Mispronunciation

My aforementioned temp assignment is at a local hospital's VNA and hospice program. (VNA, for those not in the know, stands for "visiting nurse association.") This assignment has involved a lot of personal "firsts," like operating a Pitney-Bowes postage meter, stamping stacks of incoming mail with the date of receipt (which makes me feel oddly East German), and scheduling a UPS pickup.

This particular UPS pickup was an authorized return, and when I provided the representative with the return tracking number, she impressed me by telling me what company I was with. She did not impress me, however, with her reading.

"This is for the VNA and... um... ho-spice?" she asked.

I wonder--is Ho Spice like the Fifth Beatle?

Reality check

I officially started temping this past week. My current assignment is as a receptionist for a local hospital's visiting nurse and hospice program. I am reminded of the bridge in the Barenaked Ladies song "Never is Enough," wherein they sing

You get your Ph.D.
How happy you will be
When you get a job at Wendy's
And are honored with Employee of the Month

I'm not flipping burgers. However, I'm still not getting enough brain-cell exercise. I transfer calls, I open the mail, I operate the freaking awesome postage meter (this is the highlight of my day), and I sit around and stare at stuff. But hey. It's a job.

And I did actually learn something, which is that temp work is a fantastic cure for perfectionism. I will be the first to admit that I am a perfectionist. Many things have made a dent in my perfectionism, mostly having to do with grades which, contrary to my expectations, did not actually bring on the Apocalypse. But old habits die hard, you know, and I want to be the best damn temp there ever was.

Sadly, my efforts to be Super Temp were quickly thwarted. It is the nature of temporary work not to be able to get all the information one needs before diving in... especially when one is filling in for someone who's been doing the same job for almost two decades. Temps are expected to screw things up. (Indeed, I got blamed for doing something I couldn't possibly have done, as I was in the bathroom at the time.) And when there are pre-existing chronic communication problems in the workplace, the whole thing is even worse.

This is, like, totally awesome exposure therapy.

HIPAA and the Good Samaritan

I received a call the other day from a man who said he'd found a wallet with an insurance card inside it. On the insurance card was a phone number, and when he called it, he got me. He wanted to return the wallet (and the money and credit cards inside) to its owner, and he requested the member's phone number for this purpose.

Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do to help this kind man. HIPAA prevented me from acknowledging even that the wallet's owner had this insurance in the first place--to say nothing of giving out his phone number. I apologized profusely for my inability to help him, suggested he enlist the help of the local police, and added that the wallet's owner would surely appreciate his efforts.

May your holidays be full of good will toward all--and be unencumbered by complicated federal privacy legislation.

Tales from the cube

toothpastefordinner.com

Most nights I come home from work with a couple of choice stories for Mrs. Gerbil. These stories fall generally into one of three categories: Calls that Break My Heart, WTF?, and Oh My God I Thought I'd Never Get That Person Off the Phone.

Although I skipped kindergarten (I was a precocious little gerb) I do know about sharing, and I think I'm generally pretty good at it. So, I hereby share a handful of vignettes, previously heard by Mrs. Gerbil.

I can't believe we let you into the network
me: Does the member meet criteria for a parity diagnosis?
caller: Yes, she has bipolar disorder and major depression.
(explanation for those unfamiliar with DSM-IV: by definition, you can't have both)

And you are calling now because...
caller: Oh, I didn't think you were open now.

Try again later
caller: Is this DirecTV?
me: I'm sorry, you have the wrong number. This is a mental health insurance company.
caller: Oh. Do you have the number for DirecTV?
me: No. You might try the phone book, though.
(the next day)
same caller: Is this DirecTV?
me: Sorry, no. This is a mental health insurance company. Try the phone book.

How can I help you?

