Stream of Unconsciousness

Yesterday was a little rough at work. From the time I got there, things were busy and hectic. A long strip of wiring encased in rectangular plastic tubing had fallen off the wall/ceiling in the night and when I walked in, it stretched across the office like a fallen tree or police tape at a crime scene. I tried several times to reattach it to the wall using various methods and materials, to no avail. Additionally, The Boss has a close family member who is terminally ill, and their family had received some bad news, adding a layer of tension to a pre-existing ball of stress and nervous energy.

The phones kept ringing and distractions erupted continually. There were some important clients coming in for a meeting and everyone was bustling about and getting things ready. I was doing my best to go about my normal duties, as well as trying to learn to navigate the phone system and the various hold-transfer-voicemail-hang-up options therein. Somewhere in there I jammed the copy machine, and minutes before the clients arrived I moved a box, in the process knocking an expensive bottle of red wine to its dramatic demise on the tile floor. “Deep breath in, deep breath out. Repeat as necessary…” I kept telling myself.

My good friend Carolyn was in town in the middle of the day and wanted to meet me for a lunch/coffee break. I haven’t seen her since December and wanted to so badly, but I had to call and cancel. By 5:30 I realized all I’d had to ‘eat’ all day was a latte and a few crackers, which was…insufficient.

Finally I finished my work for the day and headed out to the company van that I was borrowing for the evening. Remembering that nobody else would be home that night, I decided to call my good friend Ashley, whose week-old son I still hadn’t met yet. Due to some weird dietary restrictions, it was decided that I would pick up some chicken and head over for a non-dairy/tomato/cabbage/fill-in-the-blank dinner. It should have taken me about 20-25 minutes to get to her house. Instead it took 1.5 hours. Many factors contributed: ridiculous traffic, tricky streets downtown that I don’t know very well yet, one grocery store that had run out of chicken, and the difficulty of maneuvering/changing lanes in the enormous molester-style work van. Anyway, at long last I did get to spend a very nice evening with Ashley and her two kiddos before driving home and collapsing into bed.

Today was much better. I ate lunch! And tonight I watched the Colbert Report with my mom- she didn’t like it- and brother and his girlfriend. Then I went to Target (oh, glory) and bought some soap and lotion and stuff. It was great. The End.