I usually devote the first two spots in the link roundup to Important Things In The World, but today I have to give the primo spot to Choire’s profile of Ina Garten, every word of which is a feast for the senses:
Shopkeeper Ina, TV Ina, and cookbook Ina are and are not about domesticity. Ina-ness is about coziness, but it’s not ever about the woman’s place being the kitchen. It’s less sexist, and definitely more sexy. Barefoot Contessa isn’t about wealth in the way that Martha Stewart’s show was about wealth. The widespread mockery of Martha that suffused American comedy in the ‘90s came about because we believed that her extreme richness took her astray into the madness of perfectionism.
The first Barefoot Contessa cookbook already has its iconography intact; the aesthetic that follows in the next eight books is just versioning. Opposite the title page, Ina is pictured barefoot, one big toe showing polish, and she is shucking corn, surrounded by a riot of summer green, in an ankle-length black skirt with a white shirt worn under a white shirt and then a white apron on top. She is on a bench, next to an extremely rustic woven willow basket. It’s about loving being at home, particularly if your home has a couple acres of garden, and yet it’s accessible. It’s never about perfection, as it is with Martha, but it is about personal triumph.
Steven W. Thrasher on “the moment” black genius is having in our culture:
We are not unique. When I entered my doctoral program last year, I was the only black member of my cohort. Through social media, I have a shadow cohort of “blackademics” at other universities. Some are the only black scholar in their local circles, and most have similar stories of having their genius discouraged at many points along the way. But we’re the lucky ones: our black genius has broken through a few barriers already. When black pre-schoolers are disproportionately suspended, and when white schoolchildren get medical treatment for the same behavior which gets black kids suspended, black genius is snuffed out before it can ever flourish.
How pregnant women and mothers get hounded out of higher education:
The consequences of being forced out of your program can be grim. Many women need to keep working in their university-sponsored jobs to make ends meet. Yet those jobs are often unavailable to students while they are on leave, or aren’t offered back to them upon their return. On many campuses, being on leave or withdrawn status means losing that income, along with health insurance, loan deferment status, and even your university email address. Sometimes it means losing your housing, too.
Federal law requires that pregnant students must be reinstated following leave to their prior status, without penalty. Yet we hear over and over about women are penalized for their absence, or forced to reapply to their programs as if they had never been accepted.
Sex-ed for people with intellectual disabilities:
The lack of sexual education for intellectually disabled people is rooted in a pervasive social problem: no one wants to admit that disabled people are sexual in the first place. “The most common myths [about disability and sexuality] are diametrically opposed,” said Walker-Hirsch. “We think of people with intellectual disabilities as perpetual children, who have no interest in sex, who want to stay innocent virgins forever. On the other side we conceive of them as voraciously sexual, as potential predators who are not in control of their sexuality or their desires. Those two concepts don’t integrate well together.”
Aaron Edwards is one of the 30 under 30, and he is great:
What’s some advice you’d have for people looking to get a foothold in your industry?
Don’t be a jerk, especially on social media—we’re all trying to figure this thing out. Never assume you have nothing to learn from someone, but also never assume people will have your best interests at heart. Work first, network later. A foundation in reporting and writing can take you to many corners of journalism that you didn’t expect to end up in. Don’t do things you hate, but don’t consider yourself above work that must be done. Negotiate your salary, benefits and perks with confidence, and have the experience to back it up. Advocate for yourself, but seek out advocates who believe in you because they won’t always come to you.
This group of autistic people who meditate set up a retreat for themselves and it was pretty cool:
The Autsit retreat gave us a chance to practice with our autistic traits and foibles in an autism-friendly environment. We learned not to bang doors and cupboards, to turn glaring lights down for each other, and to work with each others’ autistic sensitivities and idiosyncrasies in general. We saw that autistic traits like mild obsessive-compulsion had two faces: They made meticulous workers but also led for example to use of napkins, paper towels and toilet tissue in quantities pitting private compulsion against care for Earth’s dwindling resources. Similarly, it made a lover of tidiness an efficient work leader but also a testy and disagreeable one. An autistic love of structure occasionally clashed with an autistic distaste for imposed structure. One person’s peaceful quiet behind earplugs was another person’s unpleasant need to speak loudly to be understood. And so on. These sorts of problems were likely to come up in any group of autistics, and the Autsit retreat provided a space for autistics to face these problems using ancient meditative tools in a dogma- and sensory-overload-free environment, surrounded (not too closely) by others with compassion born of shared autistic experience.
It happened that many participants cried at least once during the Autsit retreat, but that was not a requirement. In our closing meetings everyone expressed great satisfaction with how the retreat turned out. It seems, then, that it was a success! Go and make one yourself.
I really enjoyed this article on “Sleep No More” superfans (I’ve never seen the show, but I always love people who love things too much, because I sure do!):
Set in a dreamlike, Hitchcockian (by way of Lynch) “McKittrick Hotel,” “Sleep No More,” located in a sprawling warehouse on 27th Street and 10th Avenue in Manhattan, is equal parts “Macbeth” and “Rebecca,” dance show and art installation, theatre piece and extended role-playing game. Masked audience members are free to roam (silently) anywhere in the six-story space, which includes a full-scale mental hospital, a Scottish town high street, a cemetery, a palatial estate, a forest, and the titular hotel itself. They can follow characters, rummage through drawers in search of letters that might illuminate the story, or simply sit in a corner and listen to the eerie, 1930s-style music that weaves its way throughout the building. There is more than twenty-seven hours of material in the show, which, combined with the nightly cast rotations, makes it virtually impossible to see the same show twice, and allows superfans to collect vast catalogs of knowledge about the show in its endless possible permutations.
