Five things make a post

[darkemeralds]

1. My sister moved away last week. Not far, but out of the immediate neighborhood. For her, the change has been extreme--having to sell her house and move to a small rental apartment. Me, I just keep noticing that they don't live in that house anymore, and that there are no drop-by visits, and that I'm back to being on my own in the 'hood. So it's kind of sad.


2. On re-re-re-reading Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature over the last couple of weeks, I've been reminded of the concept of ego depletion. That's where, after forcing yourself to concentrate on a task for too long, your decision-making and general agency become measurably compromised. Five days at a job I quit enjoying ages ago practically guarantees an empty mental larder by Friday night. I'm accepting that writing, editing, or in this case even grocery shopping, over the weekend is more than I can ask of myself.


3. On the plus side, here's my retirement countdown:
   
   
   
   I went to a retirement seminar last week and I'm going to need those 351 days just to negotiate the web of red tape that lies between me and my freedom.


4. I've been re-stocking my mental larder this weekend with The Hour. It's extremely good--I put it off on the grounds of having hated Mad Men (hated. Hated like I've never hated a show before), but I enjoyed succumbing to this view of the period in which I was born.


5. I'm currently reading The Singularity Is Near by Ray Kurzweil. It's a text full of very large and very small numbers (teras and petas and nanos and picos all over the place) and therefore perhaps not the best candidate for absorption by audiobook. But the general idea--that within my lifetime we will have created technology that surpasses the capabilities of the human brain (and, shortly thereafter, all the human brains)--is persuasive, and hits me somewhere between exhilarating and terrifying. The book is nearly ten years old and so far Kurzweil's predictions are pretty accurate.

Back to work tomorrow. Work is evil. I can hardly wait for the Singularity.

Comments

[ruric]

1, I miss having hyperlocal friends. My current friend/support network in London all require significant amounts of travel to reach.

2. I hear you - after 3.4 mths in post I have discovered the obstacles to being able to do what I would like in new job. Which are both annoying and unnecessary. I'm contemplating job hunting again once the Feb event is over and I have more mental resources. I very much doubt I want to extend my contract past the original 1 year. Also job is eating my life and leaving me with no resources to do other life fulfilling things during the week too!

3. YEY for countdowns. Light at the end of the tunnel.

4. ravurian recc'd this to me too!

5. Not reading anything at the moment - see point 2.

If only there could be a lottery win in my future *G*

[darkemeralds]

1. Hyperlocal friends. Yes! That's a concept that I've been immersed in recently. Doing a lot of reading in urbanism. Cities that allow their residents to get to what they need without driving have enormous cultural and economic advantages, and I still have that (as I know you do), but hyperlocal friends--aka neighbors--are solid gold.

2. I'm delighted to hear that you have an option of changing jobs, and I hope you do it. I am so done with overwork, and if retirement weren't so imminent, I'd consider taking a big step down in order to live my life.

4. ravurian has generally been a very reliable guide to culture and entertainment. Mind you, he also texted me a couple of dire old limericks today while I was out and about. IKEA on a Sunday afternoon...here's what followed:

me: You're on a roll. I'm at IKEA
Ravurian: There once was a girl at IKEA
The staff there were happy to see 'er...
me: She got a migraine overloading her brain...
Ravurian: and would welcome a bullet to free her

(I count myself fortunate that I didn't provoke a reference to diarrhea.)

5. The only reason I'm getting any "reading" done is that it's all on audio. Best investment I make, that subscription to Audible.com.

And finally, yes. My retirement is kind of like a very long, slow, and modest lottery win. I hope you find a way too. I'm (quite seriously) convinced that work as I've known it most of my life is a terrible evil, and it's gotten drastically worse in the last couple of years.

[executrix]

IKEA...say it loud and there's music playing!
Say it soft, and it's almost like praying.

[darkemeralds]

You made me guffaw with delight first thing this morning. Great way to start the day.