They tried to make me go to rehab

I get a lot of calls from people who want to go to detox, or who want their family members to go to detox. Often they are legitimate candidates for immediate, do-not-pass-go-do-not-collect-$200 detox. For example, they've decided to go cold turkey from alcohol and now are tremulous and sweating. Or they've been quadrupling their Xanax and their psychiatrist won't write another prescription. Withdrawal from alcohol or benzodiazepines can be fatal; and detox is a medical procedure which (hopefully) keeps the withdrawal process safe. I can't begin to count the number of alcohol- or benzo-dependent people I've had to convince to go to the hospital immediately... not tomorrow, not the next day, not next week when they already have time off from work. I've found "Withdrawal can kill you" to be a fairly effective tactic.

Opiate detox is another story. Opiate withdrawal is highly unpleasant, to say the least; but it is not necessarily dangerous. Managed care does not always cover opiate detox, especially of the inpatient sort. I have no idea why. But if I get a call from someone who wants to detox from Vicodin, I tell them to go to the hospital immediately. Some will ask whether withdrawal will kill them. I reply, "At the very least, if you try to do it yourself, it will be extraordinarily uncomfortable."

But then I have some people who want to detox from cocaine. There is no medical detox procedure for cocaine. Cocaine is rapidly eliminated from the body; so even if there were a way to do cocaine detox, it would have to be done very quickly. When people ask me for cocaine detox referrals, I tell them to go to the ER right away if they have any unpleasant physical symptoms or pre-existing cardiac problems. But unless they are suicidal, homicidal, or using alcohol or benzos with their cocaine, they can most likely wait until the next day for an assessment for some other level of care.

My favorite callers, though, are the parents who want their teenagers to go to marijuana detox. (Oddly, no one ever seems to call for detox for their own pot habit.) Again, there is no medical detox for marijuana. Marijuana hangs out in the body for a while, but there's really nothing to do about it--and no real need to do anything, either. I am often tempted to tell these folks that marijuana detox is a home procedure involving a couple bags of potato chips administered over the course of a few hours. But I don't, as this would be poor customer service.

Mangled care

Mrs. Gerbil and I finally went to see Sicko last night. I was very impressed. I'm not a Michael Moore groupie--perhaps because my parents had me watch Roger and Me when I was a mere pre-teen, and I was rather bored by it--but I do appreciate a good exposé when I see one.

And it got me thinking about what I currently do for a living.

The insurance group I work for was not featured in Sicko. My actual company was not even mentioned; the behavioral health insurance system is a whole 'nother movie. So in that sense Sicko was not about what I do 40 hours a week.

Another sense in which Sicko has nothing to do with my job is that I never have to deny coverage for any individual person. I can tell a member that his plan does not cover couples therapy, but I never have to say that his particular request for couples therapy will not be approved. There are two reasons for this little bit of relief. First, "adverse determinations" can only be issued by reviewers with clinical licenses. Second, as long as a person's plan permits a specific type of treatment, it's my job to say "yes."

(And here's a third sense: I hear that the medical carrier under our corporate umbrella no longer does procedure reviews, as nearly all requests were being approved anyway.)

But this movie was about what I do simply because I work for managed care. I believe that the health care system in the US should do its darndest to promote preventive care. HMOs--health maintenance organizations--started with this very same philosophy. I also believe that, when a person needs medical treatment, he or she should get it. There shouldn't be a need to call within 24 hours of admission, or to expend time/money/emotional effort filing appeals, or to hire an attorney... or to have to decide to skip treatment altogether because insurance won't pay. Health care should not be about money--and there is where the Big Bad System and I diverge.

All of my statements above, about why Sicko doesn't point its finger at me personally, are really just displacements of blame. Like most of my co-workers, I took my job because Mrs. Gerbil and I were hurting for dough. It's been less than six months since I began, and already we're financially back on our feet. And (not surprisingly) we get really cheap health insurance, with more-than-decent coverage for what we're likely to need. Yup, managed care treats its employees well; and I think my company is one of the best in this regard.

Still, I'm part of the Big Bad System, and I'm just doing it for the money. My paycheck might not be the direct result of in-house adverse determinations, but many of our plans are carve-outs from other medical carriers. And those carriers do issue adverse determinations. There aren't many degrees of separation here.

So, no. I'm not directly involved. But lest I be accused of sounding like a complacent WWII-era German (Godwin's Law, anyone?), I hasten to point out that I do have a well-established history of fighting the system.

