Was pretty good. I got together with joshuwain and feezlekahn over at their place for dinner and a movie. I decided to make meatloaf and mashed potatoes, and the meatloaf turned out pretty damned good for something I'd not made in 15 or so years. It needed more salt and pepper, mostly. Next time. :)

We watched 'The Golden Compass' and my opinion was... Migod, the editor needs to die. Seriously. From what I was told, something like 50+ minutes were summarily lopped out of the film, and the editor fired to bring in another guy who tried to cut it like an action film! The result? A choppy, confusing film that DESPERATELY needed more meat to the story. Grr. I hate stupid people.

I got home around 9, and ended up with a nasty headache. I dozed on the couch a little bit, then dosed with aspirin and crashed for an hour. It subsided mostly, then I was off to work. For those that were wondering, I stayed offline cos I REALLY had to work on the 7th Seas writeup for the last run. I've gotten it about half done, and hopefully I'll finish it before Sunday.

I'm also contemplating overtime this week to start building the cash I'll need for MFF. I have $600, and I fugure I need $800 more so I have the transport costs covered plus enough to have a solid good time on. Anything extra will pay for Xmas. :)

Now I'm home and have just had leftover meatloaf and hash browns. Yay!

I have to work tonight, Midnight to 6 AM (or 6:30) and tomorrow from 4 PM to Midnight. So naturally, I can't sleep. Tonight is at Whitney Mills, like it was supposed to be LAST night- I found out that the guard that was supposed to be there for me to relieve DIDN'T go to another account- he just LEFT. Oy. So tonight and two days this weekend I'll be pulling that shift. Tomorrow and Wednesday is at Baker Center for training. I don't think I wanna be there though, so Thursday I'm going to go into the office and put some bids in at other accounts- something I should have done weeks ago, but only found out that I COULD two weeks back.

As it stands now, my hours at Baker will be Midnight-8AM, Monday-Friday. Or Sunday-Thursday, I'm not sure. And the Whitney Mills thing is also slightly uncertain- either Friday and Saturday 12-8 or Saturday and Sunday, same hours. I'll call and confirm it Thursday, or talk to Brandy when I'm in the office to put in the bids.

The next two days (nights?) are going to SUCK.

I will begin with the much-repeated statement that I HATE stupid people. That being said, I'm at home now when I should be at a 6-hour special shift at the Whitney Mills building.

I left the house at ten-after-eleven, as I didn't know for sure where the account was at, and didn't have an address. I had a very good idea where I was going tho. I did end up calling the comm center, and they'd fortunately gotten the address. I got there a good half-hour early, and...

The doors were locked.

And there was nobody there. There was SUPPOSED to be a guard that I was to relieve.

I called the comm center, and it turns out that the guy had left early for another account! So, I'm there, my celphone is minutes from dying for lack of battery power, and I'm waiting for the comm center to get ahold of a manager.

They tried both the managers involved, and neither would respond to pager/phone/email. So, it devolved to me to make a decision. I chose to go home, because this was stupid. The comm center has the record of what happened, and the fault should drop squarely into the laps of the managers.

Feh. At least I get to be home tonight.

Well, tonight I was supposed to start at my new account, LaSalle Plaza in downtown Minneapolis. Last week I'd first been told that I'd be going to Sibley Square in downtown St. Paul, but then Carol, from the ASC office called and told me that I'd actually be starting at LaSalle, 2300-0700 Thursday to Monday, with my first day being today. I didn't like the screwy days, but I couldn't really refuse, so I accepted. I tried calling for the address and details on Thursday, and neither her nor Mr. Preston, her superior were returning my calls for whatever reason.

So I called today, getting their machines again. I also called another ASC Supervisor, Torrey, who I was working with on the Holiday Inn East Special. I'd been accidentally shorted 3 days of vacation pay and I needed to get that sorted. I DID get ahold of him, and he said he'd get the pay fixed with Carol. It was him that called back soon thereafter to tell me I WASN'T at Lasalle. Nice that Mr. Preston and Carol dropped it in HIS lap to pass on to me.

