Had a very down-time filled weekend - I pretty much spent the whole weekend doing almost nothing but eating and dozing. I guess I was more stressed out than I thought I was.

Documentation for work is going to kill me though. I spent about 5 hours writing on Saturday - it reminded me of high school. Typing is a lot faster for me, but the notes had to be hand written. Aghh. Haven't felt that kind of wrist pain in a long time. Can't say I miss it. :P

I guess this is why there's speculation that penmanship will die, since computers are everywhere now. I guess that's pretty sad. :( .. though to be honest, it's not like I have great penmanship myself since I never really liked cursive writing.

Someone told me that I write like a left-hander even though I'm right handed. I wonder what that means. I guess maybe I write my letters differently? That might be due to the fact that my writing is a combination of printing and cursive.. but I heard that a lot of people tend to do that once they reach adulthood.


(Had this to eat today - it's an instant noodle bowl that I bought in Japan at the Nissin Instant Noodle museum. It's supposedly Wakayama influenced.. hmm.)

( More! )

Another fun filled week up ahead - going to be working late all week. Hope it goes okay. :/

So glad this week is over. Been like the week from .. some bizarro stress awful-ville.

It started out okay. Had a lot of work to do, but I usually do. Wednesday onwards, it was a nightmare. Just bad. And everytime I thought it was done being bad, it would get worse. What gives?

I'll talk in vague terms because of work, but generally speaking:

Wednesday: Had to deal with a very argumentative professional who repeteadly told me that they were 'very expensive' and that I was wasting their time because we weren't making a decision at that EXACT MOMENT. Too bad I didn't actually invite them, they invited themselves. Like I care you're damn expensive, your client hired you. Not me.

Thursday: Sat in front of a gate for 3.5, almost 4 hours trying to convince someone to come home and talk to me. I finished work at 9:30pm. Awesome.

Friday: Had same person from Thursday state that I was causing them mental anguish/hurting their feelings because someone else had kept calling them the day before. They thought it was me, even though I told them it wasn't. Required to maintain professional demeanor while said person took my reputation and smeared it across the floor. No rebuttal made during process because I recognize that 'he said, she said' is pretty pointless and doesn't get us anywhere. Wasn't able to get any other work done, but I still didn't end up finishing work till 8:30pm. Awesome.

Honestly. So tired of this week. So tired of this wtfness.

I guess the Social Work Gods' hate me this week. Hopefully it doesn't extend into the weekend, because this is just stupid.

--

Though it's not my Thanksgiving week(end), I have to say I'm just thankful I have people to talk to about the crap that goes on at work. It's really helpful to know that your colleagues are supportive and understanding, and that there's a realistic reason why I feel so frustrated. In my last job, I never really had a chance to talk to someone about the stuff I had to deal with, so it was a lot harder - not only do I need to deal with the attitude from my clients, I need to deal with the attitude from my colleagues. It's just difficult when you feel like you can't talk about anything with anyone - especially due to confidentiality issues.

It's also really insulting that people think I literally wake up in the morning and decide - okay, let me see. Which parent should I terrorize today? I need to take a child, who's a good target?! I'm in a crap mood, let me make a parent miserable! :DDDDD

Like really? I know child welfare has a bad reputation, and I understand that, I really do. But I don't wake up in the morning and think about how I'm going to screw you over. My purpose in life is not to terrorize you and make you hate me. Really. Like honestly, what purpose would that serve? Oh great, you hate me. And then what? The issues are still there, they're not being resolved. I prefer collaboration over having to call police in to make you work with me. Don't you? We both have lives that we want to get back to, we all want to eat dinner on time. Why does this have to be so difficult sometimes? I can only repeat the same statement (No, I am not here to take your child) so many times before it really gets pointless.

I worry about who I'll talk to about stuff once I move to a new office. :/

Oh well. Take things as they come, I suppose.

(A building in Kyoto's National Garden. Nice splash of colour since the day was all gloomy and such)


(Pretty! - taking this was a nightmare though. We went on a tour with like 200 other people and ONE guide - this meant you couldn't hear half the time and everyone kept getting into other people's pictures. Loren claims it was a big highlight for him because I spent the whole time angrily swearing under my breath because people kept ruining my shots)

Uber tired at work today - I guess partly because I slept late, but I also didn't sleep very well. Spent most of the afternoon staring pointlessly at a spot on my cubicle. Pretty sad. :/

Note to self: When starving from not eating enough breakfast, don't eat lunch so fast you feel sick after. Bad idea.

Work is work - mostly depressing, the environment still sucks because you have no idea if more people will be laid off. I got a bunch of new families though, which makes it interesting - I just don't really know what to do, since I have no idea if I'll even have a job in a month. How do I conduct a transfer meeting with a family when I might only be their worker for like.. a couple days? It makes any sort of planning and thinking ahead rather hard - but I guess that's pretty selfish of me. I'm trying, but I'm just human, you know? :P

So much to worry about, even though I know worrying doesn't help. Aiyes. Hopefully it'll be a better day tomorrow. :/

(Colours for the house - kitchen, bathrooms, foyer, etc.. + matching counter-tops. Blergh. -> I actually took this on my camera phone.. not bad, huh?)

The theme lately seems to be colours.

On Monday we went to the decor centre for our new house to talk about wiring and whatever. They said the appointment would take about an hour.. it really took like 10 minutes. Since it went so quickly, the person helping us said we could probably pick out colours for home. Totally random, since I hadn't been expecting that - but it was good that we could get it all done in one visit instead of having to go back. We ended up picking colours for the floor tiles/wall tiles/counters/cabinets and upgrades. It was more painful than I thought it would be. I'm not very good at that kind of thing. :/ - if you ask me, everything in the house will be neutral.. which can be rather boring. I'm kind of worried how the house will end up looking with my myriad collection of whites, beiges and light browns. :/

Also spent the weekend trying to pick wedding colours. We went to a hardware store and raided their paint sample department, because that seems like the best way to figure out exactly what it is you want, visually. It worked okay, I think - I now officially consider paint samples the best thing ever. I think we've mostly decided on colours. Kinda. A rich orange with a pale green and ivory. I might change my mind if the bridesmaid dresses end up being too difficult or uber tacky. We'll see. >.>

Have also been trying to find something to wear for holiday parties that I have to go to - it's proving to be way more difficult than I thought it would be. Most stores still seem to be transitioning from fall to winter, so they're trying to sell off all the fall clothes. Not much there for the holiday season.. which is bad. Have a semi-formal thing to attend on the weekend.. and I don't really own semi-formal clothes. I have normal, casual clothes .. then I have really formal clothes that I wear to court for work. I hope something comes out this week or else I'm really screwed. :/

Have also had 2 friends I haven't talked to in a while send me messages lately. It's kind of odd, but nice to catch up. Will have to see how that all pans out.

Gahhhh, so don't wanna work in the morning. :(

(Bet you haven't seen this in North America - new thing at McDonald's in HK .. chocolate pie. Apparantly it's great if you're a chocolate lover.)


(.. and what the pie actually looks like out of the box)

Since the official message that there will be layoffs, work has been bad the past few days. Just eerie silence, everyone waiting to see if they'll get notified.

They had mentioned last week that they would phone Supervisors on Monday to let them know if someone in their department will be let go. I had case meetings with my Supervisor scheduled yesterday, so we literally spent the whole time freaking out every time the phone rang. Of course, no one from head office actually called in the end.

Today, I went to meet a family in the morning and got back to the office shortly before 1. I didn't get any calls, so I figured that: 1) they didn't fire me and 2) they should be done with firing people by now. Instead, I find out that no, they were not done firing people and they were dragging the process out. Walking people to a room in front of all the staff.. so you knew exactly who was getting fired and what they looked like after the meeting. What gives. Like come on. It's a bad enough process already, do these people really need to be paraded in front of everyone else who still luckily has a job? And what are the rest of us supposed to say? That sucks? I'm sorry? Like .. what are you supposed to do?

I swear, the whole process has been so stretched out, it's aggravating. Honestly, the past few days have been mental torture in the office. No one can get anything done, the tension is so thick you can cut it with a knife, everyone is freaking out, panicking, scared. Like really, is this supposed to be a good work environment? The whole situation is like trying to remove a band-aid. Just RIP IT OFF aka JUST TELL US. After you tell people, the first few minutes will be bad, but at least you'd know. Dragging it out, having everyone freak out every time their phone rings is not helpful or even good in any way. And it's not like they didn't know who they'd fire. They did. So why drag it out for so damn long?

