Friday's Feast #150

Feed your blog with Friday's Feast! Go to http://www.fridaysfeast.com to learn more.

Appetizer: How many pieces of jewelry do you wear most days?
One - my watch (it was a Christmas gift.)

Soup: What is your favorite instrumental song?
There are so many... I really love "Perpetuum Mobile" by the Penguin Cafe Orchestra, but I also like "Battle Without Honor or Humanity" by Tomoyasu Hotei... there are a host of others as well.

Salad: Who has a last name that you like?
OK I'm gonna be cheesy and say my girlfriend... her last name is Burns. Maybe one day it'll be my last name too... ;-) Also, for just a cool name's sake, I had a lady who I worked for once whose last name was Bonecutter. That was pretty nifty.

Main Course: Name a popular movie you’ve never seen.
A popular movie or a classic movie? Or both? Popular movie: hmmm... well, I never got around to seeing Borat (I just don't care all that much). As for classic movies, I am severely cinematically challenged: I've never seen Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, A Clockwork Orange, or Citizen Kane. Time to go to the movie store!!

Dessert: Fill in the blank: Nothing makes me ___________ like ____________.
Nothing makes me smile like my girl... I'm gonna miss her so much while I'm away!!!

Carolina Bound

It's official! I got the job!

They called on Friday evening around 6:30. I guess they decided that making me wait through the weekend would just be cruel. They offered me a lot more money than what I make now, plus a portion of moving expenses. I tendered my resignation at my current job today. After about an hour I was escorted off the premises... they stood at my desk and watched me pack all my personal items into a box. LOL! I couldn't be more pleased about it, actually... this means they'll pay me my two week notice and I can start at Hubbell sooner than I'd planned, making more money (which is important, especially to those of us that are moving in a couple of months).

I can't believe all this is happening! It's like a weird dream or something. I'm so excited! Next weekend I'll be heading back to South Carolina! I'm going to stay with my parents for a few weeks, and then we'll move everything down when our lease is up. It's going to be so hard to be away from Erin for that long of a time, but I know we'll be fine. I'll probably post more about those worries later. Right now I just can't do anything but smile!

Take care, all!

~Becky

Friday's Feast #149

Feed your blog with Friday's Feast! Go to http://www.fridaysfeast.com to learn more.

Appetizer: Name a funny habit you have.

I never go anywhere without a book. When I was a kid, I would carry a book everywhere with me – school, doctor’s offices, when my mom would go shopping. The habit’s stayed with me into adulthood. Now I have two or three books in my car, and if I ever get stuck somewhere (dead-stop traffic, eating lunch alone, oil changes), I have something to keep my brain entertained. Not sure if that’s a “funny” habit or not, but it’s one of the most consistent ones I’ve had throughout my life.

Soup: If you could instantly know how to play a musical instrument, which one would you pick?

The piano. I already (sort of) know how to play the guitar – if I got back into playing I would be a decent rhythm guitarist, so I’d really like to look at another instrument. I’ve always loved the piano and wished I knew how to play. I would also love, love, LOVE to know how to play the drums. Drums are awesome! I’d love to start a girl rocker band with Erin and a couple of our friends. We’d do all kinds of covers, like of Ben Folds, the Eels, and the Go-Go’s! (Yeah, I’m a dork, I admit it.)

Salad: How long is your hair?

It’s very short, with bangs in the front. Kind of a boy-cut, but I don’t mind. My whole life until I was 30 I had long hair – when I got it all cut off, it was almost to my waist. I decided that when I turned 30 I wanted to do something that would be a landmark for myself. Since I don’t really do tattoos or piercings (mostly because I’m a pansy about pain), I decided to cut off all my hair. It was scary, but I’m so glad I did it. I LOVE my short hair and think it suits me much better than my long hair ever did. Also, I donated the hair I got cut off to Locks of Love (http://www.locksoflove.org), an organization that helps disadvantaged children suffering from medical hair loss. They cut off 18”! It was a good feeling to know that my hair would go to make some little girl or boy feel better about themselves during their battle with cancer or some other serious health issue.

