Sunday, March 17, 2024

A Third Look Revisited

Almost three months ago I blogged about a past hookup named Anthony who I first met in 2005 and hooked up with in 2021 and again reconnected for a third time with, online at least.   We promised to meet up sometime in 2024 for another hookup.   Well that promise finally took place last Friday on 03/15.   

I decided to take the 15th off since I made the 2 1/2 hour minimum trek to Indianapolis on the 14th for a work related quarterly townhall.   The car trip of course was the most arduous part of the day.   It was a mostly rainy morning though thankfully things cleared up by the time I arrived.

It seemed a lot of the newer folks were excited to see me.  It felt a bit surreal to have all this attention on me since I like to stay out of the spotlight.   I also found out that our townhall was not taking place in a conference room but rather at the Gainbridge Fieldhouse, home of the NBA's Indianapolis Pacers and the WNBA's Fever teams.

The stadium is about half a mile from our corporate office so the team all walked over.   It was my first time inside the stadium.   The townhall mostly featured lady trailblazers within the company talking about their various journeys at the company.   There was also a slide featuring those who were promoted in the last quarter.    I saw my name on the big screen which was pretty cool to see.   At the end of the event we all got to take a group photo with one of the speakers and then we walked back to our office.

It just so happened that it was Pi Day so as part of that day, there were pizza pies available to all the floors for everyone to take part in.   So at least lunch was taken care of.

I wound up staying a bit late to help one of my mentees on a particularly challenging case.   I was glad I decided to take that Friday off.

So I noticed that Anthony stared at my "social networking" profile earlier that week without responding.  Since I decided to take the day off on the 15th, I thought it would be good to reach out to him.   But on Wednesday I started to experience the head cold symptoms that I managed to mostly avoid while Dom was still dealing with congestion.   I wanted to message Anthony to let him know ahead of time that I took the day off.   But I didn't know how I would feel by that day so I opted not to.

I told myself that I had to go Thursday to Indianapolis regardless since I didn't want to make it seem like I was avoiding the trip.   I pretty much was sniffling and blowing my nose most of that day.

I was feeling stuffy come Friday morning but I still wanted to see if I could meet Anthony since I wasn't sure how soon I'd have another free day.   I went back and forth though on messaging, reverting back to my high school days.   I didn't want to be presumptuous that Anthony didn't have other plans for the day and wasn't just sitting around waiting for me to text him.

But I got encouragement from a random video I was watching from the website of an upcoming conference that I plan to attend in June.   One of the speakers said, "Do It Scared, Do It Afraid, Do It Anyway."   I never heard anyone encourage folks quite like that but I repeated that mantra and went ahead and texted Anthony.   Worse case scenario he would just be busy and could always reschedule another time.

It turned out he wasn't busy and he invited me over.  I managed to breath again through my nose after taking an inhaler decongestant.   I prepped myself and then made my way over.   Anthony and I chatted for a bit when I arrived.   We did the same thing when we met in 2021.   

It was then show time.  Anthony and I had a great time again.  He definitely knows what he's doing.  It's cool that he still has the desire for sex in his 60's.   I guess there are guys that still have it in their 60's and beyond.    

He's a pretty cool guy.   He's actually a retired school teacher that's going for a PH.D in education that he has a dissertation for in April.  (Heh I guess I have a type...LOL).   We were chatting afterwards about the lack of positive gay black couples that you see in media.   He said he didn't even think at one time that black guys could be together in a relationship.   I honestly didn't think it was possible either.  I did try to connect with other gay black men with bad results.   We both remembered this young-ish black couple in Atlanta that does Youtube videos and agreed that it is nice to see more representation these days.

I admit our conversation had me wondering what would've happened if Anthony and I had a second date.  I just remembered not really feeling a spark with him so it never happened.  But you never know what would've happened had I gave him another shot.    Would I have even met Rock, Midas, or Dom?   Would I have still worked at my previous job?   Would I still be at my old home?   Life is pretty interesting.   Every choice you make leads to your other choices.    Everything happens for a reason. 

