Itchy Feet

So, work just announced that our prosecutions division - the area that I've been the legal assistant for for the past seven-ish years - is going to merge with the prosecutions division of the Ministry of Labour. The prosecutors will be relocating to the MoL office.

I won't be going with them.

They're keeping me here. Despite seven plus years of experience in doing the job, in spite of the effort I've put into making sure everything runs smoothly. Despite the fact I enjoy the job and put my heart into it. Despite the fact there's not actually enough work with the solicitors for three of us, if H's reading for half the day is anything to go by.

I guess you don't actually realise how much you love something and appreciate stability until it's gone. I've got relationships with all of my prosecutors - I call them my boys as shorthand - and I have to say goodbye to them, all at once. Come May, they'll be out of the office and in another building and I'll be facing an uncertain future as S.'s lackey, by the looks.

Thank god I'll hopefully be qualified as a paralegal by September, so I have options. This is so not how I wanted things to go. :(

So, I'm down to two months left of school (and then 4 weeks of fieldwork) and I'm starting to really struggle. My marks are fine - better than, mostly - but I'm really having trouble with the work/school balance, especially since during the hardest module (criminal law), work decided to go kablooey. We've got trials all over the place, and we're losing one of our prosecutors to a transfer - and as far as we know, he's not being replaced - and the dreaded Cash Store cash has raised its head, Hydra-like, so we're looking at another prosecutor only being half available. So, basically, from four lawyers to 2 and a half, and it's falling to me to make sure everything's covered and to all the necessary prep work for file transfers, on top of what I already have. And since the orders are coming from the Legal Director himself, they're top priority.

If only I could get everyone else needing my time to understand that. *wry*

Anyway, criminal law finished last night, barring the second assignment I have due on Tuesday evening and which I'll be writing like a mad thing this weekend. Luckily, it's been writing itself in my head already, so I have an idea of where to start.

My fieldwork placement is still majorly up in the air, which is distressing for She Who Organises - and none of it is fixable by me. I've done what I can - spoken to the LD and to the union rep, so there's no issues there - just need to wait for my manager to get back on vacation on Monday.

And now I have dictation, so off I go. I'll be so glad for the Family Day holiday on February 17!

So we're into the second week of April and spring is playing peek-a-boo with us in a big day. Some days have been lovely - sunny, warm (for values of 'warm' - I'm at the point where I consider 10-12 C 'warm'), and that particular earthy smell that tells you spring is coming. Then we get pouring rain, single-digit temperatures and everything goes into hiding again. Best of all, we still have one more winter storm to go - tomorrow's forecast is for freezing rain and ice pellets and a top of zero Celsius. My evening class teacher is considering cancelling tomorrow night for safe travelling's sake.

School is going well. I don't have the exact marks for my first module (Legal Computer Applications - basically Word and Powerpoint), but I'm fairly sure it's close to 100%. The only thing that might have knocked me back was going over my alloted time for my talk (by about double - curse you, Australia, for being full of things that are trying to kill us!), but I did show off appropriate Powerpoint skills, so, fingers crossed. The next module is "Introduction to Legal Studies", which is a look at what law is and how we got it. Fairly basic stuff, with a quiz, an assignment and an exam, whee! The work's pretty easy so far, although I'm noticing the hours this week - partly due to the fact that I'm still sick with the thing I caught before Easter. Hopefully I can shake it off soon so I can get some energy back!

Work is mostly okay, apart from a lovely bit of news yesterday. Because the government is cutting back public service workers (the OPESU) to the tune of 900-odd in Ontario, the various ministries are currently "surplussing" people. Which means you get told your job no longer exists and you have a couple of weeks to work out what you want to do before the official lay-off notice comes. We're losing J., the executive assistant to our director - the whole thing came totally out of the blue. And because her position is now 'surplus' to the Ministry, her work will be redistributed - technically to the director's other assistant in his other Ministry (he wears two hats), but considering a lot of it is specfic to what we do (various reports and such), I have a feeling it will end up bouncing back on us despite assurances.

