[insert witty title here]

Things are moving along at work well. I'm now training to do two different jobs so I keep busy which makes the days go by faster. I finally got out of the hotel and officially moved into  my new house. I still have a ton of stuff down in Alabama, so I've been going back and forth every weekend. It's exhausting, but that's my life for the next few months. At least I have a more comfortable car to spend the time in. Anyway, that's not really the point of this post.

This week another person from my first project showed up at work. Apparently she's been on nights but switched to days when her man got transferred to another project. Anyway, she's sitting next to me now and we pretty much picked up where we left off when I last saw her a couple years ago. She's the only one I feel that really understands when I talk about chronic pain. She knows what it's like when people say "you're too young to hurt like that" because she's hurt since she was a kid too. I was updating her on the various things my different doctors have tested, tried, or said. She shook her head and said "You have fibromyalgia, like me." It was like everything clicked into place. I had heard of it before, but figured that if I had it, wouldn't one of the doctors I've been to have brought it up? But then I realized my doctors were too specialized/focused. I never went through ALL my symptoms with any one doctor at any one time, so how could they have seen the whole picture??

Apparently there's no cure and really no treatment. My friend said she manages it with diet. She did an elimination diet to see what caused her to hurt worse and what made her feel better. She gave me some foods that cause her symptoms to flare up as a starting point for my trials. So now I start my own elimination diet and hope I can get my symptoms under control. She suggested processed sugars, caffeine, soda, flour... That'll be fun. I'm also going to research some and see what other people have found. Off on another adventure I guess!

Well, That Was Special

Today was my first real experience going into the plant. It was... Special. With a capital S. Just to get into one section we had to badge through at least five different doors. We also had to ask Operations for permission to enter another room before badging through again. At least all of this was in a mostly air-conditioned space, and fairly quiet, at least for an industrial space. Then came the fun part.

First we had to talk to Radiation Protection and get our EDs, or Electronic Dosimeters. Then we entered the Radiation Controlled Area, RCA. In here it was hot and loud. Oh and the possibility for radiation, always fun. This is where it got really special. I had no idea what we were even looking for, I was just along for the ride. Apparently my cohorts hadn't thought to bring any drawings that showed where we were going. One of them had never been there, and the other had been there once. We went to the stair that the one guy used the last time, but it was locked. We then spent over an hour riding the elevator up and down, climbing stairs, wandering around, opening doors, and generally getting lost. Finally, when I was ready to give up, we stopped for directions. With directions in hand, we found whatever it was that we were looking for.

To get out of the RCA we had to get full body scans, it took me several tries to get in the stupid machine properly. Let me just say that the scanners were not made for women to begin with, and especially not the chunky girl I've become. All in all it was a very uncomfortable experience. Drenched in sweat and out of breath I returned to my desk and guzzled some water and made a resolution: I am GOING to lose weight. Diet is going to be tricky until I get my new kitchen functional, but I can at least boycott the vending machine. And there's a Y not far from my new place with an aquatics center. I'm hoping to check it out and that they'll have good lap swim hours. It's not going to be easy, but I think I've finally found my motivation that's not going to disappear: work is hard enough without being so uncomfortable!

A Week In Crazytown

Is it possible for things to be crazy and boring at the same time? Now that I’ve gotten through all the paperwork and training and met my official end date at my old project and start date here, things are kind of blah. At work anyway… Despite most people working 6 days a week here, there’s apparently nothing that anybody wants to give me to do. I hope this doesn’t last long ‘cause I will totally lose my mind if I don’t get something to do soon.

Anyway, so here’s how my last couple weeks have been. The week of the 4^th my man came to visit. His first flight was cancelled and they couldn’t get him on another one until the next day. Then his last flight that day was delayed several hours, so he got here quite a bit later than planned. But he got here and that’s all that matters. We hung out for a couple days and he helped me get started with my packing. I apparently had my head in the clouds ‘cause I didn’t see a red light until it was too late and smacked into the side of a big pickup. Poor Winnie was totaled. There wasn’t so much as a scratch on the truck, go figure. The guy I hit seemed nice enough (although he filed an injury claim a couple days later) and the cop didn’t give me a ticket. Overall it wasn’t too bad, just a minor injury to my toe (don’t ask, I don’t know how it happened). The only problem was I now had a wrecked car and we were supposed to go visit friends/family for the holiday. Yet again my ‘Bama family came through for me: they had a car they were trying to sell and hooked me up with a good deal. They also sent me to a real nice guy at a body shop who got me a good price on selling Winnie. So, happy birthday to me, I got a “new” car!

The rest of the holiday weekend went without much excitement, except the 6” of rain we got in four days. That was insane! The road to my uncle’s cabin was just about washed out at one point. Of course my time with my man was way too short and it seemed over before it began. It was good to see my family too, at least part of it. The last day he was here, my man took me out for my birthday dinner to The Melting Pot. We ate WAY too much food, but it was SO good! The next morning I dropped him off at the airport, drove the hour home, changed into work clothes, and headed to my last day at my old project.