Main Course: When was the last time you forgave someone, and who was it?

This morning, I forgave myself for going to Starbucks – does that count? Ha! Seriously though, the last real, serious, life-changing forgiveness I gave was probably to my friend Shane. We had a falling out in 2004, and hadn’t spoken at ALL in a couple of years. He contacted me in the summer of 2006 and asked me to forgive him for the things he’d said to me that had hurt me so badly. After some time, some long discussions, and some serious self-realizations on both our parts, I did forgive him, and our friendship is now stronger than ever. I’m so glad he sought me out, and I’m so glad I chose to forgive him and put the past behind us.

Dessert: What is your favorite kitchen appliance?

Oooooo… I’m a kitchen appliance whore, so I can’t pick just one. I love our toaster oven. And our deep fryer. And our blender. And our food processor. And Erin’s Kitchen-Aid mixer. But I guess if I had to pick a favorite, I’d say… my countertop ice cream maker! It’s great in the summertime!!!

Promising...

It’s been almost a week since I posted, and I wanted to let everyone know how the job situation was going.

The reason I haven’t posted is because I hadn’t heard anything… believe me, it was making me crazy, waiting and waiting and waiting. I can’t concentrate on anything for more than about fifteen seconds, and I keep staring at my cell phone, willing it to ring…

Hubbell called me today. They told me that they’re in the process of doing background checks, and all they really need to complete the process is my high school diploma. Once they have that, they should be getting in touch with me about an offer. The HR lady I spoke to today said they were already working up paperwork for the offer letter, but they can’t make it official until all the background check stuff comes back okay.

So, everything looks good… I should hear something definitive soon. I’m not setting off the fireworks yet because I haven’t gotten the offer yet… I want to wait until it’s official to celebrate. After all, they like to promote from within, and there’s always a chance that some random person in customer service sees the posting and decides that they want to go for it… so I’m just being cautiously joyous at this point, not all-out rampant dancing on the desk in my underwear with sparklers joyous. (But when it comes to that point, I’ll be sure to take pictures…)

Stay tuned for the next episode in the continuing saga!

Take care, all!

~Becky

Friday's Feast # 148

Feed your blog with Friday's Feast! Go to http://www.fridaysfeast.com to learn more.

Appetizer: Fill in the blank: The best thing about where I live is __________…
My job. It pays well, I like what I do (most of the time – I just hate my boss), and I have several friends that I’ve made here. I also, unlike the majority of the rest of the people on the planet, enjoy snow. I love to watch it fall, I love to play in it, I love to wake up to a blanket of white covering the world. The only drawback is that Hoosiers don’t have enough sense to know that when white stuff is falling from the sky, we’re all supposed to stay home from work and enjoy a snow day.

Soup: Create a new name for a deodorant (like “Flower Fresh” or “Shower Scent”).
Tantive IV for men (as worn by Senator Organa of the galactic republic).

Salad: What was the last piece of software you installed onto your computer?
Hmmm… I think I installed some sort of software for my new firewire card. I had to install a firewire card because I got a new video camera and I wanted to be able to pull the video from my camera onto my computer and edit it.

Main Course: If you were to receive a superlative award today beginning with the words ”Most likely to…”, what would the rest of the phrase say?
Most likely to move to South Carolina! (I hope, anyway!)

Dessert: What two colors do you like to wear together?
Black and whatever else goes with it. Ha!

Job situation update

The interview went VERY well. The company actually paid to fly me down and meet with them. I spent about 4 ½ hours there on Monday morning. I met with HR, the vice president of quotations, and the national accounts manager. Everyone was really great! And I really seemed to make a good impression on them. The building is so big and new and beautiful, it’s kind of overwhelming. It’s four stories, and is mostly glass. There’s a huge round glass tower in the front of the building that’s four stories as well. And there’s a rock and stone fountain that’s gorgeous… the inside of the building was really beautiful too. These people are very conscious of security... they have fingerprint recognition systems to get into the secured areas of the building like HR, and they have an entire security staff. I was really impressed.