You may not be able to tell this is a picture of my friend Carrie’s new puppy attempting to escape from her slanket, but it IS:
important alt-girl albums from the 90s!
“I thought it was weird that you wanted that, but I was prepared to be supportive.”
— Nicole Cliffe (@Nicole_Cliffe) September 30, 2015
(I will report back as soon as I get my period, which I anticipate will arrive…Friday.)
The existence of Ina Garten is an Important Thing in the World. Who else could guide my fantasies about my elegant and delicious middle age?
This piece was FANTASTIC and I got a little choked up reading it, I love her so much and have learned how to be a great hostess from her. I make her roast chicken as my go to “what’s for dinner?” and it never fails to delight.
When I am being my best self, I want to be Ina Garten when I am older.
When I’m not, it’s probably closer to Lucille Bluth.
Saying the name ‘Ina’ three times while staring into a mirror will invariably summon the spirit of Roxane Gay.
For the hot minute I had a Tinder, my opening line was “I’m like a sober Barefoot Contessa” which, in retrospect, makes no sense, but very few people would have understood if I said “sober Sandra Lee.” Reading about Queen Ina ASAP.
I am ALWAYS up for talking about the interplay between stereotypical gender roles and what people actually want (“Ina-ness is about coziness, but it’s not ever about the woman’s place being the kitchen. It’s less sexist, and definitely more sexy.”), because balancing those expectations is always an interest of mine — I’m about to rewatch Legally Blonde (because law applications open today!), which walks a tightrope with that.
On a related, GBBO note: NADIYA WAS STAR BAKER. Star Baker! I want her to win so much.
My relief when Paul said in the deliberation bit that Nadiya and Tamal were safe was out of control. I didn’t want Flora to go home, but I needed my babies to make it through to the finale. I think that this is the first time that both my favorites from episode 1 made it all the way to the end.
I s2g, if Ian wins over either of them, I will burn something to the ground. Possibly a Victoria sponge.
I agree with everything you just said. I knew Nadiya was star baker from social media before I watched it, or I would have been really worried. Next week, I am turning off the entire internet between when it airs and when I can watch it. But man, that peacock could have gone either way.
oh man ME TOO. I was totally relaxed for the booting-off because I knew Nadiya and Tamal were safe. I was a little worried since Tamal’s chocolate bell tower did look kind of sloppy, but at least his other things were good and the chocolate was done right.
GBBO. WHY MUST YOU STRESS ME SO MUCH.
Ian is barely hanging on; Nadiya & Tamal can wipe the floor with him. I think Nadiya will take it in the end because she’s more consistent, Tamal always struggles with his timings and getting everything done right!
Ian’s well was stupid (I may be biased) and I was hoping Flora would make it through but once the judges were soooooooooo over the top in their praise of the well I knew she would be cut. I know that she hurt her own chances with the flavour and quality of her showstopper baked goods but I just like her.
I can’t think of anything interesting to add because all I really want to say is YAAAAAYYYYY NADIYA!
So good!! I want Nadiya to win too but I want to be friends with Tamal. When he was just standing there, taking a breather and the camera caught him telling himself he could do this was so great.
Relevant to your Nadiya interests http://thedailyedge.thejournal.ie/nadiya-great-br…
THE HANDSHAKE!
I had a thought last week that I’ve never seen Paul give The Handshake to any women, he only does it to the men; WELL NOT ANY MORE.
“(because law applications open today!)”
NOOOOOOOOO DON’T DO IT NOOOOOOOOOOOOO
FYI, I’m willing to make a long distance call on my own dime to talk any and all Toasties out of going to law school. I consider it part of my pro bono work.
Here’s the thing. 1) I’m really excited. I wasn’t sure I wanted to do it for a while, but now I have done some legal volunteer work and it was excellent, and I am working in a business-adjacent role right now, and so I know that I enjoy a lot of aspects of it. 2) It is still one of the easier ways to get back to Britain. If you have other suggestions for the latter, I will take them, but this option seems like the best so far.
Ah, I forgot you were applying outside the US. Carry on!
It might not be less stressful or less soul destroying, but at least I won’t have to pay for it or find a job afterwards.
Ooo! Best of luck on your applications!
Guys I’m in bad shape and need help. Info in reply.
I’m starting to get worried… You ok?
Yeah, thanks 🙂
I got distracted and forgot I had left that just dangling there. Sorry for the drama. Writing the reply now.
