The Zoom was annoying because it's like they couldn't accept that I don't think hiring the person with no experience is a good idea. It's like they were determined to make me change my mind and agree so that everyone on the ~*~team~*~ is in agreement even though I'd tell them that hey, one dissenting vote is what it is. Hopefully I'll be proven wrong in my assessment and she'll work out well (which that got a passive aggressive reaction from Elaine,good grief piss off, what do you want from me?). If the rest of you feel she's the best person, then proceed with next steps (which they did).

Josh wanted to chat later in the day, which we did. He wanted to let me know that he respects and values my opinion, yadda yadda. I mean the sentiment is appreciated but ugh, that just feels so squicky. We are also evidently going to talk about potential upgrade and stuff next week. I said ok and will do but I internally absolutely cannot get excited for that. I mean yeah, he might try but there's been so many obstacles thrown in my way for no good reason since I'm always toted up as the all knowing, fabulous, wonderful, essential employee in the over 22 years at the University and the 13 years in the department I'm in that until the pay and title I deserve actually happens and I get some help for whatever they'd plan to toss on my plate, I can no longer get my hopes up that it will.

We found out in the meantime that the person they want to make an offer to cannot get a pay upgrade for coming over. It would be a lateral move for them and there isn't enough change in the job she's taking nor any evidence that her skills are high enough that it would warrant a raise. Elaine was allowed to make a verbal offer to see if the person really wanted this job change. We also heard through our campus HR that University HR is going through a conversion in systems and they're all flailing and angsting about it. Are you freaking serious? Candy asses. Their tiny minds would explode at the number of times I've had to learn, test and implement new and complicated systems on the fly. Hell, I'm still on a working group where I was recruited by USDA for the shit system we're using (BTW, just this week USDA finally implemented a change we've been wanting for years that I would bring up in every meeting - go me!)

Aaaanyway, Elaine gave me a call all excited and shit later that the person took the offer. Woo. Good for you. Did she actually expect me to be gleeful or something? I was friendly but ain't no way I'm going to match the manic energy. Also, be prepared to train her yourself since she ain't falling in MY lap until she picks up some skills.

I don't know if it was stress, sleeping wrong that night before or what but my stomach is SO distended since early Friday morning. Elaine looked concerned since yeah, I was not feeling good at all. Last night I had to sleep in the recliner since I couldn't sleep comfortably on either side. This morning it's still pretty big but a bit better than Friday. Just in case, I'm also going to avoid fizzy drinks and anything too acidic.

It's also 80F right now outside. Yuck. I had the windows open last night and was annoyed when the heat kicked on (I have no control of that) and so I put a window in the window and was able to get it just under 70F inside and then now I have all the windows shut. I'm hoping to avoid turning on the AC but I've a feeling I'll have to turn on the living room one this afternoon since my apartment is a heat-seeking missile.

Oh, next Sunday the 6th, I'm going to take the train in to NYC to have an early dinner with the sister and her husband. Reminds me that I'll have to text to see if she was able to find any family photos or mom's recipe cards to bring. At least we're going to go to a fancy dumpling place that she's been to in Vegas and loves. Hey, you had me at dumplings. Politics will NOT be discussed.

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.

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.

Holiday break was quiet which should have been my signal that 2025 was going to be quite the adventure. So far when we got back yesterday, Elaine found out that the person that had accepted her job offer backed out since her current place offered her more money. She was supposed to start the day after MLK day so it was annoying.

So after a while, I brought up that while we're in the in-between stage waiting for a new director, why don't we do what we've been talking about for years and merge our offices. We'd previously talked about finding a way to get me an upgrade so let's merge bits of the job she was advertising with what I do now and see about leveling me up. And at the same time, we should see what else we need done (we are INSANELY understaffed and have been for years) and put together job listings for a couple of positions to report to me and to her.

Elaine thought that was a good idea so we're brainstorming and yesterday she even talked to the head of HR and the head of the business/budget office (who he's in charge of HR too) about looking for support for my upgrade and for our reorganization. We're also going to try to get me a 10-15% raise which would be frikkin awesome since I've been hovering at the midpoint of my salary for over a decade.

So that's the positive. Then at 1am this morning, we had the negative. JonJon had been doing just fine and then he didn't finish his previous meal which wasn't surprising since he'd eaten fine before that. Well at 1, he hopped out from his carrier where he was sleeping and barfed up a lot. Then he went to the litterbox and put a squishy deposit from the other end. Poor dude! I don't know what prompted that. Nothing new to eat, he had plenty of energy before that. He spent at least an hour after that laying in my lap being kind of miserable. We both slept after that until about 6ish. He got me up but didn't want food and spent another 45 minutes on and off in my lap. I'm at work now and he's resting on the bed next to the heater (it is chilly this morning). I'm hoping he wants food when I get home and that he's ok.

So quite the rollercoaster so far.

