What a week. On Wednesday, I was officially laid off. It's now Friday, and soon I will be getting ready to go to a countywide "After the Layoff" workshop with who knows how many other people.
In my office, 38 people got pink slips. (And no, they are not pink. Sadly.) Only 13 CPS workers remain; only 2 workers remain in my Emergency Response unit (out of 15). The district I work in was hit harder than any other; we are the office that gets the bulk of the new hires. Even so, there are plenty of people with more than 4 years with the county who are gone. The people that I associate with child welfare in this county are gone. Damn good workers. Committed. Gone.
I decided ahead of time that Wednesday night would be the night to bring in our living tree and decorate it. For the first time in years, we have a Christmas tree. It's lovely. It's small, but it's got a string of white lights on it, and I was able to fit more than half of our ornament collection on it.* It really looks lovely, and it makes me happy to show it to Kid A in the mornings, all lit up, and talk to her about some of the ornaments.
* Our ornament collection is surprisingly large, especially considering how long it's been since we put up a tree. For years now, my dad's side of the family has exchanged ornaments for Christmas presents, and they have always given one each to TM and me. And for a few years in the early days, my dad got ornaments not just for TM and me, but for our two cats, as well. One year, he even got ornaments for the Yorkies we'd inherited from TM's grandfather ... Point is, we've got a LOT of ornaments. Go, little tree!
Tomorrow, our Christmas begins. We're heading up to my mom's, where we'll see my cousin and his wife and their twin boys for the first time since Kid A's been born. They live in Des Moines, and we took a trip out there in early January, so Kid A was with us, of course, but not on the outside. My brother is coming, too, with his girlfriend, who I'll be meeting for the first time, which is very exciting. And my uncle and his wife, who is excited to meet Kid A. It's a big weekend coming up. And of course it means that we have even less time to get ready for Christmas than usual, because I'm working pretty much every day except for the weekends and Christmas Day. (The rant about having no time off for the holidays and yet being laid off on the 31st would go here, had I the time to write it. Imagine what you might say, and that's pretty much what I would say, too.) Surprisingly, I'm pretty ready. I've still got a number of presents to wrap for later Christmas celebrations, but TM said he would help me with that, so I'm not stressing. He's got the next two weeks off, you bet he can help!
Last night, I baked a pecan pie and a pumpkin pie for this weekend. I'm super anxious to find out if the crust turned out well. I'm a big crust person, and to me, a pie is only as good as its crust. When we were in Mendocino for our 9th wedding anniversary, the Mendocino Bookstore clerk gave me a simple pie crust recipe that calls for Crisco instead of butter. She swore that Crisco's the secret. TM was joking that his mom would be appalled; when we talked pie crust with her after that, she said, "Oh yeah, that's what I use." We'll see if Crisco is the answer. I'll report back.
Tonight, we're going to take Kid A to TM's department Christmas party at the chair's house. None of his colleagues have met her, so it'll be fun to show her off. Hopefully, she won't get too tired and cranky -- the party starts right at her usual evening naptime. Fingers crossed!
If I don't get a chance to post again until after the holidays, Happy Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Solstice, Happy Kwanzaa, and a Happy, Jolly Good New Year to all!
Friday, December 19, 2008
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Stone soup
The Board of Supervisors of my county voted today to cut millions of dollars, hundreds of jobs. Read the article, it does a better job of explaining the details of the approved budget cuts.
I was at that Board of Sups meeting today. From a little before 9:00 this morning until nearly 2:00 this afternoon. Public comment was still going on (wrapping up, though) when I left. Hundreds of people spoke. Social workers, eligibility workers, clerks, foster parents, adoptive parents, attorneys, community members, former CPS clients all turned out and spoke from the heart. Adult Protective Services faces huge cuts in a tiny department. It's brutal.
One of the sups said at one point during public comment, "You make it sound as though we have a choice about making these cuts. We don't. We have no choice." The point was that we know cuts have to be made, but the cuts as proposed will break the Bureau. Some estimates from workers and supervisors indicate that 80% of the workers in my district office will be laid off. Workloads for remaining social workers will double. APS will lose over 60% of its small workforce. One of the people who spoke sounded like an individual with lots of job security -- 30 years with the county, and a pretty high-level individual. He got a warning letter.
Things are bad all over. It's an incredibly scary time for me. I never thought that I would see the kinds of headlines that have been all over every media source for the last few months. I never thought that good, secure, necessary, federally-mandated county jobs would be subjected to the axe like this. I never expected that this country would face another Great Depression, but it looks like that's exactly where we're headed. I feel super lucky for the opportunity to have already had an interview with another county. Things could still work out. But I'm appalled at what's happened here. I'm horrified at the careless disregard that this county is demonstrating toward its employees. I'm disgusted that they must have known this was coming, and over 100 people will be getting pink slips within the week, and summarily dismissed on New Year's Eve. I'm outraged at the mismanagement: less than four months ago, they hired four new people, and spent nine weeks putting us through an intensive training unit. The waste just sickens me.
