Category: Uncategorized

Life in the yoga pants lane

I envy people who are all put together everyday, especially those that are all done early in the day. I wake up and go walk the dog in whatever I find in the morning, luckily i find my glasses and hearing aids otherwise it would have been a complete disaster.

When iI do zumba i see the difference between me and the others, the front row is full of people who have color coordinated matching clothes,down with matching socks and shoes while I am in whatever color kirkland yoga pants that are clean and the tshirt that was on the top of the laundry basket. Frankly I am just happy that I actually went to zumba in the first place and managed to follow the steps.

 Somedays I even manage to follow the hand movements and not just the legs, very exciting for me. So of course my attire for zumba class comes last on my list, could also be that the hundred or so  kirkland yoga pants I own are very comfortable and usefull. They do have side pockets after all, one for the cell phone and the other for doggie bags.

Funny thing is that I used to be one of these well coordinated people back in the day. Somedays I wonder what happened to me that I changed and then somedays I really don’t care. Yoga pants with pockets are the best thing since gluten free sliced bread, at least in my opinion!

Resenteeism or hating your job

Read an article  this weekend about work resenteeism as in resenting our work, I started laughing, apparently I love humor columns. They coined this as a new term and a new  danger to the work environment.  However, some of us have resented or hated our jobs for many years without having a great term to define it, we just called it hating our jobs. That’s why you see so many people going drinking after work in TV shows or in the movies, at least in my opinion. I on the other hand do not drink at all, maybe I like my job, maybe not.

According to the latest articles there are several reasons for resenteeism, being underpaid, overworked, feeling like you missed the boat on getting a different job with all the layoffs going around, not feeling appreciated and undervalued by your company. These are all valid reasons that have been around forever and will most likely be around forever. However for most of us, we don’t always need to find a reason why we hate our jobs and yet stay at the job we hate. Most of us stay in our jobs because we are responsible, we have family obligations, we need to  put food on the table,  we have kids in college, a mortgage and the need for health insurance. Maybe we should all  start drinking.

The weird things I like to read in my local newspaper

My local newspaper publishes a  list of restaurants that have had health violations the previous week, each week I think to myself do I check the list or do I not. Do I really want to know? And yet every week I go to that list and read it, hoping and praying that I did not go to any of these places. It’s like a traffic accident that you see is about to happen and you can’t turn your head to avoid looking. 

There really is no point in reading  that a restaurant I went to last week or two weeks ago had a cockroach infestation or no sufficient hot water and yet I still read it. Maybe its a form of self torture, who knows.

There usually have some normal and reasonable closures, but when it said the closed CVS and only allowed prepacked foods at this particular CVS I started to wonder what exactly they sell, we have several CVS’s close by and none of them sell fresh food or ice cream. So I went to the official county website to see if there is any further information but alas there is none.

What should we do with the information about health department closures,do I go to a place that was cited and closed with the belief that it is cleaner now, with immodium in my purse just in case or do I avoid going to a place I like as they frequently have issues. This is going to be a tough decision!

It’s a fine line between not comprehending and not listening

Hearing is not my strong suit, in fact without my hearing aids I hear almost absolutely nothing. Listening is a slightly better skill for me, depending on who you ask. As I wear  hearing aids I do need to pay more attention to what is being said around me. Which brings me to my point, I work at a place with slightly different business hours and no, it’s not a strip club, although I would have definitely  been making better money.Our voicemail states our name and our hours very clearly as does the sign on our door. And yet quite frequently we receive complaints that we were closed when they stopped by or that we do not answer phone calls and when we check the timestamp of the complainer it’s always when we are closed. Sometimes people leave us voicemails asking us to call back but during the hours we are closed and then they keep calling and calling while we are still closed demanding to know why we are not calling them back. I often wonder about these people, do they not listen to our voicemail and if they did not listen the first time they called, did they not listen the 3rd time they called? We had one such call this week, the funny thing is when we called her back she asked if we are Fedex. We were not sure if to laugh or cry when she asked if we are fedex. So is this I am not listening or a comprehension problem?  Maybe it’s a I don’t care, I just want an immidiate response problem.

When fries are on the no go list

I love eating and I love eating crap! The problem is my body, with complete agreement from my doctors, all disagree with my love of crap. This sucks big time! So for the last 2 weeks I have been eating relatively healthy, not that I don’t like healthy foods, fruit and vegetables, I actually do like them and some I even love. What I don’t love is not having the freedom to eat what I feel like. As a celiac, I should be used to this feeling. But adding more restrictions to my already restricted diet is not fun. Goodbye french fries and potato chips hello cottage cheese and tomatoes. Someone should write a country song about this, really. I can even hear the song  in my brain and  it’s a very sad breakup  song. But truthfully. While I will be limiting some of my favorite  fried food groups,I will not be giving them up completely, I will just be more conscious of what I am eating and some foods will be modified. Fries are really too good to give up completely.

Unfortunately for my walking partner, the vet told Sagey girl that she is a little chonky as well and needs to lose a few. So both of us will be adding more veggies to our diets and walking a couple more steps. Thankfully the weather where we live is good almost year round so someone is happy about the extra steps.I already exercise and walk 10000 steps a day thanks to my 70lb dog, who makes sure to provide me with my resistance training as well.

Enjoying the sunset

We are busy planning our trips for the next couple of years, trying to decide on where we would like to go and what we would like to see. This is great because we both really like to travel and did not have any destinations planned for 2023 and beyond.  Planning big trips is a lot of fun but we should not forget day trips and hikes and local amazing places that most of us have close to home. Sometimes our own backyard can be amazing as well. Today we  decided to go down for a walk and went down to our local  beach. The weather was perfect, low 70’s (20C) and just beautiful. I haven’t gone to the beach in the last  3 months, no special reason, just did not get a chance, which is a real shame. 

