2012: A Review.

Good Morning, Friends.

Tomorrow, I will write my annual post regarding resolutions and other new-year-beginnings.  Today, however, I would like to write about 2012.  I mean, this is the last day of it and all.

Let's see what amazing things occurred in 2012...

• I went in for my yearly physical in January and found out I was a lot more overweight than I thought.  I decided to do something about it and over the course of this year, I have lost 8 pounds!  I tried some new crafting techniques, tried to start a daily writing prompt but couldn't stick to it, started to scare myself about my future children, and found some new music - finally.

• In February, I tried lots of new recipes, quit my job at Intab, bought a new dresser, got tickets to see Wicked for Vday, and started Freakin' Obsessed Friday.

• March was a more wound-down month.  I came to the incredibly unfortunate conclusion that I had lost 6 months' worth of photos.  I still haven't recovered them, by the way.  We found out Durham had a Zaxby's, which thrilled our souls, and it's right next to Goodberry's!  I finally finished The Green Mile.  I learned about taxes, the hard way.  I was also given a sewing machine by my absolutely awesome husband, but the post was never published.  (Well, maybe March wasn't so calm after all!)

• In April, Bonnie revealed how much of a scaredy dog she is.  I painted some pretty shoes for Easter.  We went home for Easter and I got all my hair chopped off.  Although I had heard of Etsy, my love affair with it began here.

• May had the fewest number of posts, with only two.  I started writing about my move to Durham and how hard it was for me to acclimate.  Desperate Housewives ended, and I started watching 30 Rock instead.

• June turned out to be a busy, fun month.  Ray Bradbury died, and the literary world wept.  The Indy Weekly came out with their Best of the Triangle issue and Justin and I made the best of that weekend trying out new things.  KK5 came out and was promptly read.  I told the blogging world about my then-new job.  I discovered Boy Meets World exists in DVD form, and was graciously given the entire series by my sweet hubby.  I participated in my third handmade gift exchange.  I made my first, very little, thing on my new sewing machine.  Justin and I had our first ever commission made by the supremely talented Gabe Dunston.

• The first week of July was my birthday week, and I turned 26 on the 5.  The blog got a face lift.  I found out that sometimes reliving your childhood as an adult isn't a good idea.  I got that old, familiar baby bug - but this time, Justin and I actually discussed it and there may be Lunchables in the near future. :)  I read Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.  I looked into this neat 5K called Color Me Rad, and started thinking about running it.  Then, after several signs, I decided to do it.

• In August, the date for CMR in Raleigh was finally announced.  I read The Postcard Killers.  It was in August that I started looking for other work.  Still no word on that front.  I suffered a good two-week bout of IBS, and pulled a Cinderella, using new shoes to fix the problem!  Halloween came early, and I couldn't stop thinking about it!

• The Halloween kick continued into September.  I discovered Wordle.  I will make another cloud tonight to encompass an entire year's worth of words.  I was finally able to run again, in crisp autumn air no less, and had a lead for a job that didn't end up panning out.  I discovered Gangnam Style.  I read and re-watched The Time Traveler's Wife.  I left a sweet little goodbye letter for our little apartment, when the times comes for it.

• October was another busy month, clocking in the most posts for the year, with 23.  I tried to do a 31-Day challenge but just couldn't stick with it.  After buying an iPhone in September, I was then on the hunt for a case.  I chose the I-Arc Reactor-You case.  My blog finally reached over 1,000 page views since its installation in September 2009.  I held a Halloween Movie Extravaganza, and started with my favorite, Hocus Pocus.  I finally started seeing results from my running.  This is the only positive reinforcement I received from my boss this year.  I ran the Color Me Rad 5K in Raleigh, and wrote about the little-known details.  I started jotting down ideas for tattoos.  I published a long-forgotten post about accepting Durham as my new home.  Justin and I held an awesome Halloween Party.

• We started November out with Daylight Savings Time.  Justin and I voted in our first presidential election, and Obama won.  For our anniversary, Justin and I went to Asheville, NC to see the Biltmore House at Christmastime.  Still haven't had time to work on those pictures, though.  I wrote up my experience with running in CMR.  Justin and I continued our tradition of not eating turkey the day of Thanksgiving, and had Phil to enjoy the meal with this time.  At the end of the month, I offered some cleaning tips I use myself.

