1:30 a.m. - 2004-07-09
Fatigue
I've been passing out at work off and on for about two weeks now. Just fatigue, but I thought it would be gone by now. I'm not certain why because I'm still not getting much sleep. Nightmares when I do drift off too. Why? Because there's still a bucket load of paperwork to do, so that's what gets dealt with when I get home along with calls and visits from staff still finishing off their work. One of them noted last night that she was exhausted after being off all her work contracts for the last week. She wondered how I could carry on. Simple - the bills I need to pay. However, I am glad this weekend is coming up. Just one job to cover off instead of two. I've passed out briefly on the bus too. Lucky we passengers look out for each other.
To top things off I had to deal with a break in at the Elections office on Tuesday as well. It turned out that the owner of the building had wanted in and had brought in a locksmith to pick the lock. He called my home at 11:02 am leaving a voicemail demanding I come open up for him. By 11:30 am I had received a call from the security company that we had secure the building stating that the alarm had gone off - what action did I want them to take? When the alarm went off he had instructed the locksmith to disconnect the alarm completely. They then left the building without repairing anything, leaving the whole thing unsecured except that three of my staff were now on site. However, they didn't feel they could leave the computers and confidential data still there unless the alarm system was reactivated. I called the owner when I found the story out and asked hime to send his maintenance person back to undo the damage they had caused. He did so, then tried to harass my assistant into giving him the keys to the building and the security code to the alarm "so they wouldn't have to do this again".She called me but he wouldn't back off until I said I was calling Elections Canada's legal department for advice.
As a result of all that I had to spend some time dealing with the security company (because I am the one contact) to get everything straightened around. In all, I estimate I may have been on phone calls over a three hour period for about 45 minutes to an hour of that time. Called the lawyers at the head office to ask for some help. Don't want to get into a scrap with the owners at this point but there have been enough attempts to steal the confidential data in the building that no risk is acceptable right now.
I did stay late that day - until 5 pm and said goodbye to A who was outside on a smoke break as I left the building. I also stayed until 4:50 pm the night previous so that I could finish off what I was doing. In short I don't think it cost the client any of the time they are entitled to since I will only bill until 4:30 pm each day. Besides that the anomaly spreadsheet took 4 hours to build and another 1.5 hours to code so that K could cross reference to her data and I haven't billed for either.
However the appearance of not giving due attention to the client's tasks might have been an issue and that caused me extra stress as well. Spent the next two days feeling as though someone had taken a baseball bat to my shoulders and back. Just tired of the whole mess I guess. All I really want is to have a few days to clean my house and put the dozen or so boxes sitting in my living room away. Right now though I need to send in my timesheet for my downtown job. No pay day without it you know.
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