My last day consisted of cleaning out my desk, filling out some paperwork, reading my book, and saying goodbye. Most of my coworkers will be joining me at my new project, so the goodbyes weren’t too hard. The paperwork was annoying, as was cleaning out my desk. Beyond that the day seemed to just crawl by, but it was finally over. I took the last of my things and headed to my home for the past few months.

Tuesday morning I made sure all the furniture was empty and accessible for the movers to come and load everything up. I felt kind of bad, but since I didn’t sleep well I kind of passed out on them and took a little nap while they were working. After they got all of my furniture packed up, I felt rather lost and adrift. I took a nap on my little air mattress, then packed what I needed for a week in the hotel up here, and headed out.

The morning of my first day was so foggy I couldn’t even see the cooling towers to orient myself. I was following half-remembered directions to the parking lot and ended up in the very farthest one I could have. Again, not knowing which direction I was headed, I followed the other folks towards what I hoped was at least a familiar landmark. Thanks to my friend who provided a satellite image of the area, once I got to the fence I knew where I was. Unfortunately that was on the far side of the site from where I needed to be. So I walked through the fog all the way around to the opposite gate where I got to sit and wait for somebody to come that could do my hand geometry baseline.

Just getting to my desk is now quite a process, kind of like getting on an airplane, but more. First you go through a metal detector, and put your bag through an x-ray machine. Then you go into a bomb detector which poofs air at you then sucks the air in and tests it for stuff. Of course the first time I was so nervous I was staring at my feet and stepped out of the thing as soon as it poofed at me, so the alarm thingy went off. Luckily the guard was feeling friendly and there weren’t too many people around, so I just had to back up and do it again. Then you have to scan your badge and then scan your hand. It’s not really fingerprints I don’t think, it’s more the shape of your hand (which gets messed up depending on if you have your rings on or not!). So you scan your hand, often several times, then you finally get to go through the turnstile. Then you have to scan your other badge to tell Them that you are at work. Finally you hike to your trailer. If you get to work early enough and there aren’t too many people in security yet, it probably takes about 15 minutes from car to desk. If you get to work on time, it can take upwards of 30 minutes at least.

Anyway, after I went through all that the first day, I had to walk all the way back over to the other side of the site ‘cause that’s where my trailer is. After all the introductions and whatnot I found out that while I was over on the other side, before security, I should have gone in this other building to get my dosimeter. *sigh* So after lunch I went back out through security (which involves a radiation monitor, badge scan and turnstile, another metal detector, and another turnstile) over to HR which is in a maze of trailers, and then all the way back to the other side of the site. I sat in the waiting room there for 25 minutes before they told me that they don’t process day shift people that late in the day and I’d have to come back the next day. Really?! So I trudged my sorry behind, once again, through security and back to my trailer.

All of this was in 85 degree weather with 100% humidity and off and on rain. And my poor toe not being ready to be shoved in a boot. By the time I got back to my hotel I figure I must have walked 3-4 miles. My feet HURT. And I got to do it all over again the next day. Well with slightly less walking. It was clearer so I was able to get into a closer parking lot. And I could go straight through security since my baseline was done. I still had to walk to the other side of the site, but only once that day.

Friday I got to actually be useful by spending several hours in the “library” making copies of data sheets that were used by a particular piece of equipment that had gotten damaged preventing its calibration test from being completed. We had to justify why the equipment was accurate before being damaged. Not exactly mind blowing stuff, but it was work and I got to move around a bit. I also got to go in the plant a little bit. It was kind of scary! It’s big and loud and hot with lots going on. Everything is color coded so it’s bright and chaotic, and nobody loiters like they often did at my last job.

After my first Friday worked in almost four years, I went to the hotel to change and relax for a bit before heading to the city for dinner with my friends. And a lovely dinner it was! Saturday I slept in, longer than I had planned, before heading back down to the house to pack more. Thus ended my first week at my new project.

I Never Make Any Sense

Why is it, that every time I have a bad day, I want to skip taking my meds?

Would You Like Some Cheese With That Whine?

Why are so many things in my life a downward spiral? I get stressed out and depressed so I eat comfort food. Food which makes me gain weight. When I gain weight, my clothes don't fit and I don't like how I look in the mirror, which makes me more stressed and depressed which makes me want to eat more comfort food which makes me gain more weight... See what I mean?

Say I don't have time to work out because I work such long hours, so I want to eat better to try to lose some weight. Think about how long it takes to go through the drive through at McDonald's. Now think about how long it takes to go to the store, buy some healthy food, take it home, prepare it, put it away, then pack it for lunch. If I'm already running short on time, how the heck am I going to fit all that in?!

