Blackouts and lightning and tornados, oh my!

So yesterday was my day off, and I needed it.  All this travel/wedding planning and at work screw-ups had me strung tighter than CM's anal sphincter; I woke up with a general feeling of unease, had a panick attack, tried to call MM at work: no answer; tried to call her on her cell: no answer.  Tried and tried and tried for the better part of an hour when I got this text: "Busy.  What do you need?"  It seemed ominous, like pre-termination coldness, so the panick attack resumed as I threw on clothes and drove like a screaming banshee to work (remember, today's my day off and I'm going to work.  I am an idiot.).  When I got there, MM was having a nice chat on the work line with her sister about all the crap going on between her and PBM, so when I burst in, panicky, eyes wild, she laughed at me for being a complete idiot and told me to get the hell out of there and to my noon massage appointment.

Oh, have I told you about the Maureen?  She's a godsend.  In January I'd been having some serious problems with my back when Dave finally convinced me to do something about it.  I have terrible posture from a childhood/adolescence/young adulthood (seriously, until I was 21) being extremely overweight (I'm 5'6" and, at my heaviest Christmas of 2002, my freshman year at college, I weighed 256lbs).  'Nuff said, I still have the posture of a morbidly obese 16yr old.  So I break down, give in, and call the local massage school for an appointment.  I knew I wanted an instructor to do it, and since it's only an additional $15 an hour for someone completely trained, I went for Maureen.  So I went in, and Maureen is a totally gorgeous brunette (according to Dave, who likes to make me admit (in order to keep his vision of what a massage is) that of course we make out the whole time) who is the nicest human being on the planet.  Needless to say, she fixed my posture and I've been going back every two weeks ever since.

Yesterday I walked in all wild-eyed, five minutes late for my appointment (and I'm chronically early); Maureen grabbed me and all but dragged my gloomy ass down to the Outer Banks (sidenote: each massage room is a different location around the world, and they play music according to the locale.  Usually I'm in Ireland, because Maureen knows I like the horses and the Celtic instrumentals.  I've also been in London, Moscow, Tokyo, New York, L.A. and Sydney.).  I didn't even have to tell her I was stressed out beyond control, which is always nice; we've had about 15 massages together at this point, so she can pretty much read my body language about what I'm feeling.  Asked if my ear was completely healed from my traumatic Royal Wedding experience (it finally is) and whether or not my right rotator cuff is still giving me grief (I somehow tore it playing football in Cancun, and aggravated it beyond belief by playing football/fishnet catch at our company picnic's olympics).  And then I fell asleep.  Three times.  And got my face massaged, which is seriously my favourite part of the massage.  So, completely relaxed and feeling good, I headed out to the grocery store to pick up essentials for the trip (I'm boycotting fast food stops, so I'm packing healthy sandwiches and snacks that we can eat at a rest stop tomorrow and on the Old Main lawn on Saturday) and some soup/yummies for me, since Dave was on long shift until 9pm and wasn't likely to come home for dinner.

And then I went home.  I knew there was a storm coming because I could smell it, but there wasn't anything odd about the storm clouds gathering on the western horizon.  I unpacked my groceries, started some laundry, ran and fed the dogs, and communicated to Dave via text message about what I'd bought and whether or not I was feeling better.  My phone was dying (probably owing to the 700 calls I made to work before 11am), so I plugged it in, vacuumed, watered the tomatoes and the bushes we just planted out front, and switched out the laundry so I could begin packing us up.

