Late last week, NewBoss Anais noticed that the candy bowl was getting low and brought in a bag o'treats for refilling it. I told her that wasn't necessary--that I was willing to pay for the candy and that I didn't mind that others were eating it because that's why I put it there.
The candy others like is not usually the candy I like. That's why I can keep it at my desk--the 'popular' stuff is rarely tempting to me. NewBoss Anais did ask me what I like, so I explained that I generally only eat Dove dark chocolate Promises and that keeping the bowl full of them would cost a fortune (not to mention making me fat).
When she brought the bag of bowl candy, she brought me a Dove dark chocolate Promise bar as well.
She brought me a latte a couple of days later, just for no reason.
I've never had a boss who was so thoughtful.
It's weird.
Today, the back of my head (you know the part I mean--the part that's never interested in what's going on right now but is always off on some tangent of its own) has been pondering decorating.
When and if The Gidget Co ever actually turns into a working concern, I'll be moving over there full-time. However, me being me, I'm not that excited about the idea of 'working from home.' I like having an office to come to.* I find the office ambience appropriate. A 'work' desk and the horrible fluorescent lighting and the bad coffee--all of it--spells 'work' to my brain. I can be productive--amazingly productive--working from home for a day or two on a special project, but for the day-to-day slog, you can't beat the familiar office environment.
When The Gidget Co gets going and is making us all rich, I'm going to want some kind of 'office' space.
I've been musing over the little studio apartments our complex has. I could walk to work, always an attractive idea. I don't really need 400 feet for an office just for me, but that includes the kitchen and the bathroom--both necessities. What's left is probably just enough to stave off claustrophobia.
In my imagination, I've been decorating one of them up to use as an office. Desks, bookcases, computer, coffee pot. The default carpeting in the complex is a horrible sort of beige that's perfect for an office. I have books that need to be on an office bookshelf. I plan to have desk space separate from the computer desk--sometimes you have papers you need to spread out. I want a giant white board for large-scale thinking and to accommodate my lousy handwriting. A smaller one for appointments and such. (As a rule, I don't appoint.)
I have a rich imaginary life.
I was sitting here working on a new 'Nut campaign that's not performing up to my expectations, and inspecting various imaginary lamps for the one that best-suited my imaginary décor when NewBoss Anais came by with news.
Sadly, what with one thing and another (mostly, I'm assuming the new website), we turned a profit last quarter. Not only that, but we exceeded our target/budget for the quarter.
That means I'm actually getting a bonus with Friday's paycheck. A significant one--running into four digits.
They're making it very difficult to leave this place.
________________________
* I also like being able to leave my work at the end of a work day.
So, the new website is live and more-or-less debugged. Leads are up massively, while the cost we pay for each lead is down massively. It needs more time to prove the trend.
It's the busy season, so the 'Nuts have less time to be annoying at the moment.
I'm running some experiments on significant bid changes on several campaigns but not enough time has passed to produce any meaningful results, so all I can do there is sit on my hands for another week or two.
I've run some mid-month reports--pulling the first two or three weeks' worth of data for a month in advance makes the month end project move a lot faster.
Earlier this week I put together a spreadsheet to compare and contrast campaign performance, month by month, over the last three years.
Right now I'm waiting on another report to run, so I can ponder lead generation and spending for individual days of the week over the last couple of years.
Basically, I'm bored.
The Argonut Café had a concept that they should "develop" territories and that those proven revenue sources would not only be more attractive to buyers but that we could make money from them in the meantime. Not a bad plan at all.
Problem is, it takes resources to run a project like that. They (re-)hired a former 'Nut owner (a close friend of CEOJason's) to manage one concept location in FL and one in IL. It was all working reasonably well until he decided to go do something different earlier this week. In theory, CEO Jason should have stepped up (he's a former 'Nut Afield, himself), but he's busy planning his forthcoming wedding* and, IIRC, moving to a new house, so consequently unavailable.
All that was left was the only experienced call center guy we had on staff. (He's been here for several years, in various capacities.) Now he's gone for the next week--or maybe two--taking over management of the IL location. I have no idea who is handling the FL one. The other call center sales guy, Mr. Un-nicked, is being asked to take his comprehensive 90 days or so of experience and take over the entire call center--which now consists of him and whatever time the front office staff can spare from their own two-fulltime-jobs-and-counting duties.
I'm staying out of it. I'm not that bored.
I'm also a bit reluctant to expose to the other Café employees just how little I've really learned about this place in the last 2-1/2 years.* *
Also, two days of boredom isn't a trend.
