The work powers that be decided it was time to remodel.  Not just the store, but the pharmacy as well.  Since times are tough, they decided to give us a mini-remodel for the pharmacy - in other words, just paint, new counter tops, carpet, etc instead of doing all the major structural redos.  First they said they could have a pharmacist come in and stay with them at night to get things done.  Then they decided they were in fact going to move us out of the pharmacy and into a temporary facility in the middle of the store….the box.  The move would take place on a Sunday ( I believe that was the first day they gave us.)  Then Friday night, it became Monday.  From Monday, it went to Wednesday…and we finally moved into the box that night.

The box consisted of metal framework, plywood sheets for the four sides, two cut out doors, and one cut out window.  They took the materials from the cut out and hinged them opening toward the inside of the building to make the doors and window.  The top was wire tacked to the sides.  We forced the crew building this place to put bigger shelving in - and even at that, we had to put double rows on each shelf to fit our inventory on them.  The phones didn’t work properly, the faxes weren’t coming in, the check out machines didn’t work, etc etc etc.  (Did I mention that the company has a work crew that does nothing but remodels - and they were in charge of all that stuff.  All we did was move the contents of the pharmacy when needed.)

We were told we would be boxed up for a week.  Then I took a prescription from one of the carpet layers working on the project and he said they’d be told they had a month to finish the job.  The week turned into eleven days.  Not as bad as it could have been, but if you’d have seen how far behind we were from all the extra work of moving and not being able to work properly out of a tiny place where nothing worked, you’d understand when I tell you it seemed like forever.  A co-worker was complaining and threatening to leave and I finally just turned around and yelled at him to either leave or shut up and actually work because standing around complaining wasn’t moving life forward for him any….I never do that.  He asked Robert to check up on me and make sure I was okay….lol  It was bad.

The day of the move back, they tried to talk us out of it because they hadn’t finished painting, doing the carpet or putting up the shelving…and my boss wouldn’t let them back out.  We moved.  If I had to have paid for the job, I’d have sued.  There were  phone wires coming out of the ceiling, ceiling tiles not laying flush, paint that was streaked and uneven, and the carpet was not in a pattern.  Apparently the installers didn’t know they were supposed to lay it a certain way so rather than having big geometrical shapes on the floor, we have weird patterns of nothing.  In addition to that, we had both registers down, the pharmacists phones were not working, several printers were not working, and the connection for the water machine used to mix prescriptions had been replaced…with the wrong one.  The repair guys weren’t fast in coming to our rescue.  After a week, one register still is not working, the water machine isn’t back up, and we had to have the phones repaired again after there was a phone line that shorted out.

I would think that a company that has a team for it’s own remodels would be able to whip in doing a wonderful job since it’s the same thing over and over.  What would I know though?  I just work here…at least that’s what I keep trying to tell the poor lost people that continue to stand in line with our 4 hour wait times only to be told their prescription isn’t ready yet because the pharmacist has been busy counseling every single costumer in order to comply with the new state law that goes into effect next month rather than working on your prescription.  For whatever reason, they choose to yell at me, the peon, rather than calling their congressman or going to another store.

…and that’s what I’ve done for the last few weeks…aside from attending a concert which I’ll tel you about in another post.  I was extremely close to just walking out on my job many times.  I asked myself why I do this to myself….and this is what I said,

“There ain’t no rest for the wicked.  Money don’t grow on trees.  I got bills to pay I got mouths to feed.  There ain’t nothin’ in this life for free.”

