This has been a crazy week. I had thought things at work would settle down once the auditors left, but that didn’t last long, now that we’re unexpectedly down two staff for the duration. I forgot that the book club is meeting next Friday and I haven’t started on that book yet, so I need to get my current read finished so I can at least make good headway on Accidental Happiness. Meanwhile, I’ve been finding items all week that I’ve meant to comment on, but I’m going to have to keep ’em brief.
I’ve just started using del.icio.us bookmarks and making brief comments on stuff over there too.
A post in On Balance included a brief summary of the basic work-related values and styles of the four generations currently in the workplace – Traditionalists, Boomers, Gen-X’ers, and Millenials (my son’s group, mostly kids of Boomers) – and how they might learn to co-exist. Interesting times ahead. I just can’t see myself intervening with my child’s manager at work, or, as a manager, responding well to the parent of one of my employees doing it with me.
On a side note, I’ve just learned that I actually have a generational niche – I’m part of Generation Jones. 1953-1968 is the most generous birth-year range applied to this group, but in the US it’s usually considered 1954-1965. Being born in 1964, I’ve always considered myself to be on the cusp between the Boomers and the Gen-X’ers, but not really part of either one – and I guess I’m not, at least in a demographic/marketing sense.
In my continuing coverage of the “mommy wars,” two pages in Salon talk about “opting out” and how relatively few mothers actually have that “opt”ion – it just happens that quite a few of those that do are in the media’s sights. Demographics again, and really not a new point.
As a pretty recent (second-time) bride, I got a lot of exposure to the wedding industry (and it sure is one!) last year, and have been reading some good reviews of the new book One Perfect Day: The Selling of the American Wedding by Rebecca Mead. Salon has an interview with Mead that talks about her research while writing the book – maybe not too eye-opening to anyone who managed to keep her head on straight while planning a wedding (which I think I mostly did, although there were a few Bridezilla moments), but it still sounds quite fascinating.
One of my favorite iVillage bloggers is Cathryn Michon, the “Grrl Genius.” She had a post earlier this week on the question of a “good” time for a couple to get divorced and I actually posted a comment on it. Most people spoke from their own experiences and seemed to agree that there’s no right answer, and if you have kids it’s an even harder question. Someone’s response was that how you get divorced is probably more important than when, especially when there are children involved, and I wouldn’t argue with that at all.
