Sunday, January 30, 2005

Ew.

Just because I happen to casually mention at the grocery store that I do not really like pink lemonade does not give you permission to drink out of the bottle!!

Monday, January 24, 2005

Most depressing day of the year?

Ha! I found this link in Gina's blog. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6847012/ Rather interesting after the way I felt today. I was chalking it up to pregnancy hormones, but now I'm not sure...

I had a maternity leave chat with our HR person today. She's a great gal and I like her a lot, but I was frustrated. I sent her a spreadsheet with vacation/paid-time-off (PTO) hours I expect to earn prior to and after maternity leave (company policy says I will not earn any PTO hours while on short-term-disability). The spreadsheet also had five questions, one being [paraphrase] "Since I won't have worked for the company 12 months by the time I go on maternity leave, I understand I am ineligble for the one week PTO Sycamore gives mothers for maternity leave. Can I take that week as unpaid leave or will it count against my future accrual of PTO?" Obviously HR Beth did not read the document. She brought a folder of documents for me to fill out for the paid week off; when I told her my anniversary falls 20 days after the baby is due, she said, "Oh! Well, you're not eligible for this then. Never mind!" Bah.

(By the way, I sent the spreadsheet to her nearly two weeks ago. She's rescheduled our meeting twice. We're a company of 87 people; could she not prepare for the meeting by at least glancing over my questions or checking to see when my anniversary date is???)

So then I realized, after the meeting was over, not only am I not eligible for the one week PTO for maternity, I also do not qualify for the Family Medical Leave Act job protection clause. The FMLA says companies of more than 50 employees must guarantee employees 12 weeks of unpaid leave for certain situations (maternity leave being one; falling down a waterfall is another) AND guarantee an equivalent job and pay upon the employees return. This means a woman can't go on maternity leave and return to find she's been demoted to a janitor or something like that. I don't think that Sycamore is about to fire me, by any stretch of the imagination. Okay, so my imagination was running wild today and yes, I was thinking Sycamore wants to fire me. I've worked for the company since June and I am not listed in the employee directory, yet a woman who has been with the company since Nov. 1-ish and is through a temp agency IS listed in the directory, as well as several employees who started in the last few weeks. What the crap is that?!

I got myself so worked up today that I was near tears. Ryan was in meetings and I was about to lose it; thank the Lord for Trish. :) She coached me through it over IM - told me to eat some chocolate and yell at my boss. It's all good now. (I did neither. But I feel better. Sort of.)

What else is new? We had snow on Saturday. Not much (6"-ish) and not as bad as predicted (no high winds), but enough that church was canceled for Sunday. Ryan and I slept in, then headed to Target to work on the baby registry. Disclaimer: All Coca-Cola items and Kill Bill dvds are thanks to my husband. We're also registered for a diaper bag and some baby clothes at www.babystyle.com. It's mostly a catalog/online chain, with a few stores in CA, but I've heard they have good quality stuff. And the clothes are adorable! After lunch at TGI Fridays, I went to the Hagerstown outlets with Laura Reynolds and Ryan watched the football game with Simon. Stupid Patriots. I hate them. Not that I like the Steelers, either. I'd rather the Colts have won last week.

I'm heading to Kansas City a week from Friday for a children's pastors' conference. I'm very excited; it's at just the right time. (Translation: I'm approaching burnout.) I've been stuck in the 'woe is me/nobody loves me' valley for awhile now - at work (see above), at church (Pastor said I 'help' with the children - I freaking plan everything!!), and even at home (I cried on Saturday because Ryan didn't tell me 'good job' for finding a cheap airfare). Bah. I don't know how much is pregnancy-related and how much is what I was struggling with prior to pregnancy. My old OB/GYN is coming back to the Frederick practice where I go and my next appointment is with her ... I look forward to talking over some of this with her and getting her input. (She was WONDERFUL back in July when I finally asked for help. I hate the highs and lows of PMS but I felt almost guilty for having issues at 25. She reminded that I have been menstruating for 13+ years and it's okay to have issues. She was the one who started me on Lexapro. I stopped taking it as soon as we suspected I was pregnant, but it really did help for the time I took it. It helped lessen the extremes of the highs and lows and I eventually noticed things that would have bothered me in the past did not bother me as much.)

Okay, enough rambling. I hope all are doing well. I'm beginning to suspect that the same three people who regularly comment on my blog are the only ones who read it. If you read this, comment so I know you are alive!! :)

Monday, January 17, 2005

Anonymity

So I'm not one for the "here, do this" in blogging, but I found this in Cousin Timothy's blog and it seems fun. Leave me an anonymous comment with:

One secret.

One compliment.

One love note.

Lyrics to a song.

How old you are.

How long we've been friends.

And a hint to who you are.


Heh. I just thought of something. I hope you can post anonymously in my blog.

Thursday, January 13, 2005

It's a BOY!!

As some of you know, we've been expecting at our cozy home here in Frederick. Avery joined up a little earlier than expected - he joined us yesterday - Wednesday. I was afraid to post anything until now because he wasn't doing well ... he had the shakes, and he wouldn't eat or drink or go to the bathroom. Tonight is a different story, though! After a bit of quality time in Mom and Dad's room (with the door firmly shut to keep Davis out), he relaxed and even played with a drinking straw he found under the bed. I have to confess, I dropped him in the bathroom a little while ago. But it must have jarred his little bladder because he crawled into the litter box and finally used it, then hopped out and ate some dry food. Yes, folks, Avery is a boy kitty! We finally got a kitten from one of our coworkers. He (the kitten, not the coworker) is about 10 weeks old. I'm fairly certain he has worms, unfortunately. We'll find out for sure when he goes to the vet on Tuesday. If he hadn't perked up tonight like he did, I was planning on taking him to the animal hospital in the morning. We've been worried about our little guy! But he's doing better.

Davis is another story. :) She growls at him through closed doors and she's even more irritable toward us after we've been with the kitten. We're being careful to wash our hands well and keep them apart until we can get him tested for feline leukemia.

We'll keep you posted on our growing family. :)

Tuesday, January 11, 2005

I do eat vegetables, darn it!

I do eat vegetables! A cow-orker was just teasing me that I like Taco Bell (true), McDonalds (not true), Roy Rogers (DEFINITELY not true), and other greasy places more than vegetables. I told her that's not true, that I really don't like greasy foods (look up the effects of greasy foods on an irritable bowel and you'll know why!) and that I do like vegetables. All she said was, "Mmm hmmm." I know she's just teasing, but I want to say "Don't mess with me, lady!"

Ask my mom. I like veggies. It's hard to keep fresh vegetables in the house because Ryan doesn't eat them and they go bad before I finish them. Besides, coworker person, I don't see you bringing vegetables for snacks everyday, so there!

(It all started with her describing collard greens and pouring the 'juice' over corn bread. I nearly gagged - pregnancy, I think - and she said the above statements about fast food. Grr!)