some when my hard drive died. I will take more. But for now...

Let Me Out

As the days go by and more of my website is emerging I find myself getting more and more excited about the plan. The trouble is that I still have to work at this hideous job that is sucking my soul out. Concentrating on the tedious work I have to do is increasingly difficult. I try to tell myself that it will come sooner than I think and that I should just get on with what I have to do until then. Hah. Right.

Must start playing the lottery.

So here I am writing in my blog, hoping to create a little break in the grayness. I suppose the sensible thing would be to see if I could get another job to sustain myself until the website is breaking even. Something not too demanding but less horrid than the current job. I suppose that things could be much worse. This is not really comforting.

Here it is, the long awaited pink jacket. Although you can't really wear it over much except a tank top or cap sleeved tee. The arm holes are just too small. It's still quite nice I think.

Done

I finished the pink jacket. Well, it's true, I still have to buy the buttons and sew them on but that's the work of a moment. This project has taken so long. I almost lost faith halfway through and then the second sleeve took forever. But it's done and I looove the color. I may wear it inspite of it's lack of buttons.

Mistake

I am sitting here at work doing the quarterly reports. Now, at my job out system is still DOS. Yes, you are reading that correctly. This means that there is no ready way to export reports from the POS (point of sale) to Excel or to anything else for that matter. Plus the reporting options really rigid. So you have to print out this hideously long document and then manually enter it into Excel. It's enough to make the average mind shrink in terror. Plus there's the incredible waste of paper. Forests everywhere tremble at the name of my employer.

Anyway, I'm here doing this when I realize that I have done the report incorrectly.
The previous report had been for March only whereas this one should have been January to March. Now I must print it all over again. It's fortunate that I noticed early enough in the transcribing process or they might have had to take me away in a butterfly net. As it is I want to lay down and weep.

I am doing my best to remember (in the face of another 2 hours at this hideous task) that I have the next two days off and that tomorrow I get to have dinner with all my fabulous friends.

Response

In response to the lovely Epiphany Alone, it is creepy. And what is with that damn gecko? Why does the mascot for an American company have a bad English accent? And now he's recruiting more lizards? Is it some sort of plan for a takeover? If so, I'm for it. They couldn't possibly do any worse than our current government.

My Mental Health

I am seriously considering taking a mental health day this week. I am not going to be able to take a vacation until August and if I don't have a little extra time off before then I will probably lose what is left of my mind. Not to mention that it is diffcult to start a business on no time. It can be a little birthday present to myself.

I'm going to be 36. I don't think I feel 36. What does 36 feel like? Like this I suppose. My sister will be 44 in September. I find that harder to believe.

I also find it hard to believe that Debbie Bliss' instructions for a collar on a sweater are WRONG. Just wrong. I'd been doing so well too. I'd finished all the pieces and blocked them all, lovingly. Then, just as I thought I was almost there, disaster. Well, maybe not disaster. But certainly annoyance and a lot of swearing. This is yet another reason to take the mental health day. I need recovery time.

I'm not sure how this blog is going to end up. I'm in the process of starting a business and I suspect that it may turn into a forum for relieving terror and stimulating progress. On the other hand it could just go completely beyond my control and get filled with fiction. Sometimes the characters are clamoring so loud for attention they drown out everything else.

What sort of business you ask? An internet based retail business. A financial risk to be sure. But I think it would be riskier to ignore my need to be my own boss. To wake up 20 years from now filled with regrets is a prospect too horrible to contemplate.

Oh yes, there will probably also be discussions of my knitting projects. (Yes, there will be pictures) And I may even indulge in a few stories about my cats. I'll try not to get carried away.