You'd think a baby would be safe at the doctor's office....

So, I took my little girl in to the doctor for her 9 month checkup.  SO BIG!  I won't bore you with the details of how she's the cutest baby in the world or that she's so smart that she's already sharing food with others and knows how to use a mirror.

But I will bore you with one small detail that really stuck out in my mind at the doctor's office:  the examination table.

I go to Allina clinics, so perhaps it's different with other providers, but the examination table is the same examination table that they use for adults.  It's narrow, it's open on all four sides, and it's got that slippery paper on it.  Needless to say, I found the irony when I was being asked "Do you have any concerns about your daughter's safey?' by the nurse when I was trying to hold her still on this narrow precipice of an examination table.

Honestly, if they can hide drawers and stirrups in those same tables, where are the protective bars for an infant?  The table is 4 feet off the hard floor with nothing to stop the fall!

How is it with other providers?  do they have something more age appropriate?

What do you do when someone thinks that they have talent...and they don't?

Ok, so today's post is really more of a question out to all of you, but I would like to hear from you.  I'm sure that you've all been to a bar or just listened to someone in a car...attempting to sing and they're tone deaf?  Or been out dancing and there are people who think that they can dance, but they look like frogs in a blenders?

yeah...

So, this is a similar quandary.  What do you do when you have a group of people at work who think that they can write and want to "help" you out with the big writing assignment?  Specially, my boss very directly asked me to write the content for a website.  This content includes the PR-type sales write-ups of previous projects to showcase the company.  I interviewed the project managers and spent three days working on the blurbs.  It's frankly tricky to write PR/sales blurbs because you want to tease the audience with just enough information, but not give them the whole story- you want them to contact you for the rest of the story.

I know you can see this coming.  So, after the boss specifically told me to write-up all of the project histories, specifically ME, and specifically all of them for consistency, he provided "updates" to the blurbs when I told him that I had finished writing them up.  I asked for a content review and I got a style update.  And it wasn't exactly "great".  It seems to run rampant in this company that people can't spell or conjugate verbs or use punctuation correct.  I'm not talking about whether or not to use an em or en dash or ellipsis, I'm talking about "the companys IT Team", when it should be "the company's IT Team".  I'm talking about noun/verb mismatches ("I is", "we is"...you get the idea).

This must happen to other people.  I know it happens to my husband.  He has to work with clients directly and the clients often want updates that decrease the quality of the product.  I've always just told him to run with whatever the client wants because it's what they want and they're paying.  But now that I'm in the same seat, I find that advice difficult to swallow.

I find that poor writing skills are particularly prevalent here in Minnesota compared to the area of California where I grew up.  My first semester teaching college, I used to give short-answer questions.  I was always impressed with the ABSOLUTELY INDECIPHERABLE ANSWERS.  And I don't just mean the handwriting.  I mean that it understanding the wandering, groping answers was made particularly difficult by spelling and grammatical problems. The whole semester, I spent hours, HOURS trying to understand those answers and providing grammatical corrections.  They were all ignored. (Yes, I quickly embraced the Scan-tron, as well).

So, now I work in IT with this same group of people (symbolically) that I used to teach and I find that they still have not improved, but now these people wield the power and in order to keep the peace, I just have to take their "suggestions".

Well, readers?  Share the grief.

Sugar or Salt?

So, have you ever played that game, perhaps at a bridal shower, where you have to guess whether that white granulated substance is sugar or salt?

Perhaps you've seen some comedic bit where a newlywed uses salt instead of sugar in coffee?

Well, evidently, that comedic bit didn't use Morton's salt.

Or should I say Morton's sugar?


Out of boredom or just happenstance, I looked at the ingredients on bottle of Morton's salt.  Ingredients are "Sodium Chloride" (i.e. "salt") and Dextrose (that would be sugar).

I was curious so I checked the bargain brand salt.  It's ingredients were "Sodium Chloride".

So, what gives, Morton?  I've heard that restaurants put sugar in their kids menu items to make them more "palatable" to children (like in pizza!) and thus get the kids to want to come back for more.  But seriously, sugar in salt?

