Massive climate change report: probably no surprise at all that this was released a month early, on Black Friday, when it would garner the least attention
As a parent who manages kid-free unattached staff and covers for them days nights, weekends and holidays as they need to care for their family or personal needs, as a person with chronic pain who never calls out unless it’s dire crippling pain and even then I don’t want to ask them to cover, I find these parent-coworkers enraging. What terrible selfish people!
Nnedi wanted to give Fwadausi Bello of this terrible story an alternative ending of triumph.
Thank goodness for this federal judge: A federal judge on Tuesday blocked a Mississippi state law that sought to forbid most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy, writing a sharply worded opinion with implications for states weighing similar measures. Furthermore, he called the Legislature’s professed interest in women’s health “pure gaslighting,” pointing to evidence of the state’s high infant and maternal mortality rates. “Its leaders are proud to challenge Roe but choose not to lift a finger to address the tragedies lurking on the other side of the delivery room, such as high infant and maternal mortality rates,” he wrote in a footnote.
I didn’t know any of this about Billie Holiday’s life and death.
A. I don’t like giving feedback, it feels confrontational.
B. I shouldn’t have to give you feedback or tell you what I’m thinking. You’re my right hand, you should already know.
C. Why are you doing [what you thought was your job], you’re not responsible for that! You need to be doing [some other thing you were never informed of]!
These are just a few of the gems delivered by Past Terrible Managers in my Past Work Life.
Bad managers drive me more than a little bit ’round the bend. Not all managers became managers because they were actually good at managing people, they were usually promoted for doing their own job well. When that happens, either they learn how to do it well, or you get a dingleberry of a supervisor and that’s just bad times.
As a manager, past and present, giving feedback to staff, or really anybody, without either feeling or being confrontational is such a necessary skill. If you need someone to change, they need to KNOW that you need them to change! Relying on strategy C above is such nonsense.
I understand that delivering criticism feels fraught, it’s not always comfortable, and empathetic people who have had bad experiences on the receiving end of feedback don’t want to perpetuate that cycle. That does not relieve you of a key aspect of your duty as a manager.
When a manager tells me they just don’t want to give feedback, I often ask if they enjoy being irritated, resented and subpar. Because that’s the situation they’re setting up: their employee will continue to do things wrong, this will reflect badly on the employee and reflect badly on you. Also, it’s likely that the tolerance of poor performance by that employee will have a sinking effect on morale for the rest of the team.
And conversely, what would it be like to be the hapless employee who doesn’t know they’re doing things wrong or inefficiently, and catching flak for something they don’t even realize is a problem? Don’t be that jerk boss who sows confusion, induces anxiety, and breeds resentment!
As I said, this is a learned skill. I didn’t come by it naturally, especially since I’m both introverted and at least a little anti-social.
So, how do I give constructive feedback?
1. I treat feedback sessions as conversations.
This isn’t intended as a confrontation but girding yourself for a battle almost certainly turns it into one. Be prepared, just don’t assume it has to be that difficult.
First time offenses? I ask them to explain to me how and why they’re doing X so that I understand where they’re coming from. It’s possible that they’ll identify a weakness in the existing protocol, or the training documentation. In other words, this could be a learning opportunity for me too.
After I solicit some perspective from them, if it doesn’t change my mind, then I explain what we need them to do and why.
Repeat offenses, if the thing is non-negotiable? I remind them of previous conversations, and ask what, if anything, is preventing them from performing their duties as asked. This is not permission to stand their ground, this is checking whether I need to be doing another aspect of my job: removing barriers to their performance. Reiterate that I need them to do it this way, and follow up as needed.
2. Understand that your goal is improvement, not chastisement.
Even if they’re on a PIP, the end goal is improvement of the work situation, whether that’s ultimately a firing or a mediocre employee understanding what’s really needed from them and turning a corner.
When frustrated by an undesirable outcome, I’ve seen managers rage and rant at their staff. What’s the point? That intimidates some, irritates others, but rarely ever produces results. Besides, it’s rude and disrespectful. Respect goes both ways and is more easily lost than earned.
3. Take the emotion out of it.
This is about the job, remain professional. It’s not your feelings or their feelings or likes or dislikes or any of that other stuff. It’s not personal. That doesn’t mean be a robot! It just means don’t derail the conversation. Focus on the thing you want improved and find a way to fix it. If someone is causing a problem, then figure out a way to fix that but don’t make it personal.
No one benefits from going several rounds in the blame game.
There’s no magic bullet, and I’m not the perfect manager, but I try to address my weaknesses. The least we can do is help people do the same. After all, it’s your job.
