Beth's Contradictory Brain

Dream Job?

Pixie asked, and it's a great question. My number one dream job is being a mom. And we're kinda working on that, but there's no guarantee it'll ever happen.

Ok, so other than that, or in addition to that, or whatever.

Many, many moons ago I thought teaching would be my ideal job. I love teaching people things. Every job I've had I've gotten to train the new employees, teach co-workers how new things work, etc. I got certified to teach while living in Texas. In one of those weird things in life, if I had stayed put after I got certified I would have had a teaching job in the schools I grew up in. But, I was determined to move to Austin, and did. Unfortunately, even back then no one ever wanted to move out of Austin, and so teaching jobs were incredibly hard to come by. I did try the subbing route, but that never led to anything more permanent. But I was in debt and need a more steady income, so I went back to office work.

Before I got into phlebotomy, I went back and forth between waiting tables/retail jobs and office work. It seems I have a limited ability to deal with the general public.

Then came Nerdstar and our periods of moving around the country. I knew if I got into healthcare I'd be able to get a job anywhere. And that's mostly been true, but the jobs have mostly been "as needed." Only one was full time for more than a year, and that one sucked.

Anyway. I'm good at phlebotomy and mostly enjoy it, but I'm just not having luck finding the "right" job in this area. I've kinda decided to take the hint maybe that's not what I should be doing.

I've thought about pursuing the teaching thing again. I printed up some of the forms necessary to become certified here in VA. But I'm just not sure I'd still love it.

I've spent just over a week telling God he gave me a weird brain and a weird way of seeing the world, and He needs to finally show me what I'm supposed to do with it. I know that sounds strange.

Nerdstar has always thought I should go to law school. I even took the LSAT a long time ago and scored dead average without a study course or any prep help. But I've never really thought I'd enjoy law school, the debt, or a career as a lawyer, even a non-trial lawyer.

None of that really answers what it is that would be my dream job...

I really enjoy:
teaching people things they don't know.
helping people connect with people/things that relate to things they're interested in.
making processes more simple/organized
variety in my work - sometimes alone, sometimes in groups, flexible schedules, that sort of thing.

Sometimes I daydream about opening a diner, but that would be a lot more time consuming than I'd like.

There are hobbies I haven't been able to give a lot of time to before, making pottery, maybe some woodworking/furniture making, maybe painting using lots of colors - but not anything other than shapes and such. (I can't draw stick figures, so I could never paint anything "real".) Then there's local politics to check out.

So I just don't know. I'm 41 and not at all clear what I want to be when I grow up.

I do know I'm in a very enviable position of having the time to try once again to figure it out. Nerdstar is more than supportive and gracious. (Mostly because I do my very best to keep her well fed during my non-work times!)

Update

I think about updating this old blog here all the time... And I wouldn't even say that it's because Facebook or Twitter has replaced it. Before I started this long stretch of working I got into a little funky boredom and just didn't have much to say. Now that I've been getting back into the grove of working four or five days a week, I'm tired.

And that's what I hate most about working full time. It just leaves me too tired to enjoy the rest of life.

I think that's partly because I have a semi-intense job. (Does semi-intense even exist as a concept?) Anyway. I'm on my feet most of the time, I have to make sure everything is 100% - the right patient info, the right test ordered the right way, labeled the right way, processed the right way, etc. I would say, especially dealing with cancer patients, a mistake could literally kill someone - at the very least make them much worse off, and some don't have that kind of margin for error. And I don't feel like I have a lot of stress over the actually drawing of blood. I know my skills are good, and I also know when to call for backup instead of sticking someone more than once. But still, there's the pressure from the patients to not hurt them. Plus just the grind of being social all day. I learned a long time ago - patients don't really care how my day is going, it's not about me, it's about them. So being cheerful and talking to them to distract them is a fun part of my job, but it's also pretty tiring.

I still don't know what the long term picture is. Thursday I have to go back up to my old stomping grounds and fill in for someone who's out up there. I'm not looking forward to the commute or the chaos of that office. Oh well.

Other than that I tell myself all the time how good life is. While I could rattle off projects that every room in this house needs, I'm really enjoying having a house! I still love the tress along the back yard.

Nerdstar's finally starting to settle into her new job. The commute isn't as bad as feared, but it's no picnic.

Well, I just yawned. Gonna go check on my little plants in my little garden while Ramen dog wanders the back yard. Then I'm gonna sit on the deck and wait for my woman to get home. Then it's dinner time!

Work Update

Thank God this is a short week because I'm too out of practice at working to manage a five day work week yet!

Last Thursday and Friday and then this week I was down at the closer location doing some training. They're going to add a doctor to the practice and that means a lot more work for the lab, so hopefully they'll figure out they need me down there full time! But, I'm waiting to hear something on that.

Anyway. It's a really nice place to work. The woman who's been running the lab knows her stuff and gets it done. No drama, no b.s., just getting it done. Nice!!

And the job is more involved that just drawing blood. I actually run the machine that analyzes the CBCs and get everything spun down to send out and stuff like that. Kinda cool. This week we averaged 25 draws a day. I probably did the majority of them, giving her time to get a lot of stuff done she doesn't normally have time for, like totally cleaning/rearranging the storage closet.

Now, here's the part that's interesting to me. This woman has a picture of the Obama family above the printer. She's all about her church and plays the gospel station on the radio sometimes. And I'm trying to figure out why those things aren't annoying the hell out of me. Would such out there politics and religion bother you? Now, I did let her know I'm mostly a Republican and not a huge fan of the O man. That was last Friday - and we agreed and haven't talked politics since. She'd probably be more upset with me for being Republican than gay!

So, it's been good to be out of the house and working. In a perfect world I'd still only work Monday Tuesday Thursday Friday, but oh well. We'll see what they decide.

Crazy World

I've been feeling for a while now that the world has just gone crazy. There seems to be more news than I can keep up with - and a hell of a lot of it I'd rather not keep up with.

Add to that the deaths of Michael Jackson and Farrah on the same day. Too damn weird. Sometimes it's like God gets bored and brings home some entertainers. (That sentence is in no way meant to imply He isn't entertained by us regular folk.)

On the home front. Nerdstar down in Houston until Sunday visiting family. Her real mission is to bring me home some Rudy's BBQ. She'd better not get off the plane without it! She finally got the official offer letter/start date/etc. for her new job. She's hit another personal high in income. Honestly, we laugh about it because it seems so crazy to us. I'm very proud of her.

We're also trying to figure out maybe taking a big trip next spring for our birthdays. I'd really like to do one of these sailing cruises. Nerdstar wants to take me to Taiwan and see where she grew up. I told her we might flip a coin for it!

As for me and work. It's hard to explain how Nerdstar making more than 3x what I do makes it hard to be motivated to go to work. Now, Nerdstar has never made me feel any pressure to work, or to work any particular job. She's been amazing at trying to get me to find something I really enjoy. It's just that I still have no idea what that job is. Well, I think I'd like to be a stay at home mom, but who knows if that's in the cards. And it's just not the same staying at home without the mom part. There is only so much housework and projects I can do and not feel like a slacker while Nerdstar's at work. But still, it's weird knowing I don't HAVE to work. (And in my line of work I feel guilty for even that because my coworkers are hard working folks who don't often get a break in life.) Yet, I still can't find what it is that I want to do with all my time.

Anyway. I've mentioned the the group of doctors I've worked for has an office pretty close to our new house. My manager called last night to see if I wanted to train there. So, I worked this afternoon after taking Nerdstar to the airport early this morning. And I work tomorrow and then next M-Th. I'll be in the lab with one other woman who's been working it by herself for quite a while and has her stuff together! There's a chance that they'll need me there, maybe even full time, come August. We'll see how the next few days go.

Working to Work

When I took this current job back in October, it was because I thought I'd be working three, four, or five days a week at maybe four different locations, getting a chance to try out the different doctor offices before choosing one to maybe go full time around now.

That hasn't happened. I worked about four or five weeks full time at their busiest location, then they decided that my "training" period had ended and they would call me when they needed me. One of the women at that location got sick for a week, so I worked that week. Then the last two weeks have been "the holidays" and things should have been slower for them.

I don't hate the job at the busy location, but I don't love it either. But the woman who makes the scheduling decisions is the manager there and I wasn't sure how to bring up maybe trying other locations. I'm overly sensitive and worry about what people think, so I didn't want anyone thinking I didn't want to work with them. I'd still just like a workplace with a little less stress and drama.

I've also really been considering going back to doing office work - not dealing with patients or the general public for a while. One of the reasons I got into phlebotomy when we lived in Kansas City was because I couldn't find a suitable office job.

Now, the one thing I enjoy about doing phlebotomy is that I'm good with patients who are nervous or hate having their blood drawn. And it's nice to feel like in any small way I'm making someone's day better. And I think I'd still like to work in a small outpatient lab, but in an area as big as DC, there aren't a lot of small ones.

The problem with jumping back into office work, is that after three years of wearing scrubs and tennis shoes to work, I have absolutely NO clothes to wear to an office. The few clothes I did keep don't fit because I've gained some pounds since then. I do not enjoy clothes shopping on the best of days. Buying them at this weight is downright depressing.

Hence, a real determination to start working out.

The other factor in finding a new line of work is that we're about to get serious about buying a house. In the next two weeks we really need to make an appointment and see about getting some pre-approved financing. With neither Nerdstar nor I having a great background in staying at one job for very long, I'm pretty sure it'll be better to keep this current job - providing they'll give me some hours - until this house thing is done.

So, I sent the manager lady an email today saying I'd like to work at any of the different locations. I also updated my resume's on Monster and Career Builder to include office stuff. We'll see what happens from here.

Work Update

When I took this job on a PRN, or as-needed, basis, I was cool with that. I was hoping to work three or four days a week at two or three different locations. Then I ended up doing five or six weeks working all week at the one location and thought, ok cool.

Then Wednesday afternoon the boss lady let me know that now that I am all "trained up" and due to some other moving around of personnel, they wouldn't need me the rest of this week. Next week most of the doctors are out for a conference, so it should be too slow to need me then, too.

It's been good to have yesterday and today off. I've had a lot of errands and house cleaning and stuff that needs to be done, and I hate having to spend all weekend doing those things instead of just being lazy!

Still, it feels kinda weird to be home instead of at work.

Work is Work

Damn I'm tired. Unfortunately, this job does not go well when performed tired. Being tired generally means making little mistakes. But a little mistake like drawing one tube instead of two can be a big problem later. The upside is that I know when I'm tired and I check and double check everything all day. But that also makes me more tired. Also, being grumpy does not go over well with patients. Hell, they're really sick people, who am I to be grumpy??

Being on my feet 7 or so hours a day has been draining physically, leading to aches that lead to poor sleep, leading to more tiredness.

My body is adjusting slowly. Having a very down weekend coming up will also help tremendously.

All that said, I do like this job. There are cliques and personality conflicts I'm trying to navigate, but everyone does their fair share - and that's good enough for me.

One Extreme to Another

For the six weeks between jobs I spent a lot of my days online and/or listening to the news. Yes, there were times my head wanted to explode over all the current issues.

Well, at work I have no access to anything, not my Gmail, not the internet, not even radio or a tv in the waiting room. (Actually, the waiting room is very softy lit and quiet.) I am cut off from the whole world all day. And while I don't like it at all, I'm undecided on how much it might be good for me.

Nerdstar does have my work email, but I'd say I get to check it maybe four times during the day.

