I would say TGIF but it's going to be a doozy! Setting up my book fair this morning-- hundreds of boxes and cases to move, so no formal exercise, but I'll get a workout in! Then, teacher previews this afternoon.
Tonight, dh and I are going to a book signing/talk by BJ Novak. He is an actor/comedian (Office and other stuff) and has written a children's book (The book with no pictures). I happen to have reviewed his book (positively) for School Library Journal so I intend on taking him a copy of the review. Hopefully he'll be impressed!
Many of you saw on FB what I came home to last night. Huge Oak Tree in my backyard just snapped and broke. Luckily no one was hurt. The neighbor behind us came over and dh talked to her (some fence damage) and I went next door and talked to that neighbor. We've lived next door to them 9.5 years and hardly spoken. We chatted and we have much in common. We'll see if we eventually become friends! If I believe that bad things come in threes I hope I'm done--- Jozi dying, my car getting hit (it's got more damage than originally quoted so I don't know when I'll get it back), and now the tree (who knows how much $$ it will cost-- tree guys can't come out to look for at least a week).
Hope the weekend is a good one!!
Book Club on Sunday but I need to scan the book again as it's been months since I read it. I may be scarce next week with book fair but I'll try to check in at least.
Michele~I am a true believer in the bad things happening in threes. I hope this is your third. But the silver lining of connecting with the neighbor makes it all okay, right?
I am getting more and more frustrated with my assistant. We closed escrow on our new company on October 1st and at this point we're operating two separate companies. We still have receivables from the old company. I decided that I will be in charge of the new company until we can completely close out the old company (hopefully by the end of the year). Because she is so easily confused, I don't want her to have access to the bookkeeping on the new company at all. I am very busy building all that needs to be built into the bookkeeping software for the new company (as I can just "hear" her muttering her displeasure of having to do it herself).
Today she confronted me asking "am I never going to get access" to the new company and I had to repeat my reasoning to her again (has to be the fourth time or more). I hope she finally "gets" it.
Anyway, I don't usually do the input for our payroll into our bookkeeping software so yesterday I did and asked her to review it for accuracy. I was off. I went over it and found my mistakes and corrected them and then reprinted the account register to show her that it matched. Well, it did match, if you take off the $2000.00 check I wrote to an employee for an advance. I explained she needed to subtract that $2000.00 and she could see that it matched. She looked at me like a deer in the headlights and proceeded to check it on her calculator. Really, how difficult is it to subtract $2000.00 from $17,008.08 to get $15,008.08? That is only ONE of the many little things that she seems completely dumbfounded about. Am I wrong to not want her to touch the software? Gah!!!
I explained she needed to subtract that $2000.00 and she could see that it matched. She looked at me like a deer in the headlights and proceeded to check it on her calculator. Really, how difficult is it to subtract $2000.00 from $17,008.08 to get $15,008.08?
Chris, I wholeheartedly agree that beer+chocolate > wine+chocolate. And I will normally choose wine over beer 96% of the time.
I am old-school and use my veggie peeler to make zucchini noodles (and carrot noodles - these are really good! And parsnip noodles too). I passionately love spaghetti squash for the same reason, it feels like eating pasta.
Chris, I wholeheartedly agree that beer+chocolate > wine+chocolate. And I will normally choose wine over beer 96% of the time.
I am old-school and use my veggie peeler to make zucchini noodles (and carrot noodles - these are really good! And parsnip noodles too). I passionately love spaghetti squash for the same reason, it feels like eating pasta.
I have never had beer with chocolate. Have had both with almost everything else . I am not drinking any alcohol for the rest of this year but will have to get a really nice craft beer and some good Belgian choc and try it at Christmas as my holiday treat.
Michele, I'm sure you are done with these bad luck things!
You just have to laugh about it and thank goodness no one was hurt.
Allison, wow, I'd be afraid to let her near anything dealing with money. I was going to say maybe she is very visual and if you were explaining it verbally she didn't get it. But it sounds like you were writing it down. As a teacher, I have seen some kids who are completely auditory and then others who don't hear anything I say! They have to see it, or really they have to do an example to get it. I feel like the younger generation has lost the ability to listen! No offense to anyone young here! It's just that they have grown up with so much media and sound bites, they can't listen and retain.
I don't like beer at all. But wines, yep. And chocolate with anything is good!
Sharon, my DH and I had a discussion about her at lunch yesterday. He's known and worked with her a lot longer than I have. He said that Cheri (our old business partner's wife whose position I now hold) could never explain anything to her--she had to write it down. I guess she just cannot remember oral discussions.
Later yesterday she asked a question that left me even more confused about her. Our bookkeeping has both paper journal sheets and the computer (kind of a fail-safe so if a mistake is made, hopefully it'll only be in one place and can be found easier using the other place). She had started the paper journal for our sales on Wednesday--I know this to be true because she asked me a question regarding the numbering of the page on the day she started it. Anyway, she needed to put in a deposit on the sales journal and I told her to do it. She looked completely dumbfounded and started jostling through all sorts of journal sheets she had on her desk (the page should have been in the journal book). It finally dawned on her the more I reminded her of our previous discussions. For whatever reason, instead of keeping it in the book (where current pages reside) she filed it in the file cabinet (where pages go that are either full or from previous time periods). I don't know why she filed it, but at least she found it.
