May Layoff part 1
May. 24th, 2023 09:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
taz_39I woke up at 3:30am (argh) and rode with some coworkers to the airport.
After stumbling around and sucking down coffee for a bit, I found myself in front of another "frictionless shopping" i.e. "no checkout" i.e. "cashierless" store.
This one is called &GO. You can see the cameras in the ceiling, and this time I also looked for the weight sensors under the shelves.
There was a sign-up kiosk for Amazon One!
Amazon One is a biometric payment option. It uses your palm print as a form of identification, and links that to your payment methods (as many of us have already done with facial recognition.) All I had to do was insert a credit card already associated with my Amazon account, then hold my hand above the sensor at the right distance, and a scan was taken. You can do one or both hands. Then you agree to the terms and conditions.
Voila! I've been assimilated into the Borg.
Some people find this tech invasive. I find it fascinating and efficient.
Sure, someone could steal my identity. Tale as old as time. I'm one of eight billion people, I'll take those odds.
Anyway, that was the exciting part of the morning.
Both my flights were normal.
On the Uber ride home I noticed a LOT of new construction.
New apartments, hotels, and lots of cleared woodlands. Pretty wild!
Orlando is expanding and expanding.
At home Jameson was working, but I snuck in and squeezed him hard before unpacking a little and running out to see the banana tree.
Oh dear.
I can't say I was surprised. But I was sad, and disappointed.
On the ride in, I had seen that water levels in all the lakes we passed were VERY low. And I kinda knew.
We did not get enough rain for the bananas to sustain themselves.
And Jameson dumping a bucket of water at the foot of the tree, once per week, is not nearly enough.
So, no java bananas this year. But! I am SO grateful that the tree grew bananas at all!
And there are four more trees that also have the potential to grow some!
And come June, I'll be around to ACTUALLY garden. So, it's ok :) I can't help but feel sad, but it couldn't be helped.
Jameson felt awful about it when I told him (no he hadn't noticed, like I've said many times he's not a gardener and works full time plus gigs, and I was not going to burden him with "Did you check on my banana trees today?" after he's already done 60 hours of work). He seemed a bit defensive at first, but I strongly asserted that it was NOT his fault, they were not his responsibility, and they're just bananas. Without near-daily care, there's nothing to be done...and I never expected or asked him to become their caretaker.
My little Meyer lemon tree may also be dead, or at least it is unlikely to fruit again.
It has no leaves and is mostly brown and dry. In this case I'm not sure why because the soil was very wet (it's in a non-draining pot).
Maybe it's rootbound. I'll do an autopsy over the weekend.
The vanilla orchid also looks like crap, entirely due to the dry weather.
The pipevine has died back a lot too, but it's still very present and even has a flower!
Look how big it is! The flowers on this variety can get up to two feet long and a foot wide.
It looks like meat, and has a rancid meat smell, because it attracts flies to be it's pollinators.
A lot of tropical and prehistoric plants adopt this stinky strategy instead of sweet nectar :)
Here it is from the side. The green bulb is the seed pod.
Anyway, the rest of the night was unpacking and some light cleaning and dinner from our favorite Greek place down the street.
I went to bed with a massive headache, which I should have paid more attention to, because it was a warning.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday I woke up nervous about my new patient blood draw, and still with the massive painful headache.
I wanted to take something for it but was afraid it would mess up the bloodwork, so endured, telling myself about all the people who have to deal with pain worse than this every day. Similarly, in the waiting room as I cycled through periods of intense-to-mild anxiety, I reminded myself that blood draws are going to become more and more a part of my life as I get older and I really gotta start sucking it up.
None of this actually HELPED, you understand. But it did put things in perspective.
The appointment went just fine at first; the doctor was friendly and made me feel at ease, and so was the nurse.
But when it came time for the blood draw they left me sitting alone in the exam room for at least 15 minutes, where I got all worked up again (waiting makes it 1,000x worse). Then the nurse who came in was super casual, and was kinda like, "Mhm ok" when I told her that I don't handle needles very well.
And then she couldn't get blood to come out! She went in for a second try and still couldn't get a draw, so told me that I was dehydrated. And then insisted on trying to show me. "See? The blood's not coming out. LOOK!"
I WARNED the doctor and I WARNED the nurse, I have a moderate needle phobia due to two bad past experiences, and this one was very quickly escalating into a Third Bad Experience.
