Life is a combination of magic and pasta.

Bossdude Josh is trying hard to stress that we're a team and keep things positive and productive but I can't help but get discouraged when in reality, I'm a part of their team but I don't see much evidence that anyone's part of mine. When I talk about what *I'm* responsible for - the day to day management of the land-grant research program - he tries to say that oh we're a team. Yeah? Really? So who is helping with my stuff? No one. But I don't say that since I am trying to give him the benefit of the doubt since he's only been at this a couple of months.

But today I'm irritated and glad he's out of town because I'm getting REALLY tired of being ignored. In our last team meeting, there was some haha about my emails that didn't get read. Yeah, woo. Nice. Thanks. Really feeling valued, y'all. I did say then that I have had this happen a lot before. Guess it didn't sink in much.

I've been on the group to interview people for a position for the "team." Let's get real, it's a position for Elaine and I'm not going to get any help. It's a position that they tried hiring for when she was out on leave getting cancer treatment and the person that they made an offer to then (and Elaine fought with HR to get her enough money) decided to stay where she was. She was using it to get a raise at her current location.

We didn't know when we were going to get a new director so I'd mentioned previously about how we were going to try to get me an upgrade and get us a person since we're so understaffed. Well, that all went *~*poof*~* with no mention. They relisted the other job and asked if I'd be on the search committee. Ok,sure I guess. We're trying to speed run it since we're hearing rumors of a hiring freeze. We first identified two people to interview. One that is internal and I was straight up with Elaine that he gives me the ick. That didn't give her much pause until our other team member mentioned that she also had bad interactions with him (which I found out what they were this week and GOOD GRIEF. NO) The second person we interviewed seemed very promising until Elaine called people that she knew where the woman worked and she's not really suited for the job.

So we went back to our very small pool of candidates and there was the surreal Gen Z person I posted about before and then someone that seemed like a great fit. HOWEVER, nope. She'd talked about a "hybrid" arrangement which we mentioned we'd have to look into it. She also put on her application that the salary she was looking for was the minimum of $75K. The interview went great and then when Elaine reached out to talk about the requested hybrid, yeah not so much. Essentially she wants to be remote and work 3 weeks at a time in Minnesota taking care of a family member and even when she's supposed to be back for 3 weeks, since she lives in PA near Philly, wanted to only come in when needed. Lady, if you wanted fully remote, which isn't going to work for us, you should have said so. Then she also tried to say she really wanted closer to the midpoint of $93K which well you should've led with that since HR obviously agreed to what she originally asked for. For our flexwork, even if we allowed fully remote, policy states that your remote location needs to be in NJ or in one of the surrounding states, Minnesota isn't going to fly.

In the meantime, I heard that Emily's small center across campus is crumbling due to the likes of DOGE getting rid of a bunch of their funding. They're trying to scramble for other positions and her business assistant (the gal that Emily and I had dim sum Thanksgiving with her and her husband) is super smart, has a masters and almost a PhD, has grant experience and is awesome. She obviously didn't apply for other jobs since she is happy working for Emily but well, things are bad. I mentioned that this person would fit very well with us to Elaine, I got her resume to forward but they would have to relist the position but guess what?

Ignored again - shocker. They're looking at the crop of applicants we hadn't yet interviewed and no one acknowledged the resume I sent for them. NONE of them are at all qualified but we're going to interview some chick that has just HR experience on Thursday afternoon. I am biting my tongue so hard but if they don't listen to me and they end up hiring this unqualified person out of desperation and it doesn't work out, I will not resist saying "I told you so"

I did decide to be somewhat annoying and said I'm not available before 2pm on Thursday to interview anyone. I wanted to take the full day off because I'm irritated and need a break from this BS but I did cave to after 2pm.

At some point we need to schedule my annual review before the end of next month. I honestly don't know what to say.