And on that note, I offer the following tips to anyone who might need them:

1) If you have insurance, read your Evidence of Coverage Document. Cover to cover. As soon as possible. Call member services if you don't understand the terms of your policy.

2) If you believe your claim has been wrongly denied, raise a stink. File an appeal. File a second appeal. Then contact the state oversight body for your plan. This might be the state board of insurance, the state commission on managed care, or some other such body; and you can find out which one applies with a single phone call to member services. Just don't call me about your claims.

3) If you get stuck with a huge hospital bill, contact the patient advocate about financing options.

4) By federal law , virtually all US hospitals are required to provide examination and stabilization treatment for truly emergent patients, regardless of their ability to pay. If your plan refuses to cover non-network care you received while completely unconscious, raise a stink (see #2 above).

5) Above all, don't give up. A cynic might say that somewhere, someone is counting on you to give up ("Baby needs a new pair of shoes!"). But I am not that cynical. Yet.

(For the record: Appropriately, I used a tiny little portion of my paycheck to take Mrs. Gerbil to the movies.)

Qualifications

I am considering applying for a job in a Catholic health system. The online application system won't let me fill anything out until I swear (in electronic form) that, if hired, I will act in such a way which is consistent with their mission statement. Which, naturally, contains lots and lots of references to specific beliefs.

This seemed a little too much like a credal oath to me, and out of place for a self-professed equal opportunity employer. So I emailed them to inquire exactly what it means to endorse this statement.

I spent a long, long time crafting my email. I hemmed and hawed over whether I should describe myself as "not Catholic" or "not religious"; or whether I should leave my own beliefs out of it altogether.

Mrs. Gerbil found it amusing that I'd spent so much time wordsmithing. Her suggestion: "Will godless Jews be considered for this position? Please advise."

Understanding the system

Mrs. Gerbil is always after me to remember that not everyone knows how The (Managed Care) System works.

I usually regale her with at least two work stories each night. Sometimes I just need to de-brief a particularly stressful call; but more often than not the first line of my tale is, "Oh, my God, I had the most ridiculous call tonight." (It should go without saying that I never vent any identifying information--but there, I've said it anyway.) And then Mrs. Gerbil gently chides me for forgetting that the average person does not grok The System.

Hell, sometimes I don't even grok The System. But I will admit that I have a low tolerance for certain types of lack-of-grok, viz.:

Calling the emergency line for a non-emergency. It's 10:30 on Friday night and you have just realized that one of your claims was denied. You call the phone number on your insurance card, press 8 (a prompt clearly demarcated for emergency use only), and demand to know why your claim was denied. I will only inform you that this is a routine matter which is handled during business hours only. Perhaps hearing this will anger you; but unless your claim status poses a risk to yourself or others, it's not an emergency.

Calling the emergency line for a non-emergency matter which has nothing to do with mental health. You go to the pharmacy on a Satuday afternoon, and lo and behold, your co-pay for Lipitor has changed. You call your medical carrier, but they are closed. You hang up, call again, and select the prompt for mental health services. (Huh?) And then you press 8 and demand to know why your Lipitor suddenly costs $50. I will only inform you that you have reached your mental health insurance and we do not have anything to do with your prescription benefits. Perhaps you acknowledge that you just pressed prompts randomly to get a live person; but alas, I have no more information about your Lipitor than you do.

The guess and check method. You are calling about a hospital admission. You have not actually determined who the insurance carrier is, as you haven't bothered to look at the person's insurance card. So, you take a wild guess, and (because you are wrong) you think I should give you the correct information. Perhaps I do know whom you should be calling, and I might even transfer you if you're nice; but there is a reason that triage has already xeroxed the card.

I can't believe you just asked me that. If you work for a hospital, you should know how The System works. Please do not ask me to describe the difference between an HMO and a PPO. Perhaps you are new; but honey, this really makes my teeth hurt.

"No" means NO.

One of the unfortunate things about my job is that I cannot do a single thing about claims. I cannot tell anyone the status of a claim. I cannot reprocess a claim. I cannot even say whether a claim has been received. This is because I am not in the claims department.

