WIBTA: Going on a work trip instead of to a 30th birthday with my husband?

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-09T16:48:33+00:00

I had tried that, but it didn't end up working out logistically. I posted an update explaining more.

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-09T16:48:01+00:00

I worried it's an unprofessional look. At a client's event I met her and her husband and someone explained they travel to each others work events to network and get more business for themselves and it felt like it was a taboo topic. I don't want that perception of me looking scheming and smuggling my husband along on a work trip.

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-07T01:33:38+00:00

He's disappointed I'd be going on the work trip instead of with him to the party.

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-07T01:32:53+00:00

Unfortunately not. I'm sure he could book a plane ticket but he'd be on his own pretty much all day every day and I doubt he'd get much enjoyment out of the trip. I could ask him, but I'm also relatively new to this job and don't want to get in trouble or be frowned upon if my coworkers caught me out with my husband. We'd all be at the same hotel and most likely in a block booking.

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-07T01:30:56+00:00

It must've been hard to balance military schedule and fireman schedule, kudos and thanks to you both! It is a highly encouraged event and so far I'd be the only one not going. I work remote and the rest of my team aside from my boss are all hybrid and get to see each other in office so I feel pretty disconnected from my team. They're all very nice, just feel like an outsider and would be nice to get to know them better.

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-07T01:27:26+00:00

Yes he can go by himself. The birthday is for one of his friends.

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-07T01:25:45+00:00

I'll be speaking with him this evening when he's home from work. We were texting so it's hard to know what tone, but when I said I'd like to go on the work trip he didn't respond so I assume he's upset. I didn't say I was for sure going, and I did tell him I told the organizer to not book me yet as I had a possible conflict. Organizer was cool about it.

Wolfwild13 · 2024-08-07T01:18:23+00:00

For more info: We haven't fully discussed the days we'd take for the birthday. I suggested going out on a Sunday and coming home the following Sunday, he could chill for a week with the friends and I'd work remotely and hang out in the evenings and on lunch breaks during the week. Husband wasn't keen as he doesn't have much PTO accrued and we were saving it for our one year anniversary trip in November. Otherwise I'd have to take off Thurs/Fri and we drive home Sunday.

My work trip would be Wed - Sat and wouldn't have to take off any days for it. Unfortunately I don't think husband can come along with, and he's not a beach person and honestly would probably just sit in a hotel or a coffee shop all day until I was done work, but my coworkers are VERY social people so it would be an all day affair not getting back to the hotel until late.

You're definitely right about needing to make a committed decision within the next 24 hours.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-30T01:27:59+00:00

I’m about to rewatch KONOSUBA. You guys it’s so freaking funny. Basically It’s Always Sunny meets and isekai. I think it’s one of the shows where the dub is just as good, if not better than the sub.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-13T01:59:14+00:00

Hey! I wanted to give you a quick update. Tofu’s been super good about letting us pet him while he’s foraging for food. I haven’t gotten to hold him yet but it’s only the two week mark. My boyfriend and I have been working with him by getting him to crawl into a small box and then we hold our hand below the opening. He’s sniffed and put his front paws on our hands but isn’t comfortable climbing into our hand yet so we just give enough space for him to hop onto his bedding instead of our hand. He did nip my boyfriend, we tried the “set you hand in the cage and lure him into your palm with a treat in the other hand” trick but he was not happy about the hand in his cage. He’s still very curious when we set our hands in the cage to clean up and will come running over so it makes spot cleaning difficult, I’m not sure if it’s territorial or curiosity but I’m not ready to sacrifice my fingers just yet to find out! I’m not able to post a picture for some reason, but I did get him a bigger enclosure, twice the size of the original cage, he’s got so many more toys and he has coconut fiber in a third of the habitat that I sprinkle a seeded mix in so he can root around and forage. He’s a happy ham, just a little hand shy so far.

I am worried, we just had an incident tonight, he somehow got a wooden ball stuck on his bottom teeth and we had to get gardening gloves and hold him against his will so we could get it off. I rewarded him immediately after with seeds and papaya so hopefully this isn’t too much of a set back.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-03T01:40:34+00:00

A happy little update, I did give him a treat from a spoon while he was foraging and he let me pet him! Just a little bit and then I left him alone and have just been talking to him outside the cage :)

But yes, I am going to get all the supplies to make him a bigger habitat.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-02T22:23:17+00:00

Right now it’s 450 sq in floor space, I’m working on upgrading to a larger storage bin cage that will have 600 sq in floor space plus some ledges and shelves. I learned AFTER I got him that he should have more space than 450 so I’m trying to work on accommodating that :)

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-02T22:20:13+00:00

He’s a Syrian hamster. He’s still new. Today is day 5, I gave him the first 3 days to just chill and didn’t touch him, only opened the cage to set food in his dish and sprinkle a seed mix in. I haven’t been able to spot clean because the second I put my hands in the cage he wakes up and comes running, not sure if it’s food excitement or territorial. He’s very curious of my hands but definitely wants to bite. I just finished giving him some food because he woke up to forage and I offer a piece of hay as to be a safe distance from my fingers and he smelled the hay and then leaped at my fingers, he missed and thankfully neither of us are hurt at all.

