2012 (almost)

I guess we will find out if the Mayans and/or Roland Emmerich are right and the world will cease, but I am betting that maybe a culture that counted on human sacrifice to appease their gods was not terribly prescient, but I guess we will find out in December.

There is little to add to my work drama of late. They are still planning on laying off 400 people (or otherwise eliminating those positions by inducements to early retirement and hiring freezes) and there is still no clear answer as to how many of our team might be affected. You can worry about it, but it isn't going to change anything. So, in the interim, we are moving from 'no flexing no matter what' because we wanted to preserve the notion that every hour is necessary to 'get the eff out of here as soon as you can.' So, I ended up flexing out about 40% of this past week. Left early on Monday, cancelled on Tuesday, worked all day Wednesday and left a hair early the last 2 days. Thankfully Tia is not dealing with the same, so it isn't like we will be in the bread line anytime soon. Not sure how long the flexing will continue though.

Other than that, had a nice holiday weekend (bummer that there was no 'holiday' extended time off, but nothing can be done about it) and am looking forward to a, hopefully, fresh start with new adventures in the coming year. Until then, cross em that my neck doesn't hit the chopping block.

Happy New Year!

reckless

Continuing with our new annual tradition, my employer announced that they will be laying off 400 people (or at least 400 FTE, which is the same thing cumulatively). It remains unclear if any of these will be from my department or not, though of course the speculations are running wild (as they should be since my department is considered auxiliary). At this time last year everyone in my department was interviewing to keep their jobs, and quite a few were eliminated. This year, the threat hangs over the department once again. Some holiday traditions I would gladly abandon.

Interview netted nada. At this point, though I haven't heard word one, I am pretty sure I was not selected for the position. It isn't that big a deal, but it would be nice to be the one making the choice instead of being made for me.

Will be spending even more time at the Park in the next couple weeks. Getting very tiresome, but I am reluctant to say 'no' (see above) at this point in time. I wish we had more patients.

In other news, Tia and I saw a play over the past weekend at a local theater. The acting was fine and the set pieces were simple but versatile, but god help me it was effing weird. As succinctly as I can state it the play was about the following: An over-exuberant excessively garrulous woman begins by exclaiming her love of Christmas on Christmas eve. Her husband, appearing distressed, tells her she ought to run because he hired a hit man to kill her that night. She runs. She meets a guy at the gas station pay phone and, wearing nothing but her nightgown and robe, boards his car and they head to his home where he lives with his paraplegic deaf/mute wife. She moves in with said couple and starts to work at their nonprofit with them. They go on a game show where the don 'planet' hats and win $100K. Her estranged husband sees her on said show and finds her the following Xmas. Her husband finds the deaf/mute die from poison champagne (and the deaf/mute was neither, only pretending to be so for her husband). The main gal now runs away with the guy she met at the quick stop, who proceeds to drink nothing but champagne for a year. He dies the following year on, you guessed it, Christmas day. The main character then becomes a mute herself for 6 years living in a shelter. She speaks once and then goes to a talk show where she watches the guest on the show get shot by a man in a ski mask. She then goes back to school and becomes a psychologist. A patient walks in who turns out to be her son (and her other son turns out to be the shooter from the talk show). He becomes her patient on Christmas eve. The end. Should be interesting to see their interpretation of twelfth night.

As always, more news when it becomes available.

the interview/work as usual

The interview with KP was, well, long. It was a four person panel interview that entailed a round robin of questions from a 2 page long (front and back) worksheet of sorts that they asked questions off of and, presumably, rated my answers. The questions varied from the inane basics of patient care to questions more obtuse and much much more specific in nature. I am not sure how well I did, nor what it means if I did particularly well. I know they are planning on making a decision next week and, should I be selected, it remains unclear on whether or not I would accept. I would certainly consider it though, especially after another day like today.

Nothing unusual about today really...just the perpetual schizophrenic nature of the job. To try to distill down the hours of meetings, might prove less than revealing, but the idea is that I need to schedule more patients and schedule them in a more condensed way somehow. I need to do this despite having no actual patients to schedule, on account of us always being closed, never having adequate staffing, and being nearly invisible to most clinics who might otherwise refer to us. We plan to solve this issue by wishing it were different I guess. Will it actually ever be different? The magic 8 ball says to 'ask again later'.

Oh yeah, and we will be closed tomorrow so I can help at the Park again. Bah!

Tales of clinic closures

Just a quick post:

Starting to flex again at work. Not just me but everyone. Low census. Not a big deal really, but it was weird to come back from vacation and then work a 3 hour day. Is a pleasant surprise when it doesn't occur often.

Closing the clinic again on Monday for at least part of the day. Will be going to the Park for at least a portion of the day if my clinic stays slow. Because, you see, they are busy. Hence, we close my clinic. If patients/doctors call..............tfb. Yet another way to 'expand the clinic' by making it more exclusive' through diminishing operating hours and limiting the amount of patients. Maybe it is a coherent plan after all.

Interview on Tuesday night for the IV job with KP. Sounds like it will be a panel interview. Will be interesting to see how it goes and, if it goes well, what that will mean. Of course, I will write about it here.