January, I really buckled down at work, earned a nice monthly bonus and switch in team leaders (rolls eyes). She caused me much stress in the month of February. Very nit-picky, she went through all punch-ins and outs with a ruler every day. I was counseled for coming back from lunch one minute late, which wasn't my fault. Much of February, I was sick. I was beginning to worry about a repeat of of last year with me in the ICU, this time. Every time I called in to work, she called me at home to check up on me. The worst part of it, she was from another department and had no clue what us lowly robo-trons answering phone had to deal with. Ugh!
Duane bought me a Martha Washington geranium the week I was out sick. First time we found one down here.
For March, I have a new team leader who has been in the department for a long time. She's so low key, we just nod and say hi when we pass each other. She knows I'm not one of the problem children and leaves me alone.
February, also brought me two friends at work. Actual, friends that I would consider having over for dinner. If I didn't live in this slum, that is. Which is something, considering how anti-social, I am. You know with the aluminum foil covering the windows and that hat I made with the scraps.
One rides the bus with me. This is the weird thing about work. There is a bunch of us riding the same bus every day. We all sit in different sections of the bus, never speaking, we all get off together, go into the gas station to get our human fuel, then walk our separate paces to work and back, never speaking while waiting for the bus.
This one guy that rides the same bus as me, sits two cubicles from me, never speaks to me. Occasionally, we would nod to each other. Then one day, I was waiting for the light when he came up and I started talking to him and we walked to the stop together talking about work. After that, we would talk at the bus stop after work and on the bus home. Which many nights has been great to have someone to vent to on the way home. We groan about how there hasn't been VGH (voluntary go home) in months. We are tres burnt out.
The other is an older woman who comes in by car and starts the same time I do. She sits on the bench and has one last smoke with me before we head to our rabbit holes for the day. Her sister is an RN that took the refresher course after being out of nursing for awhile. Her sister works at a re-hab center like Duane was in. She tells her all the time, tell that girl to hurry up and get her license back, I'll give her a job. Hopefully, in September, I can arrange to take the refresher course.
Basically, I go to work, come home, eat dinner, go to bed. Get up at 5:30 and do it all over again. These twelve hour days our days are killing me. I have bad eye strain headaches when I get home. Last thing I want to do is look at a computer screen. Which is the lack of blogging or blog reading, sorry.
March came a stress reducer and increase all at once. They closed down the underpass we use to walk to work for a huge two year construction project. ADOT put in a shuttle last week to take us back and forth. It runs once an hour three times in the morning and then once an hour three times in the afternoon. I take the last shuttle in and the last one out. If I miss either, I'm sunk. That's Monday thru Friday. I can't get there in time to take the Saturday shuttle and it doesn't run on Sunday. So, I have to have weekends off.
Two weeks ago, I took a PTO day to go with Duane to the pulmonary Dr. The head of staffing calls me at home.
"Sorry to bother you on your PTO day, but your the next one up for the shift bid. Congrats on being number 25 for the Arizona department."
Me: "I need these hours and weekends off because of the shuttle."
"I'm sorry, that shift isn't available."
Me: "Congrats on being number 25, my reward is I need to find a new job, thanks."
"No, no you don't, I just need to put something into the computer for you. I have Sunday and Tuesdays off you will only need to just figure out something for Saturday."
Me: "Put in whatever you want. This is what I can work. I can't just figure something out. It's the bus or a cab. The cab costs 25.00 one way now. Once the construction starts with the detour it will be more."
It ends there and we go to the Dr.s. Duane still has significant scarring in his lungs and high blood pressure. The Dr. ordered a cat-scan of his lungs. We find out the results in May. It looks like he might be on oxygen for three to five years best guess, maybe life. Come home, 13 yr old Butterscotch had bloody diarrhea all over the living room. Have to call in to take him to the vet the next day. Luckily, it's just irritable bowel syndrome and she gave me some medicine. Wonderful vet just around the corner. She does bunnies, too. She said, she's not an expert on bunnies but she would be willing to call for consults if she felt she was in over her head.
