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Sunday, July 24, 2005

Of course all this job stress these last two months have just wrecked havoc with my weight. I stepped on the scale on Friday and just about screamed. I've gained 10 pounds in two months. I was so in denial about it too, even though my acupuncturist even mentioned how fat he thought I was getting.

I didn't want to face my weight gain because it would have meant one more thing to worry bout. But I can't deny it any longer. My size 8 jeans are so cutting off the bloody supply to my legs tight. It's so horrifying to be this heavy again!

I wish I was one of those people who get sick and lose weight when they get stressed. The type that just wants to disappear from a battle. Not me. I'm the cave girl blood type 0 type, who bulks ups and screams "bring it on" while swinging her cave girl club.

When I get stressed out, my body and system become so unbalanced. I went to the vitamin store on Saturday and loaded on stress vitamins and other herbal products that are supposed to help your body deal with stress.

I should have figured I was stressed out when all I did last week was think about having a beer after a work. It's been a long time since I've craved alcohol to chill out, and this disturbs me. Sure, I've been craving ciggies all week but decided not to give into my ciggie fit. But booze? That is scary!

I think I'm getting all needy and codependent too. I think I'm driving Laguna Beach guy nuts, because I so have to call him every day. I decided I needed to stop myself from calling him on Friday, and it was so painful to do that. I don't need to be addicted some guy right now. I have my chocolate addiction to deal with, which led me to eat two huge bags of M&M's with almonds last week. Then there's my ciggie fits and not booze cravings to fuss over. I don't need Laguna Beach boy cravings.

He was really cute though last week when he emailed me and said he had "Brenda on the Brain". How corny and sweet is that? He mentioned something about flying up here which of course just freaked me out, and which he noticed right away. I am way to stressed out be entertaining anyone right now.

M-Square is very supportive in his own way, but I just don't want to see him just yet. I have so many other things to do like trying to figure out my perfect job situation. I haven't done that exercise in ages, and I know I need to do it again because I don't want to end up in another job that I'm going to want to leave in a year. I thought this current job was going to be a place that I'd want to stay for a long time, but I was wrong. I can't make that mistake again the next time around. I am tired of job hopping!

Job stress is just so bad for my writing and zaps all my creativity. Boyfriend stress does that too, but not as bad as job stress.
I'm still alive, but I've been really busy and not in the mood to write. I come home, work out, make dinner and then go to bed. Not an exciting life by any means.

Last weekend I updated my resume and sent it to my friend. I called on Friday to see how it was received and she said someone said that my resume was "aligned with what they were looking for." My friend told me that the job has still yet to post, but she was going to ask the head of the company about it again. The guy has been travelling and it could be several weeks before they make a decision.

Ah, the life of a start-up company. My friend told me that they would probably wait to hire someone until they secured another contract. And I'm like, do I really want to go back to start-up life? I told a friend of mine over the weekend that the hardest part of the job hunt is over for me, and that is the updating of the resume. From what my friend said, my resume is good and that makes me happy.

Life at work has in the meantime gone on. My boss and was up on Monday and Tuesday and she asked me if anything was wrong. Apparently people have been asking why I am so quiet at meetings? How do you tell your boss you just can't stand her boss, whom she is best friends with. You don't and say you are fine.

The HR interview on Friday went fine, which means nothing will change. A friend who works in HR law says that discriminiation cases are hard to prove. Her read on the case was that my boss' boss was an equal opportunity nasty person, and didn't just single that one guy out. I'm still planning to job hunt, but not formally until August 1.

This whole week made me realize how I just don't trust most of the people I work with, and who wants to live with that added stress. Work is already a stressful experience without feeling like you have to watch your back and what you say constantly. Life is way too short to work under those circumstances.

One way or another and I am going to be out of my job very soon.

Friday, July 15, 2005

And so the job saga continues ...

Someone from HR called to interview me to find out why so many people have left the department. I asked our department assistant about it and she said the guy who left a couple of weeks ago blasted the department and his boss in his exit interview.

