Corner of Bourbon & Division

I didn't post yesterday because I just plain forgot. Whoopsie. I am still adjusting to sharing my home with KK, and I assume that will be the case for several more weeks at least. Before I used to come home and just plunk myself in front of the computer, or at least turn on the laptop while I puttered, but now there is an actual human being here with whom I can interact! And I've been making dinner for both of us, albeit nothing particularly great because I did NOT plan any meals (because both our brains were entirely consumed by the move), so suddenly my evenings are kind of full.

I also Skyped with my parents, whom I hadn't properly spoken to in something like10 days apart from some sporadic phone calls. They both got their second vaccinations on Monday, and while they both said they felt fine and had no side effects, my mother struck me as being quite tired and out of sorts. We were Skyping later than usual, because of course now I get home and have dinner with KK, and I wonder if it's not too late for my mother: she does seem to start to fade between 19:30 and 20:00, and we started the call at 20:30. She claimed it was fine, but I am not convinced.

I am trying to call it an early-ish night tonight. Peggy was very good last night and slept all the way through the night, but I got to bed after 22:00, and I am having a lot of trouble recovering from the exhaustion caused by the move. This is not helped by the fact that I'm working overtime every single day this week, so more sleep is definitely in order.

This weekend I am heading up to see . fearsclave, which will be a welcome respite after weeks of constant moving-related stress. I am of course bringing Peggy to see her second-favourite uncle (favourite, of course, being her Uncle Dylan), and we will go for long walks. :) It's meant to rain, but I will simply bring rain gear and it should be fine.

Peggy is curled up on my bed and looking adorable, so I think I shall go join her.

Today feels like it lasted seventeen years. I dropped Peggy off for training with her hunting trainer in the morning, and then spent what felt like the whole day chasing my tail on one thing or another. By the time I picked her up my brain was metaphorically dribbling from my ears.

I have engaged the services of the lovely professional organizers one last time for next Friday, and in anticipation I have ordered a sturdy shelving unit and some clear storage bins for when we de-clutter the garage and hopefully get it all tidy and organized for when KK moves in. I have set aside the entire day for this, although I assume the lovely ladies will only be here for 4 to 6 hours, and the rest of the time I will devote to putting things outside for people from my local "buy nothing" group to pick up. Next Tuesday is garbage and plastic/glass recycling, which is not great in terms of timing, but I'll make it work. I would have preferred the reverse (paper recycling next Tuesday and garbage, etc. right after the big garage clearout), because I am quite sure there will be a lot to throw out/recycle in the end.

We have two full weekends left before KK moves, so I have blocked off all four of those days to go help her pack up. She's bought moving boxes and is in her words "beginning to freak out," so it's probably much needed. I think I will aim to put in "full days," which means going fairly early in the morning and not stopping until the evening except for lunch and water breaks. If we work steadily through both weekends I think we can get a very large chunk of it done, as long as she helps with the packing.

All in all, things are almost ready on my end, garage notwithstanding. I want to give the basement a good scrubbing, but that should take about half a day in my estimation. Mind you, I have been wildly wrong in the past about how long things take, so maybe it will take longer. If I remember I will report back here about how long it took. 

On that note, I am going to bed. The rest of the week is looking rather ridiculously busy. *sigh*

I have noticed that my angst about work doesn't seem to necessarily be directly tied to how well or how badly my days are going. There are some days when I am reasonably productive but still feel as though I am behind the eight ball, like today. I deliberately worked more hours today because I wanted to be in early to greet our newest employee and then I stayed late on purpose to discuss another employee with her supervisor (who was working a night shift, which starts an hour after I normally end work), and arguably I got a lot done. I followed up on a bunch of things that needed following up on, I finished revising a document that I promised for someone last week, I sorted out the employee pay, solved two separate computer mysteries, and set up a whole bunch of meetings over the next few weeks. In spite of all of that, I spent the whole day feeling a general malaise about everything, feeling as though I was prioritizing the wrong things anyway.

