November 1st

Today marks the anniversary of my mother's birth. She was born on November 1st, 1945 in Nicaragua. I wouldn't be were I am today without her in my life. She's always there when I need her. Even when she's mad at me. We got her some cards, a cute little cake (like her) and a 3 piece luggage set. She was so happy with her stuff. I never forget her birthday, and thank God that I was able to show her how special she is to us.

November 1st isn't only the day my mom was born, but also the beginning of the holiday season for me. They started taking Thanksgiving turkey orders today at my store. The longest 2 months of my year are upon us. I usually get depressed this time of year. It never fails. This year I'm not as depressed as I am stressed. Since I'm at a new location, I'm really looking forward to see how our holidays will be. It's either going to be dead or overwhelming. Not sure what to expect. I do think my stress levels are too high. I need to control that before the holidays arrive, because it could kill me.

As you know yesterday was Halloween. My daughter was so excited. We were all off. So we spent the day together. My wife had a job interview (fingers crossed) out at Tyson's Corner Mall. Unfortunately it was scheduled for 4pm so we were stuck in traffic, going and coming. We regretted not telling the kid to dress up in her costume before we went to the mall. There were kids going from store to store getting candy, She wasn't upset though because she was ready for the real deal. We left the mall at 6 and got home right at 7. In our city they only allow kids to trick-or-treat until 8pm. She rushed and changed and headed out. That hour went by so fast. We were accompanied by my nieces and nephews. They had not been at our home in almost a month, since our falling out. It was nice to have them around. They had so much fun trick-or-treating with us.

After I got home I spoke to my boss. He updated me on what to expect this morning when I got to work. As soon as I got off the phone, my neck began to hurt. I had serious tension going on. I knew it was going to be a rough night. When I got up, my neck was still hurting. I get to work and realize that I had more work ahead of me then I expected. We had some big wigs coming to the store so we had to look tip top by the time they arrived. We were supposed to be ready no later then 8am. It was 9:30 and we were only 75% ready. I was so stressed. The managers kept coming to ask me when we were going to be ready. I was working as fast I as I could. Suddenly my neck tension went into my head. I haven't had a headache in years. As the morning when on, the tension nestled in my jaw. I though I was going to have a nervous breakdown. I kept thinking if I had anything in my stomach, I would have thrown up on the floor.

I wasn't tense because I was behind schedule. I wasn't tense because my bosses were down my throat. I was tense because I knew that no matter what I did or how I explained myself this fiasco would all be my fault. The leadership group met yesterday to plan for this and instructions were given to the evening crew so they could get things ahead for us in the morning. We still weren't ready when we were supposed to. The thing is I'm supposed to be proving myself right now. I'm trying to get a promotion. This makes me look bad. It makes it look like I'm not ready to be a team leader. In my mind, I could hear the leadership group commenting that this is what they expected from me. They wanted my boss to be there, and expected him to do a much better job. I shifted into overdrive and put out fires by order of urgency. There were only two of us. It would have taken at least 3 people to get the job done in time. In the first 3 hours I set the full service meat case and he twisted cut and loaded 17 flavors of fresh made sausage. Not to mention filling the self service chicken and smoked meat case. I still had to grind and wrap meat.

At 9:30 our seasoned ready to cook meats display was untouched. This accounts for a third of our full service display. The store leaders kept coming by to ask us when we were going to the case finished. I felt my hole getting deeper and deeper. When I finished grinding meat and he finished setting the sausage case. We each took a side of the seasoned meats display. A job that usually takes one person 2 plus hours we had to do in 30 minutes. I don't how we got threw, but we did. Then we wrapped the ground meats, I filled the freezers and tightened up all loose ends. Just in time because soon after, the a regional VP walked our department, and mention we looked great. After that one of our regional coordinators showed up. I knew I was in for it now. I filled him in on what was going on. He told me that with all that happened we looked pretty good. I was so relieved.

I felt like I was going to die today. Or maybe I wished I would so I wouldn't have to answer for this. When my boss arrived I told him everything that happened. He was livid. It wasn't because we didn't get the case in on time. It was because he left explicite instructions the night before. He told them that we had some special visitors coming and they needed to get us ahead. I'm not sure what happened, but when we got there this morning, it was mess. We had to start behind the gun. Even if they had only twisted, cut and filled the sausages, it would have saved us 2 hours. It was a bad situation. We did our best. I think at the end of the day, the leadership team realized that it wasn't I (or us) that the dropped the ball. They saw that we put all our efforts into making the department look like it was supposed to, even thought we had a serious handicap.

After work I came home to wait for my mom so we could celebrate her birthday. I felt like crap all afternoon. I even put am ice pack on my neck. I was even instructed to go to the emergency room by more then one person. After we ate cake I told my mom of my ailment. She gave me some ibruprofene. I ate some great black bean pupusas. Since then I relaxed a bit. I'm not sure if it was the medicine or the relaxation but I feel alot better. After I finish this I will try to get a good nights sleep and start anew tomorrow. All in all I think today was a red letter day for me. I'm only human but I will not let that hold me back. Goodnight.