What's on your Monday Menu?

Morning everyone! Happy Monday! I had another very nice weekend. A good mix of relaxing, playing, and getting stuff done :) The weather has been Top 10 spectacular, too! Today will be a little cooler, but still sunny and low humidity. I wish I could do some travel to a beach or go for a hike, but at least it's beautiful in the backyard. I still love my outdoor sofa set. It's surprisingly comfortable and makes me want to spend time outside, which is nice.

Gotta say I am not looking forward to work today at all, though. We have a lot of back to back "virtual welcome sessions" with new employees, and they are quickly becoming my least favorite part of work. They aren't awful, but they are always a little bit awkward, and mostly it's just really boring to say the same thing over and over. My coordinator and I have our schtick down, and we literally say the same jokes every time, haha. We are so dorky. They take about an hour each and we have 5 of them today. Blah.

I was good with food decisions all weekend, but Grim made some cookies last night, and I caved in. It wouldn't have been so bad, but I didn't exercise at all, either. My knee started to bother me last week, so I decided to stay off for a bit. It feels a lot better, so I will definitely get back onto the treadmill today!

QOTD: What was your most memorable "first day on the job" experience? I was hired to be the Director of a private childcare center, but when I got there, the owner told me I had to fire the Director who was already there! What? Um, no. I refused to do it, of course, and it became super clear that the owner was really crazy (not just a poor manager, but actually crazy). I was so disappointed... it should have been a good job with a great salary and great commute. Oh well...

I totally haven't made a plan for dinner, yet. I need to dig something out of the freezer, but I haven't looked yet! But I have plenty of points to play with so I am not worried!

My sister sent me that meme a few weeks ago and I instantly saw cake. What does that say about me? We had a nice low-key weekend. I guess they're all low-key lately aren't they? Saturday included grocery shopping, drop off of a kid's computer and pick up of a report card, and Jon got our porch swing hardware installed - we're just waiting on the rope. Yesterday we used our weekly reservation at the pool and worked on perfecting a peanut butter cookie recipe.

QOTD: I was actually just talking about this job for a course I'm taking, because the whole experience was so weird and creepy. I was 19 and I had interviewed with a company to do outbound fundraising. It was my my cup of tea, but I needed a job and I had experience in a contact center. The interview was in a perfectly nice office building, but when I showed up to work the first day it was a very temporary set up in a former retail space (one that now, or last I knew is a laundry mat!). There was a bunch of 4'x8' folding tables and random cradle style phones. They gave us a sheet with a list of names and a script. No training, we were just supposed to start calling and "fundraising" for some random fire department I had never heard of. I sucked at it and at the end of my first week they called and told me not to come back and then never paid me for the hours I had worked. I realize now that something was very shady and they were likely not legit, but I was too naive at 19 to realize that.

My Food:

• Coffee w/ Cream x3
• Eggs, Sausage, Sweet Potato, Cornbread
• I also need to take something out of the freezer. We have chicken, salmon, and hamburger so it will be one of those with veggies.

I'd like to go for a walk today, but it's supposed to rain all day (and straight through until Thursday evening!). I may go anyway.

That job sounds super shady. The one I referenced above was not quite the same, but all of my interviews were off site, to keep me from interacting with the staff who I were eventually supposed to fire. I ignored so many red flags!

Good morning everyone. Can't believe the weekend is already over. I definitely enjoyed the awesome weather we had and spent a lot of time outside. Today is supposed to be nothing but rain all day. Blah. Accountability wasn't my best yesterday. I got into a bag of sweet and salty Chex mix and mindlessly munched away. I don't even think I was hungry. Today will be back to strictly following my menu!

QOTD: Can't really recall any exciting, odd or creepy first days on the job. However, i did have some odd experiences. My first job out of college was working as a social services assistant for this nursing home. I had only been working there for about 2 months and still learning all the ins and outs. One day I came into work and the director of social services (my supervisor) was nowhere to be found. Next thing I know management is calling me into their office and telling me that my supervisor quit and they wanted me to take over her role. I told them I did not feel comfortable with that though as I was still learning and didn't have my current role down yet. Told them I just didn't think I was ready to take that on. Not long after I was let go. In a way I was so relieved as I hated that job. There was also a lot of unethical things going on there and a lot of favoritism happening.

B: premier shake

B2: coffee w/Splenda X 2

L: 2 oz chicken breast and a hard boiled egg

D: 4 oz salmon and veggies

S: L&F yogurt and fruit

Has anyone ever eaten Chex mix because they were hungry, lol?

You have a point there! Lol

I hope the sun comes out today. It is chilly and gloomy right now so it doesn't help my mood.

DS is having friends over tonight which I am not really up for, but he will be cooking so there's that. I will probably retreat to my sunroom and watch shows on my iPad.

QOTD: I took a job in IT at a large hospital in Boston early in my career. I had been hired with a promise that I could move into management within the year. On my first day the IT Director told me that he double-checked the work of everyone (including my direct supervisor). He wanted me to do that too and tell him who was struggling. I stayed for a few weeks while I mulled over what to do which did not include following his instructions. I ended up going back to my former company, but was hired back at a level 3 grades above my former one. There had been a job opening that a manager had wanted to hire me for but my previous manager wouldn't let him talk to me. BTW, this experience taught me to hire people that I trust, delegate fully, and make sure that my people had all the opportunities available to them, even if it meant moving to another department. My people were very loyal because of it and I had a lot of people apply for my open positions because they heard that I worked that way. At the end of the day it was these super employees who made my career satisfying and fairily successful.

TSS: 4 years, 2 months

B: Coffee! Eggs and cheese

L: Ever roast chicken and laughing cow cheese

D: grilled swordfish and grilled veggies

S: cauliflower fried rice and/or yogurt with strawberry compote and/or blueberry lemon yogurt pie and/or WW one point chocolate muffin

We got our beautiful day! I wish every day was exactly like this, year round. I would be the happiest person.

Good morning!

QOTD - I will need to think on that a bit. I'm a bit sour in my current position so I think it skews my viewpoint on things (current and present).

Breakfast - fasting, so hot coffee, cold brew coffee (all black), and topo chico

Lunch - I actually planned! I brought a veggie lasagna and some salad, with olive garden dressing

Snack - Apple and peanut butter crackers

Dinner - Crispy baked tofu, panang curry and jasmin rice. A mandarin for desert!

I hope you all have a great day!

My step kids LOVE Olive Garden dressing, and if you have an Aldi nearby, they have an "Italian Restaurant Dressing" in that same exact looking bottle and it's like $1.49 and they can't tell the difference. Since they use it by the gallon, it's nice to find one that is 1/4 the price!