Invasion of the Job Snatchers

If you live close to Idaho, chances are you've heard about the lay offs happening in the company that employs me. There are about 80 people being laid off in Boise and forty in Minneapolis. And lucky me, it's pretty much my whole department. I am lucky that we weren't just given pink slips and escorted out of the building. They've just given us fair warning and individualized timelines so far. The first wave goes sometime in the third quarter. We've just started our second quarter today, so they've got about 3 to 6 months left. Another wave will go in the fourth quarter. I'm lucky enough to be in the first quarter of next fiscal year (which runs from the end of Feb. through the beginning of June), so at least I'll still have my maternity leave. I was planning on taking the full 12 weeks of FMLA, but I don't want to get laid off while I'm gone. So I'm not sure what will happen, but at least I have a little time. There are a lot of people that don't have that luxury.

We all kind of expected to get laid off eventually when our company was purchased by another company. But we thought our jobs would be moved to their headquarters in Minneapolis. I certainly didn't expect this. If you didn't catch it in the news, all our jobs are being outsourced to India. Which is great for India, but it really sucks for our economy, you know? Our CEO just kind of shrugged it off as "well, everyone is doing it". It disappoints me, quite frankly. I can understand the company trying to cut costs, but obviously "cost" to them is only calculated in dollars.

I do want to say that the company has treated me very well thus far. If it weren't for their totally rockin' health coverage, I wouldn't be getting fat with baby right now. I will always thank them for that. But I will also always be disappointed at the loss American jobs to try and save an extra buck (or a few mill, whatever). It's also disappointing that they've taken so many jobs out of the valley. This company was built here. Granted, new company is not the one who ran it into the ground, but a lot of people shop there as part of a kind of local pride. And now a lot of people won't be shopping there because so many people know people who have been affected by this new occurrence.

Anyway, enough of that mess. I have to think about it all day at work every day. Let's talk about this baby, shall we? I forget how big I've gotten until I lay down in the bed at night. Then I feel huge. Of course, I realize I'm nowhere near how big I will become in the coming months. It's just kind of a shock to look in the mirror because, well, my belly is a lot bigger than it was a few months ago, or even a few weeks ago. Check it out. I don't think it's much bigger than last time, but this is at 19 weeks.


My knockas look smaller now, though. I had to give up my fancy Victoria's Secret bra that made them look fantastic. Now I wear a nursing bra that's a little too big (you know, room to grow. please?). Ah, so glamorous! This baby has been moving around like kuurazy. I feel flutters and bumps all the time now. It's pretty awesome. Sprout's activities still can't be felt from the outside, though. And they're still sooooo unpredictable. But it makes me happy to feel them. Everything about this pregnancy has made me happy. I don't even care that I peed on myself a couple of times when I got really sick last week (note to self: you should really do those kegel exercises for more than just labor preparation...). Luckily, I was at home or on my way home, so a shower and a change of underwear were quickly forthcoming.

Uuugh, I got reeeeeally sick. Well, really sick for me anyway. It was just a cold, but it totally kicked my butt. See, I usually take a lot of medication for colds because I hate feeling so crappy. My "safe" drug list from my OB gave me a good idea of what I could take. It gave me a list of safe active ingredients, as well as a list of safe OTC brand names. All of the OTC drugs had phenylephrine in them, which is not on the safe active ingredient list. So I looked it up online, and decided not to take anything with that in it. I felt crappy for several days before I realized I could take Mucinex, and I even had some in the house already. It didn't matter because it didn't help anyway. So I drank a mug of warm water with a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar, and my congestion finally started breaking up. I'm still not completely better yet, though. But at least I don't feel so crappy anymore. Poor Chris. I gave it to him, and he's getting sick now. :(