What likely didn't help was the news that yet another employee is 90% likely to be leaving for another job at the end of July. *sigh* He has to pass one more test to qualify, but the odds are good he will pass, so that's that. If he leaves and the employee I mentioned the other day also has to go on sick leave (which he will, sooner rather than later), we will officially no longer have enough staff to run the unit 24/7.

I hate that this is happening on my watch. None of it is under my control, but the stupid anxiety voice in my brain keeps telling me that when the manager returns in the fall she is going to use this as "proof" that she was right all along and that I'm actually incompetent and that the unit failed because of me. The thing is, it's not entirely unlikely that she will act that way, even though objectively speaking all of the employees who left in the last year did so of their own accord in order to find better jobs and KK left before I was even the acting manager (because *she* was the acting manager at the time!).

I've half-joked that this feels a lot like the glass cliff, that I took the reins just as we're about to collapse under the weight of being underfunded, understaffed, and mismanaged for the better part of a decade, and that joke isn't feeling all that funny right about now.

*sigh*

In way better news, Peggy successfully slept in bed with me last night! She didn't destroy anything, didn't pee on the carpet, and didn't declare war on the cats at 1:00 am. She was a bit wriggly, but overall she cuddled up like a champ and slept most of the way through the night. I am very pleased, and I am going to try again tonight. Yesterday she was VERY tired from playing all day with her friend Shadow, so we'll see how she does after a quiet day at home while I was at work. Time will tell. :)

I took Peggy to obedience lessons today, and she was a rockstar. She is getting much better at recall and the "place" command. We started working with an e-collar today on the very lowest setting, and she did really really well. We tested the e-collar on me first just to be sure, and it was a relief to feel that it doesn't even sting, particularly. It just feels a little weird, even on much higher settings (I couldn't even feel it on the lowest setting, but of course dogs are much more sensitive than humans).

By the time I got home the migraine I've had since yesterday was back in full force, so I ended up going back to bed instead of going to KK's as planned. I slept for six hours and crawled out of bed around 8pm to entertain Peggy some more, have some dinner, and at least try to get something out of the day. My sleep schedule is a little shot as a result, but I'm going to try not to stay up until ridiculous o'clock just on general principle.

I thought I might have something more interesting to talk about today, but after a series of small time-wasting blunders on my part I ended up working from home today, so there's even less to report than usual on that front.

I DID have a meeting with my DG and her right-hand woman (I don't recall her exact title right now), and we accidentally opened a huge can of worms between the three of us concerning one of the procedures we have in place, so we may need to do a Privacy Impact Assessment. I shouldn't be this excited about it, but I am a nerd and this sounds super interesting even if it's a lot of work, AND it means a project I can take on that might give me some needed visibility at work among the higher-ups, so it really is pretty exciting!

Apart from that, Peggy spent the day at daycare and then took a nice long drive with me while I went to pick up my ADHD meds (my pharmacy is on the other side of town, but I'm going to switch to something more local to me this week, I think--it's getting ridiculous to have to drive an hour and a half just to pick up meds), and got rewarded with a Puppuccino from Starbucks as a reward for being a very good girl. She fell asleep in the car on the way home, and it was all very adorable.

Tonight is D&D! We're switching weeks for my Tuesday game, and then switching to Friday nights starting next session, because we're all getting to be old and Fridays are easier for those of us who have to get up in the mornings for work afterward. This will very likely help me with my going to bed late issue at least some of the time, because I've found it harder to readjust my bedtime(s) after D&D nights. So, here's hoping!

In other news, I am despairing at the children on the internet. There has been a hue and cry among the younger internet denizens about how there shouldn't be overt displays of kink at Pride, because OMG THINK OF THE CHILDREN! Impressionable underaged beings shouldn't be exposed to such horrors as large men wearing studded leather, it might warp their minds! *sigh* One person, and I wish I were making this up, declared that:

 We're playing the live game tonight (the one that streams on Twitch), and it's been a very roleplay-heavy session. We have a pair of brothers who are very close (and bicker constantly), and one brother has just found out that the other one is basically going to die unless they can find someone to cast a reincarnation spell. We're only level 8, so it's a ways away, but it's been a pretty emotionally charged session.

