contract madness!

Subtitled: Are we having fun yet, or should we just go fling ourselves out of the bathroom window right this second before another disaster hits??

This is the third day I’ve been back from my wonderful, long, relaxing vacation. Have I accomplished, oh, anything at all? Why, no, of course I haven’t! Day One was the frantic arrangements for the supervisor meeting that I ended up handling as my boss was out. Not that she could help that, of course. Yesterday was the meeting itself, which I wasn’t expecting to have to attend, but then in a moment of pity I made the mistake of asking New Boss if she’d like me to go with her. She certainly did like that idea. I ended up being there all day long. That meeting was technology training for the student teacher supervisors, who don’t have much of a grasp on technology and who really really REALLY need to become a little more competent as we try to forge boldly into whatever century we’re supposed to be in now. They are all circa the 16th or so.

So the whole day went mostly like this:

Tech Guy: Click on that little red dragon on your desktop that says Mozilla.

Chorus of Frantic Elderly Supervisors: WHAT??? What’s that?? What’s Mozilla??  What does that mean????? Why do you want us to use that??  What’s wrong with the big blue E one!!!???

Tech Guy: Well, I think you should use Mozilla instead of Explorer. I just think it’s a better browser. 

(note how Tech Guy obviously does not understand that when you are dealing with Frantic Elderly Supervisors who have all been deeply involved in the public schools for 30 or so years, you do not EVER say anything that is not black and white. You speak only in language that is clear, precise, unambiguous black and that is clear, precise, unambiguous white. You never, never, NEVER use any language that can be construed in shades of grey.)

 Chorus of Frantic Elderly Supervisors: But WHY do you want us to use that?? Why is it better?? What’s wrong with the big blue E one???? Is something wrong with that one? Will it not work??? But I use it all the time!!! Will my computer DIE???

It was a very very very long day.

The only thing saving my sanity was that Tech Guy and Tech Guy’s assistant started talking about Facebook and how they both have accounts and how lots of staff and faculty here have accounts and how it’s a great tool for staying in touch, so during the long long long day I made myself a Facebook account. And looked up everyone I could think of. Both our student workers have one, and I had to nearly suffocate myself to keep from bursting into laughter when I read one’s occupation: Office Slave! I also found my cousin’s kid who is a college freshman, and now he’s my friend. Of course, I’m thinking, do I REALLY want to see what he’s doing at college??? Eeekkk!!!! I don’t want to know anything I shouldn’t!!! It also kind of makes me nervous to NOT be incognito there. That’s weird.

But that was yesterday. Today was spent dealing with a Contract Crisis. All the supervisors have to sign a contract each semester. There is always a crisis. There is always a crisis, and everyone is always angry and upset, and it is rarely our fault. But we always get all the fallout from it.

This semester, the crisis was that the contracts did not get processed. Because the Dean’s Assistant, who processes the contracts, was out sick for three days last week. Before being out sick, she gave them to the dean to sign. She didn’t let anyone know he had them, he just stuck them somewhere and forgot them, and apparently nobody realized this until yesterday. She was, incidentally, here all this week.  I called her yesterday to see if perhaps the supervisors could come by and sign their contracts since they were all on campus. That evidently kicked off a chain reaction of OH MY GOD WHERE ARE THE CONTRACTS!!!! So of course first thing this morning, I am informed that the contracts are due tomorrow or the supervisors won’t get paid until October. The contracts had just been located and I got the happy job of letting all the supervisors know that we would have to fax them a contract and they would have to sign it and fax it back to us RIGHT THIS MINUTE or they won’t get paid for seven weeks. And they’ve been working since mid-August. Never mind that very few of them are at home, because they are out in the schools, and I only have cell numbers for a couple of them, and they don’t have fax machines.

So my student tries calling them (yes, I passed this unpleasant chore on to my very cheerful student, who didn’t seem to mind. Because I HATE CALLING PEOPLE. I emailed them all as a backup plan.) She gets a couple and leaves a bunch of messages. And for the rest of the day I’ve had phone calls and emails and had to deal with very put-out supervisors who of course think it’s our fault. Because everything is ALWAYS our fault!!! And that IS a very maddening thing to have happen to them, I do understand that. I just want to scream, "I didn’t DOOOOOOOO it!! It WASN’T ME!!!!!!!!!!" In all our messages and emails I said "there was a hold up in the dean’s office" since I can’t come out and say, "the dean’s assistant screwed up, OKAY???" but I’m sure not taking blame for something we had nothing at all to do with. I’m also thinking it ought to be the dean’s assistant doing all this work, not me, since she is the one that screwed up and she is the one who handles the contracts. What do I have to do with all this?? Exactly nothing is what.

No, I don’t hate my job at all!!!!

I have to say I am relieved to have just discovered that one particularly angry email I got ("I hope we can work together and avoid this in the future. We were there yesterday and could have signed them then. If someone "held up" our contracts, could that same person not extend the deadline?") wasn’t from the person I’ve thought all afternoon that it was from. I’m also alarmed that I’ve sat here all afternoon thinking this email was from someone else, because I’m obviously losing my mind! The person I thought it was from (they both use an email address that has one of those FREE EMOTICONS!!! things, so I guess that may be what confused me, although that’s not a very good reason) is the nicest supervisor we have, she NEVER whines, she NEVER complains, even about things she should complain about, she’s shockingly goodnatured no matter what happens- so I’ll admit my feelings were kind of hurt. But the one it WAS from – oh, well, she’s a whiner and complainer at the best of times.

Okay, speaking of whiners, I’m done whining now. Really. I am. One day I will post an entry where I’m not whining about my job, and all my friends will drop dead of shock. And I’ll post more happy Charleston pictures too. One day.