Another week on night shift

Well, it's only five days this time, and another girl wants to take my next two night shifts, which will be very nice. So this is the last time I'll be working nights during the week for the forseeable future.

I find working nights to be a bit hard on the system. My sleep cycles get all messed up. For instance, today I will be awake most of the day, but once I get to work I'll still have to be awake all night. I'm going to try to have a nap this afternoon so I'm not up for 24 hours straight (that never works out well for me).

I'm disappointed that I wasn't able to join in the festivities at fearsclave's this weekend. Instead I spent two days working twelve-hour shifts. I gotta tell you, even though I really like my new job, it was not my first choice of how to spend my weekend.

I'm learning a lot about my new coworkers as I work on shifts alone with people (nights, evenings and weekends are conducive to conversation the way day shifts are not). I'm also getting a much better sense of the internal politics of the place, who is friends with whom and who doesn't like whom, and who gets along with the supervisors and who doesn't and why.

I also find that I get along much better with the "old-timers" than with the relative newcomers, on the whole. This is hardly surprising, as I generally get along with the "old-timers" in any job setting. I'm not sure why that is: perhaps I find them more reassuring to be around because they've been there forever, they know the ropes, and they have nothing to prove and therefore aren't a threat to me. Maybe. It could be also because I find many people of my generation to be annoying and poorly-educated and generally not very polite or pleasant to be around. I haven't really figured that part out yet.

On a fun note, I got a call from a Crazy yesterday who wanted me to put him in touch with Céline Dion so that she could bear children for him. He assured me that he, Céline and René (René Angélil, her husband and manager) go "way back" and that they would be happy to do this for him. He told me that he was doing really well, that he hadn't had anything to drink or taken drugs in a long time, and that he hadn't been hospitalized in years (which I took to be a sign that he probably ought to be hospitalized now), and that "babies don't make themselves, you know." He was also convinced that the RCMP was the obvious choice when looking to get in touch with Céline.

I felt sorry for him, but it was also really funny.

Today has been declared a Domestic Cay at Casa Phnee. I am doing laundry, doing a bit of cleaning, and will be making bread and chili. I am annoyed with myself because I forgot to take the meat out of the freezer, but I'm sure I can think of a way to thaw it in time to be cooked. I did a more thorough clean-up last week (as the post about my new Scooba will have indicated), and now I'm attending to details. Sometime this week, probably Thursday or Friday, I'm going to do some re-decorating by shoving furniture around and getting around to hanging some of the artwork I've been meaning to hang for, oh, two years or so now. Sheesh.

That does it!

Dear CD/Cassette Player,

You have been a faithful companion for these many years. I understand that you were not exceptional when I got you, and that I cobbled you together from two different machines, and that as a result you have never played CDs all that well.

That being said, I think it's time for us to part company. Not only do you skip and shut down every time one of the cats moves in the place and whenever I walk by, now you refuse to "read" half of my CDs (including my favourite Dire Straights CD), you eat all my tapes by stretching the ribbon beyond repair, and you have taken to skipping during songs randomly even when the CD is not visibly damaged. This is unacceptable.

You have been a steadfast but not especially reliable companion. I thank you for your many years of service, and I hope that, wherever you find yourself next, you will be rewarded accordingly.

Love,

Me


P.S. Does anyone know where I might get rid of my old CD player? I don't want to toss it out, as I'm sure the speakers are still good, and the rest can probably mostly be stripped for parts or something. I'm going to be getting rid of it probably next month, as this month has been an expensive one for various reasons, and get a new one then.