I’m very close to getting fired. I work my ass off in fundraising for a small, women-run, community non-profit, and my boss is making my life miserable. She is a type-A (not that there’s always anything wrong with that) woman just a few years older than me who has no understanding of or flexibility toward people like me navigating the work-life balance on a budget. In our five-person staff, she and I are the only ones with young children, and she has a live-in au pair. I have a total of 15 paid-time-off days a year, and when I have had to miss additional days due to my kids being sick or having snow days, she has made this an issue. It doesn’t matter that not a single one of these days went by when I wasn’t still working from home, as she knows from my participation in conference calls and my frequent work-related emails on these days – but she won’t credit me for any of this time. Knowing this, I have come to work sick about three times in the past year. Three weeks ago, I had strep that was so bad my whole body hurt when I moved, and my doctor told me to stay in bed. My boss docked my pay for that day. Now things have gotten much worse – I am micro-managed to the nth degree, which is demoralizing and gets in the way of me being effective at my job – which I find hard enough, having to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars as a single fundraising staff member with only volunteer board members to count on. I’m trying to do my best, but it seems like every day she cuts me down. Yesterday she gave me an itemized, dated list of errors I’ve made and (self-created) deadlines I’ve missed, even by a day or two, and told me that if this doesn’t stop I’ll be fired. This is complicated by the fact that I’m (accidentally) pregnant – which she knows. No one else in the office knows yet – I told her early on so because my due date conflicts with our major spring benefit and I wanted to give us plenty of time to work out the logistics together. Now I feel like she’s documenting screw-ups and actively ignoring all of the ways I’m busting my ass and good things I’m doing for the organization – so that she can dismiss me based on that, hiring a more effective (i.e. childless) person and not having to deal with my maternity leave. Should I tell someone else in the office about what’s going on, to get some insurance? I’m actively looking for other jobs, but we need the money and so I’m trapped here until I find something else. The irony is that this organization helps people find spiritual renewal and healing, and I’ve been leaving it every day broken and crying. I feel like I’m trying so hard and constantly failing, with very little support. The worst part is that I know she thinks she is being very patient and reasonable with me, which makes me feel crazy for feeling this way, on top of everything else. I can’t take it anymore. I wish I could just resign today.
Oh, honey.
This sounds awful, your boss sounds awful, the whole situation sounds unsustainable. You’re not crazy. Take good care of yourself, read Ask A Manager, brush up your resume, and hopefully get the hell out of there. Fundraising is difficult enough of a job without all the rest of the crap you’re putting up with.
Not sure about some of the legality about this too — did she dock your pay because you were out of sick days, or just to punish you? If it’s the latter I do not think she can do that. I’m also not sure about not paying you for days when you are working even though you are sick/kids have a snow day. Between that and the concerns you have about being dismissed for, essentially, being pregnant, it may be time to schedule a meeting with an employment lawyer. I believe many of them will do an initial consultation for free. It may not be anything you can do anything about, but at least you have your bases covered.
I was out of sick days – technically I don’t have any, just 15 paid time off days a year. Which may be realistic for my childless colleagues or boss who has the foresight to be wealthy enough to afford live-in help (not that I’m bitter), but quickly dries up for me, especially with the crazy New England winter we just had. I had missed two extra days before though, which she let me make up by working Sundays. Not this time, though. As for the work from home, she says that I would have had to pre-arrange that with her as a set “work from home” 9-5 day. Because sick and snow days can be pre-arranged, yes.
Good idea, I’ll find an employment lawyer to talk to.
Ugh, I hate “flex time,” which basically means “forget having a vacation because you’re going to use this all for sick leave.” You’d think non-profits would make up for their low pay by having better benefits, but 15 days off a year total is abysmally low (FTR, I work at a not-for-profit institution and get 15 days a year just for vacation, plus paid holidays, and have accrued a lot more sick leave on top of that. The pay is garbage, but the vacation is great.)
I second everyone’s suggestion to talk to a lawyer – if you’re in a union you can talk to your union’s lawyer. Also, do you have documentation that she knows you’re pregnant? An email maybe? Because it’s difficult to prove retaliation otherwise.
You’re in Mass though, aren’t you? Are you not covered by the new sick leave legislation?
Your boss? Not so much type-A as type-empathyless. Jeez. Good luck finding new work, and sticking it out in the meantime.
Thanks, seriously though. Fuuuuuuck.
I suck at the job market, so I have no advice to give, except to maybe check out the archives on Ask A Manager: http://www.askamanager.org/
She has written several posts on being fired – READ THESE and anything else you can find on her site, she’ll teach you how to negotiate the firing (for example, what kind of reference you’ll get) in case they really do fire you:
http://www.askamanager.org/2013/09/help-i-think-i…
http://www.askamanager.org/2011/10/what-to-do-if-…
http://www.askamanager.org/2007/06/what-to-do-if-…
You should also check what she writes about pay docking, exempt and un-exempt workers (tl;dr: they can NEVER dock pay for time you have worked, and your exempt status decides whether she needs to pay you for the time you worked at home).
BUT what I was going to say is that this thing, this thing where she acts like she is being patient and reasonable by being around you and your many faults which she will list in incredible detail just so you realise how very patient she has to be with you, THAT IS SOME BULLSHIT. That’s sanctimonious bullshit of the first degree. You should reward yourself for having such a great bullshit detector. You are clear-headed. Don’t let her confuse you.
Okay, so. If you suck so badly, it’s on her as the manager to teach you how to suck less. Does she do that? No, she just hands you a list of past suckage moments. She also doesn’t give you credit for things you do well. So, she doesn’t observe the full picture, she doesn’t play to your strengths and she doesn’t make plans with you for how you’re going to do well in the future. This isn’t reasonable at all. But you already knew that, because you said so yourself. That’s great, you’re able to think under pressure.