That's just about when I heard the back screen door practically torn from the house by wind, and caught sight of our backyard with the 30ft tall oak practically sideways in the wind.  Okay, bigger storm than I thought.  I ran downstairs and onto the front porch, where I noticed that the clouds were definitely the harbingers of doom and likely to produce something that would murder me and my dogs, so I wrenched closed the front screen and locked it, double bolted the heavy front door, did the same out back, closed the fireplace flue and the oven vents, and locked all the windows.  As I was returning downstairs from securing our bedroom, the rain and hail began, but with the wind whipping around the hail sounded like bullets as they struck the side of the house.  I ran to the front windows and was treated by the image of shingles ripping from roofs and siding being torn from the homes down the street.  Thankfully, none of the siding ended up on/in my car this time, but some others weren't so lucky.  Morrison was cowering at my feet, and I finally found Cobain shaking inside her car carrier, curled up with her security blanket and her busy bee.  I gathered them up and was just about to chuck them into our downstairs bathroom (no windows, first floor, doubly reinforced by staircase, etc.) when I heard what sounded like approaching train engines.  I grabbed my phone, dragged Morrison into the bath, threw Cobain into the bath, and ran to grab my cell phone just as the power went out, my phone died, and I heard sirens begin on the main road.  Five minutes later, I tentatively left the dogs in the bathroom to check the damage.  Backyard was intact, tree was... worse for the wear and missing some large branches which had dropped on our fence and in our yard, but the fence wasn't damaged, nor our storage shed either, so it seemed okay.  Ran out front to check the house and my car: no dents or dings on the car from either the hail or the tornado/surge that had passed through, but I could hear the transformers at the end of the road hissing and popping as they fizzled; our neighbors were out, checking their homes too, and as I secured a partially torn out shrub and relocated the wicker loveseat from my neighbor's yard to our porch, I came to the conclusion that we came out lucky.  No damage to the siding, the fencing, the roof, the porch awning, or my car.  The sideyard was a mess, as was the street, and my car was plastered with wet leaves, but we were okay.  However, I had no way to call either Dave or Mom to tell them I was okay, so after setting up candles to light when I returned, I hopped into my car to drive to Dave's work.  He only works about ten minutes from the house, as do I, but it took forty-five minutes just to get out of the neighborhood, owing to accidents, flooding, and downed trees.  Once I got out, every street light (including those at Town Center) were out, and accidents were everywhere.  Dave's dealership had no power, no phone lines, and was suffering a good deal of damage done by the sales tent rigging on the new cars they were "protecting."  Dave and I verified that we were both okay, and mutually decided that if the power couldn't be restored by the evening, we'd get a hotel for the night.

Which was easier said than done.  The house was rapidly heating up, thanks to no a/c and a super hot (and now muggy) day.  The dogs were panting, I was sweating, and every hotel I called within 20 miles was either booked, charging insane amounts because demand was suddenly high, or the line was dead/busy every time I tried.  Finally, Dave was able to get ahold of a Motel 6 up the street which allowed pets, so we charged inside, grabbed changes of clothing and the rum, hooked up the dogs, and away we went.  Fifteen minutes later, we were chillaxing in room #231, watching Glee and waiting for dinner to arrive from our favourite local restaurant.

This morning, just before check-out, Dave ran home to check on the power.  Thank Dominion, it was on again.  He came back, we all piled back into the car, and we headed home.  He took the dogs for a quick haircut, I began the tedious process of unloading everything we'd thrown together, putting all the snacks and leftovers away, gathering up the dogs' toys and bowls and beds for the trip, restarting the laundry I had never finished, cleaning up the kitchen after the previous night's ransacking, and just in general attempting to clean up.  Now it's 4:45pm, I have another hour and fifteen minutes before I'm done with my half-day of work, and I still have to stop for dinner tonight, finish the laundry and the packing, pack the car, double-check for missing items, wrap the Christmas presents I never got to my parents and brother, because I was too sick to go home, and locate a decent book on tape for Dave and I to listen to, because I just can't listen to five hours of talk radio tomorrow.  I was going to go out and have my hair done, but that's just not in the cards for today.  Maybe I'll find a local place in PA tomorrow and get that done while Dave is at the rehearsal.  Who knows?

