Archive of Marcia's Musings July 2-8, 2001
Friday, July 6, 2001
I'm Ready!!
All of my contracts are caught up-- NDAs are in place, or at least they are from my side of the work. I've changed my voicemail message to accommodate my location on Monday and Tuesday and, yes, I am already packed!! We have a new set of luggage and, try as I might, I couldn't fit my stuff into the medium-sized suitcase so I had to use the large. The problem with the large, however, is that it is just slightly too big!! So, what I can move from my purse and computer case, I have moved just so I don't have to carry all of that. Of course, if the airline loses my luggage I am sunk cuz I can't even use my computer but, hey, that won't happen, will it? Nah!!!
I left work at my usual time tonight and, a few minutes after I arrived, it occurred to me that I had no airline ticket! Oh, man, was I supposed to go to the travel department and didn't know it? You would've thought that they would've sent me an email telling me to pick up my tickets, wouldn't you? Well, the only name I could remember belongs to the woman who works the early shift-- she left two hours before I was calling. Hmm, now what? I called the main office number and asked the receptionist for advice; she suggested talking to the manager of the department which makes perfect sense so she transferred me. I spoke with Luris for a few minutes and, upon confirming that I did, in fact, have a flight tomorrow, promised that she'd have one of her minioins call me. Within minutes, Samantha called and we discussed the fact that I do have an electronic ticket so there is no physical ticket to have received. Whew!! At least I can breathe again!!
New Rant
I had started a rant about this a few weeks ago and then thought better of it because I thought I was reading the news wrong. Now that it is splashed all over the news (at least the online versions that I typically read), I've gotta comment on something:
What the you-know-what were the Levys' thinking when their daughter said "Oooh, mom and dad-- I'm dating a married man!" Do ya s'pose they said, "Cool, honey, since he's a congressman, it'll really help your career!" Now I'm not saying that the Congressman did or did not have an affair with this girl but the family should've pulled her aside a LLOONNNGGGG time ago to get her away from "dating a married man"!!! This is not a cool or socially acceptable thing!! What kinda family lets their child/niece think that its okay to date a married guy, regardless of his profession? Oh, yes, I know what kind of family: the kind that keeps their mouth shut about it until its TWO MONTHS LATER and the girl still hasn't shown up. ARGGHHHH!!! Some people's parents!!!!
Until Wednesday . . .
Assuming that my return flights work the way that they're supposed to, I'm supposed to be back on Tuesday night. That means that you'll get an update from me on Wednesday night but, rest assured, Barbara will be back with her usual writing flair to describe our weekend in Atlanta before me.
So, until Wednesday, have a nice day, a nice evening, a nice weekend and take good care of each other!!
Thursday, July 5, 2001Closer and Closer Yet
Until I go to Atlanta, there are two days until I leave-- I'm almost ready at work but, the best part is the planning for Sunday! Barbara is great at research and she is doing a ton of it-- I am pretty sure we've got most, if not all, of Sunday planned, including dinner: Pittypat's Porch!! This is going to be alot of fun, indeed but the best part is getting to meet Barbara, of course!
As for work, well, I finished up the backlog I had of agreements today-- there was a state contract for a maintenance renewal. It has been sent off to the customer so we'll see what I get for a reaction. One of the documents that I'm currently working on is a new bid offer for another state government but I need input from other people to finish it. The same goes for the one commercial deal that I have open-- people need to be better about responding to their email and voicemail. It makes it particularly difficult to do my job if they don't!!
I may have mentioned a few weeks back about a customer who had to review and execute a document that he messed up and I fixed and sent back to him. He has been sitting on the revision since June 11 and, during the weeks of June 18 and 25, I called him every day and left voicemail to call me with the status of the document-- all he had to do was set it up for signature and check the one place that I fixed (at his request because he was going on vacation and didn't have time to do the work-- its his job to fix documents!!) and send it off to be signed!! I couldn't get him to even return my phone calls-- every one was under strict orders in my office that if they talked with him, they were to transfer him to me but, every time he called, he would conveniently call and talk to the only person who didn't know to transfer him to me!!
I got fed up and called the sales rep for the account and asked for another contact-- he gave me a woman's name, I called and left her a (as in ONE) voicemail on Tuesday (oh, yes, the fact that I may be starting a vicious-cycle ran through my head, too). Today, I received a call from the guy I'd been trying to reach for three weeks!! His "greeting"? "I hear you've been calling all over trying to get me to sign this document . . ." My response? "Oh, that would be the document I sent to you on June 11 that I revised for you." I didn't bother to tell him that I only called one other person, one time-- no, I'm not a forgiving person!! Anyway, the gist of it is that he said he'd maybe be able to get back to me by Monday. (Since today was their "Friday" based on a four-day work week, I could understand that.) "No problem," I said, "I'll be in the Atlanta office on Monday-- I could probably get David (the sales rep) to bring me over to your office so I could pick it up from you."
Yes, now I know the sound of panic in his voice: "Oh?? Uh, sure-- you could do that." I gave him the phone number for the office in Atlanta and asked him to give me a call there, depending on my schedule, maybe I could swing by to meet him. Its fun to panic people sometimes, ya know?
List Maker
Well, its time to make up my list of things to bring with me to Atlanta so I'd better get going. I brought the luggage-- yes, all of it-- upstairs tonight because I don't know which one will work for my clothes and which ones I don't need . . . Barbara said she had a truck, right? I could fill all of the suitcases-- sure, I could-- that would be easy!! Then, again, I'm only going for four days and three nights and if I brought everything, Brian might get freaked and I don't want to do that!! (Or do I?) Hmmm...
Have a nice evening!
Wednesday, July 4, 2001Happy Fourth Of July!!!!
