FondrenRoad

I still have my suit I got for graduation, and it still fits like a 12 year old trying on his dad's suit. 90s style was the worst.

I just had a meeting to set up two additional meetings. That was the entire purpose of the meeting. And you say meetings are worthless.

Even if they wanted to be, where can you even buy a pair? Have to get them custom made.

What about the pleated pants?

20 years ago, he would have been a Schwarzenegger type R. Current Republicans love celebrities, but only celebrities who are both B list and assholes. MM is neither one. "Can't we all just get along" is an entirely Dem thing now. Doesn't matter where he stands on economics or any of the old issues. Even libertarian nice people are voting Dem these days. Hes a Dem. The entire new GOP platform is "I want to be an asshole to other people." That's it. It has no other platform planks. There are still a few old stragglers like Romney, but they are going the way of the dodo.

Roll into the office in shorts and flip flops then. Back in the dot com era, I often did. Office dress codes are sexist. Men's business dress code is entirely rigid while women have some flexibility. One shouldn't have to choose to identify as a woman in order to show some leg in the summer. At my old job, I had to sweat my ass off in a damn tie every day. Those summer dresses started to look real comfortable. I'm also not even sure I have a pair of slacks that currently fit. The gym misses me.

Not at ours. Most of our promotions are based on productivity and client relationships. Seniority still happens too. None have been about facetime or being seen sitting at a desk. I suppose if someone was trying to recover from a mistake or client complaint, facetime would help, but that hasn't happened. Along those same lines, there has been something positive that's happened during the pandemic. When people aren't that busy, they now admit to it, so work has been better distributed. This was not the case when just being at the office, with work to do or not, was considered "work."

Ok gramps. But yeah, email should be the only thing used for work. People are also a little too lax with what they say in company chat apps.

Zoom sucks, but Teams is a monstrosity. Sets my laptop on fire when it's running. Nobody asked to have everything in one app. I was fine using Skype for business and SharePoint separately. And since my company uses Teams chat now, we also need it on our phones which shortens the battery life to about 15 minutes. The old Microsoft was better. The customer used to always be right. Now the customer is forced to take updates whether they want to or not.

With the shared office, dont you have to adjust the work area every day to suit your needs after someone else did the same the day before? Sounds like getting in the driver seat after my wife drove the car last. Can never quite get it back exactly how I like it.

The last paragraph isn't your fault though. I have a still open position that can't be filled because I need someone that knows what they're doing and my CEO wants to lowball them. Historically, this position would be a hire up position. But there is nobody to hire up. But at one time, I was that talented new employee. I climbed a ladder that was not even offered half the time. And what I want out of an employee is the same. They should want my job. But they also have to be willing to wait when waiting arises.

That all sounds miserable. What do you do?

I had the opposite thought. As a married person with a child, covid has been irritating but never dark or challenging. Remembering my single self, I know it would have been much harder for me then. But everyone is different.

A 2 hour commute is never worth it. Especially doing a reverse commute. You could live in Bellevue for cheaper. But I get it. You want to live where you want to live. For one of my first jobs post college, I drove from South Austin to Round Rock. Lasted about 6 months and quit with nothing. I could not stand the commute. But I dont expect everyone to be me. I moved to NYC specifically not to have to drive to work, had less than 2000 dollars to my name, no job lined up, but I did have a couch to sleep on. Here I am 20 years later doing quite alright in NYC. Maybe I could have done that in a remote environment. But probably not. So I do get it. Driving commutes do steal your soul. But that is really a problem with your local urban planners. You think you live in cities, but most of you don't.

Are you single or married?

Are you friends with any of those people you worked with in Bellevue? And I would never commute 2 hours. 30 minutes is my limit. And I will still avoid the morning rush, work at home in the morning, and stroll in at 1030 to 11.

Right. For me too. But there isn't an entry point now to even make those drinks happen. Organically at least.

Before covid, I did 2 or 3 days a week in the office, and the rest at home. At that time, I was absolutely more productive at home. My daughter was in school, and in day care til 5 after school. My wife was either working or physically at her own school. Yes, she is over 40 and going for a degree. And I could work from home in blissful silence. But during covid, my wife is doing school remotely and tries to stay quiet. Tries. My daughter is at school until 2 pm, 2 days per week, and remote schooled the other 3. On those 2 days my daughter is at school, I do actually get some things done until 2 pm. But when she is there, almost nothing. Don't get me wrong though. I'd love to have play time all the time with my daughter, but then how are we gonna eat? I am sensing though, that a lot of yall don't have friends at work. I dont know whether that's good or bad in the long run. But as someone who moved to a city knowing nobody, I would not have wanted to be remote then for sure, even if I could be now.

There is the "work" aspect of it, but cameraderie may actually be more important, and it just doesn't happen all remote. The aforementioned coworker who was the best man at my wedding was actually hired to replace me when I was quitting a job to go to law school. I later came back and worked a higher level job in the exact same department to make money during law school. Because I also made a connection with the department head. None of that happens in a remote only world. And that place was one of the 10 largest law firms in the world. To be fair though, I am also very good at what I do. I am the backstop who became a manager. I've never been just a manager. That is still a work in progress.

Im in the same space, and that's all great. Prior to covid, I was also more productive away from the office. But covid has made me understand the need for the office. But I will also ask. At your office, do you count even a single person as a friend? Had you been entirely remote from the start, its unlikely that you would know any of them very well. Perhaps my experience is colored by the fact that I moved to a new city, where I wanted to live, and worked entry level office work at the start. I'm still friends with many of my coworkers from the beginning. Going on 20 years now. One of them was the best man at my wedding even. Had I met them on zoom with the occasional forced get together, I wouldn't have known them at all. But also, I became an effective manager through mutual trust. Is that possible remote only? But there always has been and will be a place for folks who work like you. And really I'm one too. I do manage people, but I'm also the backstop for them. And I also work better in the solo dark place. Which is why the "no wife there, no kids there" part of my office post may be the truest part. Most people just aren't wired like that though. The Nats fan coworker needs to throw ideas off me. Sometimes people don't want to write the question they need to ask in email. And even with me, there are times I would ask "what do you think about this?" but I don't because it isnt for email and I'm not going to zoom it. But also maybe I'm weird because I truly loathe video calls. To my core. They really change my whole being. In person meetings, fantastic. Audio, great. Video, fuck everyone. In fact, one of my biggest issues with the covid world is that clients that used to be perfectly happy with audio conference calls now want video.

Probably not a CR topic, but DT is trash these days. Much has been made of remote work becoming the norm. And of flexible office space for those that want to work at the office on occasion. To those who say the office is dead, I'd say not so fast. I worked at my office today for the first time in several months. And it was glorious. No wife around. No kids around. I got more done today than in the last month probably. Before Covid, I was flex. 2 or 3 days a week in the office when I chose to be there. My small company has 2 offices. The CEO runs one, I run the other. My urban office has been closed for the entirety of the pandemic. His suburban office has been reopened for about 6 months. Before the pandemic, everyone was allowed 1 flex day a week, but most weeks, hardly anyone used them and came in every day instead. But everyone also had their own space. Either an office or at least a desk. I'd like to think that flex office will be the way going forward, but Americans just don't work like that. Our CEO opened his office because he wanted to go in. He openly announced that everyone else based in that office were welcome to stay remote, but could also work on a staggered schedule there with masks. All signed up for the staggered schedule on day one. But the CEO isn't going in every day, so they have also been competing to be there on the days when he is. And these are employees who are experts in their field and who have the email and client satisfaction track record to prove they have been working great at home. They have no need to brown nose. So I think ultimately, it will go right back to being about facetime with the boss in less than a year. Two employees working in the same department flexing in and out of the office just won't work. That flex desk will belong to some individual. They'll compete their way to 60 hours a week both in the office. The only reason all this remote work worked is because everyone was remote. When everyone was in the office, at least the boss saw you there even if you were posting on surly and didn't have shit to do. That being said, I do run my office so I dont care where people work as long as everyone does their work, and it's in Manhattan so way more expensive than it needs to be. And we happen to be at the end of our lease. So we are about to downsize it. But that could still end up being shortsighted. Because another thing that really matters is cameraderie. I'm a huge Astros fan and have a coworker who is a huge Nats fan. That World Series mattered for office mojo. And neither of us were going to take a flex day during it. We had to be there to either talk shit or accept shit. He is lucky that he is good at his job though. Nah, Nats won fair and square. But we all want that type of connection with coworkers. It doesn't happen on zoom and it actually matters.

What do those 2 things even have to do with one another? I am going to ground my kid until Vince Young is retroactively awarded the Heisman Trophy.

If you move to Canada with your wife, you can reside, work, and have a path to citizenship. But if your career isn't available in Canada that would make it difficult to get by. I've been thinking about moving to Europe the same way, but I also feel too damn old to fuck around with that.

Every person in Wyoming is now a state. Splitting states up is harder to do than adding new ones.

The larger problem is that the federal government doesn't properly "invest" anywhere in America. It gives a ton of handouts to corporations, funds foreign wars, and does little more than that other than bail states out because they fail to plan for natural disasters. It needs to get back to building infrastructure and providing for the welfare of Americans. Since we don't have that and rely heavily on local and state funding, we should prioritize local and state tax revenue. If my tax money was actually doing something for the residents of MS and AL, I'd be okay with it being distributed in such a manner. But it doesn't do shit for them. Their state government doesn't do shit for them either. So I'd rather just fund my state until the residents of MS and AL finally wise up and vote for better governance. I'm tired of rebuilding your coastline after every hurricane because yall refuse to properly plan as well.