A Day in the Life: Working in Tech in Silicon Valley

Now that I'm coming up on a year and a half of working in tech in the heart of Silicon Valley, I figured I'd post a day in the life. Maybe it'd be interesting if you're not from around here?

Growing up here, I got used to a lot of what Silicon Valley had to offer, but I was never actually inside one of those big tech companies. I was mostly pummeled by the impact of those companies on the surrounding area: the insane traffic, the unattainable housing prices, and logos on the sides of buildings that people outside the area only see on their computers. 

It was all still foreign for me personally though, until I made the move from academia directly into big tech last year. 

Can confirm: some of this show is accurate

Because I don't want to post photos of my work, I'm using Silicon Valley (the tv show) gifs and letting you know how accurate they are, hopefully that's sufficient lol! 

Anyway, onto my typical day!

I'm super lucky that my schedule is so flexible because I can flex it to accommodate my riding. I usually ride Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday during the week, taking Monday and Thursday off to be at work all day. I flex my schedule to accommodate it, meaning that on the days I don't ride, I usually work 10 or so hours and then on the days I do, I can work a little less. 

6:00AM - 9:00AM Wakeup & Get Ready

I usually wake up between 6am and 8:47am, why the large difference? Because I have insomnia and I never know whether my body is going to be wide awake trying to solve the world's problems at 6am or waking up to my "oh shit you need to get out of bed" alarm at 8:47am. 

If I'm up at 6am, I'm probably exhausted, so I usually lay around trying to go back to sleep and failing. If I'm struggling to get up, usually I'll open my corporate app, which will tell me what is for breakfast and that usually motivates me to get up and get out the door. 

On occasion, I'll do a bit of work early if I'm already up because some of my stakeholders are on the east coast. Luckily everyone knows I'm not a morning person!

Accurate, although we have multiple
scanner things for each building

9:00AM - 10:00AM Breakfast

I leave for work between 9 and 9:15 each morning. It's a 15 minute walk to the closest building with food in it. Yes, I said walk, I normally walk to work because I live really close, like uncomfortably close. Don't get too excited, remember that every time I pay rent, I want to jump out a window. Also my place hasn't been updated since it was built in the 80s, including the dishwasher. 

Breakfast stops being served at 9:30, so I usually make it just in time to grab whatever is being served. 

The food is free and we joke that it's the best restaurant in the bay area. It's honestly more like a cafeteria in that there are a bunch of different stations where you can grab food. For breakfast, they usually have a traditional eggs + potatoes + breakfast meat at one station, some pastries at another, a yogurt bowl, some fruit/vegetables/smoked salmon you can grab, and then there's always some kind of random option, which is anything from french toast to a breakfast burrito. 

If the weather is nice, I'll usually eat outside and use the time to answer teams messages and read emails. I also use this time to look at my calendar (which I also do the day before just in case I have a 9am meeting) and update my schedule + action items on my iPad, which I keep my entire life on.

The people in the cafeteria being like please just
pick out your breakfast

10:00AM - 12:00PM Work

I usually have at least one morning meeting. Sometimes I'm back to back all morning though. Either way this time is usually reserved for meetings and working in between. 

We have an open office with desks that we can be assigned or we can just hot-desk. I have an un-assigned assigned desk aka I put a post-it on it with my name. I sit with my other local teammates, although most of the team is based in the SF office or remote, but usually I see at least one other team member when I'm there. 

If the office is too loud or if I have a meeting, there are meeting rooms scattered around the building. Everything from big rooms to accommodate like 20 people down to tiny phone booths for just one person. 

And during this time, I try to make myself drink water. We have a ton of fun types of water (and sodas/coffee/tea/etc) in the mico kitchens. We have one per floor so you can stop by and grab food and drinks whenever you want. For my first few weeks I ate SO MANY SNACKS but now I'm used to it and only grab them when I actually want them.

Me the first week feeling like I was
stealing food 

12:00PM - 1:00PM Lunch

Sometimes I have lunch meetings, which is fine because while I try to get lunch around noon, lunch is served from 11:30 to 1:30 every day. So even if I have a meeting that ends at 1, I can still grab lunch. 

There are even more lunch options than breakfast options, so we always check the app/website to see what is being served in each building. While my building doesn't do breakfast, they do lunch so that's super convenient if I only have a half hour. If I have longer, I'll usually go wander around to find something I really want. Each building has slightly different food, but we have basically everything you could imagine. There are specific cafes for Indian food, BBQ, a general Asian cafe, ramen, boba, pizza, mexican, salad, and so on.

Not yet accurate

1:00PM - 3:30PM Work

More work time and usually at least one more meeting. Very occasionally I'll wander around campus with a coworker, especially if we have something to talk about, we've found some cool places, such as a meditation room, a massage room (you have to pay for that though), a music room, the gym, and all sorts of other things. Also all micro kitchens have slightly different snacks. If there's a bunch of us there, then we have used the game room! But that's happened like... twice in the last year and a half. 

Not accurate, they did bring these bikes around on campus for
a bit but they were used for transportation between buildlings,
not for meetings lol

3:30PM - 4:00PM Coffee Break

In addition to the cafeterias, we also have a few cafes which are open from like 7am to 4pm. These are where you can grab coffee or tea from some of our amazing baristas and they have some snacks that are pre-made. If you accidentally skip lunch, the cafes usually have some sort of sandwich to eat. But we make sure to get in the door around 3:30 because they're really good about closing on time and then after that you just have micro kitchen foods (which are like chips and chex mix type of food). 

Not every day but a lot of days lol

4:00PM - 7:00 (or whenever) PM Work

After 4 it's pretty much whatever else needs to be done, this is usually my heads down time since we don't usually have meetings after 3 or 4. Sometimes I'll walk back home right after lunch if I have an errand or laundry or if I just feel like being at home instead. Or sometimes I'm at work late finishing stuff up or hanging with one of my coworkers who also works late sometimes. 