I wonder how many of you out there are diabetics who know that there is sugar in Morton's salt?  Or how many restaurants use Morton's salt thinking it's pure salt, when it's actually salt and sugar?  Morton's isn't this a bit deceitful??  I always had a special place in my heart for Morton's because they make the mini salt shakers, which are cute and fit in children's play kitchens.  But I think now I'll have to steer clear until they can make up their mind:  are you a salt company or a sugar company?

Allergic Rashes on Your Baby

Ok, so I had one of my first scares at a new Mommy- my baby daughter broke out into a large, hot rash last night.  After spending hours looking for what it could be, wondering if it was teething or not, I looked through my own medical books (yes, I was Pre-Med) and thought I found the answer:  Allergic Hives.

What threw me was that it seemed to start on her ears, then her neck, then her tummy, and then her thighs.  In adults, hives generally start on the back or tummy.

Now, let's be clear what hives are:  Hives are an allergic rash caused by something you ingested or got bit by or got stung by- basically, the rash is coming from the inside out.  The rash is your body's Mast cells (a type of white blood cell) releasing histamine.  (Yes, it's the same type of histamine as in "antihistamines") The inflammation occurs throughout all your body's tissues, but the inflammation appears on your skin as large, flat, hot, red rash patches.

It's very important to note the difference between hives (patches) and spots (like chicken pox).  Hives are different from teething rash or a drool rash that is caused by extra blood flow to the face/gums and the baby drooling as a result or rubbing her face often.

When I spoke with the doctor, she indicated that hives appear in the warmest places on the body for babies. So, the ears, the neck, the arm pits, the inguinal areas...etc.  The treatment was a minuscule amount of Children's Benedryl of Children's Zyrtec.

So, what to notice about hives vs. teething or a drool rash:
1. It is all over the body (check your baby's torso for the rash).
2. The rash is hot.
3. The rash is large patches- like a big sunburn- rather than dry, chapped skin.

What you should do for hives:

1. Think about what your baby has come in contact with that is new or different.  Often, allergic reactions are caused by the second or third exposure to something.
2. CALL THE DOCTOR.
3. If your baby is having trouble breathing AT ALL, GO TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM!
4. If your baby is just miserable but deemed safe by the doctor, you can:
1. Dress her in cool clothing, preferably something all cotton.  
2. You can also give her a cool (not cold) bath.  This will help the heat of the inflammation.
3. If your doctor says to do so, you can give some Children's Benedryl.  Since this is not recommended without a dosage amount from your doctor for children under age 2, you MUST get the dosage from your doctor.  DO NOT GO OVER THE DOSAGE or you could be damaging your baby's liver.

Sorry that I didn't get a picture for you, but here's a picture of adult hives so you can check it out on you baby, should the need arise.

Hives on a Child I don't know

Patchy appearance of hives on the skin

Decorating for Xmas

So,  I wouldn't say I'm a Christian (or as I have started writing "Xian").  But I don't think that it matters because the Xians stole Xmas from the Celts.  That's where the whole presents under the tree and the tree inside and the candles on the tree and the red, green, white colors come from....all of it.

And I _LOVE_ Xmas.  I love the lights and the songs and the running around getting gifts and the snow...LOVE IT!

But

It's really too soon to decorate before Thanksgiving.  And I saw Xmas deco going up before Halloween this year.  I wonder if retailers really think that it is better to put all of it out that soon.  Has anyone done any sales analysis on that?  Or is it just that they don't want to store the stuff anymore?  (and isn't that what after Xmas sales are for?)  I can't honestly believe that they make sales before Thanksgiving of Xmas stuff, other than the start-up households (you know, the kid's first Xmas out on their own or the divorcees).  And, really, it just discourages me from wanting to purchase anything from those companies.  In fact, Target, is a great example.  Their Xmas decorations went out before Halloween.  And now I don't feel the slightest inclination to purchase any Xmas deco from them.  I don't know what Walmart did, but I think I might be buying from them....

or just buy it from Amazon.