The reassuring part is that you really did do well at this job. Your work ethic is great. And you’ve raised a lot of money, yes? NO ONE can take that away from you. This will be very useful when you look for new jobs. Breathe, breathe, breathe. Your boss is stressing you out, a lot. But you will have a job again. Ask A Manager is great for job-search advice too, actually – read everything she’s written about cover letters and then do what she says. You’ll get interviews, believe me. Most people freaking suck at cover letters, so this is a really easy way to improve your chances.
Congratulations on your pregnancy, I wish you the best 🙂
Thanks for this, this really helps a lot. I’m going to dive into Ask a Manager – when I get home from work of course. One thing about confused about is that I wrote what I thought was a great cover letter using her template, and now friends are telling me that it’s way too long and detailed for today’s world of mass online applications. After I’ve used it to apply to ten jobs in the past week. So I just don’t know anymore.
FWIW, and grain of salt etc, I write cover letters in the AAM “style” — conversational, friendly, informative, not-pushy, blah blah blah, and I tend to get a pretty good response, at least on jobs that I’m obviously qualified for. It’s worked less well for stretch positions, but that’s a little harder to interpret — could be that there are simply more qualified candidates out there, or it could be that that style doesn’t communicate “I haven’t done exactly this but I could because [x]” very well.
Another thing you might want to do is collect any useful metrics for your job — amount of money raised, or # donors increased, or whatever’s relevant. Those cold hard facts are great to put on your resume, and if this [redacted] boss of yours does go off the deep end and fire you, you won’t have access to those stats when you need them most.
I figured out this style a few years ago when I had no education and spotty work experience. It got me hired several times (for “unskilled” jobs, but that’s what I needed, so). I used to put in something fun, like “I like figuring out how to make the burgers keep coming, because it’s like a computer game”. Fake example, but you get my point, job skill = similar to a hobby I’m good at (and of course I also said something serious, like mentioning a great compliment from a boss or describing a job thing I did well). My resume wasn’t much to look at, so I made the letter as good as possible and tried to fit in good stuff that wasn’t on my resume. I felt very validated when I discovered AAM!
It worked surprisingly well. Interviewers just assumed that I’d be smart and socially competent, so they had a good impression even before the interview started. The only thing I had to do was to not fuck it up, I didn’t have to win them over at all. It was great, because I’m actually really dorky in real life and not very good at seeming “professional”.
(if anyone’s wondering, I’m white and female – I don’t know how well this works for other groups)
I think as long as it’s under a page, length doesn’t matter as long as it reads like a letter and not a stilted resume in sentence form.
I’ve worked in fundraising, and I feel like fundraisers often end up facing unreasonable expectations. The bright side of that, is that non-profits are always looking for good fundraisers, and having year-long jobs on your resume isn’t unusual. Make sure you’ve got some good $$$ metrics on your resume, and you should be able to get out of there soon.
Are your friends hiring managers? You can try different things if you want, but if you take AAM’s advice, your cover letter won’t be longer than one page anyway and should be written for the job you’re applying for. I mean, who could possibly take issue with this: http://www.askamanager.org/2014/02/heres-a-real-l…
Or this: http://www.askamanager.org/2011/09/great-cover-le…
Or this! http://www.askamanager.org/2013/11/this-is-a-resu…
See how detailed these letters are? And also how personal, professional and engaging they are, BECAUSE they’re detailed? I think that if you write letters like these when you apply for jobs in your field, employers would LOVE to interview you. I’m not an employer in any way but I totally want to hire these people! There’s no such thing as a “too good” letter.
(Some people make a template document with a bunch of basic paragraphs that you can tailor for every application, which probably works as long as your letter ends up speaking to that exact job with descriptions of relevant stuff you’ve done well in the past.)
I also want to say that this:
” this thing where she acts like she is being patient and reasonable by being around you and your many faults which she will list in incredible detail just so you realise how very patient she has to be with you, THAT IS SOME BULLSHIT”
Is abusive behavior. If the intimate partner of your best friend was doing this, what would you think/feel/tell them?
That sounds really shit and stressful; I’m really sorry you have to go through this!
Do you have a HR person you can talk to? or if you don’t, is there someone above this woman you can bring it to?
Firstly I’d be keeping a record of all of these incidents, including doctors notes from days you’ve been legitimately ill but been docked pay, and any evidence that you were in fact working from home on the days you say you were. If she’s sending you emails/lists criticizing you great, keep them and build your case against her.
I’m presuming you’re in the US? That makes things more difficult around maternity/being pushed out, but if you can prove that she’s deliberately creating a hostile work environment in order to push you out, or creating grounds to fire you on, then you might have a case for forced resignation (I can’t quite remember the name for it, but its basically when a company can’t fire you so they create an environment that makes you leave)
If there is someone you can talk to, you don’t have to go straight to legal action/accusations; just have a conversation and say ‘I feel that this person is being really unfair to me and this is why, I also think this is because of my pregnancy’
Check if your company has working from home policies; WFH should not really be an issue in this day and age, so long as you are able to effectively do your job from home!
