One of the biggest changes I’ve had to deal with, outside of adjusting to consistently sunny days (which, really, is an adjustment we all could get used to), is the time difference.
It’s not that I’m having difficulties (more so than the usual) sleeping. My body has adjusted fairly well. It’s my parents who haven’t. My mom’s got the not calling early in the morning thing down but she needs to have better control over her husband who thinks 7am is a great time to start texting/calling. Sure it’s 9am his time, which is LATE for the 5am early bird that he is, but 9am is still pushing it with me. I am not a morning person.
Also, can I deviate for a second and talk about how both my parents now text?! It started because I always text and it lead to my mother texting me from downstairs when I lived on their third floor and now even my father is texting away. It’s downright frightening to see Mom Cell and Dad Cell pop up on my phone as a text message. Especially when they’re texting me at the same time. When both of them pop up at the same time, my brain feels like it might explode.
This morning’s 7am gem? Can you have apps on your phone? First, my father used an abbreviation Second, how does he know what those are and Third, is that so important that you have to text me at 7 IN THE MORNING?
Then at 8, after I hadn’t responded, he texts me again to let me know he shipped my hiking boots. AWESOME news, but still too early for me to get excited over the fact that I won’t die hiking thanks to very inadequate running shoes.
I texted him back around 10 and haven’t heard from him. The thing with my parents texting? Is that they don’t really understand them. Their phone will beep and they’ll be all, why is that beeping? What’s that little envelope stand for?
It could be days before I hear back from my dad and it’s not because he forgot to check his phone, it’ll be because he doesn’t know what that message thingy is.
Maybe I’m not giving him enough credit, maybe he does know what it is and is just IGNORING me.
This whole time difference thing (and the parents texting) is a fairly new experience to me. I have always lived in the same time zone as my family and best friends. Late night chats with friends in NYC wasn’t hard when I lived in Michigan because I was in the same time zone as them. My late night was their late night. Now my late night is their bedtime and their late night is my early evening.
It’s not my first experience with it, though. For three months I was 5-6 hours ahead of all my friends while I was gallivanting across Europe–my late night was their afternoon. Their late night was my early morning. So really, it’s not that bad of a difference being only 2 hours behind them. It’s manageable, I can still chat with my friends, I can deal with it.
Except for when my boss who is in the eastern time zone calls me at what I think is a reasonable hour and starts asking me why I haven’t finished the floorplans yet and then realizing that its noon her time and the middle of the work day and in her eyes I am late to work. Like four hours late.
Luckily, my boss is pretty awesome and instead of being angry with my being late, she apologizes for not remembering the time difference and then tells me she wants to hire me as her top interior designer when she restarts her business again.
That’s a long way off in my future though and not even sure a move back east will be in my cards, but it’s awesome to realize just how valued you are as an employee.
And then she texts you and you realize that everyone who was anti-texting is now texting you and you don’t know whether to throw your phone away or embrace the fact that everyone and literally their mother is texting you. When they start tweeting at you? THAT’S when you know you have a problem.
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& that's the way life goes » peace out y’all!
[...] ♥ Ashley spills about her move from the big city to big mountains [...]
I can totally relate to the client relations. My client is on the west coast, and it’s hard for me to adjust sometimes. Like, at 10:00 for me, it’s 7:00 for him, so he’s still ready and rarin’ to go.
Love that you have a job that you enjoy, and that you’re loving the west so much. We’ll be western neighbors soon enough, love pot.
Oh no, your blog just ate my comment. It timed out on posting it.
Anyway, what I said was: I could never get my parents to read my blog, even if I wanted them to. Not to mention signing up for Facebook. They just don’t see the point in it. I’d be ecstatic if they actually started using their cellphones instead of having them turned off all the time, though. And started texting. And using instant messenger. I could see that actually being useful.
As for your employer valuing you so much? Yay, that’s great!
Oy, my mom often texts me with… no spaces. And she signs her name. But rarely at 7am.
Pretty high praise from your boss, even if it IS too soon to think about another move!
My mom claims she can text message. And then I sent her one, and she immediately called me and said “Did you just call me?” “No Mom, I texted you.” “Oh, ok, I’ll check.” Parents and their lack of technological understanding.
I completely understand the time zone thing! I lived in London for a while and it was such a pain! Thankfully, I was ahead of my parents by five hours… I couldn’t even imagine if it was the other way around. Yikes!
I just found your blog and I love it! Keep it up!
My mom texts me a lot and she has a habit of sending me sexual jokes and I am like omg mom your not suppose to send this stuff to me. When we moved to Mississippi all our friends thought we where moving to a different time zone and constantly asked me what time it is where I am living now. I would just laugh and ask them what time is it there, they would answer and I would say yup same time here.
My mom cracks me up with her texting and calling me when I’m literally one floor up. Parents and technology is crazy. Now that I know the time difference, I’ll know when and when not to text you
Oh my gosh I remember when my dad would text me when he was a few hours a head of me and I actually did the same thing when he was on vacation in California. He didn’t like that…at all.
The first time my dad texted me I about died! Now he does it all the time. He hardly ever even picks up the phone; just texts… Too funny!
I still have to buy hiking boots. I’ve been hiking in my gym sneakers for a year. Probably not a good idea, but given the spending freeze, I don’t think it will be changing anytime soon.
My mom sends us MASS messages. I can barely believe she can text and yet she’s figured out how to send the same chastising messages to multiple recipients!
My mom texts – sometimes. Like, she forgets that she knows how until one random day when she’ll be like “hi. i miss you,” and I’ll be like “HI MOM!” and then she’ll call later and be like “Yeah, I didn’t like that.”
it’s definitely funny when parents learn to text… or even you gram!
That’s so incredibly awesome that you have a job like that and that they want you to be the full-time interior designer in the future. good for you
My mother can’t remember to charge a cordless phone- if she were ever to text me I think I would drop dead of shock.
When I lived in Chicago I was an hour behind my parents, and now that I’m in LA it’s three hours.
Not a phone call goes by that my dad doesn’t ask me what time it is here, as if it magically has gone from 3 hours to 5 for some reason.
My favorite is the 7 am call, you pick up and start having a conversation. A minute in they say “Oh, you sound tired?”
Grrrrrr
When I moved to California I continued to work East Coast hours. It means that my workday starts at 6 am, but I’ve adjusted. I like having the afternoon to do my own thing.
My mom HATES texting. She thinks it’s rude and weird, doesn’t want to pay for it, and she thinks people should just call each other. Eventually she’ll break down and start using it, just like Facebook. And then she’ll probably text me and post on my wall about what I put on my blog or on Twitter and my head will explode. (By her logic, she could have just called me.)
I’m so glad we didn’t cross the time zone line. We’re right next to it, but it’s nice not having to think about it when I call home. I hope your parents figure that out soon!
My parents can’t figure out texting. One time they texted me and I was SO excited… until I found out that my sister texted me for them.
My 12 year old sister is on Twitter! I haven’t told her I’m on it because…well I’m not always appropriate. Then on the other side of the spectrum is my boyfriend who doesn’t even have text messaging activated. Sheesh.