Getting Cleared for Take Off.....

Well, let me just sit down and catch my breath!! I finally got a real job offer!! A whole 2 months after applying via the Internet for this Word Processing job at a well-known law college here, they sent me a letter saying they wanted to interview me. Well, whaddya know. Maybe the revisions on my resume are finally doing some good, after all.
Had to fill out numerous forms, etc. and went for the interview. I felt I did well, but then you never know at the time. A whole 2 weeks passed with no news, which had me sitting on the edge of my seat. But just last week they called to make me a permanent job offer!
Well, I know I should be jumping up and down, but for some reason, I am feeling sort of ambivalent about it right now. It's not as much pay as I wanted to get, but then they have excellent benefits, which I sorely need. But what choices do I have at this point! It's just that schools and educational facilities do not pay as much as the private sector law firms. But it's probably also because I have been looking for work for so long, that I won't believe it til I turn up for work there.
Today, I received MORE paperwork from them and instructions to go get FINGERPRINTED!! Does 'Juan Lopez', the illegal immigrant have to go through this much scrutiny??!! God, forbid, my fingerprints are on file for some reason! Next thing, they'll probably have me going through a strip search on COPS.....!
So tomorrow, I have to run down on my lunch hour (another 'peaceful' lunch hour down the drain..) and go get fingerprinted!
Hmmmm... I wonder if my sliced finger will fingerprint well.....?!

Is This Supposed to Be Survivor Island???

Today was my trial by fire at work. I either completely proved myself or completey flunked. I arrived at work to find out that I was going to be there alone today! No support help! Achhhh! And I am only a TEMP!! The other TEMP was taking a vacation (yes, a vacation!... I didn't know temps got vacations!??) and the guy I am temping for in the first place who just got back from a 3 week trip to Europe, decides UNEXPECTEDLY to take ANOTHER day off!!
Ok, day started fine, but by 11:00 it was already going completely haywire! Wouldn't you know it, but today of all days, when I was trying to hold the fort down by myself, all sorts of multiple worse-case scenario RUSH jobs came in!
Attorney #1: "I need this in 3 minutes!"
Me: "Well, I'm working on another rush right now, but will start your job asap."
Attorney #1: "Um, that won't work as we need to get this filing in"..
Me: "Well, let me see what I can do"... (huge Excedrin headache starting to pound behind my eyeballs)...
Attorney #2: "Can you print out 50 copies of this PDF ... and oh, by the way, convert it from Wordperfect to Word ... and oh yes, can you put it on pleading paper and line it up - I need this ASAP"....
Me: "No problem!" (Excedrin headache now morphing into Migraine)
Paralegal: "Can you scan this 100 page document and edit it for Mr. Borsini?.. and, oh did I mention, it's a rush?!".... (Now have a full blown brain aneurism!).
It was by then about 1:30 pm, and taking a lunch was beginning to seem like a pipedream... Someone walked past my cubicle with a limp turkey sandwich, and I had visions of leaping over the partition and pretending to fall on it, just so I could maybe glean a few crumbs to put into my mouth!
I was finally able to take a brief break at 2:35, and even then I felt guilty for leaving my post! Then to make matters more complicated today, I HAD to rush home during my lunch 'hour' as my paycheck didn't arrive in the mail yesterday as it should have, and I HAD to get it in the bank today or I'd go overdrawn!! So I dashed out and grabbed a cab to go up to my apartment. Ran up to the mailbox, found the check and instructed the cab driver to head downtown as I also HAD to go back to the doctor's office for a check-up of my sliced up finger! Figured if I took the cab, I'd make it all within an hour. WRONG. On the way from my apartment to the doctor's office, the cab runs into Friday gridlock traffic in downtown San Francisco!! As we sit there stuck in traffic, the meter is going up and up.... At $8, I decide to get out and walk the rest of the 4 blocks!!
Huff and puff my way there. Now, I am not a fast walker as I have completely flat feet, and pounding them on the cement pavement can be excruciating, no matter what shoes I am wearing. But I did my best imitation of a power walk and made it to the doctor's office in pretty good time. They told me earlier in the day just to 'DROP IN... NO PROBLEMO". Well, that's what I did, but then found an assortment of injured people in line ahead of me. Really considered leaving as it's just a cut finger, after all! It's not like I had my throat cut, even though at that point in the day I was so exhausted and stressed that I almost felt I was kneeling blindfolded in front of the Islamic terrorists with the rusty knife in their hands!
Finally, my turn to go into see the doctor. I expect her to put some Betadine or solution on my deep wound and re-bandage me. But she takes the bandage off, and the only comment out of her mouth is "I like your green top" before informing me that I was free to go...! I say, "Wait a minute... aren't you going to bandage me?".... I mean, yeah, let's just send this patient back to work to POUND on the keyboard with a gaping sliced index finger.....!! HELLO??? I mean, are they low on bandaids or something??
There was no bus directly back to work, and I didn't have any more money for a cab, so had to hoof another 8 blocks back to the office! By now, my flat shoes and my flat feet felt like they had BECOME the cement. To irritate things even worse, my shoes were now stretching and flip flopping off my heel! I HATE when that happens! Almost as bad as wet socks!!!
But before I went back up to the office, I HAD to find something to eat! I STILL had not had a thing to eat all day, and was feeling like I would have to make a Michael Jackson-like hospital pit stop for weakness or a blood transfusion!! I dropped into this sandwich place and placed an order for a shrimp salad on rye. "Lady, we are out of rye and shrimp salad" ... Oh geez. Ok, skip it. Dropped in at Walgreens and picked up a pre-made wrapped up tuna sandwich, which by this time of the day, was already limp. Then another pit stop was made to feed my paycheck to the Bank God.
And, of course, when I finally returned to work, there was all sorts of new and exciting mental challenges awaiting me at my desk! Some of these attorneys can be really demanding and not very friendly. They consider us people in the Word Processing department as some sort of common variety garden slug. We are just minions, peons, and slaves, only living and breathing to bow down to their commands. After all, THEY went to LAW SCHOOL! Well, LA DE DAH!! What I go through for my measly little salary! I thought 6:00 would never come!
But it did, and TGIF, as now I'm sitting here into my 3rd glass of my own version of Jesus Juice, my Ballatore!!