We don't get served dinner, which is fine. It means that I usually eat dinner at home. And honestly on the days I stay at the office all day, I don't usually want much for dinner! Sometimes if I plan ahead, I'll grab something from lunch or from the cafe to save for dinner, but that happens very rarely. 

Every c-suite at every tech company in the area lol

Riding Days

On the days that I ride, the schedule starts the same, but I usually do one of the following: 

1) drive down right after breakfast, work for the rest of the morning at the ranch, ride over lunch, work until 5 or 6, then drive home and finish up work later.

2) work from the office until 11ish, drive down over lunch, work for the rest of the day at the ranch, either squeezing a ride in whenever I can.

I'm super lucky that my schedule is this flexible. It's a perk of I think most of my work being somewhat independent outside of meetings and my team and company culture. I also will do anything to get my work done on time, meaning that I have worked a LOT of weekends and evenings. So I figure that as long as I get everything done, I can ride at a time where it makes the most sense. I've run that by my manager and gotten a "I don't care what you do, work when you work best and just hit your deadlines and go to your meetings" speech. Luckily he flexes his schedule too and has kind of realized that if he just lets me do my weird thing, I'll produce a lot more work than I would if I were forced into a 9-5 schedule. 

I also have rules around riding during working hours. I must always be 10-15 minutes from my computer (which like, at the office I'm often further from my computer lol), meaning that if I get 5 minutes into my ride and someone needs me urgently (and it's legitimate and not just like, someone weaponizing urgency), I can tell them that I'll be right there.

I also try to do my quicker rides on Tuesdays and Wednesdays when I'm more likely to be needed. I can do a trail ride relatively quickly and I will also often have my computer at the barn so I can keep an eye on things (run processes, respond to emails/teams) while I'm tacking up. 

You've reached the end of a post about work! Hopefully it was interesting enough

One Month

As of today, I've been at my new job for a month! As you can tell, I'm insanely busy, given that I haven't had much time to blog. I mean, some of this is that most evenings have been occupied with playing Horizon Forbidden West, which is amazing, but I've also been busy with work. And to be honest, the horses have been a bit boring, boring in a good way, but still boring. 

I'll definitely do an update, but I wanted to share some pictures that I took from our San Francisco office. I've been up there twice so far to meet people in person. I'm still absolutely loving it. I am so glad I waited for the right job/team/company, so glad I applied to all of those positions, and so glad I stressed myself out through those interviews and waiting for an offer. It's been a really great experience and I'm excited to continue learning. 

I'll have updates on the ponies and some other stuff coming up. I'm trying to put together an easier blogging schedule for myself since clearly writing 5 posts a week is too many! We'll see what I can figure out. 

Hired

Right before Christmas, I got an offer from an amazing company and after a super easy negotiation period, I accepted it! My current job is on winter break, but upon our return, I suppose I'll be giving two weeks notice. My first day of my new job is at the end of January. This is all pending a background check, obviously, but I wanted to share now because I'm excited! Also I don't think much has happened since my last background check. It'd be news to me not to pass and probably fodder for a pretty interesting blog post. 

I have found job search memes for this post

I've been looking for a new job seriously since May of this year. I was looking to make big changes in the industry I was working in, the title I had, and the salary. Basically, moving from higher education as a researcher into tech as a business intelligence or data analyst. Changing careers is no joke, but at least this change was easier than my first job change (horse trainer to researcher!). 

I ended up getting to the end of three interview processes for three different positions right at the same time. That was insanely lucky and allowed me to feel a lot more confident. Luckily for me, there was one clear winner for a multitude of reasons. 

There is still so much to do to prepare for the actually change, which as I said above is not going to happen until late January. But I wanted to talk about my job hunt because I want to remember the things I did right and try to not repeat mistakes in the future. Hopefully I'll stay at this company for a long time, but you never know! 

So. Accurate.

Things I learned/did: 

1) I applied to a truly insane number of positions. I didn't keep track, but when I search my email for "thank you for your application" and "thank you for applying," I get toward 500 emails from May until now. I had two reasons for this: first, I knew that the AIs were going to reject me for most of the positions I was applying for because I didn't appear to have enough experience according to an AI (as I was after a title change even though my current title does not accurately represent all that I do). Second, I found that if I applied to a lot, I would combat that bad feeling when I got rejected, which I did, a lot. Both because if I did get that many interviews, I'd lose my shit as an introvert, and the more I threw my resume around, the less I kept track in my mind. 

2) When I started looking, I got my hopes up about jobs that I applied for. I imagined working there and talked about the possibilities to my friends and SO. This made it way more of a bummer when I got rejected by an AI. So I made a rule to forget about the job the moment I applied to it. I never allowed myself to imagine what it would be like to work at a company until I was on at least the second interview. 

Me, to all the AIs

3) I found LinkedIn premium to be worth it, I paid for it for a few months. One of the ways I got around the AIs was to directly message recruiters/job posters, which that service allows you to do. That was SUPER successful. I probably did that 15 times and got responses back from like 5 of them. Better odds than the straight applications, which was probably more like one in 30-40. 

4) At first I tried to apply only to jobs that I both wanted and was qualified for. I ended up broadening my applications a bit more in the end. I applied to plenty of jobs I didn't think I was qualified for and even got VERY far in two of them (one I got to the very end and didn't get it but they gave me great feedback, the other was one of the three jobs I got to the end of at the same time and they were prepping a background check/references check when I told them I'd accepted another offer). That being said, the job I ultimately took WAS a job that I knew I was a fairly strong candidate for. 

Mine is two lol

5) For interviews, I had a list of everything I'd accomplished sitting in a document. I also had a list of questions that were typical for the roles I was applying to and had answers to all of those questions there. In the interviews, I'd take them on my computer (I didn't have a single in person interview) and have my ipad with the list next to it. Thanks to the SO for this idea, he did this in all his interviews. 

