02:29 - 23.09.06
ecliptic
I meant to get some work on the geography section of my assignment done early this morning so I could cover off before I went out to play for the day. It was one of those days when each road block just hid another road block. One astrologer that I read from time to time responded to a question about similar circumstances by saying it meant the universe was trying to redirect you to another less challenging path. I suspect that there are times when that is correct and for one's highest good. Certain relationships that were blocked for me would be a good illustration. However, sometimes when one is about to make a breakthrough on some internal work one has done - like my archetype exercises - it often stirs up an inner resistance that is reflected in the outer world in some surprising ways. That was the sense I had about the morning although it didn't ease my frustration by thinking about it in that perspective.
First up was getting my young men off to their respective jobs. It had been one of those cold, windy, dreay nights followed by more of the same this morning. Neither of them wanted to budge at a week that had been dull and grey for a good part of the time. The problem is my home and resources are small. If they both got up at the same time the competition for access to each of their morning steps in prparation for leaving would be a barrier to a smooth start to the day. I try to make the first bit of their mornings as positive as I can you see. My eldest had fallen asleep on the bus the night before because he was so exhausted. The bus driver woke him just before leaving the community to head back to the bus barns. He was even too tired to eat. There hadn't been enough time in between then and wake up to recoup the sleep and lack of nourishment made it even harder for him to function. He thought maybe he was coming down with a cold or the flu too. My youngest worked his way around my oldest and was out the door first even though he had gotten up quite a bit later. I kept trying to get a bit of work in in between tasks to help them but it seemed I kept getting pulled away just as I got started each time. Bummer. Finally my eldest was at the door when he exclaimed in frustration. He couldn't find his wallet. We searched for well over half an hour as several busses came and went. He finally called in to his first job to let them know why he was going to be late. Bus pass and money in that wallet you see. I could have helped him in that aspect but he needed other bits in that wallet for the weekend at home with his children. I even called my youngest in transit to see if it had fallen into his backpack by mistake. I had had the two of their bags side by side while I was preparing and packing their lunches you see. No go. Finally found it in one of the bathrooms. It had fallen out of his pants. Part of the newspaper had been shifted over it just enough to hide it without having any visible outline. Just a half an hour late but frustrated with the start to the day - both of us losing time we needed for other things.
Opened my email and started reading through them. Finally got to the elections account. I leave that to last so that I can enjoy the ones I read from news outlets and friends first. Good thing. Another email from the finance people. Now they were claiming that they had just received another single piece of paper they were missing that hadn't been recorded as lost in all this exercise. Appears the local rep chose to hold that one back for their own purposes. Meant my bank balance is still in trouble. I called the person who looks after that paperwork just to plead that they expedite my pay. After all I had done my part of the job and no one had advised me anything was amiss with that piece of paper. She is one of the people at headquarters that I really like. When she advised me she still didn't have that piece of paper that this mornings email stated had just been received, I lost it a bit. She said that she could not authorize payment of my fees to me until she actually had it in her hands. I told her about the email I had received this morning but she said that she actually had to see the paper herself. She checked all the folders that are supposed to contain my work and still could not locate that item anywhere despite the morning's acknowledgement. The frustration levels were really building now. She promised me that if I would fax a copy directly to her she would expedite the approval this morning. That was fair on her part but it still meant that I could be waiting for the payment for the June work for another three to six weeks through no fault of my own. I sent it off and received an email from her acknowledging receipt.
Next I asked one of the other support people for the name of the person in finance who could respond to some of my questions. According to that person there was no way they could speed up the processing of my fees even though they acknowledged that it was their error. By that point I was in tears of frustration and it was obvious in my voice as well. She said she would have the head of her section call me immediately after she talked with him because I asked if I could have an advance on the fees for the assignment I am working on now since if this happened again - the local rep withholding some of my documents - ther was the possibility that I would see no other payment until next year. That made me very upset and it is a good possibility because the head office staff cannot process my paperwork until the local rep signs off on it first. I commented that what was being done felt like harrassment at times. I also pointed out that by laws here that when an agreement to pay wages is set the employer must meet those terms regardless. They were in breach of the labour laws and that was acknowledged too. I don't really want to get into a legal tussle because that benefits no one but I do have the right to expect to be paid by deadline. She just said it was out of her level of authority and that her boss would call me later.
The problem of course now was that I had lost all the time I had set aside to work on the current assignment while trying to negotiate tht bureaucratic wasteland. In addition, the trip I had planned to city hall to pick up some more data was now on hold until the boss called back. I only had a couple of hours to play with before my next commitment came into play meaning I would not be able to make that downtown journey. My Dad called and offered to pick me up for the afternoon engagement with him and his neighbour. That took some of the pressure off. Next up the tech company that is responsible for the Elections Canada computer called to get the specs for the broken mouse that I've been working with the past few months. After that last gig with the hard drive just as the last election was called I didn't really want to deal with them again but the mouse was pretty much inoperable the past few days. Gave him all the serial numbers he requested - after crawling on my hands and knees to find the minuscule numbers in bizarre places on the machine. That new mouse actually arrived at the end of today. Much better than last go round right?