My oldest little brother is getting married Saturday.  I’m going to go, but I feel a bit odd about it.   I don’t know him very much so it’s more out of obligation to my (ex) step mom that I’m going.  She’s always been so good and I know she would love to see the kids.   I’m trying to plan around all the other stuff we’ve got going on.  Thursday night, we’re going to the midnight showing of Star Trek.  Sunday is mother’s day.  Saturday night, my sister is planning to have a cook out.  TBF’s brother may be coming to watch the movie with us and staying the night again (he spent last weekend with us).  There just seems to be more to do than time to do it in. =/

I ran into Moose from Casey and Scotty Comics today. He asked about TBF and it freaked me out a little…lol  I’m not sure why.  I know he reads my site from time to time.  I guess it’s more because I expect people to get wierded out by the age difference.  I feel like they’re thinking, “Uh-huh.  I know what you see in a little 22 year old…”

This woman at work is driving me insane.  Actually, that’s why I was shopping after work and ran into Moose.  I thought it would be best if I took some time to cool off before I went home.  This woman at work doesn’t want to work.  She’s been there forever and knows everyone in town.  She prefers to look busy rather than actually work.  To be honest, I think I might enjoy that too, but I’ve always been too worried to try it.  She has ties to the community that make her a little hard to get rid of.  I am expendable….lol  Today, she decided to take over everything I was doing - or more precisely, everything I finished doing so that I had to take over her job which always seemed to be behind.   I’ve talked to my boss about it.  Well, actually, the guys talked to my boss about it and my boss called me into a private meeting to ask me about it.  He said he talk to her, but it’s not helped.  He also said that I should be more stern and tell her what she needs to do - and keep her away from the drop off window (the job she prefers, but can’t keep up with).  I can’t seem to do it though.  She’s older than me and it seems disrespectful to talk back to her or boss her around.  He said the same thing to the other girl at work, but neither of us can do it….and neither of us think it’s fair that it is left up to us to deal with.  I keep picturing in my head the day that I’ve finally had enough and I begin yelling.  I’m not sure that day is too far away.

Ethan’s math teacher nominated him for Who’s Who Among All-American Scholars. He didn’t tell me, he just left the application on top of my laptop.  I’m a little shocked.  Ethan is a smart smart kid but he’s so not motivated…lol  He makes B’s in her class although she’s well aware he’s not even trying.  He has 0’s in there all the time because he doesn’t want to redo the same kind of math they’ve already done for homework.  He always manages to pull off an okay grade despite that and for some unknown reason, this teacher hasn’t given up on him.  She knows he’s a smart cookie and keeps trying to motivate him.  I hope she succeeds because I sure don’t know how to get him working any more.

hmm….think that’s all of my tidbits for the moment.  Don’t worry though.  There will be more later.

At work the other day, I was running the pick up window. A young girl of about 11 or so came up with her grandmother. The first thing she said was, “You need to color your hair again!” I looked at her to see who she was talking to and she was looking at me!!! I just smiled and winked at her.

Next she says, “I know you! You’re married to Bob the gas station attendant.”

I immediately thought of telling her, “No. You know me from when I was in soft lines helping you find a training bra small enough.”, but I didn’t think her grandmother would find that as amusing as I did. Instead, I just laughed and said, “Nope. Not me. I’m not married.” while her grandmother stood there pretending not to hear the little girl.

I haven’t been online enough to fix my site and there are still some issues.  I also wan to get he forums up although Krieger is still going on.  Turns out I just couldn’t see it with firefox.  I’m off all this week except Tuesday and Thursday (the two days TBF has off.  /boggle)  Hopefully I’ll fix the issues during this time…especially since TBF is going to Abilene tonight and won’t be back until Monday.  Without him as a distraction, I tend to get more stuff done…lol

I’m such a sap.  Tuesdays and Thursdays TBF and Lee go to school leaving just 4 of us techs - 1 that’s still training and 1 that’s been there for a very long time but no longer likes to work.  That leaves 2 of us scrambling to keep up with things and it’s very difficult.  When the other tech went on vacation for a week, I thought I was going to go insane on Tuesdays and Thursday.   I couldn’t do that to them…make them struggle like that.  So I didn’t take the full week off. =/  During the summer, I’ll take a full week.  There will be enough people to cover so I won’t feel bad…and I’ll still have a few days to use as long weekends. =)

Work is driving me insane.  I’m always tired and dread going because there is too much work, not enough people to do it.  Not a new problem, but just really getting to me lately…and not just me.  I think we’re all snippy because we all feel as if we’re doing more than our share - which is true because we don’t have enough people!!!

