Such a Tease

I should expect the worst in weather since I live in Wisconsin. While I do expect the cold and the snow, I don't expect a 70 degree day in the middle of March...and then 24 hours later, back to 40s. Yesterday was such a beautiful day - such a tease. Luckily I got to go outside and enjoy it a little bit with a run by the lake! I forgot what a difference running outside makes as opposed to on the treadmill. I have to get used to it fast though - half marathon in 31 days and a triathlon in 46 days!!!

Deliquent

It's been awhile. My birthday party was a TON of fun. All my closest friends were there at a very important time for me. Though I did hear someone say yesterday that "nothing good happens after midnight" - that's probably the theme of my life these days - and definitely that night! Here are some pictures from the party:

Adjusting & Moving On

After the initial shock of the break-up wore off and I stopped crying, the healing process began. I learned just how many wonderful people I have in my life - both family and friends - who have been willing to do anything and everything to help make me feel better. I also know that he and I are going to do our best to maintain a strong friendship - I realize this won't be without some awkward moments, but as there is no anger involved in this break-up, I am confident we can do it.

While I know that there are still many tough situations to come (actually moving out for good), I also know that I can call on many different people any time I need them and for that I am so very thankful. In the meantime....it's time to celebrate my 25TH BIRTHDAY!!!!! Tomorrow night should be fun and I have five days off after that - that may be the greatest birthday gift EVER!!!

I'm old, I know! ;)

Change

There is a lot of change going on in my life right now - and I've decided I don't like change. Change is hard - change hurts. Change makes a girl cry - more than I ever thought was possible. I sure am hoping I run out of tears soon.

Some of the change is good - taking control of my future as far as my career goes.

Some of the change is bad - starting over in almost all aspects of life two weeks away from my 25th birthday.

I HATE CHANGE

Office Politics

I'm not one for hiding how I feel and sucking up to people. I typically say how I feel. Because of that I'm not a big fan of office politics. Face time...ass kissing...not my deal. In the department I work on, we are at the bottom of the food chain because we aren't visibly contributing to the bottom line. We don't make or sell anything in the finance department. As a result, other departments walk all over us. And unless you can get the VP or SVP on your side on an issue, you are screwed. Because of one situation in particular, I am being forced to spend about 4-6 hours fixing something another department screwed up. We tell them not to do something, they do it anyway, there are no consequences. This is the second time it has happened in the last two weeks. No one is going to do anything about it and the situation will never improve since we won't stand up to them.

I have remained much more calm about the issue than I did last time, which is keeping me in line with my goal to be more relaxed, more positive, but it's still irritating beyond belief.

Progress

The ultimate test of my ability to remain calm/relaxed already occurred today. Health care issues. When I went to get a prescription filled last night they told me that my medical card was not adequate for prescription coverage. I needed a prescription card. The kind lady at the pharmacy informed me that I must have lost my card and I should go home and find it. Since my medical insurance has only been effective for 13 days now, I knew I didn't lose my card, but let her make her comment.

The true test was today when I had to call our HR people to find out my employee ID number that should have been on the employee ID card I never got. I needed this ID number to get through to the prescription people to get that card that was never sent to me. After ten-twenty minutes of listening to the automated voice tell me there was still no one to help me, I was surprisingly calm. This is major progress for me. Usually this situation would make me want to scream about the stupidity of some people and how rude some people can be. But I didn't....and I should be getting a prescription card in the mail any day now! :)

Making a Change

It's time for me to make some changes in my life. I was reminded on three different occasions this weekend that I need to be more positive and less uptight/more relaxed. The first was an intentional reminder from the person who bears the most as a result of my negativity, the second reminder was by watching someone I don't want to end up like and the third was when I snapped at a health club front desk person because of something stupid someone else did, but no one would take responsibility for.

I need to start looking at the glass as half full, not half empty. Lots of things have been irritating me lately with work, family, etc and I need to start controlling how I react much better. A friend of mine last week told me that she can control two things related to her job...one was the quality of her work and the other was her attitude. My first thought was that I can't control my attitude, it just happens, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized just how important learning to control my attitude is. Especially the little things in life.