[ruric]

1. I miss having a neighbour downstairs or across the road I could pop in and chat to. It takes between 1-2 hours to get to my closest friends and hour that requires some forward planning, especially when you're reliant on public transport. *G*

2.I probably shouldn't be thinking about it but job is frustrating or a variety of reasons. I could stick it out through the five years of the programme but I don't want to at the moment I'm not sure I can even make it to the end of the contract in Sept! In hindsight I should have jumped at the 6 mnth contract with the environmental charity but you live and learn. Also I figure it took me exactly one month of sheer panicked balls-to-the-wall applying to find this job. I can do that again, and I've kept my contacts with temp agencies up so...that's always an option. There's a large debt comes due in October when I'm due to pay off the house but Oct is a long way off! *G*

3. I approve of your poetry slam limericks!

5. I keep thinking about audiobooks but at the moment I value the peace and quiet at the end of a day - I need the silence to stay sane. (Working in a large open plan office is not good for my mental health).

I hear you about work - I remember being promised in the 80s that modern tech would mean we'd all end up working a 3 days week. Instead a lot of people I know are working the equivalent of a 8 day week crammed into 5 and that's not healthy. It's so ridiculously easy to slip into the mindset of working through lunch and then coming in an hour early and staying an hour late and before you know where you ae you're working a 10 hour day instead of a 7 and then it's all downhill!

[darkemeralds]

On overwork (and I know American culture is notoriously insane on this issue), it's as if, far from embracing a three-day work week, we just keep consolidating and consolidating jobs, cutting budgets, and squeezing, until those of us who still have (what used to be two people's) jobs feel lucky for the chance to put in 60 hour weeks.

It's changing, though. It has to. If a person can avoid debt or get out of existing debt, and can simplify life a little, then there's hope.

It sounds like you've got some options. I'm trying to see where mine are. Temp work is beginning to look pretty appealing.

[ruric]

American culture is more insane than UK culture regarding overwork but we're slipping down the slope too,

At current job a lot of teams are under-resourced and I know a fair number of folks working on average a 60 hour week. They're also amassing leave because there's no time to take it and then getting sick because there's no downtime and then coming back to discover piles of stuff still has not been done because there's no cover. Also newly recruited people are quitting within a couple of weeks of joining in one major team tasked with delivering a substantial project which does not bode well!

It's a vicious circle.

The whole situation is a bit Pythonesque and there are some very valid lessons to be learned about not starting on fricking huge high profile projects until you actually have all the staff resources in place to deliver and that all your staff have adequate training, experience and support to do the job.

I;m still trying to catch up with things that should have been in place back in April *G*

I figure worst case scenario I can bank Feb and Mar salary which will cover my mortgage and living expenses for about 4-6 months if I'm careful. If I really can't hack it anymore I could hand in my notice at the beginning of March, quit at the end and then I have some breathing room to find something more suitable - or I can temp while job hunting.

Job is well paid but not worth the (current) amount of stress and I can't see things getting much better. I may feel differently after this big event in Feb is over but I haven't been this psychotically stressed about work in 30 years.

I figure when it gets to the point that something is impacting my ability to sleep, and thus function during the day and think coherently it's a sign from above that this is not a match made in heaven!

There are options with the mortgage payoff - such as extending the loan - which is not ideal but would be doable even on a reduced salary.

We shall see.

I'm very conscious that stress does not lead to clarity of thought or good decision making so everything is on hold til the middle of Feb. Then it will be time to take a good hard look at ALL the circumstances! *G*

Poor ravurian is currently my lifeline to sanity.

[darkemeralds]

Well, good luck whatever you decide. I just refinanced my mortgage to a longer term at a lower rate, for a VERY significantly reduced monthly payment. I just said screw it, there will always be rent, and if I can lower mine by 60%, that opens a lot of possibilities. It's not the right choice for everyone, but after years of being house-poor from trying to pay off my mortgage, it seemed foolish not to jump.

[ruric]

Lower payments definitely are of the good! Depending on what happens in the next couple of months I suspect I will be seeking out a financial adviser to find out what my best options would be.

[darkemeralds]

He's been doing yeoman duty on my sanity too. Long-distance amusement and brainy chat are huge benefices!

As sorry as I am to read about the disorder and chaos in your job, I have to say it's kind of a relief. You could be describing my workplace, and it's strangely validating to know that it's not just my personal failings as an employee. Good luck to us both, huh?

