Report Back: Night Three

Today has been interesting and, although there was much teasing everyone over their inherently Red/Yellow or latently Blue/Green behaviour, we covered a lot. Today's topic was EQ.

It's mostly educational and I know I have a lot to learn when it comes to this, specifically in the work-place. I am definitely a gut-reaction type girl and often far too direct and honest for my own good and those around me - shoo, it's taking a lot to actual admit that here in the Blogosphere, obviously I have been learning something ;)

And the relationships between the people who were total strangers a few days ago is clearly evident as each session the noise levels rise and people take longer to stop their individual conversations and chattering - I've even met a few people who I'd like to keep in touch with (I can say that now, it has after all only been two full days spent together ;) )

This evening we had a "social mixer" with all the groups in the bar. It started out in quite a stilted manner where we mostly stuck to our own groups till they handed out question cards ... the trick was to find a person in the room who filled the 5 requirements on your card. These were things like "Have you Scuba Dived in the past 12 months?", "Do you own 3 or more cats?", "Have you swum the Midmar Mile?", "Have you ever traveled to Tasmania?" etc. It certainly got conversations flowing and people interacting as they searched thru the big group for the few people who would complete their card and allow them entry into the final draw.

It's been interesting, I've heard some serious stories about the parties that go on here during the course ... now either we have a fairly restrained group or we are still holding back in a "work-environment". Only time will tell :)

In other news, it was fairly interesting to be handling the EQ portion of the course on a day when I received some news that I'm not quite sure how to handle. It's not my news, so I can't feel anything directly and I'm too removed from the situation to have any sort of concrete gut-reaction to it so I find myself taking my emotional queues from the people involved. Dad's job is on the line. This is quite serious for a man who is not yet 55 although technically he is done raising his family and mostly finished providing for his daughters (except the Peeb occasionally), he and Mom still have a far amount of life ahead of them and the very real possibility of finding himself without a job on Friday is fairly daunting, well for me anyways. He is not being retrenched, there is nothing respectful or graceful about this process. He is being Fired. They are having a disciplinary hearing for whatever they can scratch up in the dirt just simply because a few years back the company was bought out and they have been trying to find a way to get rid of all the old staff ever since. To be fair, he has outlasted many, but unlike some of the others at his age he has no where to go from here but home.

I know he will remain strong thru out and even now he is adopting a wait-and-see strategy (how typical, as I now have him figured out as a Blue) .... really, what else could he do? And it leaves me really very unsure of my own emotions on the subject. Yes, we knew it was a possibility for the last year or two, but I never really thought it would actually happen. I feel quite helpless to suggest anything or support him or who knows what all the way from up here in Jhb. But he is my dad and he will be fine and he will survive this and we will still be there beside him no matter what the outcome :) Daddio, I'm thinking of you ... and I hope you show them what's what on Friday!

And now I'm off to do our assigned reading for the week ... although I'd much rather be settling down with my latest book, I'm loving it so far ;)