Wednesday, August 19, 2009

 

Must Cut the Crap

oh wait... here it is.... the lost blog... read on at own risk.... or just read the prior entry titled off the deep end.

This morning I went off the deep end. I think I'm happy there. That can't be good, can it? The staffing in my department was cut this summer and then 3 weeks ago my supervisor went on Family Medical Leave. It's killing me. I think it would have killed me already except I had 3 excellent grad student workers assisting me. Only 2 of 'em left me this week so I'm down to 1 in the afternoons. I swear if one more person walks in and says to me... it seems quiet. I'm going to hand them one of my many research requests and say... I need this ASAP because so and so needs this ASAP. Thanks. The requests have been coming in about 2 an hour. That is also killing me. THEN on top of that we got in 2 new collections. One has 17 boxes, the other 8. Did either person think to give us a ring and say, "hey I'm sending something your way." Nope! I called one person back giving her the benefit of the doubt that she had tried to call my supervisor, who of course is out. She didn't call...what she said was, "oh in the future should I let you know first?" Excuse me but, "Duh!" Oh Oh, then I went over to the President's house. (he's a good man) and he wanted to know who the portrait was of hanging in his house. Yeah, I had no clue. Why did I have no idea, because I wasn't privy to that information when it left. Thanks boss... nothing like seeming stupid in front of the President.



I decided to do an Internet research on the drug I'm taking because seriously... something is just not right. It turns out my drug causes depression, weight gain, exhaustion, mood swings, (something you don't want to know), and hair loss. Out of those 6 side effects... I've got 5. So, at least I have something to blame everything on... Drugs! I'm back to my Rock, Paper, Scissors game. I guess I can stay on this drug, try something else that totally freaks me out, or go back to my old drug. If I go back to the old drug I guess that means I'll be going back to living a fourth of my life with a migraine. Right now, that seems the better option. But, I think that might just be because I've not been having as many migraines as I did before. I'm not happy with these options. It doesn't seem fair... but what I've learned over the last month or so is that what I want doesn't matter. I really knew that before... I'm just grumpier about it now.



Clearly, I'm having a bad week/month.



Anyway, this morning I went off the deep end. I came very close to just walking out. I think God must have somehow stopped me... I need my job. It's just a little overwhelming right now, not enough staff, no money for supplies, and stuff is coming in faster and faster and dirtier and dirtier... I don't know what I'll do if I get one more box of rat poop. I swear I might be the first archivist to lay down the law on what kind of condition I will accept people's life work in. Please people, take some pride!



S0 back to this morning... I had a patron in the collection who knew absolutely nothing about how to do research and 2 more ASAP research requests. As I roamed the closed stacks digging through stacks of crap... (and I mean that literally sometimes) I lost it. But, then after about 30 mins of craziness I think I came up with a plan. CLEAN UP THE CRAP! I wonder if my supervisor will be good with that when she gets back... I know, you'd think who wouldn't be?... but there are circumstances here that might be beyond my control so it sounds more doable than it might be. At the very least, it sort of feels good to have a plan. I've already got my lone student assistant left working on some of it. And, when I get another... guess what he is going to be doing. Long term projects are stopping and we are all going to be cleaning up the crap.... otherwise I think I'm doomed to eventually end up under my desk nonverbal... but then that could happen with or without the crap...it's sort of a toss up now.



OH OH but I must share this with you cause this sort of fits me right now... and my ability to do customer service. (only his attitude might be a little better) It's from a BBC show called Black Books and I'm loving it.

Comments:
oh sweetie! I hope it gets better - it's good to clean out the crap. Seriously. That is a good move.

I saw the first season of Black Books!
 
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