My dress from Rent the Runway is supposed to be delivered here at work by the end of the business day today, and if it doesn't come soon I am going to have a shit fit.  I will wear Badgley Mischka to this wedding if I have to kill the UPS guy.  According to UPS.com, while the dresses are scheduled for delivery "by the end of the business day today," that could be at any time up to, and including, 7pm.  We close at 6pm.  If the dress isn't here by 6pm, I am absolutely going to lose it.  I have to get to the grocery store to get food for dinner, finish the laundry, finish the packing, clean the kitchen, clean up/pick up the living room, put all the candles away, confirm the hotel for this weekend, make/pack the food for the trip tomorrow, dose the dogs with dramamine, gather bags and paper towels for the inevitable 16 times the dogs will vomit on the trip... and while Dave texted me not an hour ago telling me that nothing was going on at work and he was planning to leave early, I just got the call that the internet and phone lines were functioning at the dealership again, and though he'd been planning on coming home early to help me, he was now going to "stick around and make some calls, just to see if I can get some of my ups in over the weekend with other guys so I make at least half commission."  Well great Dave, you do that.  You come home, "maybe not at six, maybe around six-thirty."  Which, I have sadly come to learn, means "I'll be leaving ten minutes before the actual close of business at 9pm tonight.  You'd better save dinner for me until then.  Oh, and I'll claim that I want to help, but I'll make so many sighing noises about how tired I am after I flop down to eat the dinner you shopped for and you made, all while doing laundry and folding my clothes and packing my suitcase and cleaning the house and running/feeding the dogs that you'll never ask for any help... so when I offer to pack the car and you agree, simply because you're exhausted because, while I woke up, carried a few bags to the car, and transported the dogs for their haircuts before I went and sat on my ass at work (remember, it's 5pm and the phones/internet just came back!), you got up, packed the hotel room, dragged two angry little dogs downstairs, loaded the car, unloaded the car, put away the leftovers and snacks, started the laundry, started the dishwasher, packed the nonperishables for tomorrow, put all the drinks in the fridge, changed out the laundry, folded the laundry, got out the suitcases, began packing, unloaded the dishwasher, fed and watered the dogs, switched out the laundry, folded the laundry, continued packing, took a quick bath, got dressed for work, ran to work at 2pm, worked until 6pm, stopped at the store for dinner, put away groceries, made dinner, switched out the laundry, folded the laundry, continued packing, cleaned the kitchen, straightened up the living room, ran the dogs, finished the laundry, finished packing, stowed the suitcases in the hall, hung up all your dress shirts, hung up my dresses, stowed them in the hall closet, made a book on tape cd, and vacuumed, you're the one who will bring up the fact that "I helped" by packing the car in every fight we have for the next month about how little you do to help around the house.  But thanks for carrying everything outside.  You're a gem.

It's enough to make any woman want to throw back her head and scream, "WHY IN GOD'S NAME DO YOU NOT SEE HOW LITTLE YOU DO?  HOW MUCH I DO?!  WHY I'M SO ANGRY WHEN YOU PULL THIS CRAP EVERY SINGLE TIME WE HAVE TO GO ANYWHERE?!"  I mean, this is his best friend's wedding.  He should have to do more than pack the car and get wasted with his buddies... but no, it's all my responsibility.  As usual.  Why do I believe him when he says he's going to "try harder"?  Why do I trust him when he says he'll change?  I'm an idiot.

I hate my managers, work, life in general.

In the interest of full disclosure, I will say that I don't truly hate them.  I hate the way they react to completely unimportant things that happen throughout the work day.  Every night, reports have to go to Corporate regarding changes in apartment status: if an apartment was rented, if an apartment was moved out of, etc.  Most days, there is nothing on these reports.  They are literally blank pieces of paper we initial to prove who's been working that day.   Yet they still have to be sent to Corporate.  Usually this means physically going to the offices and dropping them off in the manager's mailbox, but on days when there is no status change, they reward us by only requiring we fax the blank report.  I forget to do this at least once a week, but usually remember before work the next morning and either fax it as soon as I get there or text my site manager and have her do it for me if I'm off.  Lately, our corporate manager has been flipping out if these reports are forgotten and faxed at 10:00am, even though we don't open until 10:00am.  No one is even there to know the report is late.  But two weeks ago, apparently there was a meeting between my manager and the corporate manager I wasn't privy to, and the result was I got written up for forgetting to fax blank pieces of paper.  Never mind the fact that my manager falsifies her work hours every week because 90% of the time she is several hours late (case in point: we have been open for 52 minutes.  She is not here, nor has she called to explain why she's not here.  I mean, we are both on the schedule for 10-6pm today.) or leaves several hours early, and still claims and is paid for those hours.