My team-member dragged me out to lunch after I got back because the environment was so bad, and our Supervisor had just been taken to "the room". We get back and find out that our Administrative Assistant got fired, along with our Supervisor.. and no one could understand why. When my Supervisor's boss told my team (.. or the people in my team who were actually around, since everyone else called in sick or left - don't blame them), we just stared at him. Like really, what's the criteria for firing her? Compared to the multitude of .. not that great Supervisors who are still around.. why her in particular?

So we have no answers, and I have to go to a big staff meeting tomorrow so they can "explain" why they did what they did. Supposedly. I wonder if they'll actually explain anything.

It's just such a crappy day. One would think it could have been done differently - instead of parading the people who got fired in front of everyone. :/

At this stage, it looks like they fired a lot of administrative staff and a couple supervisors. I guess we'll find out the damage tomorrow. Awesome.

---

Wedding update:

Looking at invitations now and trying to decide on a colour scheme. It's hard. So much harder than I thought it would be - Loren ended up picking the colours for the invitations because I just had no idea what to go with.

I guess the invitation doesn't necessarily have to match the venue colour scheme/flowers/whatever. I don't know. Thinking about this is just.. hard when I have work on my mind. I think I need to go to a hardware store and look at paint swatches to get a better idea. :/

(While in HK, we took the ferry over to Cheung Chau (about an hour), which is a little island that is home to the only olympic medal winner from HK - she won a gold for windsurfing in 1996)

Our provincial government is projected to have a massive deficit - so finally yesterday, the agency announced that they'll be doing lay-offs.

So far, it's only 18 people - half from the union, half not. Supposedly, it's mostly made up of people who are not in core services (ie: workers who don't go out and meet with clients), but pretty much anything can happen. Needless to say, people are panicking - the firing from the union side is going to be based upon senority, not how good you are at your job. Lots of people have only worked at the agency for a year or so.. which makes it hard to say who's really on the chopping block.

They've said that they're not going to fire contract staff (myself) but if they fire a Supervisor, and the Supervisor decides to go for a demotion and go back to frontline, then they will have to fire contract staff to make way for them. Problem for the Supervisor is if they choose to do that, they will begin with no senority, making them ranked lower than people they had been previously supervising.. which also means if the agency decides to do ANOTHER round of lay-offs, they'd be cut first.

The environment is absolutely toxic at the agency today. No one's really there - most are sick or working from home. Of course people are scared about what will happen, which makes doing any work absolutely impossible. People are supposed to be informed by Tuesday, so things are supposed to continue as normal. But really, unless you're doing visits or something, it's really hard to focus on paperwork if you think you're going to get fired. I'm way overtime for the week, so I just took the afternoon off to stay home.

I swear, maybe I should go into a different line of work. If I get laid-off, that's like the 2nd time in a year I've gotten fired for the exact same reason. And it's not like there's a plentiful outpouring of jobs waiting for me. I'm already working for the best employer within the field - it's basically a government job, is in an area that is always funded (child welfare) and pretty much NEVER fires people since people quit from stress instead. Yet again, here we are.

I. AM. SO. SICK. AND. TIRED. OF. THIS. BULLSHIT.

So yeah. Stressssssssssssssssssssss, wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

(I took this from the plane so excuse slight fuzziness - we were flying over the mountainous areas of mainland China and we passed by this lake which had lots and lots of roads leading to it)

Uber tired. Basically worked from 9:30am-9pm today, which was an interesting experience. Back-roads driving with high beams is preeeeeeetty neat. Also, trying to stay focused when a kid rambles to you about how much they love Hannah Montana is great fun. Or which Jonas brother they think is really good looking. Wheeeeeeee, awesome.

Otherwise, work is going well. Lots to do, don't have enough time to get it all done when I have to juggle training with it. People have progressed from freaking out about their jobs to H1N1. Wewt.

I can see why it's easy to fall behind with paperwork though - I'm juggling 9 families and it can get pretty intense. I don't even want to imagine juggling another 10 more.

---- Wedding rambling to follow ----

Wedding planning is moving along, since I realize now that time is dwindling and I reallllllllllllly need to get started on everything. We managed to book a photographer over the weekend, which was nice. We had narrowed it down to two choices - I had my first choice, which I decided on since I had a chance to talk to the photographers at some wedding shows I'd been and I really loved their style.. but they were slightly out of our price range. We looked up option two because they were cheaper and also had an interesting style to their pictures. In essence, both of them did more than just blur the edges to make things more "artsy" - you laugh, but you have no idea HOW MANY people advertise wedding photography and seriously, their whole portfolio is just blurry wedding shots. Wow, so artistic.