6) I made sure to ask questions that were relevant to me (in the past, I'd just ask generic questions). If the job was a bit far from my house, I would ask about schedules. If the job said that I had to be on site, I'd ask about COVID stuff. I also did ask some generic questions to everyone. The primary ones being: what they liked best about the company vs what were the challenges and how management dealt with the increased attention on work life balance due to the pandemic. One company's answers made me immediately withdraw my application, two separate managers said "you'll have to talk to HR about that" and then asked me if I had any other questions. 

It's true

I'm really excited about this new job! I'm so glad I found out before break so that I could finally relax. But obviously I'm really sad to be leaving my coworkers and the industry I've been working in for the last five years. I really do love it there and will miss it so much. 

Already though, my new team has reached out to me to congratulate and welcome me. So I think it'll be a really good change.

Last Day

Today is my last day of work! Monday I start my new job and I couldn't be happier about the prospect of rolling in on Monday morning (except there's so much paperwork...).

I will miss it here

Despite work being generally kind of shit the last 9.5 months, lots of good did come during those times, and I want today to be a positive day, so I'm going to list everything I can think of that happened.

- I bought a horse trailer!!!

- As such, TC learned to load into a straight load

- And we went on a lot of adventures, including several new facilities

- I started riding with Tanya

- TC and I competed at First level with scores to 73%

- We won All Breeds too!

- I restarted CrossFit

- I made a bunch of new friends

- And became way closer with some old friends

- I worked to increase my client base and was fairly successful

- Along those lines, I published a website, facebook page, and instagram for my business (with the help of my amazing friends)

- I learned that I'm stronger than I think (physically, emotionally, mentally) but that I also don't have to put up with bad situations even if I am capable of putting up with them

- I learned that despite hating my job, I really do love this industry and want to stay in it, even if it means moving

Especially here

Most of all, I learned that 40 hours a week is a lot to give away to someone who doesn't deserve it and that money doesn't buy happiness (but it does buy horse trailers which can be used to transport happiness though).

I'm really excited to make things work on the coast with people who deserve my 40 hours a week, despite being really sad to be leaving the Sacramento area. I really do love it up here and hope to be back to visit A LOT.

Hold Back the River

Yesterday I gave two (well, three) weeks notice at my horrible job.

In early January, I will be reinstated at my former workplace, though in a different (better) position.

The last month and a half has been kind of insane going through the motions of doing this. Sorry about how long and uninteresting this post is. Tomorrow I'll talk about applying what I learned from Alexis with TC, so hold on!

I'll miss walking along here, but at least I will have beaches

When I took this job, I thought it was the best of all worlds. I was still in the field I loved, but being paid more and being able to live in a lower cost of living area. Everything seemed to fall into place perfectly.

The first week on the job was good. I was given some good training on the databases, given some easy reports to fill out, and promised that the work would pick up and that I'd have so many opportunities and be involved in a lot of really cool things at a higher level than I'd ever been at before. My boss took me out to lunch and we chatted merrily, turns out that her daughters and I have similar tastes in music. It wasn't my old job, which I loved, but it seemed like it'd be doable. You don't have to be completely in LOVE with your job, right?

Little things happened that week, like I noticed the lack of meetings in my calendar, the way my boss told me that everyone was "so nice" but then gave me these weird just between us looks after saying it, and the way my coworkers seemed to interact with each other. Things seemed... off. But I wrote it off as me being a little sensitive to change, me being homesick (not even homesick since I loved and still love where I live, but work-sick).

TC has come so far being up here

The second week got kind of weird. We were scheduled to go to a conference where I was presenting with my former coworkers. This was something everyone knew about. But my boss got... jealous? She loudly complained in her office to my other coworker that I wouldn't want to hang out with them. I went through the conference schedule and told her what I wanted to go to since that's polite, you know. I was going to be in charge of some federal reporting and there was a session on that. I was told not to go because we were "boycotting" that presentation. The person presenting on it had apparently not asked my boss to help her with it... uh okay.

During that second week, the tantrums started. She slammed on her keyboard/mouse and swore loudly whenever something didn't go her way. One of these things that didn't go her way was updating from Windows 8 to Windows 10 and the colors changed in one of her word documents. She cried in her office for a couple of hours one day for some unknown reason. My calendar was bare as ever, I don't think I said two words to anyone that entire week outside of my boss.

Things were so bad at the conference. I am not the most social person, but I do know the power of networking and I was chatting to someone after their presentation when my boss was waiting for me in a corner. She then rolled her eyes at me and left, complaining loudly to my other coworker when we sat down at lunch that "Megan doesn't want to hang out with us, she is only here because she feels obligated to sit with us as lunch." It was probably then that I realized I'd entered an office run by a thirteen year old. Actually scratch that, as I think that a lot of Kate's young students could do a better job running this office.

This path is so nice to walk along

The insecurity and paranoia didn't get better over the last nine months. I am not allowed to write emails to anyone outside of our office without having my boss proofread (and even then, I can count on one hand the number of emails I was allowed to send). There was an entire month this summer where I had no work to do because my boss said it was easier for her to just do it. Her interactions with my coworkers started to affect me. I heard her yelling at one of them, but she weirdly gets walked all over by the other coworker. He refused to do something she asked him to do during a meeting, instead rudely thrusting it upon me saying that I knew how to do it. She came to me and apologized for his behavior but asked me to do the work anyway.

The emotional manipulation is insane. One day she locked herself in her office and cried all day because someone sent her an email asking her to clarify some methodology we used. She often gets a pretty offensive, making fun of another coworker who she thinks is gay, making hand gestures to mime slitting her wrists when she gets an email she doesn't like, telling people she should kill herself because everyone hates her. It all seems to be in a joking tone... but it's really kind of upsetting to hear on a regular basis.