Yesterday we all know I had to work.  I never work Sundays, as Dave is off most Sundays and we like to try to spend some time together over the course of the week.  Sunday is the last day of our week, so the culminating reports all have to go to Corporate.  These cannot be faxed; they have to be physically put in the mailbox for Monday morning.  I forgot them last night, but remembered this morning, so I left home early, ran to work and grabbed them, and had them to Corporate at 9:30.  I physically handed them to the person who inputs the information.  We have seven other apartment communities in our company.  There were seven other larger reports to enter into the databases first.  But at 10:05am, just after I'd opened up, Corporate Manager (CM) called to ask where the Sunday reports are.  I'm confused.  I handed them to the Community Info Lady (CIL).  She has them.  She's the one who needs them.  Why is he calling me?  Obviously she let him know they weren't in her box at 9:00am, but she had them at 9:30.  Why didn't he ask her before calling me?  I tell him I ran to work, got them, and brought them in at 9:30.  I apologize for forgetting them: I don't usually work Sundays.  I explain that I had to stay a half hour after closing because our phone lines weren't working and I couldn't forward the calls to our answering service.  I simply forgot.  He proceeds to read me the riot act about how this happens too often and it needs to stop.  I'm confused again.  Since being written up over blank pieces of paper two weeks ago, I haven't forgotten once.  I've been remarkably anal about remembering.  So I apologize again and he lets me go.

An hour later, Corporate calls again.  This time it's CIL.  She's going through the reports and sees that I had an application/rental/move-in on Friday: where are the forms? where is the escrow cash sheet for the security deposit? where is the check?  I put all of these things in a manilla folder and put it on the counter in the kitchen: like I said, remarkably anal.  I even marked it with her name, our apartment community, and Friday's date.  Did I not drop it off?  I find it on the kitchen counter with a huge box of Gevalia coffee on top of it.  Then I remember: I was helping a resident when UPS showed up and I told him to just put the box in the kitchen.  Then I obviously forgot about the paperwork.  I apologize to another person at Corporate, promise to fax it immediately, and swear to drop off everything tonight with the mail.  The doorbell rings: it's the resident who lives beneath the apartment that flooded Saturday afternoon.  He's been in D.C.  He just got back.  He is pissed.  I run damage control and attempt to simultaneously answer the phone, which rings three times with potential renters.  I finally get him out, run to fax the forgotten paperwork, and see that the answering service has faxed over the night's messages.  A/C is out in one apartment, tub is stopped up in another, and... wait.  A resident is complaining that the patio door replacement workmen just showed up at her door while she was lying on the couch, nude, attempting to sleep.  She works nights: she just got home and now she can't sleep.  I'm confused again: I sent out the notices last week to the people who were having their doors changed this week.  It takes several hours to do.  If people don't know about it, they get pissed.  What went wrong?  Phone rings.  Another resident is calling about getting a notice, but there's one problem: her door was changed two months ago.  Our cleaning lady (CL) walks in: the power is out in an entire building.  Great, another problem for our Maintenance Guy (MG).  Oh, and by the way, a resident moved out and left there key.  Great, more goddamn paperwork to send to Corporate.  Phone rings again.  Another resident, another notice, they've had their new door for two months as well.  WTF?  I find the maintenance log to try to figure out where we went wrong with the schedule.  I didn't do it, I just addressed the notices my manager left me... so it's her fault.  And if we remember correctly, she's pregnant, so she's a little wibbly in the brain department right now.  Okay, so she accidentally wrote down the addresses for this month in March.  Gotcha.  Manager calls, I explain everything that just went down, promise to fix it, it's all okay, and she informs me that she's taking a sick day and I'm alone for the afternoon.  Lovely.  Thanks for the notice, I didn't bring lunch, incorrectly assuming you'd be here like you're scheduled so I could run out and pick something up.  Thanks.  So I call the residents who are having their doors done tomorrow to notify them at the very least, call back the nude couch-surfer and apologize and explain, and then finish all the paperwork as quickly as humanly possible, when... the phone rings and it's Corporate.  Again.  I cringe and answer: it's CM again and he's looking for my manager.  I politely explain that she had an ultrasound to check for birth defects (she's in her late 40s and this pregnancy was a real surprise) and although I just spoke with her, she's still at the doctor and has the flu, so she's just going to take a sick day.  I'm immediately freaking out because I just know he's calling her to tell her to fire me over my horrible paperwork skills.  I call her back, give her the head's up, but he hasn't called her: maybe he needs to talk to her about a problem she's having with another manager at another site.  I know he wanted to speak with both of them.