Anyhow - arranging to meet option two was much more difficult than it should have been. I emailed them at this time last week, and also called them on Wednesday. I was told that since we're getting married on (Canadian) Thanksgiving weekend, they'll have to see if they're working and they'll get back to me in a day or so. Well, it's been a week or so. Does that mean no? When I initially asked several weeks back (before we left on the trip), they had said that date was fine. So.. what's going on?

We ended up meeting with option one just because we had scheduled to, and it ended up going really well. The photographer actually planned my whole day's timeline for me (!!!) because.. well, I hadn't done anything. So he suggested what would be a good time to start, where to go, etc. It was nice - I actually felt like I was getting somewhere. After all the calculations including what we wanted and what not, the end price was pretty good - much better than what we had anticipated.. slightly more expensive, but still within budget for the most part (we kind of got a discount). We talked about it a bit after the meeting and decided just to go with the place - they had what we wanted originally, the price was decent and option two was still slacking. I hope it all goes well though. O.o - we're supposedly doing an engagement shoot too in the summer sometime.. need to start scouting locations. :P

We also have scheduled to meet with invitation people this weekend to start considering invites and what not. It also means I need to develop a colour scheme .. since I don't even have an inkling of one at the moment. Picking colours is more complicating than I thought it would be. I don't want it to be like uber rustic, pumpkin patch wedding. I also don't want to use colours that are completely not even in season. I'm thinking a pale-ish green + bold orange + soft beige. Or some combination of that .. since I like how green looks, I think orange would be a nice compliment.. and beige/ivory is basically the colour scheme of our reception hall so might as well use it. I can't really find anything visually to demonstrate what I mean though - hopefully the invitation person will help. :/

So.. I still need to:
- book DJ (we have one in mind based on recommendations.. just need to talk to the guy)
- flowers (have another recommendation.. but no colour scheme = no flowers)
- cupcakes (picked one, just need to order .. again, no colour scheme = no decision)
- attire (no idea where to even begin.. but I think the guys have a scheduled appointment at some tux place)
- photo-booth

.. and we still need to decide on the wedding party. Weep. -.-

I swear, if you're like me and most of your friends are male.. and you don't really have that many female friends (read: 3) you're sooooooooooooo screwed.

I mean, I do have female friends.. but I don't want the wedding party to be a free-for-all. I'd at least like to pick people I can talk to for more than 20 minutes. It makes it worse when people you want to include are overseas. AGKASGJ. -.-

(took this on the way to Osaka from HK - I like how everything looks like it's in minature. :D)

Woot, turning 26 on Oct 26th. Must be a sign! :) .. of what, I have no idea but hey. Big things happening in the next year, so I guess that must be it.

I think I'm finally getting over jetlag. Mostly. I still get random bursts of tiredness, but yeah. I'm just really trying to stay awake a bit later because going to bed at 10 means I wake up at 5 or so. I don't have to wake up till 8.. so yeah. Sleep later!

I took the day off work and did nothing for the most part. Felt nice, especially since work is starting to pick up pace and it's like OMG OMG OMG so much to do. It doesn't help that our province is going through a budget deficit, so they've cut funding to child welfare. Right now, they're going through reviews because if you cut funding to child welfare, you're really just screwing over kids who are already in (mostly) cruddy environments. Of course, this raises the possibility of layoffs, which results in everyone going crazy about the possibility of getting fired. It's like - really, I don't know why you permanent full-time people are crying.

Okay, that's a lie. I know why people are panicking. Mortgages, car payments, yadda yadda. But really, it's not something you can control, and not something that'll make you feel better the more you think and panic about it. I'm on a contract, so I'd be cut first and there's really nothing I can do about that. Whatever happens, happens. What can you really do? Deal with the cards as they are dealt, you know?

Or maybe that's just my way of coping. Who knows.

In other news, I should probably write some blurbs about vacation. Work in progress .. I only just got caught up with all the tv shows I missed. XD I'll get to it eventually. Or maybe I'll just use most of the pictures for everyday posts. :)

(Yes, I know. Crappy pic, but I'm kind of in a rush. XD - Isn't my green suitcase so purty? :P)

Alright - time to leave!