• The Waterfields ended the year by heading down to Spartanburg for Christmas (no post yet), and I participated in my fourth handmade gift exchange.  I was given an ultimatum about my job that I started in May, and there still isn't a lot that is certain on that front.  As a Christmas present to Justin, I started reading The Dresden Files.  I am currently on the second book.

That's a lot of stuff!  Truthfully, when I start writing this post this morning, I wasn't expecting quite that many links.  But it makes me happy to see the year in bullet form. :)  2012 yielded 122 posts, more than 2009, 2010, and 2011 combined!  I hope to see similar numbers next year.

A whole mess of other stuff happened that just never made it into a post.  One of my best friends, Dave, wrote and published a comic called Pizzula.  Along with me turning 26, Justin turned 25.  We went to see Wicked in May.  The gang reunited for our yearly shenanigans at D*Con down in Atlanta, and this time Luke got to come!  My mom started a new job.  My step dad got laid off from his.  Luke and Elyse started dating way back in February.  I got a new Keurig for Christmas and have been loving it.  Those are just some of the things that never got written about.

2012 was a pretty good year.  A lot of good happened, and a lot turmoil got passed around, too.  But I guess that's how it is with every year.  As of midnight tonight, we have officially survived the Mayan apocalypse.  I'll be glad when the year is over.  It seems like December burdened me with a bit of the Scrooges.  I've been in a bad mood almost this entire month.  I'll be glad to turn the new calendar to the first clean page and start over in 2013.  Thirteen is a lucky number for me, and I hope next year will be lucky.

Hope you enjoyed my little recap there.  Happy last day of the year to you!

The Story of 14 Hours

I'm going to scream.  And when I do, you will probably hear it; no matter where you live in the world.  You will be inclined to think it's a meteor hurtling toward Earth, but fear not for it is just my agonizing acknowledgement of Murphy's Law.

Murphy's Law: Anything that can go wrong, will.

Have you ever read "The Story of An Hour," by Kate Chopin?  It's a short story read in many English classes.  It's about a woman who learns her husband is dead from a freak accident.  She goes up to her room to be alone and grieve, only to realize over the course of an hour that she is really much happier now that he is gone.  Afterward, there is a knock at her door.  She answers it, to find her husband standing there, not dead, and her world is forever changed by the realization she had in her room.

I've had my own Chopin story, only it's been over the course of the last 14 hours.

To make a long story short, I have been working as a Marketing Specialist for an HVAC company in Raleigh since May of this year.  It has become abundantly clear recently that my boss is trying to fire me, for all intents and purposes.  It seems that almost since I was hired, my boss hasn't been thrilled with my work, despite my many efforts, and has gradually lowered my time, pay, or both, in an effort to eventually pay me nothing at all.  This has been really frustrating, hence my other posts about looking for other work.  Since I have been unable to find any other work, I have been putting up with the nonsense of low pay and hours.

Last night, I received an email from my boss Adrian.  He says that "we" (not sure who the other half is, since I had absolutely no say in this) have decided to cut down on social marketing (meaning me).  His current offer is for me to become a contractor (instead of an employee like I am now) and receive a monthly fee for social media marketing.  I've written back asking him several questions and haven't heard back yet, so I'm playing my favorite game - The Waiting Game.  I'm a pro athlete there.


I read the email around 10 p.m. last night.  I sort of had the same realization Kate had.  Maybe I'm happier without this job.  It's caused a lot of stress for me over the last few months and I'm sick of dealing with an incompetent boss.  Perhaps if he's offering me an open door, I should just walk out of it.  This was before he clarified the outsourcing bit for me.  Now that I know I could still work for him, should I stay?  I don't know what to do.  I've felt sick all day and until I get any more answers from him regarding the terms of my new "position," I won't know which answer to give.

This all just happened so suddenly, and it's a really sucky situation.  I wasn't making real good bank as it was, and now I'll be making even less.  I've applied to every job I can find that even remotely requires my degree, and even a few that don't.  I'm a good worker, and no one seems to appreciate that.  I feel like the bottom of the barrel to everyone and how they have to scrape the bottom to get to me and even then they don't want what they find.  I'm very sad and ill and depressed today.  I hope that changes but for now I guess I'll go back into my corner.

