Nose bleeds

My first nose bleed occurred when I was in grade two. I was standing in line for something with my class. There were two guys in front of me. They were fighting. A fist landed on my nose and blood came out of my right nostril.

My teacher and I headed to the washroom. She got my nose bleed under control. I pinched the top part of my nose and we cleaned myself up.

My next nose bleed occurred last December. I was in the Twin Cities. I managed to get it controlled after 45 minutes. It was trying to get something cold on my head and pinch the top part of my nose. It was tricky, but I got it done.

On my most recent trip, I had a nose bleed three times. I realized that it was way too dry in my room and where I was. I got a portable humidifier that I had on my nightstand and in my car. It helped me out a lot.

The third nose bleed out of the series was scary. I don't recall how long it took me to control it, but I didn't have anything close that did the job to cool my forehead. It felt like an eternity.

I now always travel with a humidifier. I have my home humidifier every night before I go to bed. I need it when I return to Minnesota for sure.

Fixing a novice document design issue

When it comes to document design, it's an interest of mine and I'm passionate about it. I think of how useful the document is to the end user when I'm either creating or updating a document.

A few months ago, when I looked at a document that a fellow colleague was working on, she had repeated the service that she was documenting in the title of every page. I asked her why she did that. She told me that her team lead, the diva, told her to.

Ugh. That's poor document design. It's pretty clear that you're in a document talking about the service. Why have it as a prefix for the title of each page that you have? You're taking the user read the same prefix over and over. Is that practical or helpful? No.

Her argument was that it was a best practice from a previous solution that she worked on. Um, no. Your page titles needs to be meaningful, but not monotonous and redundant.

My manager sent her a request to fix this issue in multiple documents. 

I'm such an advocate for the end user. This person wants answers immediately when looking at a document. It's not happening with unnecessary fluff.

My colleague had brought up this issue, but the diva was adamant that she was right. The issue is that the diva doesn't come from a writing background and it shows here. Our colleague does. I do, too.

The other sad thing is that she has been a writer on our team for seven or eight years now. She hasn't caught on.

My intern and training a new colleague

My intern's work term ends in 1.5 weeks. She has been great helping me with recording training videos as I update my training slides. I let her know that I appreciated her help. I'm glad that I did.

In a few hours, I am training a new member of our team. I am ready. It will be different, but everything I seem to do is different!

Happy 2021! Hello, shoulder pain... ugh!

Happy 2021, everyone! Here's to a better year filled with joy, health, optimism, and happiness.

For a few weeks, I have had a nagging pain in my right shoulder. It escalated two days ago. It feels like I have a pinched nerve.

I decided to make circles with my right arm. It felt knotted. After several rotations, my shoulder was sore, but felt better.

Today, my shoulder is doing much better. I can extend my arm up to the ceiling and not feel a ton of discomfort.

I have a feeling that lifting a 15-pound turkey, moving my stationary exercise bike every day, and playing games on my phone have contributed to this pain. I have stopped lifting heavy items with my right hand and take breaks when I am using my phone. I am also doing shoulder and neck rotations. So far, my shoulder is doing well.

It's interesting starting a new year with an ailment.

Missing detail from my previous post

Just a follow-up post.

I appreciate the comments that have come in. I do need to mention a detail that makes sense to those who have been following along for a while.

My ex-guy and I work for the same company. That's how we met -- at work.

He sent me his e-mail using his work account to my work account. Simply blocking him can be done, but it's unprofessional. Our departments work together now and again.

The consensus is to ignore his e-mail. It reinforces what I have been doing for months, which is reassuring.

Thanks to all who provided helpful, meaningful feedback.

Some things are them, but not really

My ex-guy sent me a happy birthday message an hour after my birthday was over. He was late, which is who he is.

Some things never change. And yet, a ton has changed.

He has written a couple of e-mails to me since we broke up. I haven't replied to them. He said that he rarely checks his e-mail. He has written to me more from this account as of late.

I still need time away from him. This vacation has been therapeutic and helpful in my getting over him.

Standing up at work for a meeting and being gently pushed

At work on Thursday, our company had an all-employee meeting. It was originally slated to be in our auditorium. I have no idea why the venue changed to a corner of our floor.

We had bigwigs visiting us. There was supposed to be an online feed, but the audio sucked. I walked over there to listen in instead. I was hoping to tune in while eating my lunch, as this meeting started at noon.

There were a ton of people. I ended up standing in a corridor, unable to see anyone.

It helps that I am friendly. It have established a rapport with those whom I work closely with. As of late, I have had to work with a product manager. He looked, saw me, and literally let me know that I could move up in front of him.

"I'm tall. You stand here," he said.
"Thanks," I replied.

He must be 6'4". I'm 5'10" and seem mighty short standing next to him.

It was interesting that he gently pushed me up, touching the back of my shoulder blades with his palms. I have never had anyone do that before.

It worked. I had a good view. I could hear. All was great.

It helps to work with decent people who are polite and care.