I feel bad that I only talk to Dad once or twice per week now. It's mainly because it sounds like it's a lot of effort for him to even speak since he's breathing heavier and it's difficult to understand what he says. I honestly wonder if he's going to make it to the end of the year. We'll see. Anyway, his 88th birthday is next Sunday the 13th and I thought it should certainly be observed so I texted the sister and this is what I got


Mind, no, she has no plans to visit me and/or bring Mom's ashes anymore and ok, so you've decided to take THAT particular weekend go fly off to visit your friend Carla in Denver again. So are you just going to ignore his birthday altogether and not even do something for him before you go or after you return? I...yeah I'm not shocked and anymore I don't even get the level of angry about it I used to. Honestly, whenever Dad's system decides he's had enough and we settle the details, I'm pretty sure that I'll be done with both siblings. I'm tired of the disappointment.

Consequently, I'm sending him a dozen NYC bagels and a pound of cream cheese that should arrive Thursday. I let the facility know about it and all he knows is that a "surprise" is coming. I told the person at the desk that he can share his gift with whomever he wants so to make sure to suck up to him. They thought that was funny and said they'd definitely keep an eye out.

I'd been good about dealing with the BS at work but I'm irritated with Bosslady for coming up with her brilliant plan of punishing some of the low-effort-reporting faculty by not awarding them supplemental funding but then completely flubbing the rollout of out her grand plan THEN is now letting everyone act like it's MY fault. Yeah, I don't make NEARLY enough to be the scapegoat for this shit. Fuck all y'all.

Ah, hope your Monday is a good bit better. Hugs n stuff.

Geez. It's like Monday part two with work BS today. Regular biweekly meeting with Bosslady went fine though I internally eyerolled that she didn't do any of the things that she said she'd do from the last meeting. I had to write an email for her to send to a faculty member to put the thumbscrews to them to either send me what I need to get her a USDA approved project or we're going to remove her from the group she joined because said projects has human subjects concerns.

Then there's the other faculty member trying some shit trying to buy something expensive for her project that Bosslady had me check out and I found suspicious. I also found many reasons why it didn't pass the smell test and said faculty member sent a shittygram with a pissy high-handed tone. Bosslady did NOT like that and told me on our call. I laughed and told Bosslady that it only confirmed my suspicion that she was trying something shifty and that she wasn't going to get her way as a result. Seems like Bosslady rejected her request since I got an email from the business person from that department saying this - edits in italics mine, obviously:

( Cut for work email blahblah )

Gonna piss off that faculty member even more that she's on the list of ne'er-do-wells that has been reporting less than 10% effort on their projects and isn't going to get their $5K in extra money this coming year. Ooopsie poodles! So there's going to be THAT to look forward to. Sigh

Also, yes, I'm paranoid now that I might have fatty liver disease. Because put something in my brain that's plausible and boy howdy does it RUN with it. Bahh.

No new fridge yet but when I gently prodded via text to ask whether they had an ETA and got a response that they hadn't, I expected that the earliest I'll hear about anything will be Monday. I hope that it comes then since I have that Chairs meeting on Tuesday. Speaking of that meeting, this is the first email I got from Bosslady (spotted it when skimming by work emails to look for the job listing one, She sent it Saturday morning):
Hi Diane,
Are you planning to come in person to the Chairs Council meeting at IFNH?

Could you work on a presentation for us to discuss Monday afternoon?

thanks
Bosslady

I'm glad I saw it as I haven't used PPT in eons and will slap something together today. However I won't respond to her until tomorrow morning since she doesn't need to know I saw it on a weekend and I won't send her what I put together until Monday afternoon. I want to get it out of the way today in case I am lucky enough to have to deal with fridge stuff tomorrow. Still, kinda bullshit that as usual she's pawning shit off on me. I'm guessing that she will possibly make the presentation and pass it off as hers. If so, well, I won't do my usual helpful thing of speaking up to clarify anything unless I'm directly asked. I mean that's tooooootally impolite, right? Guess she'll have to ask me to explain things when she get confused (which will be often since she's dumber than a stump after four years of having the director job)

Anyway, back to dealing with not having refrigeration. I unearthed a rolling soft sided cooler that has a hard plastic bin inside. It had been sitting next to a bookcase in the bedroom for years with random bits inside it. Most of the contents could be tossed out (another bag out to the trash) and I sat it next to the fridge. Early Saturday morning I ran some errands and stopped at the grocery to get just a few things (shelf stable creamers, individually wrapped cheese, baby carrots, etc.) but also a bag of ice for the cooler. Getting a donut was a bad idea since my stomach was displeased after having that and coffee as breakfast.