This whole surplussing thing is discomforting. I mean, I'm pretty sure I'm safe - I've been there for almost 7 years now, I'm fairly indispensible, my lawyers would cause a riot if I was let go and we've already established my 'back-up' can't do the job when I'm on vacation, let alone take it over full-time. But it's just nerve-wracking any way. And this isn't the only round of lay-offs, either - it's just the first blood-letting.

Blargh.

Any way, things are generally okay. Just having a long, tired day so I'm a tad meh. But I really am enjoying school, so much. It's great to be learning again, and I'm already chummy with my desk mate, a woman around the same age who currently works as a probation officer.

It's been a while since I did more than a meme or a whinge post, so here I am with another of those perennial updates of mine. In point form 'cause life is, in fact, very busy lately and it feels like I don't have a lot of time for myself.

1) Work: She Who Shall Not Be Named (aka, the lawyer who treated me like a moron) has left, and we have a rotation lawyer for three months, who is awesome. We had lunch together at the sushi place yesterday, even. It also means I have tonnes of work, between case reassignment of the old lawyer's piles o' stuff, four lawyers all needing me to do things and catching up from my four weeks' vacation in January-February. We've also had a time docketing system instituted for the admin staff, which means I have to account for all of my time. Right now I'm "answering emails". ;) It does mean things are tenser here, tho', which is always wearing. The more established staff are unhappy about the whole deal, which leads to griping and bitching.

(Case in point re the busy - I started this post two hours ago and then got swamped by work again)

2) House hunting: Yep, that's right, we're looking to move from the apartment. The roomie and the pretty girl are wanting to move in together and because they are nice, awesome people, they want me around too. So we're looking for a house in the area, preferably with two living spaces - the main house and then a separate basement/attic apartment dealie for me and my two boykits.

It's not actually that easy. *sigh* I let myself think we'd found something earlier this week, only to have it be rented out from under us. I hate disappointment. I'm also getting my Spring Relocation Twitch on, which is like when normal people do spring cleaning, except I have the urge to put all my stuff in a box and move to a new house. So the time it's taking is frustrating me too. Also, note to rental advertisers - if the basement apartment is not available, don't advertise it! It's really annoying to find somewhere that's perfect, only to be told the basement apartment isn't available. :P

3) Miscellaneous. Since work is not getting any quieter, everything else ends up in the last bullet point. Life is generally good, although I'm worn out a lot because of aforementioned lack of me time/space. I have an appointment on Friday to get my face checked for skin cancers (it's an Aussie tradition!) and I'll ask him to look at the Incredible Bleeding Lip as well, in case it's something like that. I took tomorrow off for that, and for giving myself time to actually do some of the things I've been wanting to do for me. Still working on getting to the pool, as there was another bout of bronchitis after I got back from Australia and allergies up the wazoo, plus the house hunting thing eating my brain.

Roomie and Pretty Girl are on a cruise at the moment, getting back on Saturday, so I'm cat-sitting. I spent last night up at L's place keeping Eliot company, so he's a lot more settled this morning. Tonight will be cleaning all the kitty litter in the world. After viewing another house.

Oh, and last weekend we played D&D with the London crew, plus the Toronto folks. A lot of fun, even if Hope killed me in the end. Curse you, twin!

Any way, winding up now before I have to stop mid-way again and forget what I was doing.

So, we have a new photocopier/scanner/fax machine. All very nice and shiny. Until it gets an incurable paper jam. Then it has this high-pitched irritating beep. Beep-beep. Beep-beep. Beep-beep.

I swear to god I'm about ready to stick a knitting needle in each ear, just to make the noise stop. Argh.It's also so damn distracting I can't actually focus on getting anything done, just that bloody beeping.

