A Bad Week

So far, it hasn't been my best week ever.

I had the the horrendous bee sting on Sunday leading to three days of a benadryl and advil binge. Last night at a family member's confirmation, it was so warm in church that my already puffy arm swelled even more so that my fingers looked like fat sausages and I could barely move them. When I finally arrived home, I had to ice them to regain movement. Fortunately, today the swelling has gone down and my arm is just mildly itchy with a five inch red blotch surrounding the wound.

My work life this week is still unpleasant. For example, my supervisor was being crabby yesterday because she didn't tell me about a particular deadline when she asked me to set up a meeting, she simply said to set up the meeting. So when the meeting time was set too far out in time for her liking - because that's the only time everyone she wanted was available - she got mad, assuming I knew what she failed to tell me. Again, not that a deadline would have mattered because no one was available until the later date.

So I went back and tried to find an earlier time, letting everyone know about the deadline and how urgent the meeting was, but there was one hold-out who refused to accomodate the meeting. Annoyed when I told her, my supervisor asked if I told the hold-out that SoAndSo asked for the meeting (in hopes of forcing that hold-out to cave into my request)? No, because again, she failed to tell me that factiod and how am I supposed to assume that anyone other than her is requesting the meeting?

This is the curse of working for someone who fails to communicate essential items on a regular basis. So I'm forced most of the time to play 20 questions with her to figure out what she really needs. Apparently, yesterday I only asked 19 questions instead of 20 - my bad.

Again, this is a daily scenario with my supervisor. I don't recall ever telling her I am psychic. I'm a secretary trying to work my way through law school, not a mind-reader. She just assumes I'm stupid while I silently seethe and wish an unpleasant rash on her.

I found out she was annoyed with how I handled the meeting task because she was gossiping to my co-worker on the other side of the wall from me, of course making herself seem blameless. Yeah, discretion and confidentiality are not high on my supervisor's list. At least it was in a loud whisper meaning that she was pretending to be discreet? I could complain to my union about her, but that's just pointless and would make an already unpleasant work situation more hostile.

Instead, I count the days until I can find somewhere else to work. I know I shouldn't care about my job since it's just temporary until I finish my law degree, but it's so hard to ignore when I spend 40 hours a week there. I come home almost every night wishing I didn't have to go back to work there. Unfortunately, jobs are scarce where I live, so I hold on to what I have, hoping for something to change.

And finally, as icing on my already bad cake for the week, last night I was using the garbage disposal to dispose of used tea leaves when the disposal backed up. After a brief, gurgling sound, an explosion of dirty water splashed out over me, including a mixture of bleach and chemical household cleaner my husband had used on Sunday. Aside from the horrible ick factor, the mixture sprayed onto my face and across my favorite black shirt. Fortunately, I was able to close my eyes in time to prevent any real damage. My shirt was not so lucky and ended up in the garbage, streaked with cleaning chemicals, brown goo, and bleach. My husband's new t-shirt was also splattered when he came to assess the damage. He was not amused.

This happened at 10 pm, so needless to say, my husband was mightily annoyed at having to fix the drain. I still maintain it wasn't my fault, it was just a little bunch of tea leaves. But my husband thinks it's been backed up for a while and and the tea leaves were the final straw.

Is it Friday yet?