Overadvertised and underfunded

So I really need to mow the back lawn and keep the dandelions from fully flowering and then turning into white puffballs. But it keeps raining, and so I can't mow my lawn. (That's my story and I'm sticking to it.)

I finally gave in and made a checklist of all the things I have to do over the next few months, from larger to smaller. It is helping. I'm keeping track of things better, and figuring out how to break down some of the bigger bits into subtasks and then finishing those up. While I have sold a home and moved before, and I have moved across international borders, it's been 25 years and a lot less stuff ago. Also, I'll be crossing a border with three more cats than I did from the US into Canada. (I remember Bear being quite happy to sit in the passenger's lap, looking out the window and climbing all over the UHaul's cabin while Beep stayed in her carrier in the footwell.) And instead of 1500 miles, I'll be going twice that far. I'm planning carefully, and building in some rest days, and splurging and staying in hotels that cater to US tourists and so will have slightly nicer beds (IHG here I come) but I do hope that I'll be able to make the drive without breaking down and crying. If I need to take an extra day along the way, I can - I'll just reschedule the next stops - but I'm hoping not to have to do that too soon in the trip.

A lot of the folks that I work with have similar concerns: the chronic understaffing and sudden unexplained changes in schedule are making us make more mistakes - which is bad both because we all want to do good work, but also because too many mistakes will lose us customer confidence AND annoy the teams working with us. But, see, if we don't have sufficient staffing levels, but they still put more work onto our team, they need to expect that we have to start delivering less quickly and in smaller chunks to do better QA on the work as we do it, in anticipation of our making errors and attempting to catch them before the final handoff. We're all in agreement. It's the accounting folks that seem to think that we're okay with things. I'm ready to start a countdown and a personal betting pool: will they authorize a backfill for us before one of us quits in dismay/disgust; and if not, who will be the back-breaking straw.

Dashcam! I need to get a dashcam. Another item for the list. Fricklefrack.

I've gotten three virtual surveys, and received two quotes. I have a final virtual survey tomorrow, and I'm hoping to have all the quotes by the end of next week so that I can make a decision. I've researched all four of the companies and none of them seems obviously worse or better than the others, but I've gotten one rather outrageous quote from Company A and I started the process feeling more comfortable with Company B (whose quote I haven't yet gotten). Luckily they're all making it fairly easy to compare the quotes apples-to-apples, which makes the comparison calculus easier.

My home is almost "staged", and while I have some final painting to do, most of the pre-sale tarting up is done. And happily I have receipts of all the various maintenance that I've done since I bought this place, which will help buyers feel good about how well the house has been kept up.

But I'm still ready for this whole process to be done!

No, recruiters.

I do not want to be part of a "challenging" team.

I'm in my mid-50s. I want to be part of a "mature" team, a "powerful" team with a large and well-managed "throughput", a "structured" team that knows how to use processes to quickly and accurately handle the Same Stuff Happens Every Week so that when someone else comes screaming in with their ass on fire babbling about something someone else broke and We Need To Document This Thing NOW NOW NOW, one or two of us can calmly turn from our current tasks, neatly and quickly handle La Emergencia, and calm the panicked person's heartrate without raising our own.

I'm old. Fuck "ambition". I just want a good paycheck and no dumbass "this REALLY could have been avoided" hasslepanic.

(originally posted July 3 2023, over on my fediverse account)