Decided to have a nap while waiting for the boss to call so that I would have a chance at being calmer with him when we spoke. Threw in a load of laundry first then cuddled with the cats. They were feeling very sorry for their mom by that time. The phone didn't ring again fo about two hours so I guess I made a good choice there. I was still really upset because he restated that they would not expedite my pay from the June work nor could they provide an advance for this current assignment so that I don't have to worry about cash flow until next calendar year. That was evident by my voice and I could tell he was feeling very tense about talking to me when I was obviously upset. He acknowledged up front again that they all knew I had held up my end of the contract and that I wasn't in error, but it is still just me that is being penalized for it. No bending at all there. He said a good part of his problem was that he didn't have anywhere near the staff he needed to look after all the paperwork being submitted from all the electoral districts in Canada and I can empathize with that. I asked him who I should write to to support his request for more funds, just pointing out that as a team we need to help each other. I don't think he wanted to give me a name because it might rock his boat with his bosses in the wrong direction. As I've noted before dear diary, they have proven themselves to be quite unreasonable and punitive. The head brags about how tight a fiscal ship he runs but it is at the expense of my mortgage payment, thank you very much, and I really resent it. Don't know who gets my letters of protest yet but someone surely will - and soon.
I finished off that conversation with minutes to spare until my Dad arrived. Jumped in and out of the shower and scrubbed some of the stress away by washing my hair. "Gonna wash that man right out of my Hair" - South Pacific, that stage play was on the tv a week ago and it was very well done. Lucky you can't hear me singing Bali Hai dear diary. Even the cats are leaving the room.Was just pulling on my runners when my Dad arrived. Ms Snowy did not want me to leave. She kept trying to trip me so I wouldn't answer the door. Hmmm. The afternoon was quite pleasant and I'm glad I foolwed through with those plans instead of staying home to catch up on the lost time working on that assignment this morning. Quite frankly my morale is so low right now I am really finding it difficult to care about enough to do anything on it. Generally the demographic work is my favorite activity so that should tell you how upset I am.
The reason for the afternoon get together was to help the two of them with different tasks they wanted to learn to do on their computers. Worked with my Dad on his first. He was thrilled to see the email from our family member in Australia. That cousin had sent a few guy to guy jokes as well and my Dad enjoyed those too. Then I showed him how to use the links I sent him so he could search for a used motorhome. He loves cars and recreational vehicles so he was really excited about that too. Next up I had sent him some links to some of the music videos he would enjoy on youtube so he could gain some skills without realizing he was doing that. Teaching should be as enjoyable for the student as one can make it - right?
His neighbour works as an intensive care nurse. She is required to take some on-line courses for her work and wasn't certain she was ready for that skill level. First up she had just had high speed provided to her terminal. It hadn't been properly authenticated or set up so that was the first line of business. Next up came resetablishing her email account on her new to her PC - the old one being decommissioned because it couldn't support the software for the mandatory course. Then came re-installing and up-loading the software from her old computer to the new unit. Discovered in the process that something was amiss with her printer. Finally called the support line. They guessed that the pump for the ink was the issue so that will have to be dealt with at their service depot. Sigh. Typical day in computer land but it meant that some actual practice with the office suite she needs to learn to operate didn't get fit into the afternoon. I did show her how to find the tutorials for them on-line so she was pleased with that.
By that time it was late in the afternoon and she and my Dad wanted to take me out for supper for helping them. My Dad's neighbour handed me some of her extra Christmas decorations and some really nice office type clothes that don't fit her daughter-in-law any more so I felt I had already been well paid. The opportunity just to spend that much one on one time with them was actually the best part of the deal. We went to pick up her dog first from the hair clipping place and spent a few minutes talking with the son and daughter in laws cats as well. Apparently her dog and those felines aren't on speaking terms yet. However at that point her puppy just wanted to eat then curl up in his basket so it was a moot point.
We left him settling in and headed off to the seafood rstaurant my Dad likes. That post ecliptic pattern of frustration ramped up again. It was Friday night and all the restaurants were busy of course. The greeter gave us an electronic pager since the wait was estimated to be a half hour. The lobby is very small so patrons are encouraged to go back outside to wait until their page. We sat in the car and chatted about things metaphysical. I started with my ghost story from the election then we swapped experiences we had had or observed with patients in the hospital. That drifted into talk about psychics and tarot cards and other paraphenalia. Astrology was next and then the half hour was up. We returned to the lobby and waited as we watched other clients who had arrived around the same time as us being seated. Then people who arrived arrived after us were being called. I finally went up to the greeter who had gone through nearly half a page of other people who arrived after us to find out what was up with that. She staed that we had been paged but that the pagers don't work if one is outside. Well then why had we been directed to wait outside. No answer to that but she stated she would seat us next. Three other parties of diners were called up after that before I talked with her again. "Oh I forgot all about you". At that point I would have happily gone home but my Dad and his neighbour were really hungry. In addition my Dad being diabetic meant he was at the point where he really couldn't wait much longer. I stood in direct line of sight with the greeter so she couldn't overlook us again and we were finally seated over an hour after we arrived. The food was good once it was served and conversation was interesting as we swapped stories about past travels and family times we each had had. Sort of a getting to know you conversation. Didn't step back in to my house until 9:30 in the pm. My youngest and the cats were waiting. My youngest had bought me treats and had been waiting for me to arrive so he could hand them over before crawling into his bed. The cats were of the opinion that since our regular nap had been missed that I should head directly to bed so that they had their pillow - me - to complete their somnambulic bliss. Lately Ms Kitty has taken to laying on her back, all four legs straight up in the air with paws bent is artistic but weird poses, deeply asleep. Not even rubbing her belly recalls her from the dimension in which she travels in theta brain sleep. Lucky girl. Don't think I'll try that sleeping position but it is time to crawl into bed since I did get some more of that assignment completed and sent off. Good thing I can still did up some reserves of self discipline - means I can sleep more soundly. Right dear diary? Good Night.
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