09:03 - 03/11/2009
Catch up
I signed up for a Twitter account for the second time. The first time was when it first emerged as a new communication tool a few years ago. Didn't really help me, so I forgot about it and, of course, the subscription lapsed. I was trying to decide whether it might not be a good way to keep up with family and friends on the fly, now that more of them are wired in to the new technologies. Sadly not, because only one cell phone carrier in Canada offers that service to it's customers. However, while I was scrolling through the accounts that I wanted to follow, I noticed that two of the local news stations had pages that provided very valuable information quicker than any other source. You see a blizzard blew in, in the wee hours of Saturday morning. When I looked outside, there was a complete whiteout at 3 in the am. Couldn't even see as far as the sidewalk a few feet away. With the wind chill, the ambient air temperature plunged to -33 C in less than an hour. About 37 C lower than the average temperatures in this city at this time of year. What was useful about the local press' twitterpages was that every accident or bottleneck on the iced up roads was posted to their sites by motorists at the scene. Also took into account transit delays.
Use of new-to-them technology is allowing me to "communicate" with my two oldest grandchildren now that they have e-mail accounts. I sent my grandson a video of one of Canada's astronauts offering a potential explanation for shooting stars. He was hooked by the story and asked for more information and links right away. Ahhh - teachable moments. Sent him several links, as well as the family tree information - with some "history" about his Dad when he was growing up, added in for good measure. While I was working on that missive, his sister sent me an invitation to come watch her perform in a play at one of our downtown theatres. Turns out her school was given a grant to assist one of their students to access the training for children to act. It was given to her. My grandson was recruited to work with the stage crew. Bonus for both of them.
I've spent a lot of time corresponding with one friend about a particular political issue that is a passion for both of us, as well as talking about employment issues. She had some great advice. You see, I haven't been given any shifts since last I posted to you dear diary. Even though I mentioned the lack of assignments available in that posting, I had no idea that there would be zero work for me after that shift. I spent about a week e-mailing the manager for the city, trying to find out why, exactly, I wasn't being scheduled. After a lot of obfuscation, he finally noted that the speed at which I counted (electronically captured by our hand held computers) wasn't as fast as the counters who were being assigned shifts. I copied those stats from my own intranet account with my employer, then emailed him back to point out that the reason for the low numbers was because those were the jobs where I was training new staff - as directed by him or the senior managers. All of those jobs where my stats were low? I hadn't count at all. Tough enough to train a dozen or so first-day-on-the-job counters, without trying to count as well. There is a coding in the computer that should have been assigned to me that indicated I was doing that and other administrative tasks as requested by each shift's managers, but that hadn't been done. The city manager responded by acknowledging that I "had done an excellent job" of training the new recruits. So much so that now they were being given precedence for work over me because of those "low numbers" and no, he wouldn't reconsider assignments for me even though the stats were inaccurate. One of the biggest ironies was that the head of HR for the international company had just posted a message about retaining good staff including a story about where companies go wrong with their management of personnel. Forwarded that to the city manager as well. I now have one shift assigned - 10 days from now. I am picking up assignments from the other casual contract I have, but with a limit of 10 assignments per month and an average payment of $15 per assignment, it just doesn't fill the income gap.
It is fortunate that A+ has been nearby when I've been trying to work something out with this employer. He often reminded me that I needed to advocate for myself. I was ready to give up in despair you see. I internalized the situation as me somehow being a "bad" employee, but his comment was not to mistake that manager's incompetence with respect to scheduling with intentional malice toward me. He often held me, as I stressed about it. I was thinking of how much ground I was going to lose again financially, when I've justed started being able to dig myself out of the hole from when I was sick for so long and couldn't work. He has encouraged me to start sending out resumes, even though I am quite happy with the work when I do get the chance to do so. I've been doing that instead of posting to you, dear diary, because survival is an issue. If I can't pay my electricity and internet bills, I can't write to you......
One son has helped me by negotiating a significant cost reduction with one service provider. That service has been a problem for almost a year now. Turns out someone in that call center has been tampering with my account without my knowledge or consent. I hate the fact that sometimes one's gender or marital status is used as an excuse to try the "power over" ploy and that it takes someone else to force the issue to resolution. Umm, but before I start ranting .....
Movie therapy has helped a lot the past week. My youngest continues to bring home comfort movies from his employer's collection. "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" and "Clash of the Titans" being the latest additions to our dvd collection. A+ let me read his Watchmen comic collection in preparation for going to see the new movie based on the story. He wanted me to be prepared to understand the background story better. He went with his business partner to see if it was an authentic representation of the original work and came back with mixed feelings. Kind of like my response to the Lord of the Rings movies - no Tom Bombadil or Barrow Downs, and a serious departure from the original characterisations = no authenticity. Well sort of. We've watched a lot of political satire, as well as documentaries as a diversion too. I've watched one law firm's podcast on international privacy laws, just to keep current on the newest developments vis a vis identity theft protection. Might as well get educated when the opportunity is offered.
My youngest and I have had similar reactions to the last couple of Harry Potter movies as A+ has had to the Watchmen movie. A new trailer for the next movie - "Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince" - due out in July, came out last week. My youngest and I trying to discern if there was an attempt to return to the integrity of the first couple of movies. We'll see. It would be nice to be able to afford to go to some of the live concerts coming up this spring as therapy, but between the lack of assigned work and the underhanded behaviour of the local ticket agent driving up the prices exponentially, I guess I'm going to have to console myself with youtube concerts instead.
Anyway I need to go back to resume writing and transmission. There aren't a lot of jobs being posted by employers in this city right now, so each one I do send has to be as perfect as I can make it. For my own mental health, I need to know that I am able to look after myself you see. A lot of sleepless nights, along with an inabilty to keep food down have been the norm lately you see. Bleagh. Too cold to go outside for walks to relieve the stress either. The cats are now taking turns climbing up and purring me to calmness. Sigh. Guess I'm lucky I have so many sources of comfort and support at least. Talk with you later, dear diary.
�
�
