I have come to a conclusion - I could not - and probably would not - work from home if given the choice. I’m too social for remote work. Have a pile of work to do all day and no one to deal with accept via email, conference call, and live meeting drives me crazy. For the last few weeks I have been working from my dining room table. I have been putting in 10-14 hour days and only leave the house to go grocery shopping or to the gym for an hour and ½. I like my house, I like spending time there, I don’t like spending all my time there. And when I have work to do it is hard to get out for a little bit. I don’t know if this is the case with most people, or maybe if I had a home office that would help. But I think being home all the time is only ½ the problem.
While it is nice to see my wife all day long, I miss seeing the people I work with. I miss the banter that comes from sharing and office. I miss lunch breaks, coffee breaks, and so on. If fact I feel like I take less breaks and work more remotely. The truly sad thing is you would think these longer hours and lack of breaks would translate into productivity. But they don’t.
My normal MOD is when I need something from someone I simply find them and hassle them until they give it to me. I don’t like sending a lot of emails and escalating issues through the chain of command. I will if I have to but I find it much more satisfying to walk over to the persons desk, sit down, chit chat for 2 min, then politely let them know I am going to hang out until they do what I am asking them to do, or at least until they schedule some dedicated time to get it done. I can’t do this remotely. People screen their calls, avoid answering emails, turn IM off, and so on. And I don’t think every little hold I run into should be a subject for all managers on a project to discuss. I know people are busy if I can talk to them face to face many times I can get an answer in less time than it takes to compose and email.
That said I also find I am missing the travel. I don’t mind being on the road. I don’t know why. I am always pleased to get home on Thursday nights when traveling, but I kinda like being able to concentrate on work during the week. I do call the wife every day and we do email, but for some reason it seems easier to concentrate away from home. Plus I like exploring new places so to go somewhere new every few months or at least every year is a nice perk. Even if it is the middle of nowhere Ohio! At any rate I am going to avoid remote work from this point on, at least for any duration that is more than a week or two.
Of course the one up side is all the time I get to spend with my wife and getting to sleep next to her on a regular basis. But I could probably get that working locally at a normal job, I just don't like working from home.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
Cash Flow
Well now that the wife is home and the European adventure is over it is time to settle in for the time and start to try and improve our financial situation. I didn’t realize just how different a single income household would be until it finally happened. When I was in the UK my food, gas, most of my entertainment, and other major expenses were covered. In fact my per diem left me with a small balance of spending cash too. But working remotely from home and having the wife back in the US has changed that. We recently sat down, as I think many people in the states are doing, and took a serious look at our debts, assets, and budget. After going over all of this I had to laugh and tell RG that we have some slight “cash flow issues”. Like many business we have a strong balance sheet but week inflow/outflow cash situation.
After a couple days of trying to figure out how to participate in TARP I decided we just had to live a little less extravagantly (though the wife will ask when we were extravagantly at all). The new budget uses an old system. Basically we determined how much we need to spend on food and gas, plus a little extra for fun. That money is it and that is all we can spend in those areas. Once it is gone, well we eat left over or don’t drive for a couple days. The bills are all paid on line, and now we almost never use the card. We still get to contribute to the 401k and savings but now we go out a lot less; probably 80% less. But that is ok. We get to entertain a lot more and RG is proving to be a great cook.
It also allows RG to look for a job she can be passionate about rather than one that just provides us with the means to buy stuff. It is very important to me that she finds something she likes rather than just something that pays. While I hope she finds something soon it is not for financial reasons. What really makes me wonder though is this, if I make a good salary, more than some families, how can they get by even with both people working? We aren’t living pay check to pay check but we don’t have much wiggle room, how do people that make less do it? Anyway I guess our budget was a long time coming, hopefully we will get a little more wiggle room in the future, but it isn’t that bad either.
After a couple days of trying to figure out how to participate in TARP I decided we just had to live a little less extravagantly (though the wife will ask when we were extravagantly at all). The new budget uses an old system. Basically we determined how much we need to spend on food and gas, plus a little extra for fun. That money is it and that is all we can spend in those areas. Once it is gone, well we eat left over or don’t drive for a couple days. The bills are all paid on line, and now we almost never use the card. We still get to contribute to the 401k and savings but now we go out a lot less; probably 80% less. But that is ok. We get to entertain a lot more and RG is proving to be a great cook.
It also allows RG to look for a job she can be passionate about rather than one that just provides us with the means to buy stuff. It is very important to me that she finds something she likes rather than just something that pays. While I hope she finds something soon it is not for financial reasons. What really makes me wonder though is this, if I make a good salary, more than some families, how can they get by even with both people working? We aren’t living pay check to pay check but we don’t have much wiggle room, how do people that make less do it? Anyway I guess our budget was a long time coming, hopefully we will get a little more wiggle room in the future, but it isn’t that bad either.
Friday, February 13, 2009
FORMS
I hate dealing with the Government, the wife hates dealing with the Government, I think most people hate dealing with the Government. We however get the triple wammy as we get to deal with so many different organizations due to the whole immigration dance we are forced to endure. The biggest pain is simply the number of forms we are required to fill out to do normal things. For example if we want her sister or parents to visit they require visas, this means paperwork. If we decide to travel outside the US RG needs a visa, again this requires paperwork. Or worse if I wanted to visit her for the weekend in Moscow I had to have a visa, and to come and go as I please I needed to obtain a multi entry business visa that of course requires a lot more documentation. And the big daddy of all the processes of course is the immigration paperwork. As you get to deal with 3 government agencies there is a lot of paperwork.