Phone rings again: it's Former Manager (FM) who got a promotion to manage a larger apartment community for Corporate, so although she had just hired me (literally just.  I began on November 17th, she changed communities January 1st, and I got saddled with my current manager who had previously been an assistant at another site.)  They're changing out the windows in her office today, so her computer is down and she needs me to call her when the CAP Sheet (list of all our properties, the floorplans, and the apartment prices, as well as the price change (if any), the number of unrented and vacant units at each, the number of rentals the previous week, and the budget Corporate has set for any improvements at each site over the next week.  As you may have guessed, we're doing the stupid patio doors) comes over from CM and whether or not there's a managers meeting today.  Thankfully, this puts me at ease because I'm thinking CM is calling to tell my manager (oh hell, let's give her an abbreviation too: MM) that she needs to come in early or stay late so that he can address this issue.

(Okay, sidenote: here is what is going on, to the best of my knowledge.  Our Corporate owns eight apartment communities where I live.  Seven of these are pretty much on or just off one road.  The eighth is another city over, roughly a twenty minute drive away.  MM was the one of the assistant managers there before being promoted in January to our community.  She worked with two women, Tiny Passive-Aggressive Assistant (TPAA) and PsychoBitch Manager (PBM).  She also worked with her Adulterous Baby-Daddy (ABD) there.  He works maintenance for the community (GBW) and MM was in the office.   MM and her daughter also live in GBW, so not only is PBM her boss, she's also effectively her landlord.  MM worked here for seven years with a two year break somewhere in the middle.  PBM is the single white female type in her early 50s, and she had a crazy crush on ABD; PBM and TPAA are sisters-in-law; MM and ABD were friends for the entire seven years (and she has since stressed only friends for the first five, then the affair started).  Before the affair (BA) began two years ago, PBM and TPAA turned on MM and began spreading rumors throughout the company that they were catching MM and ABD hooking up in the office, that PBM had seen ABD leaving MM's apartment in the mornings and walking in at night, that ABD's wife was calling trying to find MM... you get the message.  These rumors were circling all through the company, even up to the owners.  MM went into Corporate for a meeting with CM and flat out denied everything, because at the time nothing really was going on: they were just friends at the time.  CM called in PBM and read her the riot act, instructing her to cease-and-desist on the rumors and to rein in her little lapdog in TPAA, or they were both risking their jobs.  Everything was settled after that.  I mean, because of the rumors everyone now thought that MM was a dirty homewrecking skank and ABD was a complete pig, but everything pretty much calmed down.  Well, in January when she transferred, MM filled me in on this history (which I had already heard from FM when she tried to prep me for MM's arrival) and assured me that she was not having an affair with ABD (lie).  We discussed it repeatedly, and after I met PBM and TPAA I was moderately convinced she'd been being honest.  Now let me interject here and tell you that over the course of her first two months here, she assured me that she was not having an affair with ABD at least twenty times, so when she began acting funny in March, I started to see the writing on the wall.  Then she dropped the bomb mid-month: they'd been having an affair for two years, his wife and son didn't know, they were happy the way things were... but now, she was pregnant and due in December.  Yuh oh.  I jokingly called her a skank and she assured me she'd still be here until she had to take off for the birth and such.  He was telling his wife and son shortly, and they were going to move into a three bedroom apartment in the same apartment community (completely stupid decision, they actually made the move over the weekend).  They were planning to get married after the baby came.  They were going to tell CM before the news got out and he heard the gossip.  And they were true to their word: they went together, they told him, and he congratulated them - no reprocussions.  She made the smart choice of filling in FM (okay, I love her, but the girl gossips) and everyone at least got the real story.  And then I got to breathe a sigh of relief because while I don't gossip, I also freaked out that I would get in trouble for failing to inform Corporate.  But I didn't, so yay!  