Still no time to try on the wetsuit

I’m helping to create training materials, taking the courses on the software, and supposedly giving a lesson on clear writing with a purpose for our new tech support people. If I have time to organize my thoughts.

My contract has been extended

My initial contract was for six weeks, ending August 8. It’s now been doubled to September 19. Our team is creating a wiki and writing training materials for a technical support group with many varied applications to support.

New office

I’ve started my new office. It seems as if the work will be an interesting challenge, and the team and management support is great!

New contract

Enough piecework! Tomorrow I’m starting a short, but full-time contract.

Getting Things Done, the roadmap

We’re attending the GTD Roadmap course:

The flagship of the GTD (Getting Things Done) seminar series, The RoadMap defines the game and helps you jump into it at a new and expanded level. This lively one-day workshop features David Allen live and in-person as he examines the core principles of productivity improvement, then provides you with a unique opportunity to develop your own specific and immediate action steps to implement them.

Participants can expect to leave the seminar with enhanced freedom and energy, knowing that their busy lives are indeed manageable, inspired to enjoy life and work at a new level of effectiveness.

Hours: 9 to 5.

STC planning meeting

I’m off to a meeting of the Toronto Society for Technical Communication executive council, to help plan the meetings or “events” for the coming year.

What to do while unemployed

This came up in a BookCrossing discussion. My answer follows.

• Plan your garden? If it’s warm enough, plant a few things. Tell the people at the garden store that you’re looking for a new job.
• If you have TV, turn on some of the daytime exercise shows and bounce along with them.
• Start a daily stretching session- it will make you feel years younger. (Whartons’ stretch book is good–active isolated stretching or some such.)
• When you can leave the house, walk at least 3 miles a day (1 hour at a reasonably brisk pace) – but start off with five days of 20-minute walks and 5 days of 30-minute walks to get acclimatized.
• “Edit” your closets by passing along things you don’t wear, things you always put back for next time, things that itch, shrink, wrinkle at a hard look, or simply don’t flatter you. Compare them to clothes worn by people in the next level up of your profession.
• If there’s a public pool, swim. Tell the people you meet at the pool that you can swim during the day because you’re between jobs right now, and you’re looking for a new opportunity.
• Review what’s going on in your industry or one you’d like to be in and find out what skills you’ll need over the next few years.
• Phone your employed friends, meet them for coffee, and ask what’s going on in their lives. Let them know you’re looking for work. Maybe they’ll have heard of something.
• Learn to draw.
• Mend things that need mending or throw them out.
• Re-write your résumé.
• Find out what school at The Boy’s next level of school is going to need by the time he gets there, and work with parents who are there now to help provide it. Mentiond that you’re looking for work.
• Once Boy is well, run round and do all your long-term errands such as dentist, doctor, floor polishing, renew professional memberships, plan next year’s vacation. (Pitch tent in backyard? Need tent!)

I talk a good game, don’t I?

Whither STC?

Bill Swallow’s Waxing TechComm is hosting a continued discussion of the direction of and appropriate strategies for the Society for Technical Communication.

Back at work

If you notice a decline in the number or quality of my blog entries, it’s because I’ve started a new contract and expect to be very busy for the next little while. It’s difficult to be perky and attentive at work, learn a new raft of acronyms, faces, office maze, systems, and methods. I tend to come home and crawl into bed right after supper, neglecting chores such as hydrating the cat or digging up vital paperwork. Blogging has to come third or fourth after important family tasks, especially until I get into the rhythm of a new project.

New contract forthcoming

In between running back and forth to visit my dad, I’ve been sending a few resumes and going to interviews. Happily for me, one of them has come to roost and I will be starting a new, short contract, not quite full time, which suits me perfectly at this moment.

I’m skipping the technical writers’ meeting tonight to stay home and snuggle in for the next winter storm. My dad died on the tenth, and somehow I don’t feel like socializing.