I bet you're thinking "But Kaylyn, what about all the pre-packaged health foods at the store?" You don't even want to get me started on those... Oh wait, it's too late. First let's look at the frozen meals. They're expensive to begin with, so you pretty much have to be working crazy hours just to afford the stupid things! Then, if you actually look at them closer than the big pretty graphics on the front, although they may be low in fat, the sodium is through the roof! I've seen some that have an entire day's worth of salt in one dinky meal! Lucky for me, high blood pressure is pretty much the only health issue I DON'T have, so salt isn't a huge issue for me. With that in mind, I go ahead and splurge on a couple of these supposed healthy meals. Since it's a "treat" I get pretty excited on the day I'm going to have one of them, especially 'cause I have this extra time in the morning so I can savor a nice cup of coffee before work for once. Lunch time comes around and I pop my nifty little lunch in the microwave, tote it back to my desk and dig in. Now, I usually read a book at lunch (I'm nerdy, I know) and don't always pay a whole lot of attention to eating, but when it seems I've barely gotten through two pages when my fork starts coming up empty, things get a little iffy. I look down and find the little tray completely devoid of even a single morsel. Just then my stomach lets out an unhappy rumble as I even go so far as to check my lap to see if I dropped anything there. Going back to my McDonald's comparison, for $7 I can get two Big Macs, or about five bites worth of "healthy" fast food. How often does my budget and stomach agree on something??

Now I bet you're thinking "What about all the protein bars and shakes and such?" Have you ever checked the nutrition info out on those suckers?! Yeah, they manage to cram 25gm of protein in three bites, but it also has 45gm of sugar! There's probably a bagillion diets out there all saying different crazy things, but a lot of them agree that processed sugar is bad news for your waistline. Or even your health in general really. So why do so many of these "health" bars have ridiculous amounts of sugar? It's near impossible to find one with what I would call "acceptable" levels of sugar (unless it's Atkins, but I'm not even gonna go there).

And then there's the "diet" drinks (not the ones that claim to make you shed pounds, just the regular old Diet Coke, or Diet Sprite, etc). I'm a total caffeine junky and I love my lunch-time soda. Since I'm trying to be healthy and lose weight, I reach for a diet soda. It's got all these lovely zeros on the nutrition information, so I'm good, right? Wrong! The chemicals they use to make all those zeros taste good actually inhibit weight loss! I haven't yet decided if I'm better off just drinking regular, but does anybody else feel like it's getting to be a damned if you do, damned if you don't kind of thing?

So, what's a pudgy person to do? Exercise more to offset the food issue? A body needs energy to do that. At my new job I'll be working 5x10's (that's 10 hours a day, 5 days a week for those of you not in the know, and yes, I realize that adds up to more than 40 hours a week, hence the time issue) possibly more. I try to be in bed for at least 7 hours a night, even though that means going to sleep early enough that my coworkers tease me for it. But I'm still tired every day when I drag my sorry butt out of bed. If I'm tired when I wake up, is there any way I'm gonna be able to convince myself to partake in any sort of physical activity when I get home from my 10 hour shift?! I mean, if I had more energy, I wouldn't be in this situation. Maybe, if I had more energy, this all wouldn't seem like such an insurmountable task.

So maybe, before I try to figure out how to change my diet and fit exercise into my schedule, I need to figure out why I'm exhausted after eight hours of sleep. Perhaps I have sleep apnea, my man thinks I do. Maybe it's something else. I think it's probably pretty obvious that I have *some* sort of sleep disorder. That means I should probably get a sleep study done. Now that I'm closer to something you could call and actual city, it should be fairly easy to find a sleep center that takes my insurance. The only problem is that I probably need a referral from my regular doctor. Since I'll be working 5x10's I either have to find a doctor that works on Saturdays, or late nights, or take time off to go to the doc. I only get so much time off from work, and I already have to horde my precious hours so I can visit my family, so it's really hard for me to willingly take time off for something as unattractive as a doctor visit.

Unfortunately something has to give though. I think I've gained probably 10 pounds since I got laid off, and that's on top of everything I gained when I fell off the WW wagon. All that combined puts me at the most I have ever weighed in my life. If you don't think that's depressing, you're either male, or crazy. And of course when I get depressed I reach for the Twizzlers, or cookies, or chips, or potato salad (hey, don't judge me!)... And we're back to that downward spiral.

And on top of not wanting to do anything 'cause I'm depressed, I also don't want to do anything 'cause I hurt. Like, all the time. From the moment I put my feet on the floor in the morning, to some time, several hours after I sit down in the evening, my foot feels like I'm stepping on a hot marble. Sometimes it's worse, sometimes it fades, but it's always there. The easiest exercise activities, like the elliptical or stationary bike, make it hurt so bad I'm almost in tears in about 5 minutes. The treadmill gets me a bit farther, I can usually do 30 minutes or so, if I go no faster than a brisk walk. Swimming, on the other hand, is awesome. I totally forget about my foot when I swim. But it's near impossible to find a pool that I can get to at a decent time and that fits in my budget. And it takes a lot longer to get a 30 minute swim workout than it does a 30 minute run, so we're back to the whole time crunch issue. Yoga is another good one, although some of the poses are kind of hard (imagine trying to do Mountain pose while standing on a marble!). But again, it's hard to find places that offer classes that I can both afford and actually get to on time (thanks career for making sure I'll always live in the middle of nowhere!) and I haven't yet found a yoga DVD that I like (if you have a yoga video that you love, please tell me about it!).