I started to panic and feel woozy, and used all of my remaining self control not to scream and rip the needle out myself, I asked in an absolutely horrified voice for the needle to be removed from my arm, then grabbed my water and a piece of candy from my bag and laid back as far as I could because I could feel that tunnel vision and nausea that precedes passing out. I did NOT want to pass out!
The nurse went out and got a second nurse, who put a cold compress on the back of my neck.
After about two minutes I started to feel better.
New Nurse then wanted to do a third attempt(!)
At that point I was like, whatever I guess! I'm already in full-on panic mode, may as well!
I didn't see any point in continuing if I was too dehydrated to get a draw.
But she went in again at a different vein and still got no draw.
And then she started talking to me conversationally about how dehydrated I was and what the thickness of my blood must be like right now, etc etc, WHILE THE NEEDLE WAS STILL IN MY ARM.
This time I really did almost start screaming; I clamped my eyes shut and made a strangled sound and probably a really terrible face, and she seemed startled out of her diatribe enough to say, "Ok, ok!" and pull the needle out.
Fuck! I will still go to this doctor, but any future blood draws will be done with Quest. At least Quest is in a hurry to get you out, so they won't leave needles hanging out of your arm and chat you up while you're on the verge of passing out!! FFS!!
I have NEVER had to be poked multiple times for a blood draw either. I have very big, visible veins.
But that part is definitely my own fault. I am always dehydrated after travel days. That is probably why I had such a bad headache; my body tried so hard to warn me, and I didn't listen :( And they always tell you, "Drink lots of water!", but I didn't even have anything at all to drink that morning, I was too nervous and still exhausted from the lack of sleep, and didn't even think about hydrating. Dumbass!
So it didn't go very well...but I didn't actually pass out, and I am still willing to try again with Quest before the end of the week.
In the other arm, because my right arm is a bruised mess from being poked three damn times.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Back home I had breakfast and cleaned the bathrooms to work out some of my anxiety, and shared the saga of my wussiness with Jameson. While he was at the gym I did a little photoshoot with the new phone case that I ordered from Japan several months ago.
I am such a huge food nerd, so when I saw this phone case I just HAD to have it!
Hyper-realistic buttered toast!
I mean look at that butter! Seems like it would be wet to the touch!
The extra-crispy crust!
This was made by a shop called Fairy and You in Japan, and sold on the site Minne, which is like the Japanese version of Etsy.
This type of "art" involving hyper-realistic food is called "shokuhin sampuru" and is very popular in Japan.
This person takes about a month to make the cases, and then it's another month to ship.
Since I'm getting a new phone which I'll hope to have for at least four years (hopefully more) I felt it was worth getting such a fun and wacky case!
After enjoying that, I cleaned both bathrooms (but not the shower, my arch nemesis. I'll get to that special hell later.)
After lunch I had an interview for Courtroom Clerk with Osceola County.
It started with a typing test, which made me nervous because it was via Zoom and the interviewer literally watched me typing via my shared screen. I've tested my speed many times but have never taken an actual test in front of someone before. My hands were shaking like mad, but I still managed 78wpm and 97% accuracy (I usually have 98% but nerves). The interviewer was very pleased with that, and we moved on to the other parts which were standard interview stuff. I felt like it went well, and they said I should hear something back by the end of the week.
After that I kind of splatted for the rest of the day.
My nerves were just destroyed because of the blood draw incident. I couldn't nap but felt exhausted in so many ways.
It was nice to just chill with my Jameson and do quiet things, and eat dinner together.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday I got to sleep in until about 9 which was glorious and much needed.
After breakfast I went to Target to buy a new phone, bringing my buttered toast case to make sure it would fit.
Jameson's friend Paul works at Target, and we've both bought our phones through him before because he gets commission.
It went pretty smoothly but the phone will need to be mailed to me for some unknown reason.
The whole process took longer than expected, so I ended up doing a scheduled phone interview for a remote data entry position in the car. IMO it went really well, and they sent the application materials after we were finished. I'll be very excited if I make it through the application process!
Back home I had just enough time to scarf down lunch before an in-person interview with Sprouts 40 minutes away.
But just as I was done eating my phone rang, and it was Disney to give me more information about the Candlelight Processional gig.
Yay! Now I feel that it's official.
