Back at Work

I am back at work today, but there was a light at the end of the rainbow - I only have to work today and then it's the weekend!

Work

Levi came to work this afternoon, actually this evening.  It was one of those really long days that you just wish was over from the beginning.  Anyway, I had to take a bunch of photos of supporting a cough for a kid (a 6 year old to be precise) in a wheelchair.  So I brought Levi in to be that child in the photos.  He was great and did everything that I could ask of him! 

Levi loves helping out!  He had wanted to go to Sizzler tonight anyway and I had agreed.  Initially it was only He and I and Pam but eventually was most of the office.  I have the greatest office on earth!  It has been a bad week for many people fielding tough phone calls and hard stuff happening at home, but everyone is great to each other.  This dinner was another way to care.  We didn't talk about work at all.  We talked about food and life and anything except work and I think everyone went home feeling much better!  Levi is absolutely doted on by everyone. 

The other classic now is that we all tease Pam incessantly about her new baby.  She is tolerant but is quietly loving the attention that we all give her.  She will have a big support system in March when the baby is born.

I am trying to decide if I will do my Masters at the moment.  I have a project that I want to work on and perhaps the easiest way to do that is with the support of the University, but I am not sure that I am prepared for the deadlines and requirements that go along with it.  I am really sure that I am not prepared for the stats that go along with it as well.  I have to spend the next couple of days thinking hard about that decision.

Frustration

I am frustrated at work.  I am frustrated because I can't get stuff done.  Now it's not because I can't concentrate and it's not because I'm sick or tired.  What I am is sick and tired of the computers.  Our head office continually assures us that the computers are being fixed or that they are increasing the bandwidth, but frankly there has been no change.  The computers take 15 - 20 minutes to open a document and if you try to save a document, it slows down all the computers in the office, enough that we have taken to calling out "I'm about to save" prior to pressing the button.  It breaks your concentration and destroys any ability to work.  That is why I am frustrated.  Thank God for the iphone!  If it gets too frustrating we all challenge each other to a game of Boggle.  I love that game!

Jane is coming back to Australia.  I had predicted 3 months of the 2 year contract, but we only got to 2 months.  I have no idea how much money this is going to cost us.  I haven't been allowed to look at the contract but imagine that the exit clause is huge.  I have no idea what the next step is.  I have no idea what happened there and what the truth is, but I am hoping that we don't have to do this experiment again.  I think that Jane won't cope with it emotionally and we won't cope with it financially.  It is hard to have that kind of drain.  I feel sorry for Jo too.

The fun part of life continues as well.  Robert and I are working out the nitty gritty about the trip to USA, there are some fun parties coming up and we are getting organized to take Levi to a Powderfinger concert before that is just not possible anymore

Another day, another dollar

Today was a normal enough day. I went to work. Levi went to Vacation care. He and I talked about camping next to the creek at our house when it gets dry enough. That quickly translated to 'Friday night' to his ears and now I think we will be camping by the creek tomorrow night come heel or high water, but of those two it's the latter that I am more concerned about. Not really though. It hasn't rained that much, just enough to be a little annoying and making the clean up part of camping harder.

Levi can't wait. He is very excited and collapsed into tears this afternoon when he thought that I forgot. I had just misunderstood what he was asking. I think that most of the crying was fatigue. It would be a perfect thing for money to suddenly appear and for me to not have to work over his vacations, but that is just not reality for either of us. Next holiday is only a term away and that is the big one. We will have all sorts of time to relax then, when we have a whole 5 some weeks. We are definitely counting the days.

Work has been really interesting lately. Our computers are failing and the wait time to open documents is about 5 minutes, to save documents about 10 - 15 minutes and to start the computer itself has been from 30 mins to not opening at all. It means that there is a lot of down time, when you can't really start something else, but also you can't do anything. It degenerates fairly quickly into practical jokes and shooting Nerf guns at each other. In the same way that my Mother reported from every single Parent - Teacher night; "Sue knows exactly where the line is and doesn't step over it"; I am now concerned as we push closer to that line. I think that I am starting to step back again from that edge. I hope that the rest of my team are old enough and smart enough to start to take that step back as well. I also hope that the computers start to respond again, making stepping over the line much less likely.