New Job

Well, this slacker is back in the work force. Yippee! I had two days of orientation last week - wednesday and thursday. Then Friday I was at their busiest lab learning the system. It's a pretty easy system and I was grovin' right along. It's not too taxing, we check the patient's insurance, order the tests and the draw the blood. We mostly deal with the patient start to finish -which I've generally preferred. It's a group of oncology doctors, most of them in one location, but there are also five other locations. The one I'm starting at is the most busy. But it's not nearly as busy as the hospital lab was. Thank God.

The general idea is that I'll be filling in at any of the six locations on days people are off. I'm not starting as a full time employee, which is good. Three of the locations I've been to and aren't too terrible to get to. I have no idea as of now how any of that will work out. I'm not too worried about any of it. I work hard, get things done, am good with patients, and am reliable. With luck, if I like all this, I can pick one of the locations that I like working at and end up there full time maybe after the first of the year. Or not. I'm happy either way at this point.

It hasn't really sunk it yet that all of our patients have cancer, or at best are in remission. Although, one kinda weird/creepy thing... in the internal office email, we get emails when any of the doctor's patients have died. Now, I understand it's a good thing for everyone to know, for records or to contact the family with condolences, or whatever. Still, kinda weird.

My goal is simply to do as good a job as I can drawing their blood, and to treat them just like any other patients. A lot of them have books with them that they're reading, so I get to talk about books a lot

Monday

My slacker days might be coming to an end. I had a second interview today with the lab place. They've got manager meetings all week, but as soon as they can get their end done, hopefully I'll start training next week.

We had one totally lazy weekend, which is nice for Nerdstar. Saturday we took Ramen dog to the park and then did a little shopping. Yesterday I was a slug on the sofa.

I Still Give Good Interview

We were hoping to hear if Nerdstar was getting a job offer that would have us moving out of the DC area last Friday, but no word yet. Ugh.

In the meantime, I applied online for a job Friday, heard from the woman yesterday, and set up an interview for today. It's a PRN position, which means I start out filling in for employees who are taking time off at their six lab locations. It's like starting out as a temp. I like that because there are several days between now and the end of the year I can't work. It's doing phlebotomy for a group of oncologists, and even better, I'll also get to learn a little of the processing side of lab tests. If I want it to, I'm certain it would lead to full time employment in the near future.

I told the woman I'd let her know by the end of the week, hopefully we hear from Nerdstar's potential employer by then.

Done

Well, for better or worse I quit my job this afternoon. It won't fully sink if for a while.

Who knows what's next.

Fail

Apparently I am not even capable of quitting a job.

There was more b.s. with the new chick this morning - which either means she's evil or my boss is a liar. Either is a possible explanation. And so I spent all day waiting to quit. I really don't want to talk to my boss about it. There is nothing to be gained and all he's going to do is throw a fit that I'm not giving him two weeks notice. Now, if that two weeks wouldn't be full of more b.s. I might consider staying two more weeks. But, honestly, I'm done. One of the basic realizations is just how much no one there appreciates just how much more I get done every day than they do. If fact, I'm pretty sure a lot of them resent me for several different reasons. So - they can suck it. I finally realized that there's no making this situation better. The new chick could have come in and treated me as an ally instead of apparently trying to put me in my place.

Ok, so as to the actual quitting - my brilliant plan was to wait for my boss to leave for the day. He's rarely there past 2:30 or 3, I leave at 4. Then when it was time to go home I was just going to hand my badge and keys over to the assistant manager who's mostly cool and tell him I'm not coming back. But nooo... boss man just had to work late today. Plan blown.

One way or another I will quit Friday.

I do need to see if I can get with the employee health nurse Friday and get updated records of my TB tests and such so I'll have them.

Fail

Apparently I am not even capable of quitting a job.

There was more b.s. with the new chick this morning - which either means she's evil or my boss is a liar. Either is a possible explanation. And so I spent all day waiting to quit. I really don't want to talk to my boss about it. There is nothing to be gained and all he's going to do is throw a fit that I'm not giving him two weeks notice. Now, if that two weeks wouldn't be full of more b.s. I might consider staying two more weeks. But, honestly, I'm done. One of the basic realizations is just how much no one there appreciates just how much more I get done every day than they do. If fact, I'm pretty sure a lot of them resent me for several different reasons. So - they can suck it. I finally realized that there's no making this situation better. The new chick could have come in and treated me as an ally instead of apparently trying to put me in my place.

Ok, so as to the actual quitting - my brilliant plan was to wait for my boss to leave for the day. He's rarely there past 2:30 or 3, I leave at 4. Then when it was time to go home I was just going to hand my badge and keys over to the assistant manager who's mostly cool and tell him I'm not coming back. But nooo... boss man just had to work late today. Plan blown.

One way or another I will quit Friday.

I do need to see if I can get with the employee health nurse Friday and get updated records of my TB tests and such so I'll have them.

Nice

There are still times I feel guilty for only working MWF. But, they pass. Partly because work is still stressful enough that I like having days off in between. And partly because running errands is no fun when everyone else in the world is doing the same thing. I've always liked having a day off during the week to get things done.

I'm trying to get back to my main goal at work - being really nice to the patients who end up at my desk. You would think that would be easy enough. But I've found that my frustrations with other things/people at work spill over. We've got five different software programs to use related to patient registration. Two of them are actually for the lab, the rest is to get information related to billing issues. Um, I don't see billing doing anything to make MY job easier... Then a lot of times those programs don't even work. That's frustrating. There is also a lot of infighting among my coworkers. I've gotten much better at staying out of all that mess. But still. That's frustrating. The amount of bitching and moaning in the place is still high.

Then there are the actual patients. Old sick people are not nice. They are deaf. (And why in the world they all refuse to use hearing aids is beyond me! They make you yell to be heard and then get pissy you're "yelling" at them.) They are grumpy. They are rude. They are demanding. Makes it kinda hard to be nice.

But, I'm working on it.

Frustrating

Monday I came home from work really feeling like I need a different job (again). No new problems, just more of the fact that nothing's going to get any better. So I was kinda in a grumpy mood Tuesday when a lady with a placement agency called about a job. It's for a big lap company and I haven't been thrilled by the idea of working for them, I told her I'd think about it, but wasn't too sure. Then I kicked myself in the butt and said dumbass, you want a new job and someone called about a new job - go check it out. I called her back and scheduled an interview for today.

Then yesterday at work they implemented yet another software program for us to use that just adds to our registration process of patients. Now, in addition to all the crap we already do, we have these little scanners at our desk and we have to scan in their insurance, prescription, and consent forms. Now, honestly that means it takes about another 15 seconds for me. The problem is that it also means it takes about minute or two for all the already slow assed co-workers I have - which also means more work for me. Someone has to keep the patients moving while they have their heads up their butts. Ugh.

So today I drive an hour to the interview location only to find that the power is out in that building and there's NO ONE THERE. Um, yeah, I didn't receive a phone call saying no one would be there!! That really pissed me off. Ok, so it took an hour to get there - but traffic coming home looked like complete hell. It was ten miles moving about ten miles an hour. That meant I would have spent about four hours for something that didn't happen. The only good part was the Garmin actually found me an alternate route home that was pretty and took a lot less time.

I still haven't heard from the lady. So, when I do hear from her I'll say I'm more than happy to fax her whatever she needs - but I'm not making that drive again. (The job itself is actually much closer to home than my current one.) All she had to do was call and reschedule, but she didn't. (As long as she had a cell phone and internet access at home she had my info.)

Poor Nerdstar is having just about as much fun with her job and the military.

Weekend Update

Another quiet, lonely weekend around here for me and the pets. Nerdstar's over in Utah playing soldier again this weekend. Some sort of conference about things she's not involved in. I just keep telling her I have no sympathy for her boring, dreary, sleep deprived weekend.

There does seem to be some good news about her eventually getting out of the Army. She, rightly, decided the best way might be a medical discharge for her bad lower back. She's spent the past month or two seeings docs, getting an MRI and filling out forms. She finally submitted all of it and things seem to be progressing in the right direction. I'm not saying it's progressing very quickly - but it's progressing.

I haven't written about work lately, although I've been meaning to.

I'm really much, much happier at work now. Shifting the hours to 7:30 to 4 has relieved so much of the stress I was putting myself under. Now, the people who have to handle the last two hours of the day are mostly the people who were slacking off. Heh. The supervisor who's so useless is still utterly useless - complaining that they can't handle those two hours - when I've been handling them for months. But instead of making her step up, our manager is actually staying late himself some days to help her out. I think that's hysterical. Anyway, the point is none of it affects me any longer and that makes my days at work much better.

I do feel slight guilt when I'm not there Tuesday/Thursday. And I'm totally aware I've given up all rights to complain about anything at work - which can be hard when all everyone does it sit around and complain about everything. I can't say how much I wish it was Friday already, or that I didn't get any sleep and I'm tired, or anything like that.

The one thing that helps quiet that guilt is knowing that I'm still doing more registrations in 3 days than some people are doing in 5. I work hard when I'm there. I'm sure my coworkers have mixed feelings about my new schedule. On the upside I'm a lot more relaxed and upbeat. I guess the downside would be if they think it's selfish or unfair. Oh well...

Weekend Update

Just a semi-lazy day around the house for me today. Nerdstar's got Army drill this weekend, so I'm waiting for her to get home so we can go eat tonight!

I've spent the day so far cleaning the bathroom, doing laundry and buying stamps. Such major accomplishments!

Things at work should be better. It took my manager a week, but he finally talked to me about what I'd decided and we agreed to me working three days a week, 7:30 to 4 and staying in our every 3rd Saturday rotation. I told him it didn't matter to me if it was MTW or MWF, but it's mostly going to be MWF. I'm not sure how long I'll keep that schedule. Maybe in a while I'll go back to full time. I heard one of my co-workers is transferring to a different department, and another one got accepted to school and will be leaving in Mid-May. So with the change in hours, which takes a lot of stress off me, and if our manager actually hires some decent folks, it might not be such a bad place to be every day. We'll see.

I've talked about how I've spent almost all day every day doing the computer side of our job instead of the blood drawing side of our job for quite a while now. The same people who bitch that I don't draw blood HATE doing the computer part, and also, they SUCK at doing the computer part. But the computer side is important because it's what keeps the patients moving through the process.

So when the bitching people decide they're going to do the computer part I say great and I get to draw blood. And inevitably the room comes to a complete standstill. For reasons beyond my comprehension they just can't get it done. In the past, that meant that I had to pick up a lot of slack and keep things moving because the end of the day was closing in. Now these folks will be responsible for it all without me the last two hours of the day. Heh. Our manager even had to admit I was right that they can't seem to get it done. Not that he's doing anything about it.

Anyway. One cool thing about getting back to drawing blood yesterday afternoon was what an ego boost it was. For whatever reason, patients really don't appreciate how efficiently I get their computer registration part done - ok, fine. But I'm also good with a needle and people always comment on that.

Yesterday I told a lady "have a nice weekend" and she said, "You, too." I said, "It's hard to have a bad weekend." she said, "Well, the weather might be cold and rainy." I said, "Even better - it'll be nice to sleep in." She laughed and said "What a positive outlook on life you have." ... That cracked Nerdstar and I up for a long time!

I Tried

I tried to quit my job today. I even handed in my two weeks notice. Then my boss talked to his boss, then he talked to me and asked if I wouldn't consider the part time option. I said I'd think about it, and he said we'd talk on Monday. Then it all went to hell part of this afternoon and reinforced my desire to just be done with the place.

But... I decided to go and talk to my boss's boss one more time and really say just how bad things are over in our little lab, and why. Last time I didn't want to say that my manager and coworkers are kinda sucky.

I think it was a really good conversation. She was really unaware of some of the things going on, and she acknowledged that my boss's management style isn't always appropriate for some of the problems. (He really just wants to be the nice guy and tells everyone what they want to hear.)