So, because of Torrey I will be working at least some this week, Wednesday and Thursday night back at the Holiday Inn East. Also, the latest 'news' is that I may be going to an account downtown called Baker Center... But there is NO confirmation on that.

So I'm awake, as I'm queasy a bit (not for any work reasons, stuff is just disagreeing with me) and for the last few days I've been having trouble sleeping... Again. As if shit wasn't annoying enough. If this doesn't fucking well get resolved ASAP, I'm going to the union and filing a petition of grievance against the company. They pulled me out of Campbell Mithun 6 fucking WEEKS ago. I goddamn well should have something permanent again by now!

I really, really hate this. :P But am I worried? Not really. What I am is pissed off.

A quiet night at work, followed by me getting the primer-coat done on the garage doors. Yay! Next for today is waffles, then bed. The AC is on too- bloody humidity is killing me. :P

Oh- and I HATE working with oil-based paints. The cleanup is miserable.

I got the background check stuff for the new posting... If I stay here, I'll actually have a low-level security clearance! I also talked to one of the guards there, who pointed out some things I could do to make sure I actually get an appropriate account INSTEAD of it. Its in the union contract- I can bid to get specific posts when they come available! So there IS a little light at the end of the tunnel, and it ain't the train!

This whole situation is still bullshit, but maybe its getting better.

I just got woke up from a sound sleep by one of the managers at work. Good news and bad news- Good, there's an account for me. Bad, its Monday-Friday on second shift, with weird hours, in St. Paul. She told me that if I refused what they offered me it could be construed as a 'voluntary resignation', and I could be out of work. I said I'd take it, but I wasn't happy. I called the site manager, and he was a fair bit more helpful, telling me that it wouldn't be an issue getting me back on third shift in the near future somewhere. However, the position actually doesn't open up til the 15th. So, next week would just be 3 days of training.

Now, right now I feel terrible, mostly from being overtired and the adrenalin-surge from waking up by being startled (the reason why I sometimes turn that fucking phone off!), but also because I'm kinda screwed. I called the union, and the rep there said to take the posting, but get something in writing stating that I want something third shift to ASC, so there's a record.

After that, the manager from ASC called again, saying that there was a post open in Minneapolis, but it was three days (Friday-Sunday) on second shift, two days on night shift (Monday-Tuesday). This would strip away my getting together for gaming, AND its a swing-shift... AND I'd have to take a $1 an hour pay-reduction! This last is bullshit, as with the union they CAN'T reduce my pay-rate regardless of the account. I've done a swing before, and they eat you alive over time. So I turned it down and I'm sticking for now with the first posting.

I mentioned to her that I was originally planning to take next week off if I could, and she talked with the site manager, and so next week I'm off. I'll train the following week, then I'll start the actual post the week after that. Notably, I'm NOT happy. Its going to run me in the order of $160 a month in gas alone to commute to this, and the hours frankly suck.

As soon as possible, I'm outta there. I have to run out to the account on Monday to fill out a background-check form...

Its so nice to be punished for having been sick. As I mentioned in a previous post, that's why I was pulled from my last permanent post, because they thought I was sleeping. This year just gets better and better. :P

As I mentioned before, I'm working a Special at the Holiday Inn East in St. Paul through next week. Well, last night reminded me just exactly WHY I don't ever want a permanent posting in a hotel!

At just before 4 AM, while the night manager was on a smoke break I got a call- "Is there security here?" "Yes, you're speaking to him." "Well, come to 5the floor- someone is beating on my door!"

I got the manager back to the desk and headed up. What I found was... Impressive. A pudgy, naked man, clutching a towel that was WAY too small to cover anything, was pounding away on the door of the suite!