I am glad Anthony and I reconnected once again.   Maybe we'll do it again sooner.

Wednesday, March 6, 2024

Hot Cop Short

 



No I didn't get pulled over recently by a hot cop.   But OMG...this video gave me the laughs that I didn't know I needed today.   This woman definitely did her part to get herself out of a parking ticket.    The cop in question (assuming it wasn't a staged video) was all smiles and damn it, he is hot.   She threw a few truth bombs in there such as if all cops that were hired were as hot as he was, there would be no violence.    I just had to share this video with whomever still reads my blog and most importantly for me to periodically look at when I need a smile on my face.   

I have been pulled over by office cutie decades back.   I wish I could've gotten away with doing this.   Maybe I wouldn't have gotten a ticket.   Though I wound up getting that ticket dismissed.  Who knew too that I would wind up relocating almost ten years after that incident to Indiana, not far from where I had to go to court that time.   Hopefully this woman didn't get one either.   She definitely put a smile on my face and also on officer cutie.

Tuesday, March 5, 2024

Spotlight Effect

 Since getting my promotion I've definitely noticed my work days are getting busier.   Besides having to be available for Severity 1 cases, I also have to make myself available for my mentees whenever they have case issues and also other team members with their questions.   I also have to be able to meet my weekly goals at the same time.   It's been crazy.

During my manager's weekly meeting a few weeks back, she mentioned that she wanted to have a segment where an individual talks about an interesting case and do a show and tell with the group.  Our team mostly consists of wallflowers so you can imagine how well that suggestion went.   So when my manager saw nobody was biting, she made a mention of going by alphabet for presenters.   There was another team member with her name starting with A that of course protested.   

Imagine my surprise when A suggested that she and I present a case together that she was asking my help on.  I wasn't even trying to get my name tossed and somehow I wound up coming to the forefront.   So basically I was volunteered with her the following week to present the case.

That week comes and the case in question actually is in investigation by another team and I didn't hear anything from A regarding what to present.   So to save face I decided to dig out one of my cases to present.   I quickly emailed the manager to let her know about my case.   

So I wound up doing a presentation which I hated but it mostly went without a hitch.   There was a minor hiccup in coding that I luckily was able to fix.   Basically the case that A was wanting to present with me doesn't appear to be anymore ready this week to present.   But I did my part last week so I'm hoping A steps up and presents another case.

But besides that it seems that management wants "senior folks" (I'm in that category now) to volunteer and update Knowledge Articles and do additional demos with other colleagues.   I just want to go hide in a corner but I seem to be out in the open.

I will say that the promotion isn't all bad though.  I'm definitely enjoying the raise that comes with it.  I guess management wants to get their money's worth from me.   Guess I need to step up my game.

Thursday, February 15, 2024

Lost That Familiar Feeling

 Dom recently made several expensive purchases for his little hobby that were set to arrive a week back.   He was eagerly looking forward to unboxing those items and taking pictures of them.   He got an email while at school that his package was safely delivered to our residence.   So imagine his shock when he didn't see a package when he got home.   Of course he asked me if there were any deliveries and I said there weren't.

We have a problem where the street numbers for our blocks all match the same digits with a street name that starts with the same letter.   We'll call that letter T.    So we live at 555 Thomas Lane, the next street over there's a 555 Theodore Lane, the next street after that it's 555 Teddy Lane.   You get the picture!  Combine the closely named streets with an ever revolving cast of postal workers and you have a case of mistaken landings.   There were times when we got mail and packages from 555 Teddy Lane and times when 555 Teddy Lane got our packages.   I honestly feel there may have been times when the deliverer realizes the error but due to time constraints they're like fuck it, the recipients will sort it out.

