What happened to my quiet time?

I can’t think in the mornings. To start out with, I am not a morning person. It is odd because since the time change Sunday, I’ve been waking up at 4:30, what would have been 5:30, which is earlier than I normally got up anyway.

The upside is that I can usually get to work early for some morning OT. The down side is that I start to drag long before lunch hour.

When we first moved to this new building, those of us who started at 7:30 had a very quiet office to work in. It was a peaceful start to get a jump on a productive day. Now it is a loud, noisy, bustling place at 7:30 am. It is annoying, distracting, and makes it impossible to get a good jumpstart on the day.

It doesn’t help that all the new people ever hired to replace anyone or to build up the numbers in the unit to deal with increasing business have all wanted to start at 7:30. So 8:00 people left and were replaced with 7:30 people. This doesn’t help the afternoon when we need coverage for the last half hour of the day. The newest hire wasn’t given a choice.

This is why I try to get to work extra early, so I can get my quiet time back. I need that peace to get my brain in gear before the distractions start, if I don’t then the distractions keep me from working as I want to. I find myself staring at the monitors trying to find that place of stillness and peace and balance from whence all effectiveness flows.

The unit next to us now is a recovery unit who are on the phones nearly as often as my unit. The problem is that most of them get to work even earlier than us. Some mornings they are working in silence and other mornings they are loud and boisterous. This means that even if I get to work early I can’t find my peaceful, quiet, time that gives me that edge the remainder of the day.

It doesn’t help that we are now using a TPA that is so bad that half of our complaint calls are all about them and 100% of the calls about the TPA are complaint calls. It is so stressful anymore that I dread opening a file and seeing the name that indicates the file went to the TPA. It’s enough that I’m contemplating job hunting and I really don’t want to do that. I’m finally making a decent wage and I don’t want to have to start over again at a starting wage.

If only I had my peace and quiet in the mornings once again and maybe I would have my equilibrium in place before the day started. But maybe even that would no longer help. I don’t rightly know anymore. I just have to take it one day at a time.

Weather I Love

It was cool and dark all weekend.  I turned off the air and opened the window and aired out the apartment.  It was wonderful. 

 Yesterday started out cool and foggy.  The kind of fog in which you can see a long string of tail lights ahead but still feel isolated from the reality of the world.  It ended up reaching nearly 90.  The ‘feels like temp’ was over 90.  Strange for what started out so surreal and pleasant.

 Today is dark.  Very dark.  The rain started to pour down like mad just a few minutes ago.  I love this weather.  The clouds turn noon to night.  (okay, technically it is 10:08 am)  The horrible humidity and heat of summer is washed away in the torrential rain.  Flickers of light offer amazing visual effects in the clouds.  There is very little thunder right now.  So the lightning must be fairly far away.

 I love this weather.  I’ve been known to go standing in it and fling out my arms and twirl in the rain like a little girl.  I love it until the hail starts.  I can live without that. 

 I keep telling people I would do well in Seattle.  Just as long as I don’t have to drive.  Driving in that city is nightmare.  Worse.  I actually enjoy some of my nightmares.  The ones that don’t involve people I know.  It’s like watching a scary movie in my mind. 

 Our company is a national company but all the offices are in one place.  I really wish we had offices in other cities.  It would be great if I could go to Seattle but still work for this company.  I keep peeking at the jobs.  I don’t really have any intention of trying to find a new job and movie.  It’s the time of economy where you hold on to your job with both hands because at least it is a known quantity and stable.

 Still, I’m enjoying the view of the storm out the front door.  Not that I see much of the sky.  There is a short building across the road and across the alley from that a taller apartment building of red bricks, then a stretch of dark grey sky.  In the middle of this is a bright glowing orb.  It is the light for the stairwell.  With it so dark outside that we had to turn it back on. 

 Since I started jotting this, it has gotten even darker out.  It looks like 4:30 pm in the middle of winter.  I like the dark.  It seems peaceful and calming after a brutal summer.  By February I’ll be begging for the sun again.  But for now, I will enjoy the dark storms.