I asked if there was a problem, and got belligerence as a response. WOW. He was DRUNK. After about a minute of his abuse I called down to the desk with a simple message: "Okay, call the police please."

AS she called the cops on nature boy, he stopped pounding on the door and wandered down the stairwell. I followed after I was sure there would be distance between him and me. He apparently found one of his roommates, and they were talking. His friend was trying to talk him down somewhat, with little success.

With my appearance, his friend tried to say that things were cool... But I told him that the cops were coming already. With that, Nature Boy went outside, still nekkid but for the towel. Me and the roommate followed, and the pair talked while I stood back and watched.

The police arrived shortly thereafter, and nature Boy wasn't arrested, IF he behaved himself and stayed in his room. He went, escorted by the police, then they left and we had peace. But it wasn't to last.

Nature Boy and his friend came back down and were wrestling in the parking lot! Not violent, just screwing around. I checked and found that they weren't being a REAL problem, and let it go. But it didn't end there.

I went on my round, delayed because of the incredible waves of STUPID flowing about, and when I got back down to the desk, there was nature Boy, this time with pants (he had pants when he was wrestling out with his friend), trying to drunkenly talk up the night manager!

Mostly from then til the end of the shift was just fending off a half-naked dumbass. Some people's kids. :P

Well, I'm working again. Unfortunately, this is just what's called a Special: a temporary posting that is short term. I'm working at the Holiday Inn East which is right on the border of St. Paul and Mounds View, which for me is about a half-hour drive.

Its not a bad account, really, but there's a lot of walking and I'm less doing security and more acting as a gofer. I'm here through next week, working Monday-Thursday this week and Sunday-Thursday next. Hopefully they'll have a permanent posting for me thereafter... Closer to home, I hope!

I wasn't able to have my laptop last night, on the off chance that they might give a damn- but I'll have it tonight and through the end of the job as far as I know. Hell, I might even be able to get online!

And I slept like the dead- a solid 8 hours... AFTER I kicked Spaz out of the room. :P

On Wednesday, I got my hair cut. As it was halfway to the folks place anyway I also decided to drag my old, busted lawnmower out there because dad wants to try and fix it. I'd kinda rather get a new one, but hes insistent. Anyway, I got there and they insisted on me having dinner with them. I refused at first, then gave in and chowed down. Thereafter I headed home, stopping for comics.

Here's where it starts to get fun.

I started feeling slightly queasy and having bodyaches relatively soon after getting home. I ignored it because I've been achy in general from mowing the lawn and the walking I do at work anyway. When I got to work, I was definitely not feeling good- wrung out, joint pain and fatigue, and an upset stomach. When I wasn't staggering through a round I was witting, holding my head in my hands.

Eventually the night ended. I got home, and had what I thought was the onset of diarrhea- it wasn't, and I went to bed. I tossed and turned, having alternate chills and sweats, til the phone rang- It was the office from work. They told me that I shouldn't come in to work tonight (Thursday), and that I should come to the office tomorrow (Friday) at 8:30 to discuss matters of things from my account. I think that it was that they thought I was sleeping, because of my holding my head the way I was.

I wouldn't have been in anyway, because thats when the diarheea DID hit. The joint pain was a lot worse, and I spent the next few hours curled in my chair. Eventually, because I didn't want to go through what I have in the past when I've gotten sick like this, I made an appointment to see the doctor at 7 PM.

ataramos kindly drove me in, and after some minor directional snafu's (mine and the nurse who gave me directions' fault), we got there.

As it turns out, it was bacterial food poisoning. I think the fever broke last night, but since I got back from the appointment, all I've had to eat or drink is gatorade. When I pick up my prescription for Cipro I'll get some jello-cups. I do feel better, but I have to sort things with work still too. I didn't go to the meeting (I informed him yesterday that I was ill and might not be in), but I have to rearrange things to get this worked out.

It seems like every time I've gotten things working again, some other stupid shit happens. :P