Drove to Sprouts and got there early, so did a little shopping :)
There was a new flavor of Olipop, and a root beer-flavored canned coffee, and a plant-based strawberry milk that I wanted to try!
The interview went well, but I'm not sure I'd be a good fit because they're mostly looking for someone to work nights.
I popped over to Whole Paycheck across the street to get sushi for dinner and wings to make on Friday.
Driving home was awful because it's I-4, it was 4:30pm on a weekday, and it was raining so people were fleeing the theme parks. What is normally a 40-minute drive took an hour.
Jameson and I ate dinner together, then he left for rehearsal and I did my paperwork for the data entry application, then dusted the house. I had wanted to do the shower too but was too tired.
Oh, and I got a funny ridiculous accessory for my buttered toast case!
That's a 3D-printed, true-to-size, single-serving Smuckers jam!
Someone made it for me on Etsy.
It's going to be a phone charm, attached to the toast at the bottom right corner with a looped cord.
I'll be able to remove it pretty easily when I'm going out somewhere, but on days when my phone is out on a table or desk it's going to crack me up to have my "buttered toast and jam" lol. Listen, life is short, and little dumb things like this make it worthwhile.
------------------------------------------------------------
Tomorrow is Thursday already.
It's been a whirlwind layoff for me, but I'm hoping the next few days will be more calm.
Plans for Thursday include attacking the shower filth, setting up my new phone if it arrives, and going out to dinner with Jameson.
For the weekend, I need to repack my suitcases and complete the remaining Megan's Foodie Finds sheets.
I'd also like to cook one meal for us before I leave again.
After stumbling around and sucking down coffee for a bit, I found myself in front of another "frictionless shopping" i.e. "no checkout" i.e. "cashierless" store.
This one is called &GO. You can see the cameras in the ceiling, and this time I also looked for the weight sensors under the shelves.
There was a sign-up kiosk for Amazon One!
Amazon One is a biometric payment option. It uses your palm print as a form of identification, and links that to your payment methods (as many of us have already done with facial recognition.) All I had to do was insert a credit card already associated with my Amazon account, then hold my hand above the sensor at the right distance, and a scan was taken. You can do one or both hands. Then you agree to the terms and conditions.
Voila! I've been assimilated into the Borg.
Some people find this tech invasive. I find it fascinating and efficient.
Sure, someone could steal my identity. Tale as old as time. I'm one of eight billion people, I'll take those odds.
Anyway, that was the exciting part of the morning.
Both my flights were normal.
On the Uber ride home I noticed a LOT of new construction.
New apartments, hotels, and lots of cleared woodlands. Pretty wild!
Orlando is expanding and expanding.
At home Jameson was working, but I snuck in and squeezed him hard before unpacking a little and running out to see the banana tree.
Oh dear.
I can't say I was surprised. But I was sad, and disappointed.
On the ride in, I had seen that water levels in all the lakes we passed were VERY low. And I kinda knew.
We did not get enough rain for the bananas to sustain themselves.
And Jameson dumping a bucket of water at the foot of the tree, once per week, is not nearly enough.
So, no java bananas this year. But! I am SO grateful that the tree grew bananas at all!
And there are four more trees that also have the potential to grow some!
And come June, I'll be around to ACTUALLY garden. So, it's ok :) I can't help but feel sad, but it couldn't be helped.
Jameson felt awful about it when I told him (no he hadn't noticed, like I've said many times he's not a gardener and works full time plus gigs, and I was not going to burden him with "Did you check on my banana trees today?" after he's already done 60 hours of work). He seemed a bit defensive at first, but I strongly asserted that it was NOT his fault, they were not his responsibility, and they're just bananas. Without near-daily care, there's nothing to be done...and I never expected or asked him to become their caretaker.
My little Meyer lemon tree may also be dead, or at least it is unlikely to fruit again.
It has no leaves and is mostly brown and dry. In this case I'm not sure why because the soil was very wet (it's in a non-draining pot).
Maybe it's rootbound. I'll do an autopsy over the weekend.
The vanilla orchid also looks like crap, entirely due to the dry weather.
The pipevine has died back a lot too, but it's still very present and even has a flower!
Look how big it is! The flowers on this variety can get up to two feet long and a foot wide.
It looks like meat, and has a rancid meat smell, because it attracts flies to be it's pollinators.
A lot of tropical and prehistoric plants adopt this stinky strategy instead of sweet nectar :)
Here it is from the side. The green bulb is the seed pod.
