Now I see dead people.
Mar. 24th, 2005 08:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deathpixieAKA Coroner's Court for Dummies.
So, this morning I showed up at work, sat down, booted up the computer and was half-way through checking my email and my first (and what turned out to be only) cup of tea for the day, when Rick, my boss, comes past and wants to see me in his office.
'Oh crap,' I think, closing down the X-Project LJ page I was looking at just then. 'I've been busted for Net usage already.'
Instead, what I get when I sit down is: "So, how would you like to work in the back office?"
Now, to explain, Coroner's Court has two parts, really. There's the front office and the court rooms, where the inquests are heard and the coroners are. The front office deals with all the administrative stuff associated with determining causes of death.
The back office is where the whole process starts. It's where the bodies of anyone who dies a reportable death (basically anything that's not natural, and certain natural cases where there's some doubt over the precise cause of death or some other complication) are brought in for storage, identification, inspection/autopsy and in certain cases, harvesting of donated body parts.
It's also the place where the shift work happens, since people don't tend to die 9-5. Four days on, four days off, with shifts of between 8-10 hours at a time. I won't be doing that until May when Freda, the girl I'm replacing, leaves.
Now, when I started at Coroner's, I was pretty much expecting to stay in the front office for three or four months before I'd even see the back office. Today was the end of my third week. So when Rick asked me if I wanted to work in the back office, I was kind of surprised. And promptly said yes and was whisked off with barely time to log myself off the computer and grab my stuff.
I think I'm going to like it. It's a lot busier than the front office - I've learned more today than I have in the past two weeks, including the tape recording training - and there's a whole bunch of different stuff to do, including after hours requests for intervention orders and search warrants.
I also saw my first dead body. Actually, I saw a whole lot of them - I got the tour of the two cold rooms (one for new arrivals and one for those that have been autopsied), and the two viewing rooms, both of which were occupied. It was... odd. Mostly old people, obviously, ones who have died as a result of falls, but a few younger ones. They don't really seem like people, all lined up on trolleys the way they were - it was more like some sort of wax museum. Especially considering the skin colour was exactly that, waxy. The smell, I think, is probably going to be the worst of it.
***
I also got sworn in at the Supreme Court as an official court recorder. It means I'm qualified to sit in inquests and press the 'record' button on the tape deck. *rolls eyes* Actually, it's more than that - I have to keep a log of the first three words of each new speaker for the transcribers, which is why I don't have time for email on court days. Apparently I'll be bounced back to the front office sometimes on buusy days, so it's handy I've been sworn now.
So, that was my day. How was yours? ;)
So, this morning I showed up at work, sat down, booted up the computer and was half-way through checking my email and my first (and what turned out to be only) cup of tea for the day, when Rick, my boss, comes past and wants to see me in his office.
'Oh crap,' I think, closing down the X-Project LJ page I was looking at just then. 'I've been busted for Net usage already.'
Instead, what I get when I sit down is: "So, how would you like to work in the back office?"
Now, to explain, Coroner's Court has two parts, really. There's the front office and the court rooms, where the inquests are heard and the coroners are. The front office deals with all the administrative stuff associated with determining causes of death.
The back office is where the whole process starts. It's where the bodies of anyone who dies a reportable death (basically anything that's not natural, and certain natural cases where there's some doubt over the precise cause of death or some other complication) are brought in for storage, identification, inspection/autopsy and in certain cases, harvesting of donated body parts.
It's also the place where the shift work happens, since people don't tend to die 9-5. Four days on, four days off, with shifts of between 8-10 hours at a time. I won't be doing that until May when Freda, the girl I'm replacing, leaves.
Now, when I started at Coroner's, I was pretty much expecting to stay in the front office for three or four months before I'd even see the back office. Today was the end of my third week. So when Rick asked me if I wanted to work in the back office, I was kind of surprised. And promptly said yes and was whisked off with barely time to log myself off the computer and grab my stuff.
I think I'm going to like it. It's a lot busier than the front office - I've learned more today than I have in the past two weeks, including the tape recording training - and there's a whole bunch of different stuff to do, including after hours requests for intervention orders and search warrants.
I also saw my first dead body. Actually, I saw a whole lot of them - I got the tour of the two cold rooms (one for new arrivals and one for those that have been autopsied), and the two viewing rooms, both of which were occupied. It was... odd. Mostly old people, obviously, ones who have died as a result of falls, but a few younger ones. They don't really seem like people, all lined up on trolleys the way they were - it was more like some sort of wax museum. Especially considering the skin colour was exactly that, waxy. The smell, I think, is probably going to be the worst of it.
***
I also got sworn in at the Supreme Court as an official court recorder. It means I'm qualified to sit in inquests and press the 'record' button on the tape deck. *rolls eyes* Actually, it's more than that - I have to keep a log of the first three words of each new speaker for the transcribers, which is why I don't have time for email on court days. Apparently I'll be bounced back to the front office sometimes on buusy days, so it's handy I've been sworn now.
So, that was my day. How was yours? ;)
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no subject
Date: 2005-03-24 11:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-03-24 05:12 pm (UTC)I had a friend go to the pathology department at Columbia for a job interview. She didn't expect to see severed legs on metal slabs and other body parts suspended in goo. The kicker is that people were eating in this lab. She never went back even after she got a call back for the second interview. Besides, corpses smell like dookie. *gags*
Still proud of you though. Good going.
no subject
Date: 2005-03-24 11:51 pm (UTC)And it's weird - the smell isn't pleasant, but it doesn't affect me as much as I thought it might. Although apparently the decomposing ones aren't pleasant - we have to check those to see if they're all right for families to view for identification purposes. Luckily I missed out one of those being my first yesterday...
I'm not sure if I'm just insensitive or whether I've got a strong stomach...
no subject
Date: 2005-03-24 06:34 pm (UTC)Cheers, mate!
no subject
Date: 2005-03-24 11:28 pm (UTC)