THE REVENGE OF ATKINS!! A Pill Isn't the Only Thing I Cut in Half!

Monday morning, back to work, after a lovely weekend attending a country wedding in the wine country. Get into work and discover that there are lots of free bagels in the kitchen at work. I hesitate, standing over the assorted variety of bagels, as I know I shouldn't have them, as I'm trying to stick to the Atkins low carb diet.... However, just the thought of masticating those chewy, yummy cream-cheese-spread round things totally breaks down my will power, and I choose a plump blueberry bagel out of the lot. Pick up a huge serrated knife and proceed to slice the bagel in half.... But in a flash, the bagel turns bright red as I slice MY FINGER instead of the bagel!!
I drop the knife and run to the sink to put my finger under cold water. Blood is gushing everywhere! I try to be indiscreet as I don't want to sound the biohazard alarm! But the blood is coming out faster than it is rinsing away! Someone walks in and sees me. Oh dear. They run to the fridge and proceed to get out an ice cube. Then someone else comes in and proceeds to find the first aid kit. Meanwhile, in the confusion, the knife is left sitting on the table next to the bagels!! Someone finds the first aid kit, and discovers it only has one gauze packet in there and several standard bandaids. I wrap my left index finger with gauze and paper towels with the ice cube on the cut. By the time I get back to my desk, the paper towels are soaked with my blood. The gash is quite deep, and now I'm worried I might actually need stitches. And of course I'm wearing white pants today, so already I have blood stains on my pants and jacket! My co-worker Connie comes over to my desk and tries to help by bringing me more paper towels and bandaids. But everyone is concerned and suggests I call my agency to report an on-the-job injury. I tend to think they are making a bigger deal out of this than need be, but decide to follow their suggestion. My agency and my supervisor then suggest since it's a work-related injury and I have workers' comp, that I go with my agency manager to a nearby clinic! God almighty, I just cut my finger, for pete's sake! Anyway, the agency manager, Joseph, rushes over to our building, meets up with me and takes me by cab to this clinic! Was rushed in like a traffic accident patient and tended to immediately! They soaked my poor little red finger in Betadine and determined it did NOT, thank goodness, need stitches. They just treated it and then 'GLUED' the cut together (yes, glued it!), and put a bandage on it. Took my blood pressure, temperature and gave me a tetanus shot, and then was released to go back to the office! Just then I realized that the bloody KNIFE was still sitting by the bagels!!! Oy vey, and it's only MONDAY!!