I took a short nap this afternoon, and ended up sleeping until 9:00 this morning. I finally heard back from Steve the Wonderful Car Mechanic, and I am bringing the car over tomorrow morning for repairs. Since I didn't get out in the field with Peggy today, I figure I will try for an early morning tomorrow and drive there directly from the field. Then Peggy and I can walk home, as it's only about a 30 minute walk. We shall see.

 I have tried starting this post three times already and gotten distracted each time. I had the shittiest night of sleep in a very long time last night. I tried getting Peggy to sleep with me, and went to bed at the very reasonable time of 9:15. I awoke at 10:30 to her absolutely shredding the nice reading pillow KK gave me last month, so I put her in her new crate because it was either that or stay up all night to make sure she didn't destroy anything else.

As it turned out, I was up most of the night anyway, because Peggy did NOT want to be in the new crate. I don't know if it was because the crate was new (it's made mostly of hard plastic and so you can only see through the door and not the sides), or a bit smaller than her regular crate, or because she knew I was right there and wanted to be with me, or a combination of some or all of the above, but she kicked up the loudest fuss all. night. long. She whined and whimpered and barked and howled, and then she'd go quiet for 20-40 minutes before starting up again. So technically I did get some sleep, but in very short, unsatisfying bursts.

Conclusion: I am tired.

So I am going to bed. *falls over*

Today has been A Day.

It started out kind of meh, nothing special. I got up later than I intended but not actually late after a night of really fucked up dreams about work.

I am a little sad that I forgot to write a post about the suuuuuuuuper intense dream I had somewhere in the night from Friday to Saturday. When I awoke I still had really clear memories of it, and I thought I should write them down, but I got distracted and forgot and now I only have the haziest of recollections. It had a fairly complex plot and was in a sort of post-apocalyptic cityscape that was filled with monsters that were reminiscent of zombies, only not quite. I don't remember what had caused them to be that way, but it wasn't your standard zombie infection. It was a pretty action-packed dream, too, with lots of running around the city and climbing up rickety fire escapes and dodging the monsters. There were even "quiet" interludes like in a horror movie when we'd find refuge in high rise penthouses filled with luxuries (swimming pools, entire rooftop greenhouses, etc.). It's too bad I've lost the plot, to be honest. Maybe it'll come back to me another time, but probably not.

Anyway, I got out of the house without issue, except that Peggy decided that today was going to be a Put Up A Fuss About Mama Leaving day. She is usually fine being crated, but every so often she takes serious exception to my leaving her behind and barks and howls and fusses and does her level best to break out of her crate. Usually after I leave she settles within about five minutes, sometimes ten, and is good for the rest of the day. On a couple of occasions she has managed to break out of the crate, and I've found her wandering happily around the house, having terrorized the cats and sometimes having left a "surprise" behind on the upstairs carpet. I've taken to closing the baby gate even when she's crated now, and that has kept her confined to the living room when I'm gone, which has resulted in no accidents (why she feels the carpet is an okay place to go is beyond me, but we're working on it).

Today, though, she was NOT going to be contained by mere human walls, no! She collapsed the crate entirely (I've reinforced it a few times, but it's clear I need a different solution now), and then turned her attention to the back door. She removed the wooden 2x4 I have wedged in the sliding glass door to keep it from sliding, shoved aside the chair I have wedged up against the door to keep her away from the lock, then unlocked the door with her nose (she figured out how to do that months ago) and went for a happy frolick outside. Let the wild rumpus begin! Of course, I had long since gone to work and was none the wiser. The first inkling I got that something was wrong was receiving a call from my neighbour: "Hi! I've got your dog."

