Week Almost Done Already
So Johnnie birthday is all done, but not quite behind us. That won't be until this weekend when we have his official birthday get-together with Fei-fei and family on hand. And so we're back to the school routine this morning and I'm back to my normal taskmaster self. It wasn't lost on me that on his birthday yesterday I pushed Johnnie pretty hard on some lessons that weren't even part of his usual school lessons. I pushed him on math lessons that were already first grade level. I pushed him so hard he was almost in tears at some point. But I also want him to learn to be tough. Crying is ok, as long as he kept trying. And he did that. I wanted him to understand that sometimes it's not always all about fun and he needs to apply himself, a lesson his dad knows only all too well. A lesson his dad didn't learn until after college. And so I will push him so he learns to combine his already high intelligence with a work ethic. THAT part he will learn from both his dad and his mom. And coincidentally, today was also his scheduled DIBELS assessment. It's an assessment for early learning literacy skills. It lasted less than 10 minutes. I think he did well, at least in the reading part where he was rattling off all the words at the end of a minute. As you can see from the pictures I posted, I may have pushed him hard, but at the end of the day he just wanted my approval and he just wanted to hang around me whatever I was doing. That was why I sort of did whatever I could for work on the laptop right there on the couch so I could work within the same proximity. That was, until 3 PM where I had to do the Midweek huddle meeting. That was to follow up on the morning all-staff meeting, which was more of a motivational push for most of the staff. It's ok, I thought it was necessary for an organization like ours. People need to hear from their leaders. And our leaders need to show a good example, which is certainly NOT what is going on in the world today. Not here in the US, where we are being led by pretty much someone's old, angry grandpa. Lisa asked the question on Monday: why do we have to choose between 2 old fogies. Fair question. I think the answer is that mostly old people vote. If younger people voted more frequently and showed more interest, we'd have another Obama. That was why he won 12 years ago. I can't believe it's been that long. 12 years ago was the first time I heard one of his speeches at USC. Now we have someone trying to do a reality show from the White House. I've never been more embarassed to be an American as these days. Hopefully we can end the nightmare in less than a month from now. In the meantime, after the 3 o'clock meeting there was another meeting with the HIT Roundtable. We usually discuss the next month's meeting agenda and it usually does not last more than 20-25 minutes. Today it almost ran an hour! That's because I was pretty talkative. And I think I just got talked into doing a conference talk on why organizations should spend on IT Security. I mean it's such a slamdunk and I find it difficult to believe that kind of talk would still be necessary. But I guess it is. It's the kind of talk primarily directed to c-suites and I would be well qualified to make that kind of talk. Which is why I guess I was on that call that long. Johnnie almost gave up on me and kept walking in on my meeting. As soon as I got done, I quickly headed us out to Panda Express for the usual Wednesday night teriyaki chicken dinner. All I know was that I was at least doing my job today, even if I didn't seem like I got much done. Last Tuesday I also finally got a push to get that AT&T situation concluded once and for all. We had agreed on the amount and now I have until the end of the week to get it approved. This morning I got my VP of Finance and my boss to approve it. Whew. Although, Eloisa my boss wants to talk about it after the fact. That one thing had been weighing on my mind for a while now. I can finally let it go. So you see I did focus on work a lot today and I actually did quite a bit done. A good thing too because I am working another short week this week. I'm going to have to take days off here and there because I'm starting to lose vacation hours. As it is I have a full 10 weeks unpaid vacation and I'm going to need to cash out a week when it becomes available. And so tonight I focused on getting my steps in while Johnnie kept bouncing up and down on that trampoline. He really DOES like that thing. He was bouncing so much he was getting sweaty and I guess that's ok too. He's a boy isn't he? Anyway I was counting on another good early night's sleep tonight. Except... <see tomorrow's entry>
So Johnnie birthday is all done, but not quite behind us. That won't be until this weekend when we have his official birthday get-together with Fei-fei and family on hand. And so we're back to the school routine this morning and I'm back to my normal taskmaster self. It wasn't lost on me that on his birthday yesterday I pushed Johnnie pretty hard on some lessons that weren't even part of his usual school lessons. I pushed him on math lessons that were already first grade level. I pushed him so hard he was almost in tears at some point. But I also want him to learn to be tough. Crying is ok, as long as he kept trying. And he did that. I wanted him to understand that sometimes it's not always all about fun and he needs to apply himself, a lesson his dad knows only all too well. A lesson his dad didn't learn until after college. And so I will push him so he learns to combine his already high intelligence with a work ethic. THAT part he will learn from both his dad and his mom. And coincidentally, today was also his scheduled DIBELS assessment. It's an assessment for early learning literacy skills. It lasted less than 10 minutes. I think he did well, at least in the reading part where he was rattling off all the words at the end of a minute. As you can see from the pictures I posted, I may have pushed him hard, but at the end of the day he just wanted my approval and he just wanted to hang around me whatever I was doing. That was why I sort of did whatever I could for work on the laptop right there on the couch so I could work within the same proximity. That was, until 3 PM where I had to do the Midweek huddle meeting. That was to follow up on the morning all-staff meeting, which was more of a motivational push for most of the staff. It's ok, I thought it was necessary for an organization like ours. People need to hear from their leaders. And our leaders need to show a good example, which is certainly NOT what is going on in the world today. Not here in the US, where we are being led by pretty much someone's old, angry grandpa. Lisa asked the question on Monday: why do we have to choose between 2 old fogies. Fair question. I think the answer is that mostly old people vote. If younger people voted more frequently and showed more interest, we'd have another Obama. That was why he won 12 years ago. I can't believe it's been that long. 12 years ago was the first time I heard one of his speeches at USC. Now we have someone trying to do a reality show from the White House. I've never been more embarassed to be an American as these days. Hopefully we can end the nightmare in less than a month from now. In the meantime, after the 3 o'clock meeting there was another meeting with the HIT Roundtable. We usually discuss the next month's meeting agenda and it usually does not last more than 20-25 minutes. Today it almost ran an hour! That's because I was pretty talkative. And I think I just got talked into doing a conference talk on why organizations should spend on IT Security. I mean it's such a slamdunk and I find it difficult to believe that kind of talk would still be necessary. But I guess it is. It's the kind of talk primarily directed to c-suites and I would be well qualified to make that kind of talk. Which is why I guess I was on that call that long. Johnnie almost gave up on me and kept walking in on my meeting. As soon as I got done, I quickly headed us out to Panda Express for the usual Wednesday night teriyaki chicken dinner. All I know was that I was at least doing my job today, even if I didn't seem like I got much done. Last Tuesday I also finally got a push to get that AT&T situation concluded once and for all. We had agreed on the amount and now I have until the end of the week to get it approved. This morning I got my VP of Finance and my boss to approve it. Whew. Although, Eloisa my boss wants to talk about it after the fact. That one thing had been weighing on my mind for a while now. I can finally let it go. So you see I did focus on work a lot today and I actually did quite a bit done. A good thing too because I am working another short week this week. I'm going to have to take days off here and there because I'm starting to lose vacation hours. As it is I have a full 10 weeks unpaid vacation and I'm going to need to cash out a week when it becomes available. And so tonight I focused on getting my steps in while Johnnie kept bouncing up and down on that trampoline. He really DOES like that thing. He was bouncing so much he was getting sweaty and I guess that's ok too. He's a boy isn't he? Anyway I was counting on another good early night's sleep tonight. Except... <see tomorrow's entry>
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