New York, New York

Moving along the career path I had the great karma of being head hunted by my wonderful engineers at Nordic / Acres / Hatch.  Merv first called me a few months before my project was winding down and suggested I might want to go on to the one he was managing.  I told him I was very interested in the new job but I felt obliged to close out the project first.  He respected my wishes and called me a couple of months later.  The next thing I knew I was in a life changing experience at a brand new venture called North American Oil Sands Corp.  I will be forever grateful to Merv and Mark Brown for respecting my skill sets so highly that they were willing to wait for me to come on board.

And then another terrific thing happened, my HR on-boarder was Jane.  We liked each other from the first but my role took me offsite to the engineering company and it was two years before Jane and I truly reconnected.  We worked on a number of things in between though with office supplies and catering but it wasn’t until I got back to the home office that we started to see more of each other in part due to the fact that we were on the same floor.  And then one day she sent out a note to some of us ladies about a shopping / styling spree to NYC.  I had already made plans to travel to Ecuador in a few months but I was intrigued.  I went down to Jane’s office and we talked; she convinced me that this would be a fun trip and oh my goodness, not only was it fun, it was life altering in more than one way!

She introduced me to Kelly who raised her eyebrows when I conservatively estimated that I could spend $500 on clothes in NYC.  Well, I went wild some $2,000 later.  I came back a changed woman in a very good way with so many compliments on my new look and style that I have never got over it!

But over and above that fun experience Jane and I bonded.  It was the real start of a beautiful friendship.  We had a lot of things in common in our perspective of society and politics.  Later we discovered that we had a common trait in profiling; we are what HR profilers call ‘believers’.  We believe that because we do our work in great fashion we should be recognized without blowing our own horn.  Oops, are we ever wrong about that!

Jane is a real fun factor in my life.  She likes to get out there and do things and I love her great energy and love of nature.  She is the one that talked Blaine and I into our Drumheller road trip and I for one am up to another one this summer! 

Jane helps me let me hair down like no one else.  And oh, did I mention that she makes a great Sangria?