Balloons, music, bands playing. Streamers, champagne, kisses at midnight. It�s my 100th entry. Wow, Diaryland really does it up for these big events. I can�t believe they threw a party for me. And presents!!! Wow, this is amazing.
Okay, so the story of my life, well at least my life recently. I know you�ve all been waiting with baited breath to hear what is stressing me out so much� Rest assured, I will make you wait no longer.
Work. It�s all about work my friends. Only a little bit of SpaceCowboy thrown in for flavoring.
Okay, before I continue, you have to try this: eat a dove dark chocolate, and with the remnants of it still in your mouth, eat a strawberry laffy taffy. It is very delicious. And I am crazy. Just remember that. But it�s good. At least I think so.
Okay, back to the story. So, what do I do? I haven�t really spent a lot of time talking about my job, but here goes. I work for a healthcare company that is located here in California. We have some divisions of our company in most of the western states. We are the nation�s largest provider of Medicare HMO insurance. Largest. Put that in google and search it and you�ll know where I work. Find the main offices and customer service center for California and you can start stalking me. First you have to figure out which one of the 1000 employees in my building is me� but go ahead. (If I do get a stalker, then I can complain to security and get a special parking space. Parking is major premium in my building. We have more employees than parking spaces. It gets ugly. So go on, stalk me) I like to live life on the edge. I�ve worked for this company for almost 7 years. 5 of them in the same department. 4.5 of them in the exact same job.
So right now, I am a trainer. For my department I am THE trainer. There is no other. My department has somewhere around 100 employees. Right now, we are getting ready to implement a new software system. It�s built from the ground up for us. Custom and all that. Aren�t we special? And it�s going to affect our entire department as well as about 100+ people in other departments. I am in charge of all things training. I am in charge of scheduling all the training, booking the rooms, making sure everyone has a seat in class and knows where to go and that I have enough trainers. I am also in charge of writing the training manual. Since it�s a custom program, there is no documentation. None. I have to write it from scratch.
On February 18th, I teach a train the trainer class. Between now and then, I have to get this manual finished and off to the printers. The big problem is that we haven�t even figured out all of how it works. So there�s a ton of blank spaces in the manual where things are still being determined. I�ve been working weekends, evenings, all damn day trying to get it done. I had started writing it a long time ago, but first of all, the new system wasn�t really stable enough and only 1 person really knew what he wanted to do with the new system. So that makes it hard to document. Secondly, last week I took a class on instructional design and it changed my whole perspective. So I basically started from scratch last week, but the end result is going to be a whole lot better. It just means a whole lot of work for me. Which means I�ve been bringing work home with me and working nights and weekends trying to get it all done.
I was okay with that, but then two things happened at work that totally pissed me off. There�s this supervisor who hired a new employee. The new employee, from what I�ve heard, is not that bright. She really shouldn�t have been hired. I don�t know why she was. The supervisor has come to me and asked me to do some side-by-side training with her. I have told her no because I am working on the manual and I don�t have any extra time. I provided her with some written material for someone else to go over with her. So, a few days later, she asks me again. Again, I say, no can do. And then she asks me again. And I say no. She says that someone already sat with her but she wants to make sure she sits with me, because I�m the trainer. Okay, that�s fine, but that�s not urgent. Not by any scope of the imagination. If all I�m doing is training her so you can say she was trained, not so she�ll learn the job, then that�s bullshit.
So, after a few weeks of telling her no, with the support of my boss, she doesn�t stop. On Monday, I�m taking a break to talk to my neighbor DB (from hereon known as JoeBoxer, I�m really liking the nickname thing) and she, the supervisor comes up to me and just stands there. Then she says, can you sit with M and teach her XYZ system? You�re the trainer and I�d really like her to sit with the trainer. Okay, yes, I�m the trainer, but I�m working on a super-huge, mega-important project. Okay. Supposedly she gets this. Because whenever I tell her, she says �I know, I know�. Well, apparently you don�t. So, I tell her no, I don�t have time. But she just stands there looking at me not saying a word. And I know what�s going through her head. Oh, you don�t have time to train someone but you can have a conversation with JoeBoxer? That�s what she�s thinking, I can tell. Okay, this is a Monday after I�ve spent all weekend working. Working. F�ing shit man. So don�t I deserve 10 minutes to talk to my co-worker if I want? So I say, well, let me take a look at my calendar and I�ll get back to you. Because she won�t go away. Then I remember that I have 3 meetings that day. And I say, oh, I have meetings all day, I can�t. But she keeps standing there. She won�t freakin� go away. Just staring at me, not saying a word. So finally, I say, I�ll look and let you know, I�ll see what I can do. And finally, she leaves. But I�m pissed.