I'm slightly tired.. I think I slept for like 3 hours. -.-

Not really looking forward to the Hong Kong weather (30ish degrees celsius, 79% humidity - .. kill me now)

Anyhow. See you guys in 18 days! (or sooner, internet access depending)

Finally finally done packing. Well, mostly. I still have some stuff left to stuff into the suitcase, but I'll have to wait until I'm done brushing my teeth and such tomorrow. Vacation still seems surreal though, almost can't believe it's happening.

Work was a killer today - getting everything in order, making sure I connected with all my contacts. So glad that's done with, but I think I'll miss the work - it's stressful, but I like it. You just get used to the motions, it's weird once it stops.

I wonder how much I should sleep, I need to be up in like 5ish hours. FUN!

Will try to post a picture before I leave. :)

(Saw these off to the side of a neighbour's yard.. too good not to take a picture of it. So cute!)

Somewhat surreal that vacation is so soon! Have crapload of stuff still left to do and I'm not done packing. Wewt.

I realized today that one of my biggest pet peeves -EVER- are loud breathers. It drives me insane. I understand, yes, you have to breathe, yadda yadda. But holy crap, when I can feel you exhaling air onto my arm, it makes me want to hurt things. This is especially evident when I'm in training or a meeting, and the loud breathing actually somewhat overlaps the person who's talking, so I just end up hearing a lot of breathing noises and not much else. What are you supposed to say in those situations? - Excuse me sir, please stop breathing because I can't hear what the presenter is saying. Thanks?

I supposed I could get up and move, but it's one of those round table things.. and there really wasn't anywhere to move to. I had also nonchalantly tried to stick a finger in my ear so I didn't have to hear the HEAVY. DRONING. BREATHING. I guess someone, somewhere, must have known that I was at a point where I was considering doing bodily harm to myself because suddenly, someone had to leave while we were doing group work. I got asked to move over to a new section. WOOOO! RELIEF. I CAN HEAR MYSELF THINK AGAIN. If there are moments where the religious believe that there is indeed a higher power in the world somewhere, this has to be it. Thank you, my agnostic higher power. Or just coincidence. Or whatever. As long as I don't have to listen to anymore of that, I'll thank anyone.

Another highlight in my job, was meeting someone who asked me if the agency's role was to provide them with fast food. Because, the kids really WANTED fast food, so if I work in child welfare, my job is to make the kids happy, right?

Uh. What?

Just because children want fast food it doesn't mean they need fast food. They just need food. Sure, because of financial issues, you'll have to wait maybe a few months or so before you can provide them with such an experience, but it's a perk, not a need. My job is to make sure the kid is being fed, cleaned and treated properly. Not whether the child gets access to fried chicken. I understand the idea behind it, as a parent you want to give your kids what they want. I didn't grow up filthy rich either, but fast food was pretty staggered - whether due to finances or what not. And that was fine, I survived. Also, just because you belong to a different culture, it doesn't mean you'll die if you eat something different every once in a while. I understand that it's not the best solution, but if you can't stock your fridge within your own capabilities, food is food, especially if it's free. You can't pick and choose that you only want this specific food, or that macaroni and cheese is below you. It's like - do you starve, or do you eat the pasta? Your child will survive without eating specific cultural food every day. Seriously.

So yeah. I have so much stuff to do for my clients before I leave. Weep. -.-

Days till vacation: 1 (ZOMG!)

(passed by a film scene downtown.. looks like they're trying to film some swat people moving?)

Went to one of the bigger bridal shows early this morning - I mainly went to get more ideas about photographers and invitations. Finding a good photographer is important to me - the pictures are really what you'll be looking at for the next x amount of years, so they better be good. Good can also be pretty damn pricey though, which is the bad part.

I'm not as keen on videography though - I didn't realize there was such a market for it. When I went to a bridal show in January, there was maybe 1 videographer set up.. and their stuff was pretty cruddy. Today, pretty much every photographer was also selling a videographer, yadda yadda. There were showcases of massive storybook productions like the Groom picking up the Bride in a lovely carriage, etc. Or there were plot lines - like the happy couple getting pulled over by a "police officer" and arrested, etc. It was.. odd. I seriously wonder how many people watch the videos from their wedding day. I understand the concept of it - you get a chance to actually 'observe' your wedding rather than living it. The problem is, I'm not a big fan of watching myself. So.. why would I ever want to re-watch myself getting married? It's like one of those things you do at the time because you thought it'd be a good idea, then you don't look at it again until someone asks 20 years later. Just strange to me.