There’s probably some Toast HR professionals who will be able to help more, but I am on your side! You’re clearly working very hard, while also dealing with life changing events, this woman sounds like a pain!
First, all the sympathy and internet hugs. Having a job like that is so draining and hard. And of course you probably don’t have an HR department if your company is that small.
I second everyone’s “read Ask a Manager”, but also consider documenting all of your successes. You can use them on your resume and in your cover letter, and also use them to counter her accusations and just make yourself feel better.
Also, what city/area are you in, because there may be some Toasties near you who know of job openings in your field!
I’m…. probably not about to say anything that anyone else hasn’t said, but that’s because I spent some time trying to find a good Martha Stewart related hug gif, and I could only find this really mediocre one:
That sounds really hard, I’m really sorry you’re going through this, you’re not crazy.
She wants to overcommunicate to get justification to fire you? Two can play at that game, overcommunicate to cover your ass. Get her buy in on your priorities for the day, update her on how things are going, do as much of this in writing as you can. She’s going to try to fire you no matter what (sounds like), and your attempt to communicate back to her about priorities won’t *really* save you if she’s determined to fire you. But it could very well help you draw things out long enough for you to find the right place to land next.
It might also alert Madame Boss to the fact that she’s on somewhat shaky ground. It sounds to me like this is something she’s blowing up in her own head, and external reminders of what you are actually doing could serve as a virtual smack upside said head.
In addition to everything that people have added here–which is great–I wanted to ask: is there anyone on the board you can talk to about this? Someone that you’ve worked closely with re. fundraising who will have your back?
I’ve only been here a little over a year – to be honest I don’t feel safe that anyone on the Board would take my word over my boss’. I have great relationships with them, but I know that when push comes to shove they would side with her.
Argh. I’m really sorry to hear that. :/ I think there’s a lot of really good advice you’re getting so I don’t have much else to add, but good, proven fundraisers are hard to find and I hope you find a good place to land! <3 <3 <3
What a bunch of awful. I’m sorry you’re going through that, and you’re definitely not crazy. Sending wishes that you’re able to find something better as soon as possible.
I’m so sorry to hear this! I agree with all of the Ask a Manager scripts. Captain Awkward also has advice for dealing with managers — I’ll check to see if she has anything matching this situation.
Edited to remove intrusive offer of help, I am too awkwardly enthusiastic sometimes and didn’t mean to come off as creepy. :/
Ha! I caught that before your edit. Yep, I live in Sharon, we should hang out anyway, said one awkwardly enthusiastic person to the other 🙂
Thanks for understanding my awkwardness. If you want to hang out/get coffee/sing Hamilton with someone in-person, my email is reebchan (at) gmail dot com!
Nthing what others have said, both advice and sympathy.
If you are a non-exempt worker (not salaried), then your employer MUST LEGALLY PAY YOU for work you’ve done (i.e. conference calls from home on snow days). Of course, this doesn’t necessarily help you–getting litigious when you’re in a precarious work situation doesn’t really make things better, probably.
You might actually email Allison at askamanager directly–I submitted a question to her once and she just emailed me back a couple hours later. Not saying you’ll definitely get a response, but she might be able to help you even if she doesn’t post the question on her page.
Good luck, congratulations on the baby, and many Jedi hugs to help you get through this.
In your next job–which you will find–you should be very upfront about your need for flexibility/a telecommuting option. In an ideal world, you shouldn’t have to specify that as a primary caregiver to small children means you will need to miss work on an unpredictable but fairly routine basis, but in this world, you do. It sounds like there was a severe expectations mismatch at your job from day one. You assumed you could not be in the office when you needed to be, she assumed you would be in the office on a “standard” schedule. Not taking her side, but you really don’t want to have to go through this again.
What with the documentation, it definitely sounds like she is gearing up to fire you, which means you should, to the extent you can anyway, pull back on any emotional investment you have in the job. Don’t give it any free space in your head!
I’m really sorry you are having to deal with this! Part of me wants to say you should wait for her to fire you, so you can collect unemployment while you look for a new job. But I don’t really know how that works. I second all the people who say you should consult with a lawyer. Good luck.
It may also be valuable to seek out a professional recruiting or staffing agency in your area! They’ll often have relationships with a whole host of organizations in your town and it’s their whole entire job to match people with positions. We even have an agency in my town that specializes in placing people with non-profits. It’s a great way to put your resume in front of one person who then shops around for you.
Also, another thing I found was that the agency I just used to switch jobs has access to available positions that their client companies don’t even list publicly on websites or other forums like Indeed. So it may open up roads to opportunities that you would never have known were available.
Sending you all of the job-getting karma I can muster!
Next time she gives you a list, ostentatiously take out a lighter, light it on fire, and drop it in a garbage can. If she’s going to fire you, she’s going to fire you, and no amount of hard work is going to help. She sounds like a real piece of work.
Sorry, I had to run off to be a worky worker.
IME, when you get to the stage that your manager seems to be at with the cold-as-ice documentation, she has decided to fire you and is just getting her documentation together to do it. There’s really not any way that you can recover this job. Right, wrong, legal, illegal, she has decided you need to go (or someone above her has told her this is the way it needs to be and she is complying) and there is no way you are going to be able to turn this turd back into a job that you want to do.
