Perhaps when hundreds of thousands of refugees are expected to be evacuating a war-torn country is not the best time to scout new business opportunities there?

Gah! Big Boss texted me to see if I was working today less than an hour after sending me an email that required investigation into discrepancies between two versions of a book. Please give me time to figure out what's going on before prodding me for an answer!

Yeah, it’s a case of “should we use a cancer clinic located in Ukraine” and the timeline is “several months from now” but still. We basically agreed that she’s go back and see if it would change the budget to not choose them now but leave Ukraine as an option maybe 6 or 10 months down the road (or maybe not). We shall see. But she was still pushing hard at first and we were all just like whaaaaaaat

I'm reading the WaPo article about the mistakes the Russians have made in their invasion.

The Ukrainians are destroying Russian tanks with impunity. And Russian supply lines haven't been maintained, so they're running out of gas.

The Russians don't want to go in with their planes and destroy Kyiv as happened with Aleppo. They don't want to raze it to the ground. But now the Ukrainians have armed themselves and dug in and they're getting lots of equipment from the west, including highly effective anti-tank missiles, and attack drones which can go after infantry.

And we just did a massive financial sanction that's pretty close to completely cutting Russia off from the US or EU. The ruble is in free fall.

So, Putin's plan to make a lightning strike, kill Zelensky, and put in a puppet government has not gone as intended.

So, Putin's plan to make a lightning strike, kill Zelensky, and put in a puppet government has not gone as intended.

I read that Putin expected to take Ukraine in 1-3 days. It seems his plan has a flaw.

In completely unrelated news….

SHAMROCK SHAKES ☘️ ☘️ ☘️

my first of the season.

I'm very interested to see how this economic response to invasion plays out.

I'm very interested to see how this economic response to invasion plays out.

China will maintain financial ties with Russia but the US and EU have massive financial trade with China, so we'll undoubtedly apply pressure on China and China will pressure Putin to back down.

But the sanctions that came down today are unprecedented. Even Switzerland is freezing Russian accounts.

Disappointing that India hasn't condemned the invasion nor the Saudis or UAE. So much for allies.

Britain has been sidelined from much of this because they're not in the EU. So their global influence has been vastly reduced by Brexit.

India has close ties to Russia, from what I understand the fact that they are not outright supporting them is pretty remarkable.

Anyway, it seems like it should be effective, and that feels historically important, like this will mark something significant in international relations. I do like that it only works with a coalition of nations agreeing to act in concert.

On the other hand, I don't know if Putin knows how to back down, which worries me a lot.

Today is Day 1 of no indoor mask mandate at work and even though there was language like “I urge all employees who have chosen not to be vaccinated to continue wearing face masks to protect your coworkers.” the one employee in my building I have seen moving about without a mask is unvaccinated.

We are back in the office this week, although with our hybrid schedule my department is still WFH today. I honestly do not know what our mask mandate is. I'll be wearing mine, although I think if you are vaccinated you don't have to. It used to be if you weren't vaccinated you could not come on site at all but I don't think that's the case any more. I don't know.

The first thing we are doing is having a celebratory lunch at the other facility that EVERYONE from both sites is invited to. I believe it's all outside, which is something, but still is making me anxious. But I will probably go because (a) free food) and (b) people notice when you don't go to these things and think you are not a team player. Hopefully I can pick up my food to go and eat in my car and stay masked the whole time I am around people.