Fall

It’s that time of year when I walk out the door without a jacket and am fine but coming home after work I wonder what I was thinking.  I think I’m finally back in the habit of grabbing something now on the way out, even if it’s not needed.  And our new tree that the city planted out front this year was a nice brilliant red.  I had to snap a picture on my way to work one morning.

 

My traveling has increased for work this year it seems but I still squeeze in some personal trips.  I made it up to Vermont to visit dad and Barbro.  It was strange driving the route I’ve driven so many times over the years by myself, with Nick now.  I finally made it to Scott’s farm’s annual apple tasting event.  They grow hundreds of varieties of heirloom apples and have a nice Sunday morning talk about some of the apples, passing plates with slices of apples amongst the audience for tasting.  It’s like a wine tasting but with apples. 

 

 

 

A coworker of mine, Wayne, is an apple enthusiast and goes annually so it was nice to be able to meet up with him finally.  Also, dad and Barbro had some friends visiting the same weekend so it was a packed weekend of seeing the sites and hiking through the woods.  Still managed to get in a few card games with dad.  I held my own with Jungle Board but lost out on Rummy 500, but not as badly as I usually do.

 

I rewrote a post from earlier this month three times and it still didn’t make it up.  I was doing it on my phone and every time I put my phone down and it locked up it cleared the draft.  Here’s the super abridged version:

Last week I was traveling down to NYC office.  The Acela train was having power issues so had to fly through LaGuardia.  I started to second guess the time I had allotted myself to make the flight and rushed out the door sans breakfast/make-up and randomly throwing stuff into the suitcase.  It all worked out, found one of the last parking spots, security was light and there was even a make-up mirror in the bathroom.  I was strongly aware that I was flying to NYC as I queued up for boarding.  It was me, about 50 dark suits and this one random guy in tourist get-up.  They even had a set-up for you to grab a breakfast bag (bagels, etc) and a paper (I chose NYTimes over Wall Street Journal).  I felt very corporate in my get up, in amongst the rest of the suits.

On the flight back, I got to trump some of the suits and even though I was the last one to the gate for an earlier flight, I trumped the other 3 suits to grab the last stand-by seat.  I think it’s because of my sky mileage.    I still think it’s strange flying to NYC since the entire flight lasts only about 15-20 minutes.  You ascend and straightaway start to descend.  It was a good visit - NYC still hasn’t gotten old for me yet.  Such a unique city with the tall buildings and the busy busy energy in the streets.  Very different than the California visit.

 

I’m at that stage of transition with work.  I’ve managed staff before but am shifting to the next role up which means work has gotten even busier - taking on more responsibilities but not being able to properly delegate the more senior work.  I’ve been looking for new staff, but it’s hard to find the right person.  In the meantime, I’ve been working on developing the skills of my current crew.  Today I sat in on a conference call and instead of leading it had the engineer lead it all.  I sat there silently and bit my tongue.  It was challenging and I realize I do love to talk, but worth it since he did a good job and it builds the skill so I’m no longer needed to attend.  And then this afternoon I was proud that ??  I started writing this a few weeks ago and now can’t remember the rest of that sentence.  Another good reason to post more frequently.  I do feel like I’m getting over the hump of just focusing on the fact I have too much work and working on how to change it.  The secret being that it’s on me.  I’m senior enough that I don’t have a boss to go to and say I can’t take on x project, etc.  It’s my responsibility to figure it all out and work out a solution, not just for me, but for my staff and the company as a whole.  So when it gets hectic, I focus on my zen epiphanies and when that doesn’t work I think about my latest home project that has nothing to do with work worries.  I was talking with a coworker and she said that she runs to deal with work stress and couldn’t believe I didn’t have a stress reliever.  I couldn’t think of one then, but I think that’s what it is.  I’ve always been a nester.  I could stay at home for weeks on end and not have cabin fever.  I love having my little projects and working away on stuff, even if it’s just organizing the pantry.  BTW, did that other day and have a small pile of food that is near or past it’s date that I need to cook with soon.  Half of it is some form of baking chocolate (bittersweet, unsweetend, semi-sweet chips, cocoa powder).  I think I need to do some baking!

Oh, and on a final note, I ran errands this morning.  At CVS I found that the cheap mouth guard you buy over the counter is $40… on sale.  I’m waiting a little while to get acclimated to the price.  Also, my car was making noises from the Vermont trip so dropped it off this morning at the mechanic and found out it had something rusted out and so the brake pads were worn out as a result.  Big price tag to fix it.  And this just after I deposited a nice big check from work (all reimbursable expenses, so it was just getting my money back).  So I felt rich for a moment and now I’m back to feeling poor.  The ups and downs of life!