Standing up to her is hard because she cries so often. I have tried, though. She came into work sick several times, getting me sick each time. Since I do crossfit, ride, and teach in addition to working 40 hours a week, I just can't afford to be sick all the time. I finally addressed it one day in early November after she came in sick and had put her hands on my shoulder... I sent her an email saying that since she was sick I was going to stay home. I did not put in for a sick day. I am not using my sick leave to get away from her. She was super insulted and she did not talk to me for a full week after that but instead gave me dirty looks and stormed past my cube regularly.

What a pony

It's not even just that my workday is unpleasant (I mean, it is). I can deal with difficult people. What I can't deal with is how it's going to affect my career. First, no one really respects her. I regularly hear "oh... are you doing okay?" when I tell people I work for her. I don't like to be associated with her and definitely feel distance where there was none with coworkers from other departments.

Second, she seems to deliberately keep me in the dark about what work our office is doing and the industry in general. I'm still somewhat new to the industry and have previously relied on my supervisors and senior staff to be kind of mentors for me. She will have webinars, be on listservs, and receive information about our industry that she will not share. I've also been at several regional meetings (since I do not go to meetings at my workplace but I have remained on the list for these regional meetings) where she has revealed things that "our office is working on" that I had no idea we were doing.

Third, I am not getting the opportunities she promised. She hates conferences so she didn't let me go to the ones that I had clarified I'd be able to go to in the interview. She tells me "we don't do that here" when I talked to her about publishing or presenting findings from a study she then wouldn't let me do. The work has not picked up (legit haven't had anything to do in months) and I still don't know anyone here.

Really going to miss this barn

It's because of this that I feel like I took a MAJOR step back in my career coming up here. I started looking for a job outside this field, but the idea of leaving it is really awful, I really love it. I don't work just to get money to spend on horses (that's only 90% of the reason I work), I work because I fucking LOVE my job. Or I did.

I looked into other colleges in the area and in other areas. There are some, but they either pay too little or will take me too far away from where I want to be. And honestly, the idea of risking going to another toxic work environment was kind of terrifying.

My previous boss has been amazing this whole time. I texted him immediately when I knew it wasn't working and he sent me a ton of jobs, allowed me to pull him aside at that first conference to bitch to, sent me information about webinars he thought I should listen to, kind of kept me in the loop as far as the industry goes because he knows my boss won't. He's checked in on me regularly and genuinely cares that I am not in a good situation.

And my house

When he posted the three jobs that have come available in my previous office (one my old one, one another coworker had left, and a new grant funded one), I had to hold back tears. My boss immediately ran out of her office to gossip about how my previous boss was not going to be able to find anyone to work in those positions because of the pay scale. I mean sure, the cost of living over there is insane and there really isn't any way to save for a(n extravagantly priced) house in the bay area when more than half your income is going to rent.

I messaged him and told him that I volunteered to do two of the jobs for double the pay. I still couldn't make rent and have my horse over there on that salary alone. I acknowledge that without the horse, I would be able to do it... but what is life without riding? Surely riding is more important than this job.

Such an amazing place

Meanwhile in the background, my business is actually happening. I'm not in high demand or anything, but I have several very regular clients and every month I seem to have a few more than the previous month. My clients have said several times that they wished I lived closer, they want weekly lessons, they want me to do training rides.

One day I got 3 hours of sleep and woke up doing the math. I need 20 lessons a month to be equivalent to how I'm living now (taking into account the increase in rent and slight decrease in pay) and only 10 to "survive" (aka no debt). I talked to my clients and they gave me 18 immediately. Two of them promised to spread the word. Kate was really amazing in this and offered me a clinic at her barn whenever I was short.

I talked to my previous boss. Should I come back? Uh, yeah. Can I come back at a higher pay scale? Yes. Can I work from home sometimes? Yes. Does he have any overtime for me? Yes. Can he help me find contract work? Yes. Can I go to the April conference and present in November? I've already signed you up to present in April, you have to automate all of these reports first though, no one has been able to do it. YES this is exactly what I want.

In addition, a salary study is going on now so the pay should go up. And he will be getting a director under him and that position is as good as mine, though obviously no promises can be made.

Going to be way closer to this place now though

And so, yesterday I gave my two (three-and-a-half due to the holidays) weeks notice. My last day is January 4th. I start at my new job on January 7th. She immediately retaliated by shit talking me in her office so loudly that I could hear. I have nothing to lose so I went to HR today.

I already have a ton to do at my new job. I have a presentation to prepare for, I have to update all the reports that no one updated since I left, I have several meetings to go to, I have to automate several reports... and that is day one. Day two involves an insane plan to undercut a company that charges a half million dollars to do what I think I can do with R. It's a lot, but I am so so excited to be back.

It initially felt like retreating or taking a step back to come home to my former place of work. But really, it was a step back to come here. I'm excited for my career again and excited that I don't have to deal with such dysfunction anymore.

Hoping to take this guy on some trail rides this
year without having to drive as far!

Now to get everything organized! I will post about the move soon :)

Last Day

Today is my last day at my job before I'm taking ten days off to move and enjoy life a little bit. I'm really sad. This has been the best job I have ever had, and I wish the school would have realized earlier that when you give 1.5% raises every year (and no bonus/performance based raises ever since it's a public sector job) but cost of living goes up 6%... you're going to lose people. But alas in order for changes to actually come through, people have to rock the boat, so they're losing me just like they lost a few other people this year and hopefully that will be for the best in the long run. Doesn't mean it wasn't an amazing job, just meant that I'd eventually have to live in a box.

The like... one time I drove over the hill on the weekend

When I applied for this job, I knew nothing about the field of institutional research. I just wanted a job. I quit my previous job because I struggled with the people I worked with and when I interviewed at this job, everyone seemed nice enough. Unemployment made me real desperate and I figured I'd take it and see what happened. It sounded interesting anyway.

In the last year and a half I've made so many good friends at this job, have rarely had a stressful day, and have not cried once due to work (except yesterday on the way to work because I'm sad to leave). Every day is full of laughter and I genuinely looked forward to going to work nearly every day, even in the summer when I'd really honestly rather be riding my horses all day. And that's not even because of the work itself, which I do truly enjoy doing.

