bah frickin' humbug
Dec. 15th, 2013 11:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
violetcheetahLet me start by saying that I realize that having too much work is an awesome problem to have. I like money. I like that, depending on exactly how much dental work I need and how much of the expense will be paid by my insurance, I am likely to break even for the year, even after having spent the first half of the year working not-quite-full-time for 9 bucks an hour. Also, by and large, I like my job. I like the people I work with regularly, and I have a supervisor who doesn't treat us like either idiots or lazy jerks who will only work if she stands over our shoulders every five minutes; neither of those are true in all parts of the Boston mail processing plant, and I am lucky. However:
Sometime in October, us newbies — "Postal Support Employees," who are in a limbo between temp/contract workers and fully vested lifetime workers — went from a six-day week in which 4 days were 6 hours and thus we worked 40 hours, to six 8-hour days. It was supposed to be for two or three weeks as they tested a new mail-sort scheme or something. Sometime around the week before Thanksgiving, it became informally clear that this schedule would continue through the Christmas rush. I was "lucky" this week to have a dental appointment that I ended up just taking the day off for, so not only did I have two days off, but they were two days in a ROW! Tuesday and Wednesday.
Well, now the rush is even rushier. I've worked 10-hour days Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and will do the same today. Monday will be a 12-hour day. After that, except for Wednesday — my day off on which I have another dentist appointment — I don't know yet if the remaining days before Christmas will be 10 or 12 hours.
My cat, Butler, died Wednesday morning. I've had him for almost 13 years. I've been too busy to mourn. Until I'm too tired to keep moving, at which point exhaustion and grief create a perfect storm of stinging rawness, and I drown for a while.
Chess, who I've also had for 13 years, had a malignant spot removed from her chin a few weeks ago. She had another lump, but it was smooth at the time and also not in a place that the vet felt would heal easily, and the cancer had pretty much definitely spread, anyway, so chances were good that one of the other two little spots would turn problematic, anyway. That other lump is now indented in the middle, which was what the first lump did before it got raw and angry; this lump already feels a little raw, though it doesn't seem to bug her. So at some point soon, I need to take her into the vet, who will give her a steroid injection to keep the cancer at bay, for a while. I'd like to do it sooner rather than later. Wednesday is my one day off, and I have a dentist appointment. I may be asking my friend to swap telecommute days so she can drive me there on Wednesday morning. It's either that or wait at least another week.
Anyway, that's my holiday season.
Sometime in October, us newbies — "Postal Support Employees," who are in a limbo between temp/contract workers and fully vested lifetime workers — went from a six-day week in which 4 days were 6 hours and thus we worked 40 hours, to six 8-hour days. It was supposed to be for two or three weeks as they tested a new mail-sort scheme or something. Sometime around the week before Thanksgiving, it became informally clear that this schedule would continue through the Christmas rush. I was "lucky" this week to have a dental appointment that I ended up just taking the day off for, so not only did I have two days off, but they were two days in a ROW! Tuesday and Wednesday.
Well, now the rush is even rushier. I've worked 10-hour days Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and will do the same today. Monday will be a 12-hour day. After that, except for Wednesday — my day off on which I have another dentist appointment — I don't know yet if the remaining days before Christmas will be 10 or 12 hours.
My cat, Butler, died Wednesday morning. I've had him for almost 13 years. I've been too busy to mourn. Until I'm too tired to keep moving, at which point exhaustion and grief create a perfect storm of stinging rawness, and I drown for a while.
Chess, who I've also had for 13 years, had a malignant spot removed from her chin a few weeks ago. She had another lump, but it was smooth at the time and also not in a place that the vet felt would heal easily, and the cancer had pretty much definitely spread, anyway, so chances were good that one of the other two little spots would turn problematic, anyway. That other lump is now indented in the middle, which was what the first lump did before it got raw and angry; this lump already feels a little raw, though it doesn't seem to bug her. So at some point soon, I need to take her into the vet, who will give her a steroid injection to keep the cancer at bay, for a while. I'd like to do it sooner rather than later. Wednesday is my one day off, and I have a dentist appointment. I may be asking my friend to swap telecommute days so she can drive me there on Wednesday morning. It's either that or wait at least another week.
Anyway, that's my holiday season.
