Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Well, here it is, 3:55 p.m., and this day is one I got started wrong. I left my phone, papers I had set out to bring, and some medical receipts I needed to turn in, and when my office phone rang, and I saw it was Butch's Cell phone number, I realized what I had done. We are really lost without that cell phone that connects us to the rest of the world. I wanted to call my daughter and ask how the babies are, since the little one was sick, but can't make that call on the work phone. I ended up working very hard today, because I won't be at my desk tomorrow. I will be working at a co-secretary's desk because her desk is in the main building, and there are certain parts of her job that have to be done in a timely manner. I call us 'Secretaries-in-law', and she is responsible for filling off duty jobs with police officers, and scheduling funeral escorts, and it gets hectic. Especially now when people, who have had all year by the way, want a police officer or two or three to work to control the crowd at a restaurant or a hotel for the New Year's Eve celebration. You know, if I had a restaurant, I don't believe I would wait until the 30th of December, and then call both secretaries in a frenzy because you want someone, and then get ill because it may not be possible. I believe I would figure that New Year's Day is always a year apart, and for a restaurant who has been in business here for the past two years to wait and expect miracles is ludicrous. At this time of year, police officers are A) already working a shift, B) already scheduled for off duty jobs or C) off with their families because the put in for it months ago. 9 times out of 10, the officer WANTS to work all the off duty he can due to Christmas bills. So, asking for one last minute is ignorant. Treating the secretary like she personally engineered it so the officers wouldn't want to work is ignorant. I have told people in the past, "ok, wait, let me get this straight! You are asking me to help you and you are talking to me HOW?" Really, the secretary or the administrative assistant is the one who really knows what is going on in the office. And if we have trouble filling an off duty job, it's because there is no one who WANTS to work it. Or at least wants to bad enough to cancel plans. In the case of the current, very upscale restaurant, it is because the management has had officers scheduled, and then called them the afternoon of the work day, and cancelled, and done this repeatedly, and some of the officers have quit because they can't count on that job, in favor of one that doesn't get cancelled. So, then, they call last minute because none of the ones who have worked for them care to do it. Like Bugs Bunny said, "What a maroon!" These morons don't have a clue, or don't care. There, got it off my chest! And it is because I have to work in her place tomorrow, and I am not looking forward to dealing with idiots. Maybe I should put my sign up, "I will suffer no fool gladly this day!" It used to work. Maybe because most people weren't real sure about what it meant! Then this 'getting to be old fogey' will maybe pick up take out, or not, and go home and start getting the stuff out of the building and seeing what is destroyed. I don't even want to look at Sarah, Andrew, and Carlie's things that have been stored out there, or the Junior Edition books that I saved for when Sarah had kids, and our camping,and all the other things that have probably been ruined. The one good thing is that the insurance company is renting us a POD for a month to get our stuff in and determine what is ruined and what is salvagible(is that even a word?). So, hard work and long hours this weekend. Yuck. Maybe some good with all the bad. We might get things organized that we have needed to do for years. We'll see.