Don't feel bad.  This will pass and I'll be okay.  Always am.  Justin has been more than supportive throughout this whole thing, and that helps tremendously.  But I'll always take encouragement from comment-leavers, too. ;)  Hope everyone is having a better day than me (honestly)!

PS: Also, Bonnie ate a wooden spoon in the kitchen and we may have a flat tire.  Murphy's Law.

WTF Wednesday

My brain and heart are going to explode from pent-up exasperation.

Pictured: GTFO.

Here's what happened.

Yesterday was Tuesday, the one day a week I usually go into work.  My boss emailed me yesterday morning, mere hours before I was to be at work, to tell me I didn't have to come in because I wasn't needed.  With my ego deflated, I took to the Internet in search of other jobs.  I've been trying to find another source of work for several weeks now, as my current job isn't meeting my initial expectations.

Yesterday, I was simply on the hunt for whatever/whomever was hiring.  After finding pretty much nothing that even remotely required my degree, I gave into gender roles and began looking into secretarial/assistant openings.  I saw an opening for a Resident Assistant and jumped on over and applied.  I didn't really think anymore about it after I applied.

This morning, I get a call about the RA position.  I am offered an interview tomorrow morning and start to get pretty excited about it.  It's not an ideal position, nor is it a job I am particularly interested in, but the fact that I got an interview somewhere for a job I applied to made me happy.  I called Justin immediately after I hung up from setting up the interview to tell him about it, and I was met with the "Oh."  You know what I mean: when you are so excited about something and you tell someone else that you're close to about it and all you get in return is, "Oh."  It's like the other person was expecting something incredibly monumental and all they got was whatever you said, despite the fact that it's pretty monumental to you.

After Justin and I were talking for a few minutes, he began asking questions about the position.  Really simple ones, like, "What would your responsibilities be?" and "What is the position?" and "Where would you be working?"  And eff it all to hell, I had no answer for any of those!  It's true: I had applied for a job which I knew nothing about.  I had to look the listing up while I was on the phone with Justin to tell him anything about it.  It was embarrassing.  But through the embarrassment, I realized this job was almost the farthest thing from what I wanted - it was more of a CNA job than it was an RA job.  The job was a senior center in Chapel Hill, and I would be expected to pretty much nurse all the seniors.  Some of my responsibilities included bathing, toileting, and feeding them.  Now, I must be the most selfish person on the face of the earth, because that sounds absolutely disgusting to me.  I wish I could feel like I was helping someone, or that I was doing a good deed, but I can't get past the ick factor to appreciate those things.  I'm a bad person.

Anyway, once I got a better glimpse of what the job really was, I sat here for an hour trying to talk myself into it.  "You'd be helping people!" and, "This is what you get for not doing your homework, deal with it!"  But after that hour, and after my nerves were pretty much officially shot, I realized I just couldn't do it.  Even though it was the only interview I'd been offered in months, and it would surely be the only application that showed any interest in me, I didn't feel it was right to put my interviewer and myself through the process when I didn't even want the job.  I called the guy back and told him that I wanted to be honest and that I had looked over the job requirements and I felt like I wasn't the right candidate for the position.  He thanked me for being honest and we both hung up with no hard feelings.  I feel like an idiot, but at least now I don't have to go through all the motions for a job I don't even want.  There is someone else out there who needs this job and is better suited for it than me.  Here's hoping I have opened up that slot for someone who deserves it!

In closing, kids, make sure and read all the details and fine print before you fully subscribe to something.  It could come back to put you in a chokehold later.

Positive Reinforcement.

I just received this email from my boss. Kinda made my day!

Crisp.

I got up this morning and went running.  The air was so crisp and it was the best feeling I've had in a long time when the air stung the back of my throat as I sucked it in.  Ahh, fall is upon us!

I had decided I wasn't going to decorate for fall until it felt like it outside, despite all my friends and favorite blogs having started their decorating back on September 1.  And despite the most amazing drink in the entire world, the Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks, coming out that day as well (which I also have sadly not partaken in yet).  But if this weather keeps up, it looks like I may just have to decorate this weekend while Justin is judging at the Escapist Expo.  Oh, the horror. ;)

In other news, if you recall, I was contacted through Indeed by a woman named Kim Mills over at Career Partners International about a job opening.  I had a phone interview with her back on the 20 of August, and last Thursday, the 6 of September, I had the second-round, in-person interview with her at the CPI headquarters in Chapel Hill.  I felt good afterward, having "studied" all night reviewing possible interview questions and answers (none of which were even asked in the interview; not the 5-year plan, not "tell us why we should hire you," nada!).  Kim said that CPI was attempting to release a new product by the 25 of this month and she was juggling the interview process for this position on top of the product release (which is her actual position at CPI, product manager), so she wasn't sure when I'd hear back from her.  But I heard something within a month of the last interview, so here's hoping!

