Well, I finished my first week at the new job and my new classes.  I am bushed and looking forward to a relaxing weekend.  Today is my wedding anniversary of 11 years and we are headed out here soon to go surfing, shopping and then get a few things done around the house that I just haven’t had time to do all week.

The job is going great so far.  Everyone at the firm has been very nice and helpful.  In fact, everything about it is so good that I’m just wondering if there is some bad side to it that I just haven’t discovered yet.  This firm has a very good reputation in this area and they go all out for their clients and they do have some fairly large and well known clients.

They took me out to lunch at the Olive Garden my second day there.  I really feel like they rolled out the red carpet for me.  It’s something they do for any new employees.  Our scheduled work day is 8:30 to 5:00 with an hour lunch, so we end up with a 37.5 hour week.  The premiums for my health, dental, vision, and life insurance are paid for.  I get 8 PTO (Personal Time Off) days after 6 months and another 8 days at the end of a year for a total of 16 paid days off.  Every month they help out with a local cause and anyone who donates gets to dress casual (jeans) the last Friday of the month.  We’re actually getting both Monday and Tuesday off next week, so I have a long weekend.  I got paid yesterday after working the week.  That’s almost unheard of in any job around here because most places hold back a week or two weeks pay.  We have just about every flavored coffee and coffee creamer imaginable.  They also have green tea, regular tea, an ice machine, a soda machine that only costs a quarter, 2 refrigerators (one full of nothing but different kinds of beer, which is just for the attorneys), microwave, dishwasher, 2 libraries (one is the regular law library and the other is a library of all kinds of novels and books the employees have brought in) and some of the nicest bathrooms ever.  The first day I had coffee in a company mug, even, plus I’m on the email list of whatever the flavored coffee is for the day.

I got my computer in my office the first week and yet they were apologizing they didn’t have it set up for me before I started.  It was short notice since I interviewed on Thursday, was offered the job on Friday and asked to start on Monday.  Yesterday they took me to the office supply room and loaded me up with all kinds of stuff, unlike other companies that you have to beg and borrow just to get your basic essentials.

Also most companies I’ve worked for give you this huge employee handbook full of things you are not allowed to do and what will happen if you do them, etc.  This employee handbook is actually quite thin and doesn’t list out a bunch of rules you must follow or get written up for.  Their attitude is that we are all professionals, we are all on the same team and work together and that as long as you get your work done and don’t do anything that is unethical, they aren’t going to be nitpicky about whether you send a personal email, take a personal call, or are a few minutes late back from lunch.  They said they’ve only had a couple of employees that have ever taken advantage of the fairly lax atmosphere and taken longer lunches or left early, and they did start observing more closely when they noticed it.  But they also noticed that they weren’t getting their work done in a timely manner as well, so usually the two go hand in hand.  In other words, they treat us like grown-ups, not like a bunch of kids.

I’m working closely with two different attorneys.  The one I’ll probably be dealing with the most is fairly young (late 20’s I think) and he just made partner.  Therefore, he is extremely busy and generally keeps his door closed so he can work.  From what I hear, he’s great to work with.  He gives good instructions on what he wants and he thanks you for every little thing you do.  He already let me know that just because he keeps his door closed doesn’t mean I can’t come into his office if I have a question.  Plus he already has given me quite a bit to do to see how I run with it.

Friday I had to go into his office to drop something in his inbox for review.  He stopped working for a minute and talked to me some.  I noticed he had quite a bit of sports memorabilia so the conversation naturally turned to sports and specifically football.  It turns out that they have a fantasy football league and when I showed interest, he told me I was welcome to participate this year.  So I may be in two fantasy football leagues this year because I’ll probably still want to do the Yahoo league with some online poker friends that I did last year.

School is going well.  Speech class is interesting so far.  I have to write and give a speech Monday night regarding a hobby or how to do something.  I think I’m going to talk about fantasy football.  The professor is a huge NFL fan too, so that will probably be a good topic.  My other class is Statistics and so far it’s fairly easy.  He is going to let us use Excel for things and I am pretty good with Excel.

It didn’t take me long to figure out what I wanted to do for our anniversary.  We’re going to see about getting one of these bricks with our names and wedding date inscribed and placed along Flagler_Avenue.  It’s called the “Walk of Fame”.  Here’s a picture of the form for buying one of the bricks.  Not a bad deal for $50…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, that’s all for now.  :biglaugh: