One good thing...

Sometimes it takes just one good thing to happen to make a whole day worth it. Today was a read dud right from the start. So many things went wrong at work and once the trend started it was all downhill from there. BUT...then I got the email! The immigration attorney emailed me the .pdf file of the receipt for the immigration paperwork that Alexander and I submitted. It's the first small step in this long intricate journey. Basically, all it means is that the paperwork was received at the Processing Center in California. That's all. But it's just the visual confirmation that it's on it's way and so are we.

Up until that moment I had a head ache that was verging on full mental explosion. I go that email and it was all clear to me that there are more important things than what goes on at work. And life is good.

Oi, me achin' head....

So last night Alex and I decided to have a quiet night at home. We rented a couple of movies. "Tropic Thunder" with Ben Stiller, Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. I have to admit I laughed out loud at this one. Robert Downey Jr. in particular was funny as hell as the Oscar winning "method" actor from Australia who gets pigment changing treatments in order to play an African American Viet Nam soldier. Not very PC but the dialogue between him and the real Afircan American actor is priceless. The other movie we rented was "The Strangers" with Liv Tyler. This is a truly frightening film and if you like scary movies this is one to rent. We'd seen it in the theatre when it was released but it was just as scary the second time around.

Alex made a fantastic dinner - gnocchi with a great mushroom and onion sauce! We had many, many drinks. Too many to mention...really. All I can say about that is the amount of vodka consumed made playing Super Mario Kart on the Wii a truly funny experience. I ended up driving off the courses into the water or off a cliff over and over again. I think I was dead last in almost all the races we did.

The evening ended with us pretty much falling into bed, still laughing and fast asleep before we knew it. It was nice enough to have the window open a bit which was great! I love sleeping with the window open! And frankly, after all that vodka I needed the fresh air!

This morning my vision is a little blurry and my head is throbbing a bit but it was worth it. I had a great time just being silly and having fun. I don't know if Alex faired so well but I'm sure whatever he remembers of it will be good memories! Haha!

Was that a freight train?

Jeebus, I feel like I've been hit by a train. I dragged myself out of bed, got dressed and off to work. "Off to work" sounds like I sprinted which isn't necessarily the case. I crawled to work. I'm sitting here now in my office, one of only two people in the whole building, and all I can think is "OY! My aching head!"

I've already cancelled a meeting this morning and it's only 7:30am. This does not bode well for the rest of the day.

Please speak quietly and don't make any fast moves. Thank you....

Deep thoughts...

Today at work I was hit smack in the face by an emergency of the fiscal kind right when I walked in the door. That, of course, gave me the head ache from hell.

First, let me say, I am a social worker. I do social work. If I wanted to be an accountant I would have paid more attention to Mrs. Law in math class. I didn't so I am a social worker. The agency I work for is contracted to do social work by a large Care Management Organization which has an enormous fiscal department that should be able to handle the fiscal end of things. We have contracted with this CMO since last February and so far every single fiscal fiasco that happens somehow ends up in my lap to fix. The fact that they are relying on me for this should scare the crap out of them. What I do is supervise case management. The fiscal activity for that involves us doing our jobs and submitting a bill to them - the end. Last month, my case management unit billed $120,000 worth of case management revenue for the agency. Today we got our payment from the CMO. They paid only $39,000. They listed case by case those hours they denied payment for and sent it to my boss. So, of course, he brought it to me. I spent all morning checking the billing system and none of the reasons they gave made any sense. I then spent the next two hours on the phone with someone in the fiscal office trying to make sense of it. She couldn't make sense of it either. I then took it to her supervisor who also failed to make sense of it. By three o'clock I had spent the entire day immersed in numbers - adding, subtracting, multiplying, and tearing my hair out. In the end, all that was agreed was that there was a problem somewhere. I could have told them that in the first ten minutes and saved myself the migraine.

I am a social worker. I just want to do social work. And it's getting the point where the more of this fiscal crap I have to deal with the more I want to just walk away.

I am a social worker. That's all.