So Dom made me go to 555 Theodore Lane and 555 Teddy Lane to see if his package landed there.   It's harder for him to move around efficiently these days so it's easier to send me.   I wasn't thrilled about doing it but you do things when you're in a relationship.   So neither of our neighbors had the package.  So having spent an obscene amount of money, Dom was upset wondering where it could be.

The next day he went to our local post office.   The person working there told him there was nothing she could do and that he would have to go to a larger branch for assistance.   He posted a rant message on our local Facebook page asking for help in whereabouts.   I of course told him that I wished he didn't insult the postal workers in the process since the very people that read the message may very well be related to a postal worker or is an actual worker.   But of course Dom didn't care.   We had that discussion before on our differences to approaching situations and how we mirrored my parents so won't mention it again...LOL.

In the end after he went to the larger branch, they confirmed that the package had the wrong address and it actually went to someone at 505 Thomas Lane.    Guess who had to go pick it up?   Apparently the home isn't occupied but thankfully the package was still there, slightly weathered of course.    I was glad things had a happy ending this time.   He's in the process of resolving the issue with the sender having the wrong address.

But I couldn't help but wonder if we didn't have a revolving cast of postal workers and had a regular person working the route, like we used to have, the story would've taken a different turn.   Someone who was familiar with the route may have looked at the name and say "Dom lives at 555 not 505.  I believe the package should go there."   Then that person would likely ring our doorbell and verify that the package belonged to our household.   Also a regular person may think there's never any mail delivered at 505, what is going on?

Having different postal workers every other day, I wouldn't expect them to remember the nuances like people's name.   They just read what's on the address and place it there.   So they weren't totally distracted on their phones like Dom complained about in this case.   Well they probably were but they only were delivering at the address that was printed on the label.    And thank goodness the mislabel was an actual address.   On our block there's a 505, 525, and 555 but nothing between.   What if the label said 515 or worse 155.    Where would the package have gone?    Thankfully for me the place was only six houses away and thankfully no one stole the package.

Another thing about not having a regular postal worker is who would I give the holiday tip to.  I remember I used to tip my postal worker at my old house around the holiday time and I may have done it once at our current home when we used to have a regular worker.   But with the revolving line of credit, you wind up tipping whoever is lucky to show up that day and the others get stiffed.     It is a shame how things change and not always for the better.

Sunday, February 11, 2024

Office Returns

 My manager mentioned in our weekly team meeting that our company is mandating that everyone returns back to the office 3 days a week.   There wasn't much reaction on the call on the news.   The company made some noise last year on wanting employees to return to the office.   A couple folks left the company because of the news and there's been a lot of discord from folks on our message boards where grievances can be aired.   But the trend seems to be pushing towards getting folks to return.   It's said that 90% of companies are planning to implement return-to-office policies by end of 2024.   Also 30% threaten to fire those who do not comply.

There's been stories of downtowns becoming ghost towns since the pandemic.   According to a Forbes article, downtowns in Chicago, Vancouver, Seattle and San Francisco are at most half as active as they were in their heyday.   

I will say that even though the SouthShore trains seem full when I do go in the office, I can see that the station parking lots aren't as full as they used to be.   I remember when I was working downtown Chicago in 2018 that some mornings when I had to drive to the further location to park if you were late, you would not get a parking spot.   Now I can park in an area that's mostly away from folks and there's not a lot of cars nearby.    Also the trains have been reducing cars which is why the trains still seem full.   I do look forward to the station nearby finally being available so I don't have to worry about commuting to the station.

It's so funny when I was talking to Eugene about my promotion, he was telling me that I should consider going back to the office at least twice a week.    He was telling me about some moves he had to make on the job that required an in-person touch that email would not work.

I'll admit I've been spoiled by mostly working remote and not thrilled by having to return.  I'm especially annoyed since this week is Fat Tuesday and I was looking forward to going to a local bakery to get some Paczki's but Tuesdays and Thursdays they want us in the office.   I may just have to go extra early to the spot and then just be a little late for work.    But you know I guess I shouldn't bitch too much since I did get that promotion.   Rather this then my Amazon days, right.