1. How far back can you trace your family tree?
Ages. On Dad's side, there are Mayflower folks and other first settlers, English royalty and those with connections to them. The shortest branch on my family tree is my Mom's side. I have some details about my great-grandfather Martin Kelco and his immigration and his death certificate lists what may be his parents' names but that's as far as it goes. I've tried every bit of research out there.

2. What is the most interesting (or strange) thing you've heard about one of your relatives?
Well the ones far back have all kinds of notorious stories, as far as more recent ones, aside from the aerialists, there's a 2nd great uncle on Mom's side, William Montezuma (great name, eh?) Brown that was shot to death at a county fair.
Oh and we found out through Ancestry DNA that my grandmother cheated on my grandfather and my aunt is my half-aunt.

3. How do you feel about legacy names like John Henry Smith IV or naming children after other relatives?
Makes genealogy easier to do but otherwise, I like the more fun names

4. Would you consider yourself and/or your family to be traditional?
What is traditional, really? I mean if it's inheriting attitudes and ideals from family, I'm certainly not traditional compared to the rest of them.

5. What is one tradition you have passed on to your children and/or plan to pass on to them?
Don't have any rugrats.

Outlook.com is down but work Outlook works. It is a thing so hopefully Microsoft sorts that out soon.

Anyone have an abdominal hysterectomy? How did it go and what was recovery like? Don't have to do it now but it is probably in my not-so-distant future. Gyno showed me where on my stomach, inches above the belly button that the giant Fibroid of DOOM is up to and it's mind boggling. She also agrees like the other doctor that it may be causing my upper abdominal swelling since it's pushing everything upwards.

Hopefully it behaves long enough for the house move to happen whenever it happens because since I haven't popped out any rugrats, yoinking all the troublesome bits and pieces out from below isn't an option. Guess Bossdude better ponder actually having some backup for my job since according to the doctor, it would be a few days in the hospital and 6-8 weeks of recovery. Yeah, I work from home but that likely wouldn't be an option for probably the first several weeks at minimum.

Side note, good grief I hate pap smears. They freaking hurt even when they're being as careful as they can. My BP was elevated beforehand but yeah, I was definitely tense. I'd have taken a partial Xanax beforehand but I don't get into my new GP until May.

Anyway, woo.

Is LJ taking ages to load for anyone else? Figures when I get a few minutes to come up and breathe from work, things are going slooooooow.

Doing the no buy things today, at least big business. I may stop at the local farmers market on the way home (and pay cash!). My coworker just couldn't be bothered NOT to stop at Starbucks this morning. Then again, since she STILL keeps parroting the "these things happen during changes in administration" I have my suspicion about how she voted. Ugh.

I stupidly looked at work email on Monday when I was off and that ruined the vacation day. Things just keep on being stressful. So tired and today my head and neck are aching. Glad it's Friday.

I'm working today so not doing that one. However, I'll be doing the one on the 28th. I don't buy from Amazon unless there's no other option to get something I need (which fortunately is rare) and not sure about the 14th. But thought I'd share for those that might be willing to at least do the no shopping ones.

Having to keep up with all of the awful news sucks, but it's now part of my job and I have to actively seek it out to share. We just got an alert today from the marine sciences department that NOAA was forced to kill a program that "provides internship opportunities for undergraduate students largely under-represented in the marine science and resource management fields, as well as mentorship/training opportunities to the host investigators and institutions so that they learn together with the students." It had "Inclusive" in the title. I hate this timeline.

I did let bossdude know that if there were students already identified for the program that would be involved in research that we have going on, as long as our land-grant USDA program stays intact, we have the authority to direct funds to at least pay them to do research. It's something.

Our virtual town hall to assure folks that we're on top of things had nearly 100 people on it. So people that I've been working with for about a decade that have never seen me know what I look like now. Aside from the crisis assurance, we're also going to be doing regular webinars to keep people informed and educated about our stuff, currently every other month. This is such a 180 where Elaine and I were always the people behind the curtain. As an introvert, it's kind of stressful but at the same time, it makes me feel valued to get to do this.