Anyway, the rest of the night was unpacking and some light cleaning and dinner from our favorite Greek place down the street.
I went to bed with a massive headache, which I should have paid more attention to, because it was a warning.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Tuesday I woke up nervous about my new patient blood draw, and still with the massive painful headache.
I wanted to take something for it but was afraid it would mess up the bloodwork, so endured, telling myself about all the people who have to deal with pain worse than this every day. Similarly, in the waiting room as I cycled through periods of intense-to-mild anxiety, I reminded myself that blood draws are going to become more and more a part of my life as I get older and I really gotta start sucking it up.
None of this actually HELPED, you understand. But it did put things in perspective.
The appointment went just fine at first; the doctor was friendly and made me feel at ease, and so was the nurse.
But when it came time for the blood draw they left me sitting alone in the exam room for at least 15 minutes, where I got all worked up again (waiting makes it 1,000x worse). Then the nurse who came in was super casual, and was kinda like, "Mhm ok" when I told her that I don't handle needles very well.
And then she couldn't get blood to come out! She went in for a second try and still couldn't get a draw, so told me that I was dehydrated. And then insisted on trying to show me. "See? The blood's not coming out. LOOK!"
I WARNED the doctor and I WARNED the nurse, I have a moderate needle phobia due to two bad past experiences, and this one was very quickly escalating into a Third Bad Experience.
I started to panic and feel woozy, and used all of my remaining self control not to scream and rip the needle out myself, I asked in an absolutely horrified voice for the needle to be removed from my arm, then grabbed my water and a piece of candy from my bag and laid back as far as I could because I could feel that tunnel vision and nausea that precedes passing out. I did NOT want to pass out!
The nurse went out and got a second nurse, who put a cold compress on the back of my neck.
After about two minutes I started to feel better.
New Nurse then wanted to do a third attempt(!)
At that point I was like, whatever I guess! I'm already in full-on panic mode, may as well!
I didn't see any point in continuing if I was too dehydrated to get a draw.
But she went in again at a different vein and still got no draw.
And then she started talking to me conversationally about how dehydrated I was and what the thickness of my blood must be like right now, etc etc, WHILE THE NEEDLE WAS STILL IN MY ARM.
This time I really did almost start screaming; I clamped my eyes shut and made a strangled sound and probably a really terrible face, and she seemed startled out of her diatribe enough to say, "Ok, ok!" and pull the needle out.
Fuck! I will still go to this doctor, but any future blood draws will be done with Quest. At least Quest is in a hurry to get you out, so they won't leave needles hanging out of your arm and chat you up while you're on the verge of passing out!! FFS!!
I have NEVER had to be poked multiple times for a blood draw either. I have very big, visible veins.
But that part is definitely my own fault. I am always dehydrated after travel days. That is probably why I had such a bad headache; my body tried so hard to warn me, and I didn't listen :( And they always tell you, "Drink lots of water!", but I didn't even have anything at all to drink that morning, I was too nervous and still exhausted from the lack of sleep, and didn't even think about hydrating. Dumbass!
So it didn't go very well...but I didn't actually pass out, and I am still willing to try again with Quest before the end of the week.
In the other arm, because my right arm is a bruised mess from being poked three damn times.
----------------------------------------------------------------
Back home I had breakfast and cleaned the bathrooms to work out some of my anxiety, and shared the saga of my wussiness with Jameson. While he was at the gym I did a little photoshoot with the new phone case that I ordered from Japan several months ago.
I am such a huge food nerd, so when I saw this phone case I just HAD to have it!
Hyper-realistic buttered toast!
I mean look at that butter! Seems like it would be wet to the touch!
The extra-crispy crust!
This was made by a shop called Fairy and You in Japan, and sold on the site Minne, which is like the Japanese version of Etsy.
This type of "art" involving hyper-realistic food is called "shokuhin sampuru" and is very popular in Japan.
This person takes about a month to make the cases, and then it's another month to ship.
Since I'm getting a new phone which I'll hope to have for at least four years (hopefully more) I felt it was worth getting such a fun and wacky case!
After enjoying that, I cleaned both bathrooms (but not the shower, my arch nemesis. I'll get to that special hell later.)
After lunch I had an interview for Courtroom Clerk with Osceola County.
