Work, work and more work
I have not done much other than work for the last... well, since February. Things reached an all time high (or is that a low) last week when I was told to work 11 hours a day at the office. I usually put in 8 hours at the office, then another 4 to 6 hours at home and let me tell you, exchanging three hours of work at home for three hours in the office just about did me in. Although I'm pretty much doing the same work during those three hours, it's much easier at home. For one thing, at home I'm only physically interrupted by Rob, the dogs and the occasional person knocking at the door. The instant messages, emails and phone calls don't stop, but just taking out the presence of 40 or so other people around makes a big difference. Add to that the comfort factor of being able to wear my most comfortable clothes, no shoes, having food and beverages handy plus a private bathroom and I find that I'm much happier grinding away at things in my domicile. There's no way I could have done the 60+ hours a week I've been doing since February if I had to spend all that time at the office. In fact, I've been having a hard time doing the extra 20+ hours at home after such a prolonged stint of it. Seven months of 5 to 6 hours of sleep a night and 12 to 15 hours days takes it's toll and if I thought I was bone tired before last week, I found out just how much more tired I could be after these last six days of working 53 hours in the office and 28 hours at home. Yes folks, that's 81 hours in six days and I'm taking today (Sunday) off - I don't care if the place catches on fire. They can call me all they want, but I'm not answering the phone. Fortunately they've rescinded the 11 hour day mandate for next week, but I'm so friggin' tired that I'll be hard pressed to put in the normal required 42 hours in the office. I just hope that Monday, being a holiday for most of the US, turns out to be a quiet day so I can get a bit of a break from the usual chaos of floor managing. I've not really talked much about what I do here, but for 18 to 28 hours of my 40 to 60+ hour week I'm "floor managing" which means I'm responsible for the entire operation of the call center. On a normal day, it's a headache and on a bad day it's a nightmare, but every once and a while things are quiet and I can leave the shift without wishing someone would just shoot me so I didn't have to do it again. If nothing else, this job has definately prepared me for purgatory. So the hope is that the Monday morning shift (8am to 2pm) will be a cake-walk because my Tuesday night shift (2pm to 8pm) is definately going to be hell and that shift will probably last until 10pm or later. Wednesday I get to go in at 8am no matter how late I end up staying Tuesday night, but at least I don't have to floor manage that day. I'm supposedly off Thursday and Friday, but will most likely be working from home if I'm not called into the office. Saturday I floor manage from 8am to 4pm and it's anyone's guess how that will go, but I get to do it again on Sunday and that one will definately suck. Somewhere in between all of that I'll try to get the laundry done, the bills paid and all that other personal stuff one has to do, spend some time with Rob and give my parents a call so they know I'm still alive. Though the alive part is subject to debate at this point.