Ways to procrastinate at work

Lately, I’ve been a really great procrastinator. Here are the top 10 ways I’ve been spending too much time at work. How do you procrastinate? Add your’s in the comments section!

(Note: My productivity will get better. I’m determined.)

In no particular order:

1. Make a Starbucks run. (Or two, or three)

2. Check perezhilton.com repeatedly. Despite the fact I find the majority of his comments to be rude and arrogant, he does update frequently.

3. Visit people.com. Not as many stories as perezhilton, but fun photo galleries.

4. Find out what’s going on with the world other than celebrity news at cnn.com.

5. Play around on facebook.

6. Blog.

7. Chat with work friends.

8. Pay bills. Somehow it feels better to spend “work” time doing this…

9. Shop online.

10. Job hunt – because it’s always good to keep your options open.

Regola seeks to expunge charges

According to the AP, PA Senator Bob Regola wants to “erase all records of [his] arrest, including his mug shot and fingerprints.”

This is ludacris. He was charged with felonies and now wants to act like nothing ever happened? Not guilty does not mean innocent. Remember O.J. Simpson?

I’m sure the Farrell family would like to expunge this whole tragedy from existence, too. But, they can’t…they lost a son.

Summertime

I like the New Kids on the Block song Summertime.

It’s catchy, and I find myself humming along when it comes on the radio.

What is wrong with me?!

And, did I just admit that?!

Apparently, my music taste has not changed much since the sixth grade when I was in love with Donnie.

The Allegheny County Drink Tax

It’s been a long day and a fun evening…I’m quite tired. 

There’s a lot about Pittsburgh politics/government that don’t make sense to me.  The drink tax is one thing.  I don’t think it’s fair that every person who wants to enjoy a glass of wine or beer or whatever inside the Allegheny county lines should have to fund the Port Authority.  It’s not fair that small business owners are forced to charge higher prices.  Public Transportation is important, but it is not a given, and when a public agency has been mismanaged for so long, why is it my responsibility, as an occasional drinker, to pay for it?  Or why is a restaurant owner – a person taking a financial risk yet trying to contribute to the county’s economy – responsible?

But, that’s not even my biggest problem with the whole issue.  Lately, groups have been pushing to get the drink tax on a ballot this November.  Wow–what a modern notion…let the VOTERS decide if they want their drinks to be taxed in order to fund anything – let alone a corrupt Port Authority. 

Leave it to Pittsburgh and Allegheny County to screw that up.  Shady Dan Onorato and his cronies have somehow fixed it so the referendum that was up for vote tonight goes something like this:  voters can vote to have the drink tax…OR have their property taxes increased.

WHAT?

For those of you unfamiliar with Allegheny County politics, property taxes are a hot issue around here.  I guess because they were being raised and raised a few years back because the morons running this area have no idea what they’re doing.

Anyway, I need to read up more on the issue and all of the proceedings (which I will do, don’t you worry!).  But I would like to ask these crazy politicians one thing – particularly Dan Onorato (who thinks he’s PA’s Governor-in-training):  why does repealing the drink tax automatically mean that property taxes have to be raised?  I don’t see or understand the correlation to a tax on drinks (that are already taxed once through the state’s liquor system - don’t get me started on that) and property taxes.  I understand that decades of fraud and bad behavior at the Port Authority have caused the agency to be totally strapped for cash.  I don’t agree with funding it through taxation, but I’ll save that argument for later.  I don’t see how there are just NO OTHER OPTIONS other than two – drink or property taxes – to fund the county’s transportation. 

Dan, can you please explain that to me?  Because from where I’m sitting, it just looks like you and your County Council buddies are dropping the property tax card just to make sure the drink tax isn’t repealed. 

Crappy Headlines

In today’s 24-7 news cycle, everyone with a web site or TV channel is constantly vying for our attention – which means headlines and leads are more important than ever. But lately, I’ve been feeling that the media either thinks we’re stupid, or they are too lazy to try and come up with a good, solid and accurate headline.

For example, a couple weeks ago I read an AP headline: Dungy hopes Manning recovers quickly from surgery. Really? That’s absolutely shocking that a head football coach would hope that his MVP Super Bowl-winning quarterback would recover quickly from surgery. How is that even “news?” Even if this is just a typical update story on Peyton Manning’s recovery, couldn’t they have done better? I don’t know about you, but that headline irritates me so much that I didn’t even bother reading the article.