My department never closes. The claims department does. When the claims department is open, I can transfer callers to a real live person over there. When the claims department is closed, not a single real live person is there to receive the transfer. And the only thing I can do is say to wait until the next business day--which can be a tall order if it's 7pm on a Friday night.

I don't know why it is so difficult for people to understand that I can't view their claims information. I get at least three calls per day that go like this:

caller: I am calling about a claim that my doctor submitted three months ago.
me: I'm sorry, I can't see any of your claims information. The claims department is open Monday through Friday, from...
caller: But my doctor sent in this claim three months ago and it hasn't been paid yet.
me: I apologize for the delay, but as I said I do not have access to any information about your claims.
caller: What do I have to say to get you to pay my therapist?
me: Please call back when our claims department is open and they will be happy to assist you.
caller: But why can't you help me with my claims?
me: Because I am not in the department that handles claims. That department is closed right now.
caller: Oh. Okay then, bye.

As you can imagine, I get very tired of saying the same thing over and over and over again. I probably say "I can't see any information about your claims" in my sleep. Sometimes I feel like I'm David Spade in that one commercial, except I'm not saying "NOOOOooooo!" for the passive-aggressive hell of it.

Mrs. Gerbil suggested that I come up with fun, creative ways to impart this information. Last night we came up with a whole slew while we were supposed to be sleeping.

Some of them were inspired by cheesy martial arts movies:

~ Your claims information is silent, like the ninja.
~ Your claims information is as the first crocus of spring, but it is still December.
~ Your claims information is as a deer, deep within in the forest.
~ Your claims information is as concrete shoes at the bottom of the Hudson River.

Some of them were inspired by television:

~ In the world of managed care, claims information is considered especially valuable. In this company, claims are handled by an elite squad known as the claims department. These are their hours...

Some of them were inspired by folk songs:
I cannot give you your claims status
I cannot do squat about claims
That's done by another department
So why are you talking to me, to me?
Call back, call back
Call back on Monday at six AM
Call back, call back
Call back on Monday at six.

And some of them were inspired by nursery rhymes:

Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?
Yes sir, yes sir, but I don't have any of your claims information.

The man in the moon came down too soon
And asked the way to Norwich;
He went by the south and burnt his mouth
From eating your claims information.

Old MacDonald had a farm
E-I-E-I-O
And on his farm he did not have your claims information.

Alas, I don't think this would qualify as good customer service.

A word to the wise

After many, many months of under-employment, I finally found gainful work a few months ago. In the words of Mrs. Gerbil, having a real job is "totally crazy like whoa."

Since late February I have been working the swing shift (including weekends) in the call center of a humongous behavioral health insurance company. Mostly I'm quoting benefits, issuing authorizations, and pre-certifying inpatient stays. But occasionally I get crisis calls, which are always interesting.

In addition to rather sizable paychecks, this job has provided some perspective in my quest to Fix The World By Complaining. I'm now a lot nicer to call center representatives whom I contact in my personal life--because I know now that they can't change a whole lot of anything, no matter how angry I get about it.

I've also learned that every call is documented, or at least should be documented. Details of your calls to your health insurance are considered part of your medical record--which means you can request to see those data at any time. I would hate to see the notes our former health and dental plans have on me.

And I have learned about the mute button.

The mute button is the best way to put callers on hold without actually putting them on hold. It's weird and uncomfortable to be on the phone with a stranger while neither of you is saying anything, right? and it's so much better to be on hold, right?

Okay, maybe not. But in any case: If you don't hear the hold music, you are probably not on hold. You are likely on mute. Which means that the call center representative can hear everything you are saying.

So hold thy tongue, knave.

Help wanted

Helping Our Lovely Individuals Eliminate Risk by Teaching Healthier Alternatives Naturally and Touting Happy Opportunities Universally (HOLIERTHANTHOU) is seeking an
ALL-AROUND ROCKSTAR PART-TIME COUNSELOR/ROLE MODEL/EDUCATOR/ADVOCATE/MANAGER/YOUTH OUTREACH SPECIALIST!