So starting March 1, I work MWF 7:30 to 4. That means I won't be working the last two hours of the day which is quite often when I'm stuck doing all the work. That alone will help a lot.

It also frees up Tuesdays and Thursdays for things like working out, running errands, cleaning house, and volunteering.

If a few weeks into the part time thing the office moral still sucks and nothing has changed, well, then I gave it a try.

Dilemma

I decided to talk to my boss's boss today. She was nice and explained that there isn't a budgeted position for part time and they really wouldn't want to split up a full time position into two part time - which I understand. She asked if there was anyway to work out me staying. I explained that I really need more time for "life" and that I'm burned out and don't want or need to work so much or so hard. I suggested that maybe working MWF might be ok.

I left her office feeling a little more optimistic.

And then... the end of the day was just more of the same old bullshit with one of my coworkers. Ugh.

That's really the heart of the problem. Even less of a bad work environment is still a bad work environment. And the things that make it bad really aren't going to change any time soon. And living in this area - jobs aren't hard to come by - even if it means changing fields again.

One little problem is just that I always feel guilty quitting a job. And the boss's boss really said how much they'd hate to lose me and that they're already short handed and how long can I hang in there... But even if I decided to stay I wouldn't get an answer about going to MWF for about a month.

Nerdstar is pretty much behind me if I quit - which is nice. I also feel a little bad - that it's not fair for me to not work while she has to work. But her job is way cooler than mine!

Anyway. If I quit my last day would be the end of this month. So I've still got a week before giving two weeks notice. What would suck now is having to explain why I want to quit altogether instead of working things out. It would be hard to explain the sucky manager, the useless co-workers, the being tired of carrying the load all the time when I'm not even a supervisor.

More to come I'm sure.

Ch Ch Ch Ch Changes

Well, I think I'm about 90% sure I'm going to quit my job.

I finally asked my boss today if there was any way I could work part time and he said no. Okey dokey then. You'd think since he's already short a person or two, and I work really, really hard, that he'd find a way to make that work. But, no. The lab doesn't have part time positions. There's a slight chance I'll talk to his boss, but probably not.

I haven't given my two week notice yet, and would pretty much need to finish out the month anyway because one of the other people is taking two weeks off this month.

I also think my manager was a jerk when he gave the early shift to another guy instead of me. I don't love the idea of working 6:30 to 3 because I'd have to get up at 5 am. But... one of the reasons I'm going to quit is that I'm tired of being tired, and I'm tired of not having any time do things I want to do. I get home from work at 7 pm and we figure out dinner, watch The View, walk the dog and that's about it.

I really, really need to start working out. (I don't want to talk about it.) And I'd love to do some volunteer work with these people. All of the opportunities so far have been at times when work interferes.

Nerdstar and I hit one of our financial goals in terms of how much we've got in the savings. My salary goes to things like vacations and fun stuff mostly.

I'm still hoping in time to find a part time job.

Anyway. I'm sure I'll blog more about this later.

More Work Stuff

Well, I decided to give myself a break from all the drama at work and I called in sick today. It's the first time I've called in since being hired back around the first of May. Then, I'm pretty sure I can get through two more days until the weekend. Then, it's only one more week until I'm off several days for Christmas.

The problems at work aren't new. I've been optimistic things would change around there almost since day one. The Bad Apple is supposed to be leaving us soon - although with my luck she'll change her mind again. Then maybe one of the people who works afternoons with me and isn't usually very helpful will change to the early morning shift. Although that would still leave the bitch I got into it with yesterday on the later shift with me. But at least the two wouldn't be allies.

One thing that pissed me off yesterday is that no one came to my defense. I bust my ass every day - and most days help out everyone who can't be bothered to learn their jobs for themselves. Yet no one told the bitch yesterday she was out of line.

There's a guy who works down in the main lab who's wanting to come back and work the later shift in our lab. If that actually happened it would be a good thing. I'd finally have someone there from 3 to 6 with me who knows their job.

Part of what's so frustrating is that I keep trying to be patient and optimistic, and I feel like I keep getting kicked in the nuts - so to speak.

I do know that every job has it's hassles and assholes. So finding a new job might not solve the problems. But I'll keep my ears open for something new and just try to ask the right questions if I ever get an interview.

UPDATE: I know, this entry was already long enough...

But it's 6:34 and I'm waiting for Nerdstar to make her way home through traffic. While I had hopes of finding enough around the house to do to keep myself busy/entertained today - it kinda ended up being boring. I'll keep that boredom in mind the next two days at work and see which one is worse. I'm not sure the weather helped today, but I'm grateful we're not in the middle of the country without power or heat.

This Close

I am THIS CLOSE to quitting my job. I am so tired of all the bullshit with my coworkers. I keep trying very hard to just go in to work, be really nice to my patients, get things done, and go home. And I am really nice to my patients. But after waiting seven months at this job for things to be better coworker wise, well, I just don't see it happening.

Last week I had the shitty, useless supervisor come behind something I'd corrected and almost screw it all up simply because she wouldn't listen to me that I had taken care of the problem. She was totally out of line, but I'm sure there were no consequences for her. (Our manager was already gone for the day, so I took it straight to his boss.)

Then today, this lady, who's been there not even a month, and I got into it. I tried training her a couple of weeks ago on the computer system, but somehow I managed to totally annoy her, so that ended and who knows when she'll actually get trained. (The other new guy who's been there probably two months has just this week gotten adequately trained.) Whatever. I couldn't care less. But, new lady has had a total attitude toward me ever since. No problem, I can go weeks without talking to someone at work. But today she was a complete bitch, then went right out and told another coworker I was being a bitch and that's when I went off that she should in no way discuss anything of the kind with another coworkers. And the (mostly) good supervisor seemed to take her side on this.

Then her and another employee spent the rest of the afternoon not doing much of anything.

Add in some other drama I can't even write about and it's just all too much bullshit.

The problem with quitting is I have spent too much time unemployed in the past several years, and I know it tends to be depressing. Yes, in a city this size there are other kinds of jobs out there, but I don't really want a different kind of job - and I have nothing to wear to work other than scrubs anyway. There aren't really a lot of other hospitals around, and the LabCorp and Quest locations around here are actually worse to work for than my little lab.

I did apply to a hospital a little south of here. We'll see if I even hear back.

I think I'd like to work in a doctor's office - but those jobs are the kind you only get if you know someone...

Ugh. I do know that once I hit that "I'm Done" place - they won't even get two weeks notice out of me.

More Work Stuff

Work today solidified my feelings of frustration. We had 219 patients today. I registered 62 of them - out of 8 people present today who did registrations. That's bullshit - but normal. And that's not even the main problem.

See, our boss goes with this lovely theory that we're all adults, and instead of assigning specific duties, he lets us mostly do what we want to do as long as patients don't end up waiting very long. Nice idea.

The way that worked out today was that the good supervisor was training one of the good guys on registration, and I was doing registrations, and there were four people waiting on patients to draw - meaning they were sitting around talking about restaurants instead of helping register (all but one of whom knows how to register).

So when the good supervisor asked for someone to step up and help us register - no one did. In fact, a couple of them wandered out of the lab altogether.

(During this the manager is out smoking or something like that.)

Ten minutes later the good supervisor asks for help again - but not so nicely this time.

Then I think one of the four got all pissy and took it to manager who I think had walked back in. That's when I heard the good supervisor go off on that one of the four. Cool.

Now to the point - it looks like the manager is finally to the point (again - although previous attempts at this have totally failed) where he's going to make a schedule saying who registers when and who draws blood when. Which is fine by me - because anytime I end up drawing blood instead of registering will equal working less hard for me.

But here's where they're all so stupid. Because they can't be grown up and get shit done when it needs to be done - they're going to end up doing more of what they don't want to do. Right now the people who hate to do registrations either don't do it at all, or do it two or three hours a day - usually the slow hours when they're content to let me do most of them. Now they'll all hopefully end up with four hours a day of it! Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Add to that the manager is also having to assign specific lunch times for everyone because everyone wants to go at the same time every day. The two people who come in the earliest decided a long time ago they get to take their lunch together, and last (and longest). So today I heard one of them trying to get their way with the manager and for once he wasn't having it.

And I'm just so tired of it all.

My goal the past couple of weeks has really been to focus on being nicer to the patients. My aggravation with my coworkers spills over into aggravation with patients more than it should. And I've been much better on that front.

Unfortunately, from what I can tell, there's not really a better hospital or lab within a reasonable distance to work at instead. How sad is that? And I'm not ready to go back to office work or something like that.

Nerdstar's out of town again this weekend. She'd been planning on heading up to her aunt's house in NJ where her grandpa is staying for a while. The army trip to Hawaii delayed those plans, so she drove up yesterday afternoon.

Me and the cats are just happy she took Ramen with her!

I've mostly slept today, but also managed to swiffer the floors, do a few loads of laundry and take out the trash. Tomorrow I plan on vacuuming. Very exciting stuff. I'm leaving the dishes for Nerdstar.

It finally got all hot and humid here in DC. I'm so happy it took until August. Now I'm ready for fall!!

Things overall are going pretty well.

Work is work. My goal is to not let it stress me out and to be really nice to all of my patients. That's harder for me than it should be. Last Monday afternoon it was me and the more useless co-workers. Normally we're not too busy after 3 or 4 when half the crew goes home, but Monday was really busy. And that meant I was pretty much having to do the computer part for all the patients while the other 3 or 4 people drew blood. We had several people leave because the wait was taking too long.

One of the ironies at work is that the bad apple and her harder working cohort spent at least two weeks a while back throwing a fit about having to draw blood all day and not getting to do the computer part. So, we got them all trained, set the schedule of who would draw and who would register when. That worked for a week or so until those two realized that with the computer part came accountability. We've got a woman from billing who checks over all of our patient registrations and then gives them back to us for corrections. Since then, you can't hardly make those two get on the computer. Ugh.

Anyway. Monday afternoon was rough. The rest of the week went pretty well.

Next weekend we're headed to Atlantic City for some casino action. I can't wait!

Tired, Sore, Grumpy and Frustrated

That kinda sums me up lately, and it's not a lot of fun. My body has mostly adjusted to being on my feet all day, but then my left hip seems to have gotten slightly out of place like my right hip did back in KC. I've got a chiro appointment in the morning that will hopefully take care of it.

So far here in DC we haven't been too impressed with our various doctors. The dentist I went to the other day was the worst ever. I was just there for a cleaning and she was terribly rough and not even very thorough. She didn't use the waterpressure cleaning thingy.

Nerdstar had a dermatologist she went to that was ok, but not great. Then Friday I went to a different one to finally get my little skin cancer patches checked out. They're the unharmfull kind. Again, he didn't have a soft touch. He got things done, but I think it could have been a little less painfully. Plus, his schtik was getting you to tell him jokes, then he told me an off color version of one of the ones I knew. Icky.

Nerdstar's been going to the chiro I'm going to tomorrow and thinks he's pretty good. I know how simple it was for the one in KC to fix my right hip, so we'll see how he compares.

So that's the sore part.

Tired is just tired.

Grumpy and frustrated go together. The bad apple at work just seems to keep getting worse, and seems to keep getting away with all of it. And for lots of reasons it just frustrates the hell out of me every day. Part of it is the unfairness of the situation. Part of it is that her sucking really does make my day harder.

I had to work yesterday. Fine, we all work some Saturdays. (It's just 8 to noon.) I was happy that at least the bad apple wasn't going to be there. As of 8:05 I was the only worker there and there were about 12 patients already signed in. The guy who just works part time showed up about 8:10. Another new person got there about 8:10 - but couldn't log onto the computer. So at that point I'm asking where the woman who's worked there a long time is - and I'm told that bad apple is going to take her place. Bullshit. That meant that of the three of us there who know the computer system and everything else, I know the most - which is a lot, but not enough. To make it all worse, bad apple didn't even show up until after 9. I don't have any idea who approved the switch in people, but what a mess.

