I don't like making decisions

The owner of the company I previously worked for called me yesterday. He offered me a twist of my old job back. Apparently their IT system has collapsed since I've been gone. I can't say I'm surprised at all. Their outside company really didn't know what was going on, and when I left they had nobody internally who knew anything about computers. So they definitely want me back to work with the network system. Also, Bill, the marketing guy who I totally miss working with, has taken on a lot of government projects and needs help with the organization and logistics of it all. So where my old job was IT/Office Administration/Design & Marketing, my new job would be IT/Design & Marketing/Government research and paperwork.

I have to say I did not expect them to ever try to get me back. I had made up my mind about leaving and I left for very specific reasons, such as the following:

• Drastically underpaid for 2 years. While I don't have an IT degree, the State median for a network administrator is more than double what I was being paid.
  
• Despite telling my boss that I had commitments in Port Huron that I could not change, I was forced to work in Madison Heights every Friday. And by work I mean sit at a desk and answer maybe 3 phone calls. This required about 80 additional miles of driving on Fridays because after driving to and from Madison Heights I had to go to and from Port Huron anyway. Oh, and they reimbursed mileage at $0.32 a mile. When this was all going on, gas was hovering around $3.75 - $4.25 a gallon.
  
• Stress. I only had one single vacation/sick day where I did not receive at least one phone call from work. And ironically enough, it was on the day I interviewed for the job I have now. Even after going home from work one morning with a terrible migraine, I got 2 phone calls and 14 text messages from work. Different people, different problems. None of them urgent. And I was sick!
• Unfair policies. The other office had a receptionist. (That was originally my job at the office I was at.) She made twice what I made and did about a tenth of the work. She also wore whatever she wanted to work to sit behind a desk all day. I once wore jeans because I knew I'd be on the floor under a computer most of the day, and I got yelled at for my "unprofessional-ism."
• A ton of overtime. I once worked 65 hours in a week. Twenty-four of those hours were straight. Thirty-five of them were either between 5 pm and 8 am or on Saturday or Sunday. I received not a single penny of time and a half. Straight pay only. Because they had me classified as "administrative" and they are exempt from required time and a half. [Side note: I'm "administrative" at my current job, and I get time and a half for overtime.]
  
• Holidays. We worked Christmas Eve, New Year's Eve, the day after Thanksgiving, and Good Friday. I don't work any of those days now.
  

The job did have a few perks that my current job doesn't, such as the following:

• Christmas bonus. We don't get them here, but I got one every year at my old job. And it doubled every year. If this year were to follow that pattern, it would be two weeks' pay.
• More vacation time. If I was still at that job, I'd be 8 months away from being entitled to 4 weeks of vacation time a year. Right now, I get 1 week. I'll get 3 weeks in another 2 years.

They did offer me a pay raise with the new job. It's a 20% raise, but even that is still about 50% less than the State low wage for the job description.

Plus, my current job has a lot of perks that my old job didn't have such as the following:

• Much better insurance. I'm currently paying out of my check half of what I was paying for health insurance at my old job. At my old job, it was for health insurance only for me only. And it was crappy health insurance at that. Right now, paying half of what I was paying, I have outstanding health insurance for myself and Aharon with a contraceptive/fertility rider (which has already saved us over $2,000 since April), vision and dental for myself and Aharon, and disability and life for myself.
  
• Discounts. We get outrageous discounts on our products. Such good discounts, in fact, that Aharon is going to take up bow hunting and we are helping my Uncle get a new bow for a very low price. We also get free sweatshirts, t-shirts, and hats. Which is awesome. Especially since...
• The dress code here is relaxed. We are encouraged to wear our G5 and Quest clothing. Jeans are acceptable. Tennis shoes are everywhere. I've never seen a single skirt, tie, or suit coat.
  
• Every quarter, if we didn't call in at all (vacation days don't count), we get a $50 gift card. It's not much but it's a pretty easy $200 a year.
• The cool factor. Among my friends, it's cooler to work for G5 than an environmentalist group.

I do have to admit, I really miss the design work. I loved having something that I spend hours or days on be admired by so many people. I totally miss that. But would I give up what I have here for that little bit of happiness? I mean, without that, I can focus my design energies on church stuff. I really like working on that.

On the other hand, I love working here with Aharon. It's nice having the same office politics to discuss and both knowing what's going on with the company. Plus, they hired him at my request. He's a great employee and they like him, but part of the incentive to keep him is gone if I leave. Then they only have him to upset, not him and me.

I vote that somebody is stealing the mail!!

It's no secret that this economy is causing everyone - individuals and businesses - to have some cash flow issues lately.

It's also no secret that the US Postal Service has been talking about cutting mail delivery down to 5 days a week due to budgetary constraints. I personally think that the government should get its hands out of everything and let the postal service be privatized. I think it would run a lot better that way.

Case-in-point:

Last Friday, exactly one week ago, we (The Accounting Department at my place of employment) mailed out 40 checks. Most of the checks were going to vendors who had been patiently waiting while we dealt with some end-of-quarter cash flow problems. All of these vendors were either insurance providers or vendors who had been waiting for the checks in order to release shipment on parts or material that we were waiting for in order to do business.

As of today, not a single one of those checks has been delivered. This includes vendors in Chesterfield, MI and Newark, NJ. Not a single person has a check. If things were running slow and there were big weather problems I might be able to understand out-of-state deliveries taking a full week. But in-state? Even in-county?! I mean, Chesterfield is a 20 minute drive from here!!

The Post Office here in Memphis is actually located in our building. They rent from us! My mom also informed me earlier this week that someone from the city had taken some packages to the post office on Friday to be mailed to city council members. As of their meeting on Wednesday, none of them had received those packages. My mom's wasn't delivered yesterday or today either. There's really no excuse for mail going from Memphis, MI to Memphis, MI to not be delivered the very next day.

We took the matter up with our post office. They assured us that while rare, occasionally this does happen and those checks will show up and be delivered soon. They also guaranteed us they had left that particular post office.

So I called Royal Oak. That's where all of our local incoming mail is postmarked as being from. They told me that they no longer sort our mail and to call Pontiac. So I did. They wouldn't answer the phone. I've left four messages and have not gotten any replies.

Something fishy is going on here, and if it doesn't clear up soon we are going to be in trouble. Without those checks, vendors won't release shipments, and without shipments, we will eventually run out of the materials we need to continue operations.