More thoughts from my friend's funeral

My friend organized her entire funeral. We are similar in that we are natural planners. She wasn't a control freak. She simply wanted to take care of it without burdening others. It was just who she was.

She made sure that everyone had a bagged lunch after the service. It made me smile. It was so her.

She left a voice message to all of us. She said that we were her miracle. Her daughter let out a sob. I lost it there as tears trickled down my face. It felt good hearing her voice.

She chose the music that was played. I have the list, which is now a part of my playlist and will always remind me of her.

At the end, Amazing Grace was played. The Mayo Clinic managed to record her heartbeat. Her heartbeat was then used as the beat for the song, which had guitar as the melody. It was unique and I felt connected to her -- as if she were saying to everyone that they would be okay.

I managed to grieve at her streamed funeral. I felt a lot better today. It was a lovely service celebrating her life. She somehow managed to reassure us that things were going to be okay. I am healing one day at a time.

Grieving and celebrating my friend's life

On Saturday, I attended my friend's funeral online. It was my first experience attending a virtual funeral. I am grateful that the funeral home offered this service.

It allowed me to attend when the Canada-US border continues to be closed due to COVID-19. It's also nice for those who can't travel or want to stay safe to attend remotely.

It was a beautiful celebration of my friend and her life. There were many parts of the service that made me smile. Essentially, my friend organized her own funeral and made sure that we were all taken care of. She was always that way, including right up to her death.

I may write more about what was said and share in another post. Right now, I am simply reflecting and appreciate her even more.

I didn't write the previous day. On Friday night, I decided to grieve in my own way. I played music that she loved. It brought back fond memories of both of us attending these performances live and enjoying these songs together.

Vacation is nearly over

My two-week vacation is nearly over. Originally, I had three weeks of vacation planned. I wish that I had kept it on the one hand. I do feel that it is best to keep it at two weeks. I may not want to work again if I do three weeks!

I train a new intern on Monday. My manager originally thought that he'd get involved in training. Frankly, I see that being a disaster, as he doesn't have the skills to answer specific questions related to our authoring tool. So, I decided to cut my vacation short and take this remaining week of vacation after my two weeks of training delivery are over.

I earned an extra week of vacation last year thanks to hitting my ten-year work anniversary. It's unfortunate that I can't travel due to the pandemic. However, it has been nice taking time off from work and doing whatever I feel like doing, even if it's just lounging at home.

I spent my first few days doing nothing but relaxing. I then moved to cooking, baking, organizing, and driving around. It has been great. I have enjoyed unwinding.

Shift in supervision, but this change still feels the same

As I had mentioned late last week, my intern is still with our team. His work term has been extended for another four hours. It's wonderful news. The bad news is that I'm no longer directly supervising him.

This year, my duties have shifted. It has taken at least two full-time colleagues to take over roughly 75% of what I used to do. My manager won't admit that I have tackled more than a full workload for years. We both know that's the case.

I saw how worried he was last week. I was in a meeting with these two colleagues and our manager. I used to be in charge of making sure that we got all our deliverables done for each major software release. We have this release in early June. When I did it all, my manager rarely worried. He knew that he could rely on me.

Since he has handed my former tasks to these two colleagues, he is in panic mode. He turned our checklist into a release plan. Ugh!

Well, he decided to have one of these colleagues supervise my intern. So, how many people does it take to replace 75% of what I used to do? Three people so far.

My intern (I'll still call him my intern, even though I don't mean it in the sense of ownership) is capable of pitching in and probably doing a decent job relieving at least one of them.

On Monday, it felt weird. I am now a team of one. Me. However, I ended up assigning my intern work because he had started it last week.

He does miss working with me and the feeling is mutual. We continued to chat through e-mails throughout the day like we usually do. He actually doesn't mind my assigning him work, as his new supervisor hasn't assigned him a thing. I simply have to let his team lead and our manager know.

Right now, he has little to work on. He appreciates that I can assign him work that keeps him occupied and allows him to think critically.

We also talked about storage and organization. We recently found out that we both enjoy chatting about these topics. We have built a good relationship. It's nice.

Waking up early for a work call

It has been a while since I got up at 6:45 am for work. I needed to be on a conference call at 7 am. I haven't had to take this call in nearly two months. This call lasts for four hours.