Don't try this at home- we're professionals

http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/mythbusters/videos/dishwasher-lasagna-minimyth.htm#mkcpgn=fbdsc17

This is just weird.  Honestly, I wanted it to be cooler since AB is there, but he's gotten fairly egotistical since his hosting roles...and it comes across here.

Wish Jamie had a larger part...

It _is_ Minnesota, but....

http://www.kare11.com/news/article/998872/391/MN-musician-has-15-years-worth-of-music-stolen

This is truly sad that someone would take a bag of music out of a duffle bag.  It's especially sad because I used to go listen to his band, the Jaztronauts, back about 10 years... however...

This isn't what I'd call a _great_ area of town.  Just the opposite.  It's, like, on the border of a serious ghetto of St. Paul.

So, how dumb can you be the leave a bag on the back seat of your car around Christmas time in a ghetto?

Looking for a BA job

So, I'm continuing to look for a BA job, but one that's remote.  By "remote", I don't mean "field work", which involves travel.  "Remote" means "remote", like as in, not in an office, like working from home.  Why is this difficult to understand?

And looking through all of the job postings...wow.  It's like no one knows what a "BA" does.  While we all might remember the A-Team, we're not talking about Mr. Barracus.  We're talking Business Analysis.  Some of us might like the thought of cutting an impressive figure, we're more critic than enforcer.

So, what is a BA?

Business Analysts are not new to the software industry, though the term definitely has become more popular since the formation of the International Institute for Business Analysts (IIBA).  You might know them as "Analysts" or just "Requirements Managers" from the days of old. 

So, what does a BA do?

I think that the term "Business Analyst" has led to a lot of confusion in the work place about what it is that a BA does.  A "Requirements Manager" seems so much more straightforward.  Uhm, you manage requirements and the gathering of requirements through the project.  But over the past 10 years, I have seen a "Business Analyst" equated to:

A Project Manager:  where you're supposed to manage people and make budgets and other  project management stuff;

A Economic Analyst: where you're supposed to forecast sales and marketing efficacy (I know a couple of these and we're DEFINITELY NOT economic analysts);

A Programmer:  yes, believe it or not, some jobs actually group "write code" with Business Analysis;

An Architect: this one is actually a very fine line and I'm more understanding of it since diagramming out a series of web pages or the system falls into the requirements camp, but it's really more UI and Architecture;

User Interface designer:  Uhm, programmer???  This job is programming the UI of the website;

User Experience Designer:  again, more understanding because diagramming those screens and flows and how all the requirements fit on the page;

A Quality Analyst, where you're supposed to test the software (don't get me started on this last one.  While a lot of us BAs started out in the Quality field, it was all Quality Control, not Quality Analysis- but that's a topic for a different blog)

I guess after looking at all of these jobs, it seems to me that:

1. People don't  know what a Business Analyst does, and

2. People don't realize that a good BA is really, REALLY hard to find.  We're talking about someone who can listen to some vague, flufffy, completely stream-of-consciousness dreams of what needs to be done on a project and write out a series of "project must have X", "project must have Y", "would be great if project included Z" statements so that the project can get done.   (yes, this is the waterfall format- just let me finish).  My point is that an ANALYST is a great listener and able to immediately respond with a plan of action for taking a business vision or set of fluffy goals and turn them into the actual product.  The Business Analysts are the dream interpreters, if you will, between the business and the technology team.

So, what does that mean?

It doesn't mean that BAs program. 

It doesn't mean that BAs do project management of people or budgets.

It means that we listen, REALLY listen, and hang on every word that our business owner/product owner/whomever is paying for this project has to say about what they want to see for end-state.  It means that we're constantly incorporating all of the input and weighing that input against what we already know about the project:  the current state, the technology that the _ARCHITECT_ has selected, the timeline that the business has already established with the _PROJECT MANAGER.  We're constantly asking questions about who is your user?  What do you actually want to accomplish?  BAs are the ones that take the requirements and ask the question, "Doesn't this new requirement directly undo what we've already done?"   We dive into the nitty-gritty details that no one really wants to think about (except the Architects) and makes sure that the requirements can be organized and accomplished. 

