Mirena A pretty name, Mirena, isn't it? Nice name for a baby, maybe?

Well, as of Tuesday, Mirena will be the new tenant in my uterus and, sadly, it isn't a baby. Mirena is the brand-name for the new generation of IUDs.

After nearly two years of trying to conceive - including trying trying, pretending to not try trying, mild fertility drugs, herbal remedies, ovulation predictor tests, and even a psychic clearing the appropriate chakra - we are not pregnant. Now that I am looking for work, it is important I not get pregnant for awhile. Next Tuesday, I will officially throw in the towel and get an IUD.

Why bother you may be thinking? Certainly, at this point it seems more likely that a cow might jump over the moon. True enough - but it is a widely-accepted fact that some pregnancies are caused by a wild change in circumstances.

Only time will tell if Mirena will move out so someone else can move in but, for now, I am ready for a break from the pressure of trying and the heartache of being unsuccessful.  ¶ 22:25 0 comments

  Comforts of Home For the record, my husband is fantastic. Today I called him with news of a job opportunity that might be too good to let go but would totally turn our world upside down...but it was OK with him.

And then, I flip-flopped and offered the opposing perspective, playing devil's advocate with myself...and it was still OK with him.

Whatever scenario I was able to conjure was OK with him. As long as we are together, we will be happy.

Lately I am reminded that above all else, he is my best friend. I know I don't have to face this challenge alone. His support of me through all of this is so tangible, I can feel it while we are apart.

I am so lucky to have him.  ¶ 21:10 0 comments

  Suit Shopping Now that the resume is done and I have gathered some leads, it's time to kick off the job search in earnest. Well, it is my hope that this will result in some interviews so, today, I took an extended lunch to find a suit.

I wear plus sizes. I have since high school - so I am not recently fat. I am very comfortable with myself and those who know me don't even notice. I know this isn't healthy so I have been working at it but it's not going to go away overnight so there is no point in letting it ruin my self image...but that's a topic for another post.

Back to suit shopping. Apparently the chubby do not work. We go on cruises, we are the mother of the bride, and we like things to be stretchy - but never do we need anything appropriate to wear to a business interview.

I didn't actually count but, I think at one store, there was actually more in the plus section to wear in the house rather than out of it. I guess that's where we belong, out of the public eye.

How disappointing. I did try something very traditional - a dark coat and skirt with pin stripes. I think it was the right size but it still looked like I was a kid dressed up in my mother's clothes. It's as though the designers oversize everything because they don't know what part of you is plus sized. I could have probably flown away had the wind caught all the extra fabric.

I found something. It's black and white which is trendy right now and not as sophisticated as I would like. Apparently, unless I retain a tailor or have a gastric bypass, I won't ever find exactly what I want.

I hope I have better luck next week with my haircut.

Exclusive shopping footage  ¶ 22:15 0 comments

  Daycare Dingbat My son's daycare is subsidized by my employer so, when I lose my spot, so does he. Yesterday I received word that he will be transitioned to a new room shortly before our anticipated departure.

Since I had alerted the administration to our situation, I was unable to understand why this made sense. This morning, when I approached the manager who issued the letter to ask that he not be moved, she said no.

I was dumbstuck. I explained the stress of the transition and how unnecessary it was. I explained that my dear son would already be undergoing enough transition in our home lives. I explained that I personally could not handle one more piece of stress in my life. I started to cry.

She said, "There really isn't anything I can do. The letters have already gone out."

Again, I was dumbstuck. I wanted to offer her a quarter so that she could make another copy or two of the letter.

I explained my logic. Certainly, there was a child due to move up when my son moved out. Why couldn't that child take his place in the new room? Why couldn't the child taking my son's place in his old room instead take the place of the back-up child in his or her old room? It's hard to explain in writing but in no way difficult to comprehend but I may as well have been speaking to her in Chinese.

I told her this was not OK and that he was not to participate in any transition activities until she and I worked this out. When I got to my office, I made an appointment with the director of the center.

Hooray! My logic was validated. He will be permitted to stay in his current spot!

I will probably see the dingbat tomorrow. I don't know if she will know at that point that this has been settled. What I do know is that I feel much better about leaving the center (I had been most distraught over it) - and for that, I should thank her.  ¶ 21:07 0 comments

  Empty Inbox Anytime I am out of the office, I can expect to spend a big portion of my first day back catching up with my email. If I am out for a week, I have hundreds. If I am out for a day, I have nearly a hundred.

Monday, after returning from a 3-day weekend, I had 18. Usually, I have 18 coming back from lunch. In this case, everything I missed on Friday was there in a total of 18 emails.

It's like I am already gone.

Today, I sent out dozens of networking emails. I contacted nearly everyone I have ever worked with. Some people haven't responded. Some wrote things you'd see in the autographs of a high school yearbook (I really enjoyed working you! You'll be missed! Keep in touch!) Some people really surprised me with the emotion evident in their reactions. They didn't know, they were so sorry, they wanted to help in any way they could.

This is a very surreal time.  ¶ 21:26 0 comments

  Go Bolts! We had so much fun at the game last night, I truly forgot about losing my job and the accompanying mountain of stress. It's such a relief to know such joy continues to be possible. Of course, it is probably no coincidence that I found such great joy in my team beating the Carolina Hurricanes (home state of the company so carelessly deemphizing my position in favor of the much cheaper and cheaper global talent pool - did I mention they were cheaper?).