I got the opportunity to try out a Dyson vacuum cleaner at one of the registry stands though. That was pretty neat. I totally want one. >.>

Next step is setting up some consultations with photographers .. hopefully they still have our wedding date open. Also need to check in with a vendor for bilingual invitations. Should be good. :)

(yummy goodness - just wish it didn't have so much wrapping and what not)

I love the crisp autumn days where you get home from work, remove the evil bra of doom, sit in your favourite chair and enjoy the fresh breeze drifting in from the window. It's just so nice to enjoy how things are at that moment - the sunlight, the silence, the breeze. Easily one of the things I look foward to the most about getting home. (I apologize for the slightly NSFW-ness of that opening sentence)

Had a couple client meetings today - at one of them, the Mom talked my ear off for like 2 hours. About everything. I think if I didn't get up and leave, she would have kept talking. She was still talking to me as I was putting my shoes on, looking for my keys, etc. The funny thing was, throughout this conversation, she would keep mentioning that she had an appointment set up, she was reallllllllly late and holy shit, so late so late.. but let me tell you this other bit about my child, yadda yadda. Good geebus, woman. Just get going already!

I hate how on the days when you can't sleep in, you really want to.. but on the days where you can actually get away with sleeping in another 10-15 minutes, you're actually well-rested. It's like some massive conspiracy in the making.

I can't believe vacation is in 5 days! I haven't started packing at all, so much left to do. :/

Days till vacation: 5

I was talking to my Supervisor today, and she mentioned that in her experience of working in child welfare, she's had many cases where she passes personal judgement on what happened. Of course, she keeps the opinion to herself, but the point is - if you judge, it's normal.

Though I work in the social services, it's really interesting to see how organizational culture can vary so much even though they all might have the same target population that they work with. It's fascinating to me, mainly because I think with social services, there's this idea that we're all bleeding heart activists who advocate for lost causes, etc. We're also told to be aware of bias and judging when we work with people, and that in general - judging is a bad thing. You should never judge, because if you do, that makes you a bad, horrible, evil, (insert another bad word) social worker. There is one definition of judging - if you ever do it, you should tell yourself you're a bad person. That being said, you're also told that most of the time you should rely on your own judgement, though you're not supposed to be having one.

In my last job, I was working with a particular client in the way I was told to by my Supervisor - be distant because she's clingy, and keep tabs on her to make sure things get done. So I did that, and one of my colleagues/mentor/Idon'tevenknowwhatshewas said she felt I had a lot of animosity toward the client. I denied it, and this conversation went on for a while until I said - okay, I'm not going to deny that I've made judgements on her lifestyle. That just opened the flood-gates, and I was basically told I needed to "get over it" and that I was harming my client, even though this perceived animosity was merely my way of maintaining distance. Apparantly, by saying I had made a judgement on the client, it automatically meant I had animosity, and therefore I was horrible and evil and the poor woman was going to the dogs. (For the record, I really didn't have any animosity toward the client - I don't deny that I judged her for making some piss poor decisions which led to the situation she was in, but I honestly don't care enough to act like a prick just because I think she made some bad decisions. I was much more interested in trying to be a positive influence.)

This has bothered me for a while, mainly because I think the words "judge" and "judgement" have such negative connotations in the social work field. To say it means you're a bad person. But I don't think it's that black and white, especially when you're working with people.

As a social worker, or anyone that works in social services, you often spend your time trying to help your client access services that address their needs. In order to understand what it is they need, one has to make a certain judgement on the client. Are they single? Are they married? Do they have children? Have the children lacked structure? What kind of supports does this person have? etc. etc. One can call this gathering information, but I still need to analyze it. By doing so, I'm obviously making a judgement on them. The point really lies in what I do after I've made that judgement. Am I acting differently toward this person because I feel that they're idiots? Or am I acting differently because it's what they need? (ie: learn to take on more responsibility and not leaning on me to live their life for them) Have I progressed from making an informed judgement into making one that makes me so biased toward them that I can't see what they need? What is the next step that I'm taking?

