Officially Announced

I have resigned from my position at work and HR sent out the email today to let the company know. Now that it is common/public knowledge I thought I would mention it here. My last day is March 3, 2017 and I am going to have to really ramp up my job search so that there isn't too much of an unemployment break.

Movie With The Girls

Went to a movie (Hidden Figures, highly recommended) tonight with some friends from work. We have a Whatsapp group and talk throughout the day using lots of Bitmoji's. Here are the four of us represented by our avatars:

Clockwise from top left: 

Laura, Lor, ME, Sob

Recovering

I am trying to take a bit of time today to recoup, a peaceful Sunday spent inside working on quiet and easy chores as I try to restore health and energy for the coming week.

Here is what I am recovering from:

- My first cold of the season, sore throat on Wednesday led to full out aches, fever, runny nose, and cough. It only started to let up this morning.

- The stress of Two's vet appointment yesterday. She is healthy, it was just an annual check up, but she freaked out so much it was upsetting.

- Heartache from a shocking election. I am still sad about Hillary's loss, even more so after reading Politico's article What It Took: How a lifetime of compromises and concessions brought one woman to the brink of history.

- Busy couple of weeks at work that had me travelling, waking up for different time zones, and managing multiple shows simultaneously.

- The emotional movie Jason and I saw last night, Arrival. If you go see it, I would highly recommend reading the short story The Story of Your Life first.

- My first 'gallbladder attack' since my gallstones diagnoses last month. Last night I felt the familiar pain and reached for my morphine pills which I hadn't had to use yet. They do the trick but only by making you pass completely out, luckily it was late at night so it wasn't a problem.

November In Florida

Landed in Florida today, for work, and was greeted by copious amounts of Christmas music, and holiday decorations. (Really America? It is Rememberance Day / Veterians Day.) Thankful we were also greeted by warm weather and palm trees! Since the work part actually starts tomorrow we stopped by The Mall at Millenia for some food and shopping.

Massive Christmas Tree Inside - Many Large Palm Trees Outside

The Mall at Millenia - October 2016

Photo by ME with my phone

Your Cowboy Name

Happy Halloween! On Friday at work we had a pumpkin painting competition, it was a fun thing to do on my lunch break. Also according to this photo by my co-worker, I paint with my pinkie up. I am going to take the pumpkin home today since we don't have any decorations and are planning to give out candy at Casa Verde this year.

Dressed up at work today with my team as Cowgirls, (Since I was able to supply a lot of hats.) According to the quiz below my Cowboy Name is Billy The Stubborn Sheriff, which is cool but I have decided to be Chris The Kid.

---- from The Internet

Click to enlarge

Let me know your Cowboy Name in the comments!

I AM An Intrrobang?!

A co-worker shared a survey with the Marketing Team called What's Your Punctuation Mark? It was a quick quiz and I got "interrobang.' In fact each member of our four-person team got a different type of punctuation and the tiny write ups were cute. Mine was especially accurate, "Inquisitive. Confident. Often surprised." I had never heard of an interrobang before, it looks like an exclamation mark overlapping with a question mark, but can be represented with ?! as well. I like the idea that I am a punctuation mark used to show "asking a question in an excited manner."

Accomplished Before Engagement

I ran across the article Getting Married Is Not an Accomplishment at just the right time, wedding planning had been getting me down, I was struggling with a small depressive low, and I was not looking forward to the future. I needed perspective and it was great to read some words that seemed more based in my reality.

Being popped the question is still more celebrated than academic and professional pursuits of women. Yes, college graduations and landing a great career and receiving wonderful promotions are all received with happiness from friends and family, but not even close to the same level of elation received when you announce that you are getting hitched. This is my experience, at least. I am so grateful for the excitement surrounding my upcoming marriage, however, I often wonder why the event of getting married is put on a higher pedestal than the true successes that come along with an education and career.

Despite everything Jason and I are doing to try to take away the parts of a 'traditional' wedding that don't mesh with our personalities, relationship, or personal views. I still struggle with how gendered this event is - especially everyone's reaction to it. I completely notice the same things as the author, Natalie Brooke:

I can’t blame anyone for being more curious about my relationship status than my career, as I too have been guilty of doing the same with other woman. After all, we are all taught through expertly crafted commercials and advertisements that it is of utmost importance for a woman to get a ring put on her finger. Perhaps it’s time for society as a whole to re-evaluate what aspect of women’s lives we put the most value on. In my opinion, getting married should never be put in a higher regard than the academic and professional successes that women work hard to attain.

I have a slightly different reaction though, I DO blame people for being more interested in my relationship, wedding, etc than my career - I work for a really really interesting company!! Jason is constantly asked more about his job than I am. I will do another post on that since it is a longer rant.

You can read the full original article on Huffington Post HERE. Also check out Natalie Brooke's follow-up article: Getting Married Is Not an Accomplishment, But Finding Happiness (In Any Form) Is.

Also, on an end note, I am feeling much better now and wedding planning is exciting again.