I keep trying to just hang in there and be patient and not say anything. Everyone knows the situation, including the boss, but so far things aren't changing very much. I know she won't be there for more than a few months, but I'd be much happier if she wasn't there more than a few more days.

And all of that means that by the time I'm home every day I'm tired and grumpy and out of patience. Which sucks for Nerdstar.

Mostly this weekend we've taken it easy and napped.

A Little Rant

I really, really like my job. I like the hours. I like the patients. I think the hospital is decent.

BUT. I cannot stand my co-workers. It's almost a case of one bad apple spoiling the bunch, but it's a little more than that. Moral and teamwork barely exist. Naturally, it's a top-down problem. I think in the 3 weeks I've worked there the manager has been there for maybe 5 of them, and those were non-consecutive. He's been with the hospital for 35 years and this job is basically his way of getting paid to be retired. So he doesn't care one whit how things run. He thinks he does. He likes to play nice and not enforce rules or tell anyone no. But that just creates a place where people look after themselves with no consideration for anyone else.

And the bad apple takes advantage of all of it. She's one of those people working hard at not working. Then there's the over-educated guy trying very hard to get a better job (and I sincerely hope he does, he's a nice guy). And the pregnant chick who I doubt will be there in two months. And the other nice guy who's leaving in two weeks.

So of people who intend to stick around a while, there's a lady who's so slow at doing things I don't even really count her as there. There's a guy who's so sick I'm not sure how much he counts. Although he's told me every day I've been there how hard he works. And it's not that he's not working, but... Then there's the bad apple, and her friend who just got hired. Bad apple is going to totally rub off on her friend, who I think would be a good worker if BA wasn't around.

I try to not let it get to me when there's a slow patch and everyone wanders off and I'm left feeling responsible for getting the patients out of there in a timely manner. But I tend to have this problem of letting it all get to me.

I'm hoping there's a slight chance that the boss man will be in the office more starting next week, and that might solve a few problems. But I'm not holding my breath. And even if he doesn't decide to come in more regularly, I can hope that he'll at least hire some decent folks to replace the ones leaving.

It's just that it's a stressful enough job without working with some really useless, annoying people.

Bleh.

Big Hit

Yesterday I was a big hit with little old ladies. One of them even kissed me on the cheek.

Little old lady patients that is. Several of them were from Eastern Europe and several others were Hispanic. While there may be veins I can't hit (and I usually know which ones and don't try) - I have a very soft touch with the needle.

Unfortunately, there's one of my co-workers who's driving me nuts. It's hard for me to not let it bother me. She's one of those people who will put a lot of work into not working very much. And yet would be pissed and offended if you told her she's not working hard. The manager doesn't care - and he's been told she's wandering off too much. His attitude is that as long as patients don't complain - which would come back and bite him in the ass - he doesn't care what we all do or don't do - we can work it out amongst ourselves. And normally that would be great. But this chick won't change her behavior unless it comes from the manager himself. And really, I doubt it would change even then. If I know one thing - it's that people don't change.

My one hope is that she gets another job soon. This isn't the job she wants. Not that I think she really wants a job at all.

So - being a big hit with little old ladies is what makes my work days worthwhile.

Bad Days

I really like the patients at my current hospital more than I liked the ones in KC. Then again, I generally like the people in the DC area more than those in KC. As I've said, I like the diversity here - and that people who choose to live here generally seem to be energetic people who want to "make it" in life.

But the last couple of days when I've walked into one of the draw rooms and asked the patient how they're doing, I've gotten a lot of people saying "not so good".

Today, I had an elderly gentleman say that his wife had died two months ago - on his birthday. That's so sad. I had another elderly gentleman say he was ready to die. I had a middle aged woman say her doctor told her she's about to die, but that they'd told her that three years ago as well, but if they couldn't find a way to stop all her pain, she was ready to die. Worst of all, today I had a couple, the woman six or so months pregnant, and they'd just been told some really, really bad news about the pregnancy (I didn't ever find out exactly what). Her husband had gone to get something just as I was finishing drawing her blood, and after I was done she started to cry. I told her it was ok to cry, that between the hormones and bad news of course she was crying, and I hugged her for a moment. It was all I could do to not cry with her.

It wasn't long after that I had my lunch break, which gave me some time to think.

I don't write much here about my faith in God, or my beliefs. Mostly because they're so ill defined. But I do have a lot of faith in God. And there's still a part of me that really wants to be a person God works through.

In very simple terms, I have two goals at work. One is to not fuck up. I don't want to miss when I try to hit a vein. I don't want to draw the wrong tube or order the wrong test. All of that because I don't want to cause a patient discomfort or for them to have to come back and redo a draw because of something I did. Two is that I really want every patient to feel "good" when they leave my part of my job. (Eventually my time will be split between registering patients on the computer and drawing blood.)

Now, is it necessary for God to be a part of any of that? I don't know. But some part of me still believes that God really does bless people - and he generally does so through other people. I truly believe even just smiling at strangers can make a difference.

What's funny is that one of my co-workers "found God" about two years ago - and she's one of my least favorite co-workers. She tells people "God bless you" after she draws their blood - and I've seen it make people uncomfortable. Another of my co-workers is leaving this job in a month to go begin the process to be a Franciscan Monk. He has no reverence that's visible.

I really have no idea what I feel diferentiates me from them.

Anyway. I thought this post would be something other than what it's ended up being. Something about dealing with the public and trying in some small way to make their day just a little better.

Update

Work is going pretty well. It's a busy, busy place. Apparently there's going to be quite a bit of personnel turnover in the next few weeks. One lady who was out on maternity leave isn't coming back after this week. Another guy's last day is next Tuesday. I think another lady who's pregnant is kinda planning on not coming back after the baby in October - which will probably end up being August or September for her last day. Fun. Boss man said the other day he's about to hire 3 more new people. Another lady was hired just before I was - so our staff is going to be at least half, if not more, newbies.

That's not necessarily a bad thing - as long as he hires some more decent folks.

The best thing about work the last couple of days is how many patients have told me how good my "sticks" are. That means a lot to me. There are, and I'm sure will continue to be, a few patients every day with veins I can't locate. My personal philosophy is that unless I can find two good veins, I won't try to hit one hard to get one. I figure if they've only got one good vein, and by chance I miss it or something, then there's not a good backup for another phleb to hit. The goal is to get a patient's blood with as few sticks as possible. I'm usually right when I don't think I'm going to get blood out of a particular vein - so why try and miss just to have someone else have to try the second time. Of course, I hope over time to get better at harder veins.

The downside of work this week is that I'm spending 7 of the 8 hours drawing blood - which means I'm on my feet and putting my back at bad angles for all 7 hours. My back hurt so much today I was almost in tears. That's what I get for not working for 7 months. Ouch! Hopefully by the end of the week those muscles will toughen up! Eventually I hope to spend a couple of days a week doing the registration side of things, and a couple of days drawing blood. But it will be a few more days before I get trained on the registration side.

Just like the UN

Thursday and Friday were my early days at the new job. For some reason, I had to do two days of training with the lab's in-patient stick team. These folks do the blood draws all over the hospital - the floors, ER, GI, nursery, etc.

This is exactly the job I DON'T want. I don't enjoy drawing blood from people who are in the hospital. They already have all their IV lines, they've had blood drawn twenty million times already, and they're usually a hard stick. It makes me feel bad to have to stick them again. And honestly, some are just a little beyond my current competence level.

But, I got through the two days and made a decent enough impression.

Not only was I the only person on the stick team who is White, I was the only person even born in this country. It was fun listening to all the different accents. Two of the ladies are from Korea, two from Ethiopia, three or four people are from the Phillipines, and one of the men was Hispanic - I'm not sure exactly where from. It's also fun watching people with different accents try to understand each other!

Monday I start my real schedule at my real job. Apparently the out patient lab is still really understaffed. The manager told me Friday afternoon he's about to start the process to hire 3 more people.

Excited and Nervous

Yesterday I finally had the final interview for the job I've been hoping to get at the hospital. It was a "peer" interview, where you chat with three of your potential coworkers. It's an idea I really like. The three I met with seemed nice enough, I'd say we talked for about ten minutes, nothing too serious. From what I can tell they mostly want someone who's not going to call in sick all the time.

Today I got the official job offer. I start on the 7th, which is ok because I'll be out of town this coming Monday anyway. We're going to Dallas to see The Kid for his birthday!

A couple more cool things about this hospital are that on your very first day instead of spending it with HR doing orientation, you spend it hanging out in your actual department getting to know the folks, then you spend two days with HR doing all the fun paperwork. Also, over the course of the first month, once a week they give you and a supervisor and/or coworker vouchers to go to lunch to have some "down time" to get to know them.

I'll be working in the outpatient lab just like I was hoping to. We do the blood draws. Then the main lab is down the hall where they process everything. The overall supervisor, who I've spoken with more than would be normal because the lab manager is on vacation, told me there are at least 40 nationalities representated in the employees of the lab. I think that's cool. Also, this will be the first job in many years where I don't have all female bosses and coworkers - yippee!!

It's always a little nerve-wracking to be the new guy at a job. But I can't tell you how excited I am to finally be employed again - at a job I really think will be a good one!

Job Hunting

With the apartment hunting all taken care of, my job hunting has gotten underway.

I drove to DC yesterday for an interview at one of the hosptial outpatient labs. It seems like a dream job. The right hours, only a five mile drive, the right setting. I met with the lab manager, he seems really nice and like a good boss. I'm cautiously optimistic.

In the meantime, I had another hospital, a little farther away, call and I scheduled an interview with them for next Friday. I'm not sure if it's in or out patient, but it'll be good to at least see how the hospitals differ.

I also had a call from a medical staffing place in the area, but won't talk to them until I'm settled in next Friday.

I'm really ready to get back to working. Other than my paycheck being the one that improves our quality of life, (Nerdstar's pays all the bills) I'm ready to meet some new people and talk to someone other than the pets all day every day.

Quitter

Well, I finally decided the negatives outweighed the positives with the temp job and yesterday was my last day.

The cold and snow that's hit the rest of the country finally came here today and I just didn't feel safe enough making that hour drive each way the rest of the week. Plus, I really didn't see it working out into any long term job - although I could be wrong about that. Added to that was I had a woman come in yesterday with 47 different tests on her req. That's insane. I drew 18 tubes of blood and hope that's enough. I really, really enjoy being a phlebotomist, but I don't want to work in a location by myself just yet.

So, Nerdstar has a meeting in DC tomorrow morning so we're driving to DC this afternoon in the snow. At least since I'm going with her I won't have to worry about her!

We intend to get at least a couple of good meals!!

UnFun Drive

The two days of training went well. The ladies at that lab office were really nice! The drive there was in the dark and rain, so it wasn't too fun, but the snow didn't really hit until I was already back home last night, I decided to stay at a hotel that one night. I didn't sleep too well without my snuggles.

Today I'm at the actual location and in three and a half hours I've had one patient. It is a little snowy outside, but I didn't think that was supposed to matter to northerners! I think the average number of patients a day will be about nine or ten.

I'm really not crazy about the drive here. It's 33 miles or so of two lane highway that's all bendy. It wasn't too fun in the dark and light snow this morning. I don't know what it is about roads in this state, but they seem to eat your headlights and stay dark. And if there's an oncoming car - as long as their headlights are in my eyes, I can't always see where the road is. That would be fine on nice, straight roads, but on curvy ones I'm afraid of missing a turn or something. The drive home should be nicer since I get out of here around 3:30.