Fast forward to now: MM is constantly missing work for doctor's appointments and because she has severe morning sickness, which has resulted in a lot of extra work for me, much of which I have never been trained to do.  CM has asked MM to make it clear to me that I have to be able to pick up her slack when she is unable to come in.  I don't have an assistant.  It's just me attempting to do my job AND her's.  She is constantly forgetting to tell me when she changes my schedule to suit her needs, which has resulted in three occasions already where I am scheduled off and have plans (such as doctor's appointments to manage my incurable disease (I have Lupus, it's really not as bad as it sounds)) and I am instructed to change the date of my appointment because her's is more important.  She is constantly scheduling us together, which I assume means she's planning on showing up to do her job, so I don't bring a lunch as I enjoy popping out to Wawa for ten minutes to break up the afternoon, and she doesn't show, so I can't leave to get lunch.  I have to eat.  Because of the Lupus I cannot maintain my weight very well, and when it gets low I begin passing out.  Seriously, I hit 111lbs the morning of the royal wedding, went to pee, blacked out, fell and smashed my head on the porcelain sink, ripping my ear half off and knocking myself unconscious in the process.  I went to work that morning, and the next, but needed Sunday to try to recover as I was still slurring, kept forgetting phrases, and was so dizzy with such a terrible headache I couldn't function.  Not to mention the ear.  She called Sunday morning, begging me to take her shift because she was spotting.  Not bleeding, spotting.  Which is completely normal in the first trimester.  So I said no.  She'd already abandoned me for most of the previous week, and I needed a day off.  The next morning, I got a phone call from her saying she was going to the doctor at 3pm, so I'd be needing to stay all day.  Oh, and she was running late and needed to go to the store, so she'd be in at noon.  I had an appointment with my thyroid specialist at 3pm, and these appointments are impossible to reschedule.  I told her this, but I was told to either bump the appointment to noon, so she could cover, or to cancel it and do it another day.  I got off the phone with her and burst into tears.  I'm legitimately sick: I have to make it to these appointments, but if I didn't move or cancel it, I knew she'd go crying to CM like she did the previous day because I wouldn't come in, and I got a lecture about making accommodations for her.  So I canceled it.  At 3pm, CM called an assistants meeting at another of our communities, but I had no coverage, so although I both called and emailed him, desperate for a little help, I still had no coverage at 2:45pm, when he called and told me just to shut down the office for an hour.  That afternoon, MM stopped by to tell me that CM had called her complain about me, and that I needed to be written up but she stuck up for me (really?) and said she'd just have a "little talk" with me about the infamous blank paperwork, my unwillingness to step in when needed (I took this to mean insisting I get a day off after 6 days of continual work with no assistance and no manager), and my general unawesomeness.  Great, whatever.  A week goes past, everything seems copacetic, when I get a text the following Tuesday.  It's 8:45am, Dave is getting ready to walk out the door, when I read the following: "Going into work.  Don't feel good.  You can come in and work if you want to!  :)"  Well, I don't want to.  I want my damn days off.  I worked Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and all damn day Monday so you could go out of town with your family.  I have to work next Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and all damn day Monday so you can move.  I have to come in next Wednesday on my day off so that you can "get a break for a bit" because I'm heading to PA for a wedding and Memorial Day with my family (sidenote of this sidenote: my Aunt Dianne is having it catered this year because my Uncle Angelo cannot be trusted with a grill.  This means lots of ziti, chicken francais, sirloin tips, italian salad and rolls for this girl.  Oh, and those yummy yummy parsley potatoes I love so much!) from Thursday to Monday (and the office is closed Monday anyway!)  So basically she has to work Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday once.  I've done that schedule the past month, plus Monday too!  And then I get my two days off if I'm lucky enough that you don't call out sick.  So I "laugh a text back," which is basically "LOL Yeah right!  ;)," but she isn't kidding.  