The word of the week is perplexity.
May 6 - Blogging
Sometimes I really don't know what to write here - shocking, I know.
It's a little easier to come up with something when I'm
using my voice recognition software, especially now that the cat insists on
sitting on my lap for hours at a time whenever I take a seat. Since that precludes
me using a keyboard, it's a good thing that I've got DragonDictate set up to
use and it also keeps me in practice for setting my thoughts down whenever I 'write'
with my voice.
But back to writing my blog: as I've said before, some days
the words just don't flow. This week especially, I haven't done much save work
at Staples and work on my projects at home. That doesn't make for a lot of
exciting things to share, admittedly, but it is what it is.
One thing I haven't done ( and won't do ) is to make this
blog a journal of complaints, which wouldn't do anybody any good. Everybody has
their problems, including me, and it's best to talk about them instead of just
writing down and hope that somebody else will come along and fix them.
Everybody needs perspective and right now my problems may seem large, but in the
grand scheme of things, I'm the only one is holding myself back by dwelling on
them instead of finding solutions. Dwelling on problems I found does little
except to up time and energy that could be better spent; that's a hard lesson
to learn.
Is a bad thing that the best solution I've been able to come
up with is a time machine? I'll get back to you on that.
May 7 - Iron Man Birthday!
Today was a really great day!
The late afternoon was spent learning modules from online
tech training with a friend, which went very well. We're doing this at least
once a week to work towards a CompTIA+ certification, which will really help
when applying for IT jobs like tech support.
In the evening, I attended a friend's birthday party at a
local restaurant outside on a covered patio. We all sat down to a great dinner
and we had quite a few good conversations; a number of people there were quite
nerdy and appreciated All Things Geek. I hadn't been out to a party in quite
some time and I really enjoyed myself just chatting with my friends, who found things like this amusing:
Afterwards, three of us went to see Iron Man 3 in IMAX 3D - it
was spectacular! Ironically, I hadn't seen the second movie but from all
accounts I didn't miss much and I still enjoyed the third movie immensely. Without
spoiling things for those of you haven't seen it, it was laced with snappy
dialogue, great doses of humor and of course the expected spectacular special
effects that centered around the suits which thankfully didn't take over the
whole film. Robert Downey Junior and Gwyneth Paltrow were excellent in their
roles, as was the main villain played by Guy Pearce whom I liked a lot better
than the villain from the first film who seemed oddly hollow as played by Jeff
Bridges.
Getting home well after midnight, I basked in the glow of
contentment from the evening and had the best night's sleep I've had in weeks.
Moral of the story? Spend more time with friends on patios! Movies, too.
May 8 - Ice cream for breakfast?
Breakfast for me is always been important, but I've never
really given it much thought.
Sure, I've always enjoyed searching for new breakfast places
locally wherever I am, but I usually don't eat out more than once every week or
two. I love eating breakfast out! But...
Why do I mention this?
Well, for years and years I used to just have cereal, as it
was quick and easy and quite honestly had a high sugar content: Honey-nut
Cheerios were staple choice for long time. Add in some toast and that was about
it to get my day going; not a lot of nutritional variety there, I have to say.
That sufficed for university, but afterwards I gravitated
towards more of a bacon and eggs breakfast each day when I was living with my
family. That provided a fair amount of energy but I think it also started my
slide towards gaining weight in an unhealthy way.
After moving to Victoria, I dialed back on the breakfast
variety for various reasons, in the main needing to trade speed for anything
else. So I went back to cereal for the most part, something I've continued with
today while adding in a little variety and even going for oatmeal when I can
remember to give myself the time for it in the mornings.
Weirdly, I found myself wanting ice cream for breakfast
today. I've no idea why; maybe the monotony of cereal sparked a mini rebellion
my brain or perhaps I just needed to go out for breakfast but didn't have the
time or the budget. But at least I'm eating breakfast and I think that's the
most important thing that I take along with me wherever I go; unlike a lot of
rushed lunches, breakfast is something I always make time for.
May 9 - Fake Giveaways
Scammers really get my hackles up sometimes. Case in point: product 'giveaways' on Fbook.
Time and time again I see people Sharing photos of tech
products like iPads and Samsung Galaxy phones, with the caption 'Share this and
you'll get one of 3,000 opened boxes that Apple is giving away since they can't
sell them as new' which is pure fiction.
Folks, just don't do this. All you're doing is putting money
in a con artist's pocket by helping to spread their scam further.
My words will probably fall on deaf ears, as people
usually don't think before they Share on Fbook. Their hearts race at the
thought of getting something expensive for free when all they have to do is click
a few buttons, costing them nothing. It's a simple trick and one that
keeps on being repeated over the years, as it's very effective.
What it means for the scammers is that they get a nice
little package of usernames they can sell to other unscrupulous online users, who
could then market whatever they like to a fairly gullible audience. Yes, I said
gullible, as all too many people will likely click on a few e-mails or ads sent
to them by the same unscrupulous scammers, putting more money in their pockets. Check out sites like Facecrooks.com or Snopes.com to find out more.
Think before you click or Share. If it sounds too good to be
true, it very likely is.
May 10 - Podcast voices!
On my way to grocery shop today, I listened to a podcast
from Nerdist.com, with Maurice Lamarche and Rob Paulsen of Pinky and the Brain fame.
I seem to gravitate towards the podcast episodes where voice actors are on, probably
because I'm starving for inside information about how their world works
The two of them together were hilarious, sharing some great
stories about working in the voice acting business. They had quite a few things
to say about earning a living by their voice alone, but the one that stood out
for me was something Rob said. "I'm getting paid to do what I got in
trouble for in the seventh grade. I absolutely love what I do and thank my
lucky stars for 25 years of full-time employment in this business." He
also went on to say that the best voice actors have a live performance
background, but I guess I can't have everything going for me if I want to get
into the business.
For now, I'll just add voice acting to my list of Wants and
look to find some time for it this year. I've got as much of a shot at breaking
into the business is anyone, if I can get a little focus and a little time
together to do some work that will stand me in good stead. There are resources
out there now that I can use, if I put my nose to the grindstone now and then to
really dig into what I need to do.
Just having a good voice isn't enough, I have to be able to
do a lot more with it than just talk.
May 11 - Training Online Apace
Work's going all right, though I have a lot of training to
finish in the next week.
By training, I mean I have to complete several dozen more
online modules through the training site while at home. I could fumble along
without them, but in order to do well at my job I have to retain the knowledge
that I'm expected to know and that I've not been shown more than glimpses of
during my shifts.
Oddly, this is very similar to when I was at MMart, but at
least with Staples I have a massive training support database at my disposal.
It's on my own time, true, but it means that if I want to succeed and do well
it's up to me to ensure I have the knowledge ingrained to use while I work.
It is frustrating though, to go through busy day like today
feeling inadequately prepared for much of what gets thrown at me. It's odd as
well, as I projects an air of competence whenever I do a job no matter what I'm
feeling inside. That image keeps getting shattered though, whenever I have to
stop and ask for help when I hit a process that I'm not familiar with and
there's a customer waiting. Fortunately, I'm still wearing a 'In training' name
badge and everyone's been quite kind and patient with me, customers included. I
don't make the same mistake twice and I work very hard to retain what I'm shown
so that I don't have to ask again; this also cuts down on the number of
mistakes I make and being who I am, the fewer mistakes I can chalk up to my
day, the better I feel at the end of it.
My training should be complete in a week's time, at the same
time as my 90 day probation is up. I hope to present a solid package of
competence to the managers to show them I am ready to hit the sales floor and
work full-time. Only getting two or three days a week has been very rough on
the monthly budget, especially given that I'm earning around half of the hourly
wage I was before. Even though I won't be on commission, just being able to
work 40 hours a week should help greatly.
Which will also mean less time for my other projects, but
since those aren't paying the bills yet, it's a tradeoff I'll have to make for
now.
May 12 - Mumm's the Word
It was Mother's Day today and my family all went out for
brunch to the Stones Throw Restaurant at which I've become a regular, of sorts
- I show up once or twice a month, but that's enough I guess.
My family is to go out for Sunday brunch quite a lot when I
was a kid, which made for a lot of good memories of places that are no longer
around save in my mind's eye. I think that these brunch trips were what gave me
a love of breakfast, of piles of wonderful-smelling bacon, endless pancakes
and a sheer variety of breakfast foods to choose from. Today we really enjoyed
the brunch, especially as the last time we all went out together for brunch was
back in the 1990s, from what we could all agree on. It was lovely to just be
out to celebrate having all of us together as a family, especially having my
mom around as there are many points over the last few decades where she might
not have made it here at all.
The rest of my day went by fairly quickly, working at home.
No longer am I using my Xbox due to the pain in my hands that holding the controller causes; it's
been months since I played it and I honestly can't say when I
will again. I've had to set aside my feelings about that, as I don't
have enough time in the day as it is to do what I want to do let alone spend
hours just gaming, though I miss my friends.
Days like today can't be wasted, if you can call it that, on games. With about a dozen things I should be doing AND with a few 'spare' days a week right now, I have a HUGE opportunity if I can only apply myself to getting projects moving. Apart from not being able to master SQL, I've got a good shot at getting myself ahead and I'd be a fool not to use my time as wisely as possible.
I've picked up two extra shifts this week going from two
days to four, which seems to be the way things are working right now. I'm
grateful for the extra hours and as I've said already, I hope that things
stabilize enough to give me near full-time hours sometime soon; right now work
is doling out hours based on sales and since those been slow, hours are being
rationed out equally which keeps everyone working but nobody except the
managers are getting more than three days a week. We'll see how long that keeps
up until I have to start thinking about a second job to try to make ends meet.
