Alberto cometh

We had some wild, wild weather today! The dregs of Tropical Storm Alberto scooted past south of Nova Scotia and delivered a day full of heavy rain and strong wind. Nothing scary, but pretty impressive nonetheless. It was almost as black as night at 8am this morning -- that was the most impressive thing for me. I've never seen it get that dark during the day before, except for an eclipse, of course. Tried to get a photo of the wind-whipped trees, but every time I got ready, the wind would die down! LOL

Been putting in some overtime for a change this week. Last week too. The tides are changing. Been here almost 5 months and that time has been pretty darn quiet. Just developing my new design, enjoying not having constant deadlines.

Well, the deadlines are back with a vengeance. Had to get out a prototype this week. Had only expected to have to get a digital version done, but found out middle of last week, they wanted it printed too, which basically means I had less time to do my own job so there'd be enough time for printing and still deliver on the same day. Up till today it looked like it wasn't going to happen, but then the printer came through and told me they could put it on the press tonight if I could get it all to them in time. So I worked my ass off all day and made my deadline with literally only 2 minutes to spare. LOL. Damn I'm good.

Speaking of which.... I went around walking two feet off the ground for a good part of this week. Got an email from Mum on Monday asking if I'd read the glowing review of the "brilliant production manager" in the Ottawa paper that day. I hadn't, and was obviously very curious, so I logged onto the Ottawa server and downloaded the pdfs of the whole issue...found what I was looking for on page 8.

Turns out my redesign of the product (I won't say the name so it doesn't come up in any online searches) won a SILVER prize in a fairly prestigious American association's competition. Ho. Lee. Shit.

I could NOT believe it. So once I was able to stop giggling and bouncing, I printed off the article and stuck it in my purse to show my ex-boss later on - she had invited me out for dinner that night (she didn't know about the award yet). I showed her the article at dinner and she was suitably impressed. Later that night she copies me on an email she sent out to a whole bunch of the big-wigs in the company, including my division's vice president. She referred to it as an "international award." Holy moly...that's when I REALLY started getting excited. Got tons of congratulatory emails over the next two days.

Anyway. I'm still really excited about the whole thing. The second-in-command on my big project emailed me and said simply "You should ask for more money." LOL I may just take that advice.

So what else? Well, on Tuesday, after getting dumped with yet more work I don't have time for, I was informed by second-in-command that I need to visit all ten of our offices before a meeting all the big cheeses are going to have on July 10. That's two offices in Saskatchewan next week, SIX offices in Nova Scotia and PEI the week of June 26 and then two more offices in Newfoundland the week of July 4. I get tired just thinking about it. I have to do it alone, and I have to give ten very important presentations (well, the same presentation ten times) in order to get everyone to fall in love with my new design so that when les grandes fromages assemble in Halifax on the 10th of July they can pass down their approval and I can get on with the business of implementing the Big Plan.

I spent the last two evenings at home figuring out my itinerary almost down to the minute. I guess I'm a bit of a detail freak when it comes to stuff like this. Makes me feel better though, having a plan. So on Sunday I fly to Saskatoon, come back on Wednesday. The following week I'm all over the place in Nova Scotia and PEI and...well...I'm repeating myself aren't I. LOL

Oh, and in there among all this travelling, they're moving me out of me GORGEOUS harbor-view office on the fourth floor, down to the first floor. I'm losing my beautiful, big, private corner office with the two walls of windows and getting a cubicle. At least it's next to a floor-to-ceiling window. It's not so bad, I guess. The three people who share the quadrangle cubicle with me are rarely there anyway. I'll probably enjoy it.

Hmmm...what else. Well, I encountered what I thought was a really nice fellow online on Saturday. Figured what the hell, coffee can't hurt, so I told him to write to me and let me know when and where to meet him the next day. He said okay. Then I never heard from him. Bugger. I'm sooo sick of this kind of treatment! Bah.

That's all for now, I guess. I haven't been very good at keeping this thing up. But I guess things have settled for the most part and there's not that much to say most of the time. Hopefully this upcoming road trip will afford me with plenty of things to write about and lots of hotel time in which to do it.