The national accounts manager and I really hit it off. We talked for almost two hours. He told me that I would be perfect for the position! And that if he could, he’d hold me hostage in his office until they offered me what I wanted. Ha! Anyway, it went really well. I should hear something in the next few days. I really feel good about the interview, and I really hope I get the job. It just seems like a perfect fit for me… it’s what I want to be doing here at my current job, but it’s more money and it’s in the South near my family. How perfect is that?

The flights were fun. The novelty of flying still hasn’t worn off for me. I get excited about window seating. I love to watch the plane take off. I read some on the plane, but mostly I just sat and looked out the window at the Earth below us. I realized that you can make anything, any time, any situation into a moving experience with the right mindset and the right music. I got a little video of the plane taking off on one of my flights – I plan to put it into one of my video projects. I love looking down at the scenery below... we flew over the Appalachians, and they were so beautiful. Seeing where the mountain range ended and the midwest plains began was so cool - very visually drastic. Amazing!!

I’ve been thinking about the move to Greenville, and it still just doesn’t seem real to me. I can’t believe I might be moving back to Greenville in as little as three weeks. The idea is a little daunting. I’m kind of nervous and uneasy about the whole situation – moving, being apart from Erin for a month and a half, starting a new job, staying with my family, etc. But I’ve been trying to think of the good things I’m going to do when I live in Greenville again, things I used to take for granted. Places to eat, people to see, things to do. I’m going to go to the Pita House one of the first nights I’m back and have a nice leisurely dinner of chicken and lamb kababs (YUM). I’m going to meet up with my friend Jo and have a few beers with him. I’m going to (maybe) go catch up with my old gaming crew on a random Saturday night. I’m going to go shoot a few rounds of pool with my buddy Sabra at our old hangout, the Palace. I’m going to have dinner with my friend Valerie and see her husband and her kids. I’ll probably go to my favorite club and a few other places. It’ll be nice to immerse myself in the town again… I’m trying to focus on all the things I get excited about when we go visit, those things that we have to cram into a week’s time or less. I’m looking forward to it.

Also, I plan on really focusing on picking back up and exercising and losing weight. I fell off the wagon a few weeks ago, and while I haven’t gained much back (about two pounds, and I’ve already lost them again), I don’t feel as good about myself as I did when I was consistently dieting and exercising. I’ve been trying to watch calories, but getting on the treadmill has really been the furthest thing from my mind for the past couple of weeks while I’ve been ironing all this out about the new job and everything. My parents have a pool, so I plan on swimming a lot of laps when I move down. Swimming is supposed to be a great aerobic exercise, or so I’ve heard… and since South Carolina is so damned hot, it’ll be a good way to get my exercise in without wanting to kill myself. I plan on walking some as well, but I am NOT going to make myself have a heatstroke, LOL!!!

There’s a chance I might go down even earlier than originally expected as I found out that the company I work for now usually asks you to leave if you put in your notice and tell them you’ve gotten a job with one of their competitors. I’m not going to volunteer the information, but if they ask, I refuse to lie. So, I might be going to Greenville even sooner than I thought (if I get the job, of course – all this is contingent on getting the offer!). I’ll be sure to keep the journal updated.

Back to work for me. Take care, all!

~Becky

Whirlwind!!

Phew, so much has happened in the last four days!! Where to begin???

I sent my resume in to Hubbell (the lighting company in Greenville). They called me back the very same day. The HR lady (Ellen) said that she had forwarded my resume to the National Accounts Manager (Rich), and he was really excited about my qualifications, and he wanted to set up an interview as soon as possible. I told her that I would be happy to meet with him, but I’d need to do it on a Monday or a Friday because the drive from Indy to Greenville is about nine hours, give or take, and I’d need an extra day to drive. She said that she’d see if Rich wanted to do a preliminary phone interview, and she’d also see if they could help me out with travel expenses.