At 2:30pm, just as I'm sitting down to a bowl of creamy tomato soup, a green salad, and a nice caramel latte at Panera Bread, I get a panicked text from her.  She's now apparently dizzy, vomiting, and miserable: can I please come in for the rest of the day?  She needs to get to a doctor.  Please keep in mind I'm only four days past a severe concussion, and I too am dizzy, nauseated, miserable, but not working as today is my damn day off.  This continues like this for roughly forty minutes until she promises to give me a half-day Monday but pay me for a full day; everyone has a price.  So I finish my lunch, call Dave and tell him about the change in schedule, run home to let the dogs out, and head to work when, lo and behold I walk into the model and there's MM, happily surfing the web, certainly looking nothing like I look when I'm dizzy, nauseated, and vomiting.  And she strolls merrily out of the apartment, leaving me with a thousand and one little tasks she's devised, and advising me she's "gonna try to feel better."  I'm livid.  I dropped my lunch, my free afternoon, my relaxation time, kenneled my dogs, and her only response?  "If I'd known you were doing something, I wouldn't have asked you to come in!"  ... What did you think I meant when I texted you that I was eating lunch at Panera, and that if I was going to have to go home, change, take care of the dogs, and then I could come in.  But it's too late now, I'm an idiot for believing her, and I'm stuck now.  At least I'll get money for Monday's half day.  The next morning, phone rings at 8am: she's still sick and needs to go to the doctor, can I come in and work today and I can have off tomorrow?  No.  It's Wednesday.  I haven't seen Dave for more than two hours in three weeks.  I am not coming in.  And besides, didn't you leave early yesterday so you could go see the doctor?  And why would I work a full day and take tomorrow off?  I can take today off and I only have a half day tomorrow.  No dice, MM.  So, when I waltz my happy ass in at two on Thursday, guess what's waiting for me: a nice, thick Corporate write up from CM, another site write up from MM, and the explanation is: I'm slipping up and not faxing/delivering the paperwork in a timely manner.  Blank paperwork, may I remind you?  And isn't it funny that these little "learning moments" seem to perfectly coincide with the days I refuse to cover for MM?  But it's okay, right?  Yes, I screwed up, but I have a nice four day weekend to get over it.  So Sunday... niiiiice.  Monday morning, I sleepily text MM to remind her that she's giving me the day off and paying me for the whole thing because I covered for her.  I slide out of bed, pour myself a bubble bath, and am just about dozing off when I get a reply.  No, apparently I don't have the day off.  I'm working from 10-2 because she needs to go shopping in the morning.  Um... what?  But okay, 10-2, I'll work a half day and get a whole day's pay.  Still, it's better than nothing.  So imagine my surprise when, at noon, an email appears from CM announcing an Assistant's Meeting/Training from 2-5:30.  Say what?  I'm working a whole day now?  And MM backpedals.  Wait?  Oh no, you weren't supposed to come in this morning!  Oops, I didn't understand your text.  My bad!  Catch you next time?  So that was two weeks ago, and since I have a wedding this week and have to go out of town, I'm taking off five days so I can see my family over the holiday; therefore, I have to pick up some of MM's days so that we can make it even... even though I've been working this schedule for three weeks and no one's giving me a few extra days off.  So I worked all weekend and today... though MM came in for an hour to bitch and lay on the couch and eat.    Now, as of 3pm, MM is at a manager's meeting with CM, and I am sooooo afraid he's going to tell her to fire me.  I'm hoping not, that he's just called MM in so he can keep her and PBM after the meeting and have it out with the two of them, because just last week as MM moved in with ABD, PBM started up again, informing everyone that ABD is running around and hooking up with other women and MM has no idea about it.  Should be interesting.)

It's just not my day.  I signed leases I shouldn't have signed, misplaced papers I should have filed, lost my phone, etc.  I'm just so off today, and I'm totally blaming it on that damn concussion.

I am just about thirteen seconds away from murdering someone.  A resident, our MG, Dave, my mother, I just don't know.  Thank everything holy that I have a day and a half to figure out what the hell my problem is as of 6pm tonight, and another five days coming up after a four hour shift on Wednesday.  I'm also getting a massage tomorrow at noon, so maybe that'll help.  Oh for god's sake, Corporate is calling again............