This new job is in the same field and is essentially the same work, but new people. And while everyone I met at my two interviews seemed so incredibly nice and friendly, I can't help but to be really nervous. I can't help but to doubt that I will ever have such amazing people to work with again, but it's early in my career in this field so I'll stop drawing crazy conclusions like that. Regardless, I feel really lucky to have had this job and I hope to stay in touch with these people for a long time. I know I have a lifelong friend in a few of them and the others, I'll at least grab a drink with at the conferences.

GOOD-BYE COMMUTE WILL NOT MISS YOU

The rest of the week is going to be super fun. I wish my week off hadn't landed on the week where Kate is out of town, but at least I can help her out by tormenting teaching her kids. I am, however, going to follow her around tomorrow.

Outside of teaching, riding, and packing, I'll be spending some quality time with Rico and my parents' dogs (also probably them and my brother/SIL who are in the area too), hopefully sneaking in one more pix in parks hike with my SIL, and making sure I eat all the things that I'm going to miss out on eating (although Sacramento has me covered, really). And then, we move!

Remote Workday Musings

Wednesday morning I had a meeting that I was "in charge of" and so didn't have much time to do anything significant with TC. So I put him on the long lines for the first time in a while (in the outdoor round pen which was open until it rained yesterday).

I always feel like long lining might be boring to him, but he's ALL about it, mostly because I usually use the clicker. He seemed very eager to do his work, but not to bring his back up and track up. We were going left and when we switched right, he was definitely a bit sticky on the outside hind leg. So his left butt cheek was definitely sore from the day before, when he spooked at a chair every time we went by it so he had to canter by it a lot, and probably in a more collected canter than he's used to.

This used to be par for the course for this horse. I think the first six months after he came home from rehab he was kind of NQR every other day. He just got sore. After I put him on the MuscleUp supplement, and after he got older I'm sure, he stopped getting sore. So luckily I didn't freak out about it. And he was totally sound and normal on Thursday morning.

The fog was so ominous, but it was sunny at the barn

On Wednesday evening, I had talked to my unofficial boss (who really should be my official boss, this school is so weird) who has been very encouraging about me working from home once a week. It REALLY saves me on commute time and how many miles I'm putting on my car. I get a bit annoyed when I have no meetings scheduled and I end up just sitting at my desk all day and talk to no one. I get even more annoyed on days like Wednesday where I was trying to work on my presentation and it seemed like my desk was the place to be for everyone and their mother. So working from home is really nice.

My official boss is less enthused about it. Part of me doesn't care all that much. But I do have to get it "approved" so I sent an email on Thursday morning and she got back to me with what I considered to be a tiny bit of attitude about it. Dude, do you know what it's like to drive 3 hours a day every day? It is not fun. It was still approved, but I was a little bit annoyed. So poor TC had to work harder than normal because of it. And that got me thinking.

I've been considering what my future with him will be lately. I'm thinking a lot about the future. I had my life get turned upside down when my plans to move across the country fell through. For a second I had NO IDEA what to do with my life and kind of freaked out. But I'm a planner and relish in the act of planning, so I'm feeling as good as I've ever felt about the future.

So things may be changing in my personal life, but I do want to see some changes happening in my life with TC. The last few years have been a period of catching up financially. Putting money into retirement accounts that I hadn't been able to, saving a hefty emergency fund and extra money for what I was going to use for moving costs (instead that's just more emergency fund at the moment). Every single financial decision I make is heavily weighed and I stick to a very strict budget.

After he was bad the other day, he didn't think it
was unwarranted 

This means that I rarely take lessons. And at first it was totally fine. TC was too young to be in that hard of work, he was then injured, and I've taken so many horses beyond where he's at that I don't *need* lessons on him. But I WANT to take lessons.

I took maybe five or six lessons in the last year and I think this year I want to get a bit more serious about my education with this horse. I feel bad for him on days like Thursday when he had to work hard and we had a few minor disagreements (you can't prop your butt up in a walk to canter transition, leg yields from the wall DO exist and you can't stick your head up in the air and slow down to do them, you can't just run away from my outside leg at the canter). I know he needs to work hard, but it's nice having someone confirm that this is the way he SHOULD be working hard.

That may sound really confusing since I've trained horses to the FEI levels myself where I was the one who was making all the decisions. But I don't want to take TC on the path that I know. Because I want TC to be better than any horse I've trained before. And that means having someone guide me through the process a bit more regularly. Maybe not once a week, since there are no trainers who come to my barn (that I'm willing to ride with) so that means hauling out, but maybe every other weekend. This probably won't start until at least February, I'm doing the Mary Wanless workshop in a week (!!!) so that ate all my would-be lesson budget for January.

Wandering around the ranch

My next problem is finding a trainer to ride with. My first instinct is to ride with my actual trainer. She's the best trainer in the area, she gets his type, she isn't scared of him (despite knowing his behavioral problems which IMO are rapidly disappearing), she is fair to him, he likes her barn, I am not totally useless turning the trailer around there, etc. Money-wise she's not outrageously expensive.

But there are some downsides, I've had trouble with my own confidence riding with her because she knew me on Rico and likes to compare current me to past me (and kind of ignores me when I'm like dude, I used to pretty much be brought to you by Crossfit and now I'm brought to you by sitting on my ass for 10 hours a day). I also struggle because she has trouble being on time, and hauling over there, taking a lesson, and hauling back is already a 3.5 hour journey, then add in having to wait around... and it really digs into my weekend.

I audited a trainer recently who is really nearby (like take 3.5 hours down to 2). She has her Gold (but has only competed at GP on one horse and hasn't taken anyone to GP) and she's super nice. But I can only describe her lessons as... dressage porn. She told the rider what to do, and then praised them for it. So like instructions were to go down the long side, do a circle, ride a leg yield. And then more positive reinforcement than I'm used to (yah, that's nice, good job, yes!, that's it, praise him). Sometimes there'd be something helpful like having the rider bend the horse more or do a transition again if it wasn't good. But I'm used to a constant stream of intense theory and instruction. And this just seemed like the kind of trainer I'd argue with over something like over-bending. I do not like over-bending.