I'm going to be all over the place for the next month or so, bouncing back and forth between the two projects and trying to move, tie up any loose ends, and get going on my new job. This seems like the perfect excuse to put off doing anything until things "settle down." Although I am tempted to try to find a doctor ASAP so I can maybe get my sleeping fixed before they put me on 70 hour weeks or something, but I don't want to piss off my new boss by immediately asking for time off, so I should probably wait a bit. Same goes for trying to find a pool or yoga class before I really know what my schedule is going to look like. I've pretty much convince myself to wait until I'm settled in for a bit to start dealing with these issues, but I have this really bad habit. I pick some event or whatever and say "as soon as *this* is over, I'll enact *that* change." but as soon as the time comes, I go "oh, well *this* is coming up soon and it'll totally mess up *that* change, so I'll just wait 'til that's over..." You see where this is going right? Again with the downward spiral!

So I guess the moral of the story is that, well for one thing, I'm a whiny brat. And I should probably, while I'm at it, admit that I'm a lazy bum (as if you hadn't figured that out for yourself). But that's besides the point. What I'm trying to get at is that I need to find some way to get myself turned around. I need some small, tiny little thing I can use as a starting point. And then I need to find a source of motivation that won't fail me when I look in the mirror and don't see any progress, or when I have a bad day/lapse and mess up my progress. Maybe I'm just needy, but I need someone to show me that there really is a light at the end of the tunnel, to point me to the beginning of that yellow brick road. Something that will really convince me that there's a way out of this pathetic, dark, miserable hole I've dug myself into. I mean, my brain knows there are plenty of people out there who got themselves out of way worse situations than I'm in, but my heart refuses to believe it's possible. Maybe putting this out there for other people to read will shame my fat ass into motion...

Home Away From Home

I started trying to find an apartment last week, when I knew with a reasonable level of confidence that I would in fact be moving to this project. I figured that I'd get a small, cheap apartment as close to the project as possible since I likely won't be spending much time in it. But do I really want to go through the cheap apartment hell again like the last time?? Even a more expensive apartment can have horrible neighbors. I told myself that it didn't matter, I probably wouldn't be there long anyway.

So I started a list of apartments sorted by distance from the project and started *gulp* making phone calls. The very first place was for old, poor people. At least he was nice when he told me, and he said it right away... But that kind of defeat is really hard for me to get past and keep going, but I can't just not have anywhere to live. The next three places didn't answer, geeze they keep weird hours. The fifth place sounded great, they had a one bedroom apartment opening up the day I start my new job, laundry on site, $450/month rent and only $250 deposit! And then I remembered my most important question: did they allow pets *sigh* they do not. Back to the drawing board.

I tried a couple more places and got answering machines. Then another place that had a message starting out with "If this is a police or fire emergency, please hang up and dial 911..." I decided I didn't want to live anywhere that felt that had to be the first thing on their answering machine. I think that's about where I gave up for the day... or week. Every time I thought about looking I would get sad because I already found the most amazing home-away-from-home I could ever hope to find, and now I have to leave it! I mean, nothing could compare to how welcome these folks have made me feel. It's like I'm part of their family, and now I'm abandoning them... *sniffle*

Ok, no more wallowing! My work partner is very fussy about where she lives and only looks at houses (she has even more crap than I do!). Anyway, she looked at a couple places this past weekend and while she didn't find any she liked, she gave me a number to call about a little house she thought might work for me. It has three bedrooms, one bath and is $650/month. And they allow pets!! It's also only about 30 minutes from work, in a nice little town that several folks from work lived in when they were on this project the last time around. Anywho, I'm gonna check it out Thursday after work... All I should hope for is a decent house I can live in...

After meeting my 'Bama "family" my mom turned to me and said "I don't know how you do it, but everywhere you go people just adopt you!"

New Kid In School

I had some new experiences today, and some disturbingly familiar ones. I drove over a dam today for the first time in my life. Twice :) Am I the only one that gets excited about such things? I also "got" to take the Minnesota Mental Personality Inventory. A lovely 567 true/false questions on everything from whether or not I hear voices in my head, to if I would like a librarian's job. I also got to pee in a cup (the guy taking my "sample" didn't wear gloves or wash his hands, ICK!) and take some awesome Computer Based Training (CBT for those in the know). For my past work buddies: imagine HGET with a babysitter who has to check on every element before you move on to the next one. Ugh! I'm ready to chill in my hotel room and watch cartoons and/or read my book!

