One Bad Day

6:20 am: Wake up
7:30 am: Ashland, my cat, pukes while up on the table. Said puke gets all over a knitting swatch (thank got not a real project), bills and receipts. All goes into the trash.
8:00 am: Show up for crappy drug testing policy class at the county shops. Feel guilty that I'm in a very bad mood and don't feel like going upstairs to see my old coworkers
9:30 am: Class over, walk over to my boss's office to figure out what he wants me to do the rest of the day. My hours today are supposed to be 1:30-10pm. But now I've got 1.5 hours on the clock in the morning. The boss's options were:

• Have me do a "shop day," which basically means work 8-5 at the county shops doing....who knows. Whatever they come up with. Work the parts room, take cars for oil changes, wash cars, shuffle papers. Oh Joy. I dread the shop day.
• Go home and show up at work at 1:30, getting 1.5 hours of overtime--which so far they're not allowing for the trainees
• Go home and show up at work at 3, so I only do my typical 8 hours.

The boss gave me the option of overtime or show up at 3. Since I was in the throes of PMS and first day period agony, I opted to come to work at 3.
10 am: Arrive home, gather two hot pads, cup of coffee, chocolate, knitting, remote control and blanket and curl up on the couch.
10:02 am: spill coffee
10:03 am: spill coffee
10:05 am: spill coffee
10:06 am: cry over spilled coffee, while wiping off my computer, phone, and knitting.
2:10 pm: My burrito gets screwed up at Chipotle. Ate anyway.
3:00 pm: Show up at work and proceed to drive like crap for the rest of the day. Now, this takes some explaining. When water levels are low, below about 10 feet (measured at a gauge in Salem), you just drive, using the throttles to drive the boat into the ramp. When water levels are high, you have to use "the cables" (also called "the winch") to give you more leverage to turn and angle the boat. Using the cables is like driving a totally different boat. TOTALLY DIFFERENT. In the last month that I've been working, I've had to use the cables maybe a total of 3 days. Right now, water levels everywhere are high. I mean, hell, the Columbia is at flood stages! The Willamette is at 12.7 feet, and will be 13.5 tomorrow. It was 9 feet a week ago! That's a big difference. Driving the boat is so very different with the cables, I truly drove like a full on newbie all over again. It was embarassing. It was frustrating. Since I was pms-y, it made me want to cry. Additionally, I was working with D, someone I haven't worked much with. He intimidates me a bit, and I really don't want to come off as "the girl," and therefore stupid about boats and this boat in particular. Super sucky.
5:30 pm: Go on my lunch break, proceed to whine via email and text to several people (sorry. Blame the pms)
7:15 pm: Another something that takes a bit of 'spaining. Especially in high water, the boat rattles at full speed. The term for this rattling is "cavitating." Basically it's the upstream propeller, rattling a bit in it's housing. It causes the entire boat to rattle a bit. Usually you just notice a heightened noise. Sometimes it rattles enough that the safe, which is on the floor, to swing open. We don't lock the safe during the day (there's nothing in there, don't get any ideas!). This has happened before, and I've always noticed it and swung it shut and latched it. Keep in mind it's on the floor, and about a foot or so high. Yup. It swung open, I didn't see it, and I moved to go take toll, and slammed my shin and knee into the 10+ lb solid metal safe door. Much cursing, hot angry tears, foot stomping, kicking of safe door, ensued. D was sympathetic, and tried to go get the toll for me. I wouldn't let him (proving I'm tough?) and walked out to take toll from a regular. She had a ferry card, which gets swiped. I tried 3 times and couldn't get her card to read (all the while, keep in mind, I'm seeing red, my leg throbs and I'm barely holding back tears). Finally, she looks at me and says, "You're holding the card upside down, dear." I look at her and mumble that I just rammed my leg into something, and get out of there as fast as I could. Damn it, sympathetic people get me every time. I stepped into the cabin and cried. :( I got over it damn fast. Apologized like crazy to D, promised him that I've had my meltdown and was now better, and did my best to prove myself right.

The rest of the night was decent. But still super sucky. Late night, we had cars until after closing, so I didn't leave until 10:10. that's a f'ing long day!

So goes the tale of Cap'n Jenny's no good terrible very bad day.