Go into work the next day and see that I'm scheduled to work this weekend, after the shuttle starts. Here we go. I go up to the desk and talk to the head guy that had called me. To make it short, he slid me around to where it's the hours I can work. Told me when it happens again, to just come up and they will slide me around.
First day of the shuttle was last Monday. Just as I was standing up to the leave for the day, the head of the department comes up behind me. "Well, Denise,think you will make it out to the shuttle in time. You've got ten minutes."
Wait, what! How does he know who I am? He walks out with me to the shuttle. He's the liaison between our company and ADOT.
Today, I noticed the first week in April they have me scheduled for the weekend and hours all over the place. I went up to the desk. The head guy wasn't there. The ones that were up there gave me a bit of a hassle, but switched it to what I needed eventually. I said, "That's another week I won't need to hand in my resignation." My old team leader, (the one I really liked) was in earshot. She said, "Wait, what!" I told her I would be there until they didn't work with the shuttle or ADOT stops the shuttle, then I will turn in my resignation. She said, that's not going happen. We'll see. I'm taking one week at time. Of course, I'll make sure to hand my resignation to the head of department.
The people upstairs have continued to be arseholes. A couple nights, I've had to call the manager because the mom wasn't home and the kids were running around yelling and fighting for hours. It's like the Lord Of The Flies, up there. The people over my next door neighbor, throw their cigarette butts in our patios. Piles of them.
Tonight was the last straw. Duane calls me at my first stop. The kitchen sink is over flowing. Upstairs has been running water for hours. He called the manager. I call him back at the second stop to tell him I see the bus coming. Get home now, water is running all over the place. I get off the second bus and run for home. My neighbor passes me with her truck as I get to the front.
I get home, Duane is out on patio. The neighbors from both apartments are both out there yelling back and forth with him. They have the water still running. The punk above my neighbor is threatening to come down and fist fight. With an old man on oxygen. Geez. A plumber is inside our kitchen bailing huge buckets of hot water as fast as he can. It slows down enough that he can go upstairs and tell the idiots upstairs to shut the water off. We were only washing a plate. To which he said bullshit, and called the manager. The manager was supposed to come down and never did. The plumber bailed water from two big buckets for over an hour. Our neighbor bailed with a pot and made a small pond in the courtyard.
Oh, the manager moved out back at Christmastime. The whole place is the Lord Of The Flies now. Not, that he managed the place that great before.
I called him after I stopped shaking and calmed down somewhat. Enough is enough, I'm looking for another place. They go or I go. I've had it. Four hour commute, 8 hours of people screaming at me at work. I can't help it if their Dr. didn't call in the prescription or their insurance denied payment. Between the drug addicts calling Drugs-R-Us for their oxys and their xanax at work and the drug addicts up in this place, I'm fed up. Instead of being in bed an hour ago, like I should have, I'm venting to you all. Don't know when I'll be able to get to sleep, then have to get up and do it all over again.
My bus friend live a couple miles up the street from me, in a single house. He says several of them come up for rent when the college kids leave. I'm going to ask him to keep an eye out for a decent place in his neighborhood.
On the knitting front, I finished two pairs of socks, but have to re-knit them. The feet are a half and in two small and tight around the top of the ankle. It's ok, it's pretty yarn. One pair was supposed to be my Mom's Christmas present. I'm currently working on a rainbow pair, so I will send those to her instead. It will be too damn hot down here by the time I finish them.
Talk about crazy weather. Last week it was 80's down here. Then a storm came in on Sunday. Monday, I was out on break with the older woman and we both said it felt cold enough to snow. She's from Indiana, so she knows too. An hour later it did. It was actually snowing in the valley. Meanwhile, it was 80's back home in NY. We are supposed to be up to 80 by Friday. I'm not looking forward to it getting too warm, once it does it will be 110F 40C plus for months.
This weekend, I promise to tell you about Dammit and the new living room furniture. Dammit gave Duane quite the hot chase Monday morning. When Duane told me about it at lunch I was laughing so hard I had tears rolling down my face. Had everyone staring me because cranky old broad never laughs.
Thanks for stopping by. I promise a good post this weekend, I think, I hope. Someone lock the neighbors in the closet, one far away from me, and throw away the key.