On The Road Again

I'd say this will be a short post, but it seems like every time I say that, my subconscious tries to turn it into a post of record-breaking length. So this post will be precisely as long as it decides to be. Anywho... What was I saying? Sorry, I'm a little frazzled.

I'm at my hotel-home for the next 5-10 days, however long it takes me to do my training. Next Saturday my man arrives and will either get to help me pack, or will get to hang out in my hotel while I train more. I'm sure he's ecstatic about both of those options. I know I am! *dripping with sarcasm* Why hasn't anybody invented a sarcasm font yet?! Seriously.

I'm trying to decide if I'm nervous about tomorrow or not. I mean there's the normal (for me) anxiety of having to go to a new place by myself, but am I worried about starting a new job... again? I don't really think I am. Maybe I'm still in shock/denial 'cause it happened so fast? I don't know... Maybe it helps that I already know people on this project, both from this most recent project and my first job. And almost all of my coworkers are going to be here too. Or maybe I'm just going to have a delayed panic attack in the middle of the night, or first thing in the morning...

Hmmm now to decide when to set my alarm... I do so hate being late!

Well That's About As Clear As Mud

Well, tomorrow I drive up to my new project to start my training. From what I understand this could take 2 days or two months, or anywhere in between. I think it's just so I can get the proper badge to access the job site. I don't think I'll ever understand badging requirements! My first job involved access to a huge area full of crazy nuclear/chemical crap that I really know nothing about. My second job involved access to an unfinished nuclear power plant that never actually had fuel anywhere on site, but I still had to go through all new badging requirements. And now that I'm going to a site, which to me at least is just a combination of the two, that's an active nuclear power plant, I have to go through even more, crazier badging requirements! Seriously, will it never end?!

So this is being called a business trip. I still get my living allowance, which is good 'cause I still have to pay rent on my place here in 'Bama. And on top of that I get my hotel and meals paid up there, plus the mileage on my car to drive there at the standard GSA rate of $0.555/mile. Officially I'm approved to be up there until July 3rd, my work partner here thinks we'll be done by the end of the week. I have no idea, so I guess I'll just wait and see. Next Saturday my man flies in, so I'll have to come back down here to pick him up at any rate. Then I'll either stay down here 'til I actually move up there, or I'll go right back up there until the holiday. Sounds great, right? Except for the part where I'm supposed to be packing all my crap up so I can move again!

This is where my awesome friend comes in. She came over yesterday to help me out and offered to pack some of my stuff while I'm gone, if I just put notes on what I want packed where. I mean, how freaking awesome is that?! Not only that, she and her husband are going to let me store some of my stuff in the basement here until I have a place with enough room for it! Since I have enough junk to fill up a large house here, there's no way I'll have room for all of it in the tiny apartment I expect to find up at my new job. So I'll be leaving as much of my stuff as I can bear to part with here. I'm hoping that it'll be easy enough to leave stuff since my new schedule will be 5x10s.

Speaking of finding a place to live up there, that's going to be a whole other barrel of laughs. I called 5 places so far. The first was for poor, elderly people. The second, third and fourth didn't answer. The fifth sounded great 'til I asked if they allowed pets, that was a big negative. The project, like most nuclear power plants, is in the middle of nowhere, so there's not much selection for living nearby. The place my friend lives sounds awesome, but it's an hour away. I did the whole hour commute for three years and it blows chunks, but if it's that or not having my kitties, well I think you all know which I'd choose.

You know how when things are super crazy and you're totally stressed out, it's the tiny little things that turn into a huge deal? Well right now the thing that is making me most upset about getting laid off and transferred and having to move again, is that I *just* finished remodeling the bathroom in the house I'm renting and now I won't get to enjoy it! And I did a really good job on it too! *pout*

On a totally random side note: do I have to change the name of my blog if I'm not going to be in Alabama anymore??

My World Goes Crazy As I Sit Here And Watch

Getting laid off is bad enough, but when no two people can agree on what you're supposed to do afterwards, it's too much to handle. I got a new position with my same company, near enough to continue working with FLL and robotics, and I only had to postpone my surgery for a year or so to be able to meet their need date. All is well and good, right? Apparently not...

First there's a two-day training here, but then the day that was supposed to start I get told that I'm not supposed to do that training. Then we were supposed to do it and we're heading up to the new (to me) project this week, no next week, no this week again. Oh but my chief never even heard about this "business trip" as their calling it. So then I'm not going up next week, I'm waiting for my official start date to go up there (July 15th, if you want to know).

The people here are saying one thing and the people there have no idea what these people are talking about and they say something completely different! It's enough to drive a body mad!

And to top that off we're first told to complete as many packages as we can and provide a status on the ones we're not. Then we're told to toss everything that's not 100% done into a box and shelve it (mostly metaphorically, but part literally too). If it's not finished, even if the project gets started back up, nobody will be able to use it and it might as well go in the trash. So basically they're throwing out everything I've done in the last six months. It's maddening!