I'm not exactly sure how long this job will last. The guy who was working this location and is now at another location indicated they might be hiring someone for here. I wouldn't be heartbroken if they did. They've got a location in the little town I live in, eventually I'll probably talk to someone about any openings there.

For now it's mostly good.

Employed

A couple of weeks after moving here I was looking for jobs online and ended up updating my resume on Monster. It looks like that might have paid off.

Yesterday morning a nice young man in Pitts called about a phlebotomy job in a town about 40 miles from here. He ended up being really nice and going ahead and checking references and everything for our interview today at noon so that if it all worked out, I wouldn't have to drive all the way to Pitts twice.

I start training Monday morning. Thankfully it's only for two days because the training is just this side of Pitts, which means it's about an hour and a half drive to be there at 7:30 in the morning.

Ultimately I'll be working for Lab Corp, which is really funny because I applied to them online and they didn't want me.

I think I'll be more excited about the whole thing once I get through the two days of training and then actually see the location I'll be working at.

Spinning Wheels

I'm frustrated with life again. More specifically, with trying to find a job again. I feel like I spent a lot of time and engery this past year getting into phlebotomy so that when Nerdstar got a new job somewhere else, I'd be able to easily find a job as well. And I job that I really enjoy at that.

Well, so far no luck. I had a job interview last week at one of the two major hospitals. The lady said she was interviewing about 13 people for 2 positions. Dang. I haven't heard back and figure that's not a good thing.

It's like Nerdstar and I keep trying to change things up, to move on up, and it just doesn't happen.

I know. It's the holiday season and things are usually slower.

I'm just afraid that if too much time goes by, well, I don't have enough time "in job" to get another one later on.

Bleh.

Burned Out

One of the most frustrating aspects of any job, particularly one you're new to and therefore still at least a little happy to go to every day, is working with people who are burned out.

I'd say out of 6 people who work in our little outpatient lab every day, one other lady was in the phleb. class I was, so she's still happy to be at work (although there are other complications for her that I hope get resolved this week). One lady is having her baby tomorrow, but is one of the hardest working people I've seen - even very, very pregnant. The other three are pretty burned out. One of the worst parts of that is that they have tons and tons of knowledge I don't have, but sometimes getting it out of them takes way too much effort. The least burnt out of the three is looking to relocate to a different hospital, so that will make things suck even more.

I've already told Nerdstar that when I start to get that burned out feeling, tell me to find something new to do. That's one of the big reasons I went into this line of work - because there are plenty of different types of jobs in a hospital/lab setting. When the day comes I no longer enjoy dealing with patients, it'll be time to move to a job where I don't have to.

Lack of Diversity

I really do like my new line of work. Some days it's a little more stressful than I'd like - but that's as much because of moody co-workers as it is my abilities.

I've only been doing this since mid-March, but it seems a lot longer. I didn't realize how much I'd progressed until we had the current class of students and I got to see just how slow they are, and then also being able to "re-direct" when they've missed the vein.

If you offered me $1000 I couldn't begin to guess where Nerdstar's next job will be. Part of me had really hoped she could do another short tour at Leavenworth so I could get at least close to a year of experience before having to find a job in a new city. I also felt like it was just so nice to have a job I like going to every day.

But...

While I'm not getting bored with being a phlebotimist, I'm getting bored with our patient demographics! On a busy day we draw over 90 patients, on a slow day it's between 50 and 70. On a good day there are at least four of us there at any given time. Out of those patients, at least 70% are white people over 60, maybe 65. Another 15% are pregnant minority women - most under 22 or so.

It's not that I don't like either set, I'd just like to see a lot more diversity! That would require moving to a different part of the country!

Work

A couple of things I say way too many times a day at work...

whichever arm is the good one

all righty then

come on back

ok, a little stick now

Topics I discuss too many times a day...

the weather

the hits and misses of their previous phlebotomists

Good News

Nerdstar made it home last night and it's actually kinda weird having her here. I've spent most of the week mentally preparing for her to be gone for 104 days and adjusting to life alone for that period. She's got a few errands to run today and a lot of packing to do. Then it's breakfast and a morning flight out tomorrow.

I've been volunteering to help out at work with a bunch of health fairs for the past two or three weeks. I wasn't scheduled at either hospital and I figured it'd get me a few hours and a lot of practice at drawing blood. Well, it also got me a full time position at the hospital downtown! It's kinda crazy how just showing up on time and being reliable and happy to do your job is seen as something special these days.

Tuesday I got a brief email from the downtown lab manager saying to give her a call. I figured she was calling to apologize for having messed up my pay last week. Nope, she was calling to see if I was interested in interviewing for the opening downtown. I had figured that since I'm about to take 3 weeks off at the end of next month, I'd wait until I was back from that to think about a "real" job position. I haven't been unhappy doing "as needed" hours, because it's given me the freedom to take off when I wanted to. But she said she'd be happy to work around the few remaining days I have already scheduled up north and the 3 weeks off. Cool.

The interview was yesterday. It was pretty short and to the point. She'd worked a few of the health fairs I was at and was impressed and wanted me to take the open job downtown. I figure with Nerdstar being gone I might as well work as much as I can so we can bank more $$. And, as I wrote the other day, it'll certainly help the time she's gone go much faster!

Part of me would rather it was a full time job at the north location. I've certainly learned more up there and like the co-workers and it's half the distance. But I just don't see that a job will open up there anytime soon. I feel kinda bad because I think the manager up there will be disappointed to lose me. I'll let her know that if anything full time does open up to keep me in mind, I can always transfer locations.

The only thing that's a little sucky is that a woman who was in my class with me has been busting her butt full time at the downtown location for about six weeks now and yet I got offered a "real" position before she did. We're pretty sure she'll be made "real" soon, but I'd be pissed if I were her. I really like working with her, she's a fellow Texan, so I'll see how she's taking it on Monday.

Health Fairs

Work has been kinda crazy this week. Instead of getting hours at either hospital, I signed up to do several health fairs at an ammunition plant about an our drive from my house. I do get paid mileage, but they subtrack the miles from your house to the hospital that you'd be driving anyway, so that's going to put a big dent in mine.

Health fairs are pretty easy. The people usually have "better veins" than sick people. We just check their blood pressure and draw one tube of blood and send them on their way.

The crazy part has been the schedule. Monday I just had to drive out there and pick up a security badge. It was a good excuse to get out on the new motorcycle. But, it was only 60 degrees out and cloudy. Not ideal riding weather. Then Tuesday and Wednesday I had to be there at 6:30 and 6 - which meant waking up at 5:00 a.m. and 4:30 a.m. Fun. Yesterday because we were done there at 9 I went downtown to work a few more hours. Today I don't have to be there until 4:00 p.m., but we have a second health fair tonight starting at 10:30 p.m. which means I might not get home until around 1 a.m., and I have to be back there in the morning at 7. More fun. But, I'll be done by 10:30 in the morning and will come home and take a nap.

Other than that it's been an uneventful week.

How Work Goes

Work has been interesting this week. I've felt like I've been thrown to the wolves a lot! I've been at the uptown hospital where the job includes working in the lab as well as drawing from patients. What's neat is that everyone takes turns rotating between working in the front (drawing) and the back (the lab).

Now, while I learned a lot in the class I took, I didn't really learn much about the lab part - processing the bloodwork. Tuesday was my first day of training in the back. Then I show up Wednesday for work only to find out that for some reason (I think someone called in) I was the only one working in the back that morning. Now, there are several Med Techs that work in the back who are very knowledgeable and mostly helpful, but still... it was a bit nervewracking. Then yesterday I worked the later shift up front and again was left up there to work alone for the last three hours.

I figure I'm at about 70% when it comes to really being proficient in both jobs, front and back. There are so many little details about paperwork, which tests are being ordered, or what colored tube to draw the blood in that I need to learn more about up front, and in back it's a question of which tubes require special handling.

One thing I didn't anticipate in this job was that there aren't more stringent black and white standards on some things. Like if we're drawing blood for TSH levels does it go in a plain red tube or a red tube with gel? Well, that depends on which Tech you ask. I don't like that. I know the stakes are high for getting the tests results right, and the last thing I want is for a patient to have to come back in to re-draw their blood because one tube was drawn instead of the other. That happens, but not very often. I think the cause for patients having to come back in most often is that a test required X amount of blood in the tube, and the phlebotomist just wasn't able to get that much for whatever reason.

One thing I can tell you, even though you'll never see the people who work in the lab who process everything, they are concerned about the patients whose tests they're running.

Working

I had my first three days of real work at the hospital downtown. I'm in a little bit of a crazy situation. I'm signed up to work at both locations - downtown, where the class was, and uptown, close to home. The downtown location "got to me first" so technically it's my home base. But, the manager at that location had her last day Friday, and I don't think they have a permanent replacement. I haven't met the temp. replacement. I'm not on the schedule to work, but the other employees all said to just show up until a mananger either tells me not to or puts me on the schedule. It's an awkward position to be in. So, I just showed up Thursday and Friday and worked all day. While it sounds like it'd be nice to be able to set your own schedule and be under really minimal supervision at work, I find I really prefer more structure. It'd be nice if people were mature and good at self-supervision, but that's normally not the case.

Unless the weather is just too bad, and it might be, I'll show up and work Monday and Tuesday downtown just to get some more hours in.

Thankfully, I heard from the manager uptown and I start real training there Wednesday. I wasn't sure which location I'd prefer to work at, but I'm leaning more and more towards uptown. It has to be run more smoothly and I'll get to learn a whole lot more of the lab side and not just the sticking side.

The coolest part, though, is that I really like this job. A year ago I couldn't have predicted making this move into health care, much less into phlebotomy, but it's turned out to be just like I thought it would. I'm not great at it yet, but I'm pretty good with the needle. And I totally enjoy talking with strangers.

Diversity Training

Today was the last day of our two day orientation. Can I just say how much I hate diversity training? I think it's all just bullshit. We did this exercise where they tell us about five levels of comfort zones with people different than us and then show us pics of 11 people and have us write down what comfort zone they fall into for us. Uh, hello - based on looks? Ok fine.

Then, they run the video and the 11 people tell three to six sentences about themselves. "Hi, I'm a tall white dude in biker gear, but I'm a recruiter for the hosiptal." Hi, I'm an 18 year old Asian chick." "Hi, I'm a gay guy with two kids and full blown AIDS." "Hi, I have cerebal palsy and two advanced degrees." All total STEREOTYPES. UGH. Isn't a real point of diversity awareness bullshit to NOT stereotype people? So while watching that part of the video we write down our "new" comfort zone levels for each person. Right.

When someone in that hospital has the balls to talk about reverse discrimination, then I might pay attention. (In my short time on the in-patient floors, I got pissed off at being dismissed and or ignored as the little white girl by the black nurses.)

Or when part of the discussion is how some people use their minority status to play the victim, I'll have more respect for the program.

Then we're told that diversity is something we're evaluated on in our annual reviews. So, do I get an extra bonus for being the lesbian with the Asian girlfriend?

Feels Good

The interview today was just a formality like I thought it would be. So once I finish orientation week after next I'm able to work hours at both locations. I'm not worried about there not being enough hours. It's also kinda good because if Nerdstar and I want to take a long weekend I don't have to ask for days off, I just say I'm not availble.

I can't express what a relief it is to finally know I'm going to be employed, and at a job I actually like. It's been years since that's been the case.

I've been optimistic about this year. Now if Nerdstar's crazy situation with the Army would get resolved. But I'll let her try to explain it if she wants to/can.

