Hello everyone! Let’s grab some coffee and have our monthly catch up session!

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Coming out of BirthMay, I feel like I have nothing really that new to share but hey, we have to have coffee, right? Today, I’m enjoying a homemade coffee from my Keurig.

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If we were having coffee I’d tell you, all about my new job! I’m so excited to be working again that I can’t stop talking about it. I’m now an Academic and Finance Advisor for an online university. I think that I am a sort of odd one out in a way already, and not just because I’m the newbie. I’ve noticed a lot of the other advisors have a career goal to be an advisor. A lot of them view this position as a stepping stone to get experience as an advisor and move onto advisor positions on college campuses or with high schoolers and such. For me, it was not my goal to be an advisor, my goal was to 1) find a job that would pay me decently, 2) do something useful, 3) work remotely. I think this job fits those goals perfectly, and while I don’t particularly dream of being an advisor, I do like the sound of it so far. I do think that if I had gotten this job even two years ago I would have felt weird about being in the job more or less on “accident” when other people are out there dreaming of my job. But I’ve been in need of a job for so long and I think I will be good at it, so I really don’t mind being the weird one out on this!

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, what I don’t necessarily love about my new job. I am someone who loves efficiency. So I was so surprised at how much of this job is NOT efficient. The advisors send so many emails to their students and none of them can be BCC blasts, they all have to be individually sent, even if the names were personalized. There’s also a lot of manual calculations that we have to make for financial aid which is just insane to me. In training, I can see that even though it’s easy, it does take up quite a bit of time. Especially since the advisors all recommend double checking the numbers. I find it weird that there isn’t some sort of automatic system that can calculate that and put in financial aid requests automatically. Like, I don’t want to complain at work about the lack of efficiencies as then I worry I’d be out of a job if more updated processes were put in place. And plus, I don’t know enough about this to know if it’s industry standard or not. But it does seem wild at how much is so manual and not streamlined.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, how repotting my plants went horribly wrong. So last month I finally had to repot some of my plants into bigger pots. They were seriously outgrowing their pots! I have five indoor plants and four of them were in dire need of repotting, while the fifth needed more soil. I repotted my Calathea plants first. Those were quick and easy as they went from a more shallow 6 inch pots to tall 7-8 inch pots. I then repotted my new fern from a 4 inch pot to one of the shallow 6 inch pots, and then moved my tiny snake plant from a 2 inch pot to the fern’s old 4 inch pot. So that was all fine and dandy! But then I had to add soil to my fiddle leaf fig’s pot. I started to move the pot and tried to carry it down but it was really heavy because I could hear water sloshing around at the bottom of the pot. I hadn’t realized it was pooled down there! So I carefully and slowly moved it down. As I got to the patio door though, I went too fast and the pot tilted forward. The water all rushed forward too and as it was too heavy it swung out of my hands and crashed down! My poor fiddle leaf fig! Two leaves immediately broke off and the rest of the plant was in terrible shape. These plants are so delicate and I was finally seeing a ton of growth so my heart just sank. I still added more soil, and realized that the soil in general was soaked still even though the last time I’d watered the plant was a week ago. I think because the water was sloshing around it got soaked again so I just removed a ton of the wet soil, added more dry soil, and put the plant back in. Overall it looks okay and my fingers are crossed that the plant wasn’t too badly damaged. I’ll have to be much more careful in both watering it and next time I move it!

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, how excited I am to be going back to ballet! Last week I didn’t have class, as it was our “break” in between sessions. But I’m super excited as I’ll finally be fully vaccinated and can go without the mask! I was given the option to go without it last time as the instructor wasn’t strict about it but I preferred to follow the rules. I think I’ll still wear a mask in the building when outside of the studio, and still wear a mask indoors at stores and such, but otherwise in ballet I think I will take it off.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, that this month is my self-imposed deadline to pick a city to move to in Texas. I have felt called to Texas for a long time. San Antonio was my top choice for a long time, and I even went to visit the city for a week a few years ago. It didn’t feel like it was the right fit, although I did really like the city. Right now, Austin is my top pick, and it sort of came out of no where! Now I’m trying to decide if I do want to go to San Antonio, which I know I’ll like enough, or Austin, which I think would be a better fit based on my research but I’ve never been there! I don’t really want to go to Austin just to check it out right now, as we are still in pandemic times so I feel like I wouldn’t get a real experience of the city anyway. So basically if I pick Austin I’d be moving there and hoping for the best. But I figured, if I don’t like it then I can just move again!

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, another thing I thought about now that I work in higher education. I know, I keep going back to that topic but I’m obsessed with it right now! So, when talking to people at my new job, I am always asked stuff along the lines of how I found the job, why I wanted it, and my background in general. I always say I went to school for business, got my MBA in 2019, worked in event management for five years, and then I was furloughed when the pandemic began. After my story, most people will then ask if I would ever go back to events, sometimes directly and sometimes less so, but it is always something they’re curious about. My answer is always the same and completely honest. At this point, I don’t think so! Maybe if it was the right opportunity I’d consider it, as I did love the travel aspect and the passion behind the events I was working on. But for the most part, when I consider it, I think that I’ve already “been there, done that”. It seems weird to want to go back to events when I’ve already explored that world. I did enjoy it at the time, but it was time to move on. I never mention the toxicity of the company I work at as I would 100% never go back to that company, but the industry in general was cool and I did like it. But even then, I wanted to experience something new anyway! I’m excited to learn about higher education and see this new industry.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, that my budgeting plan is going well! May was the first month that I really created a budget and focused on it, which was nerve-wracking. I guess I always viewed a budget as limiting myself. But in reality, I didn’t really notice it. I think my budget is still quite generous for my lifestyle, which has grown quite simple, so I don’t really mind the limits I gave myself. I’m sure that once I move to Texas and have more expenses such as restaurants or more travel around the area, it will be a different story though!

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, how astrology keeps finding it’s way into my life. I was recently talking to a new coworker who I’d had only a few interactions with, so it’s not like he knows me well at all. During the conversation he asked me if I was a Leo, which made me laugh! If you read my post about my “big 3” signs, you’ll know what I’m talking about. So I told him that I’m a Taurus, which he refused to believe. But then I did admit that I am a Leo rising, and I do resonate with that quite strongly so it’s funny to me that he picked up on it. Plus, I recently tried to learn more about the rest of my birth chart, but I feel more confused now because I tried two different sites which gave me different placements for a lot of the planets. I felt that I could agree and disagree with portions of both, so now I’m just so confused! Maybe I should finally get someone who knows more about my birth chart to read it LOL.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, about my new yearly goal of creating peace. I think I’ve been doing pretty well with this one! I’m focused on creating a nice, stress free evening routine to wind down with on work days in particular. I already have a pretty good morning routine and I like my weekends to be more restorative. I do think that once more places are open and, of course, when I move to Texas I’ll want to explore my new home more on weekends or evenings, but for now, I want to make sure I’m focused on self-care at home.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you, about my 2021 resolution/goal, to foster positivity. I think I’ve done well with this one lately! All in May I knew I was starting a new job so I was busy getting everything set up and then started to work and train. I am honestly so grateful to be working again, so it’s been so easy to keep a positive mindset about it. I do think I’ll like the job and I want to be sure that I’m keeping a positive mindset when I go about it!

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So that’s what I would share if we were having coffee! Let me know what you’d share with me for our monthly coffee chat.

Thanks for reading!

Pamela

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