S/O called in the 'rents (who brought their anxious dogs) to stay over for the week. While they are mostly here in an emotional support capacity, they are also helping re-paint the house. To add to it, her best friend stayed a night as well, bringing her cat, so the house has been bursting at the seams as guests come and go this past week (cousins visiting, other friends come for dinner, etc.). In an odd spot where I'm just being 'supportive' throughout it all, but goddamn dude. I need a break. I am thankful for the choice of job made in January, at least. It's way more flexible than I thought it would be. Though, I've had a few clarifying moments that I want to switch into project management, and stay in renewable development career-wise. Deciding to build up enough savings again, then start looking again next January. Would like to post my DeSantis blurb over the weekend once guests are gone. Small disclaimer, a fair bit of information I'm sourcing is word-of-mouth from friends & acquaintances who (A) work in or around lobbying/ists in FL, (B) are New College alum, (C) talk around town. Also, some of this is not as topical as the bills that are cooking in FL legislature now (which has a Republican supermajority)... this all to say, some information doesn't touch on all the most recent events, and my sources to articles may be a little lazy. I'd hope to have more bandwidth by the weekend to prove otherwise. The hope with the post is to draw a through-line in related FL news to show how we got here, and what yaboi Ronnie Ds agenda looks like at large for FL as a preview of what to expect if elected.
Looking forward to the Ronnie D content. I think Meatball Ron stands a good chance of winning the primary. He's more charismatic than I once thought, despite being a total weirdo in private, apparently. That doesn't bother me nearly as much as using an intentional mispronunciation as a litmus test for how submissive women he dated might be. But Ron's also recently realized that he'll have to stoop to Trump's level or lower to sling enough mud to counter Trump's attacks. Whether or not Tiny D can win the general election hinges on whether the economy tanks or not, I think. Among other issues, first and foremost, his and the GOP's efforts to literally erase the existence of trans people should be disqualifying. And it's not. Not enough people are aware or care enough about it to damage the GOP significantly at the ballot box. It's (still) got me real fucked up. It's still escalating. And that's why Chapelle's and others' jokes at marginalized groups, however minor anyone perceives the humor to be, are 100% unacceptable. In eras when these groups weren't being rapidly stripped OF THEIR RIGHT TO EXIST, maybe the jokes would be... almost OK? Also, did you see this? What a fascistic culture they've cultivated down there. Not like Greg Abbott's funhaus is much better, admittedly. Two of our largest states are abject experiments in minoritarian theocracy. Things are great.
Agreed on your first point. The GOP machine seems to have picked their favorite to back for quite some time. Purposely deleted a few lines in my op about the 'Thai' test... I expected some fresh takes or nuance from Last Week Tonight (where I was exposed to this). I was let down when they leaned into obscure potshots at his character. Granted, it's a comedy show at heart... but I'm beyond the thinking that the public really needs to be swayed on character before they decide how they vote - or that these pieces of information have any bearing in the political realm at all. A main gripe I have with center/center-left media and reddit is the same rhetoric was/is used with Trump, and it implies tests of character have meaning in the politics today. We still got Trump. Not shocked about the principal... a large amount of what I have outlined is centered around the push to reform education as a means to sway the future population. There's your sneak preview.
I'm doing...okayish. Have more good days than bad ones. Had to skip the company ski trip, for obvious reasons, but the fomo is real. Currently waiting for a few blood test results. In the meantime I'm trying to figure out what makes the good days good. Monday I learned the hard way that waking up before 7am royally f'ed up my day. I'm looking at vegan protein shakes because keeping energy levels up seems to work. Got an Apple Watch to monitor my heart rate and learn what that does. Avoiding 'spikes' of effort also seems to help. I am intensely grateful to own a car right now because I cannot see myself bicycling the amount I used to do all the time. To some degree I am weaponizing my slightly obsessive nature to manage my own health. But I have to keep reminding myself however that my health is not entirely in my hands, that it could be a lot worse, that I have to be patient, that I have to cut myself some slack. Easier said than done though.
"maybe you aren't a runner anymore." - my yoga instructor, when I expressed frustration with my ability to run So far? She's been right. Running is a bitch. I can do it. Sort of. thing is, I can walk 6 miles a day without any problems, and I enjoy it. Rather than focusing on what you can't do and how it's gone, she opened my eyes to focusing on what I can do and what that means. Once I turned around to "hey, you're not dead, and considering what the EKG looked like a mild dose of blood pressure meds is an extremely small price to pay" I found better ways to be present. By the time my pulse-ox made it back to 99 I'd pretty much found a new groove. It sounds like you're on your way. It gets easier once you've been given an excuse to suck. Find the groove but more importantly, be willing to re-find it whenever the need strikes.
I think I'm done dating for now? I think I'm just going to climb and run a lot? Already shifted gears. Ran 14 miles Sunday. Went rock climbing Friday and Saturday. Went to a group run / potluck with friends last night. Ran another 9 miles (workout) today...loving it. Maybe it's the sun and warmth. I'm feeling much more inspired with my fitness and outdoors activities for the first time in a hot minute and much less like I give a shit about dating and relationships.
