11:40 PM - 16.02.05
Travel
Transit adventures sort of bracketed the day dear diary. This morning the neighbour took her son and daughter to the airport so I took the bus/train/bus to work. Spent the first part of the journey chatting with the one young woman who works in a government officer as a contract position. We were doing a bit of a comparison of our work styles and preferences. I'm not certain why she brought it up but it seemed to be important to her to know how I felt about things like change, and predictability versus ambiguity. I think you have lready gueesed mine dear diary. The ride seemed a bit wonky including the announcements of which statione we are approaching. Personally I use just my eyes on transit because it's the only real time information one can discern. When she got up to go to her connector bus it was obvious that she was heading for the worng platform but she had only listened for that announcement without reference to the passing scenery. She realized her error in time to correct her direction so that was good. Next stop after she got off the train stopped at the platform and just sat there. No visible problems and no announcement as to cause - just silence and stillness both - a zen moment if one chose to interpret it that way. Given that most of the people travelling with me were workers that wasn't the norm. Fidgeting to that very strained look that tells you someone has already reached the end of their rope even before the day is begun. Arrived at work avout 15 minutes later than usual but that's commuting.
Started in on where I left off after printing out the reports I needed for the weekly meeting. Looked at some of the text my supervisor had added after we spoke last night and moaned. I reminded myself that I might only be there a couple of weeks more and that it wasn't worth my health to stress about something I didn't seem to be able to convey to anyone else. About an hour before the meeting began he sent another go-forward document that still made some suggestions or statements I couldn't support. Om mane padme hum - just breathe through your heels, Grasshopper. Wish I knew how.
My co-worker came by just after I printed that out to let me know our supervisor had just called to let us know he would be there shortly so we three could have a premeeting meeting. Fine. I believe the term for such meetings is "all being on the same page" as in don't rock the boat. Om mane padme hum. The other team members arrived with the woman who had asked about labelling into the bargain. She has been directed to set up a particular class of files - one that my co-worker had been doing. Apparently her request to do her own labels came from the fact that information he had included was incorrect. Given that the files in question have some legal ramifications that was a bit of an issue for her along with a couple of other things. She directed her comments to me with respect to asking for help, but that put me in the position of blaming/overriding both my supervisor and the coworker if I responded. As a result I remained silent while the other two scrambled to explain the rationale behind what had been done. Neither of them seemed to accept that the whole of what had been labelled by the co-worker was going to have to be redone to meet her requirements - at least not until she stated that she wouldn't have time to go back and clean up the mess. Ouch. she had mentioned that there were documents missing that she needed during that discussion and I knew some of them were in the records I had indexed - 1.51 mb and counting. However, the data was all in one column and I had made my spreadsheet entries so that they were easily searchable by the parameters she requested. She was pleased with that.
Next up came the regular part of the meeting. the liaison had printed out and annotated the spreadsheet I had sent her last week - the one I got in trouble for sending her because my superviosr didn't want her inconvenienced. She seemed very pleased with what she had found though and had obviously spent a lot of time working through the data. The last go-forward document my supervisor sent was intended to help structure the next steps in the process and that was fine but the liaison, after having seem what was really in their collection had several more things to add and some revisions to make to the plan. She had a lot of technical questions that only I could answer because I'm the only person who has really seen the inside of those records. As a result, I had the floor for most of the meeting - all two hours of it. I hope my supervisor didn't think I was responding in a way that upstaged him but he couldn't have answered those questions anyway. He did try a couple of times but just floundered when she asked follow up questions. From my point of view it was a good meeting because the discussion centered around what was really in the records instead of what people wished to be there. The liaison also conceded that she realized that the Canadian legislation, admittedly very arcane in places, required a different approach than what she had been advocating in other meetings. that's all I needed to hear. As I've noted before dear diary, there are many ways to handle the same collection of data based on a corporation's use and needs. As long as the legislation is respected I don't really care how the rest is done although consistency is nice and the most important issue to address in terms of application of those decisions.
My supervisor spent a little more time with me after the meeting going over some of the technical issues arising and he seemed ok with the outcomes of the meeting. He had brought a little box of chocolates for me from "the boys" at our data management company for a Valentines day gift. Apparently only the female staff are treated, so I shared mine with my co-worker so he didn't feel left out. My marching orders for the balance of the days were to make some technical amendments to the master spreadsheet, at the liaison's request, and then start creating sub spreadsheets each to be delivered along with their share of the records to various individuals or teams for assessment. I think the liaison had been pleased with the flexibility of the tool I had created for them - once she saw how it was configured. Good work outcomes for a change.
I was going to head out a little early at the end of the day. I kept zoning out the last hour and decided it wasn't fair to bill the client for non-producitve time. Better just to go home to bed rather than try to fake it - right? As it turned out I ended up not finishing up the last bits until my rgular leave time and that I guess was a blessing. Reached the train platform just in time to hear one of those dreaded "problem" announcements being blared from the PA system. Never can catch any more than two or three words out of every sentence. One of the really nice (and handsome) males who is often on my commute came by with his buddy and explained that we had to walk all the way to the end of the downtown stations to catch our train. Accident on the tracks just happened. The thought of taking a cab was really appealing and then the reality of the ost sort of put the kibosh on the whole idea. When I make the salary I do for elections that is a justifiable expense so I can spend time working instead of traveling. Not so in these circumstances though. Headed off with all the other rush hour commuters all of us plodding alng in the same direction. Everyone usually just accepts it as part of the package of travelling and that is good. Not much else one can do is there. As we walked I realized that it might be a lot quicker if I went over a street to the downtown mall - less crowds and no vehicular traffic. Well not normally. Police had basically cordoned off all of the main downtown streets and redirected it on to the pedestrian mall. Walked past the halfway point and saw the reason for our afternoon sashay through city center. A fire had started in one of the hotels right along the train line. Apparently one fire truck and one C-train each thought they had the right of way at the one intersection. It was apparent it had just happened - the passengers from that train just being loaded on to shuttle buses and an ambulance pulling away. Remember Grasshopper, be thankful that you weren't on that train. If I had left as early as I had hoped, I likely would have been. Being thankful for being in one piece and being able to enjoy the fresh air and the walk was how I finished the journey to the designated platform for trains going in to the northeast part of the city. Managed to get on the first one of the detoured trains and landed up at home no more than 15 minutes later than usual. Added bonus was that taking the scenic route just that one street over I had beaten the bulk of the commuters and found that there was lots of space to stand rather than the sardine scenario that is a common feature of travel when an accident has occurred.
Odd day altogether but not a bad one when seen from a zen perspective. Om mane padme hum.
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