There are others in the area. Obviously the trainer who actually got me my Gold is around, but she's a bit more crank and spank than TC needs (he needs 0 crank and spanks). There's two other trainers who are close-ish, one I haven't even heard anything about and one Kate has ridden with and no longer rides with (in favor of Tracey). Soooo I feel a bit stuck. In an area surrounded by Gold Medalists, you'd think I could find someone easily!

At least I know that my trainer's track record is good!

My whole life may move soon anyway, I have some job applications out in a few different places, so I don't really need to solve this problem any time soon. But I think just reworking my budget and getting two lessons scheduled in February (unless it pours rain, both TC and I hate rain) would be a good start!

Super Enthused

Today I start my new job. So prepare for a week of me scraping the bottom of my draft folder for blog posts just in case I can't write anything because I'm so tired. It's 5am and I'll be commuting 3+ hours while trying to adjust to my first week of 9-5 life (well, 6:30-2:30 life, east coast hours FTW). Next week will be easier when I'm living a full hour closer to work!

I'm excited and a little nervous. These nerves have apparently caused me to forget that I am riding a FOUR year old horse who I am teaching how to use his massive body in stronger and more coordinated ways. I also forgot that I hadn't ridden in two days, and hadn't ridden at the neighbor arena in over a week. But longeing is for wimps! And actually it didn't even occur to me.

Hey I kept that weird thing on my face overnight,
give me cookies!

Seriously the only thing keeping me from hitting the dirt sometimes is this horse's incredibly sweet nature because Monday I got to experience what I'd like to think is TC from the future- where he is so powerful and so forward that I'm not sure if I'm about to die or if I'm having the time of my life. It was for sure the latter on Monday, and again not due to my intelligence or riding prowess, but rather due to my horse's amazing mind.

The first indication that I had caught the dumb was that he had his version of a big spook at a pile of cement bags. He got all snorty and lowered himself 2-3 feet, then crawled toward the pile. He sniffed it and it was fine. We went through the riverbed and he spooked at nothing for a while.

I tried to get him into the arena and he was distracted so it felt a lot like pushing a square block through a circular hole. Once in the arena he was fine, although amped. He was ready to WORK and he was going to work with or without me. I opted to join him.

Finishing up breakfast

We started in the walk and he felt great in the connection. He was very much on my seat as well. I could turn his shoulders around, almost like a walk pirouette, just off of my seat and thigh. He halted easily when I stopped my seat, and opened up his stride when I relaxed and sat deeper. No reins and just a little leg.

I asked him to trot and he was very professional about it. He reached into contact and immediately jumped into a medium trot. We were going places, it didn't matter where, as long as it was PLACES and we were going FAST to get there. I half halted with my seat, trying to stay relaxed in my arms and hip flexors, since I tend to get a little tight sometimes when half halting. It worked super well, he was right on my seat at trot too.

I got this trot that I can't even describe. It was so powerful, but quite well engaged and relaxed over his topline. Honestly, and I know it's probably nothing like this, it felt like Rico's collected trot. Wonderfully cadenced and steady. The only thing it had that Rico's trot didn't was the feeling that I might be launched at any moment. I've never not trusted this little horse, and I still trust him, but this trot felt a little dangerous! Especially because people were doing construction around us.

Riding home, his mane is getting wild

So all I did was play with this trot. I made it bigger and smaller, switched the bend, changed directions, spiraled in and out. It was amazing. SO much fun. I can't wait to sit it and to have it at shows.

Alright, I'll shut up about the trot. The canter was amazing too. To the right, HE WAS THROUGH. He picked up the canter, came right over his back, and stayed there the whole time. He was so focused and so professional about it. He lost balance when we passed the gate a few times, popping his shoulder and all, but then he'd regain it and get better connected. Again I worked to relax my hip flexors because they just get tight when I'm working to get a horse better on my seat. Always stuff to work on.

To the left he struggled more, it also was probably that he is the sort of horse who doesn't calm down with work, he tends to get more and more sensitive and light as we work, so by the time we got to the left lead, he was so responsive to my aids that he was getting on the verge of being reactive. He just wants to be so good all the time that about 30 minutes in, when you put your leg on he's like YES MA'AM I AM GOING FORWARD LOOK AT ME I AM BEING SO GOOD. So that could have explained the left lead issues because we were booking it and he was overreacting to the slightest half halt aid.

He is so good

Back in the trot, he was back to being his amazing self, we did walk to trot and trot to walk transitions off of seat and a little leg alone, he stayed through and kept that perfect connection the whole time. Every now and then he'd get a little on the muscle, but all I had to do was increase bend by taking my inside elbow back a quarter inch and pushing him over to the outside rein with my inside leg, then directing his outside shoulder forward with my outside thigh. He'd instantly lower his neck and soften over his topline.


I fucking LOVE riding this horse. I just hope he doesn't use this new power to test out any acrobatics. I'm cool with the amazing collected trot and some throughness in the canter. I think this is a little bit of a questionable time to move him when he's feeling this powerful and I'm not used to riding it, I hope he adjusts okay and that I don't fall off during his adjustment. This fall/winter is fine, I just don't want to break something during my first month at work!

This week is kind of a toss up, I'm not sure whether I'll have time to ride very much. Ali is going to ride TC on Thursday and I will try to ride him either today or tomorrow. Then I'll ride him Saturday before I move myself later that day and he'll get moved on Sunday to the new barn! I figured I'd give him Sunday off and then try to ride him on Monday and Tuesday after a longe. He also starts his ulcerguard on Thursday so it will kick in before Sunday. I'm not risking his stress levels while mine are skyrocketing.