So I'm doing the Diversity Matters e-course for work, since things are a bit quiet all 'round. There's a section on what they call "micro-inequities" and it provides examples of what those are:


• Constantly being interrupted while you are talking

• Being left out of a discussion or having your ideas cut down when you do have an opportunity to participate

• Having to wait without explanation while someone is on their cell phone

• Being offered assistance or accommodation based on assumptions about your ability

• Not being introduced in a meeting and then being ignored

• Having someone roll their eyes or avoid eye contact

• Being treated with fake, masked, or forced smiles

• Dismissing the idea of one employee only to accept it when suggested by another employee


The bolded ones? Huge personal issues of mine - I hate being talked over so much. Glad to see it's not a completely irrational reaction.

So, for those of you in on the email I sent yesterday, I lodged a complaint against one of my lawyers yesterday. No, not A, since I can usually sort out things with him. This was one of my new ones, who has been a little harder to deal with.

One of my daily tasks is to print out A's case-related email every morning, for the purposes of filing. Wednesday I had a migraine, so I wasn't around when an email came through to the prosecutors from Investigations, wanting to know who was attending which case on Friday (one of the lawyers was triple-booked, so we had some juggling to do). One of the responses, from C. to A. was along the lines of "it's just as well [Investigations] followed up, since that doesn't happen here".

Meaning, "our assistant doesn't do her job properly".

Now, I'm fine with being told I'm missing something that needs doing. It's a very busy job and sometimes I miss stuff. But C. hasn't said a word about any problems she might have with me. Instead, she sends a bitchy note to her work BFF. It's not even like she doesn't know I have access to A's email - I told her that a while ago when we were working out what she wanted me to be able to do for her (which turns out to be precious little). So yeah, when I saw that, it kind of ruined my day. The later back and forth we had about me getting a date wrong when she hadn't informed me who was taking on her case didn't help - I actually used the expression "with all due respect" in my reply, she was being such a bitch to me.

So yeah, I complained. Went to Sonia, who went to the big boss. They both agree it's not appropriate to bitch about the assistant without actually providing any instructions, and a Talk shall happen. All I know is, I really don't want to be here today.

Remember months ago when I was venting about the high density filing project and my co-worker who couldn't understand the need for central record keeping? And how B and I wound up going through the whole thing by hand since H's 'records' were out of date and crap and done on Word instead of the Excel spreadsheet provided to her?

Apparently she didn't learn from this - she's been moving files from one of our retiring lawyer's offices and into the high density filing area - without adding them to the spreadsheet we have on the shared drive, or indeed, without putting them into any kind of spreadsheet format at all. So my updates today are already out of date. *headdesks* And when I ask her to give me her list, she doesn't understand the same thing we spent ages explaining to her, that we need a central database to record all of the files on-site, so when the auditors come, we can tell them exactly what we have and where. Considering the sensitive material we have, that's kind of important, you know?

No wonder I feel like I'm going insane - I've explained this very same thing again and again and she still fucks it up.

Day 10 – What you wore today

This would be easier with a camera. You know, a picture is worth a thousand words and all that?

Any way, I'm wearing my dark charcoal grey slacks and a cute little red top, with a kind of Henry VIII style neckline (the dresses of that era, not the king himself) and three quarter sleeves. Both were bought when Mindy and [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] took me work clothes shopping as my Christmas gift. :) I'm also wearing a pair of black Mary Jane type shoes and grey socks with stars on them. No jewellery or make up - I don't do either at work, except my usual earrings - a stud and a sleeper in each ear (I have my ears pierced twice).

I like this outfit because a) the pants are loose and comfortable; b) the shirt is very cute and c) red's my favourite colour and always cheers me up.

Now back to my attempts at maths. Ugh, percentages of restitution totals, why can't you equal what was actually ordered?



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I'm so tired I hurt. My back is completely shot and my shoulders aren't much better. And instead of home and couch and sleep, I have 45 minutes left of work and then an hour of therapy. Meh.

Work's just been brutal this week. Expenses, trial prep, more expenses, Jane in tomorrow... oy vey.