[ruric]

I had a long meeting with the Cap Projects Team today and a chance to swap war stories. The situation the project managers and their teams are in is just insane.

So yes - always validating to find out you are not alone! *G*

And despite what himself says below I still think there's good stress and bad stress. Working at ex org could be very stressful but for 80% of the time I was there it was productive and everybody was in it with you. Some of my best memories of the old place are of working til midnight with the CEO, Directors and random staff to finish bids cos we were all in it together (that changed when my old CEO left and the new one joined).

At the new place I can't imagine the CEO or any of the Director's rolling up their sleeves to muck in and make sure anything works. There's downward delegation with apparently little awareness of how stressed and under-resourced those below them are. I'm sensing a general mood of resentment, disillusion and people feeling like they're being set up to fail which is not a great place to be at the beginning of delivering a massive programme!

[darkemeralds]

I agree completely that there's good and bad stress. And the good can creep over into the bad imperceptibly if there's a bit too much of it, or if the environment changes.

"Under-resourced" is exactly what's happening. Not only have we all been asked to take on a little more (then a little more...), but as we have to learn the new tasks we take on, AND give up elements of our private lives to do them, there's an exponential decline in the quality of everything we do.

With the best will in the world, even the most workaholic of employees can't keep up indefinitely. When it starts to fall apart, it falls apart with alarming rapidity. I'm seeing that now in my workplace.

[ruric]

Absolutely. Taking on more and learning new things can be fun but the older I get the less I'm willing to put up with things that eat into *MY* time.

I have a pretty fulfilling life outside work, there's a lot more I want to do with the Transition Town group and with the Maser Gardeners and with a couple of other projects. I don't want to lose out on doing those things which fulfil my soul because the job is eating into all my time.

I've always had a reasonable grip on what I'm willing to put up with in terms of quality of life + income to do what I want + demands of job (though I did lose that at the end at the old place).

I began my working life by leaving a job because the stress/rewards balance was all wrong, I left the old place because they ceased to value staff and to be honest if I can't reconcile things here in the next month or two then I'll be off. They do need my post (so I'm unlikely to temperfit my way out) and I'd hope to stay until they found a replacement but I have no problems with saying "thanks for the opportunity but this just isn't working for me." At least it's honest? For all I know they might be feeling the same way too!

After all my team has had 3 managers in the 3.5 months I've been there! *G*

[ravurian]

I haven't been this psychotically stressed about work in 30 years.

*Ahem* Not quite true. Your last permanent job had you existing in a constant state of stress - it's just the degree to which you had become habituated to it that's altered during your fallow period. <hands you your dried frog pills>

[ruric]

Not just habituated but there was more of a feeling of all being in it together at the old place (at least in the early years) and more awareness of pressure points and being willing to help each other out.

At the new place too many people are overworked so there is no capacity to help!

[lamentables]

I do enjoy The Hour. It's not perfect, but very satisfying with some moving performances.

I am delighted to find that there is someone other than abrinsky and me who fails to find the awesome in Mad Men. I don't remember actually hating it, but I did manage to both dislike it intensely and find it boring.

[darkemeralds]

Peter Capaldi and Anna Chancellor really touched my heart in S2.

See tehomet's comment just below yours re: Mad Men: "It's a highly polished cockroach of a show."

The cockroachiness of it, for me, is its period accuracy. I don't mind, for instance, seeing a 19th century English period piece featuring all white people (as a point of historical likelihood). But there's something so horrific about a story set in my lifetime--and not only that, but within my memory--that portrays so realistically how awful things were for women, gays, minorities... I mean, Mad Men is a perfect example of "you can, but why would you?" I just found it so viscerally upsetting that I wanted to scream. I've never had a reaction like it to any other TV show.

[lamentables]

"you can, but why would you?"

Yes. That.

It contrasts with Life on Mars, which made me wince with its 1970s sexism, racism, and other prejudices but still had heart and a story I wanted to hear.