Whispering

So I thought I had my start date all set up, but apparently I did not (it was written all over my application)! So when the hiring manager asked when I could start, I said I COULD start on the 24th but that housing was being a bitch (not my exact words) and that it'd be ideal to start the 1st. He said yes. PHEW. So I get an extra week and a Monday to figure out where I'm going to live. I think I found a PERSON to live with, now to find a PLACE to live, which is arguably more important, no offense to my awesome future roommate.

This also gives me more time with my thesis. Which hasn't made much progress because my cortisol levels are so high that they are making it difficult to read. I had a glass of wine and watched a chick flick last night so that I could get this post proofread! But too much wine and too stupid of a movie to make any progress on my thesis, oh well.

AND most importantly, more time with my pony being normal before he goes crazy when he's told that he has to live in a new place and in a stall/paddock and by himself. I think new trainer is going to hate us for a few weeks.

Whinnying because he forgot how stalls work
and that food was outside while he was inside

Speaking of the best baby horse, our ride yesterday was amazing. He got trimmed in the morning by his current farrier. We spoke a little about putting shoes on him. Apparently his foot is so big that the farrier said they may not make aluminum shoes big enough for him. He said that some farriers can make them, but it's tricky. I have six weeks to find a farrier though, so I'll be calling a LOT of farriers asking them LOTS of questions. I'm going to measure his feet today or tomorrow and figure out how big they really are so I can tell future farrier and see what their reaction is. Ugh, complicated animal.

So I tacked him up (he stands still to bridle and ground ties to be fly sprayed now!) and we got out to the arena. He was in a really good mood. I think he was just so happy to be home and back in a normal routine after his crazy day on Tuesday.

So happy for food

We started with a lot of walking, I need to get in the habit of a long warm up if he's going to be in a stall vs a pasture soon. We did leg yields, free walk, and small circles. He's so fun on the small circles, he's going to have a ridiculously great walk pirouette on him one day because he's just so damn maneuverable when he wants to be.

The leg yields were good, I just need to make sure that I ask with as light of an aid as possible. It's funny, he'll leg yield off a normal leg aid with a little spur, so then I ask without the spur and he goes over too... and then I just shift my weight and he's moving over. So why use the spur at all? Old habits die hard, Rico always needed a little spur for lateral work to be cadenced enough (he'd do it with just a shift of weight but it was slow). Light and responsive is my new (well, continuing) motto- I need to whisper my aid, not say, yell, or shout it.

Those ears are just ridiculous

The trot was excellent, the more he walks on the bit, the better the trot is. We did spiraling in and out in both directions. The left was absolutely perfect, he spiraled in and increased the bend easily through his whole body, then leg yielded out and was much more supple on the larger circle.

The right was not great, but it wasn't the worst. First, there was another rider that got in our way a bit so that really affected my ability to go where I wanted. But really, he's just not maneuverable that way. He's stopped leaning on the left side as much (thanks Barbi!) but he still darts around a little. Not particularly noticeable if I want to go on a normal sized circle, but the second I went to change the size (as in spiral in or out) he'd take it way way too far. Again I need to be careful to use light aids, because he responds nearly equally to both. In the case of the spiral in, lighter aids made for a more refined shape of circle. I need to whisper the spiral aid, just hint that I want it, because he'll dart inside and I need to not play ping pong with his body.

Pure bliss

The canter was pretty good, I feel it plateuing again, probably due to lack of muscle right now, which will be remedied soon when he's in a stall and gets hill work 2x per week instead of 2x per month. He's round for about half of the canter though, and the other half he's on the muscle. I need to buckle down and fix it, but with how stressful things are for me, and how stressful things are going to be for him, I'm giving it a month before we really buckle down at the canter again.

He is improving in the transitions though, both up and down. He easily picks up the canter both ways with just a light leg aid. The downwards I'm really proud of. Despite not being totally round and on the bit at the canter itself, he is always round coming into the trot and stays with me easily.

Oh and he totally gave me a stretch circle in both directions at the trot in the end!

I was super pleased with myself in this ride too, I worked really hard to keep my hands incredibly soft all the time. It's funny because I feel like the more I post about his rigidity and my struggles with it, the more I feel like it seems as though I'm this rider with incredibly hard hands who is just totally braced on this poor horse all the time. In reality, I'm a pretty soft rider with an incredibly soft horse who goes from being super soft and light to rigid in a matter of milliseconds and my first instinct is to match the rigidity (as I think most people's instincts would be) rather than stay soft. It is definitely improving though, and I'm glad that he's making me a better rider!

Dusk at the ranch

Back at the barn, Ali had the vacuum out! I didn't realize we had one, so obviously we tormented TC with it. He's never seen it and after a couple of cautious snorts, he was ALL about it. He was leaning into it and really enjoying it. He even let me do his ears and his forehead! Then he played with it and got his lip stuck in the vacuum, which he thought was a hilarious game.

I went through all of my barn stuff last night too. I have my trunk totally packed with all of Rico's old stuff. I also have a first aid kit now, and grabbed a bunch of weird stuff that my mom had left over from when she was the perfect pony club mom and got prizes for our annual PC show- stuff like Cowboy Magic Green Spot Remover, which she doesn't use but I was going to try spraying in his brown tail to see if we can get any of the stains out. It's all ready for moving, whenever that will be.

Today we are hitting the trails and then Friday I'm driving up to look at apartments all day while TC gets his teeth done! I also have tentative plans to do an awesome last (or second-to-last) trail ride with Rico on the beach this weekend if all goes well. Damn I miss riding that horse.

So Much to Do (Plus Progress Pictures)

I start my new job in two weeks from yesterday (Monday). There are so many things to do. SO MANY. Let me give you a nice tour through some of my to do lists. And to entertain you, progress pictures of TC.

