23:07 - 29.07.05
Grumbles
The day started off strange and just kept on that way again. This time I was standing at the bus stop, trying to locate my bus pass while chatting with one of my co-travellers. Looked up just in time to see what appeared to be a gypsy caravan. Those brilliant primary colours, you see, over a structure about the size of a small trailer. Turned out it was a motorcycle. Uh huh. Base colour was cherry red with gold flashing everywhere. The male driver was all in black leather. All I could think of was the question of how he kept that huge contraption upright. The fins flaring out along the back would create serious wind shear, I think. They were double or triple the size of the ones on the old '50's chevys - the cars that is. Maybe it was all aluminum or titanium or something. Travel talk was about work ethics. Both of us could be described as "type a" people I guess. You can fill in the blanks at this point or read the story of the grasshopper and the ant.
Yesterday, when one of the other techs was checking the cabling to my partition, he said to pretend he wasn't there. I asked him if he was like Fred, our local ghost - mischievious. He took me aback a bit when he looked at me out of the corner of his eye, then back at the cabling muttering "Oh yes we are aware of Fred and his actions". Hmmmmmmm.
When I arrivd at work I had a headache today, but not of the migraine variety. Wore my ball cap anyway. That protected me from it becoming any worse. The morning was a blur until just before lunch. I had taken a very short bio break and was returning to my desk. There were two people - one of each gender - bending over my work area moving things around when I returned. As I approached, the male told the female to unplug my still logged in computer. I had locked the account, but not powered off, because I knew I wasn't going to be gone long. The male realized that he had over stepped his authority by a long shot, I think, by the look on my face. No computer tech worth their wages unplugs a unit that hasn't been logged out, unless there is no other choice. This guy hadn't even been there two minutes. It wasn't as though there had been any advanced warning of their arrival either, so there was no way I could have prepared for them. I asked him to explain his presence and the authority he had to touch my computer, since I knew he wasn't part of the tech staff working for the company I am assigned to. He said he was part of the moving company. His responsibility was to complete the last of the set up of the cabling supports for our technology. He was also supposed to reconnect my telephone. When the movers had worked on it the other day, they had realized that my telephone line had been split or spliced to someone else's line. Guess who? The perfumed co-worker's of course. When the in house specialist had been by to work that out, she looked quite disturbed by her findings, but wouldn't discuss them with me. She left very quickly.
Anyway, I went to speak to the second in command about the male tech who had been about to crash my account. There were several other computers to attend and I was worried he would do the same elsewhere, as he had to me if no one was present. The second in command came by and asked about it, but he denied having tried it on my unit. He had called his supervisor in the meantime and asked for the in house specialist to open the phone room for access, stating he didn't want to overstep his bounds. Right.
As the second in command was talking with him, the department supervisor walked in and started talking to her. I was still watching the male and his actions around my desk. He still hadn't moved away from my workspace nd I could see that he was trying to touch something there. I should have acknowledged the department head, but I was more worried about what might happen to the material sitting on my desk if I looked away. Dilemma. Bad manners or loss of critical data?
I decided I needed a walk at noon to stop the jangling of the nerve endings and to clear my head. Walked up Centre Street bridge, then across and down the escarpment, through Prince's Isand park. Nice 45 minute jaunt wearing my .50 cent new-to-me, but second hand, sandals - those rockports. My feet felt really good. I think the shape of the sandal encourages the feet to build up both strength and shape. After having carried six babies, my feet have flattened a bit. I want my nice high, dainty arch back,thank you very much. Makes the curves of the calf of the leg so much more aesthetic, don't you know.
Afternoon was full of political games being played out. No juice in my headphones meant I picked up on more than usual. The ally of the perfumed co-worker doesn't like client service. She feels she has enough work without it. Can't say one way or another, but the whole point of a records center is to ensure the staff - usually very expensive staff - have timely access to the data they need. There was such a blow up between her and one of those people a couple of days ago, that even with my headphones on full blast, I could still hear the showdown. It ran on over several hours. That staffer emailed her supervisor, our supervisor and cc'd others, I guess, about her frustrations. The ally tried to manipulate her supervisor into the middle of the fray yesterday both directly and through the perfumed coworker. The supervisor didn't bite though. Just made the ally apologize by email and clarify what procedures had been taken that perhaps the staffer hadn't been aware of.
When the ally's supervisor left for the day today and for some holiday/sick leave time, the loud supervisor was at the ally's desk before the elevator doors had shut. The two of them were discussing the issue -beating up on the other supervisor - the ally's supervisor.
Next up around 3 PM another staff member arrived asking for some regulatory decisions made about property now owned by this company. Those documents were several decades old, but still inforce with amendments. They are not yet online anywhere. My supervisor has asked me not to do client service, because of the pressure from Texas to get my own project done. I went to the second in command to ask for help for the staffer. The second in command went through several steps just to come back to where I had directed the young woman in the first place. The data she needed is material I am very familiar with. After the staffer left, she turned to me and stated that the reason it took so long, was that the staffer had no idea what she was looking for. Indeed - sounded fairly knowledgeable to me. Truth was all that data should be sitting in another class of records on the floor. The ones that are supposed to contain every regulatory order for those properties. Apparently the thought of checking those hadn't arisen. I noted as well there were archived copies of that data in the offsite material I am working with. Hmm. Hard to do one's job if one can't be assured that they can have access to key documents. Why not just say you're not certain, but will get the material to the person as soon as it has been located? Don't blame that person. Anyway maybe it was just that I was cranky at that point anyway. Time for a nap now. Things will be better next week. Right?
�
�
