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What did you do this week (and weekend)?
As part of a weekly series, these topics are a place for users to casually discuss the things they did — or didn't do — during their week. Did you accomplish any goals? Suffer a failure? Do nothing at all? Tell us about it!
TLDR: I joined a pickup volleyball league. Weird drama ensued.
It was a pretty strange sequence of events. I was invited to play over the weekend by a few folks I met at a baby shower. Showed up Tuesday and actually had a pretty fun time playing with the group. The level of play was intermediate and as I hadn't played for almost a decade, it gave me a chance to shake off the rust. Then the awkwardness started. Rewind to me first arriving and the woman who organizes the weekly game welcomed me and told me we'd start at 5pm and tell the large family who were playing on the courts to leave. It's a planned league so I figured we had the courts reserved. Well fast forward to 1.5 hours later and the entire 30-40 person family angrily returning saying we had unjustly kicked their kids off the court, it was first come first serve, and we had been playing without switching out for too long. I was the only first time player so I wasn't sure what was true and everyone just looked around confused. No one really responded until the mother specifically called out the organizer, who then turned around and walked toward the backpacks. "Oh, she must be getting the reservation form" I thought. Nope, she packed up and left without a word. We all slowly trickled off and many people were asking what 'proper etiquette' in that situation would be. What the fuck. I stuck around after to debrief with the folks who invited me and another woman approached us, whom they knew, to ask if we had been playing in the weekly pickup game. It turns out she had been taken off of the weekly league group chat along with a few other folks whom the league organizer had decided weren't good enough to play, the league organizer changed the day the games were held, and then told them they weren't happening anymore. Rather than just say "Hey, there are all level games on Sunday. Maybe try and get your skills up there before joining the Tuesday game". At this point I can't believe how much drama a fucking game of volleyball can elicit so I suggest we just host a different one on Thursdays. We had a huge turnout and the level of play is no different than the Tuesday game. I really like the folks who participated and it just feels like a more supportive, inclusive, and fun vibe overall. Suuuuuper stoked to be playing again and making lots of friends with folks I had never met in the meantime. 2/10 for the first attempt, 10/10 for the second.
I went to a nationwide department training for newhires in Texas at my new job. It was a week-long immersion in company culture, practices, and lines of work that we will either be doing or interacting with in managed IT.
I got to my airport three hours before my flight at 3:45 in the morning. The damned airport opens at 5, and the first flight can't take off until 7, so I just kinda wobbled in place and paced until it opened. I got into the terminal, went to McDonalds for a full breakfast, hopped on my flight, checked into the company-paid hotel and... was 45 minutes late for class because I missed schedule correction.
I caught the second class on time because that time was right, and stumbled into the third class another 45 minutes late with a Starbucks cold brew in hand, thinking I was early. The rest of the week went off without a hitch, even getting home was fairly trivial except for traffic. I watched a couple of movies in transit: Encanto on the way out, and Spiderman: Far from Home coming back. Both were great.
I just flew home with the second worst hangover I've ever had courtesy of ample... let's call them "networking opportunities." It was great talking to people who had been there a while, learning their perspectives on the company, and why they stuck around, or even just hearing crazy work stories. I know that next week it'll just be work, but it was great being able to just talk straight to pretty much any level present and take stuff in, even after hours. There's no "wE'rE fAmIlY" pretense, just have documentation showing you do good work and know stuff, and you'll be paid well, like they know the real reason we're there.
It was my first time getting myself to an airport, my first time out of that specific airport, my first time in Texas, my first time socializing like that (ever). It was definitely one of the most interesting weeks I've ever had.
I actually look forward to organizing some stuff around home and preparing for my first week by trying to understand a bunch of project documentation.