Cold Holiday

Before spring sprang up of us and the snow melted I managed to go up to the mountains and catch a glimpse of this.

I also managed to try skiing. It was fun when you were going down the hill. Stopping was a problem though and I ended up falling most of the time. It wasn’t painful or anything but getting your legs tangled up with the ski was kind of a pain in the ass. It was a little humbling that three year olds were going down the hill faster without falling but then again they were born here and could probably ski before they could run.

Say That Again

Dag nab it! Sometimes I feel like a I keep saying the same things over and over again and doing the same things over and over again. Oh, wait! Maybe that’s because I am! At first I thought it was déjà vu but I realized that it was actually happening again. I’ve had the same conversation with my boss four times in the past eight working days. For some strange reason, he seems to forget the outcome of the conversion and we go through the entirely futile exercise with a different outcome and I have to redo a spreadsheet. With each repetition, I grew more confused and exasperated that I was a bit short earlier when I just finally said, “Carl, can you just decide which number you want me to use! We’ve gone over this several times and you’ve flipped-flopped as much.” Anyway, I think he came away thinking that I had the number right this time. I don’t know what he’s going to be thinking tomorrow. I’m just glad this day is over.

We also have a consultant working in the office for some process improvement crap and he’s been doing the round of interviews. I’m one of the people he’s been interviewing and for the life of me I’ve explained a certain concept over ten times. I don’t know whether it’s the language barrier because English isn’t my first language and it isn’t his as well. The thing is, my boss has also explained the same thing to him ten times. So what are we supposed to think? What really pisses me off is when he comes to me with a question and then he goes right to my boss for confirmation who tells him the same thing. I wanted to yell, “What the hell did you waste my time for if you were going to ask my boss anyway.” The past couple of times though, I’ve directed him to my boss all the while feigning ignorance.

Oh well, sometimes things just doesn’t turn out exactly the way you want them but there’s no way I won’t trade it for my old job.

New Tricks

I’ve started trying to learn two new things. One is not exactly new but I could only do it really poorly so I’ve decided to get better at it and to get help learning it. I’ve actually noticed a drastic improvement in the past few weeks that I’ve been doing it. I have the movements and the breathing right so now I just have to get my stamina up so that I can go the distance. When the whole thing is done I hope I’ll be able to go from end to end and back without stopping and standing up sometime in the middle.

The other thing I’m trying to learn is something I’ve been told that I didn’t have the natural ability for and that I didn’t have the right physical qualities for. For some reason though, I’ve always wanted to learn it and a couple of months ago I got the necessary equipment and I started poking around with it. I can’t say that I’m having a as good as an improvement on this one as on the first. It’s requiring me to develop some dexterity and strength in particular areas of my body which didn’t get that much movement. I wasn’t getting frustrated or anything because I was pretty sure this was going to be a challenge. I recently found a pattern that required less drastic changes in position and I’m sort of getting the rhythm right which is giving me hope that I might actually learn this thing.

Anyway, those who really know me know that I have this thing for learning and thirty’s never too old to learn new tricks.

Crabby

A reminder of summer during this very cold winter (still no snow though).