Day Off??

Levi in the pool

Today I had a day off. Well it was supposed to be a day off. Then I had to go to work to do a media thing for the Shark Bait Kids. I don't mind doing it, but it means that Levi came with me. So he got to play in the pool while they were taking photos of the other kids. Also he could help entertain one of the little sisters, or more likely she could entertain him. The whole thing was at the Corinda pool, so after about a 50 minute trip each way, my day off constituted about 5 hours of work. Watch me be in trouble for working too many hours again this week!

I am excited for the term to start again. I love Fourth term because we get to do the Shark Bait Program, but mostly I am excited because at the end of this term I get to go to USA. Levi is also counting days and weeks.

My heart is sad for you inside

Tonight Levi is a bit sick. Not a whole load but just a little. I told him I was sorry he was sick. Levi said to me that it wasn't my fault so I didn't have to be sorry but I explained about feeling for him and that was a way to let him know that I was a unhappy for him that he was not feeling so good. I asked him if he knew what I meant and he said that he he understood. I asked what he thought I should say. He said;

"My heart is a little sad for you inside"

Now isn't that a beautiful sentiment. There is some sweet wording for empathy. I am going to use that more often.

It has been hard to get back into work mode. I am still in that holiday feeling and not really able to buckle down and get things going again. I am once again up to my ears in work, because one of the Physios that I work with has resigned to work at the Children's Hospital. It will be a while before I can crawl out under the workload that will generate but I think that is a part of the problem. If I lift my head up too high I'll notice just how much work I have to do. OK now I'm just getting whingy. I'm going to bed!

Say What?

Today is Wednesday. At least it has been all day. I had so much trouble all day trying to work out what day it actually is. Finally tonight I am working out that it is actually Tuesday. Levi slept in this morning. I mean really slept in. He was still sleeping when I left in the morning and I gave him a kiss and he still didn't wake up. Actually if he had at that point it would have put me back about 20 minutes, so I am grateful that he didn't.

I am at the Royal Children's Hospital every day this week helping with the Back to Basics course. I have to present tomorrow but there are chunks of time that I am just listening. I am not good at sitting still and doing little but looking professional. Then on Thursday I have to have a bunch of young Physios at the office. Unfortunately that day is also Levi's birthday for real so I will not be able to take the traditional cupcakes to his class. I guess we can add that to the list of things he gets to tell his shrink in the future.

There are some days I just wish that I was richer. I just wish that I could be the mother that hand made cupcakes and took them in on his birthday and dropped him at the door of school and picked him up. I wish that I could just work because I wanted to and not so much that I can't think anymore. I just don't really feel completely in control at home or at work. I have to dance around in both places and can only really be me with just Levi or by myself. If I confide in someone, I am in trouble for not confiding in who I 'should' have been confiding in. If I keep things to myself I'm in trouble. If I think of an idea for a holiday and excitedly tell someone, I am in trouble for not telling the 'correct' person first. I just cant get it right. Frankly I'm tired of trying to get it right all the time

Stacks and Stacks

OK, this kid is trying really hard to be completely banged up for his party this weekend. On the way to the car from school he fell. Normally we race to the car and he 'wins' and then laughs hysterically. This time he tripped about half way down and took out his knee. I think there will be no part left to photograph at his party that hasn't some injury from some stack.

Actually I was feeling fragile anyway. I was driving to pick him up from school and thought "What if something happened to him?" It is so strange. I am not naturally a morbid person, but every now and then when I am feeling a little tired or low, a random thought will jump up and mug me. When Frank was alive, I would always comfort myself with the thought that "If I had thought about it, it wasn't going to happen". I think that was true and not true of Frank. So much of what happened to him and to us was so far out of left field it was impossible to predict and the things that I was trying to preempt rarely happened. Of course at the time, I kept thinking that Frank couldn't die because I had admitted it was a possibility. That of course was wrong too.

My work isn't fabulous either at the moment. The big cheeses are deciding things and that also makes me nervous. There is so much to do at the moment and I think that they will be adding to the problem rather than helping me out at all. I just wish there was a bit more direction. I am not liking the shift. However I still love my kids and what we do. I just wish I could just see the kids and hang all the paperwork!