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NaBloPoMO

You Just Haven’t Earned It Yet, Baby…

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Like many others, I suffer a bit from anxiety, but it is mostly situational. Meeting new people, starting a new job, going to a new place, etc. Recently with the change in my employment status (as of tomorrow) it has brought a lot of uncertainty and anxiety. One coping method that I have found to work for me is to focus this nervous energy into something positive and rearrange something or organize something. For me, a sense of order goes a long way and makes me feel like I am just a little more in control of the situation, not to mention it helps alleviate some of the stress of something out of order. I find that when I have a messy desk, or clothes on the floor, or a messy inbox that it does nothing but add more stress to my current load. Sure all of these are trivial in the grand scheme of things, but when compounded with other situations, sometimes it is enough to really put you in a foul mood.

With that said, I am no clean/neat freak. My bed is never made, there is always at least one item of clothing on the floor and a stack of receipts on my desk. I do however tend to keep certain things in order all of the time and one of those items is my case of body jewelry. Some girls buy shoes or purses or regular jewelry, personally, I buy body jewelry. Aside from the 3 rings that I always wear, my body jewelry is really the only thing that I never take off (with the exception of places like work, etc. when needed) Previously working for a company that sold body jewelry has allowed me to amass quite the collection.

My collection consists of my jewelry divided by type in little jars that fit into a container meant for beads. I think I picked this up at Walmart or Michaels or something for a pretty low cost. This would also be a great idea for people who own a lot of rings and would like to keep them organized and visible. I find that this is the easiest way for me to have all of my jewelry in one place and see everything at a glance for those days where everything MUST match. Also not pictured that I keep with my collection are a pair of nitrile gloves that I use to loosen or tighten jewelry and a small bottle of tea tree oil used for cleaning.

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December NaBloPoMo Topic:

How hard do you think you work?

Early on in my working career, I established a personal goal to always put as much of myself into my work as I can. This sometimes can be a fault, due to the fact that I will agonize over something that is not worth it, solely because of the high standards I hold myself to. I also learned early on that you are at work to work, that’s why it’s called… WORK. Sure I will have a casual conversation with a coworker, or take a moment to look at a funny picture or video. I think all of these things are important and make more productive people, but you will never catch me with my stuff in my hands, jacket on, waiting for the time clock to tick over. When I was in HR this was one of my biggest pet peeves as the time clock was right in front of my desk. How does someone justify being paid for the 10 minutes they stand there waiting for the end of their shift? Of course you wouldn’t want to start a new project to turn around and call it quits for the day, but there is always something that can be done that can occupy the last few minutes of your time. The same could be said for the first 10 minutes of your day. If I want to make a cup of hot chocolate or a bowl of oatmeal, I will arrive early to do so.

Depending on my workload, I will usually go above and beyond when it comes to tasks, mostly to satisfy myself. Sure I could just write out that quick list that the boss wanted throw it on his desk, but if I know that I don’t have other urgent items needing my attention, nicely formatting the list in Word and taking that extra second to do usually goes a long way. For example, at my current job, I deal a lot with equipment lists for various locations. Sure it is easy enough to have one big list for each location and look through all of it when I need to find an answer for either a technician or client, but in my down time I have managed to break these lists out by building location (ie. Building A has 1,2,3, & 4, Building B has 5, 6, & 7, etc.) I like to think that by working a little harder right now, I am saving myself hard work later. Instead of searching through one giant list looking for an answer, I can now quickly find it. Work smarter. Not harder. Probably one of the best things I strive to do everyday.

6 December, 2012
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Pretty in Black

Posted in Inspiration, Music, NaBloPoMO by

As usual I am late to the new album game. If only there were an app that would allow you to see all the new releases coming out each week. What makes this situation even more sad is that I follow The Raveonettes on various social media outlets and knew that this album was coming out, yet neglected to actually figure out when. I was introduced to The Raveonettes in 2007 by my friend Chris. He worked at a local coffee joint and I would spend my nights hanging out, drinking soy peppermint hot chocolates and we would talk music. We were introduced through a mutual friend and our common bond musically made for awesome conversations. One band that he introduced me to were The Raveonettes, a indie rock band from Denmark. The Raveonettes could best be described as a two part band with duo-harmonies mixed with electric guitars mixed with heavy distortion mixed with the 50’s and 60’s rock vibe meets a hint of surf rock. I had the pleasure of seeing them at a small venue in San Francisco for my birthday in 2008 with Be Your Own Pet (who you should also check out).