This tends to draw a fine line between being a judgey bastard and being a warm, welcoming worker. However, by telling people that they're horrible and evil for judging isn't really a solution either. The two are ultimately intertwined and I think judging is normal - in the sense that we pass judgement on the information we're gathering about someone else. Are they going to be relateable to me, should I be nervous about them, etc. It's whether that judgement effectively colours my future interactions with said person that matters. Do I act like a complete jackass to the guy in the next cubicle merely because he has bad style or doesn't throw out his apple cores? I don't think it's necessarily healthy to tell people that they should deny their thought process or to pretend they're some kind of autonomous robot. It's disappointing when you feel you can't discuss things with your colleagues because they'll know you're a judger. Like holy shit, fire alarms and sirens, I am a judger. DON'T LOOK! Wouldn't it be a better idea just to accept fallacies that come with human nature and learn to recognize them? Isn't that a better response than chastizing?

I guess this mentality varies though, depending on the level of work you're doing. I work in child protection, and honestly 99% of our work is documenting our judgements on caregivers. I work with nothing but judgers. It's all we do, since that's the only thing we can usually rely on. It's almost refreshing to work with colleagues like this since I'm finally able to discuss things without worrying that I'm not being completely judge-free and whatever. It's a nice change.

So yeah. I'm a judger.

(we drove by the construction site again and found a home being built which was the same model as the one we bought
- much bigger than we anticipated when we saw it IRL and not on paper)

Week is winding down already - can't believe tomorrow's Thursday! Have so much left to do before the trip, fun fun fun. Went on a shopping trip after work today to buy some more gifts for people I'll be seeing, but I think I forgot a few more things. Will need to do more shopping later in the week for a some more last minute items.

I'm antsy about a video game I pre-ordered, which was supposed to come in on Tuesday but has been pushed back till Friday. REALLLLLLLLLLLLY hope it comes in, I was planning to play it on the plane. Really hope it doesn't get delayed till after I leave or something.

Work is going okay - had one of those super fun training days today. There were good bits to it - you really learned what every department does and where it fits into the organization. However, it just felt like they were trying to cram too much info into too small of a timeframe, so you had some people just talk supersupersupersuper fast to try and cover all the material. When that happens, I find that I blank out on what they're saying - it's too hard for me to follow what they're saying + process it when they're talking so super fast. It's not like there's a break in there somewhere, and you get a chance to digest what they said. Nope. They're just rambling on and on and on and it's like .. holy crap, are you ever going to stop? O.o They also don't tend to have powerpoints or whatever that you can reference, so you're just literally staring at them as they keep talking and talking about a project that you can't really follow. Awesome.

In summary: short and sweet is fantastic for explaining your department - I get a sense of what you do, and I'll remember it. If only more people did that in presentations. Less is more!

On a good note - I called up a credit card company who had closed off my account several months back. They never gave me an explanation, and when I called originally, they said that they would mail me a letter explaining their course of action, and that I should check my credit report, but there was nothing they could tell me. 5 months later, I never got said letter and my credit report is all clear.. so what gives? When I called today, they told me that I was deliquent on a payment which was why they cancelled my card - completely untrue. I've never even been late on a payment, much less delinquent. The service rep looked up the info and found that I was right - I've had the card since 2004 and I've never ever missed a payment. So they profusely apologized, and it should all be back in order within a couple days. Wewt. Maybe I should have gone into righteous fury and demanded something, since they seem to hate my business that much. That being said, the person I talked to was really friendly and at least she gave me answers. If the person in April had told me what the problem was, this could have been sorted out a long time ago. -.- Of course, I also recognize that I should have been hounding them about it instead of being so meh about the situation. :P


Days left till vacation: 7

(vanilla cinnamon ice-cream mixed with strawberries - wasn't bad, should pick something other than strawberries though, didn't pair that well)

Winding down to my vacation next week - can't believe it's almost here! :o

Still lots to do though - things to buy, need to pack, sort out finances, whatever. I have a multitude of checklists that I need to finish up and write down phone numbers for people I'll be seeing on the trip. It's going to be fun trying to figure out my wardrobe for work after I pull out the clothes I'm taking. I tend to wear the same things all the time - whether at work or on the weekend, so it's going to be fun trying to find something "different" to wear. Oh boy.

Weather is still deciding what it wants to do. After a couple weeks of dry, slightly chilly fall weather, we're going back to humid summer-ish weather for the next few days. What gives?

Work is getting busier, but at least I'm finally locating all the families I'm dealing with. Trying to get as much done as I can before I leave!