Job Description:
The Counselor/Role Model/Educator/Advocate/Manager/Youth Outreach Specialist (CREAMY) is responsible for the design, delivery, and evaluation of HOLIERTHANTHOU's social services program. We offer a wide variety of activities and support to the individuals who need them. The CREAMY is involved in all facets of HOLIERTHANTHOU's work. The CREAMY also provides administrative support to the Executive Director, including (but not limited to) stocking and ordering supplies, photocopying library books, filling lunch and Starbucks orders, and providing childcare for two-year-old triplets.

Compensation:
The position of CREAMY is budgeted for 20 hours per week (FTE $20,000). However, you should expect to work at least 35 hours per week, with anything over 20 hours unpaid. Evenings, weekends, and holidays are required, as is occasional overtime (up to 15 hours per week) and work from your deathbed. Please note that this is an exempt position. Travel (30% of time) is required. We do not reimburse for mileage or parking. The ideal candidate would be just as happy doing this work for free.

Qualifications:
1. Quadri-lingual in English, Spanish, and two of the following languages: Cantonese, Mandarin, Tagalog, American Sign Language, Russian, Vietnamese, Klingon.
2. Master's degree or higher in something vaguely related to social services. Life experience may be substituted for all or part of the education requirement.
3. Valid driver's license, clean DMV record, and reliable hybrid vehicle (preferably blue in color). You must provide a copy of your title and registration with your application. Applicants with Hummers will not be considered.
3. A commitment to HOLIERTHANTHOU's vision of diversity, cultural competency, and respect for everyone who agrees with us. Jaundiced lesbian women with three nipples and a pet iguana are strongly encouraged to apply.
4. A commitment to HOLIERTHANTHOU's commitment to provide quality social services in a committed fashion.

Benefits:
Knowing that you work for the best social service agency in the universe.

Please submit cover letter, resume, transcripts, K-12 report cards, photocopies of vehicle title and registration, photocopy of Red Cross blood donor card (including blood type), and five letters of reference (one of which must be from a previous babysitter) to the Executive Director by 1/31/07.

Can't we all just get along?

"Cultural competence" is currently quite the topic of interest in mental health services, especially in California. A lot of people here are peeing themselves over making sure that their agencies are "culturally competent." In my never-ending quest for a Better Job, I keep coming across ads that devote more space to the agency's interest in "cultural competency" than to the description of the actual job.

I disagree with the entire concept of "cultural compentency." How do you know when you are "culturally competent"? There is no exam to take, no set of prohibitively expensive workshops to attend, no embossed certificate to hang on your wall. And who gets to decide which "cultures" one must be "competent" in? Most of us aren't even "competent" in our own culture--let alone able to describe exactly our own cultural influences.

"Cultural competency," I think, implies a mysterious package of skills. I would rather be culturally aware. I think it's important to know at least basic things about other cultural groups, especially as may affect therapy. But we should learn from our clients as much as they learn from us. And we must be prepared to be wrong--and accept it when we are.

Once I was the only lesbian on staff and the only Jew, secular or otherwise. So my caseload kept getting padded with lesbians, Jews, and lesbian Jews. I'm not religious at all and was never even a bat mitzvah, so I'm not sure what really qualified me to be Super Jew Therapist. It was our practice to ask clients during their intakes whether they wanted their therapist to have any particular characteristics, such as gender, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. Maybe five percent of my intakes indicated some preference. The rest said, "I don't care. I just want someone who can help me."

Certainly, there are cases where therapist-client matching is a great idea, if not a necessity. A client who speaks little English is probably best served by a therapist who can speak his or her native language. A client who has extreme difficulty trusting white men should probably not be placed with a white male therapist. My move to California was precipitated, in part, by paternalistic heterosexism; and when I became depressed as a result, I specifically sought a lesbian therapist. Though I'd had an excellent straight male therapist in the past, I didn't want a straight man listening this time.