So, bust out that resume, write your letters, and get yourself a new job with someone who will appreciate you. Pull your documentation together and TAKE IT HOME that will a) support that the firing is bogus/based on your pregnancy and b) show how awesome you have been, $$ raised, % increase over last year, etc. that you will want to put in your portfolio to WOW your new boss(es).
I know this sounds a little flip and I don’t really mean it that way. But this thing is just not salvageable and you’ll be happier once you’re on to something new.
I’m so sorry to hear this is happening to you during what should be a happy, low-stress time. I second the practical advice here, would like to give your boss two middle fingers, and the only other thing I can offer is that when I was unexpectedly laid off from two jobs in the space of a month, RIchard Bolles’ “Job Seeker’s Survival Guide” was a useful thing to have in my backpack. It would have been a lot better to have while I still had a job, but still–it offered some solace and a lot of sound ideas for finding what’s next. I hope that whatever that turns out to be for you is light years more enjoyable than this current mess.
Piping up from Tiny Nonprofit Land…
I don’t really have much in the way of advice, but oh god I know exactly, precisely what you’re going through and you have my complete and utter sympathy.
I’m so sorry you’re going through this. *All the hugs, if they are wanted*
I’m not sure if anyone has already mentioned this, but the ACLU does sometimes provide legal advice and assistance, esp. when there’s possible discrimination going on (which it sounds like is the case here). I think you’d have to look up your local affiliate here: https://www.aclu.org/about/affiliates
Not saying you have to or should go the legal route, just that it’s an option.
I am emailing you with the contact info for my own employment lawyer, who is incredible.
UGH UGH UGH. Small non-profits and their employment practices make me weep. I was working at a VERRRY small 501c3 (CEO, CEO’s husband, books/office manager, one full time programmer, and one part time programmer plus little old me running all the community programs) when my mother-in-law was diagnosed with an extremely rare, extremely deadly form of cancer. My husband and I decided we needed to move back to his hometown to care for her, so I put in my notice.
My boss wouldn’t accept it. She told me that she wanted me to step up and run the organization when she retired in a few years, that she believed in me, and that we would work it all out, that I would still want a job when I was living in Nowhere, USA, and she would support me however she could through this. I got stars in my eyes and said okay, let’s do this. We agreed that I would telecommute but would return to the city for a week every two weeks or so, staying with her and her husband, who I also worked with. Sounded great.
It fell apart pretty quickly. My position was highly dependent on personal relationships, both for fundraising and for finding participants in our programs, and it became exceedingly difficult to create and maintain those relationships. As those started unravelling, my boss became more and more paranoid about what I was (or was not) doing while telecommuting and required more and more detailed daily check-in emails about my tasks accomplished. It just wasn’t working, so on one of my trips down there I again offered my resignation… and she somehow talked me out of it AGAIN.
But of course, nothing got better. The last straw was when I left my extremely agitated husband and insanely chemo-sick mother-in-law for a pre-planned trip back to the city and no one showed up to pick me up at the airport. I called my boss repeatedly, but her phone was off. I TOOK A FUCKING BUS TO HER HOUSE, knocked on the door and she just looked at me and said “oh, what are you doing here?” Turns out, she had forgotten I was coming and turned off her phone to get some “me time” (which means smoking joints and listening to James Taylor). She then told me that I COULD CRASH ON HER COUCH THAT NIGHT but that her nephew was staying with her and I’d have to find somewhere else to stay that week, and did not say it but made it very clear that she wanted me to crash with a friend, that she did not want the organization to pay for it. When I insisted that I get a hotel, they put me up in the shittiest, shadiest, seediest motel in town.
I waited until I got home, FedExed my organization laptop and all the property I had back, emailed her the tracking number and my resignation, and promptly began ignoring all of her emails. Yes, I burned a bridge, but it has not in any way hindered me from getting hired elsewhere.
None of this is to say you should quit your job – if I were you, and pregnant, I would definitely stick it out for as long as possible. Do consult Nicole’s employment lawyer. Unemployment isn’t a lot of money, but it’s something, and as was mentioned upthread, you can control the situation a bit, especially as to what kind of reference they give you. Just thought you might get some good schadenfreude out of what happened to me.
Agreeing (with everyone!) on the potential shittiness of the small non-profit world. I was in one of those “wait, am I crazy?” situations for a few years. It’s rough when you have people convinced they are doing good simultaneously trying to run a business (often with no management experience) and deal with not having every element of their baby (whatever the organization’s mission may be) not under their immediate direction.
Good luck with everything, and hopefully you can find a space at a larger org, if you want to stay in development — they’ll be lucky to have you.
After that I took a job at a nationally known nonprofit – like, if you thought of a huge national volunteer organization it would probably be one of the first five you would name. It was a direct volunteer coordination position, which I thought would be a lot more fulfilling than development, and since it was at such a huge organization, I thought would be bullshit proof.
Indeed it was not. Very much not. I’ve left the nonprofit world and am back in school full time, working on a nursing degree. I figure if I want to make a living helping other people, I’m better off wiping asses and getting griped at by doctors. At least I’ll be making a decent living, won’t be expected to work 60-80 hour weeks (unless I want to), and can leave my work at work. There’s a real problem in the world of nonprofits.
