Work rambling

Today has been absolutely crazy at work. Emergencies and rushes and signings and important meetings and more phone calls than you can shake a stick at.

I've still managed to get a fair bit of filing done, in spite of all that. I'm very impressed with myself. I'm determined to get all my filing completely finished by the end of June. Well, by "completely finished" I mean "all caught up," really. There's no such thing as completely finishing with the filing. There are days (today included) when I feel a whole lot like Sisyphus: just when I get rid of one pile, someone else comes along and dumps another pile on my desk.

Still, if I've caught up with my filing by the end of June, it'll be one more reason to try to obtain a week or two off in July. I won't have to worry about old filing while I'm gone: only the new filing will pile up. I might not be able to get two weeks, but even a week would help. A week of nothing but domestic puttering, cooking and baking and taking walks and other nice, relaxing activities.

Also, the idea of being caught up on my filing appeals to me because it makes me feel as though I'd be able to leave the office on fairly short notice without feeling guilty that I'm leaving behind all this unfinished work. I'd like to be able to leave my successor with a clean desk, nothing pending, nothing in the inbox: tabula rasa, so to speak. Not that I have any kind of job lined up yet, but the idea that I'd be able to pick up and leave without any qualms is very appealing and reduces my stress levels like you wouldn't believe.

My job isn't all that stressful, to be honest. There are two things that stress me: one is the filing piling up while I deal with emergencies. I simply don't like having that much paper accumulate on my desk –it makes me feel incompetent and unproductive (regardless of whether or not that assessment is true). The other is New!Boss. I know he doesn't mean to stress me, but dear God is he a stressful little man to work for. It would help if I didn't always feel like some sort of bug about to be eaten by a hungry lizard every time he looks at me. I turn into a blithering idiot around him, because he's always staring. very. intently. at me, and I can't think straight because I don't know where to look that doesn't involve the Giant Staring Brown Eyes Of Doom. We just don't speak the same language: if I speak he doesn't get what I'm saying, and vice versa.

I'm hoping this will resolve itself as we each settle into the new routine. He's a nice enough guy, I just have trouble communicating with him. Time will tell.

The One Form has also made its monthly appearance on my desk. I am unthrilled, but I shall soldier on regardless. This month I get the added complication that some of the expenses are being paid by another department, but there's no procedure in place for them to do so. I anticipate many phone calls and a fair amount of aggravation. Whee.

So that's my exciting news from work. Thus far nothing new has happened at home either. The Parental Units are coming home tomorrow, so that should be fun. They're always in a splendid mood after their trips, so I'm looking forward to seeing them again.

Dreaming

I had a very nice dream last night. I was at work and looking at my calendar, and I realised as I looked that, thanks to a particularly cunning juxtaposition of statutory holidays and a day or so that I had taken off, I had two whole weeks' vacation coming up. It was a very pleasant surprise, unexpected as it was, and so I immediately set about updating all my computer documents so that the person replacing me would be able to keep up with my work.

It's been a long time since I've been disappointed that a dream wasn't really true. ( Oh, look, this devolved into whining about work. Colour me shocked. )

"C is for 'cookie,' that's good enough for me..."

The CAM bought me a cookie.

I may bitch about my coworkers and the managers especially, but they're fundamentally pretty decent people. We get along well, they never ask me to do anything that's ridiculously beyond my ability to do, and the general atmosphere here is good.

Did I mention I have a cookie? It's one of those large oatmeal things.

This weekend is going to be all about domestic felicity. There will be cooking and cleaning (not necessarily in that order) and quality time spent with the Parental Units. I have to get myself a rolling pin and a flour sifter, and possibly a large wooden board, because I shall be making the chive biscuits that toughlovemuse introduced me to this week. The recipe can be found in the comments of owldaughter's blog, if you're interested. In this post. I may repost the text here (with her permission) for future reference. Easier to check my own archives than someone else's.

I am in a baking frame of mind. Sadly, I lack many of the tools necessary to engage in that activity. Hopefully I shall be able to remedy that situation in a not-too-expensive fashion this weekend. I have a notion to make muffins, or maybe cookies. Something shareable. I might bring some to the office on Monday, should the venture prove to be a success. I haven't actually baked anything more complicated than peanut butter balls in over four years (and the peanut butter balls were in 2003, if memory serves). A frequent baker, I am not. With any luck and a bit of perseverance, that will change.

Okay, back to work. Only twenty minutes before the end of the day now.