[darkemeralds]

God, yes, Life on Mars was so wonderful. Of course, it had Sam, representing our post-2000 point of view. The wincing was explicit and part of the plot. And it seemed patently clear to me in the subtext that for all its "political correctness," modern policing is a vast improvement over 1970s policing.

Mad Men steps into the wayback machine pretending that no 21st century sensibility goes with it. Look at this museum, it says. Just look. Absorb. Admire the accuracy. Accept.

I still have a visceral reaction to just thinking about it. It's weird how powerful it is. Thanks for giving me a bit of room to rant. :D

[tehomet]

I know what you mean about your sister. My siblings both live more than two hours drive away, and my nearest friend is an hour and a half away by train. It does make a difference.

I have watched precisely one scene of Mad Men and loathed it. I understand that that's probably not unintentional on the part of the writers, but still it's not something I want to spend time on. It's a highly polished cockroach of a show. Eye-catching shine. Get the feck away from me.

Thank goodness you have less than a year to go until you are a free woman. That is marvellous!

[darkemeralds]

Your situation does sound like a serious tradeoff between good things like privacy, quiet, and independence on the one hand, and isolation on the other. I'm realizing that my choice to go car-free was heavily predicated on how close my sister and her kids were. I don't regret the choice--it's paid off in lots of ways--but proximity and transportation are huge public health issues that affect me individually more than I realized.

"A highly polished cockroach of a show" is brilliant.

[kis]

1. H moved? How did I miss knowing she was going to?

2. Ego depletion has many causes, in my experience. And probably each has its own, specific cure.

3. Whee!

4. I didn't much like The Hour. Only watched the first episode but that whole period depresses me.

5. Nothing to say, other than I'm listening to Copenhagen in small chunks and being dazzled by human brains and human frailties. (And Bendy's voice is always a joy!)

[darkemeralds]

1. I haven't really talked or written about her move. I think she recognized in October that there was no way she could keep up payments on the house; it was on the market by early December, it sold in two days, and she moved the first weekend of January. It's hard to have and express sadness about something that was both necessary and for the best, and my stress over it is a lot of what's kept me silent around here the last couple of months.

All that said, she's less than a mile away. It's not the same, but it's not as if she's left town, or even the neighborhood. And since there are only two of them left (oldest daughter in NYC, youngest in Boston, middle up the road in North Portland, leaving only my nephew), they've been able to find a very nice, well-kept-up apartment a little over halfway between my house and our mom's house.

2. I'd love to hear more of your thoughts on ego depletion. I haven't got it figured out yet. I learned the term more than a year ago, and it's taken me this long to admit that it's a real problem for me and not just me guiltily making excuses for non-performance.

4. The late 50s-early 60s period bugs the crap out of me, too. The Hour's portrayal of the period is only nominally accurate, what with a 28 year old beautiful single female news producer and all. I didn't fall for it in a fannish way, but I wasn't repelled as I was by Mad Men.

5. Copenhagen, you say? Bendy, you say? OMG! I just looked it up and I must get access to it.

And lo! To know is to have. Downloading a recording now. Eee! Going to listen on my way home in a couple of hours.

[kis]

1. It's not just the physical distance, is it? It's the loss of shared history. And change. And being 'left behind'.

2. Well, I'm taking the term for what it means to me. There are a lot of things that seem to drain me until I feel that I've got nothing left. Extensive, intensive work is one. Relationships (particularly ones where I feel I'm being Left Behind) another. Lack of sunlight. Demands with no returns.

5. Wasn't it WONDERFUL? And almost Joss-like in what it could teach about writing. (Not to mention the hot slash potential!)

[darkemeralds]

I kid you not: I was listening to Copenhagen last night on my way home from work, and had come to the part where Heisenberg is talking about playing Beethoven and skiing and not-thinking, and I was totally shipping him with Bohr. Sadly, the version I was able to acquire was flawed, and cut out before the end, so I must go on the hunt for something better.

Unwanted and unexpected change seems to set off a whole chain of reactions, primitive and sophisticated: "Oh no! Change! No! Do Not Want! But must adapt. Must put a good face on things. Must see both sides." It's all valid and necessary, but it has a cost. It's a cost I tend to pay in currency like chocolate and large blocks of random internet-clicking time.