Strong support and laugher help get me through missing my guy

As crazy as work is these days, it's nice that my students and I get along well. We spent the day working on various tasks as a group and got a lot done.

Hanging out with them and being able to make one another laugh was wonderful. We all needed it.

It's nice that I am back to being my happy self. I will always miss my guy when he is away, but having a good support group helps ease the temporary pain.

Research on winter tires by my guy

My guy is sweet. I asked him for help on getting winter tires for my car. He said that he would look for deals for me.

He loves Kijiji. He found a fairly decent set of used tires that have barely been used. The person is within my neck of the woods. My guy even pointed out what I should look for and what questions I should ask.

It's nice to have a knowledgeable tire guy.

Lunch chat

My guy and I chatted for an hour. It was evening for him and it was around the lunch hour for me.

He told me that he misses me. I know that he does when he tells me first. I am often the one who says it first. Naturally, it's mutual.

"Are you interviewing today?" he asked me, as it was the case on Monday.
"I'm working with the students today. Our IT helpdesk is useless!" I exclaimed.
"That doesn't surprise me. So, you're being the helpdesk. You're more like the help bombshell," he replied.
"You're sweet, as usual. That would make a good Hallmark card greeting," I noted.

We both laughed. Some of the things that we say to each other should not be in a greeting card!

It's good to be nice

I have been told that I am a nice person. You hear the old adage that nice folks always finish last. There are times when I feel like that's the case, especially when people on my team cannot handle their workload and I end up having to do their work. It is completely unfair.

However, there are moments when folks surprise me. I had several of those on Monday.

To backtrack, an extraordinary event took place. In the past, I could never get any of my co-op students to get proper access to do their timesheets electronically. It would take weeks, simply because those people at work who are responsible to give proper access privileges to new co-op students drop the ball.

Guess what? I managed to get both students to complete their timesheets by Wednesday. Yep, the had access less than three days into their stay with the company.

My manager came up to me, oddly, on Friday the 13th, while I was cutting birthday cake to celebrate special days for a couple of colleagues, including one of my students.

"What did you do to give them access?" he asked me.
"I contacted the Finance department and submitted a request to fix their workcentre code," I replied.
"I was surprised that they had completed their timesheets for this week," he replied.
"You shouldn't be. I finished my timesheet on Monday. You know that they will complete theirs early, too."

It's true. Every student that I have had so far has never been late submitting their timesheet.

On Monday morning, I had a busy start. I had to talk to the contractor, get RAM installed for my laptop, and complete various requests. I managed to talk to both co-op students, to tell them that we'd meet in ten minutes. I then stopped by my manager's desk to ask whether he got RAM installed for his laptop. He did.

"I got you these," he replied, handing over a large bag of shelled, dry-roasted peanuts.
"Awesome! Thanks so much. You made my day," I replied, which was true.
"You're welcome. They come like that, without any labelling, which should not be the case," he replied.
"Well, thanks for the contraband peanuts. I will enjoy them," I replied.

Then, my students surprised me when it came to how quickly they pick up concepts.

The contractor had edited a couple of guides in the past. One had a couple of issues, which were pointed out to her by another writer over a month ago. I tasked her to fix them, which would have been a fairly quick update. She never got around to it, so I decided to offload it to the co-op students.

The update involved fixing a missed letter in a word, adding the chapter number and date, converting the Word document to a PDF, uploading the document to a network drive, and creating a new documentation build.

I showed them what steps they needed to do. One of the writers followed along and actually completed the task as I showed her. I was impressed. I told her so.

The other one managed to update our helpful how-to instructions on fixing timesheet issues. Again, I was impressed.

I have forgotten how wonderful it is to work with bright students who absorb information fast and are eager to work. It's a nice change.

Being a helpful support person and wanting to be a good girl

My guy is like a sweet little boy sometimes. I just want to cuddle and kiss him, but he is still away on business.

He called me at nearly 05:00 his time. I asked whether he had come back from clubbing. He laughed.

He told me that his back is aching. We both have a history of it. He told me that he was going to take it easy.

I asked him whether he still travelled with his electric heating pad. He looked in his suitcase and it was there. I told him to plug it in and rest his back on it.

Then, he had problems connecting to the hotel wifi with his new tablet. I told him to open a browser and go to a Web page other than Google. Sure enough, the hotel page appeared, asking him to enter his special access code.

Finally, he let me know that he has changed banks and needs to update his bank account information to get paid. I told him that he can change all that information on our company's intranet site.

"What would you do without me?" I asked him.
"I don't know. I would be lost, for sure," he admitted.
"I should charge you for this support call," I joked.
"I can pay you in kisses," he hinted.
"I'd like that. It also shows that you are still my Cheap Bastard."

We then had another chat moments later.

"See, I am a good girl for helping you out," I pointed out.
"You're a useful girl, but never a good girl," he reasoned.
"You'll always be my Mr. Meanie," I told him.
"Yes, I like being your Mr. Meanie," he admitted.

Here's hoping that his back feels better soon.