I'm at home today, sick tummy, you know, the "I'd better not stray too far from home" sorta tummy. And I thought that I'd spend some time looking through my pictures. Well I couldn't find what I wanted and I remembered that I'd posted some of those pictures on my blog ... go blog! I've never really looked around behind the actual posts, and today I see that 41 people have visited my blog, just today. Whaaaaaaaa? So I decided to post something new ... actually it's a bit of old and new.
So, it's been a bit of stop and go with my layouts. Admittedly, I'm overwhelmed with the amount of stuff I want to do. After a bit of messing around I decided to stick with one sketch only and play with it ... so I choose one of my favorites from the old Sketch Support days ... 2 Page Sketch #6. I've got 6 layouts on the go with some pretty interesting variations. I'll finish 3 of them on the weekend and post them.
And I've wasted a ton of time looking for stuff ... the electrical cord for my Cricut, the plates for my Cuttlebug, my sanding block. Then I ran out of adhesives. I went looking for inspiration at 2Ps and to my horror, it's gone! So, in time I'd like to have a gallery on my own blog ... that's for another day. I headed over to Scrapbook Generation.com to look at their site for sketches and hey, they have a hole new monthly magazine ... CREATE. That was a very happy surprise. I have not looked at them all, but I will. And each month they have free sketches, so I'm going to do some of those soon too.
But right now I'm going to go back a year ... to last fall ...
Oct 2013
Well, as I said in an earlier blog post ... I worked throughout the summer to move our pilot plant, labs and offices to another building. I took 2 weeks off in October. On the 2nd, I celebrated my 51st birthday. Steve gave me different card than the usual, not the flowery, wifey-type birthday card, but this one .....
... I loved it ... but rumours of another deep layoff were circulating at work, and I wondered ...
Well, I enjoyed my vacation at home, spent largely in my gardens. My order of bulbs came from Vessey’s. First the garlic, Jean and I worked some organic matter and fertilizers into our old potato patch … and then we planted more than 200 garlic cloves! Truly a labour of love! Then I planted more butterfly weed roots, hosta and bee balm into the back gardens. Finally I planted dozens of tulip bulbs, daffodils, foxtail lilies, crocuses, dwarf iris, dwarf blue iris and something called glory in the snow into the front garden. OK, Jean helped. It was a lot of digging. We covered the entire garden in chicken wire to protect the bulbs from hungry squirrels.
And when I returned to work, well … the rumors were raging! Some went so far as to say that everyone would be let go … and still I wasn’t too worried. That is, until our Department Head called a meeting to confirm the rumors. Yes, more layoffs were coming and they would be just as deep as those in June.
After the meeting the speculation began again … who would get chopped this time. We figured that our department would lose at least 3 more people, out of 9 left.
You know, I love my job …. I’m good at it, and I work with some really good people, but the constant fear of layoff, it isn’t good for us, it’s not good for productivity either. I started looking on the internal posting board … something I had never-ever done before. It was time for me to jump, while there were still jobs to jump to. But there was nothing.
I worked to get the lab up and running, and then ran some priority lab tests. My new office was huge, and I had more than enough to fill it … but I had no time to unpack, there was so much to do in the labs.
I let the stress get to me, and having all that Halloween candy around didn’t help! I started to gain weight …
November, the Next Adventure is Revealed
Well, at least we didn’t have to wait too long; on November 7th the axe fell ... again. This time, I was on the chopping block … but not really.
Thankfully I was given a ‘heads-up’ a couple of hours before it actually happened. My Department Head showed up in the lab and asked to ‘chat’ with me in my office. I looked up and asked outright, “Are you going to fire me?”, and marched to my office. We sat down, and he told me that later in the day I would be escorted to the HR offices and that I would be offered a transfer to Long Harbour, Newfoundland.
Whew … dodged that bullet!
So after he left, I sat in my messy office … unpacked boxes stacked 4 high all around me … and I felt strangely calm. Eddie, a long-time friend, poked his head in … he had also been given the ‘chat’. He wanted to know my plans. It's a funny thing, in just a few minutes I had decided on my path forward. I had until the end of the year to transfer, and I was going to stay right to the end … December 31st … but with my outstanding vacation my last day of work would be mid-December. Eddie too had made his plans, he was going to leave in a month for Newfoundland. We chatted about moving our families and animals. And we both lamented that our colleague Danijela was terminated, not transferred.
While I waited, I called Steve. He was shocked, and really angry that I was transferred … and that upset me.
So, as promised I was called into HR, escorted by my Department Head. It was awful. All the offices were in use, and a line had formed … A LINE! Not everyone would be given the chance to transfer and people were upset, and yes there were tears. Finally I was lead into an office.
Now that the moment was at hand, and even though I thought that I knew what was to come, my heart started pounding, I worried that I would have a heart attack right there! I didn’t expect the termination letter, but apparently that’s how it’s done! First the termination, and that was a shock, and then I was given a second letter … an offer to transfer. I wanted to talk to Steve before I signed, but I left with the promise that I’d get back to them the next day. Meanwhile, more of our friends were terminated and left that very day.
I sat in my office … truly it would be a relief to get out from under all the responsibilities, all the crap. Steve called me … he had given it more thought was he was OK, he understood that it was a good move for me. I turned to the boxes piled all around and spent the rest of the day unpacking and getting rid of files that I would no longer need and filing the files that would be needed by my replacement.
That night, while the dogs enjoyed the snow outside, I told my friend Jean, she wrapped her arms around me and we both cried and cried. When she finally released me from her embrace, she laughed and said “What am I going to do with all that garlic!”
Long Harbour Operations … I know many of the people there and I’ve worked with them many times over the years, in fact I had a hand in training some of them. The Plant Managers were very happy to take me … saving a job in research for someone else. The next day I signed the offer making it official.
So, we needed to move to Newfoundland … The Next Adventure! Geez I hated doing that to Steve, and our pets! Newfoundland … in the winter! Figures.
