admin and anger

to the kind crutch that pointed out that admin i was missing… it had for reasons unexplained remained in draft form… but it is now there where it should be…

admin iii today was interesting. it dealt with the first and the third world in quick succession.

it began with a life-saving gesture for which i am very grateful – my dad delivered my birth certificate to me this morning as the germans needed it for the passport renewal process. thanks

the germans also needed what they call a biometric photo where the picture needs to be a certain sixe, and the head (without any expression on the face) needs to be a very specific size. my picture of a convict-look-alike almost didn’t make it. but eventually they said “we’ll accept it”. thank heavens!

it was a very security concious experience. with metal detectors, thick plate glass between us and them. and the slight uneasy worry that you may have forgotten something that will necessitate you to take more time off and repeat the process… you know. the usual when dealing with paper-pushers-with-power…

right after i got my receipt for my passport “you can collect in 6 – 8 weeks” i went to the iec offices to re-register to vote. cos i moved i need to register for the new ward. so i walked over to the iec office in town, in the paul sauer building.

it felt liked i’d stepped into a different world. suddenly i thought i was in the deepest darkest developing africa. a very tired looking building inside. only semi-helfpul security staff.

and then a “all staff are at a meeting in bellville. sorry.” sign on the door. no indication of course if the meeting was to last 2 hours or 2 days…

a boring afternoon was followed by a fairly nice function at a local hotel. and then a really stupid phone call on the way home on the emergency phone, that got me realy worked up. other unrelated matters circling in my head probably blew it out of proportion, but i was furious afterwards. here’s what happened:

phone rings, and i answer it.

“hello, when you are fetching my guests for the airport transfer?” (note the lack of introduction, or indication of where he is phoning from, or who the guests are)

 

“where are you phoning from? and can you tell me the name of the guests please?”

 

“i’m calling from hotel xyz, and the guests are…. umh… hang on… umh…”

 

“umh…”

 

and then a complete mispronunciation of their (admittedly foreign) surname.

 

i had the clients listed as having been collected 4 hours earlier, and that there flight had left an hour ago. i eventually spoke to the client who advised that he had changed his transfer details with a colleague earlier. and as i was not in the office today, i never knew that.

 

so i called the transfer company, who knew about the changed transfer.

and had outsourced it to someone else.

who hadn’t got there 15 minutes ago as had been booked.

and “he has left their depot now, and will be there in 5 minutes”

 

of course, that was exactly what i needed in today’s frame of mind. it was so unnecessary, because now the client thinks i am useless idiot. i explained it to him, but knowing these clients, he will complain about it. and rightly so, considering he had called our office twice to make sure the later transfer was ok. and then we get let down by a sub-hire…

 

oh well… maybe some sleep will help me.

is it fair?

i had such a crap first part of the day.

 

it started with a call at 06h30 from some clients stuck at the airport. they had been waiting for someone to transfer then to their hotel since 5. i didn’t see them on my transfer sheet, so i told them to take a taxi, and that we would refund them the taxi fare later.

 

after getting a little more sleep i checked up their booking in the system (thanks to computers i can usually do this from home). it seems that my staff member had not inserted the transfer for these clients onto the spreadsheet we have for that purpose.

 

as a direct result of that, she didn’t make their welcome pack either, and as such the clients had no information about their tours that are due to start tomorrow.

 

so i sms’d said staff member, and asked her if a welcome pack had indeed been created.

 

and in the hour that it took her to respond, i managed to work myself up quite impressively. not only was the computer system not co-operating – i couldn’t log onto my work e-mails, only the booking system – which means i needed to get the info, and then send a mail from my home e-mail.

 

and then of course the home e-mail wouldn’t send for some unknown reason. all the while i was running late for donating blood (which they eventually didn’t want because i have a sniffly nose) and for shopping (which i have postponed to tomorrow lunchtime) and for an outing with l.r.

 

eventually i did get a reply from her to say, ”sorry, i didn’t reply, i was in church. i don’t know if i made a welcome pack, i will have to check tomorrow. enjoy your day further”.

 

enjoy your day further.

 

enjoy your day further.

 

4 words that tipped. me. over. the. edge. inside.

 

my sunday morning had been ruined. my day of lying in, resting, relaxing with a book, had been fucked up because she didn’t do a simple thing of loading a transfer into the right place.

 

quite apart from the clients who had been waiting, and didn’t have the information they were expecting.

 

quite apart from the other colleague of ours who was asked to go and see the clients and apologise and refund them.

 

quite apart from the special arrangements i made with the tour company so that they take them tomorrow without the normal documents.

 

quite apart from my morning being ruined because of your ineptitude, i must enjoy my day further??!!

 

i wasn’t enjoying my day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

and that is what got to me – her day goes on like normal, while i clean up. while i do all the grovelling.

 

she did finally call and ask if the office is open today (is it ever open on a sunday?) so she could go in and check if she made the pack.

 

it wasn’t open, of course. and while i do appreciate the fact that she called to see if it was, because it showed that she actually maybe did care, i do wonder if this whole thing troubled her as much as me.

 

and try as i might, it took a very very long time for me to calm down. i tried all sorts of mental techniques. but poor l.r. didn’t enjoy today’s museum visit as much as he could have. and that poor beggar who thought he’d ask a second time after my polite first “no, not today” got an earful with the second, “no not today!”.