Emily came by a while later and we watched the first episode of season 3 Bridgerton and then went out to pick up lunch from the local poke place. The one bag of ice I got that morning wasn't enough so I parked behind my regular deli and while Emily walked over to get our food about a block away, I got two more bags of ice and that topped off the cooler. Yesterday was nice and chill watching a few more episodes, having a nice fresh lunch - I put my bubble tea in the cooler for "dinner" later. It was nice to be able to drink COLD water and my insulated water bottle keeps things chill for almost a day. This morning we went to Trader Joe's and I got a wrap to have for breakfast, a salad kit, some pre-cooked seasoned chicken, a couple of apples and some fresh bread and biscotti. We stopped at a convenience store on the way back and I got one bag of ice since it was a 7 pound one instead of the usual 5 pound ones and it perfectly topped off the cooler. If I didn't need to stop to get more ice each day to replenish things, I'd be fine for fresh food for several days.

My cooler is doing a good job but unfortunately once I get the fridge, I'll have to dispose of it. After years of sitting, when you go to roll it around, the plastic bits that hold the handle to the cooler have broken off. But that's fine. I'll find other things that need tossed out and roll it out to the ol' dumpster. My apartment is starting to look like a hoarder lives here and it's driving me buggy.

The good news - email from Bosslady:
Hi all,

Just heard from Dan. Elaine just came out of surgery and is in recovery. Everything went well and the surgeon was able to use minimally invasive surgery. He thinks he removed everything necessary. She may be able to go home this weekend.

I am very relieved!

I am relieved as well, but to be honest, I'm sure Bosslady is more relieved that she won't have to try to vamp very long when it comes to things that are part of Elaine's job. I was concerned that she would try to saddle me with learning her job too but fortunately - so far - that hasn't happened.

In depressing news, my annual evaluation was today. I was told how wonderful I was and valuable and shit. Yeah, lip service. There's absolutely no prospects for ever getting any assistance or any possibility of upgrades. As I told halfmoon_mollie this was the gist of today's bullshit:
Her - Oh, you're so valuable and needed and everything! You do everything so well! Is there anything else?
Me - Well, my job is a lot and very tiring doing it all solo (note, for the last NINE years and the previous person that did it had an associate director title and I was HER assistant...anyway...). Also, as we saw with Elaine, we have shortages of staff and contingency plans
Her - Yep, well we're going to get Elaine some more staff. That's a priority
Me - And for me?
Her - Oh, you'll have to write up everything about your job so if something happens to you, we'll be fine

Yeah, seriously. Just disrespect all around. And if she thinks I'm taking any time to write up my entire complicated job, she can kiss my ass.

Good grief. I got this request this morning which I just turned down:

Morgan and I have developed a protocol for collecting road killed dead deer for our McStennis project. However, because we have nowhere to store them at Rutgers (need a walk-in freezer) it is very inefficient for us at the moment because we need to drive around to carcasses the day of our scheduled deployment. Walk-in freezers are somewhere between $4000-$10,000. Is this something we could ask for from you? We would need a dedicated one to put in PSARF because I doubt anyone would want us dragging dead deer through their labs.

Seriously? You didn't think of this BEFORE proposing your project. Um, that would be a no. I cited multiple reasons:

• Our funding doesn't allow anything designated as "Facilities and administration" costs and a massive walk-in freezer installed in a designated FACILITIES building is kinda gonna raise red flags with our federal funder
• With installation, it would undoubtedly go over $10K even if Bosslady wanted to ok it and anything of that size needs to be proposed to the feds for their blessing
• This massive non-scientific purchase would only be used for less than two years and then what happens with it?

Hopefully they don't grumble too much but honestly, kind of a ridiculous request.

Mr. Lofty McSnobberton responded whining that the proposal I sent him as an example is long like his and boo hoo hoo does he need to chop it down? Well buddy, I sent you that one PER YOUR REQUEST since you're piggybacking off what was started by someone else and it was written in 2017 before the new database with more character limitations. That and if you'd have just READ the instructions on my site that say verbatim in the two applicable sections "This entry in the NIFA Reporting System (NRS) is limited to 8000 characters. You may wish to consider this space limitation when writing this section" you'd have known this but you don't fucking listen. Instead you decided that the instructions that I structured to mirror the new site (that has no instructions since the feds keep fucking with it) was clearly substandard.

With help from Emily to make it more lofty sounding, I went with "The proposal that we send for pre-NIFA-submission review can be lengthier and contain historical and philosophical background for review purposes if you believe it will give project reviewers additional substance to understand what your research goals are and how you will accomplish them. While a more fulsome explanation does allow for the full context to be understood, under the new NIFA guidelines we really must advise that the most successful applications are concise and absent extraneous details. NIFA reviewers are looking for your ability to hone in on the most critical issues to meet your clearly stated goals and objectives."

What I really was thinking "Listen asshole, while I know you adore the scent of your own farts, the feds don't and will see right through your stream of consciousness bullshit and reject it. LISTEN TO ME ALREADY"

I also told him "I send your project out for review" and he came back asking for the links so HE could send it out. No dickweed, it's a regulated process. You don't send your own damned proposal out for review.