Friday, post-gazette.com had an article in prominent placement on their home page titled Poverty leads to playing lottery, study says. So you mean being filthy rich and having more money than you know what to do with doesn’t cause you to play the lottery?! Get out of here! I didn’t read the article – I just wondered who authorized and spent money on such a stupid study that really just stated the obvious.

Sometime last fall, it was all over the news that Elisabeth Hasselbeck was taking a maternity leave from The View. She was pregnant with her second child at the time. It had to have been a slow news week for that to even be considered news – or a headline. What pregnant working woman doesn’t take a maternity leave? Now there’s something to write about – and an appealing headline!

And, I could go on and on with examples.

Today, Adele handed me a section from yesterday’s New York Times, and as I was glancing through it, I couldn’t help but love every single headline I read. From Putting the Dream Car Out to Pasture to Blogging’s Glass Ceiling to The Breakups That Got Under My Skin – they all enticed me and made me want to at least find out what the article was about.

Wait a minute – isn’t that the purpose of a headline?!

Maybe I’m just weird (wait – don’t answer that). I don’t know if it’s because I’m a marketer/writer that I notice these things, but better headlines would make the world such a much more interesting place. Or something like that

Restaurant Review: Cafe Allegro

There’s nothing better than Friday night date night.  Brad and I were starving after a long week and decided to go out to dinner. 

We had tried Cafe Allegro about a year ago after we first moved to the South Side.  The food was amazing but our server was terrible.  We sat there without wine from before our entrees were brought out until we finally flagged him down for the check.  Our appitizer and salad came out at the same time…very annoying especially at a nice restuarant.  But, the food was so delicious, we were willing to give it another try.

I started with their homemade white sangria.  It was fruity and refreshing…I just don’t think there was any alcohol it it.  After three glasses, I didn’t even feel a faint buzz.  Brad had the house cabernet and thought it was decent.

He tried the Allegro Salad and really liked it.  For dinner, he had the seafood stew dish and ate every bite of that.  Even the oysters, his least favorite type of seafood, were good…and gone.

I’m the type of person who finds a dish I like and then sticks with it.  The pasta I had previously was one of the best pasta dishes I’d ever had.  I immediately found it on the menu and couldn’t wait.  The second time around, the Pasta Del Sol didn’t dissappoint.  The sundried tomatoes had a really rich taste.  The cream sauce covered the penne noodles pefectly – I’m not a fan of tons of sauce.  It was a filling but very good meal.  Brad tried some and defintely agreed!

Our service this time was much better…exactly what you’d expect from a more upscale restaurant.  Our wine and water glasses were never empty, plates were promptly removed from the table and our server was friendly and helpful.

I’d give this experience four stars out of five.  We’ll definitely be back!

Not a fan of Gmail

I switched to gmail last fall when my Yahoo! account was acting up. I wasn’t getting all of my messages, and multiple emails to Yahoo! support didn’t get me any where. They kept saying there wasn’t a problem. But, since I know there was, I jumped ship.

Since I love just about everything about Google, I thought I’d give Gmail a shot. I created an account and sent out the mass email to everyone letting them know my email had changed. What a pain that is.

Almost from the beginning, I sensed that Gmail wasn’t that great. I couldn’t figure out how to organize my messages into folders. Then I realized that folders didn’t exist, and I had a small panic attack. I live for organizaing my documents, emails, everything into folders. I have a system, and it works quite well for me. So this notion of having to use labels with all of your messages still staying in your inbox is completely contrary to how I operate. Massive inboxes scare me and make me feel unorganized.

I mentioned this to a colleague a few weeks ago, and she said something about being able to create a label and then archive it so you can keep your inbox manageable. What? That sounds like an awful lot of work when I really just want to drag and drop my messages into a stupid folder!

I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to change my email address AGAIN. But this out-of-control inbox is starting to really irritate me. And, I can’t seem to find messages that well with their supposed state-of-the-art email search.

So frustrating.

Did John Peck f-up the Louis Farrell case?

As if that question could be any more rhetorical. But, watch the below video starting at about 6:45…very interesting insights into how this whole situation was inappropriately handled from the very beginning.

http://www.wpxi.com/video/16946068/index.html

It’s so sad that elected officials – who we, as citizens, are supposed to put our trust in, cannot handle their jobs and act shady. This case is about the tragic death of a 14 year old boy. Getting to the bottom of what happened was their job, and they didn’t do that. Anyone who votes to re-elect either Regola or Peck (when/if he runs) is an absolute moron, in my mind.