And, no, it's not easy to maintain all of those requirements.  Some meetings- man- they treat you like you should be the world's greatest search engine and be able to recall every requirement in a two year project off the top of your head, along with the state and planned timeline.  It's not easy.  But if you're really a BA, it's what you do.

So, I guess my advice to everyone out there who's looking for a good BA is this:  If you find someone who keeps pestering you about some little detail of a project not being in alignment or being vague- KEEP THIS PERSON.  LISTEN TO THIS PERSON.  This is your star BA.  This person belongs on you’re A-Team.  They may not have the best people skills, but they really will prevent you from burying yourself into a project graveyard.

..and...

No, Skyfall isn't a great Bond movie.

Daniel Craig is not good looking

and the rating system in the US needs a serious reboot.

Movies

So, yesterday, my husband and I went to go see Skyfall.  I'm not a Bond-a-phile, but I enjoy a good espionage film just like the rest (and let's face it, Sean Connery was just TOO divine, followed a close second by Mr. Brosnan...but I digress).

So, we go to the movies and it's Sunday morning- and it's packed!  I was shocked.  All of these people usually are in church.  What gives!

Then I'm sitting through the previews and it was something like this:
War Movie
War Movie
War Movie
Vigilante
War Movie
Vigilante
War Movie
The Hobbit

First of all, seriously- how many previews do you need?!?

Second, this many war movies???  REALLY???  Is that ALL there is to talk about in the world?  That's ALL that the screenwriters are selling to producers in Hollywood?  SERIOUSLY!?!  I'm sorry, but it all screams propaganda to me.  Each one of those movies (and hence the previews) is sending the message to the American populace that you should live in fear, that the most interesting thing to do on a date is go see a movie about living in fear and blowing Sh!t up with big guns.

wow.

I weep for the American populace.

Employee-ism

So, I am currently an employee.  I decided to take a position as an employee because I thought it would  be more stable than continuing as a contract-by-contract consultant.

I thought it would be less stressful now that I have a baby.

I'm finding that all of that is wrong.  This is the most stressful job I've ever had.

The company keeps assigning me work that I keep telling them I can't do.  Sorry- I'm not a Project Manager.  They don't seem to get it and when I don't do the job to their satisfaction, I get a lecture about how I didn't do a good job- like it's a shock that I don't excel at something that I said I don't do well.

What also upsets me about this job is that the boss is constantly badgering me to work outside of my set hours.  I like to work the morning shifts.  I find that most highly motivated people do work the morning shifts because they want to get in and get it done.  They also don't take a lunch, I've noticed.

But I digress.  I had a rather memorable conversation about what my work hours are with several members of the leadership team.  It was very clear.  It was made very clear because I just finished working on a project that I had to put in overtime.  I was supposed to be paid for my overtime hours.  But the company is now refusing to pay for those hours because they said that I didn't work overtime the whole project, so I don't get paid for my overtime.  It amounts to nearly $10,000, not to mention the time away from my infant daughter.  The very next day after our conversation about me not getting paid for time outside of my normal hours, the boss sends an email asking for a meeting a couple of hours after my shift ended.

Now, this request has several problems.

1. I have a daughter that has a nanny.  If I "decide" to work outside of those coverage hours, I either get to bounce my baby daughter on my knee while I talk about this stupid project, OR
2. I get to pay for late notice and overtime for the nanny....that's if she even would cover it at all, AND
3. The boss has already made it quite clear that I won't get paid for my over time, so why would I want to just donate my time?

What is the matter with bosses?  In ten years, even in two years, no one will remember this stupid project, much less care who got to attend an after hours meeting to talk about how we all feel about the outcome.  In ten years, however, my daughter will remember, or at least be affected by my decisions about my time with her during her life.

Let's see how hard this decision is for me...