Random Project Runway thought: Angry Tim Gunn roxxorz. :DDDD

Days left till vacation: 9

(been too busy to take pictures lately, this is a sunset pic I took a few months back)

Tired, tired, tired lately.

I think it's allergies, since it's hay-fever season. I wake up in the mornings and I'm still really tired, somtimes have a stuffy nose + a lot of sneezing during the day lately. I love the scent of pollen in the air. -.-

Drive the other day didn't go too badly - it was about a 40ish minute drive one way, most of it was endless farm fields. Wish I brought a camera, there were some nice sights.

Looking forward to the weekend - can get some more sleep, figure out what stuff I need to get done before the trip. At least work is going by quickly most of the time. I need to find more stuff to fill my days with so I don't sit around getting bored out of my skull by reading protocol manuals. Don't have anything planned till next Wednesday though. Joy. :/

Days left till vacation: 13

(The street of our future home! .. I think. There's kind of no street signs and it's being developed right now, so this is just an educated guess - based on the map I had looked at before)

Feet are aching today. Wearing heels for long periods of time = bad for Lok. I think it's mostly because I'm not used to wearing heels - work allows me to wear running shoes/shoes that are similar, so I haven't worn heels consistently in a really long time. I wore them to court today and the steps to my car later on were pure agony. I think I need to keep a pair of flip-flops in the car for situations like this.

Makes me seriously wonder what I would wear on my wedding day, since that's like.. a multi-hour event and I can't just take the shoes off and fling them somewhere. Or I could, and change into comfortable foot wear. Heh.

Really tired lately, I don't know why. Driving while tired = bad idea. I'm surprised I haven't had an accident yet (*knock on wood*) since I've had some close calls in the past couple days. Bad bad bad, need to sleep more.

It's amazing to me how lengthy the process is for court. 99% of the time things are adjourned, so it gets dragged out for lonnnnnnnnnnnnnng periods, and I need to wait looooooooooooong periods just to hear a judge tell me it's a-okay for it to get adjourned to begin with. Television has warped my mind for how fast things 'could' be. Thanks, Law & Order.

Lots of driving scheduled for tomorrow, hopefully it'll go well and I don't get pitifully lost. :(

2 weeks left till vacation! Lots to do before we go!

Went and did a registry event today with Crate and Barrel, which went surprisingly awesome. I thought it'd be pretty busy, since it was a Sunday event that basically gives you an opportunity to walk through the store before it opened, and scan/pick to your heart's content without other shoppers around. When we got there (late, due to random tidbits that added delay) we were surprised it wasn't completely packed. In fact, I think there were maybe only 6 or 7 other groups/couples around, so at most like.. 15-20 people mingling around the store. I have to admit that I signed up for it because: 1) I was really curious how their registry worked and 2) they said they'd give us a free glass bowl. Hey, freebies! But they also had a lot of food around that you could eat while you were shopping, drinks, sales people to explain things to you (got a whole knife demonstration from someone, and got to try the knives out). It was pretty cool. After we 'checked' the registry in with the scanner, I apparently only had 30 items. What the heck. I totally need to scan more next time - especially since a lot of their stock is seasonal, so it might not be around next year. :P Oh, and the biggest perk with them is you get 10% off after the event is over to buy everything you didn't get on your registry list. Prettttty cool. :)

Also went to two cupcake places today to try stuff out for wedding.


(cupcake place #1 - absolutely awesome, the cakes tasted like something, and the icing was great)

Had a red velvet cupcake at the first place. To. Die. For. So good. I have an inkling that the one I had in Montreal was a bit better, but this was a close runner-up.


(cupcake place #2 - not as much selection, icing was realllllllllly buttery.. cake didn't taste like much though)

Strawberry cupcake at the second place .. cake didn't really taste like anything. I guess the icing tasted like strawberries.. barely. Loren got an orange cupcake with ginger icing, and that definitely tasted like something, but only if you really like ginger.

I think we're getting a better sense now of which cupcake place we'll probably go with, but there's 2 other bakeries that our venue is allied (is that the proper term? or maybe it should be.. preferred vendors?) with that we want to check out and see if they do cupcakes. I'm not sure though, since they seem to mainly focus on doing cake cakes. Will have to see.

Oh, and I finally watched District 9. The first hour made me think of the Blair Witch Project (aka really really shaky camera).

Next weekend: Tiles, Furniture, possible wedding venue stuff like.. a photo screen I want to make.

Days till Vacation: 17