Recently I read a comparison of treatment-related philosophies from the 1970s and today. I think the context was how managed care has shifted psychology's priorities. There was this whole list of factors which were pretty much diametrically opposed, including length of treatment, emphasis on thoughts vs. feelings, and case conceptualization. One of the pairs was "individual differences" (the 70s) and "diversity" (today). At first I was quite confused. How were these mutually exclusive? And then it dawned on me:

Individual differences emphasizes the uniqueness of the individual, rejecting the homogeneity of the group.
Diversity emphasizes the homogeneity of the group, rejecting the uniqueness of the individual.

(And all of a sudden, this interview made a whole lot more sense.)

Racism sucks. Sexism sucks. Homophobia, bi-phobia, and transphobia suck. Anti-Semitism sucks. Ageism (though completely legal under federal law unless you're over 40) sucks. Ableism sucks. Dude, discrimation sucks.

However, it's impossible to talk about "diversity" without endorsing stereotypes. There's nothing inherently bad about stereotypes. What's bad is assuming you know everything about your 10:00 intake... at 9:59.

The Therapist Clock

No one warned me that, in the course of my training in psychology, I would develop a Therapist Clock.

I learned early on how to check my watch as subtly as possible (the "itchy wrist" is always a good technique), where to place the furniture for maximum clock visibility (you need at least two clocks, one across from each chair), and how to structure the last 10 minutes of the session in order to segue smoothly into "We need to wrap up for today" at 3 minutes before the end.

But I never learned about the Therapist Clock until it was too late.

The Therapist Clock is an internal timekeeping device that divides up one's waking experiences into 50-minute chunks. The Therapist Clock also contains subdivisions, at 10, 15, 25, and 35 minutes. The Therapist Clock is capable of running longer than 50 minutes, but it is not always accurate in its second cycle (indeed, it is frequently 10 minutes behind).

The Therapist Clock cannot be shut off, and it does not care what you are doing. The Therapist Clock is useful in many situations, such as waiting for the bus, making pasta, or gauging how much longer the washing machine will be running. The Therapist Clock is also frighteningly good at predicting plot twists during Law & Order, which, for the curious, generally fall at or around :15, :38, and :50.

But the Therapist Clock is very much a handicap with respect to other activities, such as sitting through a slow movie, talking on the phone ("hey, it's so good to hear your voice, but our time's up for today"), or *ahem* intimate relations.

The Therapist Clock frequently malfunctions on airplanes, but not on trains, buses, or cars. It never malfunctions in the waiting room at the doctor's, nor in the emergency room (provided, of course, that one is fully conscious). The Therapist Clock also never malfunctions during one's own therapy. I find it absolutely hilarious when both of us start to fidget after 45 minutes.

Yesterday morning I went to Target, in search of some random items. I entered the store at about 10:10. When I left the store, I estimated I'd been shopping for about forty minutes. I'd forgotten my watch--I knew what time I'd gone in from the car radio--so to check my estimate, I pulled out my trusty cell phone (which, for the curious, has a bitchin' Law & Order ringtone).

And lo! It was 10:47.

Quite pleased with myself, I called Mrs. Gerbil to brag.

"You scare me," she said.

I think I've been working on this post for about 50 minutes now... oho! Indeed I have. Well, we need to wrap up for today. See you next time. Bye bye, take care.

Don't try this in your office

I had one of the worst interviews of my life a week ago. It's taken me a week to recover. This interview was really over after ten minutes, but it lasted an entire hour because I haven't yet learned how to bow out gracefully.

How would I describe this interview, if I had to use but a single word? A few possibilities:

Violating.
Inappropriate.
Power-struggly.
Godawful.

In an attempt to reframe my experience, I decided to come up with a list of the Top Ten Things Not to Do in an Interview. Now, mind you, there already exist a ton of advice sites for interviewees on what not to do during an interview. These are pretty obvious. For example: Don't put your feet up on the interviewer's desk. Don't snap your gum. Don't giggle if you fart.

No, I'm talking about advice for the interviewer. Because it's not just the candidate who has to make a good impression.