Talk about karma. The person who got criticized was my boss' boss whom I do not get along with and who has been increasingly mean to me these past few weeks. She's the one who's made me like I don't fit it in. My boss even told that this woman, her boss, yelled at her a couple of weeks ago for doing something wrong. This woman is such a nightmare, and I think all her pettiness and nastiness is catching up with her. Three guys who have worked for in the past year have all left.

If HR asks me if I would work for her, I'm going to have to be honest with them and tell them "no way". I told my boss this already. She knows that if she leaves, that I would quit or try to get a position somewhere else in the company. I told her this to her face and she didn't even bat an eyelash. She knows how mean and nasty this woman is, if you don't get along with her. But my boss gets along with her and so do a couple of other people in the group.

If you get along with this nasty woman, you're fine. But if you don't like I do, she can pretty much make your life hell. There have been so many times when the whole department has been invited to meetings that I never got an invite to. I used to think it was only me, but it started to happen to the guy that quit two weeks ago. It's the nasty woman's way of making you feel left out of things.

I think my best response with HR is just to be truthful and say that me and this woman have a personality conflict. That I only know what I've experienced and cannot comment on other people's experiences. She is my boss' boss after all and I don't want this woman to retaliate against my boss because of me.

Not that it matters anyway because I've already made my decision to leave, but I don't want to burn any bridges either. Other than this nasty woman, my experience at this company has been very positive.

Yes, I think my company will be either be the victim of a hostile takeover in the next two years or they will bleed red in the next two years and the BOD will be forced to entertain acquisition offers. But I don't want to be nasty to anyone. That is so bad karma, so not christian. I try to treat others how I want to be treated, which means as much as I secretly want to to be mean, nasty and vindictive, I will not be anything but honest about my experience with my boss' boss. She's the petty vindicitve one, not me, and I'm not going to stoop to her level.

She's so unaware though, I don't think she knows how nasty she is. She hardly has any friends at work, and my boss told me that the people in the nasty woman's former department hated her there as well. When my boss told me that I felt so much better, like I wasn't the only person in the world who can't stand her.

But if my boss' boss like you, she's great. If she doesn't, then well, you might as well be thinking about getting another job like I am.
So my job saga is going into overdrive. I had lunch with a woman I haven't seen in years today. Her company does medical software consulting and I took a webinar with her company back in December. We made plans to call each other for lunch, but we both never got around to it.

Seven months later, the woman shows up in her life because we're doing an rfi for a medical consulting software firm and we decided to send one out to her company. So I called my friend and told her that we never did go out to lunch and get caught up like we said we would.

So at lunch I'm telling her how unhappy I am at my job and she says her company might have an opening and could I send her my resume on Monday. And I'm like, OH MY GOD! I would love to work with this woman. We met in growth and development seminars together years ago and became good friends. She was the person who encouraged me to change fields and go into healthcare because she felt that it might lead me into something. And you know what she was right. Taking that healthcare startup job in Silicon Valley North was one of the best moves in my life, and I learned so many unbelievable things about jobs, life, and myself.

And now this woman told me today that the job isn't even posted yet, but she thinks I'd be perfect for it. I've never gotten a job this way, through someone I know. I've always gotten a job on the strength of my resume and my interviewing skills with people I've never met before who didn't know me from a bum on the street.

I don't even know if I want to go back into a startup, because the company is a startup. I mean, do I have the energy for that now, what with my writing, but if it means the chance to work with my friend, I think I need to follow up on it. Even it doesn't pan out, I could use the interviewing practice and the excuse to get my resume roadtested.

The job would be in downtown San Francisco, a block away from where I work now and I would be doing more analytical work which I really, reallly like and excel at. I would only take it if the job was a good fit and the pay was comparable or better. But I'm thinking any job would be great for me now because I am so not feeling very appreciated at my current job. I'll have to pray about what to do with this opportunity that has suddenly fallen into my lap. I really, really love my boss but if I don't fit in and I don't feel appreciated, even having the best boss in the world is never going to be enough.