Clarification: the road to (my) happiness

When I blogged today about my twenties being over, I hope I didn’t leave the impression that I’m unhappy. Because I’m not. I have a really good life – an awesome boyfriend of almost seven years, family, lots of friends, the world’s cutest puppy, a job, my health and so much more.

The purpose of examining where I’m at right before I reach 30 is to make sure I’m on track to remain happy. I used my career as an example to show how I got to where I’m at and if I’m happy enough where I’m at to keep going along the same route. Yes, today, I am happy with my career and how far I have brought it over the last six years. But for me to be able to answer that question the same way two, three, five, ten years from now, I think I need to consciously be aware of where I’m at and where I want to be.

Does that make sense? This was a lot of reflection for one day…

Who stole my 20’s?

Earlier this month, I started the last year of my twenties. Except for the occasional conversation with Gabby about how we should celebrate my 30th in Vegas, I’m not handling the whole getting older phenomenon too well.

I am now obsessing over different aspects of my life, like my career, relationship and financial situation, and starting to wonder where the hell my twenties went. Some days, I feel like I’m happy and right where I should be, and others, I want to cry for hours over the fact that I’m going to be 30 in less than a year and don’t have a whole lot to show for it.

Take my career for example. As I mentioned before, I majored in political science. I chose this major because I was going to be a foreign ambassador and speak several different languages fluently. Well, those language classes took up a ton of time, and the credits didn’t go towards fulfilling requirements, so I stopped taking them. Then my attention switched to law school, and I decided that I was going to be the next great prosecutor and put all the bad guys away. A personal situation involving the criminal justice system was enough to make me run away screaming from that potential career path – and to never look back.

Then, my senior year, I took a political communications class and fell in love with it. It combined my interests in government, politics and the law with my natural ability to communicate. I wanted to be a political consultant and work on campaigns, write speeches, deal with the press and all of that other fun stuff.

When I graduated, I decided to stay in Pittsburgh – and since there really aren’t too many political consulting jobs here – let alone entry level ones that paid, I had to figure something out and fast. I had always been good at marketing and PR and had done a lot of volunteer work in those fields. So, I thought I would pursue “communications” as a job to get experience in that part of political consulting.

I spent a year and a half in a horrible job as a marketing assistant for an insurance brokerage firm. It was straight out of Office Space. They didn’t have a lot of marketing needs. I was constantly bored and made things up to do, and the older women in the office treated me like garbage.

My next job was perfect – on paper. I did marketing communications and online business development for a large media company. I got a ton of really great experience, met smart and respected people in the field and built up a pretty decent portfolio. I left after three years for two main reasons: my boss was a narcissistic, micromanaging, menopausal bitch and the industry’s stability was constantly in question – therefore my salary and benefits weren’t great.

Next up – my current job is in online marketing and public relations at a very well known institution. It’s been great on several levels. I can take graduate classes for free at a prestigious university. My hours are flexible. I get paid competitively. But, I’m doing marketing and pr for an organization that, for the most part, doesn’t want publicity or exposure. And the few programs that do want and desperately need marketing, have no money to pay for it. I’m good, but I’m not so good that I can magically and for free accomplish what a $50,000 (or more) campaign could do.

This whole debacle got me thinking about marketing, pr, advertising, etc as a whole. Is this really what I want to spend the rest of my life doing? Spinning products or news to make something look good or stand out? The answer is no. Unless it was for something that I really, truly believed in.

So what do I want to do with my career? I spent my twenties saying, “I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.” That seemed to work. It was true, and in the marketing field, there are a lot of different options of what you “can be.”

But now it kind of feels like I should have it narrowed down to more of a path or two. I’m just not entirely sure what those paths should be. I like to write. I think I’d like to teach college courses. But write what? Teach what? I have the opportunity to get my Master’s FOR FREE – but I don’t know what I want to get it in…I don’t think I want to pigeonhole myself into this marketing field too much more. I’m interested in other things like history and public policy, but marketing is where my experience is.

I’m panicking about this now because I’m completely afraid of waking up one day and being 40 or 50 and not happy with the career – and life – path I chose.