Speaking of genius- this is an interview Rembert Browne did with Lin-Manuel and it is excellent. He straight up admits that “Wait For It’ and “Room Where It Happens” are pretty much the best things he’s ever written and he gave them both to Burr.
+1+1+1+1+1
This is a truly great interview and I was coming into the comments to suggest it
“If there is a Busta Rhymes of musical theater, it probably is Mandy Patinkin. ” A++++
There is nothing about that analogy that isn’t 100% truth and that I don’t love with every fiber of my being
This seems like a good place to say that I finally bought and listened to the cast recording of Hamilton yesterday and I loved it. It’s all because of reading so much about it here. Well I mean I listened to some of it free on NPR and hearing Helpless was pretty much when I was done for and I knew I would end up buying the cast recording.
Ahhh, I love Helpless too! I feel like it hasn’t been getting as much love as some of the others. But they’re almost all great, of course.
Ah, I’ve always thought that In the Heights is the spiritual successor to Fiddler on the Roof, I’m glad that LMM listed it as an influence!
I love Ina. She is my role model. She is just a joyful, happy human being.
Martha’s perfectionism is weird and fascinating and pervasive in everything she touches. I have been going back over older cookbooks I have to see if anything old is new again, and I realized I have “The Martha Stewart Cookbook,” which is unreal. A lot of is useful, but there’s also a caviar recipe that makes 100 pieces, a cassoulet recipe that takes like three days and serves 100, and a recipe for a roast turkey that instructs you to “arrange the sage leaves under the turkey skin in a mosaic pattern.” I mean.
I love the weird perfectionism of Martha Stewart. It is so specific and unobtainable that it doesn’t read as a life guide to me- just as a fascinating media personality, like a top athlete.
Same! I sort of also appreciate that her version of domesticity isn’t cozy or nice, but nearly militaristic. It’s just sort of entertaining, especially because the perfectionism makes me feel I don’t have to even try to live up to it.
militaristic domesticity is an ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE phrase
YES. It is so Not Cozy that it becomes fascinating.
I thought she was pretty much a stockbroker who hit a vein of gold with the creation of Martha Stewart Inc. Then I read her schedule in an August issue (in the early 2000s, I think) “1–have the pink gravel taken up on the circular drive–it gets so muddy in the Autumn and Winter.”
She had people who CHANGED THE GRAVEL SEASONALLY.
I could not even after that.
Yes! Her domestic life is interesting in the same way that the Rock’s meal plan is interesting — I’m never going to live like that, even if I really want to [live in a perfect home and serve perfect food/be huge and muscular], because I’m just not willing to put the effort in, but it’s interesting to see how someone who is that dedicated to [domestic perfection/muscles] achieves it.
She only needs to sleep four hours a night, which I’m pretty sure is how she has so much time to make perfect beautiful things.
I can’t believe I missed a Martha conversation. I live for Martha conversations. Her brand of militant domesticity (someone else in the comments used that phrase and I’m stealing it and loving it) is what I aspire to. My grandmother is the closest I have ever seen a mortal come to it and I Want That Life.
Also. Long standing family rumor is that she’s a not so distant cousin. Her mother and my mother have the same not at all common last name and come from the same regions. That is not random chance. Come, Cousin Martha. Come and tell me your secrets.
Bless that alt-girl albums article, that was my youth in a nutshell & wow what a throwback! I feel like I should be ashamed for liking some of those bands BUT NO I FEEL NO SHAME COME AT ME.
Dig Me Out is a perfect album as are Debut and Star. FIGHT ME.
The omission of Not a Pretty Girl is glaring. GLARING.
“For some reason, the vast majority of pregnant students who have reported discrimination to us are women of color.”
For some reason.
FOR SOME REASON.
WHAT COULD THAT REASON BE
HMM
LET’S THINK
I guess we’ll just never know.
SO MYSTERIOUS
Sometimes things just happen! Statistics are confusing!
Correlation? Causation? DUNNO!
COULD IT BE…SATAN?
That Ina piece is everything. I need to know more. I am sort of obsessed with Ina and Jeffrey’s relationship, which is clearly so loving but also so strangely played for the cameras sometimes. Especially now knowing he was/is a major political and financial playa.
They are the modern day Julia and Paul! And I loved the line about how normal things that anyone would say sound Lynchian when Jeffrey says them for the camera.
I love that Ina was a nuclear policy analyst before she opened up shop in the Hamptons and starting having gays over for cocktails.
“But even as she has stood all these decades stirring and paring, laughing and cocktailing, her hair, nails, skin — all the exposed human parts — each has become more coddled and elegant and more content.”
– Erotica Written By An Alien Pretending Not To Be Horrified By Ina Garten
Ina forever! Every single recipe I have ever made of hers is wonderful, and guests/family are always impressed. And the thing is, they aren’t complicated or fussy, just delicious. As she would say “What could be bad about that?”.
That 90s album list is very good but really should have included the Angus soundtrack.
Which is essentially, like, 60% Smoking Popes, right?