Thursday, February 1, 2024

Causing A Promotion

Madonna - Causing A Commotion

Refrain:
I've got the moves baby, you got the motion
If we got together we'd be causing a commotion
I've got the moves baby, you got the motion
If we got together we'd be causing a commotion

Verse 1:
You met your match when you met me
I know that you will disagree it's crazy
But opposites attract you'll see
And I won't let you get away so easy
The love you save may be your own
Can't fight this feeling, aren't you tired of being alone
You won't admit it but you know it's true
It's not a secret how I feel when I stand next to you

Repeat Refrain:

Verse 2:
Someday you'll see my point of view
You can't keep wishing on the stars baby
What works for me can work for you
You've got to make a compromise and maybe
Then we can keep our love alive
And when it falls we won't let it die
It doesn't matter if you win or lose
It's how you play the game so get into the groove

Repeat Refrain 
 
Causing a commotion, causing a commotion
Causing a commotion, causing a commotion

Bridge:
I hope you find what you're looking for
Is it mine, walk through that door
We're wasting time, make up your mind
And get into the groove

Then we can keep our love alive
And when it falls we won't let it die
It doesn't matter if you win or lose
It's how you play the game so get into the groove

I hope you find what you're looking for
Is it mine, walk through that door
We're wasting time, make up your mind
And get into the groove

Repeat Refrain
 
Causing a commotion, causing a commotion
Causing a commotion, causing a commotion

I received some good news from my manager this week.  It took a bit of time before we were able to connect to share it with me since we were both busy with meetings.   It's been a bit hectic since I'm the guide for four of my company's newer employees.   It's very intense working with them and then trying to work on my own cases.   I want to scream but I'm keeping it pushing.

So when my manager and I finally met, she shared with me that I officially received a promotion.   As I mentioned my manager was discussing with me on strategies I should take in order to get a promotion sometime in 2024.    I just didn't expect it to happen so early in 2024 let alone at all.   

From what my manager told me it's a competitive process to even be considered for one.  One of the things I needed to do of course was increase my responsibility load, including taking on high severity cases which I started doing a few months ago.

I remember telling my manager that I wasn't interested in joining the team that handled Sev1 cases.   But the person who took on the role wound up getting a promotion and basically they reached out to me to take over the role.   At the time they asked me about taking over, I didn't know about that individual's promotion.   So I was hemming and humming over whether I should or not.   But when I found out about the individual's promotion, I was channeling Roxy Hart in Chicago where she changed her tune about wearing a hideous dress for her court appearance after the prison killed another lady by hanging.   The next scene Roxy was like..."ohh I don't think this outfit is so bad"...LOL.    And I was like, "Oh maybe this Sev1 thing isn't so bad."...LOL.    We changed our tunes with a quickness.

That may have been the thing that tipped the scales in my favor.    I still can't believe it happened.   The timing of the promotion also happens to coincide with my second anniversary starting work there.   What a way to celebrate my second anniversary.    

There may have been some other soft factors as well that contributed to my getting a promotion.   Out of everyone on my team, I'm one of only two folks who turns on their camera during my manager's weekly Zoom meeting.   The other person is already a senior person.   I honestly felt awkward turning it on while everyone else had theirs off but I think it made my manager feel better knowing that she wasn't alone on camera.   She kept repeatedly encouraging others to show their faces but a lot didn't.  Several other key team members that my manager liked made lateral moves late last year to other roles within Salesforce.   Two others that were good workers left the company altogether.   She's had drama with other team members so I couldn't imagine anyone else from her team being considered.

I also kept my LinkedIn profile updated as well with my additional 6 certifications I've completed since starting my new role.   I also recently renewed my Security Plus certification for another three years which I mentioned on LinkedIn.   I was under the assumption that management or higher was watching what I post there.   