So we're doing the EXACT same thing only with two sets of books (one the old company and one the new company) and she just can't grasp the fact that really, nothing has changed except our name (as well as the legal numbers and such). I would think this would be easy, but no.
I did finally get her to understand just WHY I don't want her in the software portion of the new company--I told her that EVERYTHING has to be built in. Every little thing. I explained that it took me 10 days to get all our vendors built in (not really, I did some as I went along and added the remainder yesterday morning and it only took an hour or so). Then I said I'm still working on getting our current customers built in. She realized all that extra work was not something she would have wanted to do so she "gets" why I am doing it. At one point she kind of accused me of not wanting her to do it (DH thinks she's afraid for her job--which i totally understand with all she's been going through). I think her understanding will be a little bit helpful anyway.
Oh, but the cat. You all know why we took the feral office cat home with us, don't you? It was because she (my assistant) didn't want to come in on Sunday's to clean any longer (I understand, it's a long drive). She wanted to stay late on Friday and do the cleaning (which we pay an exorbitant amount to her to do--$500 a month and she doesn't do much at all. My own housekeepers only get $300 and they do tons more). So we didn't want to have to come to the office to feed the cat twice on the weekends, so we brought him home. Two months go by and she decides she doesn't want to clean at all (which is fine with us) because the cat isn't there. She totally didn't remember why we took him home. She thought we took him home and THEN she decided not to come in on Sundays.
Anyway, DH wants to be compassionate with her. She's lost two very close friends this summer and we're pretty sure the stress is what is making her physically sick (we're assuming an esophageal ulcer--she already has stomach ulcers). She refuses to take medicine so I don't know what she's going to do. She had a test two weeks ago and still hasn't gotten the results (she'll probably get them Monday) but in the mean time she says she cannot eat anything. She was drinking Ensure but said that makes her feel sick so she switched to Boost (after having and Ensure at work on Thursday and had to go home because she felt sick--I told her that if it makes her sick she shouldn't drink it).
Thanks for letting me rant. I need to tell someone. Keeping it bottled up just makes me upset.
alinnell, how frustrating! It sounds like she is just under an incredible amount of stress, what with the deaths and her health issues. I think you're right that she is terrified for her job, too.
If you do want to take a compassionate route, do things in such a way that will make it easier on her (thought that may be harder for you! Argh!). Write down task lists in stepwise fashion and print them out, for example. Remember that she really does want to do her job and keep it--and she is probably very frustrated too.
As for taking care of yourself--helping her may make it easier on you, but also you can do lots to lower your stress. I know you know how.
Allison... Do you think she may have some dementia?
I've wondered that myself, but as DH says, she's been this way the entire time she's worked for us (15 years?). Prior to this she was a legal secretary. She definitely has her quirks--that is for sure!
Now that you've heard my rant about my assistant I'll tell you a funnier story.
We were in the process of ordering new checks for our new bank account using our new name. I wanted the logo on the checks to match the logo on our letterhead (also we were ordering invoices and that logo should match as well). My assistant always did the ordering but I had the .pdf of the letterhead from the company who printed the letterhead, envelopes and business cards. I forwarded the .pdf of the letterhead to my assistant for her to forward to the guy who does the checks and invoices at Safeguard.
She prints the .pdf file
She faxes the printed .pdf file with a fax cover sheet indicating we want the logo to match
She calls to see that he got the fax
She emails to see that he got her phone call and fax
When I realized what she had done, I told her she had to email the .pdf file so he'd have the actual file rather than a faxed copy of it.
She does this a lot, too. She gets an insurance certificate from our insurance broker. She prints it (which is fine as we keep a book of all the certs) and then she gives me a second copy to scan and email to the contractor. I tell her she has it and she can email it to me and I'll forward it to the contractor (as she has no real concept of how email address books work and therefore only has a couple addresses saved in her manual rolodex).
We've finally cut down on paper when it comes to invoicing. We email about 98% of all invoices so instead of printing two copies (one to mail and one for our files) I'll scan the original to email and then give her back the original for our files. She actually understands this one.
Allison I tend to print things out too - but I can and do email bills, bank electronically, etc. If your assistant has been working for your company for 15 years I don't think it's the stress in her personal life that is making her this way. It might be adding to her confusion but I think she may need to take a course or two in electronic office skills. I have done that just to keep up and to keep from driving DH crazy. Either that or you have to hold her hand all the time and that makes life hard for both of you.
. I am not drinking any alcohol for the rest of this year but will have to get a really nice craft beer and some good Belgian choc and try it at Christmas as my holiday treat.
no more