In fact to date I have a running list of all the forms, letters, and documents we have had to submit since before we were married. The current grand total is 49 give or take. This of course is not including all of the documentation that many of the visas require; such as proof of hotel accommodations, travel arrangement, financial security, insurance, etc. In fact the number of pages would be thick enough to be a Harry Potter novel! We have gotten so proficient at Visa applications that we can prepare a 20 page package in a matter of hours. It is pretty sad too that we are able to give other people advice that is more accurate than some of that given by the embassies. Now that isn’t to say we get everything we apply for. Many times we only get single entry visas when we would have preferred multi entries causing us to skip a couple weekend trips, and RGs name on her passport and green card are spelled differently than the marriage certificate due to a strange process called transliteration causing some confusion from time to time. But all in all we have managed. Even if most of my raise from last year went to fees associated with these forms, processes, and documents!
I have actually joked that if I get sick of consulting (which is more likely lately) that I might have a decent career as an immigration lawyer. Heck we have been through a good percentage of the processes and without any legal assistance. But then I have to wonder if I want to spend that much of my life chasing government forms and creating documentation. Maybe I will wait and see if we can get through the Citizenship process. Then at least ½ the requirements will cease as RG will get a US passport. One thing I can defiantly say to anyone is this, if you have a US passport, be very thankful, it opens more doors around the world than you can even guess!
In fact to date I have a running list of all the forms, letters, and documents we have had to submit since before we were married. The current grand total is 49 give or take. This of course is not including all of the documentation that many of the visas require; such as proof of hotel accommodations, travel arrangement, financial security, insurance, etc. In fact the number of pages would be thick enough to be a Harry Potter novel! We have gotten so proficient at Visa applications that we can prepare a 20 page package in a matter of hours. It is pretty sad too that we are able to give other people advice that is more accurate than some of that given by the embassies. Now that isn’t to say we get everything we apply for. Many times we only get single entry visas when we would have preferred multi entries causing us to skip a couple weekend trips, and RGs name on her passport and green card are spelled differently than the marriage certificate due to a strange process called transliteration causing some confusion from time to time. But all in all we have managed. Even if most of my raise from last year went to fees associated with these forms, processes, and documents!
I have actually joked that if I get sick of consulting (which is more likely lately) that I might have a decent career as an immigration lawyer. Heck we have been through a good percentage of the processes and without any legal assistance. But then I have to wonder if I want to spend that much of my life chasing government forms and creating documentation. Maybe I will wait and see if we can get through the Citizenship process. Then at least ½ the requirements will cease as RG will get a US passport. One thing I can defiantly say to anyone is this, if you have a US passport, be very thankful, it opens more doors around the world than you can even guess!
Friday, February 6, 2009
Don’t mess with that!
One of the first things I did when I got back to the states was to take the truck to a Valvoline Instant Oil Change and get my oil changed. You know the little building you pull into, driving over an oil pit, and they have guys work on your car from above and below to get you in and out in 15-20 min. The funny thing is they are always trying to find new ways of attaching additional sales onto the deal. They have always done air cleaners, windshield wipers, tranny flushes, coolant servicing, “better” synthetic oil, and the like, but they have never performed any sort of automotive shop test on my car. These all seem to make sense – why not have them do other fluid related activities. So I wasn’t really surprised when they pulled out a cheap looking battery tester and started messing around with that.
Of course testing a battery is not rocket science. Anyone who can read instructions can do it. Turn car off, check, clip red cable to positive terminal, check, clip black cable to negative terminal, check, press test button. However there is a little thing that is not in the instructions. Running a test through the battery cables and not clipped onto the terminals will always make the battery look weaker than it is. But apparently no one told these guys. Because that is exactly what they did, connecting the tester to the brackets of the battery cable and not the battery. So of course the battery read weak. So this prompted them to come up and warm me about being stranded in the middle of nowhere when my battery died when it was cold.
I don’t know why but this always pisses me off. I know it is their job, I know that they are doing what they should be doing, but dang it, I do know a couple of things and I don’t want to be treated like a moron just because most people are ignorant about their cars. I only use the rapid oil places in the winter because it is too cold to do it in the driveway. Otherwise I take care of this stuff myself for the most part. So NO I DON’T WANT A NEW BATTERY and stop messing with that. Ok well just felt like ranting a bit. FYI I would suggest not letting the oil monkeys mess with your battery. Oh and I always buy a battery that could start the truck ½ dead so even if it were as bad as they said I would not be worried as the battery would only be down to the recommended strength once it had only ½ its capacity. I do live in a state where temps get well below zero….
Of course testing a battery is not rocket science. Anyone who can read instructions can do it. Turn car off, check, clip red cable to positive terminal, check, clip black cable to negative terminal, check, press test button. However there is a little thing that is not in the instructions. Running a test through the battery cables and not clipped onto the terminals will always make the battery look weaker than it is. But apparently no one told these guys. Because that is exactly what they did, connecting the tester to the brackets of the battery cable and not the battery. So of course the battery read weak. So this prompted them to come up and warm me about being stranded in the middle of nowhere when my battery died when it was cold.
I don’t know why but this always pisses me off. I know it is their job, I know that they are doing what they should be doing, but dang it, I do know a couple of things and I don’t want to be treated like a moron just because most people are ignorant about their cars. I only use the rapid oil places in the winter because it is too cold to do it in the driveway. Otherwise I take care of this stuff myself for the most part. So NO I DON’T WANT A NEW BATTERY and stop messing with that. Ok well just felt like ranting a bit. FYI I would suggest not letting the oil monkeys mess with your battery. Oh and I always buy a battery that could start the truck ½ dead so even if it were as bad as they said I would not be worried as the battery would only be down to the recommended strength once it had only ½ its capacity. I do live in a state where temps get well below zero….
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)