My phone rang at 3 yesterday afternoon, and surprisingly, it was Rich. I had a phone interview with him right there and then. He was really, REALLY excited about my resume and meeting me. He said that they’ve been growing very quickly and they’re really hurting for help. He also said that they can find people with lighting experience, OR they can find someone with customer service experience, but to find someone with both is a rare thing. He wanted me to come down as soon as I can to meet with him, so I have an interview this Monday at 8 am!!! I’m still not sure how I’m getting there – Hubbell is going to reimburse me for travel expenses, so regardless of whether I fly or drive I should be covered.

During our conversation, Rich asked me, “I don’t want to jump the gun here, but… if the interview on Monday goes well, how soon do you think you could come down here and start working?” I told him that I’d need to give my employer a two weeks’ notice and then I’d need 2-3 days to get my affairs in order and I could be there. He said that would be great, and that he couldn’t wait to meet me on Monday. All I want to do is type exclamation points here..... !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I’m nervous as hell. I want the job, it sounds great and it pays more than what I’m making now AND it’s in SC. I just keep waiting for the rug to get yanked out from under me, ya know? My dad told me a long time ago that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is… but at the same time, this doesn’t feel like a scam or anything… they just seem really desperate for people.

So now I have this whirlwind in my head about what will happen if I get the job… stuff like where we’re going to live, how the hell we’re going to move with Erin and I being 600 miles apart, being away from my girlfriend for over a month, how we’re going to afford moving, how I should address this with my current employer, saying goodbye to my friends up here, etc., etc., etc.. It’s overwhelming. I can’t get my thoughts straightened out in my head because they’re going so damn fast.

I never expected all this to happen so quickly. When I applied with the company I’m working with now for the NAC job, they took almost three months to review my resume, interview me, and place someone else in the position. I do have to admit that I get a great sense of evil satisfaction that the job at Hubbell is the very same job I applied for here (national accounts coordinator), but the pay is MUCH better and is in the South, which is where I would rather be. HA!!!

My parents live outside of Greenville, and my mom has said I can stay with them for a few weeks while Erin waits out the lease and gets stuff ready to move. It will be so hard to be apart from her for so long. If they offer me the job right away, I could conceivably be in Greenville by the first week of July, and she can’t move until the middle of August, when our lease is up, because we can’t afford to pay moving costs and rent in two places (breaking our lease isn’t even an option… talk about expensive!). I don’t even want to think about it right now… we’ll jump off that bridge when we get to it… but it really kind of bothers me.

Anyway, that’s what’s going on right now… I will be in SC on Monday for the interview, and we’ll go from there. I’ll make sure to post and let my avid readers (hehe) know what’s going on… besides, if I’m gonna be moving, it’ll be time for a PARTAY!!!!

Take care all!

~Becky

Ahhh, a nice long update

Sorry for the lapse in posts, folks. It’s been a busy couple of weeks.

Shane came to visit. I wish he could have stayed longer – we had a great time. He got here on Thursday evening and we took him to our little Irish pub (the Claddagh). Then we took him out for gelato and we drove around for a while and showed him downtown and some other parts of the city. Friday we drove to Chicago and had a great time exploring the city and taking pictures of everything. We ended up staying in this really great hotel. It was actually the hotel on the campus of Hamburger University, the McDonald’s corporate headquarters. All the McDonald’s decorations were… well, they were kind of creepy in a strange Twilight-Zone kinda way, but they were still fun. We went to see Pirates of the Caribbean III on a great big giant screen in Chicago, too, and it was REALLY good. We had some Thai downtown and took about five million pictures of the city at night and drove all over the city and listened to music and smoked cigarettes like rebellious angry teenagers. LOL! It was a lot of fun.

Then Saturday we went to the Art Institute. We saw all kinds of really amazing stuff, but I wish they had had all the things we wanted to see on display. The last time we went they had these absolutely beautiful stained glass windows, but this time they were all packed away to keep them safe while the Art Institute was remodeling. I appreciate the action and sentiment, but I wish I’d gotten to see them again. I was gonna take some pictures of them and incorporate them into a video I’m making.

