Tuesday, May 10, 2016

Rainy Days and Tuesdays

"The Cobalt Superbaby Overlord"--Tuesday, 5/10/16

This morning required a last-minute substitution as the forecast for the day has over the last two days gone from high of 67 F to 62 F to 57 F...and raining.  Since I just. can't. the tights anymore, time to pull out a pants outfit.

So let's check out a little piece of Teacher Style: Grey Pants Inspiration.

From littlebitofwowe.blogspot.com

I could not resist wearing my creating-a-Superbaby-through-visual-stimulation/page-from-a-coloring-book dramatic black-and-white leaf print top as part of my recreation.


Grey 5 pocket pants (Rafaella), $3.64/wear
Black and white leaf print top (thrifted, Kohls), $1.87/wear
Cobalt cardigan (Lands End), $4.13/wear
Blue sparkly necklace (Kohls), $1.32/wear
Grey ribbon flats by Louise et Cie, $4.55/wear

Outfit total: $15.51/wear

Lest you think that this is a Superbaby-compatible outfit, though, I added a necklace of the right size and length for an infant to grab and potentially choke me to death with his mighty arm strength.  Better for the babies to view from a safe distance, I think.


In other news...It's only Tuesday and I'm kind of ready for this week to be over.  I've been going around and around with our technology people on this data request (i.e., my requesting data from them) since last Friday and I'm sick of it.  There is a manager over there who clearly views her job as ensuring that no one in her group ever does any work for anyone outside of it.  I was telling Robert about my dilemma and said, "There are gatekeepers and then there's..."  As I paused to come up with something, he intoned, "None shall pass."  Which nails it.  So now I (and my office mate, with whom I shared this story) have this image of my colleague as the Black Knight in my head.

From factoryent.com

I'm 99% sure I will have to talk to her again tomorrow.  I hope it doesn't come to this.

6 comments:

Jen M. said...

Tis a scratch! Haha.

Sally said...

I move for no man!

Debbie said...

Ugh. One of my philosophies of work are that there are two kinds of jobs. There are the kinds where people ask me to do stuff. And then I do it. And there are the kinds where I ask other people to stuff. And some of them do it. And then I have to ask the others again. And again. And maybe put things on my calendar to remind me to re-ask them at reasonable intervals. Ugh.

Admittedly, one of my things I'm ridiculous about is not liking to ask people for favors. Also, once I ask someone, it disappears out of my brain because the ball is in their court, so if they ignore me, things fall through the cracks. (Thus the calendar strategy.) But surely even normal people do not like having to ask repeatedly.

At my last big job, I rarely had to ask for anything for myself, but I often found myself asking for other people. (This I find to be much more satisfying. Maybe because it feels less like whining and more like heroism.) My boss taught me to use the phrase, whenever relevant, "It's a data-integrity issue." Later, I learned another helpful phrase: "This could affect graduation rates."

So is there any obvious way to make it clear that fulfilling your request not only helps you, but also helps them in some way?

Sally said...

Great question, Debbie. Unfortunately I have not yet found anything that this woman cares about. We have KNOWN "data-integrity issues" that multiple groups in our organization, including hers, are like Whatev. "This could affect graduation rates" is a winner with people who care about graduation rates (and those people do exist for us) but our tech people don't. But "win-win" is a cliche for a reason, so I will ponder if there is a way to move in that direction.

Debbie said...

Good luck.

Maybe more work now = less work later (for some things)?

Sally said...

When I got to work this morning, the technology guy had sent me my file--huzzah! I did not have to battle the Black Knight...this time.