Inspired by actual events, I present:

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF INTERVIEWING

1. Thou shalt not ask thy candidate about his or her personal philosophy and then declare that it is wrong.

2. Thou shalt not ask thy candidate vague questions, refuse to provide any additional useful information, and then declare that his or her answer is wrong.

3. Thou shalt not preface thy question with, "I know I am not allowed to ask this," and then proceed to ask thy candidate a disguised version of thy illegal question.

4. Thou shalt not compel thy candidate to elaborate on any matter to which thy candidate referreth as "personal."

5. Thou shalt not interview candidates whom thou hast no intention of hiring in the first place. If thou interviewest candidates whom thou hast no intention of hiring in the first place, thou shalt not convey this information to thy candidate.

6. Thou shalt not belittle thy candidate.

7. Thou shalt not get huffy when thy candidate sayeth that he or she honoreth the Sabbath. For I am a jealous G-d and besides I have already made it quite clear about my feelings toward the Sabbath.

8. Thou shalt not cut thy candidate off by saying, "you really believe that?"

9. Thou shalt not present information which is incorrect or untestable in order to prove thy superiority over thy candidate.

10. Thou shalt not do all of these things which I have commanded thee not to do, and then inform thy candidate that thou really liketh him or her and that thou really wouldst like to hire him or her, but thou canst not do so and is that not a shame.

Pretty obvious too, don't you think?

Apparently not.

Boyz in the Vatican

Whilst browsing the online classifieds today, I happened upon an announcement from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. The CDCR is always hiring, it seems, and the ad I stumbled upon was for Youth Correctional Counselors.

I quickly disabused myself of the notion that I could be a Youth Correctional Counselor. True, I did spend a summer sitting upon bad pre-teen boys in the middle of the woods of New Hampshire, and those bad pre-teen boys were approximately my size or slightly larger... but honestly? CDCR would pee its collective self laughing at me during the physical strength and endurance tests.

But I could not resist reading all the way through the bulletin, just for giggles. And lo, there on the bottom of the third page, I was rewarded:

The POPE includes two written tests and an interview with a psychologist to determine that the candidate is free of any emotional or mental limitations, which could restrict him/her from safely performing the essential functions of the position. The POPE is taken in two sessions: the written tests are taken first and then the interview is scheduled at a later date. An approved POPE is valid for one year and must be current at the time of appointment. Candidates not cleared by the POPE cannot reapply for this position for 12 months from the date of disqualification.

Yes indeedy.

RATZINGER WANTS
YOU
TO JOIN THE CALIFORNIA DEPARTMENT OF
CORRECTIONS AND REHABILITATION

Doogie

I am seriously thinking about chopping off all my hair. I've been coveting a cute little pixie cut. Or a cute little dyke cut. Or a cute little pixie dyke cut. I don't know. Something that will make me look more than 15.

This is getting OLD--no pun intended.

On Thursday morning I was supposed to have a meeting with my supervisor, the principal, and the counseling coordinator at the high school where I work. The principal and my supervisor was running late, so the counseling coordinator and I just stood around in the main office to wait for them. My supervisor often runs late, but she was really late this time; and so I decided to give her a ring to find out where she was.

No sooner did I pull out my phone and dial her than one of the secretaries barked, "YOUNG LADY!"

Now, there were several potentially misbehaving young ladies in the office. And I've met this particular secretary before. So I figured she couldn't possibly be talking to me.

"YOUNG LADY!"

Oh, but she was.

Still waiting for my supervisor to pick up, I looked over at the secretary.

"YOUNG LADY! You are on your cell phone!"

"Yes, I am," I replied. I mean, what else could I say?

She glared at me evilly.

"I'm staff," I said simply.

Still the glare.

"She's one of our therapists," said the counseling coordinator.

The glare quickly became a look of panic.

Just then my supervisor picked up. "I'm parking my car," she said. "I'll be right in."

"I'm SO sorry!" said the secretary. "I didn't mean to offend you! I hope I didn't offend you! Did I offend you?"

"I'm used to it," I replied.

"But you--I'm sorry, you look like you're 15!"

