I'm posting! I'm posting!
Jan. 6th, 2013 11:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I don't do New Years resolutions, but I have been telling myself to get back in the journaling habit. I am making an effort to move over to Dreamwidth because the longer I look at LJ's death throes, the more I'm like, eh, LJ, you were fail in so many ways even before you started going all Varnish Error every five minutes.
Work: Work has undergone major upheaval these last few months, and probably will for the next few (hopefully no longer than that. We'll see). A round of voluntary redundancies in the final quarter of 2012 meant the loss of sixteen staff, along with assurances from management that OF COURSE there would be changes made and checks and balances, I don't know, checked and balanced so we would be able to operate with a 20% loss of manpower. Well, we've lost the sixteen bodies, but as of yet...that's it. No reduction of hours of operation as promised. No promised dissolution of two departments and the reabsorption of staff assigned to them back into the call centre proper. Just insane workloads, and OF COURSE they decided that Christmas was an ideal time to buy sixteen people off with a golden (well, maybe bronze) handshake.
I actually have no doubt that all the above will happen. The manager who made all these proposals has always put his money where his mouth was before now, and he is responsible for basically rescuing us from being shut down completely (get a dog up ya, Mr Premier) only this organisation being what it is, it doesn't happen quickly. And said manager now taking his well-deserved (no sarcasm) annual leave, so. You know. By the end of next year, the place might be squared away.
Family - Christmas was a little less fraught than usual - Grace (how on earth is she eighteen months old already) seems to be a civilising influence on Dad and while he was still pretty drunk, he was not the paralytic mess that he usually is given a fraction of an excuse. Also, because I didn't stay overnight there on Christmas Eve, he insisted on coming to pick me up on the day of, meaning he couldn't drink until he'd done so. Lost his head start. Small victories - I'll remember that for next year. He's proven to have a nasty habit of underminining Kelly's authority with Grace, which annoys her and embarrasses the rest of us. Kelly, being the daughter in law, obviously doesn't feel as if she can call him out on it, and Mark (who, being the man's son, SHOULD say something) just doesn't. I've been known to bloody well do it, though. Tha man can be infuriating.
Three days after Christmas I had my cousin's engagement party, and by then, tbh, I was partied out. I participated, but retreated once or twice just for some quiet. I also don't normally take holidays over Christmas (travel industry? Holidays? At Christmas? HAH!) so I've been working right through, and the combination of work/socialising/work/socialising (not to mention the abovementioned workcrazy issues) took the predictable and totally expected mental toll on this introvert. I set aside January 2 for a hermit day, stuck to it and oh my god, I felt so much better.
Fannishness seems to be on a downswing for me. I read the occasional White Collar fic, but while I'm still enjoying and squeeing over plenty of shows and movies, I'm back to reading profic and doing, idk. Other stuff. LOL. Speaking of movies, what have I seen since my last update? Probably Skyfall, The Hobbit and Les Miserables. Loved them all to varying degress and for varying reasons. Opinion seems to be split on them all, which is fine. I might write up something more involved on The Hobbit and Les Mis later, but I'll have to see them again first. I rarely do the multiple viewing at the cinema thing any more (time, money, inclination, access to downloads) so it might be a while. Mind you, I did just find a DVD screener of the Hobbit (thank you, Oscar season) so maybe it'll be sooner than you think.
Maybe.
Work: Work has undergone major upheaval these last few months, and probably will for the next few (hopefully no longer than that. We'll see). A round of voluntary redundancies in the final quarter of 2012 meant the loss of sixteen staff, along with assurances from management that OF COURSE there would be changes made and checks and balances, I don't know, checked and balanced so we would be able to operate with a 20% loss of manpower. Well, we've lost the sixteen bodies, but as of yet...that's it. No reduction of hours of operation as promised. No promised dissolution of two departments and the reabsorption of staff assigned to them back into the call centre proper. Just insane workloads, and OF COURSE they decided that Christmas was an ideal time to buy sixteen people off with a golden (well, maybe bronze) handshake.
I actually have no doubt that all the above will happen. The manager who made all these proposals has always put his money where his mouth was before now, and he is responsible for basically rescuing us from being shut down completely (get a dog up ya, Mr Premier) only this organisation being what it is, it doesn't happen quickly. And said manager now taking his well-deserved (no sarcasm) annual leave, so. You know. By the end of next year, the place might be squared away.
Family - Christmas was a little less fraught than usual - Grace (how on earth is she eighteen months old already) seems to be a civilising influence on Dad and while he was still pretty drunk, he was not the paralytic mess that he usually is given a fraction of an excuse. Also, because I didn't stay overnight there on Christmas Eve, he insisted on coming to pick me up on the day of, meaning he couldn't drink until he'd done so. Lost his head start. Small victories - I'll remember that for next year. He's proven to have a nasty habit of underminining Kelly's authority with Grace, which annoys her and embarrasses the rest of us. Kelly, being the daughter in law, obviously doesn't feel as if she can call him out on it, and Mark (who, being the man's son, SHOULD say something) just doesn't. I've been known to bloody well do it, though. Tha man can be infuriating.
Three days after Christmas I had my cousin's engagement party, and by then, tbh, I was partied out. I participated, but retreated once or twice just for some quiet. I also don't normally take holidays over Christmas (travel industry? Holidays? At Christmas? HAH!) so I've been working right through, and the combination of work/socialising/work/socialising (not to mention the abovementioned workcrazy issues) took the predictable and totally expected mental toll on this introvert. I set aside January 2 for a hermit day, stuck to it and oh my god, I felt so much better.
Fannishness seems to be on a downswing for me. I read the occasional White Collar fic, but while I'm still enjoying and squeeing over plenty of shows and movies, I'm back to reading profic and doing, idk. Other stuff. LOL. Speaking of movies, what have I seen since my last update? Probably Skyfall, The Hobbit and Les Miserables. Loved them all to varying degress and for varying reasons. Opinion seems to be split on them all, which is fine. I might write up something more involved on The Hobbit and Les Mis later, but I'll have to see them again first. I rarely do the multiple viewing at the cinema thing any more (time, money, inclination, access to downloads) so it might be a while. Mind you, I did just find a DVD screener of the Hobbit (thank you, Oscar season) so maybe it'll be sooner than you think.
Maybe.