A Matter of Trust

I need to vent a little.

Today was pretty good.  At work, we only had one room going, with seven cases (and four surgeons).  Not a huge deal; everything went pretty smoothly.  But then we got the call.  The dreaded call from Travis, our instrument czar from Central Processing.  They were missing a pair of scissors.  Awesome.

We thought we had a solution to this dilemma, painful though it is: we label our garbage bags, and if something goes missing, we know which bag we need to go through to find it.  We lost the scissors today, but they couldn't tell me which case it was on.  He called in the early afternoon, when we were very busy, so we told him it would have to wait until we were done.

Okay, okay.  It was my fault they were accidentally chucked (actually, I'll blame it on the resident, but even so . . .), but I hardly sat down all day.  I was scrubbed in for hours, plus we had to do seven turn-overs, then I had to check 17 case carts for tomorrow . . . I worked hard today.  And Travis calls to tell me I have to dig through the garbage.  I was pissed.  It was agreed upon that I would do it if I had to, but they couldn't even tell me which bag it was, so I had to dig through five different bags of trash to find them.  The thing that really pisses me off is that I am POSITIVE the CP staff has spent at least three hours on the internet: youTube, e-mail, whatever.  They spend so much time online, it's ridiculous.  And they couldn't dig through the garbage for me (it took me 10 minutes).  It probably wouldn't bother me so much if the nursing staff had internet access.  Our manager took it away from us, which, to me, shows a complete lack of trust.  That is one of our core values as a company: "We trust each other."  Except, in our case, we can't be trusted to check our e-mail or log into Pandora.  I had internet access at IMC (everyone did), and it was so nice.  Yes, some people abused it (like the CP staff at Riverton does), but we worked hard, too.  No one could say that I didn't work hard today, and honestly I'd have to try hard to abuse it, because I'm so rarely in front of a computer.  It's silly, but it just doesn't seem fair to me.

I brought my laptop a couple of weeks ago, because I knew it was going to be a short day and I had some things I needed to do for work that I couldn't do on the company computers.  I had lappy out at the desk, and my boss came by and saw it and freaked out.  Seriously?  What is the big deal?  If they are so concerned about facebook HIPAA violations, why don't they just block that site?  They have plenty of other sites blocked, so it's not like it's impossible.  And it wouldn't cost my boss a penny to give us internet access; it's just an act of total control and distrust of her staff.  Ever since then, I have been very uncomfortable around her; I always feel like she's waiting for me to do something wrong, to find an excuse to get rid of me.  I apologized, and explained to her that I needed my laptop for work-related activities, and she calmed down, but really?  Was that necessary?  Staff at IMC brought their laptops all the time.  They could check their e-mail without being yelled at.  And they work their butts off for 95% of their shifts.  I know I'm idealizing IMC in that way, despite all the reasons why I left.  And I do love working at Riverton--I actually enjoy going to work, I like my co-workers (usually), and it's a nice, calm place to be (even if I try to avoid my boss).

Okay, that's out of my system.  I need to be more grateful, especially since Thanksgiving is coming (in only 2 weeks?  Holy cow turkey!).  I'll try to write three things I'm thankful for every day.

1.  Tomorrow is Friday, and I just might hit overtime.  Nice!  I get to keep all my PTO for this pay period!
2.  Harry Potter comes out next week!  It has been a long wait, and I know it will knock my socks off.  Uh, anybody want to babysit?
3.  You can see the carpet in my living room.  It's in desperate need of a vacuum, and there are socks strewn about, but I have definitely come home to worse.

Here's a bonus nugget for you:
‎"When you wish upon a falling star your dreams can come true. Unless it's really a meteorite hurtling to the earth that will destroy all life. Then you're pretty much hosed no matter what you wish for. Unless it's death by meteor." -- despair. com