The game itself was fantastic. After leading 2-0 going into the 3rd period, Carolina tied the game. We won with 10 seconds left in overtime on a breakaway by Lightning star, Martin St. Louis. The excitement was amazing!

During the game, my son was on the jumbotrons twice and met Thunderbug, the team mascot (this was easily the highlight of the game for him). He was actually very engaged throughout, chanting "Let's go Lightning!" He has been to several games, but this was the first time he wasn't solely focused on leaving his seat.


My dear husband was more excited than he usually permits himself to be. He literally jumped up and down after the winning goal! He freely shouted his immediate feedback to the refs when bad calls were made and he cheered our team's great saves, hard hits, and shots on goal as though he were the coach.

I so enjoyed being with both of them, watching both of them. No matter what happens with my job or our finances, I know that no amount of money can buy the happiness my family brings to my life.

Take that, Carolina!!!  ¶ 20:52 0 comments

  Kid Couture Tomorrow we leave for a long weekend in Tampa. The main event being a Tampa Bay Lightning game. We paid for most of the trip months ago, so it is nice to take this weekend away from the job stress without worrying how it impacts our budget.

Anyway, I have spent far more time preparing and packing my dear son's wardrobe than my own. Mixing and matching all the cute little t-shirts with the shorts that best capture the spirit I am looking for. Please. They are t-shirts and shorts. You do not accessorize little boys. There isn't even the pressure of matching the socks.

Basically boys clothes fall into 3 major themes:

• Vehicles - anything that could also be a matchbox car is eligible for boys clothing, including firetrucks, cars, airplanes, boats, frontloaders


• The Outdoors - usually cuddly animals like lizards, insects, wolves, sharks, and snakes -OR- themes like camping and exploring.


• Sports - baseball seems to big favorite, but you can expect to see surfing, basketball, fishing, football, skateboarding, or even billards. Even the notion of sportiness is popular with shirts featuring the word "Varsity" or just a big number as if on a jersey.

This all drives me bananas. My son likes puppies. He likes butterflies and flowers...and he likes colors. Boys clothes are generally limited to 3 major colors - red, blue, and heather gray. I constantly survey the girl's section for anything I could easily unembellish enough to make gender neutral just so he could wear yellow, purple, or aqua. Inevitably, if I do find a fun color, it's a polo shirt. I'm not a huge fan of polo shirts, and neither is my dear son, but I have been able to find them for boys in hot pink and lavender!

Well, time to finish packing! How ever will I choose between the blue lizard t-shirt and the gray lizard t-shirt? For the record, my boy doesn't really care.  ¶ 21:35 0 comments

  Whipping Girl I had a particularly bad day at work today.

I learned that I wasn't given a merit increase this year (not that it really matters, I have about six weeks to go) and a teammate of mine (who is not being laid off) is smugly micromanaging the rest of the team's efforts. Combined with the morose mood of the entire division, it is nearly intolerable. If I wasn't being laid-off, I would probably quit.

I was shocked, at first, to be losing my job. Sometimes, I still feel betrayed. Given the way things are going, I am beginning to think I am one of the lucky ones.

Even I can't be perky every day.

I feel for my boss who has had to deliver all of this bad news. Today, I didn't hold back my reaction. I told her I was sick of taking the fall for management's lack of accountability. I said I was done being their door mat. I said a lot more. It's easy to be candid when you have nothing to lose.  ¶ 20:59 0 comments

  Ketchup? I have spent several hours over the past two days brainstorming with my husband the perfect new gmail address. Given our new financial uncertainty and the large expense of high-speed internet, it seems prudent to move to web mail. It is independent from out ISP, it's free, and we can check it from the library when we are living in a box.

Like most families, we have multiple addresses. I have the professional sounding one to put on my new and improved resume, my husband has one as well, and then there is the frivolous family email where relatives and friends can deposit superstitious angel blessing chain mail and other assorted greetings. Well, the first two professional-sounding addresses were easy. The third one gave us a little trouble.

My sister likes to send those jokes and surveys and chain letters to a distribution list not unlike the one overstock.com uses to remind me daily that shipping is only $2.95. I read the names on her list with great curiosity...there's damnation_angels_whore666, crazy_error_dot_com, welcometothespectacle, and darktigger. I don't know who they are and am not sure I want to but I admire their flair for choosing an email address.

We have used the same user name for years, eeduo. It stands for a nickname given to us before we were married, the "double e duo." Well, we have added a new member of the family so, as beloved as eeduo was, it seemed time for a change.

You would think we were drafting our epitaphs or playing championship scrabble. It needed to be eloquent and witty. If we could throw in a pun or a double entendre - all the better! It needed to personify us to the throngs of people who don't know us yet will see our name on countless morality-affirming stories about the wisdom of children and puppies zooming around the internet. We tried cute phrases our son says. We tried incorporating things we enjoy as a family, we actually settled on snugglenuggle but it made us sound like dorks. Seriously, this went on for 2 days.

When it was far more frustrating than fun, my husband suggests we select the word 'ketchup'. Despite the fact it was probably already taken, there we had spent the better part of two evenings debating the merits of each other's suggestions and he was ready to throw it all out for 'ketchup!' It seemed so unimaginative, what would people think?

In the end, we chose something like eeduo that acknowledges the 3 of us. It's sweet and all but 'ketchup' would have probably aroused more interesting backstories to those left wondering.  ¶ 23:57 0 comments

 
  ¶ 23:27 0 comments