:: What ridiculous things have you heard from management? :: What did you love in a good manager?
There’s no real privacy on the internets, but it’s still rather jarring to drop by a website and see the Live Traffic Feed widget broadcasting my location to every other reader.
As an academic notion, it’s not a bad thing and most people don’t care to track who arrived when and made what comment. But it’s still stopped me from commenting more than a few times when I just can’t reconcile having my comment and location on the same page at the same time. There are quite a few blogs I like out there that have given me pause when I wanted to leave a comment.
Am I the only one who dislikes being pinpointed this way?
A few weeks back I finally tried out Bloglines and as a reader, I love it for the convenience of knowing when someone has updated. As a blogger, though, I wonder if the convenience of Bloglines or any other blog aggregator has any negative effect on the responses from the readers? I’ve a small handful of subscribers (yay!) but I don’t know how long you’ve been subscribers and if that encourages you to drop by more often or speak up less? Do you find that you comment more or less when you use a feed aggregator? Have you experienced a drop or increase in dialogue on your blogs?
Year 5, Day 26: Last week, I was eagerly anticipating the arrival of my seeds today for planting the front yard and the garden. Not only are they still in Florida today, throwing my planting schedule into a shambles, I’m anticipating a terrible conversation with the internist about Sera’s prognosis. She relapsed over the weekend and was hospitalized for lifesaving care. After going through half a box of tissues and putting a cool washcloth on my eyes, I did some grasping at straws research. None of it did any good. Her prognosis is bad. She’s already on the best possible treatment plan and it’s still failing. The other treatment options aren’t truly options, they’re desperate attempts to prolong life without regard for quality of life. We’re bringing her home for doggy hospice for as long as she still feels good. If she relapses again, when she relapses again, it’ll be her time. It would be deeply unkind to force her to go through this over and over.
It’s a good thing that I did a lot of work on the weekend because I’m fit for nothing today.
But she felt better enough from the overnight care to have a laugh at me.
Trying to shift her for her last walk of the night at 945 pm: Sera. Sera. Sera. (Gently shake her shoulder) Come. Sera come. Sera, come. Seraaaaaaa come. (Start worrying she’s relapsed again the past hour) Sera. Sera. Serraaaaaa? Ok fine, you leave me no choice. Open the wipes packet to get a wipe. (To wipe her down because she IS still a bit grubby from the hospital but I’m not going to make her have a bath now.)
She pops up like a jack in the box.
AH HA YOU WERE JUST IGNORING ME.
We finally went out and instead of going right back in like normal, she took me on a jaunt to sniff the ALL sniffs. She still doesn’t want to eat much of anything but her energy is much better than it’s been in days. I don’t know how long this will last but we’re going to make the most of what time we have left.
Year 5, Day 27: I can feel the depression gloom creeping in. I don’t want to eat, I don’t want to talk to most people, I want to be left alone with Sera to just be quiet together. I hand fed her boiled eggs this morning, she was strangely excited about it so I boiled some more for her. Of course she then decided she was done with eggs. I’ll have to think of something else for her dinner. Several cries later, I got some work done, listened to her snore, cuddled with her a bit, and then she took me for the longest walk in the recent history of walks. She was either feeling her oats or taking her farewell tour, or both.
We were both fairly wiped out but there was still the usual stuff to do so I went through our usual routines: “I’m going to pick up JB now, you can stay here and nap”, then “we’re going to run an errand now, we’ll see you when we get back”.
And she was here when we got back and she was coddled some more with hand feeding and head rubs. JB wistfully says, now and again, I wish she could get better.
Me too, kid.
She was hospitalized overnight and part of one day and the house positively echoed with her absence. It’s going to be so much worse when she’s gone.
Year 5, Day 28: Sera woke me before 5 am trying to get out the door because she had the Tummy Troubles and we didn’t get out in time so the first hour and a half of this predawn was spent scrubbing the carpet, the floors, her tail and bum, and washing blankets and towels. That was a lot.
She seemed fine the rest of the morning so I decided it was more important to get some calories into her around lunchtime than to go the full 24 hours of withholding food. This proved to be a Big Mistake. She frantically (for her, this just looks like a tense body and an intense eyeball) got me to take her out at 6 pm and had a real mess before we got across the street. I had to get some warm water and wash her up. She smelled of Mango Tango for about ten minutes before she continued to have Tummy Troubles a few more times. Oh well, good effort.
I camped out on the sofa so I could get to her quickly during the night if she needed to go out urgently again. She did. Every single hour until 5 am. But not for Tummy Troubles, half the time she needed to pee, half the time she was asking for water. I’m grateful I didn’t have to clean up but am ever so tired.
Year 5, Day 29: Just in case, I’m switching her to morning meds only. I gave her the steroids she’s been on for months last night. I’m not sure whether it was the steroids or if it was because I camped out and she was thrown off by the light and relocation. Thankfully no tummy troubles since 7 pm but I am whipped and it’s only 7 am. Another 12 hours of water-only and tiny amounts of rice to be safe.
I’ve cycled through all the stages of grief in the past few days and I’m sure when the clock really starts ticking I’ll be cycling through them again a few more times. But for this moment I’m finally in a brainspace of trying to just be in the moment with her, whatever that moment contains.
I’m mentally (and photographically and sometimes here) recording her maybe-lasts. Tonight, she came to Smol Acrobat’s room and laid down nearby when they started to tantrum, following Seamus’s tradition of going TOWARDS the alarming and loud screaming. They never interfered with the yelling, they would just be nearby radiating support. She followed me out of the office yesterday afternoon to see where I was going, like she used to do all the time. I’m trying to commit these all to memory. Smol Acrobat cuddled her face gently tonight. It breaks my heart that they’re not really going to remember her. They’re still too young to remember this year on their own, outside of pictures and stories. I hope we have a good night tonight, maybe a good day will follow that.
Life is still inexplicably going on around us. We’re scheduling the final review of the will and trust. I marked up my first round of edits and sent those back already. This week I marked up a second round of clarification questions to be sure I know how some of these details work when we brief our new executors/trustees for our meeting. Then it has to be notarized to be official. That’ll be one giant important thing off my list. Then we need to make sure all the relevant people have a copy of the paperwork and understand our wishes and our thinking.
My seeds are still in transit. I’ve been itching to plant them and have something good to look forward to, to do something that’s positive and not sad.
Year 5, Day 30: Starting at midnight, she kept coming to fetch me to go outside every hour, then half hour, then quarter hour. She threw up everything she’d eaten yesterday evening, and it wasn’t that much to begin with. It tore my heart up trying to support her as she heaved.
It’s been almost seven years together and she’s only now communicating clearly to me. Each time she comes to get me, I know she wants me to take her out. Maybe it’s less about clarity and more about consistency. Most of the time, prior to her illness, she didn’t need anything, she was just keeping me company. I’m just slow and sluggish on my third night of this, having had no sleep, day or night. She settled on the kitchen bed, instead of coming back to the bedroom like usual. She wanted to stay near the door. We went outside seven times by 330 am and I was absolutely beat. I begged her quietly to sleep for a while. We both needed it. I was dizzy and no longer seeing straight. Miraculously we got three whole hours of sleep before she fetched me again and out the door we went.
I wondered how much longer we could keep this up. She was still interested in food, she was still ambulatory, but she wasn’t going to get better. The disease had progressed too much. And I was getting delirious.
I sat and held her paws for a long while, crying and contemplating what we could do to make her more comfortable. I wondered how we’d make the decision. I wondered how I could let her go. I don’t want to. She’s come so far, we’ve tried so hard.
But by mid afternoon I had my answer. She was crashing again. She had always jumped up for her midday walk. Today, she didn’t even try to get up. She just looked at me. It took such coaxing and encouragement and helping her up to get out the door. Once out, she was fatigued and unsteady. Not nearly as bad as when we took her to the ER but we already knew that we could not let her get that bad again. When we returned, and I offered her baked salmon, she’d only take slivers. Nothing like enough to sustain life.
She sat nearly in my lap as I hugged her and snuggled close to me for a while. That was a first, and last. She’s never, not once, been a lap dog like I’d hoped she would become. Seamus certainly was and he had 30 lbs on her. It’s like she was checking every last box this week except the one where my dogs are on 20 year contracts. But she was telling us it was her time, so we called the vet, got the kids, and brought her to say goodbye. We were with her every minute, telling her how much we loved her. I felt like the world’s worst traitor. She trusted me and I tried but I failed her. And now …
The vet was as kind as could be. She pointed out that Sera’s 🐶 body condition showed it was time and reminded us that we’d done everything we could do. She talked the kids through what was going to happen and gave us time to say our goodbyes.
This has been one of the most painful days of my life, having to make this decision because of a disease, before her time. She deserved more years, more pets, more cuddles, more love, more treats. Everything feels terrible and unfair and awful.