I'm in good health and have a wonderful boyfriend and fabulous friends. I'm actively searching out career paths that may lead to more happiness. I am more aware of how my actions affect other people. Even if it's only been a very short time that I've been doing this, it's a good start. Hopefully this change in attitude/hope sticks for a very very long time.

From One Extreme to Another

It was no secret that I hated my last job because I had NOTHING to do. The current job has kept me busy and last week was the first of our " fall busy season". I was told last week that I needed to maintain 55 hour work weeks. The entire team was irritated....not that we had more work to do, but that we were being told how long it should take us. Towards the end of last week and now definitely this week, I am getting slammed. I could probably stay until Friday at 5pm, never going home, and not run out of work to do. 55 hours will be no problem. Been here since 6:15 and only leaving before 6pm because I HAVE to. I'm glad to have lots of work to do, but I definitely needed a break from looking at spreadsheets. Off to another meeting....

A new year

In terms of my fitness life, yesterday marked the beginning of a new year. I have various goals for the year...many of which are to beat times from this past summer. I am not planning on taking on any new distances or events, just fine tuning to improve. This involves strength training and endurance. To motivate myself, I will be treating myself to manicures/pedicures/massages after each 4 weeks in a row that I meet all my goals. While I didn't work out yesterday due to sheer exhaustion, I did eat better. I did also get my lazy ass out of bed before 5:15 this morning to do spin and weights. Hopefully that's a sign of many more successful mornings to come! I enjoyed my two weeks of no working out and eating whatever I want, but it was definitely starting to make me feel gross. Being back on a plan with lots of goals is very exciting right now! :)

BIRDIE!!!

This weekend was our anniversary trip to Kohler. We had big plans of golfing, eating, drinking, enjoying the spa...and just having a great time together. The weather interrupted some of our plans, but the weekend turned out better than we could have planned. We got to nap on Saturday afternoon because of the weather. While we would have enjoyed being able to golf, a nap, room service, and a bottle of champagne turned out just fine. Sunday was beautiful weather, so after breakfast in bed we went golfing. Now, I hadn't golfed in over a month, so I knew it would be ugly...and we were golfing at Whistling Straits on the Straits course, so even on my best day, I'm not good enough for that course, but wanted to get out there and have fun. While I played horribly for most of the day, I GOT MY FIRST BIRDIE...EVER!!! It was AWESOME!!! I've never even gotten a par...went straight for the birdie. A co-worker of Alf's told me to just quit golfing now...it doesn't get any better than at birdie at Whistling Straits! Today is back to work and back to only seeing Alfredo in passing! :( At least we had the wonderful weekend!! Now we get to look forward to Mexico....only 2+ months away!!!

Update

At my new job, which I LOVE, I am blocked from sites such as this, hence the long break without a post. Lots of fun stuff has happened though. First, I met my final summer goal....a fifth event. I did the Dousman Duathlon on Sunday and it was AWESOME! It was a 2 mile run, 20 mile bike, 2 mile run. I was hoping for a time of 1:45 - 2:00 and I finished in 1:40!!!! My first 2 miles were under 15 minutes...I was THRILLED! I think my brother may even do it with me next year. Pictures can be found at www.imagebyfuad.com, going to public galleries, Dousman Duathlon, and searcing for Bib 424.

We got our new furniture, so we have a completely furnished apartment! Now all we need are pictures, some tables, and GOLDEN TEE!!! We're not sure when, but we will be getting a Golden Tee for our place. Alfredo and I got to hang out on Sunday....an unplanned date night. Drinks, Golden Tee & Dinner together are so much fun when we haven't had a ton of time to hang out together.

Yesterday was our 3 year anniversary! We can hardly believe it's been that long. This weekend we are heading up to Kohler to celebrate. Golf, spa, breakfast in bed...it will be WONDERFUL!!!

I DID IT!!!