My promotion also is a good thing for my manager as well since I am officially the first person on her team to get promoted under her watch.   She really did fight to get me considered as well with my "presentation" to the decision makers.    It is a win for her which I am happy about.

Of course I'm wondering how other folks will react.  I'm sure some will wonder why I was selected.   Some will no doubt be jealous and accuse me of kissing butt.    If doing my job, supporting my manager, and being helpful to other team members is called kissing butt, then I have kissed all the booty.    But I have to put that out of my mind.   I can't let it bother me how negatively other people may react.   At the end of the day they are not paying my bills.   

I'm actually also happy to get this promotion since there are some newer folks that have been hired that have the potential to be super stars down the line.   I imagine it would be harder to have to compete along with them for future promotions (though I would have seniority at least).   But thankfully I don't have to worry about that now.

The promotion gives me a 20% percent raise that puts my salary just over the 6 figure mark for the first time since 2017 where I only got to enjoy the raise for 5 or 6 months before getting laid off.    Ruh roh.  I hope that doesn't happen to me here.   But the increase will no doubt help in my quest to pay off my mortgage by July 2026 and help Dom and I with a few other things.   It's also my first promotion since 2006.

Guess how I unintentionally celebrated my promotion.   I did so by accidentally banging my foot against the entertainment center on the floor as I walked out of the room.   My toe is injured and is currently swollen and numb.   I've been icing it and elevating it periodically.   I hope it's not broken.   

I made the moves baby, manager made the motions, put those all together it was causing a promotion...LOL.   Congratulations to me!

Sunday, January 28, 2024

Do People Work?

Obviously of course people for the most part do work.   In fact U.S. workers work a lot harder and longer than most other countries.   According to this Money article, Americans work hundreds of hours more than their European counterparts.   This translates to around 1750 hours.     Apparently if you hate work, Germany is the place to be as they clocked the least number of average working hours.    Americans work about ten weeks more than their German counterparts.   

Despite the high number of hours Americans work, China and India workers work much longer.   Average working hours in those countries clocked over 2100 hours annually.

But I wouldn't know that after I ventured over to my local Costco last Friday just around 11am.    I thought it would be less crowded but the parking lot was nearly full though at least the gas line there wasn't as bad.  I was released early from my voluntary time off that I've been doing periodically for the last six months.   My company encourages employees to take Voluntary Time Off to help out the local communities.   I found a foodbank in Northwest Indiana to volunteer some time at.   

So as I said earlier I was leaving my VTO after 10:30 am since work was light.  Dom and I needed some things from our local Costco so I decided to take advantage of the extra time since I wasn't due back to work till 12:30.   As I walked into the store I couldn't help but ask myself 'Do People Work?'...*LOL*.

Obviously remote work has become more common since the pandemic.   With that flexibility I imagine a lot of folks take advantage of being close to home by venturing out to run errands during their workday. Remote working is nothing new as I first was introduced to the concept at my old job back as early as 2002.   

It was more of an anomaly back then.  I remember telling a few friends that I worked remote sometimes and they were so jealous.   When our company moved headquarters to a location further from most folks locations in 2008, to appease workers they allowed remote work 2 days a week.   And the last four or five years before I eventually got laid off in 2017, I was working remote 4 days a week and coming in one day a week.

The rest of the working world caught on to remote work when the pandemic took over in March 2020.   Companies have been fighting to bring workers back to the office but once people got a taste of it and the newfound freedom being at home bought, folks do not want to go back.    Judging from the shoppers at Costco, I can see why they don't want to be pulled back in the office full-time.   I will say if there's a way I can work remote 5 days a week, I would do it in a heartbeat.   But I do have a sweet schedule now, I go in the office once a week in Chicago now and then I venture to the Indianapolis office once a month (with some flexibility in the winter months meaning I probably won't venture there until March or April).   Hopefully I can still hang on to that deal.