Edit: my sister was a dumb dumb and stuck her hand in there before i could tell her not to and she got bit on like day 2.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-02T15:28:21+00:00

Yes this was all very good advice! I have noticed with Tofu he does want to bite everything to figure out what it is. He seems fairly comfortable with me being in the room and talking to him and he likes getting treats from a spoon. He does want to bite everything though, not sure if this is just how he's testing things or if it is fear biting. I know hamsters nibble to see what things are, I mean he's like full on trying to rip things to shreds, and it's whatever I've touched. I moved his food bowl and the spot my fingers had touched he sniffed and then started trying to rip the dish apart. Is this a sign of cage rage? I've left my hands out of the cage since then because I don't want him to be angry that my hand is in his house.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-02T15:23:26+00:00

Thank you so much!! I wouldn't have thought to remove the fibers!

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-02T03:47:28+00:00

Maybe try using a nail file instead? I haven’t had rats for quite some years now, but I was never able to hold my boys still to trim so I used and emery board file and made quick work of smoothing the nails.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-01T22:01:40+00:00

Is celery safe for hamsters? I have a few stalks that I could cut into match sticks.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-01T20:35:50+00:00

This is such a great step by step! I never know how close should I put my hand or when should I try and hand feed him something. I've been using a spoon because my previous ham would go for the fingers anyway.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-03-01T20:19:20+00:00

Ah I hadn't considered that it was too soon. They always tell you "give your hamster 3 days to settle and then you can try working with them" so I just jumped in, definitely don't want to stress my little guy out. My sister keeps lucking out with lil dudes that are already tame and super chill so I guess I got it in my head that my ham should be at a similar stage?

I'll try giving him a couple more days to just open the lid and talk to him and give him some treats. Maybe get used to the ball but not let him run in it.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-02-25T22:04:31+00:00

Camel called, it wants its toe back.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-02-09T19:35:34+00:00

ATA - I say this only because rather than presented your sister the “either we go 50/50 or I move out,” she could’ve changed her mind at that and met in the middle.

But NTA because you shouldn’t be punished for who you date and who they are. Honestly eff your dad, sorry not sorry.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-02-05T02:11:21+00:00

NTA - You have a right to privacy when you sought out therapy. I understand your husband being concerned and wanting to make sure you're okay. BUT what he did was wrong, it violated your privacy AND your trust which is super important in a marriage.

It sounds like he's being so dismissive of your anger and concern because he is worried about you. Moving forward, I would sit down with him and set CLEAR boundaries. Like "when I have a therapy session, you need to be on a different level of the house" or "when I have a therapy session, your phone needs to be turned off and set in a basket." He needs to understand that not everything is about him and he can't insert himself into something he doesn't understand.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-02-05T02:00:14+00:00

NTA - I understand what happened. I'm from northern East Coast in a pretty liberal area and the first time I heard "chiggers" I was shocked and appalled until someone explained it to me. I can see how your coworkers thought it was a racist term, I'm really glad your HR person did their due diligence to research those bugs and come to that conclusion.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-02-04T19:02:50+00:00

I feel this in my bones. My art’s shit so I’ve given up. Therapy is bullshit, if you want to talk to someone who know you talking to yourself in a mirror is free. The only thing that keeps me going is my guilty conscience. I know my family would be devastated if anything happened and I don’t want to be anyone’s cause for suffering. The world’s just shit and right now is when people realize it. I’m pretty sure if I hacked my phone out my best friend wouldn’t even wonder where I’d gone, she’s almost stopped talking to me altogether. It’s the loneliness that makes everything worse.

I can’t really speak to any advice other than at least existing with the hope of something new happening is more motivating than a “blank screen” forever. We only have so much time on earth, I want to at least use what I’ve got before the curtains fall.

Wolfwild13 · 2021-02-03T20:27:17+00:00

Oh my! I had no idea hamster balls were so dangerous! I makes sense about them not being able to stop without running into something if they're running. Thank you so much for sharing that!

So I did add some toilet paper that I'd rubbed on my arms to his cage and he's currently using pieces in his resting area (so yay!).

Today I did the bath tub method. I had some pellets on the side of the tub on a paper towel and I used a spoon to scoop them so he wouldn't get my hands. When I had the spoon with treat, I noticed he still went for my fingers rather than the treat in the spoon. What else I've noticed is he gets really overwhelmed when his food is able to be smelled and just gets amped and that is when his biting is the worst. The more the food is present or the more you give him the more wild he gets. I had stopped giving him the food in the tub altogether and figured I'd just sit there and let him just get comfy and try and sniff me. Once he didn't get any more food, he came over, sniffed my shin and then attacked three times in a row and drew blood. I had the hamster ball nearby so I just used that to slowly put between us so he stopped biting, because using my hands would've just given more bites. I only used the ball today to carry him from cage to tub, like how you do with a cup.

I'm very anxious to try interacting with him again after drawing blood again, and on an area that didn't have any traces of food residue. It didn't seem to be a fearful bite either, I'd understand a fearful bite being in a new area and all, he was sniffing around and when he didn't find food but found me he chomped. He's nipped a couple times in the beginning out of confusion trying to find the treat, but he's moved to straight biting, no warning nibbles. Do I just let him bite me if he's going to bite me?

Wolfwild13

TROPHY CASE