Beats By BB8

Just got these for work:

BB8 Headphones

Photo of me, by me, on my phone

They are children's, from Indigo, and were on sale for $12. They are super adorable, and I really liked the new Star Wars movie - BB8 is way better than R2D2 who I am slowly realizing is basically a massive dick.

A Day Of Prep

Tomorrow is Rob and Andrea's wedding!! And, tonight I was asked to join in the Rehearsal events, both at the church and dinner afterwards. (Jason is Rob's Best Man.) Here is how I got ready, in my usual ADHD fashion is was scattered and done in stages. Note that between all these steps I would be off doing something else:

7:00am  - (At home) Had a bath
7:30am  - Put product into hair, then tied it up in a loose bun
7:35am  - Packed make-up and redid the stuff I keep in my purse
7:55am  - Put on red dress and black flats
8:50am  - (On Dufferin Bus) Take down hair from bun
9:05am  - (Bathroom breaks at work) Put clips in hair
11:30am - Put on pantyhose
12:55pm - Laura helps fix the clips in my hair
2:35pm  - Apply foundation and blush
3:50pm  - Put on eyeliner and mascara,
3:55pm  - Fix clips in my hair, again
4:05pm  - (On King Streetcar) Apply lipstick
4:45pm  - (In taxi) Switch flats for heels

New Month

There are lots of new things happening in June:

I have a new job title! This is the second change since I started two years ago. The marketing department here is small, so the role is evolving and getting redefined as the work I do changes. I really enjoy the changes actually. I swear position title adjustments are one of the easiest, cheapest, HR paths to employee satisfaction. I don't know why more companies don't take advantage of this. Even better than the new job title is that my work here has moved from a contract position to a full-time one.

This month, I want to start writing everyday again on Always Standing. May got away from me with busy weekends, trips to Edmonton, and mainly getting really sick. It has taken my all to keep regular hours at work so I have struggled with anything extra. I am starting to feel better but my body still seems to be fighting off several infections and trips to the doctor's office haven't been helping much. I am hoping for a healthy June with a lot more posts.

Besides getting back on track with my writing, I also want to be more diligent with my diet. I need to start going to Spinning regularly again and eat better. I am blaming my weight and health issues over the past month on being sick, but I am sick of being sick!!

These Are My Guys

I am in a Fantasy NHL Playoff Hockey Pool at work. (We are using the Sportsnet platform.) I have done lots of hockey pools before, but just picking teams on the bracket, never actually choosing players. These are the guys I chose for the first round of playoffs that start tonight. (Hockey playoffs that don't include any Canadian teams! Not a single one made it, which hasn't happened since 1970.)

I first made my picks based on a combination of ESPN suggestions, former Leaf/Ottawa players whose names I recognized, names/teams that I like, etc. I decided that this didn't seem like a winning strategy so I reached out to Rob for some suggestions. I also got a lesson at lunch as to how 'player value points' work and heard about various strategies. I also now have some clarification on how points are determined. Then I made some changes to my original picks to end up with the players above. I wonder how I will do?

This has reminded me of making my Fantasy Baseball Team from the Brantford Expositor when I was really little. You had to cut out the entry form from the newspaper, fill it out, and mail it in. I always got Bon to help me with my picks since I only knew of Roberto Alomar and didn't follow baseball at all. I have no idea why I used to participate in that as a kid but I remember doing it for a couple of years in a row.

Be Smile

I enjoy running across badly translated English. I saw the following on a website for a hotel in China:

Join us NOW!

Be surprised.

Be satisfied.

Be smile!

At work we are in the process of doing the opposite. We are getting ready to launch the Chinese version of our website, hopefully we get the translation edited properly. Ideally we will not make mistakes in Mandarin that end up reading like the section quoted above. However, I like the idea of "Be smile!" it is a good goal or life motto.

What I Do And Where

I haven't talking about my job in a while and my company just launched a new website that I thought I would share. I am part of the four-person marketing team at FORREC, where we focus on on promoting the company. My title as Marketing Events Coordinator means that I mainly work on logistics and planning for our attendance at industry tradeshows.

I really love internal and corporate communications, but the business-to-businesses (B2B) marketing that I am now focused on is my second love, and definitely my preferred form of marketing. However, since we aren't working at bringing brand recognition to the 'consumer' or general public, few people even know that this world renown entertainment design company exists in Toronto.

This company that I do marketing for is incredible and I am surrounded by the most amazing talent. I am in constant awe of the creation that is occurring around me every day. Check out the company and the projects we work on at FORREC.COM, our recently redesigned website.

Big Day At The Office

Me And A Floorplan

February 2016

Photo by B on my cell phone

I got to use the big plotter printer for the first time yesterday! I printed out a floor plan for a tradeshow we are attending this year, to get a better idea of what the best booth locations would be. I printed it as 36x48, I think that is inches, I think that means it is 3' by 4'. I could wear this thing as a dress!

