Photos!!

But first, a little bit about my promotion, since I'd noted I'd write a bit about that. I am now in Resolutions which, as you may expect, means coming up with resolutions for users on our site who are unhappy or have asked us to intervene. I'll admit that I was leery of applying, but they seemed to really need the people, and key colleagues kept pushing me in that direction. So I did, and I was brought on. A couple of things have made me realize that actually I think I'm really going to groove on this team, despite it having a lot of pressure and much more real-time communication with people: I was one of 6 people from email/chat who were promoted, and of the 5 of us in the North American group (thankfully there is a small batch in the EU also promoted), 2 are colleagues whom I've adored for a while and am thrilled to be still on their team, and the other 2 are from my own training batch who went straight into chat (I was in email until December) and so I'm getting to know them now. So I'm already feeling supported and among friends, which is great. But also, now that I've completed 2 weeks of training, I'm understanding that much of my role is that I get to be the person acting like an adult, no matter how the users are behaving. I get to educate, to decide to give money or to hold on to it, to surprise a user with an unexpected gesture or to stand my ground and say that my final decision is final. No supervisor is going to come along behind me and undercut what I've decided. The overarching lead for this team has said his motto for us is "You are the CEO of your own inbox." Ah, sipping the delicious nectar of autonomy. :)

( And now, pictures! )

I hadn't posted any pictures of the apartment in a while, so here are a few. Hope you all are having a lovely weekend!