As fast as I can...

FIRST, I'd like to thank Jaxson and COMPLIMENT HER for single handedly keeping this blog and the morale UP, UP, UP... THANK YOU

Without your (slightly threatening) encouragement, and depressing expressions of your waivering mental health status, I would not have (literally) DROPPED EVERYTHING i WAS WORKING ON to post some graphs...

CHART ONE: EXPLANATION
OF MY TIME SPENT AT WORK TODAY



As you can see, I didn't have time CREATE the CHART the proper way, with data, and spreadsheets, and whatnot...
but I wanted to respond quickly, so I just drew them on the back of a napkin and uploaded them as fast as I could!!!

The next bar graph is meant to show the things in my life that get a "quick response" when they/he/she call out in need:



I hope this proves my level of devotion and commitment to my IMPORTANT commitments!

The Importance of Planned vs Actual

As a financial professional (insert your laugh here) - I am constantly reminded of the importance of planned versus actuals. In work mode that tends to be financially driven numbers. If the actual spend is less than we planned, I'm doing my job right. Since they've kept me around this long and I tend to save my company money - I must be good at comparing planned vs. actuals. Now some may think that this knowledge and experience would shadow over into my personal life. And to those folks I'd say - boy are you wrong.

I tried to reason this into my life with my planning to break up with someone I had been seeing. As I spoke to some of you at cooler caddy - you were aware - others were apparently "Shocked" (see Jackie's post below) - which let me tell you - you are NOT the only one.....

However don't feel bad for Boy X just yet. I gave him plenty of warning signs, he just chose to over look them.

Now as far as how the actual event went let me start by providing the best advice I think I've ever received to date, courtesy of Teri:

• "You need to arrive early....order a dirty martini....slam it down....order another dirty martini....now this next step Sarah is so important - PAY YOUR TAB. You do NOT want to break up with him and THEN have to wait for the Tab to arrive. Trust me!!"
  

When I went home that night I thought about what I was going to say....which obviously lead me to think about how he would react...

Compared to how it ACTUALLY went down.....

For those that are chart illiterate (Tara) - I was left at the bar. To which my immediate response was relief and of course uncontrollable laughter. When I got back into my car George Michael's "Freedom" was playing on my radio (no joke) - and I felt as though that was all the closure I needed...

My Guardian Angel

So today when I arrived home from work I went through my usual routine of throwing my stuff down, greeting my pups and checking the mail. I assumed that today was going to be just like every other day, bills and useless credit card offers, but to my great surprise I had something special in the mail today, an actual letter! (Apparently some people still do that?) This letter was not a typical letter either. There was no return address! In a flurry of excitement and anticipation to find out who the mysterious sender of this letter was, I vigorously tore the envelope open and when I saw what was inside I knew I had a guardian angel watching over me. Right there was a shopping list made just for me listing off the fish that contain the LEAST mercury!! It even had a list of fish that contain moderate mercury and a note saying that I should only have 6 servings of those fish a month! Like I said, I clearly have a guardian angel watching over me because now I know what fish I can eat endless amounts of at Sushi Palace without getting mercury poisoning!

Using my impeccable deductive reasoning skills I noted that at the bottom of the shopping list it says that the source of information is the NRDC, so perhaps I have someone there watching out for me. I don't know if I will ever find out the sender of this saving grace, but I can only hope that when our blog goes public and we all make millions, that person might read it and know just how grateful I am. For now I feel that the best way for me to show my gratitude is by paying it forward and passing this shopping list onto all of you, so below I have inserted an image of the list. Normally I would have just rewritten the list, but I feel that seeing the actual list will have a greater impact on everyone.



Also, I updated my chart from earlier since some new stresses have come into my life and thought it was necessary to share it (not as necessary as posting the epic shopping list, but definitely more necessary than it is for our economy to turn around before I graduate)

Teri Time

Ladies, Ladies, Ladies –

I have been trying to enjoy the blog from a-far, but alas I have some important information to contribute. For starters I hope everyone is enjoying the season. I hope the beer caliber in the cooler has improved as the age of the team has decreased and I hope we continue to be supporting each other during through hits, and runs, and hits and runs and hits and runs and hits, and runs.

There has been a lot of progress this season:
- We got the CRAZY team to overlook a potential “WIN” (nice Jacks)
- Sarah was able to get an award by locating a friend’s missing cat
- We learned, I can get Jess’ bod by just taking steroids – wait till you see me at the next game. I will have lost 50 lbs
- In my spare time I started a relationship with a state trooper a few houses down. His wife was a total loser and my girls could not resist his kids or dog
- Ms. Lovelace and her clan has been injury free for at least 2 weeks which is progress compared to this winter
- Court is making her mother proud by playing her first softball game this season (thank goodness b/c she will need some brownie points as her future sister-in-law starts sucking up and winning over Nancy and Mark’s attention and affection)

The graphic below depicts the variance between my current participation on softball compared to my desire to participate in the 2011 Season:




Anyway assuming we have games next week. I hope to be there on…hold your breath…Wednesday.
Monday I am at The Hartford (I was hoping to see Sarah but alas she is too busy!) but Wednesday I hope to be with you lovely ladies.

In case you haven’t been keeping up with my hear fatal experiences via “The Facebook”, below is a summary of how I have spend the last few days:




XOXOXO Girls!

Tara's Job Security

Today Tara expressed concern over losing her job as a DCF-like employee. Governor Malloy is laying off upwards of 6500 state workers. But Tara is employed by Yale. Which begs the question...

Why is Sarah Sweating?

I agree with great britain. I canno work on charts via my gmail/blackberry... even though I was late this morning and am 90% sure I'll be late to my 9am meeting, I've completed the attached chart to summarize my morning...

Casey Anthony Verdict Chart

Not replying from work had NOTHING to do with the fact that my job sucks some serious ass right now... it wasn't that I didn't have time to do anything except put out fires and have panic attacks... it was just that I didn't feel like replying.

I did have a very emotional reaction to Jax's charts in particular, b/c if I had had to spend any time negotiating with hells kitchen, and then someone took credit for that, I would have run straight to my new coping strategy: chart-making.

btw, Tara- I think "f-bag" might be this year's MVP nickname for the playas on our team!

Attached please find a chart that illustrates my favorite conversation of the evening. I'm pretty sure this conversation took place during one of the innings that almost lost us the game, but it was worth it.