The truth about Mondays

Mondays are the day we find out what pranks the universe has been preparing for us. Every Monday morning, we get up and we go to our work, whatever that may be. We have an idea in our heads of what the week will bring, conjured up on Sunday evening as we ran through everything approaching in the coming week. 

And then the universe reveals its hand. "Ha! You thought you'd work on editing and cataloging today! How charming! But I have a surprise, just for you. Kiss your little plans goodbye!" Our week is upended and the other days just fall like dominos. No amount of begging will keep the universe from tipping the first domino. 

And truthfully, what else is there to do than sit back and enjoy? 

Health and well-being

It seems like lately, my closest friends (and me!) are hitting a wall when it comes to life. Maybe it's burn out, maybe it's a mid-life crisis, maybe it's the post-pandemic slump. Maybe it's just the people I hang out with,* I don't know. I do know that everyone I know is feeling the increasing madness of the world. And be fair. The world really has lost its mind. 

As a result, I've decided that instead of asking how my people are doing, I'm going to ask how their sanity is. It seems far more the relevant question. And, just think! It would keep the conversation about mental health going without putting all the work on famous people announcing the measures they are taking for their own well-being. All in together, I say.

And while we're at it, I have another thought. Could we have a cabinet post for "Therapist of the United States"? I think the country could use it. 

Anyway, I hope your sanity is holding up. 

*But I like them and have no interest in changing crowds. My people are my people. 

The downside of adulthood

I know. There are lots of downsides of adulthood. It definitely doesn't float on a balloon. But here's a random and very minor one.

I'm listening to a book that I have read before and enjoyed. It's a retelling of the twelve dancing princesses. I enjoy retold fairy tales, and I am enjoying this one. However. In this retelling, the youngest 'dancing' sister is an infant. Literally a baby. The oldest is maybe 16? So, 12 kids, between 0 and 16, a deceased mother, and a father who is off at war. They are all inexplicably (maybe it explains later and I will get there) they are all SUPER obsessed with dancing. And the older kids, as they are sneaking out to dance every night, are thinking, "Hey. I know what we should do. We should drag along a baby with us while we go dancing. It will be fine!" Really?!?!?!

I know it's totally a story-telling device. If stories made sense, it would just be real life, and I get it--we get plenty of that. Maybe I always realized these little bits were kind of crazy and just didn't care, but it feels like now they scream at me, instead of being subtle niggles that I just ignore.

Don't get me wrong--I'm going to keep reading and I'm going to enjoy it and it's all going to be dandy. It's just one of those dumb things about being an adult. 

Service, PLEASE

Last month, I had a series of run-ins* with various customer service entities that nearly drove me over the edge of sanity. I was on the brink of finally setting up that archive in Antarctica that I've been talking about for ages, they were that bad. 

One of them involved trying to leave feedback about a certain delivery service that cannot actually deliver packages to my complex because it requires a physical key and this particular service doesn't have one driver assigned to the route. Obviously, for security reasons, it would be nutters to give the gazillion different drivers who might stop by to deliver a package their own key. For months-possibly-years, I have been training them one at a time on how to actually deliver a package to my complex. And it is exhausting. So I tried to send feedback explaining the situation but I was only allowed to leave feedback about the actual delivery person, NOT the company itself. Which just seems like they are saying, "Leave us anything we can blame on our employees, but we aren't interested in constructive feedback about anything else." Which is silly and rude.

Then there was a package from a different company that didn't show up. I tracked it, and followed all the instructions on their website for what to do if you can't find a package: wait 3 days, check the entire property (which in my case includes 10 buildings, all of which have 2 possible entrances where a package might be left), etc. Nothing. So I emailed. They emailed back and told me to do all the things on their website. Which, I will cut them some slack, because they probably do get a lot of people who don't check to see what to do and just email. And when I replied and explained I had already done those things, they were very prompt in getting me a refund. It was just frustrating to not have the thing arrive (and, probably not their fault). 

But the last one was the worst. I was trying to download something, and whenever I clicked on the link to download it, nothing happened. I read the website and did all the things. Then I tried to contact the company, which doesn't answer phones after 6:00, which is a pain, because I'm at work until then, and can't really problem solve for something that's on a computer in a different location. So I did their chat, which just puts you through to a robot, and the robot just kept telling me to do all the things on the website. I finally figured out how to get past the robot to an actual human, and the human told me to do all the things on the website, which I told them I had already done, so they told me, "Clear your cookies and your cache." Which, friends, is the new next step after, "Is it plugged in? Did you turn it on?", in case you wondered.

So I tried that, which took forever, and when it was done, didn't work, but the chat had already been closed. Sigh. 

Well, I decided to try again another day, and it was the same rigamarole with the robot, but this time, I got past him faster (it's like a new kind of video game! Bypass the bot!!!). And then the human, after reading the chat conversation in which I explained that I couldn't download something from the internet, hopped on and said, "It looks like you're having problems with the internet." Which is not at all what I had said, and made me question human's literacy skills.** So I explained to human the problem and that I had already done ALL THE THINGS and cleared my cache. And he sent me the link to do all the things, which again makes me question human's literacy skills, because I am not at all understanding what was confusing about my explanation, but I have wondered lately if I have some weird syndrome where I hear everything in complete, comprehensible English sentences but what actually comes out of my mouth and is heard by everyone else is gibberish***. 

Well, this human tells me to try starting my computer in safe mode to solve the problem, which 1) doesn't work and 2) again kicks me out of the chat. And, as a bonus, 3) has me wanting to bang my head against a wall repeatedly.

I never did get anyone from that company--robot OR human--to solve the problem. I figured it out myself when my computer asked about updating Java. I updated and voila, problem solved. (Which, no, that didn't come up in any of the google results when I tried to see if anyone else had the same problem. I really did do my due diligence).

Anyway, I'm not saying the penguins in Antarctica would be any better at customer service, but on the other hand, I wouldn't expect them to be, so I wouldn't be disappointed. And maybe it was just a bad run, and I'll go for months or years without such taxing customer service interactions. But, sheesh!

*If you can call it a run-in when there is no physical encounter and it all happens in a digital world.
**Maybe it was another more advanced bot?
***Why is it "gibberish" and not "jibberish"? I think the j looks better and makes more sense, really.