Working in IT and Not Working In IT

So, it's true that we're now a two-income society.  Unless you have someone bringing in well over 150K, there's just no way you can really afford to have a house, groceries, gas, or a child (let's face it, they're cute but expensive).  Child care alone can eat up one parent's salary, which is the main reason that so many parents give for one parent quitting their job nowadays.  And the parent that keeps their job has to be in IT or you'll never afford life.  I've had friends of my husbands actually change jobs from low paying 3D animation to programming so that they can afford their families.

So as the parent who quit their job, what do you do when your kid doesn't need child care any more?  You've quit your job and your resume is dusty- you have no contacts in the working world.  S-tarting over would be ok for someone who had a baby in their 20s because they still have a long working life ahead of them.  But what happens when you have a kid and you're almost 40?  (gulp).  You can't really give up the career that you've worked on for 10, maybe 20 years.  You're at the Senior or Management level and you can't start over if you leave that.  I have a sister who's in this track right now, but she hasn't realized that she's going to need to go back to work at some point.

It used to be that you could just get any old job if you had the skill set for that job, no matter how rusty your experience or perhaps you just knew how to answer phones, work a copier, and file papers.  But nowadays, you can't even get a secretarial job without a certification in "Administrative Assistance".

Seriously

or should it be "Seriously!?!"  I mean, if you've worked in a office for 20 years and you've had your own phone and haven't had a secretary running all over doing the work for you, you already know how to be a secretary- you've had 20 years of experience doing that.  But you couldn't get a job as a secretary unless you have that stupid AA degree in knowing how to press the Copy button.

Now, don't get me wrong, secretaries (or administrative assists- whatever you have to call them), are very valuable and offices can't be run without them.  But do you really need to mandate that someone has a degree?  I can type at over 100 words a minute.  I know how to file.  I know how to multitask- I mean, being a secretary is usually akin to being the office Mommy.

so, why can't I get these jobs!?

Some of it, I blame my resume- it's just too IT heavy now and no one takes me seriously when my cover letter clearly says that I don't want an IT job anymore.  I actually did manage to swing a part-time secretary interview with a local property management company and they wanted to know if I knew how to make copies after looking at my resume...my PAPER resume.  Are you joking?

But the salary of $12 an hour was what made the whole conversation ludicrous.  I mean, in IT, you shouldn't be getting anything less than $45/hour for a senior, permanent position- if you're a contracting consultant, you can easily go $20/hour higher.  There isn't a middle layer type of job where I could make, say $20 per hour and still bring my vast amounts of office experience to the job?

So far, I haven't found it.  If you know of one, please let me know.

Kinderlieb

You know, there are countries in Europe that actually pay their citizens to have children? They get paid to stay home and raise them for the first phases of life, too. It's freaking amazing. Some of these countries include German, Norway, Sweden, Austria, just to name a few.  In Germany, it's called "Kinderlieb"

 What I find interesting is that these countries also have:
1. A better standard of living,

2. A better Quality of Life,

3. Children are more educated than Americans in all subjects,

4. SIGNIFICANTLY fewer infant mortalities (in fact, the US is ahead Croatia, Slovenia, and Serbia- SAD!)

I'm just going to throw this out there, but there seems to be a correlation between countries that actually care about sustaining their cultures and populations and the family care that is provided by the state. And it isn't that there is a dramatic difference in the birth rate that would explain this DRAMATIC difference:













What is painfully obvious to me is that Americans don't really care about their children as a country. They don't see that there is a problem with both parents going to work and dumping their child off at some internment camp called a day care where they are sat in front of the television or given appeasement toys all day.

Wouldn't it be great if we had a country that really cared about the next generations?

In the meantime, don't tell me what a great country America is when we don't even support the raising of our children (even when it turns out its in our best interest).

Exhaustion and Children

My daughter used to sleep well. Now, she has forgotten how to sleep. My daughter is teething. At least, I think that's the problem. What a cruel joke of evolution that the parents are almost killed: 1. giving birth, 2. from exhaustion in the first three months, 3. from exhaustion in the second three months from teething, 4. from exhaustion in the next three months from teething... That's as far as we've gotten. She's usually a great kid, but she has been doing this grunting in pain thing and screaming her head off at nights which is really stressing me out. We've tried tylenol, we've tried Orajel, we've tried teethers, we've tried washcloths, we've tried bottles, but nothing, NOTHING is stopping this grunting. We're open to suggestions. I'm so exhausted right now from this child that I don't feel like I will make it to Thanksgiving without going to the hospital. Oh, yeah, and she tried to bite my boob off last night, so that was fun, too. Please post your ideas, in sane as they may seem, here. thanks, Two tired parents

Working from Home

It's Minnesota.  It snows here.  When it snows here, people forget how to drive.  It's dangerous.  I don't like sharing the road with these morons. So, on snow days, I like to work from home.

Well, actually, I just like to work from home.  It really doesn't make sense to drive into an office where you have to spend all the gas and time to sit in stop-and-go traffic both ways, pay for lunch (unless you brown bag it), and generally end up wasting your time because the servers are down.  It makes much more economic sense to just work from home and I don't understand why more companies don't enforce this as a viable option for their companies.  We live in the freaking 21st century- we all have high-speed internet at home.  Every company has VPN (that would be virtual private network software or some other way to connect to the work system when not at the office).  Everyone can afford a $30 webcam+ microphone set.  And don't tell me that people don't use some sort of chat software every day of their lives.

I think about how much money is wasted by companies who make their employees come into work- they have all of the electrical bills for the lights and machines, all of the liability bills for insuring the site, all of the utility costs for internet and phone, all of the desk rentals, all of the paper supplies, etc.  So, why can't they just tell people, "Go home.  Please don't come into work.  You're expected to be at home getting XYZ done, not sitting in traffic and using our copy machines."

Just think about how much less waste there would be (just to name a few)

1. No more sitting in stop-and-go traffic.  Just service industry people would need to go to work (like doctors- sorry, you can't get out of that one).
2. No more "'I'm sick', but going on vacation today to make myself feel better".  When you have results-oriented work environments (also known as "ROWE"s), you are expected to get your job done, but it doesn't matter WHEN you do that job or WHERE- just that it gets done by the deadline.
3. Decreased costs for industries- without all of those office expenses, companies could spend their money, thereby getting the economy going (yes, that sounds republican and I really can't argue with that, but there is some truth to the idea that if big companies don't feel secure, they won't spend their significant amounts of wealth).
4. Happier people- I think most people would agree that working in your PJs and visiting the restroom on your own schedule qualifies as sheer bliss.

So, big business, think about it.  Your productivity will go up because of fewer "sick" days, your costs will go down because you're not paying for the electrical or supplying all of your employees' houses with post-it notes and pens.

And for all of you out there that have abused the privilege- thanks for ruining the chance for us all.

Giftedness

So, I was complaining about being gifted.  Here's the chart to support what I'm talking about:

ARGH!  A bell curve!?! You're making this up, right?

Sorry, but bell curves are naturally occurring phenomenon and while professors in college like to "grade on a bell curve", this often means that their teaching and testing structures are sorrowfully lacking or the bell curve would occur naturally. (Except lately where colleges threaten to fire the professors if they actually let the bell curve occur because colleges are businesses and students are consumers for the college, and students that fail don't retake classes- something wrong with that, isn't there?)

Anyway, as you can see, the median (that's the middle or "average") IQ score is 100.  "Giftedness" is officially defined as being over 130. That means you're 2 standard deviations from the median.  A deviation is a statistical breakdown that measures groups of figures.  Let's just summarize here - if you want to learn more, Stats 101 is your best friend:


The Median IQ is also the Mean IQ of 100.  Let's call this "core IQ".
The first standard deviation (the little vertical white lines on either side of 100) capture 68% of the population's IQ.
The second standard deviation bars capture another 28% (14% above and 14% below the core IQ scores).
The third deviation adds only 4% (2% above and 2% below the core IQ scores).

Traditionally, this is as far as you take statistical measurement of a bell curve because, as you can see, the more standard deviations you add, the fewer and fewer percentages are added to the measurement.

