Change of Title and Football Madness!

I have changed my title once again. I cannot seem to find one I like. I am also not as creative in the department of catchy blog titles as I am in other area's of my life! So, I have gone to "The Bird and the Bee." The Bird is Chloe....Chloe Bird.....and the Bee is me. Melissa means "honey bee." I am not sure how long this will stick. If you have any other suggestions please feel free to send them my way!

This past weekend was a whirlwind! Mom and I left Friday and headed to Lafayette, GA to visit my cousin's. (Her nephew and his family.) I LOVE all of my family and cannot say that I have a favorite, but Greg is like a big brother. We fight, we laugh, we talk. He is awesome! (But please don't tell him I said this!) When I need advice, other than my parents, he is the one I go to! Anyways, the original plan was that Friday we would go to the Lafayette High vs. Cartersville High game to see one of my younger cousin's play, then Saturday get up and head to Jefferson City to see Landon's (Greg's 2nd son) game. (We are going to see Madison, son #1, in a few weeks.)

This is a yearly tradition that Mom and I do, and I look forward to it every year! Unfortunately plans were changed a little. Because of all the rain last week the Friday night game was moved to Saturday. So, bright and early Saturday Greg awoke, got Preston and Brennan (his 2 youngest) up and they went and ran the Duck Race 5k. Petey won!!! He ran the race in 18:18 and won the whole she-bang! Mom, Camie, and I were back at the house getting ready. Once they got to the house around 9:30 am and showered, we loaded up and headed to Jefferson City. Just outside of Knoxville the bottom dropped out and it started raining and never let up! We made a quick pit stop at a BBQ joint for lunch and ate in the car in the parking lot of the stadium.

This was the view from the car of the stadium...

I sat thru the 1st half of the game and went back to the car for a nap during the 2nd half. I was SOAKED and FREEZING and that is NOT a good combo for me! Greg and Preston went into the athletic building and stayed dry. Mom and Camie sat thru the whole game in the pouring rain! They definitely had their big girl panties on! Carson Newman did win!

Here is the best shot I got of Landon (#86)....

After the game we all headed back to Lafayette for the high school game! We got to the house around 6:30, changed into dry clothes, and piled back in the car to go to the game! Cartersville beat Lafayette!!! Woo - hoo! AND, Devin played his first Varsity game! We were all sooo excited!

Here he is going after one of those Ramblers! (#88)

After a FULL day of car riding and football we were very tired and hungry! By the way, the ONLY thing open at 11pm in Lafayette is the Krystal which is where we had dinner that night!

On Sunday Mom and I headed home. I am still tired! I don't think I dried out until late last night! Hopefully Madison's game will be a little more dry!

Oh, and can I just how EXCITED I am that October is just DAYS away!!!! AHHH!!! I think this is my favorite time of year! Corn Maze's, the Cumming Fair, Hayrides, Pumpkins, Bon Fires, UGA Football, and Halloween! Then, Christmas is just around the corner! I am just a big kid at heart!!!

"Boyfriend"

Chloe has a "boyfriend." OK, so really he is MY boyfriend...but Shane is referred to in my house as "boyfriend." If you ask Chloe where "boyfriend" is, she will go running to the stairs and start whining. I keep a baby gate up so that she cannot climb the stairs. She knows that "boyfriend's" room is upstairs and since he is not down here with us, he MUST be up there! She loves him....and as much as he denies it...he loves her!

Chloe Bird

Chloe has many nicknames....Chlo (because adding the "e" is just to much), Princess, Lovey, Baby Girl, Clover (yes mom, I know you hate this one! :) ) but mostly we call her Chloe Bird. She answers to all of them.

Chloe Bird has a new favorite spot in my house. The window in my dining room does not have a blind on it. The previous owners had a dog who chewed on the blind and I just have not replaced it...took the old one down, just havent gotten the new one to put up. Chloe LOVES this window....she can see the back and front yards and will lay in this window for hours!

Since the past couple of blogs were a little more serious, I thought I would be a little light-hearted this time and show you my baby girl!

Wait, what was that...

Ok, I'm to tired...

Such a rough life she leads...