We came home Saturday evening and got to’ up from the flo’ up. We had a great time being intoxicated and silly. Then Sunday and Monday we hung out, played some D&D, had some really good food. Tuesday we had sushi for dinner and went waaaay overboard, LOL. We ended up with two take out boxes full of sushi after we were done. He went home on Wednesday. I took a lot of good pics, and I’ll post a few of them sometime soon.

Let’s see… what else? All my shows are over… House, Heroes, American Idol… so now I have even more time to concentrate on my weight loss goals. I have to confess that I’ve fallen off the wagon. Having Shane here for a week was hard on my determination as we didn’t exercise and I pretty much threw calorie counting out the window. I’m discouraged with myself and with the whole process. I just can’t seem to make myself go get on the damn treadmill! But this is a new week, and I am going to MAKE myself do it tonight. I know from experience if I can just make myself go do it ONE TIME it will be so much easier to get back into the habit of it. I really need to do something about it because I’m starting to feel really bad about myself again. I’ve realized that if I’m dieting and exercising the self-image issues improve a little already because I’m DOING something about the things I hate. Now I need to make myself get back to that. I don’t understand why it’s so hard to do that. I know that it’s good for me and makes me feel good too, so why am I so much more inclined to sit on the couch and eat ice cream?! Grrrr… well, tonight I am GETTING on the FUCKING TREADMILL. I know I have gained a few pounds, I can tell in my body. So… I have to stop the cycle before it really gets going, and start walking and eating right again. I know I can do it, I just have to make myself.

We’ve been to see a few movies lately… Spidey 3, Pirates 3, Shrek 3… they were all good. Of the three I think Pirates was the best of the bunch, then Spidey, then Shrek. I’m ready for the next really good movie to come out, but I don’t think that’ll happen until July (Harry Potter). I love going to see movies on the big screen, but lately they have really been a suck-fest. I call them that mostly because of how expensive going to the movies is as opposed to renting the DVD. The tickets, popcorn etc. are all actually much more expensive than buying the damn DVD would be. So moviegoing is a real treat, and the movies should REFLECT that in my opinion! Dammit!

On the move to SC… The company in Greenville that’s very similar to the company I work with now has posted a job opening for National Accounts Coordinator. This is the same job I applied for here and got turned down for. I’m gonna bite the bullet and submit my resume. Everybody keep their fingers crossed for me, I’d really like to have this job. Mostly I’d like to have a steady, reliable job in Greenville that I know I can excel at, and be close to my family. But it will also be nice to walk into my boss’s office and tell her that I’m lighting out for the territories and what she can go do with her reports and her call center queue and her micromanaging. I hate what has happened to this company, because it’s not the same place I started working and fell in love with two and a half years ago. I can’t imagine how upset and disappointed and let down I would be if I had spent twenty years of my life working on this company as some of my co-workers have. It’s time to move on; big business has arrived, and it’s screwing over the company that I started working for. It sucks, but that’s life.

So we’ve been looking at apartments and stuff in Greenville, just daydreaming mostly, but also really getting a feel for what’s available and how expensive it will be. We’ve found some really good ones. I can’t believe we’re actually gonna move back to SC. I have really mixed feelings about it, but that’s for another entry as this one has been really long! I need to get back to work. I’ll blog again soon!

Take care all!

~Becky

Friday's Feast # 146

I'm too lazy to do the hyperlinked picture today. Go to http://www.fridaysfeast.com to beef up your blog.

Appetizer: Name something you think is “the best.”
The falafel, chicken shawarma and hummus at the Pita House in Greenville, SC is the best Mediterranean food I've ever had.

Soup: On a scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 highest), how stressed are you today?
7 - got a lot on my mind today.

Salad: What kind of cleanser do you use to wash your face?
Uhhh... Ivory soap?

Main Course: Tonight is a blue moon! What is something that you believe only happens “once in a blue moon.”
It used to be that every weekend my roommates and I would get falling-down drunk. Now we only do it very rarely... once in a blue moon. Consequently... our preferred beer to get trashed on is Blue Moon beer...

Dessert: When was the last time it rained where you live?
Last night.