THIS is why I have my number on her tag AND have a microchip. She also has a tattoo from her breeder. I should have named her Houdini, clearly. Little shit. So she took ten years off my life today, and got sent to a half-day of daycare at PetSmart to play with all her dog friends as "punishment" for her actions. In the meantime, I need to get a better crate and figure out a better way to barricade my back door. *sigh*

I went back to work and spent the rest of my time there putting out fires and answering questions from people who really ought to know better. All the employees are getting seriously burnt out, too: it's clear everyone is worn down to their last nerve, and there's very little I can do about it. We need more people, and the best I've been able to manage is a single hire this year so far. It's disheartening. I'm trying to think of little things I can do to bolster morale a bit, and kind of drawing a blank. It's all very well to buy pizza for folks every so often, but at least two employees are actively trying to lose weight, and I don't want to be the person to sabotage their efforts. ;) I will keep thinking about it and hope for inspiration.

Last but not least, I am half-vaccinated! Got my first shot today (Pfizer, for those who are curious, but I would have happily taken any vaccine destined to fight COVID-19), and the next one is slated for September 6th. In two weeks I will be more or less 80% immunized against the more common variants of the virus, which is a very nice feeling. We're on lockdown here in Ontario until June 2nd (it was extended from May 20th), but they're finally ramping up the rate of vaccinations, so there's something of a light at the end of the tunnel.

Of course, the more extended problem of vaccinations not being available to most developing nations is still a huge fucking deal, and the idea of all the pharmaceutical companies insisting on maintaining their intellectual property leaves a very bad taste in my mouth. For instance, Pfizer made 78 billion dollars from its vaccine this year, and they're blocking IP access mainly so that COVID-19 can't go away entirely and becomes a chronic thing we all live with (like the flu) and have to get vaccinated against every year. It's a super fucking cynical ploy, and I am not especially thrilled to be a party to it. Refusing to get the vaccine on principle is very much a cut off your nose to spite your face proposal, but I am going to find organizations that are putting pressure on governments and pharmaceutical companies to ensure more equitable distribution of vaccines. 

And in other news, I veeeeery gingerly began poking at an idea I had years ago for an urban fantasy novel that has the potential to turn into a series, provided I actually manage to figure out the full plot and, you know, actually write it. It's an idea I really like, but the alternate universe isn't really fleshed out in my mind, and I also don't have the plot fully figure out, either. So, ugh. Writing is hard. OTOH, it's been several hot minutes since I actually tried to write in a serious way, and I need to at least try to get back to it. So that's what I'm doing now. Trying.

On that note, it is bedtime. Good night, folks!

 The Pegglemonster somehow got a zip-tie wrapped around two of her toes. It took three vet techs, the vet, and 200mg of gabapentin to get it off, but she is fully recovered today, none the worse for wear.

OTOH I ended up going to sleep well past 2am and then I stayed late at work because I got up a bit late and I kind of dragged through my day. I wanted to go to bed early but it's already past 9pm, so the best I can hope for is to get to bed "not too late."

So I am off to brush my teeth and generally perform ablutions before passing out. I will try to post something more interesting/meaningful/whatever tomorrow.

Oh, and I am officially getting my first vaccination on May 17th! I have to wait until September 6th for the second one, but whatever, I will take what I can get at this point.

Good night, folks!

I ended up not having to go back to work last night, which was a mercy. I really didn't want to go in. I have thrown someone else at the problem (the ISSO), and moved on with my life for now.

Today wasn't as productive as I would have liked, because I let myself get sidetracked from the stuff I wanted to do by other work things, but I didn't procrastinate in time-wasting ways, so I'm still counting it a win.

One of my colleagues is taking my problem child employee off my hands, which is good news but also means we will have fill a new gap in the schedule, and given just how short-staffed we are, that is going to be a challenge. I'm probably going to end up pulling double-duty over the whole summer to help fill in gaps. *sigh* 

I have a sort-of impromptu Mage game tonight. We played Sunday and ended a bit early, and due to Plot Reasons it made more sense to do a two-player session tonight before our next full session. I was going to take a quick nap before the game, but I'm not sure I'll have time now. I've never been good at cat naps--I usually need at least an hour to feel like it had any effect--but I may give it a shot anyway and see what happens.

Peggy is being a very good girl and chewing a bone very industriously under my chair, and I kind of feel bad about interrupting her. XD