"But"

"But" - conjunction - on the contrary, yet

The word "but" is a very small word that packs a HUGE punch. As stated in my previous post, my manager (we will call him Mr. M) decided that the appropriate course of inspiring his team would be to call us all failures. Well Mr. M did not fully realize how badly this hurt all of us. I will admit that the past 2 weeks at work have not been fun. I have actually NOT looked forward to going in to the office because of Mr. M. I, and several other team members, have had several conversations with our supervisor (we will call him J) about what happened. J has had several conversations with Mr. M to relay how we all felt. But, yesterday Mr. M decided to have a meeting to discuss how other teams in our building felt about us. The meeting was quiet confusing and a lot of the things that Mr. M said were contradictory. On one slide it had things like we are curt and not very welcoming and on the next slide it said that we were a pleasure to work with....????? Yeah, I didn't get it either. I think that Mr. M noticed the frustration and finally at the end of his hour he asked if there was anything we all needed to talk about. One of my teammates spoke up and ended up getting emotional. Andrea, my right hand man...err gal... spoke next while Regina recovered and explained that coming out of that meeting made her feel worthless and like crap. I spoke next and flat out said that I did not appreciate being called a failure, that I was not a failure, and that I did a damn good job at what I do. And yes, those were my exact words. I will admit my voice broke on the last part and I almost lost it completely. Finally Regina spoke back up and a few others did as well. A couple of those that did not speak had tears in their eyes. Finally, Mr. M gave an apology. He said that he was sorry "but" he was serious about what he was speaking about.

While I appreciate the apology there is a level that does not feel sincere. The word but has a lot of impact, especially when you are giving an apology. The word but negates everything that came before it. And Mr. M felt the need to use that small little word. I hope he was sincere. He still has a lot to prove. But, I guess I can be thankful that he apologized?

Failure

Failure: refers to the state or condition of not meeting a desirable or intended objective, and may be viewed as the opposite of success.

I am NOT a failure! I refuse to use the word! That definition does NOT describe me at all! Last Wednesday as our year end event approached (the next day) my co-workers and I were called into a meeting and told that we were failures.

To explain, each year we have peer awards that are given out at the year end event. None of my co-workers and I were nominated nor did we nominate anyone. Yes, we should have nominated one of our own or someone else on another team but we didn't. This does not make us fail. In fact, I have had MUCH success this past year. Our whole team has. I (and several of my co-workers) worked very LONG hours and weekends implementing the new ARRA standards. I have streamlined processes, written procedures, developed new applications to reduce the time it takes to post payments, trained/supervised 4 contract employees, trained a new team member, coordinated many social events for the team, and of course did my normal day to day job. This to me is not failing. I did not receive a bad review either, in fact it was a very good one.

In fact, if any one failed, he did. He failed us by not promoting, supporting, encouraging, and backing us up. He has no clue what we do day in and day out. He really has no clue what we have to put up with! He failed us by calling us failures!

I have been quite upset for the past week. I am hurt, angry, confused, and defiant. He wants to call me a failure, let him. I know that I am not a failure. My team knows we are not failures. Our supervisor (the one just under the manager, who by the way was as blind sided by all of this as we were!) knows we are not failures. So what am I going to do? Well, I need my job considering I have a mortgage and bills to pay. But, my plan is the same as it was a week and a day ago. To go to work, do the best job I can, and be satisfied knowing I have done the best I can do! We joke around a lot at work, and are quite cynical about it and are laughing A LOT about it.

I have to admit I have lost respect for him. He lost a lot of credit with me. And, I don't know how or if he will gain it back. And that is pretty bad I know, but I am being honest about it. He knows he has screwed up by telling us that. And he is sucking up a little. I am polite but not overly nice to him. My Mother did raise me to be a lady. I don't have to like him, but he is my manager and I do have to smile! (And say really mean things in my head....OK OK just kidding!)

I have been called a failure before. Proved that one wrong. In the 6th grade my teacher told my Mother that I would be a failure, never go to college (or graduate), never really amount to anything. WRONG!

I will succeed and come out the better person. A stronger and wiser person. He just doesn't know what he really did to all of us!