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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!
I honestly didn't do much this week. My company has been doing some re-orgs for the last few weeks, pulling people against their will into this new AI org to help improve our own internal tools and products. Unfortunately for half my team and I (including my manager who's being flattened to an IC), we're being pulled into this as well. I saw the news earlier in the week and have basically been a bit stun locked. They're being extra secretive about what the work looks like in this new org but it's essentially just glorified data labeling. There doesn't seem to be any room for career growth and progression. As a result, I've been thinking about hopping again but I really don't want to go through the interview loops again. However, if I don't want my software engineering skills to atrophy, I don't really have a choice. I could write about this endlessly here but I'll hold off on that for now as I'm still just processing my own emotions.
On the much brighter side though, I'm traveling for the Indy 500 race! I've been wanting to see it for a few years now and my college friends have finally gotten into racing after watching Drive to Survive. We saw tickets go on sale and I managed to snag a few, physical ones at that! I also haven't seen some of these college friends face-to-face in years so I'm looking forward to spending the extended weekend with them.
European here. Had to look up what an “Indy 500” is. Really happy for you. Hope you enjoy it!
This week marks the end of the school year. I've completed my first year teaching in public school, and now I have the entire summer to look forward to. It was an interesting year - many joys, many hardships. I was challenged and I feel I rose to the occasion. My new colleagues like me, my scores were good, and families were happy.
Tonight I fly out to be with my sibling for their graduation ceremony. I hope the weather is nice, otherwise I'll have to watch it on a screen, which would suck.
I'm looking forward to spending more time with my son and creating memories together.
Dang! What’s it like being a new teacher? May I ask what grades and subjects you taught? Were the parents and the students cooperative? Also… So, teachers do get the summer off? Do you still earn an income during that period? Sorry for all the questions. lol Feel to answer none of these if I’m getting too close to home.
I'm happy to talk about it! I taught prek in private school for 15 years so I'm not entirely new to teaching. I switched to 2nd grade in public school last year and it was also a very large shift demographically for me - I went from teaching mostly white, middle class kids to teaching low income Black/Hispanic kids.
Parents were for the most part easy to work with, though they weren't as involved as I was used to. The kids came with emotional baggage at times that could be difficult to deal with. They also have a different culture which I needed to adjust to.
I do get summers off, though I can teach summer school if I wanted to. I have a young son though so I'd have to pay for daycare or camp and that is... Expensive. I'd lose all the income I make. I get paid year round (salaried) so I'm fine through the summer.
Wow. Dang! Thanks for sharing all that with me! Also, may I ask what prompted you to change to a public school with the more disadvantaged kids? That’s great work you’re doing!
Frankly, better benefits and more pay.
Haha! That’s fair. Sometimes a little self-interest sets us up for more and better opportunities to help others.
One highlights this week was that I finished the manuscript for the first chapter of my book and sent it to the editor/publisher. Due to privacy reasons I can’t tell you more about this project, but this is a big milestone for me, and I’m very happy with the outcome.
Another highlight was that Tales of Arise released today on Switch 2, which I bought and am already 3h44m in. I wanted to play only for two hours, but it was hard to put down. I’m enjoying it so far. It’s my first action JRPG experience, and my first foray into the Tales series.
Tomorrow I’ll be joining a large group of friends and acquaintances and we’re all going to have lunch at a residency in a beautiful place out in the wood, far from the city and noise roads, with a large pond and everything. We’ll spend the afternoon there together. It’s an annual activity. It’ll be fun. Some of my homies will be there.
I posted a few weeks ago about some issues with my back. It's now been two weeks of physical therapy and one visit to the spine specialist. He basically said that regarding the spondylolisthesis, the vertebrae are stable, so I shouldn't worry about it slipping further. He said most of the pain is likely due to arthritis (swelling pressing on the nerves). Physical therapy has been good, and I'm more or less keeping up with the home exercises. I'm hoping to use this as an opportunity to turn over a new leaf with regard to strengthening my core, improving flexibility, and exercising more.
Good luck with your recovery! Great to hear that you don’t have anything worse.
I met a lot of people.
Sometime within the last month I went on a cruise and there were a ton of gay people in it, and it made me and the husband realize that we really desperately need more gay friends. For whatever reason pretty much all of my husband’s friends are lesbians, and on top of that all of my friends were my husband’s friends. They’re also kind of flakes so we realized we were both friend-lonely.
We are both big gay bears so we thought we would try to meet people in bear events happening regularly in our area but it turns out that pretty much everyone in these all know eachother and split off into cliques and we have no social finesse to join them. We’ve instead been on the apps and things have been going really well.
It’s such a huge change for me as well. It made things difficult to concentrate when it came to my study day yesterday and it takes up a lot of my time. But I am so happy these days, and so is my husband. I’ve been wanting to be more social for years now and it’s so good that I’ve finally been able to break out of my shell.
There’s actually a lot more I could say about it but I don’t think I could say it to a public forum even pseudonomously.
I got word that my cholestorol/trigycerides are high so Im abstaining from booze and trying to avoid unhealthy foods for awhile as a type of reset. It's going ok. Beer and chips are my main weaknesses with a nod to red meat/fried foods. My diet isn't too terrible otherwise...I get a decent amount of fiber and eat vegetables everyday at least. I'm going to miss having a cold drink especially after working outside but hopefully I can rebase my numbers and return to a more responsible consumption level later on
I'm also trying to make a plan to fish Cat6 through my house. Its a much larger enterprise than I imagined. Im in a narrow townhome with three stories and Id like for my equipment to be in the basement. Attic access is spotty so Im pretty much resigned to hoping I can minimize the amount of drywall I need to cut. I've never patched drywall so thats another skill I need to learn
I don't know if it will help, but you might try keeping some seltzer water around. I found that the fizz and the routine of physically opening the can scratched some kind of itch in my brain when I was trying to kick soda.
As for chips, I feel you. However many potato chips are in our house is how many I eat.
Good luck with your new diet. I hope you get good results quickly. Also, what is a CAT6? Pardon my ignorance.
A duck seems to be nesting right outside my front door. Its been a couple days so far Ive seen it chilling there, rarely seems to move, doesnt appear bothered when I walk by.
Im guessing the best thing to do in this situation is just not to try and interfere in any way. I was thinking of leaving out a bowl of peas or something, but I believe the common advice is not to feed wild animals, so Ill just let it be.