Their newest album Observator falls right in line with their previous stellar works. I think my main draw as to why I love this band so much is their vocal pairing and subtle electronic elements. Despite the usually dark lyrics most of their earlier albums have a rather upbeat vibe to them versus the more mellow tone of this album. This album was created after a few day bender by Sune in Venice Beach where he spent his time people watching. “Young and Cold”, the opening track on the album happens to my favorite mostly because I can identify with how he is feeling, each year of my life passing me by faster and faster.

If you like groups like The Bird and The Bee, Blonde Redhead, Mew, The Jesus and Mary Chain, and Velvet Underground, you will probably enjoy The Raveonettes.

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December NaBloPoMo Topic:

Do you enjoy teaching others? Talk about a time you taught someone how to do something.

Do I enjoy teaching others? Short answer, No. But I don’t think this question is so black and white, or maybe it is and I choose not to see it that way. The reason why I say no is because I am somewhat of a control freak coupled with a slight compulsion of OCD and sometimes get frustrated easily. Sometimes I forget that things that I find easy are not easy to others, this especially rings true when it comes to technology. When it comes to a menial task such as teaching someone how to use Word or how to send an email or take a screen capture on their computer, if they don’t pick it up quickly, I find myself getting slightly frustrated because these are all things I can do without even thinking about it. One thing I learned from my Mom was teach people by doing. Instead of completing the task yourself and asking them if they understand, have them complete the task and guide them. I find this yields better results.

A time that I had to teach someone was actually a time where I had to teach over 200 people. When my former employer added a department to the store, all of the employees had to be trained on all the various procedures, safety precautions, etc surrounding that department. Because I had been promoted to take over this department, I was in charge of ensuring that everyone was trained within a 2 week period. I started by reading over all of the information that I had to cover, because not only did I want to be informed and ready to answer any questions pertaining to the training materials, I wanted to see if there were any portions that I could change or omit to keep my audience engaged. After jotting down key points of all the topics that I needed to cover, I broke the entire building up into small groups that would be more manageable. I engaged the employees by asking them what prior knowledge they might have of the subject and then proceeded to break things down in visual way with props and whiteboards instead of standing in front of the room and reading from my notes. I felt that this approach was more effective than dumping a ton of information on them and expecting them to pass a test in 45 minutes. In the end most absorbed the material and passed the test and I was able to spend time with those who needed a little more help.

5 December, 2012
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Posted in Friend Fun Times, NaBloPoMO, Video Games by

While at my Mom’s house for Thanksgiving, I found myself completely lost after she decided to “rearrange” things in her kitchen. I scoured the shelves where I thought the sugar would be, and found TONS of powdered sugar. More powdered sugar than one person should own. I poked around a little more and finally gave up. Then a light bulb went off. I opened the spice cabinet and BINGO. SPRINKLES. This turned my wheat Chex into something exceptionally more exciting. Try it some time, you might not be able to stop smiling through your breakfast.

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Last night Richard and I chipped away at more Lego Lord of the Rings. I swear, this is one of the THE MOST glitchiest games I have ever played. The loading ring will just spin for ages in the bottom corners of our split screens, quests will glitch out and not continue on into the story, causing us to restart the game multiple times, items don’t respawn in their established places making it exceptionally difficult to complete story lines. Dear PS3, give us an update already, I am head over heels for the LOTR franchise, but this game is borderline unplayable at times. After struggling through one minor quest portion for almost 2 hours (which should have only taken about 30 to 45 minutes) we went and had dinner at Chipotle. I honestly can’t think of the last time I had Chipotle and it was pretty good. Our friend Aaron happened to show up at the same exact time and it was nice to have some dinner company and remissness about the crazies at my former work place.

After our meal we parted ways, sadly we had not killed nearly enough time before the midnight release of Batman: The Dark Knight Rises. We wandered over to The Nugget, which is a fancy pants supermarket. Considering how much time we had before 12 AM, we started at aisle 1 and proceeded to walk up and down almost every single aisle looking at all the food stuffs. Richard picked up some crazy delicious waffle cookie things, some chips, and a bag of cotton candy for me. With all of the aisles exhausted, we decided to kill the last hour and a half or so wandering Walmart. I honestly have never been to a midnight release for a movie (on DVD) and didn’t realize that people would actually be there to buy it. We were digging around in the CD bargain bin and suddenly a bunch of people materialized out of nowhere to buy the DVD. Sadly I could not find a Huey Lewis & The News CD, which I was convinced at least a greatest hits album would be in there, gave up and wandered over to where everyone was gathered. The employee had a huge display on a pallet that he was pushing into place and one guy asked if he could just grab it and go, to which he was swiftly shut down and reprimanded that he had to wait until the pallet was on the floor. Who knew they were such DVD nazis. Anyways, Richard grabbed his copy and we ducked out of there. I promptly crashed out maybe 10 minutes into the movie. Sad.

