One Woman’s View is now a book and officially on sale, you can order one on Facebook by sending me a message or it will be available on Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, and on Cassaro Crafts at https://cassaro-crafts.sumupstore.com from tomorrow.
My first novel The Gabellotto’s Daughter is available for preorder on most eboook platforms now. The paperback comes out on August 22nd
https://books2read.com/u/mqY6NO
I arrived at the airport on time, checked my bag and made my way to the lounge. I had to go to the service desk for something and there he was, a young’ish man with a clipboard. For those of too young to remember clipboards are in lieu of digital means of data entry. A clipboard requires one to hand write the data they are collecting. Names, flight numbers etc. This task was obviously difficult for the young man as he hovered 2 inches above the clipboard and painstakingly navigated the paper and wrote the information down by hand.
Ironically this reminded me of the look on students facing when first encountering a keyboard on a computer. They would look around at the many keys and were quickly overwhelmed. This reverse situation would have made me laugh but I had now been standing and waiting so long for him to complete his handwritten task that my left leg was going numb!
I can only hope that all computer systems are functioning normally for the remainder of the trip.
A few years ago I thought that I had reached a point in my career where I should start to throttle back and stop looking and reaching for the next thing. Maybe it was time to put this endless drive , to do better and be better , into a lower gear. I tried and failed miserably, I had to accept I am someone who thrives on pressure.. I actually perform better in this kind of environment and I was not ready to stop pushing my own boundaries personally or professionally.
On the personal front I decided it was time to get a hobby and learn an artistic skill. I was entering my later 50’s when I made this decision. I chose to learn to throw pottery. I will tell you that I do not have a creative bone in my body but I have always admired potters. Pamela bought me a short taster course and I was hooked. I started taking more courses (one and two day chances to improve) I am still not not a good potter but that doesn’t matter to me because I love it. It is the first time in my life that it did not bother me that I wasn’t “good” at something I do it for the enjoyment. Wow!
What was next, job change, yes that was another boundary push because we were just coming out of COVID and the world was suddenly an uncertain place but for me no better time to take the next leap. I landed at an amazing company with a fantastic job.
One year in and loving my potting and my job I got a chance to fulfil a life-long ambition, to learn to speak Italian. My awesome employer provides a learning platform which has one to one instruction on everything from Pilates to business coaching to languages. I took this incredible opportunity and after six months of classes 2 times a week I finally I had a breakthrough.
My instructor, who has the patience of Job, would tell me to “think in Italian not English.” She might have well said go take a walk on the moon. I had no idea how to do this. She says “it will just happen if you keep trying. “ So, when I have meetings with my Italian colleagues I always try to use my Italian. When I get to visit Italy, I order my food, I don’t always get what I thought I ordered but that is an adventure too. I talk to the taxi drivers who don’t mind me trying my nascent skills out on them, but I still can’t “think in Italian”.
Well today that changed. While on a flight to Dallas I was listening to some short stories in Italian. (A friend who is learning French on the same platform told me that it doesn’t matter if you can’t really understand it, it will help your pronunciation and accent. ) It has been frustrating not to understand what is being said, catching only a few words and short phrases but today when I was listening I subconsciously stopped trying to understand and just let the words flow past me me. Suddenly, I realised I could understand the context of what was being said. How did that happen? Then I got it, I was thinking in Italian not in English! I still have a long way to go before I can get more words than I miss but I could understand!! What a feeling, it truly is hard to explain the joy and satisfaction I felt.
The moral of the story is in the title. Keep pushing, keep testing yourself. It is worth the effort.
As our project team continues to grow we are getting introduced to an even more diverse group of people and with that some new behaviours. As I promised you I would do I’m keeping you informed of the very best of them. One of my current favourites, which I have yet to personally experience, but have had been fully briefed on by someone who has, is the low volume murmur. My colleague/informant started hearing this quite yet persistent noise. At first she thought it was some background noise from the office equipment. Then realised no one was using the printer or other devices. She looked around to see if anyone else was reacting as if they too heard something. Nope, everyone was head done, hard at work. Soon after it dawned on her that one difference was that she had a new desk neighbour. By this time the noise was starting to burrow its way into her brain. So, she slyly watched the new arrival and saw her lips moving and could hear the “h
mmmmmummm”.
Now at least she had confirmation that she was not losing her mind, she felt marginally better. This lasted for a total of 2 minutes because now that she knew what is was and where it was coming from it was no longer possible to tune out. The questions started to bubble to the surface of her mind in rhythm to the “hmmmmmumm” “Is this noise because she is reading and thinks she is doing it silently?” Could she be humming the most tuneless song known to man?” “Or is she on a mission to drive me insane before the end of her first day?” At this point my informant could no longer suffer alone so she quietly started asking others sitting in the general vicinity if they too had noticed the additional undertone that had emerged. Of course she had to do this using messaging technology so as not to make the new person uncomfortable. It was soon confirmed that several other people were on the brink of migraines from trying to first figure out what the noise was and second trying to block it out. All had been extremely unsuccessful in the latter!
For clarification this started on Monday of this week, we are now at Wednesday and no one has broached the subject with the murmurer. The British politeness gene is still in clear evidence in our office. If this was happening near me I would have had to take swift action. Newbie or not something would have been said or duct tape may have been deployed as a solution!