Happy Monday

I had a job interview at 9 this morning with the hospital that's actually closer to my house. It's a PRN position which means I start out "on call" and then when something more permanent opens up I'm pretty much a shoe in. It's also more lab work than people work there, but I don't mind learning that side of things.

I think the interview went pretty well. It helps a lot when the directors of the program I was in send glowing emails about me! But, as you can tell, the HR process goes very slowly.

Then, while driving home I got a phone call from the downtown hospital offering me a PRN position with them! YEAH!

I've got another interview with the closer hospital HR dept. tomorrow.

What's neat is that if you are just PRN and not a full-time employee you can work two locations so you can be sure to work enough hours - so I'm sure that's what I'll start off doing.

Whew!! I'm so relived to know I'll be working soon! I've got orientation for downtown the 13th and 14th. Not too far off.

This also means I get reimbursed for my tuition, which was $780. That'll pay off my credit card from Christmas!

Day 12

Today was the day we got to "shadow" the patient care technicians to see if it's a job we're interested in. I already knew I wasn't, and this morning cemented it. The PCTs do just that - care for the patients. They get their meals, bathe them, change the linens, and whatever else is necessary, including getting urine samples and drawing blood when necessary. Why would I want to add all that work when working in an outpatient draw center just drawing blood pays the same. Yes, I know, some people like the aspect of spending more time with patients... not me. I'm really, really good at being very, very nice for the short amount of time it takes to draw someone's blood. That's why I chose this route.

Our first of two tests was this afternoon. I got a 94, and I'm not even that happy with it because I had to answers right and changed them to wrong answers. I know, always go with your first choice! I did get the highest score in my little class of four :-)

I'm feeling pretty ready for this class to be done and to get a job earning actual $$ for the work I'm doing. Although, we do still have rotations at a children's hospital and on the regular hospital floors just doing early morning draws. And I do still need some pratice at drawing, just to get better at the harder ones. Tomorrow I spend all eight hours at the fairly busy outpatient station, so I should finish up my 100 required sticks.

Other than that just hanging out with my girl and the pets and trying to stay rested and not sick. Zinc really does help.

Obligation?

YES! I got an email today saying that I have been invited to the phlebotomy program. Very cool. I hope it's the start of good things. It starts Jan. 9.

So the very current struggle in my brain is about obligation and not being an ass. I'd love nothing more than for tomorrow to be my last day at the sucky job. But...

See, in spite of hating it, I'm actually doing a really good job, and my boss would probably do just about anything to keep me. I have a feeling that in spite of how much it sucks, she's probably tried to make it as stress free as she possibly could. (Unfortunately not enough.) So I'm really, really going to hate telling her I'm quitting. So I can be a total ass and just call the temp agency Monday and tell them to let them know I quit. Or I can play nice and at least work until next Friday.

It's a question of how much of an obligation I feel I have to these people. Technically, probably not much, as I am a temp. But what kind of person would I be if I just didn't show up starting Monday? And can I live with being that kind of person?

As much as I'd like to live a life that's all about me, well, it's just not always doable. I've never been Catholic, but you'd never know that by all the guilt I feel over stupid things.

Oh well. Either way. The very good news is I won't be working the week of Thanksgiving when my folks are here. And, I'll be free to go to Dallas for Christmas and Nerdstar and I can meet up in Austin for New Years. I can't wait!!

My Job Sucks

Man, it's either drought or flood for me job wise. Why can't I just find a simple job, show up for eight hours, do a little work, surf a little net, and go home?

I'm getting to work at 7 am, taking about a 25 minute lunch, and on good days I'm out of there at 5:30. 9.5 hours Plus a 35 to 45 minute drive. And it's 9.5 hours of solid work. Trying to solve shit that shouldn't be a problem. I've got 180+ brand codes of coffee products (Folgers etc.) that are all fucked up because of Katrina hitting New Orleans where the plant was. And the people who can tell me what to do about those codes will do anything other than just fix the problem. Nice. When you see the little signs in your grocery store that they don't have some Folger's products, that's why. Although you'd think by now they'd get their act together and figure out an alternate plan.

You'd also think that two weeks after dipshit quit, the nice boss lady would be nice enough to hire even a chimp to help out with the work load. Nope.

I sit in my little cube with three midwestern grandmothers within four feet. Not the most exciting of conversations when I do take a minute to look up from the paperwork.

I've been waiting, somewhat patiently, since the phlebotomy interview two and a half weeks ago for an answer. They said they'd have the notifications to us by the 7th, that was yesterday. I emailed them today and haven't heard anything. Even if the answer is No, I'd like to know so I can make plans.

I think about just quitting every day. But I don't want to be a quitter. (A common theme) I keep thinking any day now it's going to get better. But I realized driving home that's probably not going to happen. Honestely, I don't even think I'll get time off for Thanksgiving while my folks and the kid are here. (Trust me, I'll certainly quit before then.)

It's just the hassle of quitting a job. Having to tell them, try to answer why without too much honestly. Letting the temp agency know without screwing up them ever sending you to another job - you know, if the blood thing doesn't work out.

UGH. It's driving me crazy. And in turn I'm driving my poor black and blue Nerdstar crazy.

Weekend

Nerdstar sums up the weekend pretty well.

And while she may not be, I'm impressed with her bike riding. I know Kansas has a rep for being flat, but the little corner of Kansas/Missouri we're in is all rolling hills. So bike riding around here is not easy at all.

Work is still work. I hope to hear about the phlebotomy program in about a week. In the meantime, my boss called (her office is in a different building) Friday morning to talk about trying to juggle responsibilities so it's not so stressful, but really, until she hires an additional person, it's going to suck. At least three times in six or so minutes she said she was trying to make sure I wasn't going to quit on her. I mostly avoided answering, knowing that if the program works out I'll be quitting by mid December at the latest. But I certainly intend to at least give a week or two notice. The last week at work wasn't as stresful, but it was still a 47 hour week. The boss wants me to take on more responsibility - taking over the most fucked up part of the job in my little office. I was wondering why she didn't have the lady who's been there longer do the fucked up stuff and just let me do more of the worked out stuff. I have a feeling the other lady also refused to do the fucked up stuff and kept the easy stuff - and I don't blame her a bit. So we'll see how this week goes.

This and That

The interview yesterday was actually fun. There are two women who work part time to make one full-time person, so they were conducting the interviews together. It was supposed to be a short and to the point process, but we sat and chatted for about 35 minutes. We talked about my jobs dealing with oral history, Nerdstar's job with the military, Mpaquest and how exit signs are also mile markers - which comes in very handy for learning how to get around in a new city. At the end they said they should have me come back once a week just so we can all talk and they can learn more. How nice was that? I certainly hope that translates into getting into the program. They're taking six people this time and they said everyone gets a job at the end of the program who wants one - so that was good news.

They said they'll send out notices within two weeks.

Back at the job from hell... dipshit girl who honeymooned in Branson came in yesterday, gave her two week notice, worked half assed all day, then this morning just called in and quit. Nice. So my day was a little rougher than I would have liked. I didn't get done until 6, and that was only because the non-supervisor lady took pity on me. Hopefully tomorrow I'll know better what to look for to not have the same ton of problems.

Either way, I don't intend to be at that job past Christmas.

Ugh

I really don't want to go to work tomorrow. I ended the work week on a pretty big down note Friday evening. After a long week of feeling like the shit kept rolling downhill onto me, I was dead tired and very frustrated. I had hoped that Friday would go relatively smoothly, I'd get out of there at a decent time (God forbid after only 8 hours) and that come Monday my job would consist of only my job and things would go much more smoothly. But about five or so Friday, (my 8 hours having been up at 3:30) it all went to hell. There was me, the lady who had been training me who's not a supervisor, but has worked there forever and I think is like me in that she just wants to get shit done right and get done. There was our immediate supervisor - who I'm pretty sure thinks I'm a pain in the ass who doesn't want to learn every little detail - even though those details were about a job I won't be doing. Then there was our manager who is really nice, but not always helpful. There were a ton of issues, none of which I could offer any help with, and about 5:30 I saw no immediate end to. I was trying to finish up the issues with one stupid peace of paper, but the immediate supervisor would keep making me wait at least ten minutes before answering my questions every time I'd walk over there to try to find out the right processes. Also about 5:30 the manager came over to our building to try to do what she could to start resolving issues. I think the lady who'd been training me would have been happier to not have to explain every little thing to our manager and just gotten it done herself.

About 6:00 I was physically and mentally done. I was shaking and frustrated. What sucks is that all three of these women have been putting in 80+ hour weeks for a month or two. It's not that I expect sympathy, but I was asked to do way too much last week with zero training on at least half of it. So I went over to our manager, told her I was about to pass out and that I was sorry, but I was going home. At that point if she'd said "then don't come back on Monday" I would have jumped for joy.

I don't really feel bad for looking out for myself. But it's just damn frustrating. I'm smart and I'm a hard worker - and it was partially those two facts that got me fucked over last week. I'm sure they thought I could handle the other person's job on top of my own, but they just never gave me enough information to do any of it well or right.

I'm also pretty sure that the immediate supervisor and the lady who's been there forever were pisssed that I left. So working with them tomorrow won't be fun.

On top of that, I have to leave tomorrow at 2:30 for an interview for a phlebotomy program. (Keep your fingers crossed on that for me, I really want that to work out!)

We'll see how this week goes. I'm trying to not be a quitter. If I have any luck at all, I'll get accepted into the phlebotomy prgoram that starts in January and I'll work this stupid job until Christmas.

Work Is Not My Life

Week three of the new job, and I'm finally all set up at my own desk, with a working computer and such. Nice. But, because some chick is out on vacation for her honeymoon (to Branson, Missiouri - which tells you all you need to know about the women I work with) and because of the rollover to the new computer system, this week is still a little crazy. I worked over ten hours yesterday and just under nine today. I fully expect it to be better next week.

I work mostly with five or six women. And while I know things have been busy, they all seem to enjoy working eleven + hour days. Um, no thanks. I swear they don't even take lunch breaks, they work at their desk and eat. Um, no thanks.

I don't mind working hard. I'm all about getting my job done, and done right. If you ask me to do something, I'll never say no. I'll never ask you to do my job for me. I prefer to live and let live at work. This job seemed nice in that I should have a set routine every day that I work through without much interaction. I hope that next week that's more how this job ends up being.

In the meantime, I'm not sure I'm making the best impression. (Thank God I'm there to make money and not impressions!) I take my lunchtime away from my desk. I generally bring my lunch and a book and read in the breakroom. Today one of the ladies came in and joked about me not eating at my desk. I said, "no way!" Then, because I was as done as I could be for the day, I left about 4:15 (not 3:30 which is 8 hours) and a different lady said, "well, aren't you special." I said, "Yep, always have been."

I do understand there's not much to life up here in the void of the midwest, but I would NEVER prefer to be at work when I could be ANYWHERE else! They don't seem to share that philosophy.

Oh well. While I'm glad to have a job, I'll never be sad to see this one end.

A Job is a Job

Sorry for the lack of posts. I was not informed when I agreed to take this job that the hours would be from 7 a.m. to 4:45 p.m. (I'm hoping for 8 hour days soon!) IF I had been informed of the hours when the temp agency first let me know the job existed I would have said thanks, but NO thanks. I was never a morning person, but two years of getting up around 9 a.m. is making it damn near impossible to now get up at 5:50 a.m. And I'm afraid that next week they'll want me to start being there at 6:30. UGH! Other than that it's a perfectly boring job. That, too, might change Monday. They're switching over to a new inventory system (sort of) and the way it affects what I was hired to do is that it totally fucks it. Nice. Not that I care enough to be stressed.

