It's going to be that kind of a week, I see

 

Today started with the guy meant to be delivering (and installing!) our new printer calling me to tell me that property security weren't allowing him on the grounds because he "wasn't cleared." ARGH. This isn't some random delivery dude, he's a specialized tech for a secure network belonging to a government partner. It took 45 minutes to get that sorted out, which is 45 minutes of my life I'm never getting back.

The day kind of went downhill from there, culminating in a technological malfunction causing a data loss that we can only PRAY is not going to compromise a national security investigation. GAH. 

The employee drama seems to have sorted itself out, at least, which is nice.

The best news of the week so far is that we seem to have FINALLY fixed my employees pay issues. All of the back pay she's owed should be deposited into her account tomorrow, and all of the various pay people have sworn on their children's heads that the system correctly reflects her current pay rate. So once we confirm tomorrow that she got paid all of her money, I will be able to say with a reasonable degree of confidence that the problem is resolved. I won't call it good, because anything can happen, but there is every reason for optimism right now.

I haven't gotten anything done at work this week that I planned to do, so it feels like I got nothing done. Objectively that isn't true of course. I've been dealing with the fallout from the system migration this whole time, but it's frustrating nonetheless.

In news unrelated to work for once, my darling car mechanic Steve finally got back to me, and we are a GO for car maintenance this weekend. The General Service Vehicle: Congenital Optimist (that's the car's name, for more recent readers--I used Iain M. Banks' naming convention) is long overdue for some TLC. I'm getting a new-to-me alternator (technically it's an after-market one, but Steve is confident that it will work well for me, and it has a three year warranty, which is good), a new timing belt, new spark plugs, a complete replacement of the transmission and power steering fluid, a thorough check and servicing of the brakes (we will set up another appointment if they need to be replaced), an oil change, and the application of a protective lubricant on my poor patch of rust to keep it from spreading until such time as we can find someone to do the body work for me.

I won't have the car for the whole weekend, and it's not going to be cheap, but it's going to be MUCH cheaper than if I go to the dealership or Canadian Tire, and Steve does excellent work. My goal this year is to get the car into the best shape possible and keep maintaining it for as long as possible. I toyed with the idea of trading in the GSVCO and getting a larger car or even (ugh) an SUV of sorts in anticipation of moving further out in the country: having something with more torque and more cargo space would definitely come in handy. That being said, the math of getting a new vehicle convinced me that sticking with my trusty steed for several years longer makes much more sense. I own the GSVCO outright, and she is very good on gas, which means my main expenditure every month is insurance (which is bananas in Ontario, for the record). Getting a larger vehicle means hundreds more dollars a month just to pay for the silly thing, and probably hundreds in gas.

So right now it's much more cost effective to just do a bunch of preventive maintenance. Come the springtime I'm going to do a few cosmetic upgrades too. Nothing fancy, just new floor mats, maybe find a way to fix up some of the nicks and scratches in the paint (they are all very small), things like that. I'm also going to investigate new all season tires and maybe get them already mounted on rims if I can. All very boring stuff if you're not me, but I'm low-key excited at my newfound understanding of care and feeding of my motor vehicle.

On that note, it is time for care and maintenance of the Phnee, which means bedtime. Here I go.