After that, I complained to JoeBoxer for a moment, then decided to talk to my boss and have him call off the dogs. Then I thought about it for a moment, and thought, well, maybe she really doesn�t understand what I�m doing. Maybe she needs to know, see it, see my calendar and the 150 page document with mostly blank pages that I have to fill in. So I ask her if we can meet for a few minutes. I bring my document and my schedule and I show her. I say, maybe you don�t understand, that I worked all weekend, I�ll be working until 10 tonight. She says, oh, I know, I know, you�re really busy. Well, if you knew, then you would not keep asking me. She says, well, my people keep asking me so I have to ask you. No, you don�t. You can tell them what I�ve already told you. So that�s not it either. Then she says, well, I know you�re really busy but my people say how they�ve seen you out on the floor socializing. Oh, I see, because I take a break and get away from my desk for a minute. Seriously, what the fuck? So that was piss off moment # 1. The result of that meeting is that I went to my boss and he sent out an e-mail to the department and said �Janet�s not available, leave her the fuck alone, if you want something come to me.� (not in those exact words, mind you.)
Okay, piss off moment #2. So, I met this week with a team of people who is (off topic but is it "are" helping me or "is" helping me? "a team is" but "peole are" so I don't know) helping to review the training manual and filling in the gaps. They are what we call SME�s (Subject Matter Experts) and have all been involved in our user testing/development. We met on Monday. I gave them what had been created so far and they were to review it and get back to me by Wednesday with changes/comments/improvements, etc. I told them that I�d need the changes by 3:30 on Wednesday because that�s what time I leave. And that I wouldn�t be here on Thursday (I had taken the day off to speak at the Women�s Health day at the ol� nunnery) but that I would be working on changes from home to have the updated version ready for them on Friday. So, the next day, my boss calls me in and we were chatting it up, then he says that people had a problem with me saying I leave at 3:30 and that I�m salary and that doesn�t mean I always get to leave at 3:30 if there�s work to do and that HE knows I�m working nights and weekends at home but other people don�t know that. Well, I don�t like to be at the center of controversy and the truth of the matter is that I have enough enemies at work. There are tigers prowling the hallways looking for ways to take me down. I�m not making this up, JoeBoxer can confirm this. So, I contact my carpool partner and say, I can�t take you home tonight or tomorrow, or ever again, because I live here in this cubicle. This is my new home. Sorry. That was Tuesday. The Tuesday after I spend all weekend working and spent Monday night working until 10 PM. I arrived at work at 7 AM on Tuesday. I stayed until 5. I have not taken a lunch all week. No breaks either. I�m lucky I get to pee. Wednesday, I arrived at work at 7. And I stayed until 6:30. Again, no break, no lunch. Thursday, I took the day off. I took personal time. To do something personal. Yet last night, Thursday, I worked from 4 PM to Midnight. 8 hours. Then woke up at 4 AM, got to work at 5:45. And I will work all weekend. But somehow, it�s just not fucking good enough for all the tigers. I�m just a raw steak and they can�t wait to devour me.
My boss, however, does have a heart. This afternoon, there�s me, exhausted and stumbling around his office walking into furniture. He says, you know what you need to do. You know when it needs to be done. I don�t care when you do it. I don�t care where you do it. Just have it done by Monday at 10. Go home. So yay! I was home by 1. All I have planned for this wonderful evening is relaxation and sleep. I�ve given myself the night off. Tomorrow it�s back to the grindstone. But tonight, ah tonight, the pleasure of it all.
In other pastures, I�m talking to this guy in Africa who, after seeing my picture, has decided he�s in love with me and wants to marry me. He wants to fly me to Africa to meet him and then he�ll relocate here. Maybe I should go for the free trip to a foreign land. Yeah right.
Okay, so here�s the deal, I need some advice on something so I thought I�d try a little diaryland experiment. Go either to my comments, or to my guest book and leave me some advice. But here�s the kicker, I�m not gonna tell you what the situation is.. you have to leave advice without knowing what you�re leaving advice about. Ready? Set? Go!