It is kind of tedious, though.
___________________
* Seriously? It's a month away, so hardly "imminent." Also? (A) he's a guy, so how much "wedding business" does he really have, anyhow; and, (B) it's a second wedding for both, so not, as far as I can tell, a big shindig.
* * It's a fallacy to think that "industry knowledge" is invaluable in all fields. I haven't bothered to learn about any of the half-dozen industries I manage advertising accounts for. So far, it hasn't been a problem.
I blog infrequently these days. Sorry. Between answering questions on the Webstrainer forum, trying to remember to update my 'professional' blog, doing my actual job, making occasional forays into managing my freelance accounts, and making time in my evening schedule for some fun/hobby/leisure amusements, the days are just packed.
I took Monday and Tuesday off this week--spent the mornings on the aforementioned freelance accounts and the afternoons puttering around, being happy. (I've rather slacked off on my vow to work on those accounts every Saturday and Sunday morning, to keep up with the workload, and found myself in need of some concentrated hours of effort.)
I'm spending some of the time saved by not working so much on playing. Reading, study, and gaming. At the moment, I have so many DS games going simultaneously that I'm having trouble keeping them straight. One hidden-object game, the Harry Pott&r Lego game, Rune Factory, and at least three Harvest Moon games. (A new HM game was just released--must get a copy!)
My recent visit to the Tutankhamen exhibit has reawakened my interest in ancient history. I'm debating getting a video course on the subject but my wish list for courses is already longer than I'll have time to study between now and the end of the year.
Just not enough hours in the day.
Today was the (more-or-less) monthly 'Nut staff meeting. Very little to be discussed.
CEOJason who, IIRC, has been divorced for about six months is remarrying next month. (Weird situation that I don't feel inclined to try and describe.) They want to have a party for him at the office. They also want to schedule the company summer picnic. I will no doubt attend the first and skip the second. (Summer has arrived in Colorado and the temps are in the mid-90s every day.)
I may and/or may not have mentioned previously that CEOJason's younger (by a decade or more) sister is our summer intern here at the Argonut Café. NewBoss Anais is getting most of the benefit of her assistance, which is as it should be--the marketing department has a ton of stuff that could stand to be done but with only two of us left standing, all we can handle is what's most urgent in any week.
This 19ish, maybe 20ish, girl is in college--apparently one of those military programs where she'll be an officer when she graduates--or in line to get into one of those programs, I'm not really sure. She's majoring in marketing so who knows what she thinks she's going to be when she gets out.
I'm going to come right out and say it. I'm not in love with her. She has flashes of humanity--where she seems quite like anyone else--but by and large she's a bit too taken with her own pretty young blondness (she wears her hair long and throws it around a lot, especially when no one is paying her any attention) and her smug satisfaction with her life of privilege. Her expression alternates between sulky (Maybe this summer internship wasn't her own idea?) and vaguely disgusted, as though she was smelling something nasty.
I noticed this expression most especially when she was looking at me today. It struck me as odd since I haven't had much contact with her up until now. We were introduced. She sat in on one local 'Nut meeting and came along when NewBoss Anais and I took a new 'Nut out for lunch one day. Until today, I think that was the extent of our personal contact.
No, Little Smellita didn't really loom large on my horizon until today's (more-or-less) monthly 'Nut staff meeting when she and the heretofore un-nicked sales guy created a minor but obnoxious disturbance muttering about how people thought "free" health care was "free" only because someone else paid for it.
First, the sheer bad manners. Second, the rudeness of dissing the guy, who happens to be Mr. Un-nicked's boss, who had made the joke about the company someday providing health care benefits to employees again. Third, the gross inappropriateness of someone related to the CEO airing their political views in a company meeting.
I shushed Mr. Un-nicked so that the meeting could continue and ignored Smellita.
Yes, the temptation to point out the arrogance of a wealthy college girl--who went from daddy's health care plan to a government-funded health care plan--scoffing at a twenty-something widower with two small children to raise who is finding the expense of health care for his family to be a financial burden was strong, but I resisted. Politics do not belong in the workplace.
There really are days when I ask myself if how committed I am to making this group of rightwing-leaning 'Nuts successful.
The holiday weekend is behind us and I've been buried neck-deep in projects (of my own creation) all morning, but I did want to take a moment to chat with y'all.
There's a guy outside with a shovel. He's shoveling. I stopped him and told him that he shouldn't go to other people's buildings to shovel. If he wants to shovel, he can shovel at home. (I really do think it's kind of late in the season to be putting in new planters, but whatever.)