That face is so cute

Find Housing
- ideally I want to find someplace temporary so that I can really make sure I like the area before committing to an entire year lease. I don't care about living with other people, I've done both and genuinely don't mind roommates, so I've been looking into that. I've also looked into apartments but basically all of them require a year long lease unless I'm willing to pay an arm and a leg each month, and my arms and legs are limited.

- then I need to see the place, I'm trying to live a bit more than an hour north of where I'm at now in the beginning. It gives me a solid 30 minute commute with no traffic, which kind of sucks, but I'd rather start out further away and move closer than start out close and want to move further away. The places I'm looking are suburban, and the office is in a city. The city is expensive. The parts of the city that are not expensive are places where I will surely be murdered. Also city = traffic in and out, which means that the hours I can get to the barn easily are limited.

January I think, dates are approximate

- I'm hoping to find a place close to the barns. There's this one town that is right in between two towns known for having lots of barns, so I'm primarily looking there. It would mean about 10-15 minutes driving with no freeway to about 10 barns (and like two of which meet my criteria for boarding and are full, but we'll get to that). There's also another barn that is close to some barns but far from others, but is a bit cheaper and closer to work.

- next is that I can't be too far away from my current clients. I'm still going to be teaching on the peninsula (~60 minutes away from office over the bay, yuck, fast track is being obtained). My goal for housing is to not be further from my clients than the office is, because that will make going home kind of shitty.

- and eventually I'll go through the stress of finding a new grocery store, new gas station, new doctor, new dentist, new everything. Until I get all this other shit done though, I'm just assuming that new town has all those things.



Acquiring the Horse
- TC's vet check is scheduled for next Tuesday (a week from today). I'm doing all the normal stuff- flexions, longeing, etc plus x-rays of at least his hocks and front feet. He has a weird bump on his leg that he's always had, so I want to get that looked at too either by ultrasound or x-ray.

- I'm picky about who is doing it. I want my vet. MY vet. He's the best vet in the area. I'm having to haul an hour and a half each way to get this shit done. Worth it. I love my vet.

- Then I need to buy the horse, I need to discuss price with his owners but we sort of landed on a number earlier in the year which I am hoping is sticking. I already talked to them about making payments and that works. I will put a deposit on him when I move him, then pay them the rest after I get a paycheck or two.

February

- BOARDING oh my god this is worse than housing. At first I was like ooo so much boarding over here, and that's true, but you know what else is true? Lots of horses over here! All of my top picks are completely full with incredibly long wait lists. This sucks. Mostly because boarding and housing are interconnected and if I find excellent housing but no boarding nearby, I have decisions to make. UPDATE (after I wrote but before posting), a barn in the area is available! 10 minutes from potential new house that I'm seeing Wednesday! Complaining really does work! Barn has some questionable reviews... but I'm on the wait lists at my top 3 choices so I will probably not stay there for too long.

- I also have to find a new vet, new farrier, new chiro, new trainer (but dude this is not a problem, the more I read, the more I realize that this is where the top dressage trainers in the bay all train. HOWEVER I will need a trailer to get to most of them since all of their barns are way expensive and have no turnout, but that is a problem for future Megan who has more money and less debt).

- so many things need to be bought. Riding Warehouse is going to get a hefty order from me, as well as my new local tack store, which is a really freaking awesome place. On the to buy list is replacing my makeshift pile of wood that my trunk is sitting on with an actual trunk stand, and buying TC a flymask. He's never worn a flymask. Or a blanket for that matter. I also need to go through what I have already left over from Rico. Some things need to stay with Rico and some need to come with TC.

- obviously if he fails the vet check, none of this will be necessary! Until I find another horse to buy. Guys I'm so scared he'll fail.

March

Car Drama
- remember my mysterious back weakness the last six months? And the fact that I could not heal from my back injury that I got at Crossfit in June for months? Yep, it's my fucking car. The seats are crippling my back. I love my car. So much. But it needs to go. Guess who doesn't have a back injury and who does need a car? My brother. So I'm now shopping for a new car and he's buying my current car off of me when I find one. Which needs to happen in the next two weeks. Along with all of this other shit.

- I need to take my car into the shop, plus get it cleaned inside and out before my brother takes it. I also need to pay for my insurance, which I'm kind of putting off until I get a new car and a new address.

- Oh and my license expired this year so that's a thing I have to do too.

April

Current Work
- as I said above, I'm keeping clients on the peninsula and even teaching pony club this fall. Because I'm crazy. But I have a few kids who are so awesome and are only around for another year. So my business IS being downsized, I emailed the important clients yesterday and will phase out the others, but it's going to be tough.

- in addition, my part time job is being crazy. My boss wants to get as much work out of me as possible in these two weeks. Problem: I have a lot of other shit to do. Solution: don't sleep, or eat, or do anything but work. Also quit writing blog posts. Nah. I'm telling her that this is it. I'm going in today and it's my last day 100%. I can't do anything else for her. I feel bad, but I've added detailed comments to all my R scripts so she and whoever is next in line after me can actually understand what they do. So hopefully that makes up for it.

- oh and this doesn't fall exactly under this category but I HAVE NO WORK CLOTHES. I have maybe three items of clothing that are appropriate to wear to work. This works out when I work from home all the time and only go into the office once a week at most. This does not work when I go into the office every fucking day. Monday I bought shoes and rejected most clothes that I put on. Thursday is my shopping day. Luckily it's the west coast and everyone wears jeans. Unluckily all of my jeans are actually jeggings because fuck wearing real pants. And most of my shirts have been to the barn one too many times to be appropriate for a work environment.

May

THESIS
- I have a hard deadline for this shit at the end of October. This means I have to defend at the beginning of October. Which means that my committee needs it in mid-September. Which means that my adviser needs it in early September. Which means that my deadline to finish it is August 31st.

- do you know what's hard to finish in two weeks when you have everything above to finish in the same two weeks? AN ENTIRE FUCKING THESIS.

June (stretching down extra because of the water)

If I don't go completely crazy in the next two weeks, I'm buying myself something nice. Like maybe a pony.

July