OMG, I THINK TWITTER IS DOWN! How will I live without knowing what everyone is doing/thinking/talking about???

Edit: Ok, it's back up now... and hardly anyone has tweeted since the last time I was on (last night) anyway. No need to panic.

I last shaved my head over 3 months ago, and it had been growing in nicely for a while, and I started pulling it again, more and more. Today it looked so awful all different lengths that I thought it would be best to even it out before work tomorrow. So, I took my hair clippers and evened it out. Turns out that my pulling is not exactly uniform, so I now have visable bald/really thin spots. It probably looks worse than it did this morning. FML.

If there is one person (or more) on your friends list who makes your world a better place just because they exist, and who you would not have met without the Internet, post this sentence in your journal.

Sick day. *curls into fetal position*

I have a new law to pass...

If a family's child flushes a puppy down the toilet, said family does not get that, or any animal, back.

I know everyone is going to be all "he's just a kid, he didn't know any better". That doesn't really matter, because whether it's out of malintent or immaturity, that child has demonstrated capability of harming the pet, and therefore should not be in the presence of an animal without adult supervision.

Also, who washes ANYTHING in a toilet? It would have been more logical for the kid to have accidentally almost drowned the puppy in the bathtub while washing it... at least then it would have been clean.

Primary face-palm: Going into work thinking I'm supposed to start at 5am, actually starting at 5am, and then realizing not long after that I'm not supposed to start until 6am.
Secondary face-palm: My team manager telling me to stay to the end of my "scheduled" shift or it'll count as leaving early. Yay ten hours at work! Actually, it was a little longer because I had a call last about 10 minutes after my scheduled shift ended. And then I had to write notes, and then go home... at which point I had 2.25 hours until bed, and still had to stop for gas on the way home. Now, since I ate pizza yesterday and have none left, it's poptarts for dinner! Yay!

I'm trying to resist the urge to eat an entire pizza two days in a row. That seems excessive to me... though it is the ultimate comfort food.

"Every now and then I get some moron that says "you don't need to use a capo!" You don't have to use a capo. You don't have to wear clothes when you go out during the day... but it's a good thing to do, you know?" - Erich Andreas, www.yourguitarsage.com

Don't you love when I go on recording binges? Here's one I just did a few minutes ago - Butterfly Fly Away is the name of the song. You can assume these are all covers of other people's music unless I tell you otherwise :) I gotta learn to play before learning to write!

Anyway, you might notice this is the first song I've recorded/played with the majority being individual strings/notes instead of chords... it's not a particularly easy feat! This is largely improvisation as opposed to reading from someone else's tab. As usual, be nice!

Also, a shout out to folkchick3 - thanks for your comment on my last recording, I promise I'll reply to it soon! Busy, busy...

So I got my capo, which opens a new world of songs I can learn on the guitar. Here's a cover I did of one called Forever & Always by Taylor Swift... I just heard it a few days ago and was intrigued by it, so I decided to give it a go on the guitar. It's obviously not perfect, but heck, let's enjoy it anyway.
Listen at your own risk. (and as usual, even constructive criticism will make me sad so say something nice or carry on your way... thanks!)


(you may need to turn up your speakers to hear it, as my recording equipment is very 90's)

Another tech down. I feel like finding out how long it takes until I'm the last one standing from our training class of 30ish.

As difficult as this job is, and as much as I sometimes complain about it, I deserve to be proud of myself for sticking it out this long. When we first hit the floor, I was sure that I was going to be the first one to give up... but I told myself "wait two weeks - wait until the end of Streamline". So I did. And then Streamline didn't really end. And then it was "wait another week - don't say goodbye to the trainers before you have to". So I did. And then I told myself "life's a climb", so I stuck it out some more. At this point, the reason I'm there is because I have a mortgage to pay, and I can't afford to be without work... and of course, I do get the occasional customer that I actually enjoy speaking with. That said, I've outlasted a lot of people in my class. Last I checked, we're down to somewhere between 15 and 20 people from 30, after just a couple months.

As much as I struggle with my job, another thing that keeps me going is that I want it to mean something that the trainers from Florida were here. If every person quits that they trained, that 2 months of their lives was just a huge waste of time and energy... besides which, if I were in their position and every one of my students quit almost immediately, I'd feel badly - like I didn't adequately prepare them for the job ahead. I want them to know that it matters that they came here to help us, that they did a really good job in training us, and that we were lucky to have them. Perhaps the only downside was that we got spoiled - once they left, it wasn't physically possible for work to be as much fun without them.

Today people walked out of work, or didn't come in at all.

Mittens was on scheduled vacation, Matt came in and walked out after one call or less, Steve came in for a couple hours and left for a 'personal' day since it's his birthday, Martina's stepdaughter tried to fly again and broke her wrist so she had to leave after a few hours, Carlie didn't come in at all, and neither did Jason. In our entire row (full capacity at 10), it was just me and three other people.