My last major goal for the summer was to finish a half-marathon. I want to complete five events total for the summer so I still have one more thing to go, but today was the summer's major goal. 13.1 miles and I FINISHED!!! I didn't walk and I even did it in a good time. I was hoping to average no more than 10 minutes miles and I finished in 2 hours 1 minutes. My legs hurt like nothing I've ever experienced before, but seeing that sign that said mile 13 and then Alfredo waiting with the camera...it was AWESOME!!! I'm probably going to be sore for a few days, but it was totally worth it. I'm so happy I achieved this and even did it in less time than I hoped. Hopefully some day he'll be running with me...but until then, having a cheerleader is wonderful as well!

Light at the end of the tunnel

The day is almost done and my time here is almost done. In 24 hours I should be a free woman. I say should, because there is a chance it will be 25 hours, but hopefully a greater chance it will be 23 or less. My boss is leaving early tomorrow (he hopes 1pm which means closer to 3pm) and he thinks I will have to turn my computer in to him. A big part of me is hoping that the HR lady takes my computer at my exit interview (10am), but that might be wishful thinking.

There is only one person I will miss here and we went out to lunch today and will probably keep in touch, at least a little, via email. It was a mistake for me to ever come here and I've dealt with that for 5 months. I'm ready to move on to bigger and better things. And it's SO CLOSE I can almost taste it!

New Levels of Boredom

I knew this last week was going to be a struggle. I don't want to be here....my supervisor doesn't really need me to be here and his manager doesn't want me to be here. Luckily, my supervisor has found some tasks for me to do. Generally really boring things like typing numbers into a spreadsheet (instead of giving me the original document to cut and paste), etc. Even though it was tedious and stupid, it passed the time. Well, today, time has stopped. A pointless task occupied me from 8-11:30 and now I am sitting. I've read the news, I've read blogs, I've balanced my checkbook, I've made appointments for next week, I've done Alfredo's requests...and I've got absolutely nothing left. For about 5 minutes I was just staring. Looking at a clear spot on my desk...almost as if I was willing some work to show up. Luckily I have a dentist appointment so I will be leaving in less than two hours, but using the words dentist and lucky in the same sentence should illustrate just how bored I am.

A friend that I have here knows how bored I am. She helps me out when she can and this morning that meant walking to the cafeteria together. THAT is how bored I am. Hopefully she will take another walk this afternoon because I'm fresh out of ANYTHING to do. Two more days of this?!?!?!

The Decision Part

Wow...I should stick to one topic per blog at a time because when I try to do multiple, it just doesn't work. The Decision part of blog "Decisions, Wedding and Bike Lesson" was that I decided my next career move. I accepted the position with Kohls this morning. I will be a financial analyst in the financial and capital planning group. I'm really excited about this position. I am confident I will be busy a lot and really enjoy the people I am working with. My future boss even called this morning to congratulate me and let me know how excited they are to have me! AWESOME!!!

Next week I am taking off to enjoy the last part of summer and I will start there on August 28.

Bike Picture

He's going to really love me for this

Decisions, Weddings & Bike Lessons

This weekend flew by, as most of them do. Friday was spent celebrating my job offers and Alfredo's being in town for three nights. We went out for Indian food AND Ice cream. It was really yummy and really nice just spending some time together after a messy car rental return and luggage not fitting in my bug. Saturday we went to a wedding for a family friend's daughter where my brother was definitely THE drunk guest. He went from seeming fine to being crazy drunk in less than 5 minutes. It was unbelieveable. Luckily, for the most part he's a funny drunk and amused most of the guests. We also did a lot of dancing and in general just had a really good time:
Me & Mom















Me & Alf















Me & VERY drunk brother















Me & Father of the Bride















On Sunday, after Alfredo went golfing, he decided it was finally time for another bike lesson. About a year and a half ago we made a deal that if I learned how to golf, he would learn how to ride a bike. He never learned as a kid because his mom told him he'd have to wear a helmet and he refused. Now, I've learned how to golf (still have a lot to learn, but I'm getting out there and trying). So, he realized he was going to have to give the bike riding stuff a shot. My dad gave him his first lesson a few years back on my brother's old bike (from when he was like 10). We took the bike home with us and it has sat in the garage ever since. After a whole golfing vacation Alfredo realized he really should hold up his end of the bargain so here are pictures from lesson #2: