shit happens

This weeks seems to have been a veritable textbook definition of the expression "shit happens".

On Monday I discovered I'd made bit of an error at work.

Basically I'm working on a literature review, which means reading all sorts of reports and I discovered that what I thought were documents to be included were actually not quite that. Instead, they were, in essence, documents that were to be included only if the customer is willing to pay for them.

In other words, I've done a bunch of work that technically we're not definitely going to be paid for. As it turns out, I think the reason I've gone over the times is actually because my work colleague has done a much smaller share of what was required. So, if there were 40 documents, I've done 30 and my colleague has done 10.

If we'd both only have done 20, then these extra documents would have been within the time allocated. I'm not sure that makes sense, but I know what I mean.

Also, at the end of Monday the work colleague and I had a long chat about which documents were still to be done and what was next. And I mean loooooong. This colleague could talk the hind legs off a donkey.

So I didn't even leave work until 6:30, which meant I got back really late. After having a bit to eat, it was basically time to go to bed. I therefore couldn't bake any bread for my lunch on Tuesday.

Following the discovery on Monday of me being over the days allowed, I basically had to suspend activity on that project. And that meant getting something else to do. And what I ended up doing was horribly tedious.

Basically, I had to do data entry. And it was tedious data - lots of dates and serial numbers, which are dull, but also easy to make errors with.

Plus Tuesday I had to buy lunch, which also meant I bought some other bits (as you do) and put my whole shopping schedule out of whack.

When I got home I initially had plans to do something productive and did something utterly unproductive instead. I also discovered that sometime during the day one of the curtain rails in my room had fallen down, which took a good half hour to fix.

Wednesday was more tedious data entry, except for the end where my boss suddenly asked me to do some stuff on a bid she's working on. However, my colleague on the other project had got themselves into a bit of a flap and basically asked me to continue working on that project, so I could get something to them by Monday. It's really not needed for a while - I wasn't even going to start on it until Monday - but it was easier just to agree to do it.

And it would need a couple of days to do, so I planned to finish the data entry on Wednesday, then work on it Thursday and Friday. Except the bid was due to go Friday lunch and my boss is away all day today.

So I've basically had to drop everything and work on this bad today. What I didn't appreciate from the simple instructions she gave was just how much effort it was going to need. I've spent all morning working on it and it's still got lots to do. There's nothing more I can do for now, but I wouldn't be surprised if I have to get involved tomorrow as well (hopefully more people will be back, so my boss will pick on them!).

And to cap it all off, last night when I thought finally I could do that productive stuff (finish Samurai Champloo or do more scanning) instead I get involved in a massive e-drama and the entire evening disappears.

See - sometimes shit just happens.