Emily (who is just getting over the flu that she got from her niece and it knocked her out BAD), found out that her sister (who got Covid - mask up folks, it's BACK with a vengeance and making the rounds big time, though you won't hear it on the news) is closing on a house near the end of March. That's significant to me because I don't think I mentioned it but Emily and I were planning on doing a whole Golden Girls situation and the house her sister, sister's wife and twin nibblings is currently in is technically Emily's house. We all live in the same town. Her twin niece and nephew that just graduated high school last year don't yet have their drivers licenses. Her niece works locally and her nephew takes the bus to community college, neither of which would be feasible to the distance where her sister is moving.

Emily wants to get the basement of that house, including the stairs to the basement, in much better shape and she is also hoping to overhaul the upstairs bathroom. I told her what she should do is stay where she's at in Emily's Mom's house and let the niece and nephew stay in the house while it is getting renovated and then when the work is done, swap houses and give the kids the stipulation that they can live in their grandmother's house for one year rent free to save up $ before the house is sold to put the proceeds in the bank for her ongoing nursing home care. In this way, it'll give the kids time to figure out how to live more independently but they'd still have Emily nearby and give them time to get their drivers licenses (though going to be hard for her niece who is traumatized when she totaled Emily's sister's car the first time she got behind the wheel).

Whenever I move in - the first floor has a bedroom/bathroom that would be my domain - depends on when the swap happens and IF it happens. Emily was implying recently about her nibblings staying there and um, noooo. Especially since they have two cats and with me having JonJon, that's more chaos than I'm prepared for. That and honestly, although we're not as heartless as Emily's sister at chucking the kids out on their own with little notice, they do need to figure things out. I'd be fine with hosting them for Sunday dinner or whenever they need to pop by for moral support and also teaching them life and money skills but being under the same roof 24/7 is wayyyyy too much.

Anyway, there's that. I need to get to my doctor's office to pick up paperwork sometime since she wants me to get a coronary calcium test done to make sure I don't have blockages. I also have to have her sign my form and give me a script to renew my disabled placard. The fun never stops.

All this stress is making things flare up - this week it's sciatica. Woo hoo.

Hope y'all are doing ok. Hugs n stuff.

Isitdownrightnow confirms LJ is down.

Interesting...LJ is back up but DW logged me out when I went to edit this post. Leaving the post up for documentation.

Now that the shit is hitting the proverbial fan and at 5pm today, we are Officially Fucked thanks to Cheeto Mussolini, somehow people are actually listening to me when it comes to sage advice on what to expect and how to communicate to people without inciting panic.

I am glad that I'm somewhat safe for now on State funding but I'm taking no chances and the belt is being tightened as much as I can.

My darned cholesterol is in the toilet


Considering my issues with getting medication side effects, I really do NOT want to take statins. Since I'll need to get the second shingles vaccine in several months, before I agree to any new meds, I'll see what I can do on my own.

For one thing, gonna miss cheese (I do notice a difference in the numbers when I avoid it, bah).

If anyone else has a similar battle with these numbers, let me know your experiences. Oh, the A1c is still diabetic at 6.5 but the cutoff is 6.4 so I'm betting if I improve the cholesterol, that will improve as well. There were a few other off numbers but nothing alarming that I can tell.

Also, I still have a hot red blotch on my left arm from the shingles shot. The flu shot injection site is nearly gone. Also still achy and tired. Hopefully that improves in another day or so

When Elaine and I were speculating about our new director (we were right, by the way), I sent his website to Emily and her first reaction?

"He looks like Ted McGinley with a beard"

New Bossman stopped by to meet with our admin (good start, bud, good start) and hehehe, he looks even MORE like Ted McGinley in person.

Not that I told him that. But I told my officemate Regina who had a good chuckle and agreed.