Open plan offices are very common now but you would be amazed by what you still see and hear going on in these shared spaces. Here are a few do’s and dont’s for working in an in this type of environment:
Dont’s
Gentlemen, when walking through the office Don’t adjust yourself first and then turn around to see if anyone can see you…they can!
Ladies, don’t hold conversations at your desk or other’s desks regarding the pros and cons of various feminine sanitary products.
Don’t perform personal business transactions on the phone while in the office because when you give out your bank details, date of birth, credit cards number etc. the person on the other end of the phone is not the only making notes!
Don’t argue with your kids on the phone because everyone will just think you are the meanie no matter what the child has done.
If you are the one person in the office with the piercing laugh please refrain because it makes others want to strangle you!
Hovering,…this spans both the do’s and don’ts. If you are hovering because you do not want to be at your desk but you have nowhere else you need to be this is a don’t.
Hovering with Intent is slightly different and gives you leeway as you are simply trying to give someone else (who is currently engaged in something you consider to be not very important or you think will end very soon) a clue you need to speak to them and s acceptable.
Hovering because someone else is hovering near your desk is not acceptable.
Eating in an open plan office has its risks. The rule of thumb should be just because you think the strong aroma of your lunch is nice does not mean others share your olfactory preferences.
Don’t eat a food that can be measured in decibels.
Don’t PICK anything!!
Do’s
Be considerate of others but if someone else is annoying you with one of the don’ts plan to use a more offensive don’t back!
I hope you will find these tips useful in your day to day working life. 🙂
…will get an earful from me! There are difficult travel days then there are Hellish travel days. Today is firmly in the Hellish category? The day started at approximately 8:00 a.m. when my stepson brought the wonderful news that the M4 (main East/West motorway from Wales to London) was closed at the Swindon junction, which is the one we use, was closed owing to an earlier accident. So, change of plan, we were supposed to leave the house about 9:00 to be at the airport in plenty of time for my flight, we decided to leave immediately and find an alternate route. My plane was due to depart at 12:50 for Milan. We were listening to local radio for traffic updates. One would say the motorway would reopen shortly and then the next would say they really didn’t know how long it be. It is now 9:30 (1and 1/2 hours after leaving the house), we have finally made it to the junction for the motorway, normally a 15 minute drive! The local radio guy, whom by now I’m extremely sick of, says the traffic is flowing but it has to be diverted through the local services and then back on the road. From where we sat the closure was a short 15 miles up the motorway…another 90 minutes later and we are finally clear of the traffic. In the meantime Pam had to pull over to the shoulder so I could call my office to ask they get me on a later flight. Our 3 year old granddaughter is quietly sitting in her seat like an angel except for the occasional reminder to Nan to “put two hands on the wheel”
Rebooked and heading to Heathrow. I whiz through check in and into security. Out the other side I now face a 2 hour wait for the newly arranged flight to Milan. On the plane, down the taxi way and we stop and stay stopped for the next half hour. Finally the captain announces a vital piece of equipment has failed and attempts to reboot the system have also failed. 10 minutes goes by and he comes over the intercom again, his voice now equally annoying as the local radio guy. He explains that we have to return to the terminal and the engineers will meet us to fix the said computer. It is currently 4:45 GMT and we are waiting for a replacement computer because the engineers attempts to fix the computer has ended in misery and they have now called for brand new computer which they are currently installing. Most likely estimate for our departure is now approximately 5:45. Mr’s Dorst, Hauserman and Long I started having flashbacks to 10 hours on the DFW runway while trying to get to New Orleans!!
As bad as this day has been the poor newlywed couple in my row have just flown in from Mexico (where their flight was 3 hours late) and now they have to endure this. I am beginning to think these are signs from God and we are not meant to get to Milan today.
If you read this blog you will know my desire to see 2013 draw to a close. I am unsure, as everyone else is, how things will be in 2014 but I have a good feeling about it. I think both professionally and personally this year will bring opportunities for growth. On the personal side I hope the growth will not relate to size but rather as a human being. i have a few resolutions this year, yes the ever popular weight loss but also I want to learn enough Italian to feel comfortable using it when travelling to Italy. I want to obtain my British Citizenship (if I can pass the Life in the UK Test which most Brits find difficult with questions like how many teenagers live in the UK?) Lastly, I’d like to finally take a pottery making class, not sure why but it is something I’ve always wanted to do. Okay, what are your resolutions for 2014?
Well, this morning we started with a 35 minute delay out of Swindon owing to “train problems earlier, on the line”. Once we were actually on the train and we got to Bristol Parkway (my first change of the day), I made it to my connecting train with seconds to spare. Deep breath we are back on schedule. Now whizzing our way to Birmingham, 30 minutes in we stop and we wait…eventually the train manager announces that there are cows crossing the track so we will wait for them to cross. The waiting continues and then we hear that we are being diverted because said cows are enjoying the grass alongside the track! We change direction (driver running from one end to the other) so we can follow the diversion. We get to the diversion point and lo and behold we are advised the cows have now sought greener pastures and we can return the way we came. Poor driver hoofs it down the track once again to change direction. Finally back on the correct track, literally, we are now delayed by 35 minutes putting us in Birmingham precisely 10 minutes after my connecting train leaves the station. Upon arriving at Birmingham I now get to sit and wait for an hour until the next train which will get me to my destination exactly 35 minutes before my meeting starts in a nearby town 30 minutes away! Yep, my colleague who is picking me up in Preston will have to put his foot down and hope the roadways do not experience any of the same problems that the railways suffered today.