The weather was amazing and we were blessed with a great sunset. And we really enjoyed our walk as did Sagey girl,our Airedale,  she behaved well and did not bark or terrorize the other dogs either. So what have I learned from this? 

I learned that I  have  to remind myself to enjoy the simple things. Grand plans are great, but sometimes local things are great as well. I also had to remind myself to pause a little and take a break, walk the dog on different paths and just enjoy being away from work even if it’s for an hour.

Valuing your time as a patient

I had an 8 am doctor’s appointment the other week, the office called to confirm and requested that I arrive at 7:45.  I have been a patient of this doctor for more than 20 years, in those 20 years my appointment has never been on time, I love this doctor and he usually runs late as he takes time with each patient and really listens so I don’t mind usually but as I am aware that he runs late I try to be his first appointment of the day, hence my 8am appointment. But even me being his first appointment I know he will be late as usual, this time he saw me at 8.25am.

I did not arrive at 7:45 as I am very aware he takes his time, I arrived at 7:58am and with me all the medical staff arrived as well. I was even there before the nurse arrived and felt like I should turn on all the lights in the office as well. I was not called in until 8:10am.

So why do these schedulers not value  our time? If I had actually been there early, that would have meant almost 40 minutes of just waiting there. Shouldn’t there be an appreciation for the patient’s valuable time as well as the doctor’s time? 
Sadly, this doctor’s appointment was actually one of the most efficient ones. I had another appointment with a different doctor lately that  had me waiting for 30 minutes in the waiting room and another 45 in the exam room, when I asked his medical assistant if he was running late today, she looked at me in wonder and goes no, he is on time, to which my reply was really, I have been waiting for an hour and half already. I have canceled all future appointments with this practioner as this was the second time in a row that I was left waiting for hours and will be shopping around for another doctor. It seems like some medical practitioners overbook and value their own time but not their patient’s time. Yes, if the doctor has had some emergency this is expected, but most cases this is not the reason for leaving us in a waiting room in a paper robe cold.

So who’s time is more valuable? CVS just announced that their pharmacies will have less hours and will close earlier in the day. Those who need to pick up their prescriptions will have to go get them in the middle of the day or during lunches or wait for  the weekend and delay taking them,again the focus is not on the patient. When did the medical field change from being patient focused to being corporate focused.

 Every one’s time is valuable, us waiting in a doctors office to be seen for hours or running to the pharmacy instead of eating lunch as well as the service providers,  there must be some middle ground and respect between everyone’s needs.

Listening to your body

We always say that we don’t have time to be sick but truthfully no one has time to be sick or really wants to be sick. That’s usually when the universe finds us and shows us how much it really cares about our time line. This week it’s my turn, I postponed going to the doctor  and gave myself many excuses of why it’s not a big deal. Of course I ended up with antibiotics and even more medical procedures that will take more of my  time this week. I should have known better and  listened to my body, for sure. I am after all a grown adult.  

But I guess even  I don’t listen to my own advice. My first inclination was to be upset with myself as  I just postponed the inevitable or probably made my condition worse . I actually did make it worse and my dr was  not very happy with me. So now  the question is what have I learned from this week? For starters I need to Listen to my body  and commit to taking better care of myself. Not only for me but for my family as well. I should also practice what I preach.

Being treated like a dog?

I was told this by someone this week that im treating them like a dog, I responded with I guess I really like you . That person looked at me weird for a moment and had a puzzeled look on their face. Expressions we used in the past might not apply these days. I don’t know about your dog, I love my dog. My dog has an orthopedic bed, lots of great toys, snackies galore and a personal butler (me) that picks her poop. So my Sagey girl is spoiled rotten, she even has her own spot on the sofa which her 65lb frame pushes people away if they dare take her favorite spot. 

And I am not even a real crazy dog mom, although those who see me video chat with her when I am away might disagree. Most dogs are treated so well in the western world, probably better than humans in most places. There are even subscription boxes for dog toys.  So yes, if I treat you like a dog, I probably like you, maybe even really really like you.

Finding time for taking time off

It is very easy to delay time off and  vacations, telling yourself you are very busy right now and postpone fun activities. God knows I have found many excuses before – I have deadlines at work, this is not the right time, it’s the end of the quarter or year and many more excuses. But when is the right time really? It seems like when we become adults with full time jobs there  is never really a right time to take  a vacation or sometimes even just a day or two off.

I know some people with unlimited PTO and  from what I hear these unlimited PTO people take the least time off. I have a limited amount of time off, it is not small at all but still limited and I get to transfer only a small amount of vacation days to the next calendar year.

Time off is important, we all need it. We need time to refresh, clear our heads and do things outside of our professional life for ourselves and our families. Weekend breaks are really not enough, at least not for me. 

Although my time off is limited to specific times during the year, times that are not flexible and do not always allow me to get the best rates for travel, I still choose to take my vacation days and have some fun. I even stopped taking my laptop with me as I learned to let go and trust my team to cover for me (this was a big issue for me as a recovering workaholic).

Something happened in the last couple of years that made clear what my priorities should be: family,  friends , health and time off for fun. Health I can’t really control but everything else I can.

I can not only make sure I take care of myself but take care of my work team as well.

And since no time off makes employees burn out, it is very important for us as not only to take care of ourselves but as leaders and managers to make sure our team gets time off as well.

I read somewhere that employees don’t quit jobs, they quit bosses. Not sure how true that is for everyone who quits, but having managers that truly care about their employees’ life balance , happiness and yes, their time off is, should be part of managing a great team.