Frankly I don’t remember how to exist with my dog. She’s been a constant companion, day and night, and everything in between. She’s my officemate, snoring and running in her sleep while I gripe at the computer. Sometimes stinking up the joint with her toxic farts. When your heart breaks, you hug your dog. What do you do when your last dog is gone?
Year 5, Day 12: I was in a terrible mood yesterday and woke up on the precipice of that terrible mood again today. That, my utter lack of patience for anyone’s anything, and my pain and fatigue during school dropoff when I’ve normally walked twice that distance by the time we’re done – it’s screamingly clear I’m completely at the end of my emotional and physical ropes.
Between last week (travel, Sera’s health scare, hours of catching up, Smol Acrobat suddenly deciding that they’re ready to use the toilet so we have sixteen false alarms a day, Smol Acrobat’s stomachaches that spiraled out of control last week) and the weekend (scrubbing Sera’s vomit out of the carpet, the rug, and off the floor x 4, the washing machine dying, my backup computer turned main work computer trying to die)… I need a break. But I have a full week ahead of me so there’s no room for recovery in sight.
I put myself to work on meditative tasks: washing dishes and cooking turkey for Sera in an attempt to settle my ruff.
*****
I simply don’t understand why people call it “six months of the Gaza war”. It’s a genocide, not a war. The Palestinians are not waging war. A small part of their population is committing crimes and the entire population is being held responsible for it. To quote a friend, “one side in this has the power to exterminate the other and they are using it.” Of course we all know the chaos and horror that suicide bombers can wreak and October 7 was horror upon horror. And then it was followed up by a relentless six month extermination campaign. How is that going to bring any hostages home? They’re murdering indiscriminately, children, women, men, aid workers, it doesn’t matter anymore. Israel is just on an all out destruction rampage. They even killed some of the hostages themselves: 3 hostages killed in Gaza by Israeli troops were shirtless and waving a white flag, official says.
Year 4, Day 356: Nothing like avoiding any Sunday scaries by being so completely exhausted that you can’t even think ahead to Monday. We overdid it on the weekend and today we need a secondary weekend for recovery. That would be nice, wouldn’t it?
A very small part of it was I finally had the werewithal to pick two Lakota families to help. One family is grieving the loss of a son and have been on the list since January without much help. They were in need of propane, formula, clothes, and diapers for the baby, and clothes for the surviving family. I requested to tackle the propane, formula, diapers and wipes. The second family was almost out of food, and they’re also the home where people keep dropping off dogs that need feeding and care. I put together a giant grocery shop for them while I waited for the information I needed to complete the orders.
I’m annoyed with Costco Pharmacy. They save us a bit of money but I called in a prescription on Saturday and they gave me a choice of picking it up Saturday after 2 pm or Monday after 2 pm. Every time I called for an update, it was “scheduled to be filled”. They didn’t bother to fill it until today after 2 pm. So why offer that option if it wasn’t really an option?? Huff. Thankfully I had enough brainspace to figure out the refills while we still had a week left. I wanted the Saturday pickup because weekday pickups are so much harder for us to squeeze in.
Dinner: Frozen lasagna + yesterday’s leftover meat sauce +plain pasta for Smol Acrobat because the frozen lasagna is a little too spicy for them + 4 leftover ravioli + frozen green beans. Both kids were intensely irritating about eating their green beans but they ate them all in the end and Smol Acrobat even ate all of their pasta and the meat sauce under their own steam. Yesterday the meat sauce was a big frickin’ deal. Today they kept telling me “I am eating my pwotein. Are you happppyyyy?”
Year 4, Day 357: Day 2 of weekend recovery.
My Big Task is mostly completed! I should have done this a long time ago. I knew that I should and had started the process, so I shouldn’t complain, buuuut it’s no fun and I’m going to complain. I’m finally separating my work and personal digital lives from the one computer. It’s just so much more convenient for them to be on the same machine, I could multitask so much more easily, but it’s better to keep them separate so I bought a laptop for household use last year. Several months later, I set up logins for ourselves and the kids. Another several months have now passed and now push has come to shove, changes in our systems mean it’s time for me to fully remove the personal from the professional. The process took hours: moving bookmarks over, backing up the files to our external hard drive and our cloud system to transfer them to the new laptop, and THEN to remove them completely from the work machine. HOURS. So many hours. And errors. And disconnections. And one mysterious failure where the power to the modem and our server both failed even though it was plugged into the Yeti to prevent exactly this loss of power that interrupts file transfers. I’d be tempted to say that I SHOULD have done this in stages but that wouldn’t work so well either because the point is to transfer the full contents of the hard drive at this specific moment in time and carry on working on personal stuff from that date forward entirely in the personal computer. A multi-stage transfer would mean I’d miss files that were changed in the interim period because I’m always doing something.