"Wanna guess when I graduated from high school?" I said. (Okay, it was kind of cruel.)

"No!" the secretary said. "I mean, no, I don't want to guess, because I'm just going to offend you more."

"I'm so not offended!" I said. "But anyway, I was in the class of 1997."

My supervisor had walked in by this point. "Oh," she said to me, "did she think you're in high school?"

"You know, it's going to be even worse after I get my degree in May," I said. "When I went back to defend my dissertation in the fall, the guy next to me on the plane got all nervous and accused me of being some kind of genius kid when I told him the purpose of my trip. Then I told him I was 25, and he softened up a bit."

But here's the thing. If I chop off my hair, I probably wouldn't be mistaken for a 15-year-old girl anymore.

But I might start being mistaken for a 15-year-old boy.

My dog ate my paycheck

I finally managed to catch one of the colds that have been floating around the Bay Area. I'm not sure if I got the one that turns into bronchitis, the one that turns into a sinus infection, or the one that just does what it damn well pleases for a really long time. But suffice it to say, where respiratory ailments are concerned, when I fall, I fall hard.

This morning I really did not want to go to work. I felt like crap, my voice is about half an octave lower than usual (and my job is all about talking), and on Mondays I have to walk up to 6 miles to get from place to place during the day. What with my weird cough, I was especially dreading the walking.

But I knew my name would be mud if I did not go in this morning, for Monday is quite possibly the most important day of my three-day work week. And with next Monday being a holiday, I perceived even less of a choice in the matter.

Of course, under normal circumstances, respiratory infections are perfectly reasonable excuses for staying home from work. Especially when one's job is all about talking. Heartburn, however, is not grounds for going home, even when one works in food service at Sesame Place right after one graduates from high school. Which I did [work there; it was a lousy job] and wasn't able to do [get sent home on account of heartburn; which I got, no joke, from the grilled cheese they served me on break].

On my grumbly way in this morning, I started to wonder whether anyone's tried any of the following, and to what degree of success:

"I woke up really stiff this morning. I think it's my rigor mortis again."

"My hip dysplasia is flaring up."

"I don't want to give anyone else in the office my case of FMD."

"My mother was in town this weekend; I think I caught parapraxis from her."

"My car's in the shop--my goniometer is broken."

In related news, as I was preparing this particular entry, I came upon these beauties of sponsored links on Google:

The bucket brigade

DISCLAIMER: This entry does not necessarily reflect my life. It might be an accurate description of things that happen to me; it might not be an accurate description of things that happen to me, although it might be an accurate description of things that happen to other people. But then again, it could be the spittin' image of my life, and you'd never know for sure.

So one day the overlord assigns the underling a piece of work. This piece of work is very simple. From start to finish it will take approximately 90 seconds. It doesn't even require opposable thumbs. It requires a rather bulky piece of equipment that consists of plastic, platen glass, a really bright light, a lot of mysterious moving parts that jam just when you need them to work, and a bunch of messy black stuff. This piece of equipment is located right next to the little hole in the wall in which the overlord puts things for the underling. The overlord sticks the piece of work in this little hole in the wall several hours before the underling will be in to check said hole in the wall. The overlord puts a note on the piece of work that indicates its somewhat time-sensitive nature.

The underling retrieves the piece of work from the little hole in the wall, walks a couple yards over to the necessary piece of equipment, does the piece of work, and puts the finished product in the overlord's hole in the wall.

The underling does this in about two minutes, including "warm-up" time for the necessary equipment.

Total elapsed time for this whole business: Approximately 4 hours and 30 minutes.

Another day, the overlord says to the underling, "I have a piece of work to be done by someone else. This work does not involve any tangible materials, but it involves a single intangible item. I am going to transmit it to you right now via a nearly instantaneous medium of communication. Then you must transmit it, via the same nearly instantaneous medium of communication, to the person who does this work. This has to be done as soon as possible."

Nearly an hour later, the underling leaves the overlord's chamber to go retrieve this intangible item. The underling re-transmits the item to the correct person, jauntily humming "The Sorcerer's Apprentice."