It started with a typing test, which made me nervous because it was via Zoom and the interviewer literally watched me typing via my shared screen. I've tested my speed many times but have never taken an actual test in front of someone before. My hands were shaking like mad, but I still managed 78wpm and 97% accuracy (I usually have 98% but nerves). The interviewer was very pleased with that, and we moved on to the other parts which were standard interview stuff. I felt like it went well, and they said I should hear something back by the end of the week.
After that I kind of splatted for the rest of the day.
My nerves were just destroyed because of the blood draw incident. I couldn't nap but felt exhausted in so many ways.
It was nice to just chill with my Jameson and do quiet things, and eat dinner together.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Wednesday I got to sleep in until about 9 which was glorious and much needed.
After breakfast I went to Target to buy a new phone, bringing my buttered toast case to make sure it would fit.
Jameson's friend Paul works at Target, and we've both bought our phones through him before because he gets commission.
It went pretty smoothly but the phone will need to be mailed to me for some unknown reason.
The whole process took longer than expected, so I ended up doing a scheduled phone interview for a remote data entry position in the car. IMO it went really well, and they sent the application materials after we were finished. I'll be very excited if I make it through the application process!
Back home I had just enough time to scarf down lunch before an in-person interview with Sprouts 40 minutes away.
But just as I was done eating my phone rang, and it was Disney to give me more information about the Candlelight Processional gig.
Yay! Now I feel that it's official.
Drove to Sprouts and got there early, so did a little shopping :)
There was a new flavor of Olipop, and a root beer-flavored canned coffee, and a plant-based strawberry milk that I wanted to try!
The interview went well, but I'm not sure I'd be a good fit because they're mostly looking for someone to work nights.
I popped over to Whole Paycheck across the street to get sushi for dinner and wings to make on Friday.
Driving home was awful because it's I-4, it was 4:30pm on a weekday, and it was raining so people were fleeing the theme parks. What is normally a 40-minute drive took an hour.
Jameson and I ate dinner together, then he left for rehearsal and I did my paperwork for the data entry application, then dusted the house. I had wanted to do the shower too but was too tired.
Oh, and I got a funny ridiculous accessory for my buttered toast case!
That's a 3D-printed, true-to-size, single-serving Smuckers jam!
Someone made it for me on Etsy.
It's going to be a phone charm, attached to the toast at the bottom right corner with a looped cord.
I'll be able to remove it pretty easily when I'm going out somewhere, but on days when my phone is out on a table or desk it's going to crack me up to have my "buttered toast and jam" lol. Listen, life is short, and little dumb things like this make it worthwhile.
------------------------------------------------------------
Tomorrow is Thursday already.
It's been a whirlwind layoff for me, but I'm hoping the next few days will be more calm.
Plans for Thursday include attacking the shower filth, setting up my new phone if it arrives, and going out to dinner with Jameson.
For the weekend, I need to repack my suitcases and complete the remaining Megan's Foodie Finds sheets.
I'd also like to cook one meal for us before I leave again.
Tags:
no subject
Date: 2023-05-25 12:37 pm (UTC)Sorry that they didn't take your discomfort seriously at the doctor, you would have thought they would be better equipped to deal with it in their line of work
no subject
Date: 2023-05-25 01:09 pm (UTC)The doctor himself was listening attentively, and took me seriously about a separate issue that usually gets brushed off (my mom had pancreatic cancer and I am now approaching the age when she died, so I'd like more screenings in that direction, and doctors usually pooh-pooh me about it). So I do want to continue seeing this doctor. He actually had calmed me down so much that I thought this blood draw would go very well.
But then these nurses...they were just being themselves and going about it like it was a normal blood draw, and I get that. But all I wanted was for it to go QUICKLY. The quicker it goes, the less likely I am to have an episode. It was my own fault for being dehydrated...but it was unnecessary for them to leave the needle dangling out of my arm while chatting casually, when it was clear the procedure was not happening!! That is what absolutely freaked me out!
(although it was probably a good experience to have, maybe I'll be better prepared for that in the future now)
no subject
Date: 2023-05-25 06:23 pm (UTC)Hopefully remembering extra hydration before it happens again will help. My husband has had the hydration problem before and had to return another day
no subject
Date: 2023-05-26 12:34 am (UTC)Yes the hydration problem has never happened to me before and hopefully won't again. If I had scheduled it later in the week, not so close to my flight home, it would not have been an issue. Lesson learned.