This is super last minute, but if any MPLS/StP toasties can join us, we’d love to have you!
https://www.facebook.com/events/1639228916333510/
yayyyyyy
I enjoyed the Punchdrunk superfans article! They remind me a bit of the superfans of the Night Circus in the Erin Morgenstern book. I saw the London show The Drowned Man last year and just went the once, but I can definitely see why people went back again and again (a friend of a friend must have spent over a grand on tickets I think!). I was SO JEALOUS of the people who got pulled into the secret rooms by the actors.
Wherefore art Bikini Kill, Popsugar?!?!?!
http://www.cracked.com/personal-experiences-1878-…
Cracked linked to The Toast! They seem to be equally obsessed with how much cod The Rock eats. I had a nagging suspicion that they had read the article since they included ‘The Rock eats so so much Cod’ in an article recently.
(I don’t know why I’m so excited by this but I am.)
I wonder if there’s been an influx of crappy commentors after that link. Cracked’s comment section…ugh
“I Love The Victorian Era So I Decided To Buy Panties From It” by Nicole Cliffe
<3
Long train journey ahead of me today… bookmarking the Autsit article for delectation later.
I finally got a Netflix subscription yesterday (don’t look at me like that) and am digging belatedly into “Orange Is The New Black.” Two episodes in. I have many feels, not all of them pleasant, but my primary comment is: KATE MULGREW FTW. My God, that woman is up there with all the classic movie goddesses I can think of.
YES
She is amazing.
I liked her fine on Star Trek Voyager, but she really knocks it out of the park when she gets better writing.
Oh man, that sex ed article was great. When I was in grad school for Rehabilitation Psych, we had a course on psychosocial well-being for people with disabilities and one lecture focused specifically on sex ed. It’s not very often you can say “Our guest lecturer brought in vibrators for people to pass around.”
Wow, the 90s alt-girl music has me itching to put on my (fake) Docs, wrap a plaid flannel around my waist and a velvet choker around my neck. My list would also include Ani Difranco (duh) and Dar Williams (ok she’s not really alt-rock but she’s definitely alt-something and she meant SO MUCH to me in college).
SAME. On both counts. Seriously, how could they have left off Ani? My much-cooler, much-older stepsister made me a mixtape of her songs in 1994 that changed my 14yo life.
I was a music industry major back in the late 90’s to early 00’s and everytime one of the professors would give a “this is the way the music business works” lecture someone would inevitably pipe up and say “but what about Ani DeFranco?” It was pretty glorious and usually by the end of the semester the professors would be saying “this is the way the music business works unless you are Ani DeFranco who is the only one who’s been successful outside this model.”
10+ years later I’m still getting a kick about how WRONG those professors were about the changes coming down the pipeline thanks to Ani, Napster & the Internet.
Although I will never regret taking that History of Rock class. Best class ever.
I haven’t read the article yet, but I’m mostly curious to see where the Sleep No More superfans get the money to spend on all those visits. I’ve been five times, and two of those times had tickets bought for me. I wouldn’t mind going again, but I can barely justify the price when it just keeps going up! (Also, the last time I went I got the super-secret 6th floor Manderley one-on-one, so my life is complete.)
*comes up for air*
HI EVERYONE
Ina Garten is my new crush maybe?
My THINX arrived last month, but I chickened out on my recent period. The underwear itself seems perfectly fine, but I’m just really daunted by cleaning it afterwards, so I’m looking forward to your report!
I’ve been holding off on pulling the trigger on them because I want to read a thorough review first, so I am excited to hear more too!
I bought one pair (black) to try out, and so far so good. I like wearing them at night. My cycle is fairly light and I just rinsed them out in cold water and threw them in the laundry hamper. I will say though, that on a hot day, things can get muggy down there.
I hadn’t known Aaron Edwards before his award announcement, but I am immediately a fan of anyone who, when give a platform from which to provide advice, goes with “don’t be a jerk.”
Ina Garten is a retired assassin is the implication I’m getting here.
I’m convinced that there is barefoot contessa fanfic where this is canon.
This would be the perfect TV show.
There is a Black Widow joke to be made here somehow.
Missing from that PopSugar list: Fiona Apple “Tidal”! Also did anyone else listen to Heather Nova? Man the 90s were great for hearing female-fronted bands on the ‘alt-rock’ station
Ah, yeah, back in the day when rock-centric radio stations didn’t believe that they could only play one female-fronted band a month. I miss that.
I’m only halfway through, but here are two of my favorite lines so far:
“This problem is solved by a youngster named Lidey Heuck, a 2013 Bowdoin graduate who started working for Ina right after graduation, after having written Ina a letter delivered by means of a classmate’s father who is Ina’s attorney, because apparently she inhabits some marvelous Victorian novel.”
and
“Recently, also, Ina followed a friend to the grocery store just to see how people shop.”
I just read the autsit blog, and the ones from 2012 and 2015, and the sparseness adaptation theory on the main page, and found pictures of the Online Meditation Hall which is people sitting in the view of webcams with the microphones muted, and it was all so excellent and I am very happy.
Oh, I DEFINITELY knew that was Nicole’s friend Carrie’s new puppy under that slanket. (I know her name, but kind of think it should be changed to this.)
This would be the perfect TV show.
The 90s albums list… Such good times! And I’m glad the cycle has come ’round again, and we get great female-fronted bands like Speedy Ortiz, Tacocat, Pity Sex. STRATOCASTERS FOR EVERYBODY.