Now, what is interesting about this is that being mentally retarded means that you're IQ is below 90.  In fact, there are several classifications of mental retardation that range from dead to normal and all vegetative states in between.  On the other end, however, you're just "smart", or "genius".  Although Wile E. Coyote says he's a Super Genius, there's no such label.

What has this got to do with anything?

Well, people in the core IQ group spend an awful lot of time trying to make the mentally retarded fit in. They have special programs, they have special funds, they have special rules for how to talk about mental retardation.

But the smart people, who are EVEN MORE HANDICAPPED BY THEIR DISTANCE FROM THE CORE IQ GROUPS DON'T GET SQUAT!  You think it's easy for someone who is over two deviations from the standard IQ to talk to anyone in the core IQ groups?  It's like someone of average IQ talking to a mentally retarded person who's so retarded, they're in a vegetative state.  That's what is't like.  It's the difference between the pony express and WiMAX super high speed internet.

Now, I've been told that I'm not a good communicator and what it really is is this:  I don't communicate every step in my thought process because it goes too fast.  I don't make a log file for how I come to every conclusion- that though map would take too much time.  And trying to drag those of average IQ along with me is just painful.

Why I'm mad:  There aren't any support groups for people out there like me.  There aren't special funds or special classes on how to deal with smart people- you're just expected to figure out how to deal with the average.  (and, no, MENSA- a laugh.  Bunch of egotistically people who like to play chess all day.  Think Frasier Crane when you think MENSA and you'll know why know one would want to be a part of that club.)

I'd really like to see what would happen if you told a mentally retarded person to just figure it out.

Just because we're smart doesn't mean that we know anything about how to deal with people or how to talk to people who are slower.  And the frustration factor- let me tell you.  There is NOTHING MORE FRUSTRATING than sitting in a meeting with a group of "your peers", coming up with the answer, knowing it's the answer, trying to sell people on it being the answer, people looking at you like you're speaking a different language, completely denying it's the answer, and then two months later figuring out that you had the right answer.  I kid you not- there are several consulting gigs that I've been on (5 come to mind) that I have gotten follow up emails from the clients where they say, "wow, I just found out how far in advance you were thinking"...2 to 3 months later!

Smart people, are you out there?!

one frustrated genius

Bosses

Okay, so yesterday I had to have lunch with the boss.  Not just my boss, but the president of the company.

Sounds awesome, doesn't it?

Well, yes and no.  It's great that I have visibility up to that level of management in an IT organization, but it also sucks because he was wanting to tell me about how I'm not living up to my potential.

Now, I will be honest here with some facts:

1.  Yes, I have an IQ of over 150.

2.  Yes, I have been told "I have potential" in EVERY career, EVERY class I've ever had.

3.  Me having "potential" doesn't mean that I have "motivation" or "desire" to do something.

It is very difficult - I'm the type of person who loves a challenge and I obsess over that new venture until I've mastered it (however long or short that is) and then I'm bored with it.  In the IT world, I make a great consultant because I walk into some new chaotic landscape and come up to speed quickly with their problem.  However, in about 3 months after I've started somewhere, I've learned what their systems are, learned what they want to achieve, and also learned that THERE IS NO WAY THAT THEY WILL EVER ACHIEVE THEIR GOALS IN THEIR TIMELINE.  This is mostly because there are unreasonable people on the team.  Developers who refuse to code requirements from business owners.  (ah, a topic for a different blog)  Project Managers that think they can maintain an unreasonable timeline because it will look great for their success rate if we finish on time.  And then there's me, trying to point that they have process holes and defects that are so astronomical, it will take at least twice as long as the project will last just to fix the defects!  This is, by the way, why I'm no longer in "QA"/"QC"- talk about a job from hell.

Anyway...

I'm having lunch with the boss and he's telling me that I am not a good communicator.  I'm hoping that you're reading this blog and thinking he's on crack.  Because that's how I was feeling the whole time.  No examples, no suggestions on improvement, just the "You're not living up to your potential and you should be" type of bullying, depressing, demeaning comments.