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December NaBloPoMo Topic:

Do you feel most comfortable being a leader, a follower, or a collaborator?

I feel that I am most comfortable in all of these roles in various capacities. I also feel that that answer is a bit of a cop-out, but hear me out a little. I have been a leader, follower, and a collaborator in various capacities of all of my jobs. When I started my first job, I started as a follower. I was new, inexperienced, nervous, but eager to learn and grow. I followed in the footsteps of over employees that I admired, taking direction from both my peers and superiors to improve my performance and the performance of the store I was working for. As I became more comfortable in my role, I started collaborating with leaders on various projects and ideas, which also meant taking on more responsibility and training other employees. Naturally that translated into various promotions until I ultimately landed the role of being the leader of the entire operation.

I feel that all three positions have unique rewards and challenges presented with them. In the role of the leader, you are able to make decisions that directly impact operations and employees. It gives you a position to teach, inspire, and coach others. I often find myself in the leader position, such as a school projects or a complex problem at work, because when it comes to situations like that, I am not the type to sit around and wait for everyone else to do something about it. I want to figure it out, getting done, and move onto the next challenge. Though in the position of leading, comes more responsibility, but sometimes in the end the rewards are greater.

In the role of follower, you are given the opportunity to take on someone else’s perspective with usually little or no repercussions for your actions (provided you follow instruction correctly). I often find that this role allows you to learn the in’s and out’s of the position you are in without having to worry about all the red tape. I also feel that people who start in this role before moving into a leader position (regardless of previous experience) often tend to be better leaders because they can identify more with the “followers”.

As a collaborator, this allows you the chance to both lead and follow. It can be the best of both worlds, provided the people you are working with feel the same way. I often find myself struggling with this the most because I tend to be a bit of a work-a-holic and control freak. But admitting you have a problem is the first step, right? As long as everyone feels valued and people are contributing equal amounts to the cause, being a collaborator can be a rewarding position.

I feel most comfortable evaluating what the situation calls for and assuming that role. By being flexible and dynamic, I feel that I am a greater asset to whatever goal I am working towards.

4 December, 2012
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My week in an instant & my first NaBloPoMo

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  1. I dumped the news on IG last week because I couldn’t take not talking about it any longer.
  2. Midnight looking ultra cute. I love when cats cover their face with their paws.
  3. I spent my day Saturday curled up in bed with my feline friend and watching Private Practice on Netflix.
  4. I started a class on Coursera – Drugs & the Brain. Its proving to be quite the challenge.

I didn’t realize how little I posted to IG this week – I guess things were not that eventful.

December NaBloPoMo Topic:

What do you consider yourself a “pro” at?

All of the topics in this months NaBloPoMo topics are in relation to work. When I glanced over the prompts and saw this first question – I wracked my brain as to what I consider myself a “pro” at when it comes to work – or anything for that matter. Upon some self reflection on the way to work I decided that I consider myself a pro at time management, creating plans, implementing procedures, and including others in the decision making process (when I can). By having multiple jobs that required me to manage my time in the most effective way possible, I had to become a master at this task. I mostly find myself making lists and using my phone to keep track of what I have going on. I often find myself pondering ways of how I can work smarter, not harder, which has lead to various procedures and plans that I have put in place at various jobs to help facilitate the flow of work.

I have had a few trying leaders in my journey – and along the way I have told myself that I do not want to be like them, and what about them do I admire and what do I not care for as a subordinate. One of my biggest frustrations was in certain instances that I or we were told to do something because they said to, with no explanation. I think there is a line between questioning authority and honestly curious about why a task is being completed or how. Because of years of ‘because I said to’ I have found myself often asking my employees or peers why we are completing this task to gain understanding or how they would improve it if they were in my shoes. For the most part, my return has been pretty successful, and I find that it helps build an environment where employees/peers feel valued and included.

What do you consider yourself a pro at in the workplace?

Tonight Richard and I are going to grab some delicious food from Chipotle, play some Lego Lord of the Rings, and hit Walmart for the midnight release of The Dark Knight Rises.

3 December, 2012
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