This day has really crawled by. What weird is that I’ve been swamped with work, so typically that makes the days fly by. But not today. I still have over an hour left, so hopefully the pace picks up a bit. Apologies for the boring post. I promise to add more pictures on Monday. Have a nice weekend.

I’m stuck at work today in the office, so I haven’t been able to keep up with the DNC events as well as the past couple of days. What would have been really cool to see is Rage Against the Machine’s concert that is going on now. I used to love this band, and have never seen them live, though I’m sure it’s full of energy. Instead, I had my yearly review, and despite receiving the highest marks possible, received another mediocre raise. I guess it could be worse, the amount equates to 8%, but still I always expect more. I’m really curious as to when I’ll get my next promotion from level two up to level three. There is always next year, I suppose.

As if the office weren’t already distracting enough, I arrived this morning to see that we now have a popcorn machine less than 50 feet from my cube. So, not only do I get to hear constant popping, I also get the constant smell of popcorn. The smell obviously isn’t all that bad, it just makes me want to eat popcorn all day long! I think the worst part is the noise, not only from the machine, but also from the people standing around it talking about the machine and whatever other random office talk they choose. I just don’t understand why it wasn’t placed in the big break room with all of the TV’s, stainless steel appliances, and constant noise.

Our company has started a new on-call system and today starts my first shift. For the next week I could potentially be called to work if a problem arises during non business hours. Yippee! The program started a couple of weeks ago, and I don’t think anyone on the team I work on has been called yet, and I don’t anticipate we’ll be called very often. However, the thought of them calling when I’m out hiking, or catching a show, or even out of town is really bothersome especially since I don’t have a laptop to work from. Hopefully all issues will be resolved before they get to the sixth and final level, which is where I am now sitting.

I just got into Kansas City and into the office here. I haven’t been back for work in nearly a year, so I’ve got lots of catching up to do. More from me tomorrow…

I apologize for neglecting my site today, but it’s been one of those days. On the positive side I am working from home today, and will be again tomorrow. Yes, I finally worked out the details for telecommuting and I will be doing so on Monday and Tuesday each week. Then I’ll spend Wednesday through Friday in the office. This should be a nice split between the two.

As for the crappy part of the day, my boss is out again so I’m filling in for him. And another from my team is out as well, so I have to fill her shoes as well. This has led to a stressful and busy day. And to top it all off I’m fighting some combination of allergies and/or a cold. Though I’m starting to feel better as the day goes on, I just hope I’m back to 100% soon.

What is one thing I wish I knew more about? Stocks. Over the past year or so I’ve definitely thought about branching out and “playing the stock market” a bit, but honestly I really don’t think I understand all that goes into it. For instance, take my employers stock, HRS, which rose as high as $66 a share over the past week or two with speculation of a merger or buyout from a larger company. We received an email from the CEO yesterday saying that we are not seeking either. Once that was released the stock fell to under $56 a share. I own nearly 200 shares as part of my 401K, meaning that I lost over $2000 since the start of the week. There goes my retirement!

Good news at the end of this crazy busy week, my application for our company’s telecommuting program has finally been approved! What does this mean? Simply that I will once again be allowed to work from home just as I was doing since we moved to Denver until a month or two ago. I’m not sure why it took so long to get approved as I was working from home full time before, but this time the approval did have to go beyond our small work group.

Unfortunately it’s not a full time telecommute this time, now I will only be permitted to work two days from home and then the rest of my time is spent in the office. We haven’t settled on the days yet, but I know that Friday’s are likely out of the question. We have a weekly meeting that day and my boss really likes us to be in as few locations as possible. So I’m leaning towards Monday instead, and then I can hopefully get Tuesday as well. We’ll see, as I mentioned my boss is on vacation this week, so I may have to wait another week before anything is finalized.

This is going to be a busy week. My boss is on vacation and I’ll be covering many of his tasks for the week. I’m hoping that it won’t be as bad as it has been before when he took extended vacation, since there is another individual in the office who will be doing some tasks, but I guess only time will tell. So far it’s been a really busy day.

Our Memorial Day labor day weekend (I always mix the two up) was good though. We were back in Cincinnati for the wedding of one of Kim’s cousins. Kim was a bridesmaid in the wedding and we’ve known her cousins husband for awhile as well, so it was nice to attend their big day. And since a good number of her extended family was there it gave us a little taste of what our wedding will be like. Everyone better get their dancing shoes out and be ready to swing all the way into party mode! I took some pictures throughout the day and I hope to get them online sometime soon. I’ll be sure to post a link.

Though most of us probably still aren’t aware, today is Earth Day. While my daily adventures on the light rail were originally intended to save money, it’s nice to know that I’m contributing one less car on the roads each day. It may take me twice as long to get home, but I’m proud that I am starting to do my part in being more environmentally friendly. To make it even easier for me and others in the Denver area, Google now has RTD schedules built into their maps and transit applications. This should help make it even easier for us to use public transportation as much as we can.

Other things that Kim and I have been doing recently include setting the thermostat to 60 degrees while both of us are at work, using refillable water bottles instead of regularly buying disposable bottles (even though they may be causing cancer), replacing standard light bulbs with CFLs, among other recycling efforts. What other easy things should we be doing, or what have you been doing to help save our planet?