If you've got the day off today, enjoy it!! So far, we've slept in a bit, at least compared to the time that we got up yesterday or will get up tomorrow.
The Day Itself
Brian's already got the laundry washed and now its in the dryers. We needed to get it done today so that I'd have time to iron whatever I need to pack for my trip over the weekend. When the dryers are finished, I'll go down and hang it up and fold it and he'll come down to carry it up for me. Then, I'll be able to start the ironing. It has cooled down here today-- much to all of the accu-lie forecasters' surprises!! I shouldn't have a problem with the heat so I'll be able to do all of the ironing that's backed up on me again.
I'm also changing my nail polish cuz it wasn't going to make it through the trip next week and I didn't want to have to go through the process while traveling. (It may take away from our shopping time!)
Searches
I know its only the 4th but in checking my stats, someone has searched on "Contract Negotiator Resume" and clicked in to my resume for a total of 15% of search responses that hit my site. That's a higher number than I've had for that search type in a long, long time sooooo, I decided that I would go ahead and update my resume online here. For anonymity's sake, I'm still not revealing the company name but I've updated my responsibilities especially since they've changed quite a bit since I began working with the company. When/If I ever leave this company, I'll reveal their name and hide the next company's name-- its just a tradition I have to keep up at this point. ;>)
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More later if the mood strikes me or something momentous happens. If not, I'll see you tomorrow and you should have a nice day and evening in the interim!
Tuesday, July 3, 2001Here We Go . . . Again!!
Its HOT again-- the temperature above (at Moffett by the Bay) is not right and it ticks me off!! It is close to a 98F inside and outside and I'm melting!! I guess I just need to consider it as practice for next week!!
Plans Are Afoot . . . Again!!
I am nothing if not prepared!! Well, as you know from Barbara's and my pages, we are excited about meeting up in Atlanta-- should be lots of fun!! She's sent me some websites of places that we're going to check out while we're there so we will have a jam-packed day indeed!! Okay, so we both qualify to be Boy Scouts!! ;>)
Barbara mentions in her post that I've met the most Netwidows and, I have to say she's correct and I'm thrilled to say that that has been pleasure to accomplish!! I've met Shelley before she was a Netwidow and Keri before she decided not to be and, of course, I've met myself. I am definitely looking forward to running around Atlanta with Barbara-- I've only driven through it and heard about it is definitely going to be helpful that she has some experience being there!!
More Accomplished
While I do have a ton of stuff in the backlog of agreements to review, my desk is starting to resemble a desk again! Wow, I thought that the desktop was lost forever!! Hopefully, I'll have this stuff done by Friday when I leave work-- if not, I'll be bringing some work with me, for sure!!
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Well, I hate to be negative but it is way too hot to sit at this computer any longer. Hopefully, tomorrow will be better but don't hold your breath as we are supposed to hit the triple digits for sure!! Yep, you guessed it: I can hardly wait!!
Have a nice evening-- especially if you're cooler than me!!
Monday, July 2, 2001News Of The Day!!
The biggest news of the day: I'm going to Atlanta on Saturday!!! The second piece of Big News today? Barbara Thompson is going to Atlanta on Saturday!!! Hmmm, sounds like the forces of nature will be colliding this weekend, doesn't it?? The flights that my office were going to schedule for me had me arriving at 11pm on Monday night-- that was just arriving at the airport, not the hotel!!! Then, I'd've had to get up for an 8am meeting in a different time zone that's three hours earlier-- I asked the travel agent why she was bothering to book a hotel room cuz I didn't see the need for it. She didn't laugh too much at that one but, once I told my director the schedule that they had me booked for, she told me to book through on a Saturday evening (late evening, actually) arrival and then I will work from the office in Atlanta on Monday. Several of the reps have already told me that they're looking forward to my being there so that we can put our heads together on some deals-- cool!! Sounds like useful time spent to me!!!
Barbara and I will have Sunday to do fun things while I get aclimated to the time zone-- she's even agreed to go shopping!!! (No, Bob-- do not let the air out of the tires on her car!!! She's going to come to Atlanta!!) So far, we know that we're going to go to The Underground, which is shopping and eating . . . underground Atlanta and then, from there? Well, we're going to see what there is to see. Barbara has been there before so I'll have to rely on her ability to get us around using the Metro system, etc. Should be lots of fun, at any rate!! Gives us both something to look forward to on the weekend!!
Other than that . . .
Work was work except that I was a bit lost-- someone called and said "Whatever happened to the NDA that we were doing with X-n-So Company?" Hey, ya know what? I couldn't remember it at all!!!!! I had to stop and look through all of my email-- filed (in the email folder) and unfiled (250+ in my Inbox!!) to figure out where that document had been left. Turns out, the guy should've been bugging the sales reps cuz that's who had dealt with the document and the customer last. I've got a jillion files to make up on my desk-- okay, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration but, people are coming into my office (and leading tours) to point out the piles of papers on my desk!! I'm usually very neat (although you'd never know it from my desk at home) at work and its making me crazy!! I've gotta get those files made up!!!
Aunt-Like Things
Since I've been home from work, I've made some banana bread for Natali-- I'm going to send her home with a loaf of it and I'm going to keep a loaf. (I can keep a loaf of banana bread because I made it with low-fat and low-calorie things so that the total points in the loaf at 26.5!!! That's amazing!!) I figured I had an obligation to send her home with something "homemade"-- even if in the sweltering heat (Oh, yes, Shelley-- you're very glad you're at the coast this week!) I'm really, really, REALLY hot!! I have to do these aunt-ly things, don't I? Oh, I didn't?? Oh, well!! Too late now!!
Anyway-- gotta run and try to find some cool some place. Have a nice evening!
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