Hello hello,
Looks like it’s been about a month since my last “Now” post. It’s been quite busy, but in a good way.
Career
The first thing I’m excited to share is that I’ve been interviewing for an internal promotion and new role, and I’ve gotten the offer! For the past year and a half, I’ve been working as a Senior Financial Analyst I, supporting our merchandising business and some distribution-related projects. It’s been a fantastic learning experience, and I can honestly say that I love what I do. Specifically, I’ve had the opportunity to learn our Appliances business, our Wireless business (phones and activations), as well as the realities and complexities of our Canadian distribution network.
This new role will be a promotion to SFA II and will focus on supporting our stores nationwide, as well as the financial analysis needs related to the labour that supports those stores. We have over 200 locations across Canada, and truthfully, I don’t know anything about this part of our business, so it’s going to be a massive learning exercise.
The other exciting thing that comes along with the role is a somewhat unique opportunity to work with and learn from some very senior leaders in the company. I’ll be reporting directly to the Senior Director of Finance, which is quite a few levels above where I currently report. It’s an amazing chance to learn from really experienced people, with significant exposure to the top of the organization. That also, obviously, comes with more pressure and responsibility, especially as I try to learn the business on the fly. However, I’ve learned over the last five years of my career that the best way to learn is to just jump right in.
Learning Goals
My personal learning has taken a backseat for the last couple of weeks due to work and other areas of my life that I’ll explain below. That said, I’m genuinely a bit happy for the break. I’m about six or seven weeks into my Introduction To Japanese History and was feeling a bit burnt out before life got busy. I’m still planning on finishing it in preparation for the trip I’m taking there in June, but the break has been nice. I’m only studying it because of the trip, and I’m in a bit of a battle with my deep interest in continuing my studies of Acceleration & Philosophy of Technology. Focusing on this type of thing has never been a strong suit of mine, but I’m determined to finish this Japan learning plan to make the most of the trip.
Fitness & Health
Fitness is going well. I’m deep into my training plan to run my first marathon on May 3rd. Unfortunately, in January, I developed a painful ingrown toenail and had to get it removed (it was much more painful than I thought). That put me out of training for a few weeks, partially because I waited too long to see the doctor.
February was catch-up time. One thing you might find useful is that I was able to upload the entire Nike Run Club marathon training plan into Gemini, explain my situation, and get a personalized “bridging program” to get me back up to speed on where I should be on the plan. I followed it exactly, and I’m happy to say things are back on course for May, with last weekend marking my first half-marathon since last year. Unfortunately, I don’t think I’m going to have enough training under my belt to hit my original time goal of four hours, but completing the race is good enough for me.
Relationships
Finally, February 23rd marked eight years with my girlfriend, Linda. We honestly can’t believe it’s been that long. Being long-distance for five years after meeting on an exchange program in 2018 was not on my life bingo card, but the last few years with her living in Vancouver have been wonderful. We celebrated with a cooking class at The Dirty Apron, a dinner at ELEM (which served some of the best lamb I’ve ever had), and a couples massage at the JW Marriott Spa.
Earlier in February, I also got the chance to visit Pender Island with my friends. It was basically just a lot of eating, drinking, and playing disc golf, but it was an absolute blast. I also snuck in a 14k run as part of my marathon training, which allowed me to see a bit of the island outside of the local neighbourhood.
Life is good and the future is bright. I hope you’re doing well too.
Ciao Ciao!