I oddly woke up just fine. It's amazing how solid my sleep has been for the past week. I haven't had any foot pain since I've reintroduced exercise into my life. I am still eating a banana a day. I need to get it down to half of a banana a day and see how that goes.

The best part about starting my workday early is ending it early. I was so happy to call it quits just after 3:40 pm.

The drawer exercise continues. I only do fifteen minutes of reorganization a day. I have realized that I have more white socks than I had anticipated. I don't wear them to work. I'll need to wear more of them when I work out.

Losing track of days, except for Wednesdays and Saturdays

I have been losing track of the days since I have been working and staying at home. I realized on Monday that Good Friday is coming up.

It's Easter this weekend. Wow!

Luckily, I do know when it's Wednesday and Saturday each week. I go out to get groceries and more those days.

I'm still working on my drawer organization. I need to deal with my pajamas next. I'm not thrilled with a lot of them, so I'll end up donating many.

Reorganizing plastic bags and panties, fixing earrings, and more

Over a year ago, I was getting rid of stuff at home that I didn't need and reorganizing the stuff that I wanted to keep. I then went on what I didn't know was my last trip with my ex-guy. Since the breakup, I haven't had the motivation to reorganize my stuff and pick up from where I had left off.

I am motivated now.

On Sunday, I looked at all plastic bags that I had thrown into multiple bags and folded them up. They are now organized by size. I also found my iced tea flask. I will be brewing iced tea with a bunch of tea bags that need to be used.

I folded all my panties and bras in my drawer the way Marie Kondo does hers. I will say that it's such a major improvement and I have a nice, cheerful collection of panties and bras. I'll be doing socks and pyjamas next.

Finally, I have been converting earrings with French hooks over to leverbacks. I don't like the former because the hook part jabs into me when I wear them and I don't like the tiny plastic backings on the hooks. The conversion is pretty simple. I need to reorder more leverbacks.

I like that I have various projects on the go. It's great that the time that I used to spend commuting to and from work is put into tasks that are meaningful.

Sorting my panty collection

Shipments are delayed. It's expected as more folks are turning to ordering items online.

I subscribed to a panty service nearly two weeks ago. I was expected to receive my first shipment last week. I haven't got it yet.

Although I am anxiously looking forward to getting my order, I am a patient person. In the meantime, I'm looking at my current panty drawer and seeing what I have.

I like comfortable panties. I also like lacy ones. I have a good mix of them.

It has been nearly a year since my ex-guy broke up with me. It has been less than a month since I ended a brief stint with my love interest. Looking at my panty drawer more closely has been the furthest thing from my mind.

I'll need to sort it out. I simply threw everything in as storage. I have another drawer for panties that I regularly wear. I need to amalgamate the two drawers and give my panties that I have the proper love that they deserve. I also need to work on self-care.

Staying at and working from home makes me focus on organization

I have lost count of how long I have been working from home this month. It's easier to say that I have worked in the office once this month.

I find that after I'm done work that I take a nap, fix myself dinner, and then organize various parts of my home. Last night, I spent a good couple of hours filing my tax receipts away, re-organizing how my bedroom looks, doing laundry, and throwing out correspondence that I don't need anymore.

It all feels good and freeing. It's cool.

At this rate, my home will look pretty tidy and nice.

Incompetent manager and craziness at work

This week is already shaping up to be super crazy!

At work, we have a major software release. It isn't going as well as we had hoped. At least our part of the exercise isn't too bad.

It's my mini me's last week with the company. I will miss her. My manager finally got around to booking her farewell lunch. Unfortunately, he can't get his act together collecting money from the team and buying a gift. He asked me to do it. I am a good organizer, but this week is not good for me I declined and asked my intern to help me out.

As a manager, if you can't organize something as simple as getting a farewell gift, you have issues. I am also trying to wrap up my work, ensure that my intern is okay while I am way with work, get tasks that my mini me has left, and prepare for my business trip next week.

I've started to pack. I have a ways to go. My guy is also doing training this week and flies off a day before I do.

On top of all this madness, my intern and I have to train a new employee this week. So, no, I do not have time to do a task that my manager should be able to handle.

I'm glad that I put my foot down. He made the argument that I would need to get a gift for my intern, so I might as well get both gifts. First, we have never got parting gifts for interns -- only a farewell lunch. Second, I said that I couldn't do the gift-buying this week, but could when I am back. He finally accepted.

Sometimes, I feel like I am the manager and my boss is the incompetent one.