At this instant in time I am to drive up to the new project this weekend and report for training on Monday. I will then stay there for training until July 3rd (except for a trip back down here to the airport to pick up my man who's coming 'cause I already bought his plane ticket for my surgery). I can do whatever I want for the 4th through 7th, then I report BACK here to my old project for the 8th, 9th and 10th, and on the 11th I drive back up to the new project so I can officially report for my new job on the 15th. Are you confused? 'cause I sure am!

I'm afraid to do anything 'cause it could literally change any minute. I mean it's already changed about 15 times this week already. I really wish my HR rep from my first project was here, he was SO much more helpfull and easier to work with. I don't think she's a bad person, but my HR rep here is totally useless. She's never been able to help me clear up any matter at all. I really want to throw my hands in the air, shout "I give up!" and go crawl under my covers until somebody fixes everything for me. Sheesh!

Wow, just wow...

It's amazing, shocking even, how quickly things can change. Just two days after my last post my entire project was put on ice. 400 out of 540 people working there were laid off, myself included. At 8am that morning we were called into a meeting with all the non-manual folks on the project. The client, with whom my company had just signed a contract with two weeks before, informed us that the project would be slowing down and de-staffing some. The also apologized a lot.

After that meeting we were told that there would be separate meetings for each company to go over the specifics for each group of folks. In that waiting time I kept telling myself that it couldn't possibly be my company, we just signed a contract! Apparently that was the denial phase. When noon rolled around and our bosses told us that our company staffing would go from 83 to 2 by September I must have known in some part of my brain that I was not going to be one of those 2 people, but it still didn't really sink in.

We were told that the funding for our project was getting moved to another similar project that is much farther along. Theoretically when that project finishes, the funding (and people) will be moved back to this project. But that's not until the end of 2015, if it happens at all. I felt kind of numb through this whole thing, like it was happening to somebody else. We were also told that management would do their best to find a place for everybody who wanted one at the other project.

I started thinking, well the other project is only a couple hour drive, so I could probably still live here on weekends... Or at least come back for weekend LEGO League meetings. You see, I wasn't worried about myself, my company will find some place for me, I'm more worried about the FLL kids. If I'm not there, the team doesn't get the money from my company. Also, I'm the only one with any "experience" with FLL... *sigh* Why do these things happen just when I'm figuring out how to deal with my life?!

Distraction

It seems that every time I think of writing a post, I get distracted. I suppose that's to be expected with me. I have so much going on lately, I think I'm going totally crazy. Always first in my mind, and scariest, is my impending surgery. It's similar to the one I had a little less than two years ago, but... well worse. In many ways. First and foremost is that I will be having it here in Alabama. So while I recover I will not be home, surrounded by friends and family. Yes, I have great friends here and they have already told me they're going to help out tons. But it's not the same as being in my own house, with my own family. I hate being weak, and now I'm going to be relying on other people heavily for probably two months at least. But more on that later.

In January through March I was occupied with helping mentor the local FIRST Robotics team (usfirst.org if you don't know). Their season ended with an amazing second-place victory at the Smokey Mountain Regional in addition to the Graciousness & Professionalism award! Going to competition with those great kids was awesome and all sorts of fun, but then it was over and I needed something else to occupy myself. This is where I'm pretty sure I lost my mind.

For those of you not in the know, FIRST has programs for all school age levels, the robotics competition is the high school level. I decided, in my infinite wisdom, that since there wasn't a team for the middle school level here, that *I* would start one! Anyway, the middle school level of FIRST is called LEGO League (LL). Yes, LEGOs! And robots! All in one awesome program to get middle school kids interested in STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) fields! I mean seriously, how could it get any more awesome than robotic LEGOs?!

After the glow of the glorious new idea faded I realized I had NO idea how to start a new team! I searched the website and started reaching out to anybody I knew in my company that had anything to do with FIRST programs. I also contacted the middle school (which I had visited for e-week) and arranged to come and speak to some students about LL to see if there was even anybody interested. For my activities with e-week, one of the folks in my company who handles money for this kind of outreach program, I got a nice Amazon gift card. With that I got my own LEGO Mindstorms kit, which is the robot set that LL uses. I also started poking my coworkers to see if any were interested in helping me make this thing happen.

Well, the day of my presentation arrived faster than I expected (procrastination doesn't end with school!) and I jumped in head first with no plan in mind. I had followed the instructions that came with the kit to make a simple robot that moved around and shot little plastic balls (insert giggle about saying "balls" here). So I arrived at the school with my little robot, some sheets of info copied from the website, and my plucky personality! I'm pretty sure I made a total fool out of myself in the first class period. But if there's anything I got from my mom's family is stubbornness in the face of embarrassment! So I kept at it and somehow bumbled through the rest of the classes that day. The teachers at least thought it was great.

A couple weeks later I went back to the school, intending to speak to another couple classes, but the 8th grade science teacher had bigger ideas. He put me in the library, and on the spur of the moment had all of the science classes come in for me to speak to, at one time! So, over the course of the school day, I spoke to, by myself, the entire school! This time I embraced my inner dork and just went with it. It seemed to work fairly well, I even got some laughs! I handed out some fliers for a parent meeting about LL in a couple weeks. I figured maybe one or two kids would show up, but I wasn't really expecting much.

Fast forward to the parent meeting. Again, I didn't really have a plan except to talk about what LL was and try to answer any questions that came up. I figured that if there were enough kids interested I could figure something out before the season started in August. Well, more people showed up than I expected, but I muddled along. In my infinite wisdom, I told people to contact me, instead of having them give me their info, but hindsight is 20/20. At any rate, I had enough interest to start seriously looking into funding.

I had a few leads so I started to do what I hate most in the world: make phone calls. Ok, maybe I didn't start with phone calls... I'm absolutely terrified of making phone calls. Don't ask me why, I don't know, I've always been this way. Anywho, I sent some e-mails and instant messages. The high school team had gone to an event hosted by my company's client and gotten a contact in their outreach program. After several weeks of agonizing messaging back and forth with him (heaven forbid I tried calling him *sheesh*) he sent me instructions on registering and ordering supplies and sending him the bill. I was totally ecstatic!

Then my contact with my company got back with me. She said that my company had put funds aside in their grant to FIRST for my team and that I could go ahead and use that to register and order the supplies. I was like this is awesome! And then I realized that I had already ordered all that through the other company! Well this is an interesting dilemma! So I finally made a phone call. It was slightly easier since I had spoken to this person before, but not much. After a lovely conversation we figured out a solution. I could use the grant money to get the team a special laptop/tablet made by LEGO for LL, and another account for additional stuff like travel costs, t-shirts for the team, etc, for "encouraging employee participation."

I was super excited! I not only got my new LL team completely funded, but I also got a nice grant for the high school team! Then I got my official e-mail stating all the above from my contact. Maybe I read it wrong, but it sure seemed like I get to be a lab rat, not that it's really a bad thing in this case, she wants me to test out the laptop and report back on whether I think it's a good idea to get it for other teams. And she wants me to talk to the "council" about how I got the client involved (um... they already were?). Oh, and I possibly somehow volunteered to coordinate/host a LL event next year! And possibly help create a LL team start-up kit to help other people start LL teams in their areas. What have I gotten myself into?!

Update

Wow, it’s been a long time since I last wrote. I could make excuses like I’ve been busy and writing intimidates me, but what does it really matter? It’s not like this is some school assignment I’m late turning in! Anyway, on with the catching up.

One of the big things that happened is I found a big house to rent. Actually, it’s huge, 3,800 square feet with a two-car garage and almost two acres of yard. I’m renting it from my new friends, who I’ll talk about later. The super awesome thing about it is, since they’re animal lovers too, they’re letting me have Pepper and put in a doggy door for her! So, I’ve spent the last month or so moving in and unpacking and getting ready for Pepper to arrive. She will (hopefully) be here next Friday! I’m so excited to have my baby girl with me again! It will be interesting to see how she and the cats get along. I also hope to get her back into training, and then maybe she can go to therapy with me! J

Another thing that’s been keeping me busy is Robotics. I’ve started helping out with the local high school robotics team. They call me a mentor, but mostly I just hang out ‘cause I’m not very good at robotics. The kids are great, it’s nice to see them excited about science and engineering and everything. Reminds me of when I was on the Robotics team at my high school. The main mentor and brain power behind the team is also my new landlord. One day I was whining about how horrible my apartment was and how much I missed Pepper and he said he had a house for rent if I wanted it. Long story short, I’m now renting his house. I’m also helping renovate it, so that will keep me busy after Robotics is over.

More than just a new place to live, my new landlord and his wife have made me feel like part of the family. His wife is a hair stylist and is helping me do crazy fun things with my hair. He also has a motorcycle he doesn’t use that he said I can ride whenever I want! How freaking lucky can a girl get?! He’s a great mentor for the kids, being a machinist and owning a machine shop. I like to putz around his shop cleaning and organizing. One day I spent several hours sorting drill bits; it sooths my OCD.

It’s a good thing I have new friends and things to keep me busy because work has been trying my patience. First, when the NRC was coming to visit, one of my coworkers informed me that my desk space was “unprofessional” and that I needed to clean it up. Apparently people don’t like my construction toys and sparkly things. I thought she was being ridiculous so I left everything how it was. Until somebody else came and told me the same thing. So I packed up most of the more frivolous stuff, just leaving my pictures and some colorful things. And then somebody came and told me that the little one’s homecoming picture was “offensive” and that I needed to take it down. At that point I called HR and she said that no matter what it is, if somebody thinks it’s offensive you have to take it down. So I stripped my cube of everything personal (except my reference books) and tried not to cry where anybody could see me. I even switched to a totally plain coffee mug that nobody could possibly call offensive. What is the world coming to when you can’t even have family pictures up in your cube?! I was really upset for a while, but I’ve pretty much gotten over it. I now have a bunch of pictures up at the house and it makes me happy there.

I’ve also been butting heads with people at work a lot more. I got in a big argument with one of the design guys and my group lead about what category a certain item belonged in and who’s scope it was. The way it was worded, I’m not qualified to do it. I argued that per the procedure, it belonged to a different group. The design guy claimed that in the calcs it defined it as being in my scope. So I said it either had to be redefined everywhere else, or it had to go to the other group. I went to my group lead for some backup, and he told me to just do it as-is ‘cause the design guy said so! I was so freaking angry that he would tell me to do something that violated the procedure just ‘cause he didn’t want to confront the design guy! This wasn’t the first time he’s failed to back me up, but it was by far the worst. It was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. So I gathered up paperwork to back up my story and went to our manager. I was so upset I was shaking the whole time, and almost started crying again, but I managed to get my point across. For the rest of the day I hid at my desk with headphones on listening to heavy metal and avoiding my lead. Later our manager came back to me and said they had decided to redefine the scope so that I would be qualified to do it. That seems really fishy to me, and I said so, but I’ll do it anyway because he has authority to do that sort of thing.

What else has happened? Oh yes, one of my group-mates got fired, supposedly for collecting the living allowance when he wasn’t qualified for it. Unfortunately he and my lead were buddies, so my lead is now super grumpy. We got two new people in my group and I’m trying to make sure they get their training done as fast as possible so they don’t have to go through the training purgatory that I went through for over two months.

Well I’m sure I’m forgetting half the stuff that happened in the last couple of months, but I can’t think of it right now. I’m going to try to update more often, but no promises!

A Pain in the ... Joints

As some of you may know I was born without hip sockets, well I just recently found out this is called Developmental Dysplasia of the Hip (DDH). When I was born the doctors put me in a harness thingy for a few months and told my mom I was good as new. After doing some research I found out that now doctors know they have to do years of follow up care for DDH because symptoms can become noticeable as late as the teens and twenties (I started having joint problems when I was 12). I also learned that if left untreated long enough it can cause severe Osteoarthritis. And I have all of the symptoms of improperly treated DDH. We're not 100% sure that's what the problem is, but it makes the most sense. I've never had any imaging of my hips or knees, probably because none of my doctors knew I had DDH (my mom had been told it wasn't an issue and I had no idea that I had it in the first place) so they never knew to look for it. Over the years I've had therapy to treat the symptoms, but nothing to treat the cause. Friday I got a serious of x-rays to see if there's still a significant deformity of my hip socket and if I have any arthritis developing. After that I'll likely have an MRI to determine if there are any soft-tissue concerns. Another part of DDH is that the "ring" of cartilage around the hip socket can be inverted causing it to be pretty much useless in keeping the hip in place. Also the tendons can become very stretched out, again reducing their effectiveness in keeping everything in place. The good news is that if my problem is a result of DDH, they know how to treat it. If we caught it early enough I could see a lot of improvement with properly aimed therapy and possibly injections. There's also several "levels" of surgery that can help. Hopefully I will soon have a path forward and get myself onto the road to recovery!

Ups and Downs

Coming back from the holidays I was pretty depressed. I hardly wanted to do anything and my apartment got messier and messier. But nearing MLK Day I had something to look forward to: a week off work and a visit with my man. I went into a cleaning frenzy to make sure my apartment was nice for him. Well as nice as that shit-hole can be. Anyway, we went to Memphis for a few days for our fifth anniversary. Some days I can't believe we've been together for five years already, and other days it feels like we've been together forever.

We had tons of fun in Memphis and Huntsville. Got to see Sun Studio, the botanical gardens, an epic hockey fight (both goalies got ejected!) and all sorts of other neat things plus awesome music and great food. My diet managed to last half a day into the visit, but we made sure to stay active, usually parking the car in one place and walking everywhere for the day. And I still tried to keep my portions smaller and eat lots of fruits and veggies. My hard work paid off and I lost another two pounds! Next week I'll hit the 10 pound mark, I'm sure of it!

When my man left the depression came back. I won't see him again until the end of May. Almost four months we'll be apart. It's going to be a struggle to keep it together that long. Especially since my only work friend is moving away soon, and work itself is sucking horribly. But I have lots of activities to keep me busy. I've joined the local FIRST Robotics team as a mentor, I'm going to visit my family in North Carolina next month, in March I'm going to a seminar in Florida and the robotics competition in Knoxville, get a visit from my mom in April, fun trip with my mom and grandma in early May, then I get to go home for a week at the end of May. I can do this!