A This and That Kinda Work Day

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Hmm... oh yeah Mornin! We slept pretty good last night and woke up at a respectable hour. Walked through the J-land Garden and saw many blossoming/petaled words of love and wisdom. *Sigh* Right on target for the day!

Yesterday was a pretty good day. I like going into the office late sometimes, though it drives my time clock kitty bonkers. She KNOWS what’s supposed to happen each day. The drive was a lot zippier at 9 am rather than 7 am too. You know at 9, you can get up to like 40-45 mph!? In the morning it’s a slow 10-15 if lucky. Won’t complain though ... I cherish the half hour it takes to get there. I’m probably the only one that likes to sit in traffic. It’s our time to think/drift and sip coffee. Ahh ... Nothin is expected of us, but to sit and point the car straight. Can’t go wrong with that!

It seemed well into the day and we still hadn’t done anything we could of guessed we were going to do. The first task (beside opening the windows - fresh morning air is the best!) was to go through our mail. I think Sr. Tess takes great pride in adding at least 2-3 things in there each day. *Sigh* That’s the cool part of having a staff, I guess? LOL

I addressed the fact that the mail contained our Annual Staff survey and 6 month personal review. Hehe - Generally, Sr. doesn’t care for people to sit on her tasks, so I set off to complete it right away. As in every other writing venture, I tend to write volumes and often go past the 3-4 lines alotted. It’s only once a year you are requested to make comments on your work place and boss.

The other documents require a bit of soul searching. I figure that the quality of my work is very good, but although I wear dresses daily, I’m on the bottom of the well-dressed staff list. Something about needing more than 6 changes of clothes and holy tennis shoes (that doesn’t mean religious). Sr. and us battle this fact each year. Shoot, why should I waste good money when she only dresses in 1) A white/gray summer dress, or 2) a black dress. Hmm? She scolds, I bow my head in shame and say I’m sorry, I’ll do better. But, I suppose it’ll just carry on over the next 5 years too ... It’s one of our eccentricities.

As far as critiquing her ... we were pretty honest and forthright. I thinkyou’d all be pleased with us. We told her (pretty clearly too) about not being able to talk to her when she was angry or overwhelmed. We also told her that we felt we disappointed her with our work in general and particularly with this last CARF survey, even though we had thought our work was better. This included not saying thank you or good job. Stuff like that. I didn’t make a copy before handing it to her. I also told her that we liked better to ask for help when we needed it, rather than be "managed."

I didn’t have any indication she’d read it yet. Maybe. I think most people want to know right away what was written about them. I handed it in with another document. I’m pretty sure it will have been read by at least this morning. I hope she remains calm enough to sit down and go over it with me. Told her I liked it when she did that kind of stuff too.

The next task that befell me was that Sr. had decided to make arrangements for the Thinking Group while I was taking care of surgery stuff. She is going to have one of our OT (Occupational Therapists) come in. So we took some time to set up the curriculum and group priorities.

Hehe - and we told him of the behavior problems too. Like nip that one’s excessive laughing, these two will cry, that one will sit to close to this other one. This other will continue to talk excessively by repeating the question, "Do you know why?" That sort of stuff. I’ve general rules how to be keeping things in check.

Since we got in at 9:30, by this time we were already up to the client’s lunch. I had to be called up front, because I’d forgotten, then after I got there, I became very dizzy and confused. Sr. recognized it though and hustled me out of the client’s lunchroom to be getting orange juice. Part of being a diabetic. So, we sat out the half hour and answered phone and doors instead.

The next thing that prioritized itself was a call from the high school that refers most of the new clients to us. That put back in memory the new state rules, we’d just been told about during the Friday Administration meeting. We had "inadvertently," yes that works, put them on the bottom of our pile of things to do.

There had been a big South-side Chicago meeting the day before that Sr. And our friend had attended. Usually, me and one other lady over at the school (she’s become a good friend) handle the transition for the individuals and their parents, but I knew this new stuff was over our head and involved changing the procedures of their school psychologist and the Universities Psychiatrist, and more. So we made arrangements for our boss to talk to her boss.

Thing was when we got to our boss, she said that I should look over the 16 pages of information on the changes and be ready to talk with her on a 3-way call to our PAS agent (middleman between the state and the providers- Our Center is a provider). So, that sort of set-up the rest of the day type project.

There was one other matter that came first though. I had to take care of an incident with one of our male clients inappropriately trying to lift up the shirt of one of our female clients. There were two DSPs involved and the two clients. Happened that the male client’s psychological report came in that morning, so it took some time to get through all that. We’re still missing about three hours though, not sure what happened there.

Just know that the last three hours was deciphering the issues that involved receiving new clients to the service. It also included re-determination issues that will now be done annually for all clients. The material was real hard to get through because it involved odds and ends copies of a couple of manuals we’re not familiar with and other odd assortments of things. It was a terrible job of communication, whether it had come from the middleman or the state. A page of this and a page of that all mixed together and not everything matched up. I would have never, never let something this sloppy go out that would represent "our work." Just a mish-mash.

So, in the process of trying to understand it, I rewrote the parts that were relevant to our needs. Of course, it is all relevant actually, but as far as which tests the psychologist or psychiatrist are now going to have to do ... I left that part be, we will send them the original pages. It took me three pages to condense what I believe is to be the new procedure and write out the questions that remained. Afterward, I printed out on the other Q’s printer ... (still no cable service!) And left a copy in Sr. Tess’s mailbox.

We’re pretty sure, she’ll value this one, because I knew when she handed the project over to me, she had a good general idea of what was happening, but the specifics weren’t clear to her either. Sometimes she gets so frustrated, she gets lost on the first 2-3 sentences of poorly written documents. Most documents including legal ones, she gets through without assistance. Like we said this one was terrible!

Oh yeah, she didn't seem angry at us for having done the "Benchmark" schedule.  She's using it differently than how I would have, but it's ok - she can do her part as she see's fit!  At least she doesn't appear to be angry at me or my part!!!  :)

Aynway ... that’s about it for that day. Had a Icey on the way home ... that part is very important for our very patient younger parts. Cuz, really how exciting can procedures work be if it weren’t up to you to be following it?!

Have a terrific day out there ... just think we’re only at the beginning of a brand new day!!

Picture - http://www.michaelmccumber.com/pictures/coastal-maine01/