January 13, 2008 at 7:13 pm (Movie Reviews, Rants and Whines)
I’m hooked on Prime Suspect. I netflicked disk 1 and was quite upset to find out I needed disc two to complete the story!!! It was so engaging. Helen Mirren is just terrific as DCI Tennison. She is an excellent investigator, but has been passes over because she is a women. When the investigation of a horrible murder appears to be bungled, she makes some breakthrough and gets her chance to show her stuff. In the background she is trying to balance her relationships to family and boyfriend. I finally got my hands on disk 2 and now I’m totally hooked. I just found out there are 7 seasons!
2009 Lost Memories takes place in an alternate universe where Japan rules Korea, and the US and Japan were allies in WW2 and the bomb was dropped on Berlin instead of Hiroshima. Our Korean hero is in the police force and his best friend is Japanese. Our hero is blighted not only by his Koreaness, but also by the fact that his father sided with a mysterious Korean underground organization and was shot by his own collegues. He is haunted by dreams of a woman who wears a necklace with a crescent moon. He is distained by his superiors. He is distained by his Korean brothers for eating like a Japanese. Poor guy. He even has a corny theme song the breaks out inappropriately. This movie has the big budget type effects with helicopters, machine guns and cool hand gliding attacks which seem a bit over the top for the story line. But there is time travel so that counts for something! The turning event in this alternate history is a foiled assassination attempt back at the turn of the century.
Jang Dong-gun, the star of this show was also in The Promise, Taegukgi. According to IMDB, he learned Japanese for this movie and Mandarin for the Promise and he is cute, too. That counts for something. I will rate this one 3/5 acorns because of that.
Work is a struggle. Now I have some guilt and regrets, but also I have that sense of excitement and resolve. 5 months, 16 days, 16 hours, 47 minutes and 14 seconds….
Leave a Comment
December 16, 2007 at 12:01 pm (Rants and Whines)
6 months 14 days, 26 minutes and 51 second til retirement. I’m crabby about nearly every email at work. I know I have to snap out of it! I love that line from Moonstruck
It’s my fault for doing some work while on vacation. I just don’t like going back to a full load of catching up. Really, I know better then to work while on vacation.
I was lucky enough to attend a Christmas breakfast after walking today. Beside great food and a great view of Kaneohe Bay, I was able to see more possibilities to this retirement thing. The actual retired One said after a couple months she forgot she ever worked for over a quarter of a century for the company. That sounds good to me. Another one has put in for retirement in April. These two ladies did middle management. I have a bit of angst off and on about of my future. It’s exciting but scary all at the same time.
When is Battlestar Galactica and 24 coming back? I think CSI with Gil Grissom should be on everytime I channel surf until they return. Kamikaze Girls was fun, but it’s tough to knit and read subs at the same time…waah!
It live action comedy based on a comic book. Our heroine goes to live with her dad after her mom walks out on them. She loves to dress up in frills and lace. When they move to a small country town, she meets a moped riding female gang member. It’s pretty much as dumb as it sounds, but I liked it anyway. I even stopped whining for 102 minutes. I also did not drop any stitches which is always a good thing. I will rate it 3/5 acorns, no clives.
Leave a Comment
November 30, 2007 at 7:31 pm (Rants and Whines)
1 Comment
November 7, 2007 at 10:33 am (Movie Reviews, Rants and Whines)
When I start watching a movie and realize I’ve seen it before I must have either been knitting or uninterested when I saw it the first time. I’ve looked for pictures of Christian Bale’s teeth on the web and haven’t found any large ones which can only mean one thing. He’s a vampire. I’m not sure why he can come out during the day, too, but science has come a long way. He was great in 3:10 to yuma but even as a caped savior, I can’t help but think of the American Psycho or the Machinist. He plays creepy well. There are some great classic scenes of the bat on the rooftops. I enjoyed this movie more the second time around. I will rate it 3 acorns (out of 5)
I decided to try a job change next year. If it doesn’t pan out, I’ll retire in June or September. I wish there was an opportunity to take and extended leave, like a sabbatical or an opportunity to drop to half time so I could be more prepared to retire, but alas, nothing has come up. I put some feelers out and if nothing come it I decided to do it and start the process of retiring in March. What to do after that? Well the current plan is to do nothing for a couple months or more, but I’ll just leave my options open.
Leave a Comment
September 30, 2007 at 10:51 am (Rants and Whines)
A meeting for all providers at work, required. only half of us were even working that day. 90 people lost their jobs. Apparently they can apply for one of the 100 positions open. I’m sure the unions will have something to say about it. There really was no lead up or prep. It feels like martial law, for the preservation of the company. No one is safe. Adapt of die.
Fortunately or unfortunately, I wasn’t one of them. Some good people are being cut and I’m sure I’m not the only one wondering where their workload is going. Service is sure to suffer. Will my job still be there when I return?
Leave a Comment
September 5, 2007 at 7:19 am (Rants and Whines)
The supervisor at work continues to preempt my teams meetings even though I asked her not too. FGS why can’t she use the time some other time? I’m tired of working on it. I think I’ll quit.