Call volume was huge because there were so many people missing, and then around 2:30pm our call logging tool froze again - even the preprod program. I made a dispatch just in the nick of time, and then it went down. I was in 'system down' idle code for a while, then I went on break, then I came back into idle, and was very frustrated. I took another call - luckily one that was a new issue and not something that I had to read tech notes on. I then heard one of my colleagues, Brody, say to someone else that "It's not the customers' fault our system isn't working", and I thought to myself, how true. Why should they be punished with ridiculous wait time? I wish there was a way to punish the maintainers of the system without killing the customers' experience or that of our coworkers.

When lots of people walk out, it makes customers have to wait longer, remaining employees have to work harder, and if the service levels aren't good, our employer gets fined hundreds of thousands of dollars by the computer company. Essentially, everyone suffers expect for the people who should. Even given that, I was ready to walk out at 4pm anyway because the tools weren't working and how am I supposed to do my job like that? Just as I'd put everything away and got my stuff ready to go, I was about to log out when our tools mysteriously started working again. With that working, I had no valid reason to leave, so I stayed until the end of my shift. Unfortunately, it meant I still got home at 6pm, and tomorrow our shifts are changed again so at 6am, I'll be back sitting at that desk. That's 12 hours to eat dinner, take the dogs out, go to sleep, wake up, take the dogs out, eat breakfast, and get back there.

And to top it off, my car has decided to become a jerk. It still starts and runs, but when I got into it for the drive home, the signals won't work, the air controls won't work, my new stereo won't work, the windshield wipers don't work... it's like there's no accessory power at all. I don't get it.

INSANE DAY - in a good way!

My shift started at 8:30am, but I always get there 20 minutes early so I can chill out and not be in such a rush when I get there. I whipped out my Hannah Montana poster book and put up four Miley/Hannah postcards with my collection of other Hannah Montana things. Then my team manager summoned me and told me that I had to go back to training, and I was totally excited because I'd rather do anything than actually answer calls. I asked if he was serious and he "not really, you're actually going to be doing the training... and I am serious about that!", and I probably got the most frightened look on my face because I have slight stage fright and I haven't been trained to be a trainer. Anyway, what happened was during my training, I was sitting beside someone who was in training to be a trainer, so we got to know eachother pretty well. The class that she's teaching now doesn't have log-ins yet for our remote connection tool, so she got special permission to pull me from the floor and have me help train people on that tool. It was really awesome - I spent almost an hour helping teach, and it was totally fun. I may end up being a trainer - we'll see!

Anyway, my ego was so big I could barely fit through the doorway after that because after all, I'd been hand-selected to help and it went really well. I went back to my desk and heard that someone got VTO (voluntary time off) 15 minutes into their shift today so I went and signed up for that too in hopes to have a little time off today to get other things done. I answered a few calls including one that taught me if you hold down the CTRL button and hit the letter "w" on your keyboard, your window will close. I also got to talk to a person that I had helped during one of my first days taking calls, which was nice as well... except it reminded me that Kyle was the one that helped me with that call, and now he's gone. :(

Back to good things - a few easy calls and no real cause for concern, and then I get told that I'd gotten VTO, so I left around 11:30am. Obviously I don't get paid for the remainder of my shift, but it's all good - I really needed the time off. So I called up my mom, and we went for lunch. Then I went to my other work for a little while, and then home and had a short nap.

And then I woke up to my phone ringing - my mom found a car for $600. I called the lady up and set up an appointment for a test drive, and luckily my brother was able to come with me... he knows way more about cars than I do. The extend of my knowlege is "does it start?" Thanks AJ :) The car has only had one owner and was built in 1992... I was really surprised at how good of condition it was in. The interior was spotless! As far as I'm concerned it's completely worth $600 so I wasn't about to be a jerk and lowball the lady. Anyway, the car will be mine shortly; I'm dropping off a deposit for it on wednesday, and then will pick it up on the 18th and pay for the rest of it then. I'm actually kind of excited because all I've ever had were new vehicles (aww poor baby) so it's going to be cool to have something that's... more appropriate for my financial situation/place in life. I will own the car outright, no loans or anything, so it should be all good.

I am currently uploading photos of thursday's get-together with my coworkers and trainer on my flickr. Check it out if you want to.

I had my first customer today that escalated a call because I wasn't telling her what she wanted to hear. So I put my supervisor on the phone, and he told her a little more of what she didn't want to hear. And then there was no making her happy, but at least she wasn't on the phone with us any longer. I was unfortunate enough to get the call 20 minutes before the end of my shift, and I ended up not leaving work until almost an hour and a half after my shift was supposed to end. I had great hopes of spending time with my mom after work, but I couldn't leave the dogs alone any longer so I had to go straight home.

