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So, we've reached Friday and the business is still going out - at least it is in Sydney. I hear Melbourne is having a meltdown and Perth isn't doing so well, but we sent someone down to Melbourne last night to help deal with the ins and outs of Melbourne, and the analyst who's helping them out over in Perth isn't generally considered one of the better analysts in the office.
By the end of Wednesday this week, I'd worked almost as many hours as I do in a regular week. Thirty-eight hours on the job by Wednesday night. I've never done a 50 hour week before, but I've hit it this one. (To those of you who've done the 50+ hour weeks, how do you do it regularly? I'm barely sane and it's only been one week.)
Fortunately, things are settling down in this office. I went out the back to the warehouse this morning to say hi to the shipping peeps, and when I asked one of them how he was doing, he said "Good!" in tones that suggested he'd expected the Judgement Day to arrive before he got an order out without needing to call someone over to help him solve a problem!
So, yeah, I think they've gotten on top of it, more or less. And while there've been a few scares here and there - most notably when we tried to pay some credit card bills on Wednesday (with a due date of Friday) and the payment authorisation transfer failed.
Anything involving money and banking and the word 'Failure to process' is A VERY BAD THING. Cue quite a few stressed people from Finance and one stressed Sel trying to work out what went wrong and fix it!
One slightly annoying point: a new co-worker who started just last week. He's nice enough most of the time - except when he leans over my shoulder to tell me something that I know but which is taking me a few seconds longer to process than he thinks it should. And he has a habit of saying "At [my old workplace] [statement that amounts to we did things better]..." Very frustrating.
*frowns* I've had a low-level headache all week. Caffeine temporarily helps it - I've learned to drink my coffee with less sugar this week, although I still prefer the massive sugar rush.
Downside: there may be weekend work involved fixing stuff. And I was desperately hoping to have either Saturday or Sunday off so I could work on my![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
atlantisbigbang which still needs massive rewriting and rejigging to make any kind of coherent sense.
By the end of Wednesday this week, I'd worked almost as many hours as I do in a regular week. Thirty-eight hours on the job by Wednesday night. I've never done a 50 hour week before, but I've hit it this one. (To those of you who've done the 50+ hour weeks, how do you do it regularly? I'm barely sane and it's only been one week.)
Fortunately, things are settling down in this office. I went out the back to the warehouse this morning to say hi to the shipping peeps, and when I asked one of them how he was doing, he said "Good!" in tones that suggested he'd expected the Judgement Day to arrive before he got an order out without needing to call someone over to help him solve a problem!
So, yeah, I think they've gotten on top of it, more or less. And while there've been a few scares here and there - most notably when we tried to pay some credit card bills on Wednesday (with a due date of Friday) and the payment authorisation transfer failed.
Anything involving money and banking and the word 'Failure to process' is A VERY BAD THING. Cue quite a few stressed people from Finance and one stressed Sel trying to work out what went wrong and fix it!
One slightly annoying point: a new co-worker who started just last week. He's nice enough most of the time - except when he leans over my shoulder to tell me something that I know but which is taking me a few seconds longer to process than he thinks it should. And he has a habit of saying "At [my old workplace] [statement that amounts to we did things better]..." Very frustrating.
*frowns* I've had a low-level headache all week. Caffeine temporarily helps it - I've learned to drink my coffee with less sugar this week, although I still prefer the massive sugar rush.
Downside: there may be weekend work involved fixing stuff. And I was desperately hoping to have either Saturday or Sunday off so I could work on my
atlantisbigbang which still needs massive rewriting and rejigging to make any kind of coherent sense.
no subject
Well, my job is "mom" which is 24/7/365, but I'm allowed to goof off while still on the job and take coffee breaks...
On the other hand, when things go badly on the job, there's no escaping it, no haven to run to. It's definitely less of a career and more of a calling.
My husband is a physician, and works 64 hours over a 4 day work week, and works at least 70 hour a week when he has call weekends (every 4th weekend). I think he handles it by remembering that it is soooo much better than internship and residency.
There was one week in residency that he worked 3 days straight, came back and slept 4 hours, came back the following night and slept 4 hours, and then was gone for another 3 days of solid work. He should not have come home for those two 4 hour nights, but he desperately needed to recharge his batteries by seeing the wife and baby daughter he was doing it all for.
After the second 3 day stint he came home, looking forward to an actual day off! (he got 3 or 4 of those a month at that point in his career). He went into the bedroom to take off his tie before brushing his teeth. Silence. I went in to find him standing up asleep, with his tie half undone. I told him to climb into bed, but he insisted he needed to brush his grubby teeth. He took a string of dental floss into the living room so he could look over the paper as he flossed. I found him sound asleep sitting up cross-legged, holding the floss between his two upper front teeth. I sent him to bed, and he slept for about 16 hours, and got up only because he desperately didn't want to miss all his precious unstructured time and a glimpse of his wife and daughter.
Compared to that, working from 8:00 a.m. until 12:00 or 1:00 at night, four days a week, and working 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. with call from home on every 4th weekend is quite reasonable.
It's not the seeing patients that takes the time, it's the labs and tests to look over, the letters to write, the physician assistant and nurse practitioner's notes to read and cosign, the prescriptions to write, the phone calls to return, and the charts to dictate.
Primary care docs earn their salary!
On the other hand, we can afford to have 4 kids, and offer them piano lessons and ice time, nice clothes, and good books to read.
no subject
I'm salary, so I don't get paid overtime, anyway. I don't have a husband or partner, let alone kids. I don't mind the job generally, but this week has been several kinds of insane.
I'm coping fine; I'm just tired. Some of it's rote; it's just the parts where I need to think and concentrate at the end of the week that's the tough part.
I'm glad you get to see him more than you did when he was in residency, though! I went to the parentals' for dinner the other night and was so glad that my mum was willing to: a) hug me, b) listen to me explain the issues we were dealing with around here...
no subject
Well, while I am sure we are right up there, there are other factors:
He likes to teach. Part of a physician's role is educating the patient so that they can make the best choices about their health care and be motivated to comply with the treatment goals. He also works with med. students, teaching them physical diagnosis.
He likes puzzles. Figuring out the disease from the symptoms is often an intriguing mental exercise. When I get time to relax I like to find something to turn my mind off and stop it racing. He likes to find more to give his to do.
He likes making a difference, and working to make this world a better place. He likes to alleviate, or - better yet - head off pain and suffering.
The hard part is watching bad things happen to good people, and sometimes there is nothing one can do but break the devastating news as gently as possible.
I went to the parentals' for dinner the other night and was so glad that my mum was willing to: a) hug me, b) listen to me explain the issues we were dealing with around here...
Yeah. Moms are great that way. Well, mine was never a hugger after I was eight or so, but she listened to me come home and bitch about my day every single day all through school until I went away to college. I'm sure there were days when she would rather not have heard so many discouraging words, but she never complained, or told me to stow it. Now it's mostly my husband that gets to hear about my hard days. Still, there are times when only Mom will do, and then I call her.
It's an arrangement we all have with our moms. We learn all those little points of manners and social nicety for them, and they hug us and listen to our small troubles. What they never read the fine print to realize is that at some point we master all those manners and display all the niceties, but our troubles just get bigger and harder to untangle and soothe away, and yet we keep bringing them...
Realizing that we benefitted from an advantageous contract, we all try to do something really, really nice on Mother's Day to assuage our guilt and express our thanks!