So it's 2012...
To be honest, the end of the year always gets so crazy and then I feel a little sad when the holidays are over and I feel like I didn't get done what I wanted to do and so on, which almost is like a funk. This year was definitely no different.
In October I was responsible for a very large submittal for the company I work at, followed by an interview for that same large submittal in December. This submittal ended up demanding of me many, many, many hours of uncompensated overtime (think something like 85 hours worth over the 3 months), considerable sweat, and admittedly some tears... yes, there was even an "ugly cry" in the car the day the interview was over and by almost all accounts our team had done extremely well.
Well, I guess not well enough because last week the notification came that our company was not selected for a contract. It was quite disappointing for everyone involved, and not to sound melodramatic, but I sacrificed quite a lot to get both the proposal and the interview and everything that goes along with them done, and it was especially heartbreaking for me for all of that to result in a loss.
So, let's see... to go back to October and recap, we have:
1. Document submittal for aforementioned large job. I worked something like 66.5 hours in a 5-day period. Not pretty.
2. Holiday Photo Sessions. I managed to do most of them early, which resulted in a little less stress this year as compared to other years, but it is still rewarding, yet time-consuming work.
3. Two weeks after the big work submittal, Steve and I went on a little trip to celebrate our sixth anniversary. We stayed close to home and spent a couple of days in the Santa Ynez/Santa Barbara areas. It was a lovely trip overall, highlighted by tooling around in a fancy convertible (we splurged, and it was worth it), a great visit to the Getty on the way up; a wonderful visit to several tasting rooms in and around Santa Ynez/Los Olivos; stops and missions and museums along the way; affordable, and honestly, quite lovely hotel rooms during the trip; the best pizza I've ever had at Olio Pizzeria. I'd show you photos, but they're not edited yet. Ooops.
4. Came back to an UGLY job I got assigned at work. Bad things were said to me. Not fun and not nice. That, unfortunately, lasted right up to...
5. Thanksgiving with family in Lake Arrowhead. Because there was some "discrepancy" (I use this term loosely and cannot talk about this even now without getting angry) about whether or not I was to be given time off for the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, I ended up having to work the full day, thus Steve and I did not get to the wonderful cabin my mom found until Thanksgiving morning. Thankfully the traffic was light, we arrived early in the morning and were able to enjoy the day with everyone. The meal was lovely. The next day I cooked dinner and made, among other things, this recipe which was quite delightful.
6. Vertigo. Unfortunately I woke up Saturday morning with vertigo -- the first time I'd ever had it for any length of time, but knew what it was because mom, grandma, a cousin and an aunt have all had it before. It was BAD... throwing up, etc. Fortunately quick action by mom and Steve got me to a point where I could leave the bedroom by mid-day. We left Saturday night, with me drugged up on Dramimine, to get me down the mountain before I got any worse.
I spent that Sunday in urgent care and the next week at home, trying to recover. The PA in the urgent care prescribed me some different drugs than what I was familiar with to treat vertigo and they didn't seem to help much. The thought is that I had an infection that impacted the crystals in my inner ear. Despite a visit to a specialist and lots of Brandt Daroff exercises I still have fairly significant symptoms in certain positions. I have made an appointment to see someone who can do some work with me to treat my BPPV and teach me what maneuvers to do next time. To be honest, having these bouts regularly is quite exhausting and I'm hoping to have some relief soon.
7. Back to work. By now we're almost certain we'll have an interview for the big job so I start work on the interview materials. We get our date... December 14. I am also attempting to do a December Daily album but realize almost every day would have a photo of/from work, which seems no different than most days, so I scrap the album idea.
8. Christmas decorating. Steve and I go and pick up a tree... a beautiful Nordmann pine. I try to put lights on it, but everything seems to make me dizzy. I get lights on the thing and then spend several days trying to get ornaments on the thing, only to have most of them slide off the branches. Next year, we are picking a tree that seems easy to decorate, not one that is just pretty. Man, that was frustrating! So, I finally got the thing decorated and was laying face down (so I didn't get dizzy), trying to slide the tree back toward the wall and dumped the fully decorated tree and its stand full of water all over me. Weeeee! Steve had to come lift the tree off of me. Needless to say, our tree was not at its best this year. I put up a few more decorations, but it was a lean year for Christmas decor in our house. Oh well.
9. Big work interview. Honestly, there were moments that were very enjoyable, only reinforcing the fact that teaching/coaching people is what I should be doing, however there were moments that were excruciatingly painful as well. Truly a mixed bag, in terms of the experience, but as I said above, our team seemed to nail the interview, so there was hope. And the feedback I got from some people I truly respect made me feel very valued, which was nice.
10. Christmas shopping/prep. This year there were no cards, no cookies, no crafts and not a ton of Christmas spirit coming out of our household. It wasn't for a lack of desire, but rather a lack of time. I think we did most of our shopping online and the rest we did in one marathon day of shopping mid-month and then another marathon day on my part just a few days before Christmas.
11. Christmas was nice, but came and left too quickly. I wish there had been more time between the interview at work and the holiday for me to enjoy it a bit more, but honestly it felt like Christmas was here and over before I even realized it had come. I did get some nice gifts including a new iPod Classic from my husband, some great jewelry and Project Life materials from my mom and a week of timeshare from my Dad for us to use later this year. I am definitely blessed, but this year felt so rushed.
12. New Year's Eve at the casino. Steve and I dressed up and went out to a local casino for New Year's Eve. We had a good time, but it got so crowded that we left before midnight and made it home just in time to kiss at New Year's and watch "Elf."
13. 2012's Word. My One Little Word for 2012 is LIVE. Live unapologetically and fully. Stop waiting and live. So far, I'm doing my best. I'm working on some projects for my word. I'm gearing up for a great year.
14. Last Week. Unfortunately last week wasn't the best start to the year. The car broke again (but was fixed by my super husband for pennies compared to taking it to the shop), Steve was sick (and still isn't 100%) and we found out we didn't win that job. Just a bummer.
So, all that said, I'm anticipating things to be better this week. Our weekend was nice and I got some things accomplished, plus we had a nice dinner out last night with my mom and grandma, so that's good!
Alright, in my mind, the blog is up-to-date. It's full steam ahead from here! Oh, and that collage above is some phone photos from the past couple of months. It'll have to do for now.
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