I Am Moving These Boxes, Sir

Yesterday I found out that my boss doesn't consider me a lady, and I am actually rather glad about it. The term can be problematic and is starting to dance on the sexist side. Even according to its definition, it is sometimes offensive depending on its context:

LADY
noun, plural ladies. 
1. a woman who is refined, polite, and well-spoken
2. a woman of high social position or economic class
3. any woman; female
4. (used in direct address: usually offensive in the singular)
5. wife
6. (initial capital letter) (in Great Britain) the proper title of any woman whose husband is higher in rank than baronet or knight, or who is the daughter of a nobleman not lower than an earl (although the title is given by courtesy also to the wives of baronets and knights)
adjective 
7. (sometimes offensive) being a female
8. of a lady; ladylike; feminine

Last night I was in a rush to leave work because I had a waxing appointment at 5:30. A delivery showed up for marketing right at 5. The building locks its loading dock at that time so the 25 or so boxes being delivered would need to be moved into our suite, off the truck, by hand.

The driver and our small marketing team used a couple of hand trolleys to wheel in the delivery. The driver kept insisting that he do the brunt of the work, even though there were three of us there to help. (Note: The boxes were maybe 5lbs a piece.) I ignored his protests and helped anyway.

Driver: No, no, no, I will do it. It is too heavy for a lady.
Marketing Director: Oh, she isn't a lady, she's ... Chris.

We got the boxes moved in and they were not too heavy! I also made my appointment in time.

Back With Compression

I am sure that you have noticed that I have been away; besides my Stay Tuned post, I haven't written anything for Always Standing for the past two weeks. However, I am going to get back in gear and post at least everyday, hopefully more.

Let me start by explaining that nothing bad happened. Toronto is hosting the Pan Am Games and leading up to this event there was a lot of worry that rush hour commute times would increase greatly. Everyone who works in the city was asked to adjust their schedules to try to make traffic and transit better.

My office responded by moving into three weeks of compressed hours. We would close the office on Fridays, but would still need to work a minimum of 37.5 hours, on site, from Monday to Thursday. This would shift our commute times outside of the normal rush hour times.

Because I am trying to spin regularly with Tessa at Cykl, I am unable to stay late at the office most nights. Instead, this adjustment to our working times meant 6:30am starts. It has been very challenging to adjust to and not left me any time to blog. In fact it actually made me borderline ill. The exhaustion was pretty rough.

This is the last week and just as I am adjusting to the new schedule it is going to be returning to normal. It was quite nice to have the Friday off and I have enjoyed the 3-day weekends. However, the sleep deprivation and difficulties staying focused during extended work days have not really been worth it.

On My Desktop

Sunday Mornin' Coming Down - A post about my Dad each Sunday, named after a song that he loved.

I keep a photo of Dad on my desktop at work. I don't remember how it got there. I thought it might have been from when I posted it to Always Standing, but that was in April of last year and I wasn't working at FORREC yet.  I can't image why else I would have brought it onto my desk top, but it is there. I like to see the little thumb nail and be reminded of him.

Screen Shot From My Work Laptop

(July 2015)

Title Change

I got a NEW job title:

On July 24th, I will have been with FORREC for a year, but the title change went into effect today and now shows up on my automatic email signature. There is an adjusted job description that goes the new title as well. Since I started there have been so many changes that I was no longer doing half of the stuff from the original job posting and new responsibilities had been added to my plate but not documented. I am looking forward to another year with this amazing company.

I Rode For Heart

Sunday morning was rainy and very cold. I know this because I was awake at 6:00am and down at my workplace in Liberty Village by 7:00am. I did the Ride For Heart as part of the Forrec team, so we met up as a group to start together. Jason joined us. Thank you to everyone who donated towards my ride - I completed the 25km route as promised. This is impressive since it was only about 10 degrees out and rained the entire time. I finished in less than an hour and a half (though only a few minutes ahead of Jason who was doing the 50km). It was a very surreal experience to bike on the roadways - there is no need to break. Even on bike trails there seems to be stopping and such, but I did the whole thing on Sunday in one go, not putting my feet down once. It was a lot of fun and I would like to try the 50km route next year.

Two Ingredients Too Sweet

Today there was a Bake Sale at work, to raise money towards the Forrec Ride for Heart team. I don't really like cooking, and baking is so much worse. However, I thought I would put together something easy and help out. I made Rice Crispy Squares since they are my favorite quick treat. But I had also found an easy Oreo Dessert on Buzzfeed that I thought I would try, "Two ingredients, 20 minutes" seemed doable for me. Here is how to make it:

White Chocolate Oreo Bark

1. Put 15 Oreos in a large ziplock bag and crush/break them all up. I used a meat tenderizer and it was pretty fun. (I also bought 'fake' no name Oreos too.)

2. Put a bag of white chocolate chips in a bowl. (Don't go cheap on these, get a good bag of chips, my bark didn't turn out well because the chocolate was fake and sickly sweet.)

3. Melt the chocolate in the microwave using 30 second increments and stirring between each one.

4. Once the chocolate is melted add in 3/4 of the crushed cookies and stir.

5. Pour the mixture into a parchment-lined pan and sprinkle the remaining crushed cookies on top.

6. Put the pan in the fridge until it hardens - about 15 minutes. Take it out, remove the parchment paper and break up the chocolate into 'bark pieces' - I used the meat tenderizer again for this part.