6 years with my partner last week. Unfortunately coincided with the passing of our cat, but we went out for dinner this week. Then got ice cream and drove to the beach at night, listened to the waves hammer the shore. Upside of living on an island, you're never far from a beach. Downside of living on an island during a climate crisis, eventually the beach comes to you.. Work is on a hiring freeze thanks to yet another fucking review being 'executed'. So our usual manager team of 6 is down to 4, about to be 3, with no proper replacements on the horizon because people want stability in these wild and wacky times. My own team of 7 is working fine, but I know the stress signs. By the time the review is done, we'll be down a few more. Nothing I can do except advocate for my group, and hope the powers that be aim for a functional business, rather than cut more staff to save miniscule costs. While I was on leave during March, my remaining colleagues met with HR and explained the ongoing issues with my boss. So now her boss, and HR know the full extent. Nothing is happening yet, as they want to talk to me as well. I'm the sole male colleague and they want to know if I've been getting any different treatment. Building a tunnel house for my garden, a neighbor in our cul de sac showed me her absolutely stunning setup, four tunnel houses, home made compost bins, every plant under the sun is flourishing. So I'm gonna become best pals with the retirees in our street cause fuck they can garden. Growing kumera/sweet potato down south is supposed to be nightmarish but she showed me her collection and now I want in on this. Writing is going well, starting the editing of the first big project, and writing a second one. It's fun. I never set any daily goal, but I tend to write about 1-2k words each session regardless, and plan a little for the next session. Current story is a sci-fi tale focusing on a weedy logistics administrator accidentally assigned to a warship full of angry soldiers. They launch into various battles and he's along for the ride. It's dumb. But it's fun dumb. The gaming crew has settled back into Destiny 2. I argued. I didn't want to go down that route again. But it is fun with friends, the gunplay is smooth and I get to be a bit of a menace and let off steam. Currently also playing through that Star Wars: Fallen Order. I heard it was a buggy mess at launch, but it runs well on my PC. I've never been a huge Star Wars fan, so I'm going in with pretty open eyes about the whole thing. So far it's been fine. Under $1,000 to go on my student loan. Then that's an automatic payrise.. .That I will chuck directly at my mortgage.
I'm on the war path today. My wife works for General Motors. If you follow the financial news, you may be aware that GM is trying to reduce their white collar workforce by some unspecified amount, but probably around 10%. My wife's boss is a bone fide misogynist. Fortunately for him of the 200 or so people who work for him only 5 are women. It's a sausage fest. However, he's been pressuring certain people who he thinks are likely to be laid off to take a buyout that GM has offered. Somehow, he has pressured at least 3 and maybe 4 of the 5 women to take it, including my wife. She has until Friday to decide, but I've basically forbidden her from doing so. This is 2023. I tried to tell her that no matter how moronic and anachronistic her boss is, that the leadership of GM is aware that in this day and age a single tweet from a powerful person can tank your stock. How would it look, I asked, if they have to lay off 10%, they're 2% female overall (in design, which is where she works) and women comprise 15-20% of layoffs. Now isn't the time to make your company less diverse, and using attrition to achieve that end is doubly stupid. The whole thing is weird, because GM is led by arguably the most powerful female executive in all of American business. Anyway, I keep trying to reassure her that in a sane world, she's the last person to get axed (female, 20 years experience but not in management, all glowing yearly reviews), but my words have not been soothing to her. Her boss basically back benched her after she returned from maternity leave, so he has a bad track record. Sounds ripe for a lawsuit to me, though I'm admittedly no lawyer. As a last resort I have a powerful friend who can scare them, and probably would if I asked, but I've been asked not to resort to that, not yet anyway.
Counterpoint: GM is only going to get shittier. I mean, if she legit loves her work and the people she works with, that's one thing. But if her misogynistic boss is cleaning house of all ovaries and GM is offering a payout? Now is the time to call up anybody she knows in design literally anywhere else and say "yeah my misogynistic boss is cleaning house of all ovaries I'm wondering if you might know somewhere interested in hiring females with 20 years of design experience in the automotive industry." We've been dealing with hiring nonsense lately. Our receptionist basically overbalanced her ADHD meds and became a zombie. We put together a list of 30 (thirty) "hey here's this thing you're doing that isn't great that you didn't used to do could you maybe try not to do that" bullet points and she responded by going "...oh yeah I meant to tell you I'm changing careers next week." One of our midwives waited until one of our other midwives was in Brazil to say "oh by the way I'm not coming back from maternity leave." Another one of our midwives told us "hey uhh so yeah I know we discussed that I was trying to get pregnant again and last time it took me six months welll this time it took less than a week." One of our naturopathic doctors told us that her husband just took his dream job 150 miles away so uhh. And don't get me wrong. Everyone should follow their bliss. They owe us exactly what we pay them for, no more. We have taken as our guiding star that every employee we take on leaves happier than they started and that they really take something fundamental and personal with them and so far we're batting a thousand (minus that idiot we had to fire). But none of them are mission-critical. All of them are great to have around, and we look forward to seeing them in the future. We'd sincerely hope that anyone unhappy where they are would tell us and allow us to remedy it, and also entirely understand that if they get better opportunities even if they're happy they're gonna bail. And they should. And we're happy for them. That's a big difference from working with misogynists who don't value you. You know what sucks? Hiring through Indeed or Monster or craigslist or Facebook or WTFever. It REALLY sucks. And it's expensive, and full of tire-kickers, and dipshits who only need three contacts for their unemployment and aren't at all serious. You know what works hella better? Calling up contacts you know and like and saying "hey you know anybody unhappy or moving." We had four or five candidates for two open positions before we knew those positions were open. And the only way that shit happens is if people know you're a candidate. Congratulations to your wife for thriving through 20 of the stupidest years in General Motors history. Do either of you really think it'll be any fun through the next 20?