I am getting more and more afraid of the race in October.  At first, it was like, "It's just running."  But now, as we are getting closer, I am realizing that I have never run a stupid race before, and it's a long race for me. Three miles doesn't seem to be anything to anyone else, but it sure is to me!  When I was out this morning, my brain just refused to wake up.  I couldn't get into it, and I didn't do a very good job.  This cannot happen on race day.  Sigh.  As with everything that comes with a deadline, I guess I'm just freaking out because it's actually going to happen now.  At one point, it was just a far-away date on the calendar, but now it's only 45 days away!  That's pretty crazy.  I really need to step my game up.

My race countdown on RunKeeper.

I guess that's all for now.  I shall return later when I have something else incredibly compelling, witty, and awesome to write about.

Needs More Splenda.

Guess what?


I was contacted by someone else about a job!

 

Yes, you read that right.  I posted my resume on Indeed.com and actually received a reply!  I received the email above last Friday, sent her my resume and writing samples yesterday, and an hour after she received those from me, we had a phone interview!  It all went crazy fast.  I was afraid at first that it wasn't legit, but after yesterday it seems like it is.  It would be a full-time position, working at least 40 hours a week (she said that sometimes it would be more than 40 if that's what it took to "get the job done"), and it would basically be the same work I'm doing now.  The person who was in the position before me set everything up, and now I have to maintain all of it.  Click here to read more about the company.

 I'm supposed to hear back from them sometime this week.  I'll let you know when I find out something!

As an aside, I really should have put more Splenda in my coffee this morning...

On the Hunt

Over the last week, I've been looking into getting another job.  Even though I'm happy with my current job (to a degree), and I'm thankful for the one(s) I have, I would still like a better one.

This is hard for me to admit, because my mom and Justin, specifically, both think I can do anything.  This is awesome for my ego, but not for applying for a job.  My mom (and Justin, sometimes) talks me up to everyone and sometimes I feel very pressured by this.  My mom, like many other moms, thinks that because I can make blogs/websites and can make videos using iMovie on the computer that I am a computer whiz.  Then when she has a question about the inner-workings of her computer or the Internet, delving into stuff like C++, she doesn't understand why I don't automatically know the answer.  The mediums I work with and the mediums my mother thinks I am the master of are so radically different.  To her, it's all just "computer."  It's almost like thinking that a child who has mastered Checkers should somehow automatically know how to play Chess because the board looks the same.  So, when a potential employer asks my mom if I know how to do "blank," if it has to do with computers in any way, my mom starts singing my praises.  Then when they get to me and I either have no clue what aspect of computers they're talking about, or have zero experience in that part of the field, I am left in the dust.  Justin does the same thing.

This is not to say I am not grateful for their efforts.  The fact that the two most important people in my life think I am capable of pretty much anything is both flattering and humbling.  Sadly, it's also wrong. :)

I said all that to say this: because I am so often put up against jobs I am in no way suited for, I tend to have a low view of myself in terms of what I can do.  I always see what I can't do and that can end up weighing heavily on me.  I look through countless job postings on numerous websites and all I ever see is what I can't do or what I'm not capable of.

Well, I'm sick of that.

So this morning, I went to LinkedIn (ironically, to get a better idea of my current job description) and searched.  I found a Copywriter job with a company called Capstrat in Raleigh.  Capstrat is "One of the largest communications firms in the Southeast and one of the top 40 agencies in the United States.  Capstrat is a full-service strategic communications firm, providing these services in-house:"

Taken directly from the website.

Their About page is one of the funniest/coolest ones I've ever seen.  They just seem like a cool company and I'd love to work for them.  I applied to the Copywriter position and am hoping for the best.  The company is also in Raleigh, but it's only about 25 minutes from the apartment, as opposed to 40!

