I've been reading some personal accounts of horrors soldiers have encountered during their service, and it makes me chuckle to think how Gomer Pyle-ish my dad's adventures overseas in the Army were. Instead of daring night missions and grenades I get tales of drunken antics in biergartens and The Limburger Cheese Sandwich Left Forgotten in the Room.

My father was stationed in New York City during WWII. The only stories he told were working on plans in New York and Canada, and he had a box full of swizzle sticks from several different bars. Unfortunately, that box disappeared. He died my senior year in college, before I got my brain organized enough to realize he probably had terrific stories about being stateside during the war. Though they probably would not have been the stories you tell your youngest daughter.

we are graded by "Meets expectations", "Exceeds Expectations", and "Does not meet expectations". If you work you heart out every year - how do you ever get Exceeds. That is everyone's expectation of you.

This is the problem in my workplace. We're graded by Satisfactory (or not), Superior, and Outstanding. The bar has been raised to the point that you practically have to donate a kidney to get Outstanding. Satisfactory is what you get by just doing your job, which is - needless to say - no longer satisfactory; they expect everyone to go above and beyond. "Stretch goals" are built into the review process and if you don't meet them, you can expect not to get a very Superior raise.

My theory is, they're not planning to give anyone in my department much of a raise, ever, except the few people who haven't been here long. The rest of us old-timers are bumping our heads on the ceiling of our salary bands with a long time to retirement and nowhere in the company to promote out to. So since we're not allowed to make too much more money, they have to have reasons to not give us much more money.

My company's evaluation system needs serious overhauling as well. The labels and their corresponding scores don't match up, and most managers don't actually read the definitions. For example, if you are given a "needs improvement" on something, the system defines that as "cannot be relied upon to do _____". But then managers throw that out there and go "yeah, you could do better". At my last evaluation I kept trying to drive home the point that, sure, everyone can always improve at something, but that is not the same as being completely unreliable.

Super frustrating, so I sympathize with you!

My father was a flight instructor with the Air Force during WWII. He was stationed in Florida; three-day passes were often for trips to Havana ... when Havana was a major fun place to visit.

In re work - I'm no longer working for someone who hates me so I may actually get a raise in January. Here's hoping!

Air Force or Air Corps? My father was a mechanic with the Army Air Corps in New York.

Air Force ... although, when he first enlisted, they assigned him to the cavalry.

I always thought the fact that he was missing most of his right index finger was a factor in keeping him out of combat. Although he was, seemingly, a rough but effective instructor. I remember one story he told about a student pilot who wouldn't wear his seat belt/safety harness. My father took them up, then went into a steep dive ... and the student floated up out of his seat and hit the canopy.

Daddy told a story about riding with a hot dog pilot who liked to fly under bridges.

Both my grandfathers helped dig the Panama Canal.

Well, I guess my parents are cool too, but only my father makes it into the history books (via the UN in the 70s).

Timelies all!

Congrats Anne!