Needless to say, the atmosphere in my office is dismal. My colleagues are angry, stunned, deflated, worried and depressed. We still have three weeks to slog through. We still have the long march of the pink slips calls, whenever those come out. We still have families to serve, investigations to complete, court reports to write, children to protect. We have to find new jobs, get our own families through the holidays, figure out how to hold on to our remaining assets. It's exhausting.
And tomorrow, I get to drive to Novato (over an hour away from where I live) for another day of training. For real.
I was at that Board of Sups meeting today. From a little before 9:00 this morning until nearly 2:00 this afternoon. Public comment was still going on (wrapping up, though) when I left. Hundreds of people spoke. Social workers, eligibility workers, clerks, foster parents, adoptive parents, attorneys, community members, former CPS clients all turned out and spoke from the heart. Adult Protective Services faces huge cuts in a tiny department. It's brutal.
One of the sups said at one point during public comment, "You make it sound as though we have a choice about making these cuts. We don't. We have no choice." The point was that we know cuts have to be made, but the cuts as proposed will break the Bureau. Some estimates from workers and supervisors indicate that 80% of the workers in my district office will be laid off. Workloads for remaining social workers will double. APS will lose over 60% of its small workforce. One of the people who spoke sounded like an individual with lots of job security -- 30 years with the county, and a pretty high-level individual. He got a warning letter.
Things are bad all over. It's an incredibly scary time for me. I never thought that I would see the kinds of headlines that have been all over every media source for the last few months. I never thought that good, secure, necessary, federally-mandated county jobs would be subjected to the axe like this. I never expected that this country would face another Great Depression, but it looks like that's exactly where we're headed. I feel super lucky for the opportunity to have already had an interview with another county. Things could still work out. But I'm appalled at what's happened here. I'm horrified at the careless disregard that this county is demonstrating toward its employees. I'm disgusted that they must have known this was coming, and over 100 people will be getting pink slips within the week, and summarily dismissed on New Year's Eve. I'm outraged at the mismanagement: less than four months ago, they hired four new people, and spent nine weeks putting us through an intensive training unit. The waste just sickens me.
Needless to say, the atmosphere in my office is dismal. My colleagues are angry, stunned, deflated, worried and depressed. We still have three weeks to slog through. We still have the long march of the pink slips calls, whenever those come out. We still have families to serve, investigations to complete, court reports to write, children to protect. We have to find new jobs, get our own families through the holidays, figure out how to hold on to our remaining assets. It's exhausting.
And tomorrow, I get to drive to Novato (over an hour away from where I live) for another day of training. For real.
Saturday, December 6, 2008
Joy to the World
Man, I'm so tired, but if I don't write now, I suspect another weekend will go by without a post.
Kid A has not slept through the night since that first night, but nights are definitely easier since she's transitioned from nursing to exclusively formula. In fact, life in general has been easier. I think that, because I knew she wasn't getting enough from nursing, but I didn't know how much more she needed, supplementing with formula was always such a guessing game. Does she need 2 ounces or 3? Is she really still hungry, or is it time to try to get her to sleep? Is she hungry, or is it gas? Since the wean, it has been so easy. Now she's up to four ounces per bottle, and she wants a bottle every 2 hours or so. She makes these little grunts when she's hungry, and if she doesn't look tired during a feeding, that means she's still up and ready for more playing. It's just terrific, being able to tell what she wants and meeting those needs. Life is sweet these days.
Here's some things that she is NOT doing yet:
* sitting up on her own
* teething
* rolling over
* laughing (much)
* eating cereal (she plays with the spoon every few days, though)
What she IS doing:
* Standing. As often as possible, for as long as possible.
* Holding the bottle during feedings, and practicing putting it into and taking it out of her mouth.
* Refusing the pacifier. This started maybe two weeks ago, and she has been consistent both in refusing it when offered, and no longer needing it when going to sleep.
* Grabbing her feet
* Looking for dropped toys and trying to get them back
* Continuing her love affair with her hands and everyone else's
* Babbling, squealing, and raspberry-ing
This morning, Kid A and I went out to Peet's while TM slept in. On our way back, we stopped off at Home Depot, because they had some living Christmas trees on display. I picked out a tree and had them set it aside, and later in the day, TM and I went back with Kid A and purchased the tree and some new lights. TM did a little research when we got home, and learned that our tree shouldn't be indoors for more than 10 days, so instead of putting it up this weekend, we'll put it off a week. I'm going to try to put up some lights outside tomorrow.