I don’t think the team is working. Many members have stopped coming as the “phones” are too busy during the meeting time.
The service issues such as scheduling and and the waitlist have not been resolved and I’m tired of just getting the same ole excuses. I will have to let it go and refer the complaints I get from the customers to the supervisor as I don’t have any more energy to go someone else’s work. My own work is suffering for it and I have no control over it.
Once again the whiny favorite gets what she wants and we get the shitty worker dumped on us. Never mind what we want.
Much as I try and I have trouble maintaining a positive attitude at work.
Is life better in the frying pan or out?
1 Comment
July 29, 2007 at 10:12 am (Rants and Whines)
If I have to try, it must mean I’m not positive. “Do or do not… there is no try.” (Yoda)
The bright spot is Harry Potter. No spoilers here. When can I start talking about it? I finished the last book today, instead of studying, instead of stewing, instead of bogging down. A most satisfying ending, imo.
I’m going to try and focus on the exam Friday, and not think to much about work.
The Kula Lodge, reminded me of the game Myst, with it’s little rooms on the side of the mountain, overlooking Maui’s southwest shore.
1 Comment
July 21, 2007 at 11:39 am (Rants and Whines, Uncategorized)
Just another picture that has nothing to do with the post. The good news is that believe I have caught the rat or rats running around in the walls of my house and attic. The bad news is, that one or more have died in the ceiling and I don’t know if they can be retrieved. I arrived home from a nice few days off on Maui, to a putrid stench. So far it is confined to one hallway. From what I’ve read, if they can’t be retrieved, it can take 1 to “several” weeks for the smell to go away. Waaah!
1 Comment
July 11, 2007 at 11:15 am (Rants and Whines, Uncategorized)
Okay, the picture has nothing to do with the post. I looked briefly for a picture of positivity and there were a bunch of cartoons with a sarcastic twist that were probably copywrited, and hey, is sarcasm positive? I think not!
So what am I positive about? Monday was a meeting at work I really obsessed about. The boss and mini boss called a meeting to discuss “issues that are causing a rift”. I set up a lunch with the bigger boss the next day in preparation for major whining. So Monday came. I was prepared for the usual…boss comes late, boss tells my team is going wrong, and mini boss says don’t do it, and envisioned fist fighting, stomping and general wailing. Instead, the boss was on time, and darn if my partner and didn’t leave the meeting both feeling like it went well. OMG, for the first time in the last year. The next day was another meeting with our team and the mini-boss, and OMG if we didn’t leave that meeting with a postitive feeling. So meeting with the bigger boss just seemed anticlimatic. I vowed not to whine, but alas old habits die hard, so I did share my concerns about un-supervisorly behavior in min-boss, and self centered behavior in bossman.
Time will tell. Trust has been broken, and it will be some time before I let my guard down.
Dang the Boards are coming up soon and I haven’t studied! Just hope there aren’t too many questions on shoulder dystocia
Leave a Comment
June 27, 2007 at 7:11 pm (Rants and Whines)
The administration at work is going through major changes as the old President is retiring. He is leaving the group on the brink of a death spiral financially. The new “team” started with a large dinner, where none of the hard questions were really answered…like “what about ME!” A lot of nice things were said about the big picture…hard times, work harder, work smarter, blah blah blah. As things have unfolded I am feeling more hopeless. In the restructuring, my current boss has been promoted. I found working under him very frustrating as he really has his own best interests in mind. Often when I raised issues, he did not validate my experience, but said things like “It never happened to me.” I know I have some issues with punctuality, but I expect the boss to actually schedule and start meetings on time, in respect for the worker bees, who have schedules and work to complete. I took the time to speak up about some of these issues and I know a lot of others did, too. It was quite interesting that the people who worked under him these last couple decades, were not big supporters. The vote was close. Rumour has it that he addressed some of his failings as said he will be a good boy when he is promoted to the ole boy network. I suspect a spy, as a person instrumental in getting him this promotion was at a meeting with me the other day and I had expressed them to him. People can change yes, but I really don’t think he will. It doesn’t give me much hope, and now I have less faith that the new administration will pull us out of the death spiral.
Our department has been having emails flying around. The chief of our department was asked to step down and other members in our department who have administration postitions as well. One particular person who was canned has done amazing work in the CME department and really made a difference. I am amazed that a chief can be canned without input from the department. The other larger department to which the new President belongs, now has members promoted to the most key positions. It smacks of ole crony-ism. Politics. The general feeling is that it is a slap in the face.
I have moments of paranoia thinking the group is trying to cull the old timers like me and hope we all will go quietly and sit on the ice. There is something holding me back from putting in for retirement. I know when I’m ready it will be easy. So it’s back to my corner, treading water, wondering who I will be after I let go this identity I’ve had for 26 years, taking pleasure in the small things, trying not to get too fat, and encouraging my last baby bird out of the nest. I’ll have to let go of a company that does not value my years of service or opinions. I still like the actual job I signed up for and hey, a paycheck is always a good thing.
1 Comment