Rearranging furniture
Friday, I was released from vile servitude (it isn't, of course) at an unreasonably early hour (based on the expectations of those who pay me) and took the opportunity to swing by Target on the way home. I'm abandoning my Ratty Old Cardboard Boxes system of storing books in favor of tidy plastic bins. (Ecologically irresponsible, I know, but there are still times when I buy plastic without stopping to think first.) I bought one each in two sizes so I could test which one will make me the happiest, along with a little chest I wanted for my closet.
What with all the clearing out in the last five years, reorganizing the books I have in storage isn't quite the massive project it once would have been, but I am nevertheless determined to make the whole thing as much work as possible. I'm pondering--do I store--by size, age, or genre? What about authors who wrote in multiple genres--do I store them together or separately? How do I label?
Once home, the in-apartment part of the project went--surprisingly faster than I expected. The R.C. did not escape her place of employment early in the day, so I wasn't slowed down by someone constantly demanding that I not lift/push/carry/shift/shove various items. In two hours, I finished the entire closet, except for getting that now-unloved industrial-strength shelving carried downstairs and tagged "free to a good home."
After my next paycheck (the last one went for rent and part of what I owe for the new mattress) I'm going to treat myself to one of the two bookcases I still need in the bedroom. BTW, after more thought, I realized that the excitingly constructed "lifting shelves" option would only be a cleanliness improvement if I actually unloaded all the bottom shelves and cleaned under them each week, a thing that is highly unlikely to happen, so I'm going with shelves that match the pricey one I already bought. I may run amok and buy both of them at once--I would really like to have that bedroom project checked off the list, you know?
Freelance
Gidget emailed me on Friday saying she had a new client she needed a campaign for. I got it up and ready to go yesterday morning. She's such a pleasure to work with. She gave me the budget, the area to target, and the market. That's all the "help" she offered. 3-1/2 hours, that's all it took.
It took me less time to conceive of and create this campaign--in an industry unfamiliar to me--from scratch than it did to write the email for Bernie's Funhouse client a week ago, justifying the campaign edits I made that actually brought about two leads for them.
Other than that, I did virtually no freelance work this weekend--I glanced at things a couple of times, then moved on with my life. I'm just so over Bernie's boys. (They're all unreasonable because the two campaigns have been live for a month and they haven't sold any of their half-million dollar s/w yet--they want to know what they got for their money.)
I still want to fire him. I'm going to tell him I've given up the idea of going freelance full time. I think that's the only way I'll be able to go away.
Weekending
So, what did I do this weekend? Well, I had fun!
Saturday, a bit of shopping. Target (to exchange the bin lids for the right size), the bed & bath store (duvet cover), drugstore (make-up), and Chinese food for lunch. Doesn't sound that exciting, I guess, but it was hot outside and the stores were well air-conditioned. On a hot summer day, that's pretty much enough to keep me satisfied.
I bought some "privacy film" which is technically in violation of the apartment's rules but I put it on my bedroom window anyhow. I really like the light I get with the blinds up, but there's another building right outside my window and I don't like feeling like a goldfish in a bowl.
Sunday, the R.C. and I took the light rail downtown and strolled up the 16th St Mall to the museum. The weather was perfect--just enough cloud cover to make walking outdoors a complete delight. We loitered through the Tutankhamen exhibit (fascinating) which was not as crowded as I feared but was still too busy for me to really stop and stare to the extent I wanted. Then we saw an all-too brief 3D movie abut the building of the ancient temples. We weren't too good to stop by the children's educational center, either, because that's where the x-ray movie/display of Tut's mummy was being shown, with an explanation of what science's examination of the remains has told them so far.
After that, we strolled back to the Mall for lunch (a wicked indulgence in the caloric offerings of Johnny Rockets), and visited a bookstore where, I'm proud to report, I bought nothing. (I didn't fail to find things I wanted. I just reminded myself that I'm no longer allowed to buy new books if I already have a single, unread book in my "new" pile.) (Also? No new books until I buy new bookshelves.)
Then home--and just in the nick of time as the looming clouds condensed into a thunderstorm, the first in a line of storms that rumbled and banged overhead for the rest of the day.
We watched a movie. Giant snails!
Yesterday, I did the freelance work and then took advantage of my room being almost-but-not-quite the way I'm trying to get it by puttering around for most of the day. I knitted, read, watched DVDs, listened to some of my mythology course, did a bit of laundry and some cleaning. It's an aimless sort of process that I refer to as, "being happy." I spent yesterday mostly being happy. (Yes, some eating was involved.)
Hope your weekend was happy as well!