Grr.

Work has got me all worked up.

i fucked up big this month. Twice. And both came to light on the same day, and both were discovered by someone else, and both are now known to the entire nationwide company. YAY! When i fuck up, I fuck up BIG.

So now my boss wants me to set some goals for 2010. He's wanting me to revise my processes and procedures to make sure this never happens again.

I get that he's doing his job. I do. I really, really do. And that's fine.

What pisses me off is that I don't understand why he's now deciding to do it? Our salesman hasn't sold anything in years. He doesn't manage the accounts he has sold. I pick up his slack daily. Where's his lecture on needing to focus and pay attention? And don't even get me started on the plant...

My attention is never focused. It can't be. As I'm entering invoices, the phone is ringing, i've got 3 drivers in my office, a customer at the window, and emails flowing in, all of which must be addressed RIGHT THIS MINUTE. I try to do a good job, because i hate fucking up more than just about anything else in the world. And most of the time, i manage to juggle all the insanity that is my job and do it well. But when you've got this much being thrown at you every minute of every day, something is going to fall through the cracks. I'm going to mis-key an invoice and overcharge a customer by 120,000 bucks. No, I didn't catch it. (Not to pass off blame, but no one else did, either.) I'm going to open an email and forget to print it out before I move onto the next, causing me to miss an order. Or maybe I got a phone call just as I clicked on the message and didn't notice that I'd moved on. Or maybe I printed it out and it somehow got lost in the never-ending shuffle that is my desk and never got entered. I don't know how it happened.

Maybe I'm just not cut out for this job. Maybe there's just too much to it. It's been 2 years and I still feel like I'm just barely treading water most days. There's not time to catch up, much less get ahead.

I don't know what to do. I just know I hate my job today.

My day sucked.

A salesman overreacted and sent a nastygram out this morning, one of the big bosses responded scathingly toward me implying I'd somehow fucked up, and I cried. Twice.

So I went to lunch. Driving down Southern Parkway, a dog darted out in front of me, and I hit it. It screamed. I covered my face and wished it wasn't happening. I put my flashers on and got out, certain that the poor animal was dead under my car. It wasn't. I couldn't see it anywhere. A lady that was walking nearby said he'd run between the two houses across the street and disappeared. I moved my car off the road and went looking for the dog, but couldn't find him. I heard barking coming from one of the houses, though, so I knocked on the door. A little Vietnamese woman answered, and she spoke very little English, but she understood that I was asking about her dog. She led me through her house to the kitchen, where the poor pup (a full-grown male Pit mix) was bleeding all over the floor from his crushed rear paw. My heart broke for him. The barking I'd heard was the woman's two chihuahuas, who were hiding under a cabinet against the wall, losing their fucking minds over the confusion between their hurt friend (Ace) and the stranger in their home. I asked if the woman had a vehicle to take the dog to the vet, told her I'd drive them both there right now. She seemed hesitant. Or maybe she was just confused. Her dog had just run into the kitchen screaming with a crushed and mangled paw and then some stranger came knocking on the door crying and saying "Sorry sorry sorry". I would've been confused. She motioned for me to wait and went upstairs, coming back a minute later with a young girl who had that "WTF?" look in her eyes too. I explained what had happened, that he'd just run out in front of my car and that I'd tried to stop, but I'd been doing 40, and there just wasn't time. She said he does that, meaning escapes the yard, and that's why they'd put up the whateveritwas to keep him in. I offered again to drive them to the vet. She picked up the phone and said she'd call her friend, her friend would take them, their vet was just up the road. I asked for her name and number, and gave her mine. I apologized again. I thought about saying "have a nice day" as I left, like I try to do to everyone I greet throughout the day, but that didn't really seem appropriate given the circumstances.

And I left. I got in my car and drove home. I called Kim. I bawled my eyes out. I let my dog out, and made sure to hook up his lead before letting go of his collar, then I covered him in kisses and tears.

I'm so sad. Poor Ace.

And Ace is a big boy. Probably 50 pounds. He did a number on my fender. It's going to have to be repaired, mainly because i don't want to think about his poor paw every time I see the front of my car. How do I call Ace's mom and say, "Hey, remember me? I hit your dog? How's he doing? Well, he fucked up my car, and I'm going to need to you fix it. Thanks."

SNUGGIE!!!

Jimi bought me a Snuggie on Sunday. It was an impulse purchase from Walmart, because there was an endcap (3!) full of them, and I'd made the comment the day before, while freezing in the living room dressing in only a pair of sweats, a t shirt, and socks, "I need a Snuggie!" I didn't really mean it. Or rather, I didn't know I did.

But I did. OH, how I needed this lovely, warm, soft, beautiful backwards-robe-looking piece of lounge wear. I love it so much, in fact, that I can't bring myself to stop wearing it long enough to wash it. Why, you ask, does it need to be washed when it's only 3 days old? Because I spill shit. In three days, this is what I've spilled on my snuggie:

Beer. Like 3 times, probably half a can each time. It smells like stale beer. Still wearin' it, though.

Pear juice. Because it's impossible to eat a pear without dripping juice. Right?

You know when a person says "I just threw up in my mouth a little"? Some came out.

Okay, seriously, I'm washing it now. Under protest. Because I'll smell like stale beer, that's fine. But even I have a line.

I do love my snuggie, though. You should totally get one.