This is all exciting for me because I finally feel like I am deserving of something job-related.  Usually, I am so quick to just say, "They'd never hire me," and don't even try.  But this morning I just felt different.  I felt deserving and I felt cool.  I didn't care what the job description said (even though I could do this job pretty easily...it is pretty much what I went to school for), I just wanted to try.  So, I did.  Here's hoping it paid off!

Daily Creed

Daily Creed, by John Grey

I love this.  I keep this in a frame on my desk at work.  I think it's lovely, and something we should all try to live by; religion and personal afflictions notwithstanding.  Just a little bright spot on a Tuesday morning!

Oh, what a day.

Today is apparently "one of those days."  I have been going since the sun came up (for real!) and am just about beat.  It's not even 2 p.m. yet!

There are three major things that are making today "one of those days."

1. When I got up this morning, I had an email from my boss telling me to stay home today and now I'm fearful for my job security.
2. As Justin and I got to the car to take him to work, the low pressure light came on.  Sure enough, we had a very low tire.
3. I may have inadvertently ruined a pair of Justin's pants.

And now, I will elaborate.

Over the last week, my boss has been hovering a bit.  He keeps sending me emails, asking for specific jobs I'm working on or have been working on.  It's all very basic procedure, he's just keeping tabs, but it's also quite abrupt.  Then this morning, I get an email from him giving me the day off.  As much as I appreciate this, my mind is racing.  Am I slowly being fired?  I feel like he did a two-step of "What am I paying you for?" and "I don't need to spend money on that."  In this morning's email, he wrote that he was taking today to look over his budgeting and that some of the marketing budget may be cut.  I'm not sure what that means.  Does that mean I'm getting my hours cut?  Because that's no good, either.  Ugh.

The tire turned out fine.  I was able to drive the car to the dealership, and they were able to plug it, attributing the leak to a small nail.  So for now, we're good on that end.

I was fixing pair A of Justin's pants with some Heat N' Bond to secure a loose hem.  Once pair A was good to go, I picked up pair B, just to iron the hem.  The tag on pair B said Low Heat.  I didn't read this tag.  I only had to put the iron on there for a few seconds, because after that an imprint of the entire iron was left.  I freaked out and threw it in the washing machine in cold water.  I found a site online that listed white vinegar as a solution to removing iron stains and am currently testing this out.

I'll give an update on any of this when I know something.

Toodles.

Update #1 at 2:46 p.m.

I tried the vinegar treatment and promptly washed the pants.  The stain was much less noticeable.  I worked the vinegar treatment again and put it outside to dry.  Here's hoping.

Update #2 at 12:37 p.m. the next day

Well, as usual, things are fine.  I told Justin about his pants last night and after looking at them, he said they were fine and not to worry about it.  (Not worry?  Has he met me??)  Justin also made me feel a lot better about the job situation, which I've heard nothing more about.  So, not a very exciting update, but thankfully things are much better.  God's good that way. :)

Good News & Bad News

I finally heard back from Tara this morning regarding the email I sent her June 19 about my work duties.  She was no help whatsoever.  She basically just said to research other HVAC companies and see what they do, and to pretend that it was my company and act accordingly to promote it.  Ugh.

That's the bad news.  I'm still really clueless about this job.  I'm also scared to talk to anyone about it.  I suck.

But there's good news!

Also on June 19, ironically, I bought the domain for Daddy's website, so now you can visit 109southmain.com!  Then, on the 27, I set up emails under that domain.

-I feel like I'm the shit when I work on Daddy's stuff, and feel like shit when I work on CSI stuff.-

Yesterday, Daddy sent out his first Monday Morning THOT (which is just thought spelled weird; it doesn't stand for anything).  Daddy really loved my layout and we got excellent stats on the newsletter as well!

So far, no unsubs, and mostly opens!  We unfortunately had a decent amount of bounces, but that was no fault of our own.

I'm SO ready to go home.  Don't feel too hot today and woke up in the middle of the night with tummy troubles.  Can't we just run on Australian time and say it's already tomorrow?

Why this job is better.

Several months ago, I wrote this post regarding working for one of my former jobs and how I knew it was time to quit.  In that post, I realized the job chart at work, which was posted in many places, didn't have my name on it after I had worked there nearly 6 months, but had the name of a person who had only worked there two days.  This upset me and was the final straw in a long-running debate with myself over whether or not to quit that particular job.

This morning, I got into work and sat down at my desk.  I opened my right side drawer for the white-out roller to fix my time sheet and found this:

Another organization chart of the company.  I immediately picked it up and searched it for my name.  And guess what?