It's a job. I'm not looking to quit any time soon. But I am hoping for a good reason to quit - like Nerdstar getting a better job in a different state, or a program I've applied to to be a phlebotomist. We'll see.

In the meantime, I'm dead on my feet and my eyeballs feel like they're going to fall out of my head.

$$

Now that it appears my financial situation is changing, let’s see if I can manage to write about some things I’ve been reluctant to write about. It seems it’s easier to write about sex than money.

It’s been 22 months since I quit my last job. Ten months of that Nerdstar was in Iraq. A month or so on the road. Then the holidays. Then the move seven months after her arrival back in the states. Did I look for a job during any of that time. Yes. Vigorously? No. The time Nerdstar was in Iraq was harder on me than I thought it should have been, but that’s how it was. Then there was the uncertainty before the move.

Do I feel I have to make excuses for 22 months of being unemployed? Sometimes. I know Nerdstar’s sister and one of her friends from college feel I’m taking advantage of her. I feel I stood by her through some damn hard times.

But it’s been hard. For both of us I’m sure. (Nerdstar has her own blog if she cares to weigh in.)

We’ve also talked a couple of times about if things would be different if: 1. she was a man, 2. if we were married and/or 3. if we had kids. I think it would have, but how I can’t articulate.

We’re not into gender roles and all the associated issues. But I still end up feeling guilty for not holding up my end of this partnership financially. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t feel that way if I were straight.

Before she went to Iraq, when we both went through times of employment and unemployment, we split most things 50/50. The exception being food bills – my girl eats at least twice as much as I do. When she was being deployed, we consolidated everything to make it easy to pay all the bills, and “just in case.” I used up my savings and such paying “my” bills as long as I could.

Now, as I mentioned in the last post, I joke with Nerdstar about being her indentured servant. Like I’m somehow responsible to pay her back for the past 22 months. But will I really feel any less bothered by the whole thing a year from now? I guess I hope so.

Day One

I work in the office of older ladies with very bad hair. It's almost bad enough for me to get a camera phone just to show you guys, but, that would be rude. Heh.

I think the job will be fine. Getting up ass early won't be fun, but oh well. After two years of a pretty leisurely schedule, I can't complain.

New Kid

Well, the new job starts tomorrow. I actually intend to keep this one more than a week. I'm still not entirely sure exactly what I'll be doing. I know they're getting a new computer system starting tomorrow, so at least I'll be in on the ground floor for training. The temp agency mentioned my hours might end up being from 6:30 to 3 or so. Ummm, I sure hope not. But, I guess it wouldn't be the end of the world.

I have mixed feelings about finally working again. I told Nerdstar I kinda feel like I'm her indentured servant for the next six months to a year.

So, we'll see. See how the job actually is, how the co-workers are. Things like that. I know they needed to hire three or four other people, so at least I won't be the only new kid.

Maybe

Looks like things might be looking up. I'm scheduled to start the new job on Monday. I called the temp agency this morning and the lady asked how things were going at the new job, I laughed and said I was still waiting to hear back. She said, oh, I guess I forgot to call you yesterday. Um, yeah, I guess so. I'm not sure exactly what I'll be doing yet. They had a facility down in New Orleans that's now inoperable, the KC offices are picking up that business and doing lots of overtime, so they have five or so positions to fill. None of them are exactly anything I've done before, so it doesn't really matter to me which one it is.

It's going to be really weird going back to work after all this time. I have a feeling I'll have a new bedtime of about 7 pm!

Nerdstar's job seems to be set until the end of the year, I think. It's been an insane story of her unit back in Austin totally dropping the ball. Fortunately, the folks here at Leavenworth are helping her out.

And the weather has cooled off, which we love.

I give good interview

I had a job interview today through a different temp office. It went well, seems like a decent enough job in a decent enough location. I've got a second interview either tomorrow or Wednesday, keep your fingers crossed. Further bulletins as events warrant.

Disaster

What a disaster this temp assignment turned out to be. I've done a lot of temping in my life. Only once ever did an office I was sent to not want to keep me for life. (I had my eyebrow pierced at the time, although it was barely noticable, I think the lady was a bit more conservative than I was.) So the past three days have been rather surreal for me.

As I said, I told the temp agency I was fully willing to finish out the week and give them time to find someone more suitable for the place. Well, after I got home yesterday my phone rang and I prety much knew it was the temp agency - she said I didn't have to return today or tomorrow in light of me being unhappy there. UGH.

I'm really not sure why that happened. The lady who I reported to at the work site wasn't even at work over half of the time I was there (she was having medical troubles). I did exactly what she asked me to, I sat at this dingy table and answered the phones and organized pieces of paper in files. No, I wasn't outgoing or friendly, but the people in that office weren't either. It was just a bad experience all around. But I'm frustrated that the temp office - that I'd like to eventually get a decent job through - now sees me as a problem child. I would have thought that the temp office's rep's trip to the site would have made my position clear. Who knows.

On a better note. Nerdstar and I went to dinner last night with a bunch of people from her work. There were nine of us and it was the only table in the restaurant not filled entirely with white people. What a refreshing change! Some of the people work in the same building as Nerdstar, but not directly with her. Some are some guys here at Leavenworth for their two week AT. It was a nice mix of people from a nice mix of places and the conversations were fun.

Day Two

I once wanted to have everyone I knew write a short storing staring with the line "On day two of my therapy..."

Anyway.

Day two was just as mind numbingly boring as day one, but with one small amusing bit. The lady from the temp agency who sent me to this industrial wasteland was supposed to call and check up on me. She didn't. So about 10 a.m. I gave the office a call and told the supervisor why I'd stay until Friday but wouldn't be back next week. I literally used the word "industrial" in the conversation. About thirty minutes later the one who sent me there called me back asking if she could come by between one and two. I said, "of course," hung up, and laughed. See, she'd been to the corporate type office for this company, but never this location, as I figured. A few minutes past two, after getting lost like I figured she would, she showed. She had some younger man/boy in tow. We chatted for about six minutes and they left. I'd give a hundred bucks to hear their conversation once they were back in the car! "OMG, what a shithole, how will we ever in good conscience send someone there again??" Uh, huh.

Three more days to go.

Ugh!

I have never walked into a workplace more dreary, dirty or industrial in my life. A thirty mile drive, in traffic sometimes, to answer phones in the most depressing setting ever. Um, no thanks. The temp agency lady said she'd call today and "see how it went" - I'm still waiting on that call. I'll say, yes the people are nice, and I'll be happy to finish out the week, but I'd prefer a less industrial setting for the next assignment. Not to mention, I clearly stated I do NOT want a job that is primiarly answering phones. Well, the only thing I did other than answer phones today was the even worse task of filing. Again, um, no thanks.

I did find a better route home. I've been home for fifteen mintues already, and Nerdstar, who's drive home is less than half of mine - not home. And, to make my sad little day even more sad, she'd left her cellphone at home and didn't even get my test messages and voice mails of dispair!

I hate to feel like a snob or that I don't want to work or anything. But it's bad enough living somewhere I don't want to live, I can't make it worse by working in such dismal conditions.

Sigh. Here's to the week passing by quickly.

Changing jobs again

Well, this temp job was nice. But... I've decided to substitute teach starting (hopefully) next week. I know, most of you are probably saying to yourselves, Is she crazy, giving up a cushy little office job to sub? Well, yeah.

I'm just not up to an office job just yet. Actually, if I have any say in it, I wouldn't have one ever again. But I usually doubt I'll have much say in it. At least for now I don't have to have one, so I don't.

There's some small part of me that still thinks I'd make a great teacher and just can't give up yet. Austin's just too hard a city to get a real teaching job in. Austin's famous for having more people with masters degrees waiting tables than any other city. And while I'm sure that's not exactly true, there are a lot of people who love living here and are willing to be substantially underpaid to do so.

Anyway. Who knows what next year will bring. Maybe we'll end up moving to a city that desperately needs teachers.

Even if we end up in Austin, and I don't end up with some principal dying to have me teach at their school, getting another $10/$12 an hour office job that requires less than half my brain and more than all of my patience is just not something I want to do. I'd love more than anything to have a couple of kids and stay home and take care of them and the house and everything. I know that in itself is a hard job, but I not only think I'd be really good at it, I think it'd be fun and fulfilling.

Baring that, I have ill formed plans in the back of my mind to go to a head hunter and get serious about really pinning down what my skills are and finding a job that suits me. I don't know what that's so hard for me, but it is. Having more brains than ambition just isn't good. Of course, I'm sure it would suck just as much having more ambition than brains.

Work

Well, go figure. The temp agency finally called today. I have a temp job starting Thursday morning. It's just normal 8 to 5 office stuff. It'll be so weird to go to work again.

The only downside is it's going to mess up my daily chats with Nerdstar. She's usually able to be online around 1 or 2 pm my time. But I'm sure we'll work something out.

The job isn't temp to hire but it should last several weeks. I'll know more Thursday.

Life is Good

It's been a really nice, relaxing weekend. I was hoping to get out and do some motorcycle riding, but it's been way too windy. Today the cold is finally coming back, it was in the 80s yesterday. Now it's starting to rain. Nice!

I've been going back and forth on whether to give two weeks notice tomorrow or next Monday. The difference is about $300 in pay and maybe a small missed yearly bonus. I don't think that's enough to have to pretend everything is ok for three days. I've also been trying to make sure I'm not just being a quitter and bailing when things get hard. If you've read this site for any time at all you know I've been wanting to quit for a long time. I've also been trying to decide if I should even try to explain to them why I'm quitting, how hard they made things for me. I wrote a brief statement to that affect in my two week notice.

My mom called last night. It helps a lot that she's supportive of me quitting. Until last night she wanted me to hang in there and make it work. It's nice she gets that I'm worried enough about Nerdstar and don't need the added stress of work. Looks like I'll be bringing my nephew down to Austin for probably a week sometime before Christmas. I'm really looking forward to that! I'll also keep him some during March and May.

I met with the therapist yesterday. Mostly it re-inforced what I've been thinking about taking care of myself. I'll decide in the next few days if I want to see her again. I'm not sure it's necessary at this time. I do need to get better at even the simple things like taking vitamins and walking the dog. Hopefully soon they'll fix the carpet in our duplex and I can feel like my home is back to normal.

I'm looking at this time as an opportunity to really get my life together. There's no pressure to do anything anytime soon. That helps a lot.

Well, I'm off to shower, make some coffee and toast a bagel. It's a nice day for watching football.

Deal Breaker

It's taking every bit of maturity and patience I have not to walk into my manager's office right now and give two weeks notice. The only reason I'll give two weeks notice instead of outright quitting is on the hopes that like with the other employee who quit this week, they'll pay me the two weeks and just send me home. Although, if that isn't their offer, I won't finish out the day regardless.

You know what the biggest deal breaker is in all the bullshit paperwork I had to sign this morning was? They stipulated no personal phone calls other than on break or lunch time. That would be fine except that everyone around here takes personal calls all damn day, you know, part of that isn't this a great place to work b.s. Even more than that though, obviously I have no idea when Nerdstar will have a chance to call. They know this as well. Yet, instead of saying, ok, we know it sucks for you, we understand you need to talk to her whenever possible, they throw this in instead. It wasn't necessary, it was petty. And that's just one small part of what was handed to me this morning.

It's the hypocrisy that really gets me. The meeting before this one they were all, we know this is a really hard time for you, we care, let us know how we can help. Yep, this morning was a great big help. It clarified my situation perfectly.

The end is near

Damn it all to hell. Once again, I’m crying at work. Bastards. Yes, the meeting went that well. Silly me had failed to realize it was a “serious” meeting including HR (no one ever told me HR would be there) about how much I suck at work and all the things I will improve immediately or face firing. Thirty minutes later I’m almost breathing normally. Almost. Now I’m just trying to decide when to quit. It’s no longer a question of IF. I can make it thru today. Then there’s only three days next week to get another full week of pay. Then that’s probably about it for me.

Yes, a company has the right to expect a certain level of performance from it’s employees, no matter what’s going on in their personal lives. I get that. But it doesn’t mean I have to work in a place that tells me they care and are here to help me and then turn around and make my life way more stressful than it already is. That’s the beauty of living in a capitalist society – I’m free to quit and move on.

Slowly Imploding

I suppose that's possible, slowly imploding. I was walking the dog last night, feeling pretty damn down, and tried to cheer myself up by "looking on the bright side." Guess what. I couldn't find one. In fact, I ended up making myself feel worse. I realized that this time last year was just about when the bullshit with our last apartment started and we ended up paying two rents for six months. When that hell finally ended, about two weeks later is when Nerdstar got called up to active duty. Then I thought, well, at least I'm driving a better car, oh wait, that's not really that great of a consolation prize.

I was actually contemplating quitting my job just to make it a clean sweep and a chance to start from scratch. Except I didn't think I had the energy for that.

Anyway. Today was day one of some pretty inane team training at work. It was a complete waste of time because those of us paying attention were the ones who already knew the material, the ones tuning out where the ones who don't know shit. Figures.

Not the point. Back in June I looked ahead on the yearly calendar and asked off for Nov. 26 and Dec. 26. The day before Thanksgiving I drive to Dallas, to leave after straight up noon doubles the driving time. We have wed/thurs Dec. 24-25 off, so I went ahead and took that Friday to avoid driving back to Austin for one day of work and driving back to Dallas for the weekend. No problem. Until Tuesday when I get an email from my team leader saying that in light of my recent approved time off, I can no longer take those two days off. I politely emailed saying I had plans and still needed those two days off. She said she'd consult with our manager and our manager's manager.

This afternoon, after a day of training, I get an email informing me that if I choose to take either of those two days off they will interpret that as a voluntary resignation.

HUH? Fuck you. I've been at this job for three years and have a pretty decent work history there. Yes, I've been thinking of quitting, but my work standard has not dropped. They're also very aware that this is the most stressful time I've gone thru in my life. The last face to face conversation we had before I took last week off was "we understand, we'll work with you." And now this is their response? They'd rather fire me than give me two days off? Fuck you.

I'll be talking to HR tomorrow. Yes, I'm aware I probably shouldn't blog this while it's ongoing. Fire me. Oh wait, they don't have any grounds to fire me. I was informed by a very nice person who works for the same company, but not in the same office, that our company allows up to two weeks of unpaid time off per year. Interesting.

I'm so pissed. If they want to get rid of me fine. Fire me. Call me in and tell me I suck. But this passive aggressive bullshit coming from the top manager in our office down thru my team leader? Again. Fuck you.

The ball's basically in my court. I can suck it up and have job security for a little longer, I can talk with HR about being transferred to our other facility, or I can keep a low profile and simply quit without notice at a time when they really need me there.

One thing I won't be doing is making small talk with any of these people anymore. Our office is supposed to be great to work at because of how nice and friendly every one is, how supportive management is. Whatever.

I also pretty much need to decide by Monday on whether to renew our lease for another year or not.

The wild card still being we have NO idea where Nerdstar is going to be for the next twelve months. Fun.

Anatomy of a Decision

I’ve written before about how hard I find it to make decisions sometimes. (oh no, not this stuff again.) But that doesn’t stop my brain from making contingency plans for my contingency plans.

I’m still very tempted to quit my job this Friday and take off on the road Sunday or Monday. After a day and a half, I still haven’t been given a decision on the request I made for two weeks off. That’s kinda odd in our office. I wonder if they are worried I’ll quit if they tell me I can’t take the time off (they’re right, I will). There’s an important two day training during those two weeks that I have a feeling they don’t want to give me time off during. But really, I don’t know what’s up.

There is still the chance, though, that they'll approve the two weeks off, I won't have to quit, and I'll take about eight or nine days and fly up to Tacoma.

There are still too many loose ends/unknowns to make a decision tonight, but here’s where it’s at.

Either Nerdstar comes home in the next few weeks, or on November 8 she’s headed to Iraq. I don’t think it’ll take the powers that be past November 8 to make a decision.

If Nerdstar comes home, she’ll either be looking for a new job, or we’ll be moving so she can go back to school. It would really suck for us both to be looking for a job at the same time. So we’d need all of the money we currently have saved to get thru that.

If Nerdstar goes to Iraq, her salary would cover the bills for as long as it took for me to find a new job. And I don’t think we’d have to use any of our savings. So, it wouldn’t really matter in the long run if I were unemployed for a while. I don’t think it would be realistic to hope to find a job in Dec/Jan. I’m sure there would be some temp stuff if I wanted to go that route, but I figure a lot of companies will start to put off new hiring until after the first of the year. (Business guys - is that a bad assumption?)

Like I said in an earlier post. I don’t want to fuck up the future. So I’m trying to really figure out if quitting my job will do that.

There’s also the road trip itself. I’ve really been wanting to take one for a while. But I’m also aware it could be kinda depressing to do that much time on the road alone (well, with Ramen). It’d take me three days to get to Tacoma. But I’d take my time getting back to Austin. Again, either Nerdstar will be on her way to Iraq and it won’t really matter where I am. Or best case scenario is she’d be taking the trip back with me (that's a whole different idea that I'm not letting my brain dwell on).

The clock is ticking. I just have no idea what the next few days will bring.

Oh, and as for what Nerdstar thinks about all of it. Beats me. We've talked about it some. I'm sure she'd tell me to take the next flight out if she could, but she's not the best at making plans.

Bad relationship

My relationship with my job is bordering on totally unhealthy. How sad that the best analogy is that of a relationship gone bad. I've been obsessing about quitting even more for a week and a half now. What it comes down to is that I'm just not happy working here, and not just for the eight hours a day I'm in the office, but it's carrying over to home time as well. Life with Nerdstar being gone is hard enough, but to be so miserable at work at the same time is just stupid.

No matter how much I try to talk myself into being happy here, into sucking it up, sticking it out, making it work, it really is like a relationship, once something goes bad, it's almost impossible to get it back to good. (yes I know, cheesy lyrics.)

Part of why I don't just quit is that I don't want to be a quitter. I don't want to feel like I failed. I mean, how stupid to quit a job because your feelings are hurt. But that's a lot of what's wrong. I feel unappreciated, unchallenged, disliked and just plain stuck.

The other problem is trying to find a different job. There's still just not much out there. I have experience in office work, answering phones, a little bit of retail and waiting tables. So in addition to feeling like I quitter, if I ended up back in temping or waiting tables I'd also feel like a loser.

I just can't seem to find a line of work that I'm qualified for and that I want to do. There's always the option of going back to school, but I guess I'm not ready for that yet.

Of course, this is all complicated by not knowing how long Nerdstar will be gone and what happens after that.

I am checking hotjobs and monster. Putting out feelers for doing some transcribing, contemplating bartending school. I just don't know how to think outside the box of my apparent qualifications.

Sigh.

Stupid Callers

Just a couple of the stupid calls I get:

Call 1

Caller - I need to get some study guides

Me - Ok, I just need a name and fax number and I can fax you the order form.

Caller - Oh, you can fax me the order form?

What'd I'd like to say - OBVIOUSLY!

I go thru this about twenty times a day.

Call 2

Me - standard phone greeting, then - This is Beth

Caller - long pause.... who are you calling for?

Me - um, you called me.

The ones who really piss me off are the ones who call regarding something our office doesn't do, and when I tell them that they get pissed and say I'm not being helpful. Uh, how the hell can I answer questions about something we don't do?? I was helpful and told you we don't do X, isn't that more helpful than if I made shit up to make you happy?

I think there should be one day a year (month would be even better) when anyone who's job it is to answer phones should be allowed to be a total smart ass to stupid callers - maybe then they'd (we'd) all realize just how stupid they are.

Pet Peeves at Work

It's annoying as hell to answer the phone and have the person on the other end just sit there quietly, then stutter around trying to figure out who they called and why. Uhh... hello... if you're going to dial a phone number - expect and be ready for it to be answered!!

The lady in the office next to me is very nice, but not too bright when it comes to using those new-fangled contraptions called a computer. She frequently comes to me to help her figure out how to do what she's trying to do in Excel or Word. No problem. Yesterday she said she'd tried entering info in Excel three times and it keep losing what she entered. I looked at her screen, saw that she was in cell #65406 and then looked at her number lock key - sure enough, it wasn't on. She'd tried three times to enter in information and never once figured out it wasn't typing in numbers at all. Smart.

Round and Round

Wow, it's great that they found Elizabeth Smart alive. But I can't help but wonder (before much info is being released) how a 14/15 year old girl could be kept against her will for nine months by some sort of homeless preacher man?? Hmmm

Work was funky today. We've had several changes in the past few months. Our office manager's resignation, as well as the retirement of her boss about six months ago, has led to "reorganization". That's all good. But a lot of days I feel unappreciated and underpaid and underutilized. So when there's been word of restructuring how phone calls are handled - making it more organized instead of willy nilly - I was hoping to have some input and such. I mean, for two years I've been the main person answering the phones and routing calls. Today I found out that someone else will be heading up that project. Also in the same meeting, it was announced that an internal website would be developed to facilitate communication.

I was pissed. Not only was I passed over, but it appeared my idea was going to be handed over to someone else. So after the staff meeting, I went in and talked with my boss. I was visibly frustrated.

For about the first nine months or so I had this job things were fantastic. I thought I was making friends on top of doing a great job. Then things kinda started to unravel. I found out the hard way I can't trust some of my coworkers. It made my work environment very icky for me, which made me kinda cranky. Then I had some districts complain that I was mean to them (I concede that point, they're stupid and I'm mean - so be it!) Then I didn't get a promotion I wanted. I think I've covered those things previously in my writings.

Anyway. Today my boss was nice to say that she knows I could have done a good job on the new project, but the other person just has better people skills. Fine. The good part was that she said I'll have a big part in the internal web site development. About five weeks ago I pushed really hard for someone to find me some server space so MT could be installed and then it would only take me about two days to set up a fantastic office blog. In this big of a company that was too complicated. (don't ask - it's all very stupid!) So I have no idea what direction they're looking at going to have an intranet site.

I guess I'm writing all this to say that vicious cycles just suck. I'm no good at masking how I feel. For almost a year and a half at work it goes back and forth, I get frustrated with how things are run, it makes me bitchy at work, which makes me get passed over for shit, which makes me bitchy at work.

And when life outside of work is just as frustrating and complicated, well, it's fuel for the fire I guess. I'm sure life would be simplier if I were a happy-go-lucky person, but I'm not.

That's my day. Fifteen days till Vegas!!

Boring

At my workplace different people/teams do pretty different tasks. This means that while some people are busting their ass and working over time, others are surfing the internet and chatting all day. Then in two or three months it switches to the other group being busy.

I kinda fall into a group all by myself because I was assigned a hodgepodge of tasks other people used to do and it all got consolidated down to me. I think I've said this is the busy time for me. After each test session score reports go out along with pages of student data that needs to be corrected so the scores can be assigned to the right student. You'd be amazed the number of ways the student/district can screw up the simple part of filling in the name, birthdate etc. on an answer document.

In some ways it's nice that the work i'm doing is on all these pieces of paper - so i can see actual progress - less pages in this stack = work done. but it also means i have all these different piles of things in different stages of "done" and I hate that it looks all cluttered. One of the reasons I get it all done so fast is that I like things to be finished.

So, that's my boring work life for now.