Now, I know that I take things SUPER sensitively.  Yup, as a matter of fact the SENG organization has proven that this is because of point #1 above and, unfortunately for me, I will always be super sensitive.  There's no "stop taking it so personally" for me ever in my life.  It's all personal- guess it's almost like a handicap.  Hmmmm.  Yet another topic....So, when the boss says that I'm not living up to my potential, I have to ask myself, what is my true potential?   Should I be planning world domination like a certain lab mouse?  Should I be working my ass off in some thankless job instead of spending time with my family?  Or is there something else that I could be doing to make the world a better place.  I am a nature spirit, if you will, and I feel that it IS my responsibility to leave this Eden in the same or better state as when I got here, though there are several physics jokes that are popping into my head about electrical potentials that only a few people out there would really appreciate.

So, after a ton of soul searching over the past few months, I feel that my best "potential" is a teacher and a mother.  And if that's the case, I guess I'll never be able to "live up to my potential" as long as there are stupid people in the world who are my boss and make blanket statements about my potential but make me come into an office every day instead of raising my daughter. 

Thoughts, anyone?

So, I'm deciding to write this blog, not because I'm good at keeping a diary, but because I'm finding that I have a lot to say about the working world.  I just had a daughter in February.  I'm in my late 30s and am finding that the world is not allowing me to set my own priorities in life.

For example:
After 51 hours of ACTIVE labor (not that prelabor nonsense, the contractions-every-three-minutes labor), I ended up with an emergency C-section to give birth to my daughter.  I'd like to consider myself a bit of a hippy/nature spirit; certainly wanted to give birth naturally and I tried my hardest, but it wasn't happening.

Now that I have my daughter, she is the most important thing in my life.  Yeah, I used to say I understood when other parents would tell me that, but I really didn't get it. Now I get it.  So, being that she's the most important thing in my life, I refuse to just dump her at a daycare center and let other people "raise" her with electronic appeasement toys.  I want to be home with her.  I want to see her go through her day of wondrous experiences.

However, we're a two income society.  On top of that, we're a society in which one parent MUST be in IT or you can't pay for groceries, much less the rent/mortgage.  I am that person in our family.  I have a fantastic husband who is an animation artist and I have never wanted him to do this terrible IT job because, let's face it, IT sucks.  He enjoys what he does and I think it's great.  It has been fabulous up until the point that we had a daughter.  We had plenty of money, and who cared if I had to work on the laptop during the football game instead of paying attention to him?

NOW, we have a daughter.  I don't want to, nor does my health permit me to, work overtime.  I can't even make it through a 40 hour work week.  I'm that fantastic race horse that has been "blown" and now is out to pasture...or I would like to be.  The IT world doesn't respect parents.  The respect breastfeeding even less (no, I can't wait another hour to pump at work- there are two milk bladders attached to my chest and they're leaking now!)  I keep trying to find either a remove/virtual job, or a job-share.  I don't think I'm the first mom or dad to want such a thing.

But, I can't find it.

I'm treated like I am speaking a different language when I ask.

WHY DO WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHERE, IN ORDER TO AFFORD A KID, YOU HAVE TO GO TO WORK FULL TIME AND NOT SPEND TIME WITH THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN YOUR LIFE????

This makes no sense.  Children aren't little video games or pets that we get to make ourselves feel better and spend time with them as we want to- they're people!  Parents used to drag their kids along with them to whatever job they did- most places in the world, they still do!  But in America, since we "value" our children so much and we ship them off to some daycare every day, we create holders and all sorts of distancing devices to keep ourselves from bonding with our children.  I was at Barnes & Noble and actually watched a mom pushing a stroller with a screaming kid in it, just continue to push it back and forth.  Like, uhm, PICK UP YOUR CHILD!  IS THERE SOMETHING WRONG WITH YOU!?

So, I guess this blog is going to be a bit about everything in my life.  My grievances for today are:
1.  Why can't I have a part time job so I can raise my child?
2.  Why can't we live without having both parents work? (F-ing feminists)
3.  Why won't people PICK UP THEIR CHILDREN WHEN THEY CRY!?

wah!