It was there!  Don't worry about the spelling of my name; when Adrian first hired me, he could have sworn my name was Cathy, so he's called me that ever since.  Trust me when I tell you, he means Caty.

This made me very happy.  I feel accepted here, and the proof is on the sheet (as they say in the Color Catcher commercials).  Not only that, but this chart calls me the Assistant Marketing Manager!  That's pretty cool.  It's kind of like an inner-company promotion.  Maybe I'll change it on Facebook.

It's things like this that make me realize how right I was to quit the other job and take this one.  Things fell into place here for a reason, and I was meant to work here.  Some days, I think the exact opposite.  I just feel like up and quitting.  But not today.  I'm taking this as a sign to work here.  After this exact same thing influenced my decision to leave one job, it can now influence me to stay at another one.

Hooray :)

So, I've Been Holding Out

For a little over a month, I've had a new job.

It all started on Friday, April 6.  Justin had gone to play Magic at Sci-Fi, and at the end of the night, two girls from a job recruitment place were asking if anyone was interested in working as a video game tester in the area.  When Justin realized the girls worked for a job recruitment facility, he asked them about me.  He talked me up (probably a lot more than he should have), and asked if there was anything they could set up for me.  Tara, one of the girls, gave Justin her card and told him to have me email her and we would go from there.

Justin was so excited, and just about shoved the card in my face when he got home, begging me to email Tara.  I did the next morning, the 7th.  I heard back from Tara the next day, the 8th.  She told me she had just recently been hired by APC (the job recruitment company) and was looking to start full-time there, but was currently wrapped up with an HVAC company in Raleigh as their Marketing Specialist.  She said that given my resume, it looked like I would be a good candidate for her replacement.

The next day, Monday, was dead as far as communication.  Then, I got a call from Tara that night asking if Tuesday would be okay for an interview.  Totally freaked out and unprepared, I said no.  We finally rearranged the interview to Thursday, the 12th.  Tara and Adrian, the owner of Comfort Services Heating & Air, met me at a Starbucks near the Comfort Services office.

We proceeded to talk things over concerning my job responsibilities and what I wanted from the job and what Adrian needed from me.  It also came out that finding Tara's replacement had turned into an almost-three-month-long search.  Tara said that nobody seemed qualified enough for the position and that at one point, they had even turned the position into an internship to gain more interest and hopefully fill it quicker, but to no avail.  It just seemed like everything was falling perfectly into place.  The interview went well and everyone seemed to leave happy.

The weekend went by and I heard nothing.

Then, on Monday, the 16th, Tara called while we were watching America's Got Talent.  She said that Adrian was willing to offer me a place in the company and keep within my requested salary ($13.5/hr).  And so, standing in my living room, I accepted the offer and was officially employed.  My biggest prior concern had been taxes, as my other job doesn't tax me and it scares the hell out of me to file at 1099.  But Adrian was totally fine taxing me, which thrilled my soul.

Tara noted that Adrian didn't want me to start until May 8, so that gave me almost 3 weeks to chill, which was nice.  I drove to Raleigh on Tuesday, the 8th, and have been coming back ever since.

So far, the job has been easy-peasy, and that's what scares me.  I don't feel like I'm so qualified that the job seems easy.  I feel like I'm not doing something right, or not doing enough.  I feel bad that Adrian's paying me, and all I'm doing in playing on Facebook (not my page, the company's page, but still).  I took the liberty this morning to contact Tara, who by the way is still a consultant for CSI, and ask her if there was something I was missing, something I need to be doing but am not doing.  I'm hoping she'll answer soon (her history of answering emails quickly is short indeed).

What I'm most proud of thus far is getting to work without using a GPS.  Work is exactly 40 minutes from my apartment, and getting through Raleigh seemed a daunting task at first.  But now I can do it with ease. :)

I'll keep this ol' blog updated about the job.  Sometimes I just consider quitting altogether.  I'm already part-time, working between 13 and 18 hours a week.  There are those who don't understand why I would quit a job that basically pays me good money for not a lot of work, but I just feel so guilty.  Adrian is a good man who just wants the best for his company.  Once I have a better understanding of what I'm supposed to be doing, exactly, I'll feel better.  And I'll feel more entitled to work here.

Til then, Blogger!