I think it’s time for me to get my resume in order and start looking for the next big thing.

TBF comes back to work after a break and says, “Something I never thought would happen just did.”  We were all like, “Huh?”  “I was just asked to be a stripper - and they weren’t kidding.” 

Not only did the woman ask him that, she also came back to the pharmacy to ask in front of all of us and to continue on “If you’re too shy, you don’t have to strip down to nothing.  You can leave your boxers on; although it’d be nice if you didn’t.  The girl getting married works at a liquor store and so do several of her friends so we’ll have plenty of alcohol.  What kind do you want?  We’ll get you all liquored up and then it’s show time!  There’ll be like 20 women there all with money.  I’ll have $30 myself.”

He told me later, “Get me liquored up?!?!  Doesn’t she realize I’m a guy and we invented that ploy of getting them drunk and then taking advantage of them?!?”

I was dying laughing and threw him under the bus, “You should do that.  You can get me a good Christmas present!  If you do that once a week, we could get a new computer, a blue ray player, a big screen tv….”  He was NOT happy with my response…lol  Little did he know that my thought was also, “He would never do that.  If he does though, he’s so gone…and those women.  I’d have to kill them all!”

I’m such a bad girlfriend.  My response is always to tell him to go for it.  A girly at school brought him chocolate chip cookies and a cashier at work kept sending people over with her number to give him.  Both times I told him to go for it.  It’s my gut reaction to make sure he knows he has the freedom to leave if something better comes along.  Of course I’m also pouting not wanting him to take them up on their offers and realizing that he’s likely to if I keep pushing him to, but I can’t help it.  =/  I don’t make him cookies and I’m not some cute 20 something.  I’m old and fat with three drama filled children.  Why he continues to stay with me is beyond me…but he does and I’m glad he does.  Other women can just keep wanting him.  I’ll take it as a compliment that they think I have good taste in men…and try not to harrass him too much about it.

calls into work the other day and asks when we’re giving out flu shots.  I told her that we’d already done it.  She asked, “What about ammonia shots?”  The first thing that came to mind was handing out a shot glass filled with ammonia, but rather than saying, ”Sure.  Come on down.  We’ll take care of you!”, my conscience got me and I had to tell her, “They gave those out with the flu shots.  You might try another pharmacy in town.”  Gotta love working at WM. =)

I passed my test!  That’s right, I now have certified buns so some of you can stop pestering….lol  CPhT Naye now. =)

I took my PTCB exam yesterday….and I’m afraid it probably kicked my bootie. =/  I had a test with lots of hospital questions that I didn’t know.  One question was about administering chemo drugs, another about who writes drugs administered on a MAR report, and another about what could make an IV solution cloudy.  I got home and tried to look these answers up in my study book, but couldn’t.  They weren’t in there. =/

I did not have one single question asking about sig abreviations or how to read prescriptions.  I feel pretty confident that I got the math questions right, but that still left about 20 questions out of 90 that I was completely guessing about. =/  In most cases, I could rule out a couple of the answers, but had to guess between the two remaining.  Of those 20, about 5 were complete blind guesses…stuff I had no clue about at all.

If I managed to get all the other questions answered correctly, I’ll pass, but I’m just not very confident about it. =(  That test was hard.  The good news is, I can still take it again if I failed. It’ll just cost me more money. =(

Petey barked at every little noise or shadow.  Around 5AM, I thought I heard someone knocking on my window when Petey woke me up barking.  I had to have been dreaming, but boy did it seem real.  No one was out there of course, but that didn’t matter.  It freaked me out anyway. =/  I’m soooo tired.  I couldn’t sleep past 8AM and I have to close at work tonight.  To ensure I stay sleepy, the rest of the week I work the early shift…lol