Now, I need a pill for the pain, but do I dare get out another pill and try to cut it in half!!!!???

I FOUND THE PILL!

Here it is a slow Friday afternoon. The early shift gal has already left for the day, and the evening shift lady has not come in yet. I am the in-between shift! No one around and all quiet on the western front.... So I decided to have another go at finding that half a pill that disappeared last week under my desk.
Dived under my desk and this time took a 'tool'... a RULER! I slid it under all the cabinets and desk areas, and lo and behold, within 10 minutes, out came the yellow half pill!! HOORAY. Small victories can make a day.
As I sit here, I ponder how many other mini stories are going on at the other office cubicles of life... Little vignettes of life that no one shares for fear they will be laughed at. I'm sure I can't be the only one with such crazy everyday stories.

Never Cut a Pill in Half at Your Desk......

This is absolutely insane. I have been suffering from really bad headaches all this week, so this afternoon at my desk, I take out one of my cherished last few remaining Vicodin pills that I save for REALLY bad pain, and decide to cut it in half. I want my headache to go away, but I didn't want to fall asleep or zonk out here on the job.

So I dig in this guy's drawers (No, no!!! Not THOSE drawers!!!!!), and find a reasonable shaped tool (No, no!!!! And not THAT tool!!!) to do the job. I clear an area of my desk and prepare for the pill for surgery. The make-do tool cut it in half perfectly.... EXCEPT...... ONE HALF OF MY PILL FLEW OFF SOMEWHERE, AND I NOW CAN'T FIND IT!!! ACHHHHHH!! It's a good thing I'm not real busy right now... I crawled under the desk and proceeded to hunt down the chopped yellow half of the pill. Well, you wouldn't believe the commotion I created, and I am absolutely surprised that no one even noticed the noise and me fumbling around! The paralegal guy across the aisle from my cubicle is so deep into his paperwork, he never even looked up, thank god! You would have thought that I was hunting down the Hope Diamond. I thought I'd easily find it on the floor, as I could swear it shot down there. But no.

So, then came the next step of foraging through the garbage can which was nearby... geez. There I was crouched down behind my cubicle on the floor, taking everything out of the garbage can to look for it! Made my way through a stale half hot dog, mustard packets with semi-dried mustard on them, coffee-stained paper napkins, and numerous straw covers, all to no avail. Ok, maybe it BOUNCED into my handbag, I ponder. Now I am behind my desk removing everything from my humongous black handbag to dig for the half-pill at the bottom of the bag. No go. Did it FLY OVER the partition, maybe? I walk around the other side of partition, trying to look casual and ready with an excuse of "oh, I'm looking for my pen" if someone decides to ask me what I'm looking for. Well, not there, so let's try under and around the phone, the computer monitor, inside the keyboard, and under the computer speakers. STILL NO PILL. Ok, now I become somewhat obsessed. I glance over at the paperclip container.... oh geez, I wonder, could it have JUMPED in there??? And, yes, I do proceed to empty all the paper clips out of the little box to check!!! Does this make me a junkie??? Am I having severe withdrawal symptoms!??? I have even checked the scotch tape holder! Where in the hell did that yellow pill go??!!! Have you ever looked for something til you are blue in the face and still can't find it?!? One last thought..... "maybe it LEAPT into my Coke (No, no!! Not THAT kind of Coke!!!!)"...... I was now at such an insane stage that I actually stuck my hand down into the Coke to feel for the pill!! Now, I am sitting here with a sticky hand and still glancing on the floor, trying to imagine where the hell it went. The ramifications of losing that half a pill has now become a worse condition that the headache I had to start with!! I even checked my hair, thinking it could have RICOCHETED off the cubicle wall back onto my head!! Now, I have the pill doing GYMNASTICS, for god's sake! I need more than Vicodin. I need a straight jacket and Prozac!!