 

i know that she made a mistake, and we’re all human. i know that the checks and balances failed somewhere along the line. i know she didn’t mean to.

 

i know i ruined my own day. my whole day.

 

but it is almost like i couldn’t help it. like i was driving myself to be angry, to wallow in self-pity. to keep repeating it in my mind again and again.

 

i know i did everything i could for the clients, and i know that a year from now, it won’t even feature. hell, a month from now it won’t feature.

 

but i think it boils down to what i perceive as the injustice of my day being fucked up, because of the (in-)actions of another person. and that her day is not affected.

 

would it make me feel better if i ruined her day too? if i made her feel guilty? in that moment, probably yes. but not later.

 

so i need to find a way to harness this feeling to make a change for the better in the system.

 

problem is, it doesn’t make my day better, and now it is evening time.

 

and so i will go to bed early, in the hope that i will feel better tomorrow, after a sleep.

 

and maybe it is just an indication of my disillusionment with my current work set-up. i wish i had the answers, it would make life easier.

 

what bugged me today: locking myself out of the house this evening

 

what i learnt today: that a cranberry smoothie is quite yummy

 

what i am grateful for: spare keys at nearby friends, and time with my boet

anger management

i think i have a problem.

i get angry too qickly, too often and i seethe & simmer for too long. (and even though “seethe & simmer” has a fabulous sound to it, it’s not nearly as good in reality…)

i don’t like it, and i don’t like myself like that. and my colleagues certainly don’t like it. i was reminded of it again when i was told that some of my correspondence can be “too aggressive” – which is not the intention at all! occasionally, as an example, when colleagues become impatient at getting an answer from me, which i cannot give until i have heard from a third party, i explain nicely that i am still waiting on an answer. or i explain that i have had a verbal confirmation, but nothing in writing. and i am certainly not going to confirm something in writing if i don’t have it – that would be daft.

when they then continue to nag and nag, and get a senior person to phone, then i become irritated – and may make a comment like, “as the third party is in johannesburg and i am in cape town, i can unfortunately not drive over to their offices to collect the confirmation” – which is then deemed aggressive. but what is one supposed to do?? i have no control over the third person, and i understand that theirclient is getting upset – but what would they like me to do!?

in my position in middle management i sometimes get the feeling that i am stuck in the middle – getting pushed from above and prodded from below – it can be a pretty crappy place to hang out.

anyway – i became very aware of my seething & simmering today (not only because i don’t want it to affect my internal job interview next week) – and took some time out over lunch to read up on anger management. some interesting stuff, and i came back feeling better. (murphy’s law did however dictate that i had a shoddy waiter though… isn’t murphy great…?)

i really thought that coming out would do away with a lot of the angers within me – but maybe it is the job or it’s environment. it is only here that i am really like this.

but apart form this, i’m not sure what to do. i can spend every minute of every day considering exactly how i feel and how i will respond to any stimulus, but will that help? it may help with figuring out the triggers.

i’ll have to try, because i don’t like myself this way.

 

and now – i suddenly have another hour to spend on my own. i was supposed to go grab a bite to eat with a colleague. i didn’t really want to when she asked last week, but i thought it best to keep the peace and hear what she wanted (she’s in the department i may move to). so when tonight she says, “bye!” at 6 instead of, ”come let’s go” i was… surprised. one – that she was cancelling and two – that i was ok with it.

because here’s the rub – should i be glad that i am out of this? – for now, as it will be postponed – thereby lengthening the period to when it is over. or should i be pissed off on principle, as she should have told me sooner – i did after all make plans around this fact.

and as many of you will know, i am a very principled person.

what bugged me today: i, myself

what i learnt today: a little about anger management

what i am grateful for: an hour to myself

go team!

last night was an interesting evening on the stage. or more precisely, behind the stage.

our lead actor somehow forgot / didn’t realise that we had a show last night. i might have called earlier, knowing his time-keeping skills, but when i did call him at 45 minutes to curtain-up, he was about to sit down to dinner. he still argued with me about whether there was a show when i asked him where he was…

anyway, we all pulled together beautiully – a true team effort. the school kids blocked a parking bay for him (after i moved my car out of it), we had someone looking for shirts for him in case he would forget his, i calmed the lead actress down and asked her to take him aside when he arrives and help him get in character.

oh, and in between all this, my dad was begged to bring their iron, as the backstage one was not getting mother’s dress pressed… he is a hero!

at 15 minutes to curtain up he arrives. with girlfriend – who is promptly encouraged to take a seat in teh auditorium (no further distractions needed…) and the show went on as planned.

it was quite remarkable actually. it struck me while i was sitting backstage in the dark waiting to press the doorbell for one of the actors’ entrances, that i was incredibly calm.

i had been so stressed at work over stuff, angry in fact. but here i had handled this situation without a scream, shout or even angry thought. ok, a mildly angry thought, followed by a quickly-retracted demand of cake by the late-comer the next day. i still don’t understand why this didn’t topple me when other stuff does.

maybe because i know the team is so good and pulls together when we need to.

gosh, this is fun

 

what bugged me today: leaving my clock-in card and desk key at home…

what i learnt today: that talking things through after a fight can make it better

what i am grateful for: going for a motorbike ride, to an overnight stay with a great friend. next friday. only 9 more sleeps…