I also called my mom today, since TM had more work to do today than he'd originally anticipated, and asked her to come down and help out with a little babysitting. Fortunately, she was able to spring into action and came in the late afternoon. Ironically, Kid A went down for a nap just a few minutes before Mom got here, and napped for about three hours. But Mom and I spent some time visiting while I dusted and put up a few Christmas decorations, and we even made a little garland out of old-fashioned colored glass ball ornaments and white curling ribbon. It's hanging from the curtain rod above our sliding glass door, and it looks very festive. When Kid A woke up, Mom played with her while TM and I rushed around, vacuuming and cleaning the bathrooms and whatnot. All in all, it was a great visit.
Tomorrow, we'll head back into our native lands to visit friends. Originally, the plan was to make eggnog, but now it looks as though we will be making gingerbread houses! How fun. We're also going to have a brief visit with some friends who just had a baby boy about a month ago.
December is already feeling so crunched: we have our first family Christmas gathering the weekend before Christmas at my mom's (my cousin and his wife and their twin boys will be in California over Christmas, and their first stop is my aunt's house, who lives across the street from my mom). That means I only have 2 weekends to get ready for Christmas, and this one's already half over! I'm kind of in denial about it.
My interview on Thursday went fine, I think. It's out of my control now. I did my best; we'll just wait and see.
Kid A has not slept through the night since that first night, but nights are definitely easier since she's transitioned from nursing to exclusively formula. In fact, life in general has been easier. I think that, because I knew she wasn't getting enough from nursing, but I didn't know how much more she needed, supplementing with formula was always such a guessing game. Does she need 2 ounces or 3? Is she really still hungry, or is it time to try to get her to sleep? Is she hungry, or is it gas? Since the wean, it has been so easy. Now she's up to four ounces per bottle, and she wants a bottle every 2 hours or so. She makes these little grunts when she's hungry, and if she doesn't look tired during a feeding, that means she's still up and ready for more playing. It's just terrific, being able to tell what she wants and meeting those needs. Life is sweet these days.
Here's some things that she is NOT doing yet:
* sitting up on her own
* teething
* rolling over
* laughing (much)
* eating cereal (she plays with the spoon every few days, though)
What she IS doing:
* Standing. As often as possible, for as long as possible.
* Holding the bottle during feedings, and practicing putting it into and taking it out of her mouth.
* Refusing the pacifier. This started maybe two weeks ago, and she has been consistent both in refusing it when offered, and no longer needing it when going to sleep.
* Grabbing her feet
* Looking for dropped toys and trying to get them back
* Continuing her love affair with her hands and everyone else's
* Babbling, squealing, and raspberry-ing
This morning, Kid A and I went out to Peet's while TM slept in. On our way back, we stopped off at Home Depot, because they had some living Christmas trees on display. I picked out a tree and had them set it aside, and later in the day, TM and I went back with Kid A and purchased the tree and some new lights. TM did a little research when we got home, and learned that our tree shouldn't be indoors for more than 10 days, so instead of putting it up this weekend, we'll put it off a week. I'm going to try to put up some lights outside tomorrow.
I also called my mom today, since TM had more work to do today than he'd originally anticipated, and asked her to come down and help out with a little babysitting. Fortunately, she was able to spring into action and came in the late afternoon. Ironically, Kid A went down for a nap just a few minutes before Mom got here, and napped for about three hours. But Mom and I spent some time visiting while I dusted and put up a few Christmas decorations, and we even made a little garland out of old-fashioned colored glass ball ornaments and white curling ribbon. It's hanging from the curtain rod above our sliding glass door, and it looks very festive. When Kid A woke up, Mom played with her while TM and I rushed around, vacuuming and cleaning the bathrooms and whatnot. All in all, it was a great visit.
Tomorrow, we'll head back into our native lands to visit friends. Originally, the plan was to make eggnog, but now it looks as though we will be making gingerbread houses! How fun. We're also going to have a brief visit with some friends who just had a baby boy about a month ago.
December is already feeling so crunched: we have our first family Christmas gathering the weekend before Christmas at my mom's (my cousin and his wife and their twin boys will be in California over Christmas, and their first stop is my aunt's house, who lives across the street from my mom). That means I only have 2 weekends to get ready for Christmas, and this one's already half over! I'm kind of in denial about it.
My interview on Thursday went fine, I think. It's out of my control now. I did my best; we'll just wait and see.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
All Through the Night
Woo hoo! Put Kid A down last night at 7:45, and she slept STRAIGHT THROUGH until 5:45 this morning! A little after 3, she made some noises that sounded like she was going to wake up for a bottle, but no -- she went back to sleep! I'm sorry for all the exclamation points, but hey! I feel great! I even went to bed late last night!
I have my interview today. I've been preparing, so I'm hopeful. Will post more later.
Slept through the night! I'm so proud of my big ol' baby.
I have my interview today. I've been preparing, so I'm hopeful. Will post more later.
Slept through the night! I'm so proud of my big ol' baby.
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