Caroline Rose is releasing a new album Friday. It's about their super depression during the pandemic combined with the end of a relationship right at the beginning of the pandemic. They did a small concert right at the beginning of the pandemic and it was obvious how much they were hurting. I'm a big fan of owning physical media (plus it's likely the artists get more!) So I pre-ordered the CD months ago. It arrived this afternoon. I'm about halfway through and it's incredible. Def recommend, but it is a very sad album. Otherwise I've got like 6 weeks left or something. Thesis (April 24 deadline) poster presentation on thesis (April 17 deadline), midterm due in 6 days, presentation in a class around the 24th of April, another class I'm taking pass/fail with things due here and there, finalizing summer project due in 10 days, student job has things due April 3rd, and I still gotta find a job cause post-grad right as the economy is like "nah fuck this" so things are going great.
Me too buddy. I'm gonna try to schedule an end of program virtual meetup once I'm fully done but idk what tomorrow is going to hold let alone that far out.
Caroline Rose is sooooooo good. I should see if they've already come through town or not.
trying to schedule more surgery consultations with different clinics. right now I have another one scheduled and then a phone call to schedule one scheduled with another place I've been doing more writing and trying to get more social. i went to a transfem social group last thursday and it was really nice. we're planning a book club thing i got concert tickets for 100 gecs as well. they were scalper tickets so they were expensive but might as well live a little my goal is to get 3 job applications out by the end of the months and my thinking is that once i get off my ass about it i should be able to do more
it's still sour grapes jobwise. the unexpected part is that my boss has been a lot nicer to me since i said i'd be quitting. seems assbackwards to me considering his behavior is the reason I'm leaving. it took me about 2 months into the job to realize that the reason this place had to keep hiring receptionists was because he treats them like personal assistants / sacrificial lambs, and 4 months to actually decide to quit because of it. two coworkers said to me that i lasted longer than pretty much anybody else has in this role my passions are in things that make you no money and i don't have the drive to chase that horse. my career goal is to move into translation because i think it's my only potential specialist skill that's in demand. until then it's gonna be clerical office bullshit because at least it's not retail or call center or restaurant bullshit. at least this has consistent hours and you can sit down i would say maybe i should think about grad school but that seems like a much more expensive way to kick the can than the current way of festering. i don't know. it could easily be worse
We only have 4 short biking days on the trip left to compete the Taiwan bike touring! It’s been really fun and exactly what I needed. Then we’re going to Nepal, but we’re out of luck because a new law has hat will force us to hire a guide. The law gets into effect 5 days before we get there. Found super cheap flights back, with a day stop in Abu Dhabi and a week in Italy.
Mentally, I’m doing really good actually and the trip has been amazing for my breakup processing. It’s not something I think my ex would have enjoyed too much or that I would have done with him. So it’s cool to do something that I feel is my own. Still had a rough moment yesterday, hesitating between buying a ticket for a regional burn event in Ontario. We’ve always done the events together and now I don’t have a car to get there or even a tent. All common friends but also a ton of new fun people attending. I could find a tent and ride easily - but do I WANT to is the question. We’re on good very friendly terms. I can’t tell if I’ll regret going or not going more. I cried, made a pro/cons list and talked to my friend about it that offered me a spot in their camping area. Still can’t decide…
We had neo-Nazis giving Nazi salutes in the middle of Melbourne this week. Working from home for the rest of this week because my partner has covid (a policy of my employer). This is the second time she's had it and I've missed it despite sharing a bed. Three years in to the pandemic, and I've still yet to test positive to covid, no matter how frequently I test. I assume I must have had it at some point.
Likewise on the 'no-covid' front. I've worked in and around our city's hospital the last three years, I have been close to people who had it at the time but I've never tested positive despite rigorous testing. I also assume I've had it at some point. I'd hate to have passed it onto people unknowingly, but I always took precautions at least. When I went to Melbourne last year, I noticed people were further along the "we're just over it now" train, compared to NZ. People on the trams didn't seem to bother masking up. We did, but mainly out of habit and also at the time we had to have a negative test 24 hours before our flight, or we would have to stay in Aus a while longer.
Today I drove the kids to school, lifted at 7:45am, played tennis at 8:45, had Krav at 10am and have been at my desk working since 11am and will do so until around 5. Then soccer game. Get to watch my first born play. I love it. Today has been a great day. Lots of big business wins in there today too. Feeling bullish even though the world is on fire.