I did a little more cubicle decorating this morning:



The top poster is all Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus. The photo to the far left is Zach (left) and Kyle (right). The picture right underneath the HM poster is Zach high-fiving Elizabeth's son, and the picture under that is Kyle (left) and Pete a.k.a. Helper Cat (right). Zach, Kyle, and Pete are all trainers, with Zach being the trainer of my class, Pete being a co-trainer of my class, and Kyle being my favourite floorwalker. Zach and Kyle are back in Tampa now, but Pete is still around - though he is training his own class now. Now I never have to be without them.

It sucked going to work today though because a) my weekend was one day long and I worked half of it anyway, and b) I usually volunteer on sundays.

Ugh. I have to work today. Today is Sunday. Ugh.

This year (2009), I worked somewhere I swore I'd never work.
Last year (2008), I had my purse stolen from inside my house while I was home.
The year before (2007), I spent as much time as possible outside in a bathing suit.
The year before that (2006), I was finishing off my first (and only) university semester.
The year before that (2005), I was about one month away from graduating.
The year before that (2004), I was in grade 11 - need I say more?

Looking back over the years, those were the month of May events.

Today marks my 5th year of having my lj. I usually take anniversary opportunities to explain exactly why I love lj so much, but today I am far too tired to do so, and I have to work tomorrow because my new shift is 8:30-5:30 with thursdays and fridays off. So, instead...

*hugs lj*

My trainer, Zach, on his last night here, high-fiving Elizabeth 's son, Noah.

Tomorrow is my trainer's last day here. I am a mess. The end.

AAAHHHHHHH, this is so NICE!

My roommate (roommate B) moved out this week, and now I have the place to myself again. You know, I really took it for granted before, but now every minute that I'm here alone is like a personal gift from the universe thanking me for putting up with all the crap it throws at me regularly.

I moved my computer into the now-empty second bedroom, and hooked it up with the ethernet cable directly from my modem - now my internet is so much faster! Wireless is nice and all, but it will never compare to having a hardline going straight from the source to the destination. I also removed a few programs I never use from my computer, so things are running better in general. You know what that means - more updating!

Also, I did some work at my other job today, and ended up going out for sushi with my mom. I love sushi. I also love eating sushi and running into my trainer and a couple other almost-equally-awesome seniors, which is what happened today. It's rare that I get three high fives on a weekend, but today I did! I'm not sure what to attribute the near-uniform awesomeness of the guys from Tampa to... I don't think it's because they're American... maybe because they live in Florida? Maybe because they're all computer geeks? Maybe because they all work together in the same building? I don't know, but there's definitely a trend of awesomeness in the guys they send up here to train us.

Also nice is that I cleaned my house this morning, and I know it will stay clean... and if for some reason it doesn't, it's my own fault so I'll just clean it later. I'm running a million loads of laundry to get that all taken care of as well. By a million, I mean about 3.

Yesterday evening was pretty much heaven - it was so warm that I went and relaxed on a chair on my patio. It must have been like 70 degrees (aka 20 degrees celsius)! It was quiet in the complex, birds were chirping, the sun was shining, there was a gentle warm breeze, the dogs were napping at my feet, and there was no worry of a roommate coming home. HEAVEN.

Yesterday morning, however, was pure hell. I got a really pissed off customer who pretty much thought I knew nothing. Even though I tried my best, it wasn't good enough. That made me very sad, and I almost wanted to walk out of work. I took my break after I got off the phone with her, came back to my desk, and referred to the Hannah Montana collage I made for my cubicle, which has some of my favourite lyrics on it:
"I know where I stand, I know who I am, I would never run away when life gets bad"
"Nobody's perfect, I gotta work it, again and again 'til I get it right"
"There's always going to be another mountain, I'm alway going to want to make it move. Always going to be an uphill battle, sometimes I'm going to have to lose. Aint about how fast I get there, aint about what's waiting on the other side - it's the climb"
So, I got back on the phone, got another call that required a lot of troubleshooting - but this time, the customer was endlessly patient and thought I was really smart. Sometimes when we were running a test or I was poking around in her settings, I would hear her talking to her mother about how well it was going and how "she's got this." I almost think that I do a better job with customers that are like that - the ones that are patient and have confidence in me - because then I'm more relaxed and can think more clearly. It's hard to concentrate on an issue when someone is expressing their dissatisfaction with you. Currently I've had more customers who like me than customers who don't, so as long as that stays the case, I should be okay. Hopefully over time I'll get thicker skin and irate customers won't bother me so much, but at this point, it hurts my feelings.

This entire entry has been brought to you in reverse-chronological order.

Another kudos call today! I feel a little guilty for taking the credit when it was really Kyle (one of the trainers/floorwalkers) that provided me with dead-on troubleshooting steps (must high five him later), but I'll take any kudos call I can get! Also had some good talks with people from work, which was nice. Pretty tired right now though, so I'm going to have some dinner, play some guitar, and go to bed.

P.S. I heart hannah montana!