My personal files are all transferred to the home computer. Now I am practicing typing, the keyboard is just different enough to throw off my typing, and get in the work groove so I can make some decisions about critical software. I despise the Microsoft subscription model so I went looking for and found that we can get an older Word product key from Costco for $150 (plus a $25 Visa back). Or other places, I haven’t looked at them yet. That’s probably the software I’ll need the most.
Year 4, Day 358: Day 3, I think the PEM is finally starting to fade after 2.5 really tough days and nights. My bones still have lava for marrow but the deep and full-ton fatigue has lightened a bit to a more normal load when I’m trying to walk Sera. It’s not quite over yet, though, and this is probably where I accidentally overdo it because I think “I’m ok now!” Reminder to self: not quite yet.
I did one very slow walking set of karaokes on our morning walk and we went on one slightly longer walk midday but that’s it. I’m pacing myself!
Well that and I did the other half of a massive food prep. We got takeout yesterday so with some of my time saved, I cut up 6 lbs of meat and made the nuoc mau for the thit kho. Today the stock pot came out to play. I boiled the meat to clean it, set it to simmering for 3 hours, adding things periodically to end up with a large entree for dinner, two freezer portions for other non cooking weeks, and sent a large portion to our friends for their dinner. I’m satisfied with my performance in the kitchen for once, though I cooked it a little longer than intended and the meat is literally falling apart. Whoops! I really need more childhood recipes that can be frozen for later eating. Most of our recipes weren’t that sort of meal, they were all meant to be enjoyed fresh.
Feeling: So glad it’s not Monday anymore, so glad it’s not Thursday yet.
Year 4, Day 359: Taxes are in process. Will update is in process. Which genius thought it was a good idea to do those at the same time??
I thought my diet needed to be adjusted a bit to get to a shape I felt more comfortable in. It was a theory, attempting to lose weight has never been a thing in my life. It wasn’t about the number on the scale, I just hate(d) how my body has changed and feels after two pregnancies. The feet changing sizes is annoying, one changing to be a half size larger than the other is annoying, the stretch marks are intermittently annoying. All annoying but ultimately ignorable. My belly shape isn’t ignorable. Last month, my jeans were intensely uncomfortable after 2-3 hours. So I thought I’d have to figure this out.
I never even tried my lower carb trial since 2024 has been terrible, I didn’t want to give up one gram of carb or sugar. I did add in salads for lunch courtesy of PiC. (I’m terrible at feeding myself when it’s just me during working hours. I’m even worse at eating my vegetables these days so these were a neat fix for both problems.) What’s changed?
I’ve been going out on 5-6 walks a day with Sera since January, that’s the same.
I threw in those karaokes a few days a week recently. I noticed I’m just less hungry during the day but always hungry late at night when I’m too tired to do anything about it. I haven’t put actual effort in but it seems like maybe I’ve gone from a 4.5 month belly to a 3.5 month belly. Soft pants are still the best but the jeans aren’t awful anymore. I’d like to shed another couple inches to feel more myself but we’ll have to see if it happens with my current routine. I’m just trying to keep up with life and Sera’s 🐶 needs and I don’t have the energy to experiment with more.
Year 4, Day 360: Sera had more bloodwork. I’m crossing everything that the results come back looking better. She’s getting balky about these visits, she doesn’t want to go at all anymore. It’s a poke every time and she hates it. And I feel terrible but it’s gotta be done.
PiC usually makes time to do that during the week but couldn’t make it happen so we all went tonight. (I have a Pavlovian need for hot dogs anytime I even think about going to Costco. Anyone else?)
Somehow I managed to get through all my work and a little of my backlog today, so that was good but I was also totally wiped out by the end of the night. I should have reconsidered…well, no. It’s hard for PiC to do Costco with both kids in tow. One or the other is doable but both is just an exhausting combination, plus I needed to run a specific Costco errand as well. So it’s good that I went, I’m just knackered.
*****
I notice that some neighbors never cover their windows. Not even their front facing windows, so people can see into their home day and night. What is that about? It creeps me out on their behalf even though it’s their own privacy they’re giving up.
*****
I grew up loving Tracy Chapman’s Fast Car without ever knowing the name of the song. It came on that radio today with the wrong name: Luke Combs, and JB’s friend started singing it. That was all kinds of confusing so I had to go down the rabbithole. Oh, he’s covering the song. And then I found this and it pulled up all kinds of feelings. What a world we live in.
Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.