I Love My Job

MFCU: Rusty's Retirement Lunch

Kerry Gallegos, Sam Battaglia, ?, Rusty Isacson, Linda Snow, Me, Robert Steed, Darrin Williams, Brendan Call, Coy Acocks

Rusty retired from MFCU, which, of course, meant Chinese Buffet.

I seriously don't know what it is about these guys and chinese buffet food, but there it is, and there it always will be.

Rusty is on to a grand adventure of opening his own batteries+ store.

And I missed these guys terribly.  How grateful I am they still let me join them for lunch occasionally.

Total Eclipse 2017

A total eclipse happened in August (2017).  While we weren't in the totality zone, we still say quite a bit of it.  It was strange that the world seemed to have a filter on it as everything became, not shady, but muted in color and vibrance.  And the temperature dropped noticeably.  I was staffing the Mayor at a few different schools as we checked out what they were doing for the eclipse.

Shantytown

Back in October I had the opportunity to go with work and help clean up a section of the Jordan River that had been taken over by homeless encampments.  These encampments had been well established and been there for a very long time.  The police had already given notice that this would happen so there were no homeless people on site when we were there.

However, the conditions of it left me very emotional.  Perhaps somber and contemplative would be better words.  Definitely reflective.

I am so incredibly grateful for the blessings in my life that have allowed me so much luxury.  A home.  Food.  Clothing.  Shelter, security, warmth, love, and hope. 

It was an experience that I will never forget.

Graduation: Finally.

I graduated with my Bachelor's Degree in Information Technology in September of 2017.

And I could not ask for a better support system in my life, from my family who were solid for me the entire way, to my co-workers who cheered me on.

And I can't believe it's done.  

I have a college degree.

My College Degree at Work

The day I finished my last college class was surreal.

Surreal.

It's taken me months to grasp that I don't have homework.  That I don't have some looming project or deadline hanging in the back of my mind.

The day after I finished my classes, and became official done, finished, graduated, if you will, because I was not planning on walking so what else was there, I found myself in a back stairwell trying to pry the Mayor's stuck key out of a back entry door.

So let it be known that this is what a college degree gets you.

The One Where I Rode in a Helicopter

Working with the Mayor has given me some incredible opportunities.

(Let's take a moment to still appreciate that I met Captain Kirk and Luke Skywalker)

In the summer of 2015 I found myself on another first for me.  Another great opportunity in the name of "staffing the Mayor."

For the County Fair the Mayor is asked to participate in so many ways, and on this one I got to ride in a helicopter over the Salt Lake Valley.

Can I just say that we live in a beautiful valley?

MFCU

Working for the Attorney General's Office in the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit was an incredible experience.

The Director, Robert Steed, took a leap with me as I still had a short resume from returning to work after being a stay at home mom for so long, and my accounts payable experience at Burt Brother's certainly wasn't helping me any.

I know I was blessed throughout the application process of this job, I felt the guidance of the Spirit and have no doubt that I was not alone in that process.  I was desperate to find a new place to work as Burt Brother's was overall, a toxic place to work.

And Robert was desperate to find someone who was "nice" as they had just gone rounds with someone who wasn't.

So in the end, it didn't really matter what my resume was, aside from getting me past the initial electronic screening process, once we met and they realized we could get along... the rest is history.

I learned a lot about working in government (which helped me immensely in my current job with the Mayor), about legal processes, and about investigations.  I was able to help in all of these areas, and also the auditing side.

I felt I was valued, and found a friend in each and every co-worker.

I miss that group.

They're good people, and I'm thankful for social media so we can still keep track of each other.

Robert, Cord, Bob, Coy, me, Linda, KayeLynn, Valerie, Darrin, Mike, Brendan, Rusty, Sam

We took this photo on my last day in the office.

While I miss them, and the change of job was extremely intimidating and scary at the time, I certainly don't regret the change.  It was difficult to find a way to move "up" or "forward" in MFCU, so I had to do that elsewhere.

My life has been blessed with a string of incredible experiences and steps, and I'm grateful to the Lord for His hand in my life.

Prom 2016

Before I begin this "catch up" post, I have two current complaints about my job.

And to be clear, it has nothing to do with my boss, my co-workers, my office, or even my actual daily grind except that I have to deal with these two things repeatedly in my daily grind:

1. The double meeting.  As in, can the Mayor participate in this event for us?  Yes?  Great.  We need a meeting to tell him more about it.

No you don't.  You do not need a meeting to tell him about the meeting.  Please just send me the information via email.

Thanks.

2. Entitled constituents.

We've all heard the rant about entitled politicians that only work for themselves, and that's true, they do exist.  However, I happen to work for a genuinely good politician who is in it for all the right reasons (and takes a lot of rebuke for it), so when I get a call from an angry constituent that goes something along the lines of, "I live in the County, I pay my taxes, I'm a voter, I refuse to speak with anyone else, I will not share my information with you, only the Mayor, and he owes me this," and they're speaking very heatedly and their words are dripping with contempt, then I just want to politely tell them that if they can't "help me help them," then there's really not much I can do for them, because frankly, paying your taxes and being a registered voter, does not enable you to be a pompous jerk.  Period.

And with that my rant is over.

I want to catch up on a post from prom. Prom from 2016 that is.  I posted about how Max asked Casidee here, but never followed up with actual prom pictures.

Seeing as Casidee will be attending Prom 2017 tomorrow, I suppose it's only proper to get Prom 2016 on the blog so I can move on.

We learned a lot about dress shopping last year.  That prom dresses cost upwards of hundreds of dollars (are you kidding me?), and every dress that caught her eye far exceeded the cost of my ( I thought) generous budget of $150.  However, we did eventually get tipped off to a cute dress "shop" that rents dresses out of a lady's basement.  The basement is packed full, and I mean full of dresses to rent, and all were $150 or less.

So there you have it, choose any dress you desire.

We went back there this year and they do not disappoint.

Max and Casidee have been good friends forever.

For. ev. er.

If you're missing the Sandlot reference, we can't be friends.

Max wanted to take someone to prom that he could just be chill and have some fun with.  It was perfect.  And they decided to have some fun with the flowers while they were at it.

It fit them perfectly.

They went on a hike, toured around downtown, took pictures, ate at The Roof, went to the dance, and then bowled.

And now an onslaught of pictures.